FTB Departed Discussion

[Lawnchair]

Anyone else notice an obscene amount of squid spawning? I installed COFH to kill them all and it murders 100-200 at a time. I've had no mobs to kill around my base because of them. I then installed Squidless and it's restored some mob capabilities but it might not be enough. It's making me regret having my base next to the ocean.

 

[statphantom]

No idea how this happened, by from opening diamond chest to another diamond chest randomly some items of mine duplicated into a stack of that item, even if I never had a stack of them. No clue what causes it or how to duplicate it.

 

[statphantom]

I would also like to know this and by regular pick do you mean a vanilla MC pick or a vanilla AoA pick? on a side note here is a nice starting seed - 7987649462320895058 has a jungle, desert and village close to spawn and just north of spawn is a Thaumcraft mound/dungeon.

Spoiler: Spawn

AND SAVANA! awesome.

 

[Crhymez]

Any chance we can get
http://www.curse.com/mc-mods/minecraft/mrcrayfish-furniture-mod
Mr.Crayfish added to the pack? I think it fits in really nice with Pam's.

 

[statphantom]

is there a way to increase accuracy on arrows in TiC? if not what should I upgrade them with.

 

[Crhymez]

is there a way to increase accuracy on arrows in TiC? if not what should I upgrade them with.

Change what they are made of.

 

[Zerohearts]

So there actually is a bug right now where assassins do not despawn. I've fixed it for the future. In the meantime, I'd just try and kill them or ignore them.

So, about those assassins, any idea on when this might be fixed, and an update released? Check out my world,

 

[nolaw70]

Something the modpack devs should consider when thinking about the balance of Tinkers weapons (especially the ranged ones) vs. AoA weapons is that depending on the combo of AoA weapon/enchantments and armor, specifically the Moon Maker sniper (37.5 hearts) with Shell III (+60%) enchant and Sharpshot armor (+60%) one can get up to 96 hearts of damage (depending on how the game actually computes the bonuses, I am just going off of NEI and the AoA wiki). So, if you figure out your AOA equipment combos rights, you can do a lot of damage. However, using skeletal/skeletal/slime fletching bolts, on a cobalt/cobalt crossbow right off the forge with no normal TiC or Iguana modifies, I can do 100 hearts of damage with up to an extra 50 on a critical, while suffering none of the disadvantages that AoA weapons have (ammo consumption, potential damage to the player on firing (for some high end weapons), requiring support equipment, etc.).

 

[Xavion]

Something the modpack devs should consider when thinking about the balance of Tinkers weapons (especially the ranged ones) vs. AoA weapons is that depending on the combo of AoA weapon/enchantments and armor, specifically the Moon Maker sniper (37.5 hearts) with Shell III (+60%) enchant and Sharpshot armor (+60%) one can get up to 96 hearts of damage (depending on how the game actually computes the bonuses, I am just going off of NEI and the AoA wiki). So, if you figure out your AOA equipment combos rights, you can do a lot of damage. However, using skeletal/skeletal/slime fletching bolts, on a cobalt/cobalt crossbow right off the forge with no normal TiC or Iguana modifies, I can do 100 hearts of damage with up to an extra 50 on a critical, while suffering none of the disadvantages that AoA weapons have (ammo consumption, potential damage to the player on firing (for some high end weapons), requiring support equipment, etc.).

Ignore skeletal as it's broken and an acknowledged bug that the damage is so high, it should be nowhere near that value in actuality and has been nerfed in the most recent ExtraTiC update from 27 damage to 2 damage, the new highest materials are bloodstone and crystalitestone at 14 damage so just over half of what skeletal was. Crossbows are kind of OP from what little I know of them though, as mentioned in my last post though the issue seems to with modifiers rather than the AoA materials as they are balanced towards AoA's much higher damages.

 

[goreae]

is it possible to repair enchanted AOA armor? the rosite ingots always say too expensive.

there's always the thaumic restorer from thaumcraft, timeless ivy in botania, and I'm sure I'm missing something.

The knives are normally so weak and useless. I don't think there's a good way to fix how powerful TiC is in this pack without making Vanilla Enchanting a better option. Unfortunately, Vanilla enchanting is really bad. I've been enchanting books to keep from wasting materials on x amount of bows and armor. Getting efficiency 3 and proc 2 on level 30 enchants suck, and those are useful enchants. Smite and Bane of Arthropods are next to useless in vanilla, let alone a modded environment with a mod like AoA or Lycanite's mobs. The Osmotic Enchanter is very good, but by the time you get it Tinkers' is just a better option. Not only that, but by the time you finish getting your enchants on that awesome sword just right, when it comes time to repair it the level cost is enormous if you can repair it at all.

If the real issue is Tinkers' ranged weapons, then I don't know what to tell you. A lot of AoA's guns are terrible and vanilla bows tend to be a better option. Bows still end up relying on enchanting to be a good option for any mob with 80+ hp.

Basically, the only real way to fix some of the things you have issues with is to get rid of ExtraTiC or blacklist metals for certain weapon parts.

We're working on revamping the tinkers support. It's going to work very well with AoA working on the utility thing it does with the armors. The goal is to make tinkers an attractive option, but not the absolute best option there is.

So I just posted that in another thread and am copying it here as well, for reference though some numbers as I'll go into a bit more depth here. A vanilla TiC tool/weapon gets 3 modifiers at base, 3 more from upgrades, and another 1-2 from parts for a max total of 7-8 modifiers. This is compared to with leveling which gives 1 modifier at base, 1-2 modifiers from parts, 3 more from upgrades, 8 from leveling, and 13 random ones from leveling for a total of 26-27 modifiers. That is the real issue causing the power imbalance, considering that modifiers are an alternative to enchantments a weapon without modifiers really isn't better than the equivalent normal weapon, they have some extra abilities and variance sure but they're equal in damage, a non leveled broadsword and vanilla sword made of the same material are very nearly identical with TiC generally have an edge in durability. The difference is modifiers vs enchantments, generally speaking modifiers are roughly equivalent to enchants, when compared to the fact that AoA has several special enchants that aren't replicated by TiC I really don't see modifiers being broken in moderation, the problem is that massive amount of them you can get access to with leveling, it'd be like doubling or tripling the max level of all enchants in how it simply provides far more power to them then they were supposed to have so compared to things that still have reasonable amounts of power they massively outpower them.

So yeah, I'd suggest playing around with leveling disabled or at least massively toned down for your first look at nerfs, it's still nice but maybe only have a couple of levels and they peak around standard TiC stuff? Like a max level of five with no base modifiers and slot, bonus, slot, bonus, slot progression, you have to level it to get the most out of it still but your resulting tool is only going to be a little better then it would've been without leveling in the two random modifiers you got but otherwise identical. That's opposed to the current progression of bonus, slot, bonus, slot, bonus, bonus, slot, bonus, slot, bonus, bonus, bonus, slot, slot, bonus, bonus, nothing, bonus, slot+bonus, slot+bonus which is massively powerful as has been clearly seen.

It's also worth noting ranged weapons I'm much less sure of as I don't use them anywhere near as much, I'd say if they're balanced well around vanilla TiC they should be similar in becoming reasonable but I have heard a lot of stuff on them being more powerful than their melee counterparts so maybe they need an extra nerf.

The idea was to have the tool get more modifiers as you go. I'll work on it, and totally agree. My limonite throwing knives have like 3 mossy, 3 knockback, and I'm pretty sure there's smite there too. It's unstoppable. That's all from level ups. The only modifiers I put on it was a diamond and emerald for increased ammo.

Something the modpack devs should consider when thinking about the balance of Tinkers weapons (especially the ranged ones) vs. AoA weapons is that depending on the combo of AoA weapon/enchantments and armor, specifically the Moon Maker sniper (37.5 hearts) with Shell III (+60%) enchant and Sharpshot armor (+60%) one can get up to 96 hearts of damage (depending on how the game actually computes the bonuses, I am just going off of NEI and the AoA wiki). So, if you figure out your AOA equipment combos rights, you can do a lot of damage. However, using skeletal/skeletal/slime fletching bolts, on a cobalt/cobalt crossbow right off the forge with no normal TiC or Iguana modifies, I can do 100 hearts of damage with up to an extra 50 on a critical, while suffering none of the disadvantages that AoA weapons have (ammo consumption, potential damage to the player on firing (for some high end weapons), requiring support equipment, etc.).

Yeah, skeletal was based off of the skeletal sword, which glassmaker (quite understandably) assumed was made of skeletal metal. In actuality, it's the most powerful sword in AoA and dropped from what is said to be one of the hardest bosses in the game. So yeah, the damage was entirely too good.

TL;DR: fear not good citizens of Departed! AoA tinkers support will be gloriously nerfed into submission, making it an attractive option while not completely overshadowing AoA weapons. That will be all. *scuttles away*

 

[statphantom]

TL;DR: fear not good citizens of Departed! AoA tinkers support will be gloriously nerfed into submission, making it an attractive option while not completely overshadowing AoA weapons. That will be all. *scuttles away*

*Cheers ENCORE! ENCORE!*

 

[statphantom]

The advent of ascension website has been updated to include the new patch that departed uses!

 

[wolfenstein19]

I don't really like AoA. Here is some of the reasons why:

• The skill system needs extensive wiki consultation to understand. No Ingame documentation of that
• The wiki is not really descriptive and up to date. There is also no ingame documentation whatsoever. Tooltips woulda been nice
  
• The leveling of two skills is entirely dependant on munching on as much stone as you can using a pickaxe. Having that as a significant endgame element is boring
• Energy weapons are easy to get and very op
• The Bows are useless
• So are the staffs and the entire runing profession
• Animus skill is basicly free if you place a brick on your mouse for 10 minutes
• All the individual armors are just 50 shades of slightly recolored diamond armor with potion effects added onto them
• The early game is punishing and once you get to sapphire the entire thing is entirely dull and easymode
• The minion system is useless on servers (they lag and bug out) and borderline useless in single player
• The dimensions have no uniqueness to them. They feature mostly color shifted version of stone or obsidian + 1-2 ores in the ground, and some generic nether/end/biomecopy design with equally color shifted blocks on the overworld.
• The progression curve (if it even exists) is really wonky and not really there
• The infusion skill is weird and borderline useless (other then armor and meele weaponry, nothing is enchantable, so you cant really do much with the exp
• Every armor in Nevermine is equally protective as diamond armor, making the choice purely on personal preference (means if you prefer the speed armor, you can get your endgame and forever armor in less then an hour)
• The bossfights can be easily bugged and aren't all that interesting (haven't killed all of them yet, but from what I see)
• The hunter skill and the fact that "to hurt this specific mob you must grind at least this much" is a cheap cop out as progression blocker and of next to no effect anyways

These are a few gripes that I have atm with this mod. Might be its just not for me, but it feels really cheap, really poorly made, really non-effort and not engaging in the slightest.

 

[nolaw70]

• The skill system needs extensive wiki consultation to understand. No Ingame documentation of that

goraee is working on that, there is currently a book you can make in game that has the start of the skill explanations (book surrounded by four limonite ingots, I believe).

• The wiki is not really descriptive and up to date. There is also no ingame documentation whatsoever. Tooltips woulda been nice

Most wikis are volunteer efforts. The post right before yours indicates the wiki has been updated with the latest info for the Departed version

• So are the staffs and the entire runing profession

The staffs seem to be situational (though whether you actually need to use them in a situation is another thing altogether). The Archmage enchant removes most of the rune costs, plus there is the Rune artistry armor, those make staff use work a bit different.

• Animus skill is basicly free if you place a brick on your mouse for 10 minutes

Yeah, there is an exploit for that. Maybe that will be fixed.

• All the individual armors are just 50 shades of slightly recolored diamond armor with potion effects added onto them

At first glance, I can see why you would see that. But many of them are situational (some are even required for certain situations, like Vox Ponds), and synergize with other equipment in different ways. If you have played other mods that have armors that combine what multiple sets of AoA armors do, then your impression is understandable, but AoA like most mods is not balanced against them.

• The early game is punishing and once you get to sapphire the entire thing is entirely dull and easymode

I submit that the early game is easy mode as well, but this pack was never intended to be a hardcore pack. I play in hardcore mode, but I do that with every pack.

• The minion system is useless on servers (they lag and bug out) and borderline useless in single player

Minions are situational, especially their are situations you do not want to have them out.

• The dimensions have no uniqueness to them. They feature mostly color shifted version of stone or obsidian + 1-2 ores in the ground, and some generic nether/end/biomecopy design with equally color shifted blocks on the overworld.

Eh, every dimension in modded Minecraft is basically like that. Twilight Forest to me sticks out as being more different, but that dev only has to focus on content for one dimension.

• The progression curve (if it even exists) is really wonky and not really there

The progression is not really linear. Its boss based. If you want the best sword in the game (Skeletal), you go to a jungle, hunt the mobs there until they drop the Precasia realmstone, go there, get the item to summon the boss (Skeletron) which is dropped by a mob in Precasia, fight the boss and hope it drops. You do not have to go to any other dimension in order to do this, theoretically, though you would probably want to in order to survive. This pack sort of breaks that need, however, as the big magic mods provide options that allow you to ignore the options AoA intended to be used.

• The infusion skill is weird and borderline useless (other then armor and meele weaponry, nothing is enchantable, so you cant really do much with the exp

The wiki has the following infusion enchants (besides the vanilla ones), though I have no idea if they actually work:

Sever: applicable to Greatblades, increases damage by 20/40/60%. Level III max.

Crush: applicable to Greatblades, increases knockback. Level II max.

Shell: applicable to Guns, increases damage by 20/40/60%. Increases fire delay by 20/40/60%. Level III max.

Control: applicable to Guns, reduces recoil by 25/50%. Level II max.

Recharge: applicable to Energy Weapons, reduces Energy usage by 20/40%. Level II max.

Overpower: applicable to Energy Weapons, decreases fire delay by 20/40%. Level II max.

Slice: applicable to Scythes, increases damage by 20/40/60%. Level III max.

Windfury: applicable to Scythes, gives Speed I/II/III when holding the scythe. Level III max.

Archmage: applicable to Staffs, removes rune costs excluding Life Runes and Distortion Runes. Level I max.

• Every armor in Nevermine is equally protective as diamond armor, making the choice purely on personal preference (means if you prefer the speed armor, you can get your endgame and forever armor in less then an hour)

This is not really true; while the base protection value of all the armors is 8 (diamond), some are more protective than others. For example, Weaken armor gives Resistance I buff, others give health regen of various levels in various situations, one give you a heart shield similar to the absorption effect or runic shielding, etc.

• The bossfights can be easily bugged and aren't all that interesting (haven't killed all of them yet, but from what I see)

This is mostly true, but I do have an appreciation for how hard it is to make a boss fight in any game interesting, let alone being confined to the restrictions that Minecraft imposes on the developer. It looks like Mojang is working on boss fights in general for 1.8, maybe future mods will be able to take advantage of that.

• The hunter skill and the fact that "to hurt this specific mob you must grind at least this much" is a cheap cop out as progression blocker and of next to no effect anyways

I believe it is meant to give you a bit of caution no matter where you are, that there are certain mobs that you need to NOT fight while you are spamming whatever death you are dealing at the moment. I like Pinchers the most; highest level hunter requirement right there in your overworld ocean ready to eat you on day one if you are not paying attention.

These are a few gripes that I have atm with this mod. Might be its just not for me, but it feels really cheap, really poorly made, really non-effort and not engaging in the slightest.

I disagree. There has been an incredible amount of effort put into this mod, more than most, its just that the scope of this mod is so much larger than most (you see any other FTB packs that are built around a specific mod?) that it will by necessity lacks the polish in a lot of areas that other mod devs can take the time to put in their mods. However, the polish can be added later.

 

[wolfenstein19]

There has been an incredible amount of effort put into this mod, more than most,

No real offense, but this mod looks like (and plays like) and parts of the code i've looked at also look like someone spent a few hours in paint palette shifting various materials and then just made loads and loads of content with no relevance.

On the flipside, the progression and wiki issues are the first that need to be adressed. Most people will not even take a look at any wiki. If the mod isn't self explanatory or ingame info is available, it will fail.

I concede the point about the enchantments, though they are just copy paste % increases and potion effects, which again just shows low effort.

ps: I fought the skeleton Army with nothing but 1 golden apple (blocks), Alacrity Armor and a sapphire broadsword as well as sapphire shurikens. Seems too easy to me.

 

[nolaw70]

ps: I fought the skeleton Army with nothing but 1 golden apple (blocks), Alacrity Armor and a sapphire broadsword as well as sapphire shurikens. Seems too easy to me.

Which speaks to my point about the other mods (in this case Tinkers ranged weapons) breaking the progression, though I am not saying you could not do it with just stuff from vanilla (like your Notch apple), I am sure its perfectly doable. You used one of the recommend armor sets for it as well.

You probably have experience with MMO's; if so, you are probably aware of their balancing issues. Though this is boss centric, its not like WoW progression raiding; not necessarily a DPS race, so their is no real boss progression. Of course, its Minecraft, and there is only so much you can do to make a boss battle "interesting". DivineRPG has more linear progression in that materials from one dimension are required to progress to the next one.

 

[Bickers]

So, about those assassins, any idea on when this might be fixed, and an update released? Check out my world,

you can disable the spawning of them in openblocks config

additional {
    # List any mob names you want disabled on the server
    S:disableMobNames <
    nevermine.Assassin
     >

to kill off the ones in your world you will need to install cofh core and run /cofh killall nevermine.Assassin
so far this has worked for me seen none after adding that to the config

 

[Zerohearts]

you can disable the spawning of them in openblocks config

additional {
    # List any mob names you want disabled on the server
    S:disableMobNames <
    nevermine.Assassin
     >

to kill off the ones in your world you will need to install cofh core and run /cofh killall nevermine.Assassin
so far this has worked for me seen none after adding that to the config

Thanks alot, I had no clue about that feature of openblocks.

 

[statphantom]

No real offense, but this mod looks like (and plays like) and parts of the code i've looked at also look like someone spent a few hours in paint palette shifting various materials and then just made loads and loads of content with no relevance.

On the flipside, the progression and wiki issues are the first that need to be adressed. Most people will not even take a look at any wiki. If the mod isn't self explanatory or ingame info is available, it will fail.

I concede the point about the enchantments, though they are just copy paste % increases and potion effects, which again just shows low effort.

ps: I fought the skeleton Army with nothing but 1 golden apple (blocks), Alacrity Armor and a sapphire broadsword as well as sapphire shurikens. Seems too easy to me.

I have to severely refute the comment about not much effort going into the coding side of this mod, the comments you made about the armor designes has next to NOTHING to do with coding and takes graphic designing to do with no coding, the side of this mod that requires a lot of coding (the skills, the UI, the efficiency, the mobs mechanics, the dimensions etc.) It is extremely well made. If you want to complain about the design, complain about the design, don't complain about the effort put into coding because of the design.

 

[wolfenstein19]

I have to severely refute the comment about not much effort going into the coding side of this mod, the comments you made about the armor designes has next to NOTHING to do with coding and takes graphic designing to do with no coding, the side of this mod that requires a lot of coding (the skills, the UI, the efficiency, the mobs mechanics, the dimensions etc.) It is extremely well made. If you want to complain about the design, complain about the design, don't complain about the effort put into coding because of the design.

Kay, let me rephrase that: It doesn't feel cheaply coded, just cheaply made and cheaply designed.

The UI lacks tooltips and proper explainations, it lacks coherence and doesn't display everything you want. The whole thing lacks tooltips.

If it took effort to code then that effort was wasted on an undercooked concept and at the very best slightly below average graphics work.