[getting started] need some sort of power system going

[Antice]

Granted, but then it's not like you have to go that route. In fact on my second map I have hardly touched panels.

//snipped for brevity//

Heck, after learning about the Netherrack -> Lava -> Magmatic engine route I've not even feel the need to dabble in the infinite lava trick. Don't want to bother with inter-dimensional wonkery when I can mine a stack of Netherrack in under 2 minutes and it lasts for several hours.

It's a good thing nothing is actually forced in this mod's yeah. I tend to shy away from all the easy routes. I'm into building interesting big new machines. not plowing trough enemies with endgame items.
and tanks for the tip of how the TE energy works. Now i know what not to do. I really has a thing for avoiding over unity machines. they just break the game for me. altho it's technically not over unity if it's using up a resource in the process... but nether-rack? that is a tad too easy a fuel for me. half the fun is to break trough the energy barrier the tough way.

 

[Greyed]

True, true. But it really is a matter of perspective. I see in the other thread about engine rooms people talking about massive energy builds and I wonder, what are they using it on!? Notice that my builds, thus far, are in the sub-10MJ range. I tend to let the power trickle into a battery and burst off that battery. So I don't see much of an energy barrier; to me it is one engine and one energy storage block. After that it is all just a matter of patience on waiting for the energy storage to build up.

 

[Omicron]

It's a good thing nothing is actually forced in this mod's yeah. I tend to shy away from all the easy routes. I'm into building interesting big new machines. not plowing trough enemies with endgame items.
and tanks for the tip of how the TE energy works. Now i know what not to do. I really has a thing for avoiding over unity machines. they just break the game for me. altho it's technically not over unity if it's using up a resource in the process... but nether-rack? that is a tad too easy a fuel for me. half the fun is to break trough the energy barrier the tough way.

I agree - the netherrack thing is way too easy. In my SSP world where I experiment with configs, I actually quadrupled the netherrack meltdown cost, from 4,000 up to 16,000. That still allows for a net gain (magmatic engine gains 18,000 from one bucket of lava, and boilers noticeably more), but it's not as ridiculous. Plus it requires some more serious setups since the magma crucible will also need four times as long to process the recipe.

As a side effect, this happened to also balance out the crazy 5:1 EU conversion that magma crucibles allowed you to do. You now have the option to use the easiest route for the worst returns (Forestry biogenerator - just plop down and ensure a steady stream of biofuel to generate 32,000 EU out of 200,000 MJ), or go the medium route that requires some effort (magma crucibles generating 20,000 EU out of 16,000 MJ and a fuel you need to mine in a different dimension), or go full-on and make the largest investment for the best possible conversion rate (boiler + steam turbine doing 50 EU/t for 32 MJ/t).

Tests showed that a 12 LP boiler running two magma crucibles melting netherrack for two geothermals would produce around 30 EU/t on average, while the same boiler driving a steam turbine would do 37.5 EU/t. Since the turbine is far more costly, that seems quite fine to me.

At the same time, solar panels are still too powerful, at least for singleplayer where it's permanently day due to being able to sleep whenever you wish. Plopping down a single Hybrid solar panel pulls almost double what the expensive boiler + steam turbine does, while costing far less and requiring zero fuel (nor the infrastructure to produce that fuel). Okay, it actually costs 6 UU-Matter and a ridiculous amount of uranium, but unless you build a nuclear reactor, uranium is something that just clogs up inventory space, so the actual cost there is zero. Plus GregTech doubles your uranium income from mining with the rockcutter. And why would you ever build a nuclear reactor if you can just build solar panels instead? Only for the heck of it, but certainly not for energy generation. I'll probably end up halving the energy generation of solars across the board in my SSP config.

After that, only Forestry is left that's far, far too easy in terms of infinite fuel for no cost and effort. I asked SirSengir for config options to make it harder, and he says he's considering a difficulty toggle like he already has implemented for bee breeding.

True, true. But it really is a matter of perspective. I see in the other thread about engine rooms people talking about massive energy builds and I wonder, what are they using it on!? Notice that my builds, thus far, are in the sub-10MJ range. I tend to let the power trickle into a battery and burst off that battery. So I don't see much of an energy barrier; to me it is one engine and one energy storage block. After that it is all just a matter of patience on waiting for the energy storage to build up.

I often have the same issue - the only machines that really need power are the quarry and the mass fab (matter fab). Why bother building more than a few MJ's worth of engines for your base? While I think most people just do it because they can (which is a perfectly fine reason IMHO), I'd prefer if there was more actual reason to build up a real power infrastructure beyond one or two special purpose machines. See above.

 

[Antice]

I agree - the netherrack thing is way too easy. In my SSP world where I experiment with configs, I actually quadrupled the netherrack meltdown cost, from 4,000 up to 16,000. That still allows for a net gain (magmatic engine gains 18,000 from one bucket of lava, and boilers noticeably more), but it's not as ridiculous. Plus it requires some more serious setups since the magma crucible will also need four times as long to process the recipe.

As a side effect, this happened to also balance out the crazy 5:1 EU conversion that magma crucibles allowed you to do. You now have the option to use the easiest route for the worst returns (Forestry biogenerator - just plop down and ensure a steady stream of biofuel to generate 32,000 EU out of 200,000 MJ), or go the medium route that requires some effort (magma crucibles generating 20,000 EU out of 16,000 MJ and a fuel you need to mine in a different dimension), or go full-on and make the largest investment for the best possible conversion rate (boiler + steam turbine doing 50 EU/t for 32 MJ/t).

Tests showed that a 12 LP boiler running two magma crucibles melting netherrack for two geothermals would produce around 30 EU/t on average, while the same boiler driving a steam turbine would do 37.5 EU/t. Since the turbine is far more costly, that seems quite fine to me.

I agree. the boiler/turbine combo is expensive enough to justify having a better return than the easier builds like the magma cruisible geotherm gen setup. Besides a boiler and it's attendant streampipes, water cycle and all makes for an interesting build all on it's own imho. I'd build it just for that reason alone without ever worrying if it actually made sense in energy terms

At the same time, solar panels are still too powerful, at least for singleplayer where it's permanently day due to being able to sleep whenever you wish. Plopping down a single Hybrid solar panel pulls almost double what the expensive boiler + steam turbine does, while costing far less and requiring zero fuel (nor the infrastructure to produce that fuel). Okay, it actually costs 6 UU-Matter and a ridiculous amount of uranium, but unless you build a nuclear reactor, uranium is something that just clogs up inventory space, so the actual cost there is zero. Plus GregTech doubles your uranium income from mining with the rockcutter. And why would you ever build a nuclear reactor if you can just build solar panels instead? Only for the heck of it, but certainly not for energy generation. I'll probably end up halving the energy generation of solars across the board in my SSP config.

I think this is a shame really. also those uranium using solar panels are kinda like Diet nuclear. That energy is definitely NOT coming from the sun that is for sure.

After that, only Forestry is left that's far, far too easy in terms of infinite fuel for no cost and effort. I asked SirSengir for config options to make it harder, and he says he's considering a difficulty toggle like he already has implemented for bee breeding.

That would be sweet. As it is the Energy balance is a bit too rich. I don't mind the forestry energy glut devices to be too bad tho. since they do require either some serious infrastructure or is less than sustainable without constant material inputs. (not that a single medium sized quarry won't gather enough apatite to keep a bog earth energy plant supplied for a LOONG time)
He needs to seriously nerf the melon seed-farm combo tho. altho the seed-oil is only usable in biogas engines. it practically give you an infinite source of MJ's.
One so rich in fact that if you set the melons up optimally to maximize production the system clogs up with melons and seeds within an hour even if you go overboard on the squeezers and biogas engines. It's just insane how fast you can fill a 128 blocks high tank with the stuff. and that is with a single harvester.

I often have the same issue - the only machines that really need power are the quarry and the mass fab (matter fab). Why bother building more than a few MJ's worth of engines for your base? While I think most people just do it because they can (which is a perfectly fine reason IMHO), I'd prefer if there was more actual reason to build up a real power infrastructure beyond one or two special purpose machines. See above.

[/quote]

I never put my engines in a centralized facility. I use engines the way we use them IRL. I attach them either with a short shunt or directly to the machines i want to power. that way i have control of how much energy each machine get's. besides. I like the look of having fuel tanks and such sitting next to my power hungry machines. Gives me that Industrial feel ya know.

I really do like the steam engines in railcraft tho. They make for all kinds of interesting builds.
The IC buildcraft engines are fairly balanced too, since they can blow up if you don't babysit them, and that i think is fair considering the amount of power you get from a single block like that. despite needing to feed them water. making them failsafe is pretty easy once you have the BC logic gates available, but it requires that you put some thought and effort into your setup. I hear a lot of crying over blown engines all the time, and it makes me giggle a bit inside every time.

 

[Greyed]

I often have the same issue - the only machines that really need power are the quarry and the mass fab (matter fab). Why bother building more than a few MJ's worth of engines for your base? While I think most people just do it because they can (which is a perfectly fine reason IMHO), I'd prefer if there was more actual reason to build up a real power infrastructure beyond one or two special purpose machines. See above.

I agree. Honestly I actually haven't touched the quarry and the mass fab. I'm quite content with the IC2 miner though I do wish it had a longer range than 9x9 since we can have quarries that can do 64x64. I just don't like the notion of either ramping up the tedium on the power generation side (ala GregTech) or nerfing them into oblivion (with the exception of solars). Adjustments can be made to the machines to require more power per operation, no? Maybe the problem isn't that power generation is too simple, but that the operations to which we apply power aren't reflecting a balanced cost.

 

[Omicron]

That argument doesn't really make much sense... If you up the energy hunger of machines, you get exactly the same effect as you would if you nerfed power generation methods. Either way, you would need to build more power generation to feed the same amount of machines than you need today.

 

[Greyed]

Actually, it makes perfect sense. When you adjust the power output of the generators you affect the ratio of all operations that use power across all machines in all mods. When you adjust the power requirements of the machines you are adjusting just the requirements of that machine in that mod. Adjusting from the power generation side is blunt force fraught with the possibility unintended consequences, not so from the machine side.

Just a simple example, one of the operations which is set in stone (no pun intended) is the 8:1, item:coal conversion, especially the relation of charcoal made to coal used. That's pretty much the basis set in vanilla upon which all power operations can be judged. So if you decide to increase power generation costs by, say, 50%, you may be balancing some things like IC2 macerators and extractors but now you've wiped out the benefit of the iron furnace and generator over a basic furnace for the wood->charcoal conversion. However if you increase the cost of macerators and extractors by 50% you have gotten the same balancing effect on those two items but have not destroyed the entirely reasonable efficiency gains in the stone furnace -> iron furnace -> generator chain.

 

[Bluehorazon]

Well actually I believe that IC2 needs a major machine overhaul. I suggested this a long time before to alblaka but the problem is time.

Basically you could do it like that:

Build Macerator-Chassis, the chassis has 4 Upgrade-Slots, one for the actual grinder and 3 for additional upgrades, also the macerator should need water to cool it or a coolant-cell that is used up over time. The cheapest grinder is made of flint, but will lose durability quite fast and can't macerate lot's of stuff, so it is basically more used for making sand from cobblestone, coal-dust from coal or macerate other relativly weak materials (like wood... well IC2 does not have sawdust^^). The benefit is that it uses only few EU per operation.

Next could be a carbon grinder or advanced alloy or whatever (I'm not really sure what would make sense^^, since IC2 does not have tungsten for a tungsten-carbide grinder^^). It would be the normal macerator but would still lose durability, there might be some stuff you still can't macerate (obsidian or diamond or other gems, but there are no recipies for this anyway, it would only be a problem with gregs). The stronger grinder also increases the energy-requirement for the macerator.

The last ultimate grinder would be diamond... it lasts literally forever (well you might need to replace it at some point but it will pay for it). It can macerate everything but will take double durability-hits from macerating certain stuff like diamonds or other gems etc.

To get rid of duriability you can upgrade this to the iridium-grinder. Well Iridium isn't that hard but it is the ultimate material in IC2 anyway.

The other upgrade-slots should not be used for trivial things like overclockers... overclockers are boring. Modules could be:
-automated material output (like TE)
-seperator (makes it possible to macerate two materials at the same time)
-a motor-upgrade (basically this is the overclocker)
-heat dispenser (eliminates the need of a coolant, but slows down the machine)
-input-storage (a 9-slot inventory that refills the macerator)
-an upgrade to reduce dura-loss of the grinders
-fortune-upgrade (a magical upgrade that creates a chance of 5% to double the output but needs a Fortune-Diamond-Pick)
...

Also the compressor should change. It should actually work with pressure and if you improve it, the pressure increases and every compressor-recipe has a certain amount of pressure it requires. So compressing plant-balls or sand to sandstone is very easy. But to create diamonds out of coal you need a very strong engine to create enough pressure. Oh and the compressor would definitly need an upgrade for explosive compression as long as you feed it TNT or other explosives (nukes are not recommended) it will compress instantly.


There are a lot of things you can do to make things more interesting for players. But at the state IC2 is now it provides not much progress to players. Upgrading the macerator would be something that is worth it and you had to put some work into it, but if you are ready it would be like "yeah I can double my ores". TE actually has the same problem. You can build almost all the machines after you first mining-trip since they are incredible cheap.

 

[Antice]

Actually, it makes perfect sense. When you adjust the power output of the generators you affect the ratio of all operations that use power across all machines in all mods. When you adjust the power requirements of the machines you are adjusting just the requirements of that machine in that mod. Adjusting from the power generation side is blunt force fraught with the possibility unintended consequences, not so from the machine side.

Just a simple example, one of the operations which is set in stone (no pun intended) is the 8:1, item:coal conversion, especially the relation of charcoal made to coal used. That's pretty much the basis set in vanilla upon which all power operations can be judged. So if you decide to increase power generation costs by, say, 50%, you may be balancing some things like IC2 macerators and extractors but now you've wiped out the benefit of the iron furnace and generator over a basic furnace for the wood->charcoal conversion. However if you increase the cost of macerators and extractors by 50% you have gotten the same balancing effect on those two items but have not destroyed the entirely reasonable efficiency gains in the stone furnace -> iron furnace -> generator chain.

Jupp. I agree with this.
There is also a need to reduce the cost/benefit ratio on the free energy devices. devices that consume a non renewable resource should have a bigger gain than when using a re-newable/infinite source.
For instance. If i run Geothermals for my EU's it should not be particularly cost effective (in EU/turn gain) to get free energy that way by exploiting lava manufacture from another mod. payback times should be fairly long imho. It's especially bad when you don't even need to combine mod's to get the free energy. ala OP solar power and forestry seed oil farms. you can mine the stuff you need and set one of those farms up in less than an hour. it will actually take you longer to get enough stuff to get a quarry going so that you actually have something worthwhile to use all that seedoil you make on.
one such farm can easily power several quarries even if you really go into maximizing the output. Adjusting the output of the machines that makes the seed-oil is a good way to re-balance this somewhat.

Balancing the geotherms is harder, since it has to be done by increasing the cost of making lava. (IMHO the cost of making lava should always be higher than what you get back. otherwise it's an over unity device) It's thermal expansion mod that adds the lava making this time around. EE2 broke the geotherms back in 1.2.5.
and this is actually a silly thing, because despite trying my hardest on not using renewable/infinite i never run out of lava even in the overworld. I Don't pour water on it as a general rule, but drain all the lava lakes i come across with the help of BC pumps. (makes looking for diamonds underneath the lava easier), since i drain them anyways, i might as well use it. By the time i run out I am set to start playing with the stacks of uranium ore i got stored away. And I'm not making stupidly op solar panels out of it.
All the other ways of making power are currently actually superflous. I build them because I'ts fun to build stuff, not because they actually contribute to my survival needs.

 

[Greyed]

Actually, let me amend my last statement. I do think that there is a time and place to adjust power outputs on generation blocks. But it needs to take a multi-tiered approach. Work needs to be balanced against work in relation to power. Power generation needs to be balanced against other forms of power generation. Power from one mod needs to be balanced against power from another mod.

So I do agree that passive power generation should be tepid compared to active forms of power generation. So in that I do think solars should be adjusted way down. I also think that conversion from one mod's power to another mod's power should always, always be lossy. I know Power Converters has settled on a roughly 2MJ:5EU conversion rate. I don't disagree with that. However I think that while the actual conversion is standardized around a ratio like that the machine doing the conversion itself must draw power to do the conversion. Having it separate from the actual conversion means the mod authors can tier their conversion machines on efficiency.

BTW, Glennox, you still with us? I know we got side tracked here but did you get your early game power worked out?

 

[glennox]

Yes, ive got the Thermal Expansion kinda set up.. all i need is some netherbrick and i got it up running. Little question.. when i get the magma crucible is there a way to get the lava out of there with a bucket or something?

 

[Greyed]

No, there isn't. The Magma Crucible exports only via its ports. You'll either need to use a liquid proof pipe it get it to where you need it to go or into a Liquid Transposer which is used to empty/fill buckets/cells.

 

[glennox]

Today ive made quit some progress.. Yesterday ive did setup the Thermal expension steam engine and the aqueous accumulator with the induction smelter. wich works great, ive used mystcraft to get a few stacks of wood and turned this into charcoal to get the steamengine running. used the same mystcraft book with the beach biome and wooden pilllars(forgot the right name). To get sand for the induction smelter. Made my first trip to the nether today but lost allot of time to find a fortress to get the brick. Wich i just found and also found a blaze spawner wich is great to starting brewing potions.

My plan next is to get the magma crucible to fill up the geothermal generator, wich i dont know its gonna work. Atleast i could put some efford into this. please dont spoil and then i will use this to build out my base some more and get more of the fun stuff running. I hope to finish my little machine with lava from the crucible into the generator. When that is finished i will try to brew some potions wich is just vanilla minecraft but a thing ive never did before.

So it was a pretty good day. Did also some landshaping for my to create a building for my machines.

Ps: i really should try to build the transdimentional rail system myself sounds like a hard but posible thing to do now.

 

[Antice]

Today ive made quit some progress.. Yesterday ive did setup the Thermal expension steam engine and the aqueous accumulator with the induction smelter. wich works great, ive used mystcraft to get a few stacks of wood and turned this into charcoal to get the steamengine running. used the same mystcraft book with the beach biome and wooden pilllars(forgot the right name). To get sand for the induction smelter. Made my first trip to the nether today but lost allot of time to find a fortress to get the brick. Wich i just found and also found a blaze spawner wich is great to starting brewing potions.

My plan next is to get the magma crucible to fill up the geothermal generator, wich i dont know its gonna work. Atleast i could put some efford into this. please dont spoil and then i will use this to build out my base some more and get more of the fun stuff running. I hope to finish my little machine with lava from the crucible into the generator. When that is finished i will try to brew some potions wich is just vanilla minecraft but a thing ive never did before.

So it was a pretty good day. Did also some landshaping for my to create a building for my machines.

Ps: i really should try to build the transdimentional rail system myself sounds like a hard but posible thing to do now.

Yeah. it's the kind of thing that is fun to make at least once. I think i have made most of the exploit type over unity machines at least once just to see how well they work, and some of the builds are pretty complex, and hence fun to build after all.
I havent tried the magma crucible nor the transdimensional railway yet. I probably will do so in a creative test world pretty soon. but my main survival world is not going to see one. I go for old style do it the hard way without any infinity tricks there.
I play with gregtech fully enabled as well. so my EU needs are still non existant while I go trough the tech tree towards steel. working on getting a proper steam powered foundry going first. complete with a stone crusher and all.

 

[glennox]

Got another noob question. Are there teleport pipes in FTB? ive been watching a few of Direwolf20's video's on youtube and he uses teleport pipes but i cant find it.. Does this means its out of FTB? or does it have another name?

 

[Antice]

Got another noob question. Are there teleport pipes in FTB? ive been watching a few of Direwolf20's video's on youtube and he uses teleport pipes but i cant find it.. Does this means its out of FTB? or does it have another name?

The teleport pipes are still missing. they are planned to be added once they are stable for this release of minecraft. they are sorely missed i assure you. Especially the liquid ones. using tank carts to move liquids is a pita, and gold liquid pipes are just too expensive for any serious distance.

 

[glennox]

My plan was building a automatic tree farm, Wich turns the wood in charcoal to keep my steam engines running.
But now i am a bit confused how i should keep going on this haha, since i dont like to have multiple steam engines running..

Is there a easy way to change EU into MJ?

 

[SilvasRuin]

EU into MJ? There's only the Electrical Engine. Though that coupled with a Solar Panel and a Batbox tend to be good enough to run Forestry farms.

 

[Antice]

use a big low pressure boiler that feeds steam into a turbine for making EU's. it can make 50 EU/t. then use electrical engines to run the treefarm. you have to keep feeding the setup humus tho, but you should end up with it being self sustaining as far as energy at the least. probably making you a huge charcoal surplus tbh.
I think it would be more efficient to use the really big boiler and then run the farm and logger with a pair of hobbyist steam engines fed directly by the boiler. then feed the rest of the steam into a turbine for the EU's to char the coal in an induction furnace. should give you a healthy surplus of both charcoal and EU's. you could have a second big boiler churning out more MJ's or EU's depending on need.

 

[Omicron]

No need for a boiler. A single hobbyist steam engine running on its own internal boiler will run an arboretum/ logger pair at pretty much full speed. And once heated up (which consumes a grand total of two charcoal), a single 64-stack of charcoal will keep it running for close to 9.5 RL hours straight. You will need to supply water, but that's as simple as burying an aqueous accumulator directly below it. No need to surround it with water blocks either, the internal generation is more than enough.

Of course, if you employ a Forester to speed up tree growth, you'll need a second engine... but Catalyst tends to be expensive for what it does, and also needs to be refueled periodically.