Is there a way to reliably get pickaxes? I got 2 pickaxes pretty early on, then I played for over an hour breaking every rock I could find, and.. nothing.
I found a total of 6 pickaxes in probably 3 hours. My #1 suggestion for this game would be to radically increase pickaxe spawn rate. Like 10x more would be fantastic. So to answer your question, no there does not seem to be a reliable method other than grinding.