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I have been digging a mine and now have a slew of dirt and cobblestone blocks. How do I destroy them permanently and keep them from filling up my inventory?

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18  
Why don't you build something with them. You can smelt the cobblestone back into rock and do some terraforming :) – ChrisF Apr 4 '11 at 20:43
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Destroy blocks? Why not save them in a chest for that epic super-structure you'll eventually want to build? – Arkive Apr 4 '11 at 20:44

9 Answers

up vote 45 down vote accepted

You have a few options:

  • Throw them into a pool of lava
  • Throw them into a cactus block
  • Throw them into fire
  • Explode them (items will be destroyed if they are in the radius of a TNT or creeper explosion)
  • Just throw them on the ground and forget about them and they'll despawn after 5 minutes. This is generally longer than desirable, however, which is where the other options come in handy.
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10  
Expanding on the third option, you can bury them. This way, you don't accidently pick them up again. – Arkive Apr 4 '11 at 20:43
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If you do decide to bury them like @Arkive suggests, make sure you leave an empty block for them to sit in. If you completely fill the space where the items are, they will be shunted to a nearby open space, which is often close enough to where you're standing that you'll just pick them all back up again. – StrixVaria Apr 4 '11 at 20:54
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Expanding on point 3, you can build a toilet with a water flow that flushes the block away and will eventually despawn. Much easier than doing the bury thing. – Jared Apr 5 '11 at 1:24
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+1 -- never knew about the cactus method. – Billy ONeal Apr 5 '11 at 2:57
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Oh, so many ways to destroy or burn. – MonochromaticPalette Jan 4 '12 at 7:12
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up vote 9 down vote

There are a few basic ways to ditch this stuff:

  • Throw them into lava (my favorite)
  • Set them on fire by other means
  • Just drop them somewhere and leave them, they'll despawn after 5 minutes
  • Throw them on some cacti! (Thanks @Raven Dreamer)

Did I miss any?

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5  
cactus. you missed cacti. – Raven Dreamer♦ Apr 4 '11 at 21:01
up vote 31 down vote

You should always keep cobblestone...It's used for a ton of stuff in various forms. You can smelt it into rock, make it into stairs, roads, and, of course, huge fricking floating palaces with skulls that drip lava, etc.

Gravel is useful for mining flint, so keep it, then throw it in a hole and mine it again, and again, and again, until you've converted all of it to flint.

Dirt is pretty annoying, granted. I tend to keep it because I'll occasionally want to level a lot of terrain in preparation for building something. It's also nice to use in building elevated roads/bridges, because you don't have to use the more valuable cobblestone. I like to use dirt for "lighthouses" (really tall towers with torches on top so you can see where things are) and other disposable structures.

Chests are super cheap to make, so there is no reason not to throw the mined dirt/stone/cobblestone in chests whenever you go back to base to make more picks/shovels.

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5  
+1 It takes just as many clicks to drop from your inventory into lava as from your inventory into a chest, so why not just save it? – BlueRaja - Danny Pflughoeft Apr 4 '11 at 23:14
Agreed. There are very few structures built with cobblestone that are self sufficient (i.e. you mine enough while building the structure), so you're better off saving it. Sky train bridges don't mine their own cobblestone after all. – MBraedley Apr 5 '11 at 1:04
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I disagree in one point: for me, dirt is slightly more valuable than cobblestone. Why? Because cobblestone is a renewable resource, and dirt is not. You can easily build an infinite cobblestone generator using lava and water. However, you can't generate dirt. – Denilson Sá Jul 25 '11 at 0:52
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@Denilson Sa: Plus, dirt (alongside wood planks) is one of the best materials with which to build support structures to help you move around whilst building something. It's readily available and you can destroy them very quickly with no tools. Wood planks, on the other hand, can't be destroyed quickly individually, but you can burn them all down in the end. – Jonathan Hobbs Jul 25 '11 at 2:06
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...and with the latest version, it takes even less clicks to save it than destroy it - just hold shift and click on it while having a chest open, and it automatically gets moved to the chest. – BlueRaja - Danny Pflughoeft Jan 6 '12 at 23:17
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up vote 6 down vote

Alternatively, you can try the TooManyItems mod, which lets you 'delete' materials from your inventory screen.

Look Here for more information about uses, and setup, and a screenshot that should give you a better understanding of it.

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+1 Thankyou. I've seen that around and had no idea what it was. – Jonathan Hobbs Jul 25 '11 at 2:07
up vote 3 down vote

If you want to lose many items quite quickly you need a bunch of toolboxes and a bucket filled with lava:

  1. install toolbox on ground
  2. "use" toolbox from as far away as possible
  3. fill all 9 nine crafting slots with rubbish you want to get rid of
  4. dump the lava and see items disappear
  5. collect lava
  6. IF(too much rubbish items) THEN GOTO 1.

(But I prefer storing them...)

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3  
I find it easier to stand in front of lava, open your inventory, and then keep picking up stacks of 64 items and clicking outside your inventory window to 'throw' them. No need for an intermediary crafting table. – Phrogz Apr 5 '11 at 19:56
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If you really want to destroy lots of items really quick, empty your inventory of everything you want to save, and jump into a lava lake. Hopefully you remembered to sleep in a bed recently! – thedaian Jun 28 '11 at 20:34
@thedaian yep, that should work too but usually I don't take suicide into consideration – mbx Jun 28 '11 at 22:25
But...what about XP? – Joe the Person Feb 22 '12 at 0:09
up vote 1 down vote

Shortcut to drop 4 items at a time:

  • open your inventory screen
  • put an item you want to drop in each of your 4 'craft slots'
  • when you close your inventory screen, you'll drop all 4 items
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I actually liked it pre-beta when your crafting screen was just 4 extra inventory spots. – Raven Dreamer♦ Apr 12 '11 at 0:41
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It takes just as many clicks to drag the mouse outside the inventory frame to drop them, and that way it doesn't matter where you move the cursor to (as long as it's away). – Brant Apr 12 '11 at 1:26
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-1 This isn't a shortcut. It just makes you drop all four at once (you still do the same amount of mouseclicks and movements). Then once you take into consideration this method requires you to a) position the garbage items carefully b) keep opening/closing the inventory, it becomes the long way. – Jonathan Hobbs Jul 25 '11 at 2:01
up vote 3 down vote

Most simple and less time consuming.....throw it off a cliff or into a sea nearby. The items will disappear when 5 minutes have passed.

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up vote -2 down vote

It's real easy: Items get destroyed if they take damage.

You can use creepers, TNT, cacti, lava, fire, and maybe even more!

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-1, this doesn't work. Creepers destroy enviroment blocks (so does TNT). And, it is unclear. – Joe the Person Sep 10 '11 at 4:37
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That's... not how it works. – MonochromaticPalette Jan 4 '12 at 7:14
up vote 1 down vote

Or alternatively, you can install the Equivalent Exchange mod and shove it all in an energy condenser. Much less wasteful: you get diamonds from it.

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