Enchanting mod tools

[Zelfana]

What kind of enchantability do the various mod tools have? I'm talking about this: http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/E...-_Applying_modifiers_to_the_enchantment_level

Basically I want to know which pickaxe I should enchant to get the best chance for Fortune III. I'm guessing bronze might be the same as iron but how about steel? There's also the Survivalist's Pickaxe which seems completely pointless to me, though.

 

[SilvasRuin]

I'm afraid I don't have the information you're looking for, but I do want to dispute one of your sentiments. The Survivalist's Pickaxe (and shovel) is far from pointless. If I remember correctly, the Survivalist's Pickaxe can mine anything Iron can successfully at close enough if not at the same speed, except for Nether stuff. Sounds pretty mundane so far, but the Survivalist's Pickaxe has two things going for it. 1.) Once broken, two of its three ingots can be reclaimed. This is the cheapest repair method for a tool there is (not including recharging electric tools). 2.) You can produce kits of the pickaxe that can stack, allowing you to carry 64 picks on your person and only take up 3 slots total when all is said and done. The kits stack, the broken ones stack, and then there's your active pick.

The whole point of this is to increase yields via Fortune, therefore automatic mining methods undermine the intent by mining the ores before your Fortune pick can get to them, so much of it needs to be mined by hand. If you're going to be doing that, your cost-efficient choices are limited, assuming you don't want to drive yourself batty by digging through it all with Stone Pickaxes. You can either rely on the IC Drill and a batpack or their upgrades, in which case even a Lappack under constant use will need several return trips to be recharged, or you can carry a stack of Pickaxe Kits for a final cost of a single bronze ingot each pick.

 

[Zelfana]

Why do you mention increasing yields via Fortune when you can't even enchant the Survivalist's Pickaxes at all? I checked that just now. It's useful yes, but only for early game when you don't have the drill yet. I will use a diamond pickaxe for Fortune when I have the diamonds but for now I will try to get a Fortune pick with iron or steel.

 

[arkangyl]

I think his implication was to use the Survivalist's Picks to mine the mountains of Stone between your Fortune Pick and the Minerals you are attempting to collect. Stone Picks are cheaper ultimately, but they do not stack, so they are more of a hassle. That's where the trade off in what you value more comes in: one lost Ingot per pick, or time spent making new Stone Picks when the one you're using breaks.

 

[Zelfana]

I would rather make a drill for that, it's faster to use. Running out of juice should not be a problem, you can just bring batteries with you.

 

[SilvasRuin]

Arkangyl is right, that's what I meant.

The Survivalist picks would save more inventory space than lugging around the equivalent number of batteries. I've ran plenty of lappacks dry just hollowing out underground rooms; I'm pretty sure you'd have to use either GregTech's new batpack tiers or one of the Gravitron batpack tiers to be able to compete with the Pick Kits' longevity and inventory space compression.

More in line with the original question: I'm afraid I can still only go on hunches and anecdotal evidence, but I'm thinking most mod added tools fall in line with Iron's enchanting and the RP2 gem tools sharing the same "enchantability" as Diamond. But if all your concerned about is the best tools to enchant, the answer is probably going to remain Diamond throughout Feed the Beast's lifespan unless the Minecraft devs decide to add something even better in vanilla. I've yet to see any mod that adds more power to vanilla enchanting (quality of life, yes, more power, no) that I would even for a moment think the FTB team would include.

 

[Omicron]

Then you haven't seen Thaumcraft 2. Okay, fair point, the FTB pack will never include that mod, because a.) it was singleplayer only and b.) it's currently getting recoded from the ground up. But who knows what TC3 will bring?

Thaumcraft is about alchemy, leaning towards magic and miracle-working. As such, it makes sense that enchanting would play a big role. And it did in TC2 - the game even added two new enchantment tables, one that let you enchant with resources instead of levels, and one that did the same while letting you pick and choose your favorite enchantments (super-expensive though!). Pretty much every wearable or hotbar-usable item could be enchanted in some way - not only weapons and armor, but also wands, charms, utility items etc.

The mod added two metals: thaumium, which is basically enchanted iron, and voidmetal, a very endgame stuff that took ages to get in legit gameplay. Thaumium tools and armor worked just like iron ones, but had the enchantability of gold (i.e. the best there is). Voidmetal armor (tools didn't exist) had the same quality as diamond armor, but again, the same enchantability as gold. Keep in mind though that that was the kind of stuff you got as a reward for beating Thaumcraft's endgame - it made you a god, but one without much in the way of challenge left. I suppose it made the Ender Dragon fight a little easier, if you cared to do it...

 

[SilvasRuin]

Technically if it was the "enchantability" of Gold, then it didn't add more power than vanilla. My mistake was in forgetting that Gold's "enchantability" is higher than Diamond. For some reason, I was thinking Diamond's was equal or higher.

 

[Bibble]

The other thing to note about survivalist pickaxes is that they are the only way to mine obsidian pre-diamonds. It's not quick, but it does return the block.

 

[Omicron]

Sorry for the slight off-topic, but do you guys know offhand which mod or addon adds steel tools? Railcraft by itself doesn't seem to offer that.

 

[potter]

You can craft obsidian pre-diamond stage though. Nifty for getting that enchanting table fast and early.
2 water cells + 2 lava cells = 1 obsidian ( I'm also the kind that always constructs his first nether portal by molding the lava with dirt and pouring water on it )

I usually enchant iron first ( gold = terrible durability ) then move on to diamond after the first Fortune III happens upon my luck.
I stick with stuff that works in the anvil for obvious reasons

 

[Bibble]

Sorry for the slight off-topic, but do you guys know offhand which mod or addon adds steel tools? Railcraft by itself doesn't seem to offer that.

No, I'm fairly sure it's a railcraft thing, it's the only mod that adds/uses steel.

 

[Zelfana]

The other thing to note about survivalist pickaxes is that they are the only way to mine obsidian pre-diamonds. It's not quick, but it does return the block.

You can craft obsidian by crafting lava and water buckets with empty cells that make lava and water cells that you craft together to get obsidian. That's what I did for my enchanting table. I guess it uses more tin than the pickaxe way but might save a lot of time. Depends on how fast the pick is. I'm guessing it's as fast as punching but it just drops the block, too, so too slow for me. Diamond drill for any future obsidian I would need I think.

I made two industrial diamond for the table and enchanted an iron pickaxe and got the super pick for Fortune III. Now I have gone around getting coal and made 12 diamonds from it so far and the pick is still kicking.

I tested the picks out in creative and bronze and steel certainly are along the iron line of enchants. Dunno about others.

Sorry for the slight off-topic, but do you guys know offhand which mod or addon adds steel tools? Railcraft by itself doesn't seem to offer that.

Yeah, don't know. Some recipes are also changed to use steel instead of refined iron. It's so confusing.

 

[Bibble]

You can also get lava/water cells by filling an empty cell from a source block (the same as with buckets, just not reversible). I'm aware of the obsidian recipe, but, sometimes, early game, 40 cells might seem a bit extravagent for a nether portal, while 3 bronze is more reasonable.

 

[potter]

Yeah, don't use the crafting recipe on the portal, just mold it yourself. No mining needed at all, just bucket/s.

 

[Honza8D]

No, I'm fairly sure it's a railcraft thing, it's the only mod that adds/uses steel.

nope, gregtech also uses steel. And in newest version it also adds a way to smelt them (but thats not in current ftb)

 

[SilvasRuin]

Why would so many of you use any cells for Obsidian when you can get the block in your inventory by just bucketing things into an Igneous Extruder? It doesn't consume anything but the lava (and the water which infinite springs make moot), and both the single bucket and the machine you have to make for it are very useful for other things after you're done with the 14 obsidian for the portal and enchanting table.

 

[Bibble]

Why would so many of you use any cells for Obsidian when you can get the block in your inventory by just bucketing things into an Igneous Extruder? It doesn't consume anything but the lava (and the water which infinite springs make moot), and both the single bucket and the machine you have to make for it are very useful for other things after you're done with the 14 obsidian for the portal and enchanting table.

Mainly because, at the point at which it is being used, the power and gold needed for that kind of setup is more costly than the tin/lava.

 

[SilvasRuin]

Er, what? The Igneous Extruder requires no power and finding at least one gold ore is not a problem.

 

[potter]

The machine itself requires no power, but how exactly do you bucket/pipe it in?
Most of TE's other machines do require some power and I presume Bibble assumed you were using one/them in the process. ( Liquid Transposer to be more specific )

Edit: I guess you could just bucket it into a BC tank then pipe it.