Needles are a Plains-tier crafting material with exactly one reliable source: the Deathsquito. They weigh next to nothing, stack high, and pass through portals, which makes them one of the easier late-game materials to haul home — assuming the thing carrying them does not kill you first.
Quick answer: Kill a Deathsquito in the Plains with a bow. Every one drops at least one Needle, and picking up your first Needle immediately unlocks the needle arrow recipe.
Needle item stats and sources
The in-game description reads “The pointy end of a Deathsquito,” which is a fair summary of where it comes from. Here is everything the item itself is carrying.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Item type | Material / monster part |
| Weight | 0.5 |
| Stack size | 50 |
| Teleportable | Yes |
| Main source | Deathsquito (Plains) |
| Secondary source | Fuling Village and Fuling Ruins chests |
Because Needles teleport, you never need to sail a load of them home. Kill what you find, portal back, and craft. Looting Fuling settlements is a decent supplement, but chest drops are inconsistent — the flying insects are the dependable supply.
Where to find Deathsquitos
Deathsquitos spawn only in the Plains, the golden, flat grassland biome that also holds barley, flax, Lox, and Fuling camps. Check the biome name on your map before you commit — Plains borders can sit right up against Meadows, and wandering a few steps too far is a classic way to get ambushed at half health.
They are small, fast, and audible before they are visible — listen for the high-pitched buzz and scan the sky rather than the ground. Open, rolling terrain gives you the sightlines you want, since Deathsquitos close distance quickly and a hedge of trees or a hill crest can hide one until it is already on top of you.
One or two connected hits from a Deathsquito can kill an underleveled character outright. Do not walk into the Plains in mid-game armor expecting to farm these safely.
How to kill a Deathsquito and collect Needles
What Needles are used for
Needles feed two recipes, both of which need a level 4 crafting station. Neither requires any wood, which is unusual for arrows and makes the ammunition unusually cheap to mass-produce once you have a needle supply.
| Recipe | Materials | Output |
|---|---|---|
| Needle arrow | 4 Needles, 2 Feathers | 20 arrows |
| Porcupine | 5 Needles, 20 Iron, 5 Finewood, 10 Linen Thread | 1 mace |
Needle arrows are the direct step up from obsidian arrows and hit for 62 pierce damage with 62 stagger and 15 knockback. They weigh 0.1 each, stack to 100, and give off a faint green light in flight. Feathers come from gulls, Meadows and Black Forest chests, burial chamber loot, and chopping beech trees, so the feather half of the recipe is rarely the bottleneck.
Needle arrows are excellent against Fulings and Lox, but skip them for Yagluth — he heavily resists pierce damage, so frost or silver arrows are the better call there.
How to confirm the recipe unlocked
Hover the item in your inventory. A genuine Needle shows the description “The pointy end of a Deathsquito,” a weight of 0.5, and “Teleport: Yes.” That is your confirmation the pickup registered.
The needle arrow recipe unlocks the moment that first Needle enters your inventory. Stand at a workbench upgraded to level 4 and open the crafting tab — the arrow will now be listed alongside your other ammunition. If it is missing, the station is not yet at level 4 rather than anything being wrong with the material.
If you are testing on a private world and do not care about the survival part, Needles can also be spawned directly. Enable cheats by entering devcommands in the F5 console, then use spawn Needle to create the item.
Once the pipeline is running, a single Plains trip can cover hundreds of arrows. Each kill is near-instant with a bow, the drop is guaranteed, and the material portals home — the only real cost is the risk of standing in the Plains long enough to collect it.
