Forum:Breaking Speed table colours

The block breaking page says that a yellow background means that a block can't be harvested but will still drop something. However, blocks like Glass, Blue Ice and Reinforced Deepslate are listed in yellow even though they drop absolutely nothing when mined without silk touch (or anything at all in the case of reinforced deepslate and trial spawners). In addition, blocks such as Diamond Ore and Ender Chests are listed in green, even though they only drop themselves when broken with silk touch and drop something else when broken without it.

The "Obtaining" section of each block's pages have the same issue. The legend sometimes says that it "drops something other than the block itself" when in reality it drops nothing. Instead, it seems that yellow instead means that a tool will break something much quicker, but it will still drop nothing. How should we go about fixing this? CitrusEgg7168 (talk) 15:56, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

How about this:

Red = doesn't drop anything

Orange = Requires Silk Touch to drop itself

Yellow = drops something else along with / other than itself

Green = drops itself — 3A |  T  C  16:20, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

I think introducing a new colour would require changes to Module:Breaking row, though, and I have no idea how modules work. Reinforced Deepslate, Vault and Trial Spawner are also listed in yellow, despite them not being silk touch-able. CitrusEgg7168 (talk) 16:55, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

What about stuff like ores? -~- Nerdyguy2000   Talk   Edits  20:36, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

As in right now or as in with the proposed highlighting?

Right now, ores are highlighted in green if the right pickaxe is used. CitrusEgg7168 (talk) 23:28, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

The table automatically colors cells red if the block is being mined with an incorrect tool (which means a penalty on the breaking time and no drops, e.g. mining iron ore with hands or a wooden pickaxe), and green if it's mined with the correct tool (no breaking time penalty, drops are irrelevant). Additionally, there is an optional drop=0 parameter that can be added to make cells yellow, and it's supposed to mean that a block is being mined with the correct tool (no penalty) but drops nothing. For example, the "required" tool for a monster spawner is a pickaxe (wooden or better), so the breaking table shows a red cell for "default" (incorrect tool, the breaking time is longer than what it would be if pickaxes were not "required"), and yellow for all the other cells (correct tool, drop=0 was manually added meaning the block drops nothing nonetheless and to make the cells yellow instead of green). Blue ice has a pickaxe as the preferred tool (not required), so mining it without a pickaxe doesn't apply a penalty and thus the "default" cell is not red. drop=0 was manually added to make all cells yellow.

I agree this needs to be clarified. Since it's a breaking table and not a drops table, I'd personally just use red and green, meaning respectively incorrect tool and correct tool, regardless of the drops, but I can see the usefulness of having a quick idea of whether it drops nothing/something/itself. Potentially we would have to distinguish between:

• incorrect tool, drops nothing
• correct tool, drops nothing normally or with Silk Touch
• correct tool, drops nothing normally and something else with Silk Touch (infested blocks)
• correct tool, drops nothing normally and itself with Silk Touch
• correct tool, drops something normally and something else with Silk Touch (farmland)
• correct tool, drops something normally and itself with Silk Touch
• correct tool, drops itself normally (could be a partial chance e,g, gravel or twisting vines) and with Silk Touch

Edit: if we want to keep it at three colors without changing the existing templates and modules, I would go with red = incorrect tool / yellow = nothing or something else / green = itself. The legends in all the various pages would need to be corrected.

--Capopanzo (talk | contribs) 00:01, 31 January 2025 (UTC)

Totally agree! I also noticed the issue with the coloring of the breaking times. CARLOCCM (talk) 15:49, 7 March 2025 (UTC)

I strongly oppose to distinguish a block dropping itself, dropping something else or dropping nothing by using red yellow green color. For example, we cannot distinguish the difference between potato refinery and reinforced deepslate. The hardness value of potato refinery is 3.5, and the tool type is "null-required", so the breaking time is 3.5×1.5×10÷3=17.5 sec. The hardness value of reinforced deepslate is 55, and the tool type is "none-required", so the breaking time is 55×1.5=82.5 sec. Both of them drop nothing, but they are calculating in a different way because of time punishment. Whether they drop themselves by hand or with Silk Touch is controlled by loot table instead of breaking mechanism. Instead, in my opinion, colors should only distinguish whether there's a breaking time punishment (0.3x breaking speed) because of using incorrect tool. Red means there is time punishment, while green means there isn't. As for whether they drop themselves, by Silk Touch or nothing, write another sentence below the breaking table, which has nothing to do with the colors. Chinese Wiki is now using this logic. 👁 Image
Wilf233_zhMCW（论·功） 15:44, 7 March 2025 (UTC)