An idea to prevent Nether lava exploitation

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AlanEsh

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Following that line of thought, there is sort of a method for that available. Only allow yourself IC2 power through Railcraft Steam Turbines, and switch the Nuclear Reactor to the steam setting. You'll need to leave generators enable to be able to build reactors and solars, though. Or you could disable Generators entirely, removing reactors from the options. I wonder if anyone would be interested in a server with that kind of rule set...
You need a Compressor to make Blocks of Steel for your Railcraft Steam Turbine blocks -- so you will have to run a Generator or something to power the Compressor to get started on your plan. Thanks to GregTech I presume... while I generally appreciate Gregtech, I am definitely not a fan of forcing a mod like Railcraft to depend on a device from IC2 to make what I would consider the centerpiece/cornerstone of it's EU generation capability.
 

HeffronCM

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Yes, that is thanks to GregTech. However, in the spirit of GregTech hardmode, you'd just have to use Redstone as 'fuel' for your compressor to get things started. And really, GregTech is an IC2 mod, it changes the way everything interacts with IC2, and a lot of the changes focus on power generation.

Anyone have an opinion on my 'nerf the pump' idea? That is, have the pump produce 1/2 lava bucket per lava source block, replace lava source blocks with cobblestone, and cost more MJ per lava source block pumped? Replacing the lava source blocks with cobblestone is the real important change, as it will kill the server lag issue.
 

Entropy

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Agreed, balance is very hard to deal with. I was hoping to get to the heart of the matter, which is really the fact that lava is available in practically infinite quantities in the Nether. By addressing it at the source (where you pump it), my thought was to make a small change that would have a cascading effect.

Many of the players on our server are abusing the hell out of this mechanic while we fight to reduce lag, so it makes me grumpy. One has THREE 9x9x7 tanks of lava and something like 80 geothermal generators. His transposer > ender chest system triggered a RP2 filter dupe bug, so now I have a filter in the nether that endlessly spews out cans that I have to deal with somehow. So I may be a bit biased against nether lava at the moment. :mad:

This is a legitimate issue, but it's up to you, as the server owner, to manage it. There is absolutely no reason to change existing mechanics in some absurd quest for "balance". Server performance issues are a whole different issue though, and I wish you luck in resolving this problem. might I suggest placing a hard limit on stuff like that, and enforcing it with your players?
 

Celestialphoenix

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Tartarus.. I mean at work. Same thing really.
What I don't get - why is everyone suddenly bitching about this like its some kind of new exploit?

The nether as *ALWAYS been there
Lava fuel values *HAVEN'T CHANGED across versions
Its always been easy to get lava out of the nether.​

The only new features are a machines that uses power to fill buckets ect (making it slower and LESS efficient than the old ways), and a speciality lava engine that produces less per bucket than its predecessor.
 

KirinDave

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The solution is to make energy-efficient ways of making lava. As I learn more about the balance work TE has done on this front, I like it more and more. You can quarry the hell out of the nether forever, generate your lava there, and pump it via tesseracts back to your home dimension (or keep your entire powerplant in another dimension) with minimal impact to lag and a setup that is much more "obvious" to work with. Modern mod fluid storage is only getting more space efficient and accessible (dear FTB, please get Xycraft tanks in the next version!), so it's actually way more efficient to just extrude as needed to fill a buffer.

But of course that doesn't change people's behavior. I think the easy fix is to make an option to make pumps non-functional in the nether, so bigger servers can prevent this behavior and demand people use other measures.
 
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KirinDave

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I don't understand why so many proposed 'fixes' in this thread revolve around removing the option altogether, rather than fixing the part the causes server lag.

It sounds like it's minecraft fluid mechanics? It's entirely possible to be a Java Reflection Hero with the Sword of Devious Classloading (+5 vs Debug-ability), but the more core mechanics are modified by mods, the harder it is to track across minecraft updates.
 

Wizaerd

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What I don't get - why is everyone suddenly bitching about this like its some kind of new exploit?

The nether as *ALWAYS been there
Lava fuel values *HAVEN'T CHANGED across versions
Its always been easy to get lava out of the nether.​

The only new features are a machines that uses power to fill buckets ect (making it slower and LESS efficient than the old ways), and a speciality lava engine that produces less per bucket than its predecessor.

Everyone is not. In fact, the majority of responders to this very thread are saying the same thing.
 

Xakthos

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Simple solution:

Disable Nether on your server. Set up vending machines to trade materials for blaze rods/soulsand/nether brick.

Done.

Or reset it regularly. Say every 3-4 days. The setups by nature will get smaller, more compact and they'll move to other alternatives to replace and/or suppliment it since they won't want to spend 2 days building something they'll have to tear down the third day (or lose the equipment).
 

Lambert2191

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Or reset it regularly. Say every 3-4 days. The setups by nature will get smaller, more compact and they'll move to other alternatives to replace and/or suppliment it since they won't want to spend 2 days building something they'll have to tear down the third day (or lose the equipment).
that's what my old server did. A resources world that reset every week, and a nether that reset every 2-4 weeks. Ofc, this was a tekkit server without mystcraft/enderchests/BC pumps even... but still
 

King Lemming

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Hrm, guess I oughta weigh in on this one. :)

Frankly, lava is a bush league power source. Given all of the options available to you in this modpack, you're doing it wrong if you're using lava. I provide Magmatic engines as an analog to the geothermal gen, and I'm willing to admit it's a ridiculous concept. The Magma Crucible specifically is to prevent flow block lag, since I know people are going to want lava power anyways.

If you really want a good power source, then good lord use Blaze Rods, or use Charcoal in a boiler. The moon math on that stuff is staggering and makes lava seem embarrassingly inefficient. Guess how many Magmatic Engines I personally would run on a large scale setup. I'll give you a hint - it rhymes with "hero." They are just completely and utterly outclassed by other forms of power generation. Strictly speaking, lava isn't even renewable.

The issue here isn't the perceived exploit, it's a lack of imagination and fear of exploration.
 

KirinDave

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Hrm, guess I oughta weigh in on this one. :)

Frankly, lava is a bush league power source. Given all of the options available to you in this modpack, you're doing it wrong if you're using lava. I provide Magmatic engines as an analog to the geothermal gen, and I'm willing to admit it's a ridiculous concept. The Magma Crucible specifically is to prevent flow block lag, since I know people are going to want lava power anyways.

If you really want a good power source, then good lord use Blaze Rods, or use Charcoal in a boiler. The moon math on that stuff is staggering and makes lava seem embarrassingly inefficient. Guess how many Magmatic Engines I personally would run on a large scale setup. I'll give you a hint - it rhymes with "hero." They are just completely and utterly outclassed by other forms of power generation. Strictly speaking, lava isn't even renewable.

The issue here isn't the perceived exploit, it's a lack of imagination and fear of exploration.

I'm sort of curious how steam systems deal with inefficiency though... it seems like if you don't have constant power draw you're in a world of hurt, particularly if your spawn is short on lead... And even in the optimal case, you're often just wasting power.

Also, I really hope that Thaumcraft adds some sort of crafting automation golem in the future. Alumentum is wonderful stuff. I'd love to see a thaumaturgical engine based off a golem that eats alumentum (or just consumes a lot of vis and flux) to produce MJs.

Although I did some figuring and I think my first big powerplant will be based off biomass (with a sideline producing biofuel for portable power). This seems way better. The only reason I've been doing a magmatic loop is because it's a nice My First Baby Power plant.
 

King Lemming

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I'm sort of curious how steam systems deal with inefficiency though... it seems like if you don't have constant power draw you're in a world of hurt, particularly if your spawn is short on lead... And even in the optimal case, you're often just wasting power.

Hence the qualifier of large scale. ;) That's what makes the MJ energy ecosystem so good - it works a lot like real power. In real life, you want to run your nukes full out as often as you can, because you can't simply shut them down - you get Xenon precluded startup and lots of nasty exotics.

Same deal with large coal plants - you have to be running pulverizers, get it all warmed up and primed, and it takes a day or two to ramp up from nothing.

Meanwhile, hydro power can be ramped up nearly instantly (and it's clean!), and natural gas turbines can spin up in about 20 minutes easily for power demand response. Wind and solar are entirely different things IRL, so I'm not even going to go there.

There is no one size fits all solution, it's a question of how you run your system. And that's the fun part.
 

AlanEsh

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I'm sort of curious how steam systems deal with inefficiency though... it seems like if you don't have constant power draw you're in a world of hurt, particularly if your spawn is short on lead... And even in the optimal case, you're often just wasting power.
Can you expand on your "short on lead" comment? I don't understand what this means in relation to not having a constant power draw on your steam power system. Thanks!
 

KirinDave

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Hence the qualifier of large scale. ;) That's what makes the MJ energy ecosystem so good - it works a lot like real power. In real life, you want to run your nukes full out as often as you can, because you can't simply shut them down - you get Xenon precluded startup and lots of nasty exotics.

Same deal with large coal plants - you have to be running pulverizers, get it all warmed up and primed, and it takes a day or two to ramp up from nothing.

Meanwhile, hydro power can be ramped up nearly instantly (and it's clean!), and natural gas turbines can spin up in about 20 minutes easily for power demand response. Wind and solar are entirely different things IRL, so I'm not even going to go there.

There is no one size fits all solution, it's a question of how you run your system. And that's the fun part.

Just pressing "like" doesn't really adequately express how much I appreciate this sentiment.

Occasionally we see people post their large scale power plants here, but they seldom include a "why". I wish they would. It seems to me like aside from nonstop quarry output there just aren't that many uses for MJs except to produce more MJs outside of ore processing? This is in sharp contrast to EUs where the entire point of many of the tools is to convert material decay to power usage.

I guess maybe my problem is I am not familiar enough with Forestry yet. As a recent Tekkit expat, there are plenty of things I really don't know about with MJ usage.

I guess with things like the Soul Shards mod you get more uses for MJ, but still...[DOUBLEPOST=1359574545][/DOUBLEPOST]
Can you expand on your "short on lead" comment? I don't understand what this means in relation to not having a constant power draw on your steam power system. Thanks!

Oh sure. Lead is necessary for hardened glass, which is necessary for empty conduit, which is necessary for redstone energy conduit. If you have power overproduction in a system based on standard redstone piping... you're gonna have a bad time. You could also just pipe the steam around directly, but until very recently this has been a pain (also facilitated by hardened glass-based products).

I am acutely sensitive to this right now because one of my minecraft cohorts used 3/4 of my precious lead supply for thaumcraft research last night because he didn't know better. I didn't realize I had to lock up the lead. :(
 
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Celestialphoenix

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Tartarus.. I mean at work. Same thing really.
I'm sort of curious how steam systems deal with inefficiency though... it seems like if you don't have constant power draw you're in a world of hurt, particularly if your spawn is short on lead... And even in the optimal case, you're often just wasting power.

Only a world of hurt if you do it wrong, and not shutting down/high start up costs balances the crazy fuel efficiency rather well.
Though I'd like to see an overpressure system blasting your boiler sky high if you shut off your engines and don't dump unused steam.​



Also, I really hope that Thaumcraft adds some sort of crafting automation golem in the future. Alumentum is wonderful stuff. I'd love to see a thaumaturgical engine based off a golem that eats alumentum (or just consumes a lot of vis and flux) to produce MJs..

Alumentum already has fuel/heat values, and autocrafting golems will probably come soon. (hopefully)
But a device that draws vis to directly make MJ? Doesnt seem to fit with TC3 as with TC2.
-And certainly not one that runs off flux, at best one that uses lots of vis and dumps flux like crazy to make power. (Or golem+giant hamster wheel+kinetic generator)
High flux levels are a punishment for screwing up, so a machine to use that to make something good would throw gameplay/balance right out of whack. (I like the idea though)​
Here's my new favourite: Tree farm (S.C/Forestry)-> Wooden bowl->Deployer+Mooshroom->Centrifuge->Methane.
 

KirinDave

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-And certainly not one that runs off flux, at best one that uses lots of vis and dumps flux like crazy to make power. (Or golem+giant hamster wheel+kinetic generator)
High flux levels are a punishment for screwing up, so a machine to use that to make something good would throw gameplay/balance right out of whack. (I like the idea though)​

I of course meant to imply generating flux, not consuming it. Sorry.

In a similar vein I've been spinning up ore processing via an Infernal Furnace and I really like the balance of that device. I wish I could make steam with it too.
 

Honza8D

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Hence the qualifier of large scale. ;) That's what makes the MJ energy ecosystem so good - it works a lot like real power. In real life, you want to run your nukes full out as often as you can, because you can't simply shut them down - you get Xenon precluded startup and lots of nasty exotics.

Same deal with large coal plants - you have to be running pulverizers, get it all warmed up and primed, and it takes a day or two to ramp up from nothing.

Meanwhile, hydro power can be ramped up nearly instantly (and it's clean!), and natural gas turbines can spin up in about 20 minutes easily for power demand response. Wind and solar are entirely different things IRL, so I'm not even going to go there.

There is no one size fits all solution, it's a question of how you run your system. And that's the fun part.
well then I dont understand you. You made redstone energy cells and conduits that provide energy on demand basically so its more like IC power system. Not that i dont like it, its just that its in contrast to what you just said