Explosives are special items that can be used to blow up other players' structures. Most explosives require gunpowder to craft. Some advanced explosives require plastic explosives to craft. Some explosives are 'standalone', or plantable. These must be placed against the target block, which activates them. However, other explosives are projectiles, like bullets, grenade rounds, or rockets. Projectile explosives must be fired at the target block. Each explosive item has a 'yield' property which can be viewed in the item lore, describing the strength and radius of the explosion it creates. See Algorithm for more details about explosive yield.

Explosives use a ray-tracing algorithm to inflict damage in a spherical radius, based on their 'yield' value. The yield value, a float, determines the damage dealt by the explosive and its radius. However, the radius of the explosive is limited to a maximum radius of 4 (spherical). The damage dealt by the explosive is uncapped, and is directly proportional to the yield. The durability damage dealt by the explosive is approximately equal to 10 * yield.

Most explosives have a fuse period of a few seconds, which is listed in the item lore, and indicator sounds when planted. Upon detonating, the explosive will calculate how much damage each block in its vicinity will take. Rays will instantly destroy non-indestructible blocks in their range, but will be blocked by durability blocks. Each ray is given a damage value, and once a durability block takes enough damage, it may be destroyed. If there are more rays remaining, they may continue onwards and pass through the new hole. However, if a durability block survives the explosion, all blocks behind it (with respect to the explosive) will be spared and take 0 damage. This is internally described as 'sponge absorption'.