The Grounded Insect Axe is one of the most important early tools you'll need to craft in order to open up the crafting menu further and grant yourself access to a whole new slate of recipes and tools. Better than the starter item, the Pebblet Axe, the Insect Axe allows you to chop down objects like husky weeds, apples, toadstools, and more. The Pebblet Axe can only get you so far, so read on to find out how to quickly gather what the crafting ingredients you need and make yourself the Insect Axe.
Grounded Insect Axe crafting recipe
The Insect Axe requires eight total items split across three categories. This includes:
- 1 Ladybug Head
- 3 Bombadier Parts
- 4 Silk Rope
Each of these items can, in theory, be gathered very soon after you begin the game, but they'll each require some skillful combat abilities and/or expert sneaking. Silk rope is crafted from spider webs, which you can find wherever spiders dwell, like along the wooden stumps just south of the Koi Pond. You can break these webs apart using a melee item and you'll instantly gather the webbing, but be sure to do this while the local spiders have left the area, even if they only tend to do this briefly.
Ladybugs are found all over the map, including right by where you first begin, but they're quite tough to bring down solo. You should either take one on in co-op with some friends or, at the very least, have a melee weapon and some armor equipped. The simplest armor set to craft is the Clover set, which takes 13 clovers, six crude ropes (crafted from plant fibers found all over The Backyard), and 2 sprigs.
Once you've taken down a ladybug, you'll need only some Bombadier parts. You can find these green and black-spotted bugs in the southeastern portion of the map.
The Insect Axe gives you access to otherwise untouchable crafting ingredients due to its superior chopping ability.Bombadiers possess a unique ability in that they can lob acidic blobs at you, so while they won't test your parrying ability as much as, say, spiders will, you'll want to dodge their acid projectiles and be sure not to step in the puddles they form when they hit the ground.
Remember that due to the way they may roam, you are liable to find these and other insects in places far away from their spawn locations at times, so these are just some of the more reliable ways to quickly locate them.
Once you've got all the parts you need, head to your workbench and craft the Insect Axe. Now you're ready to take on a big, and perhaps newly intimidating, portion of Grounded. For more on Obsidian's kid-minded survival game, check out our glowing-like-a-firefly Grounded review.