How long do you stay in the "Vanilla" stage?

[Jess887cp]

I've recently got back into playing the modpacks, rather than just posting in forum games. So I've been playing a ton of LAN minecraft with my little sister on the Unleashed pack.

It's pretty vanilla, nothing big at all. All we have is a generator for charging electric tinkers tools, a smeltery, and a coke oven. And we've been playing for a week or so. I know people who would have an entire pimpin' suit of top-notch armor and good power in that time. But I've really been enjoying taking it slowly.

So how long do you stay "vanilla?"

 

[ThatOneSlowking]

Staying "pure" vanilla lasts only a couple minutes for me, due tinkers construct(and natura woods/generation for food)
If you mean the point in time with no machines, manual mining then i stay in vanilla for a few days, sometimes longer.

 

[Shakie666]

For me, the "vanilla" bit is the most boring by far. I try to get through it as quickly as possible (annoying when there aren't any nearby caves). It doesn't get interesting until I get the stuff for some basic machines, tools, maybe some MPS with a few basic modules etc.

 

[Jess887cp]

Staying "pure" vanilla lasts only a couple minutes for me, due tinkers construct(and natura woods/generation for food)
If you mean the point in time with no machines, manual mining then i stay in vanilla for a few days, sometimes longer.

Yeah, I meant that. Time with no machines, manual mining, mud huts galore.

 

[Tristam Izumi]

Usually, I take my time as well. In my previous 1.5.2 worlds, I usually get as far as a smeltery, coke oven, and a basic TE infrastructure powered by hobbyist engines. Most of my time is either spent exploring or building/prettying up my base and surrounding area.

In my current 1.6.4 world (custom magic-based pack), I jumped into TC4 and AM2 even before I had a proper base, and a smeltery followed soon after. Now I'm taking up residence inside a BoP sacred springs giant tree, and placing down the infrastructure for more advanced magical enterprises. And it's only taken me a little under a week of playing to get this far.

So yeah, you're not the only one that takes their time getting past "vanilla"

 

[Jess887cp]

I usually slam through it, and I know lots of other people do too.

But stopping to smell the flowers is just...

 

[The classless]

maybe about an hour or so

 

[thewindmillman]

usually a few hours at least, but even then me and my friend tend to take it really slow and do things like the twilight forest and a bunch of exploring before settling in for the machine phase.

 

[rymmie1981]

I usually take a little while. I get a few diamonds first and build decent stock of ores. I used to rush into my first machines, but I ended up with a bunch of machines sitting there with nothing to do except maybe turn wood into charcoal. Besides, caving will bring you to some dungeons and mineshafts which can net things like steel and knowledge fragments which can boost you forward in your tech tree.

 

[kaiomann]

Actually I stay non-technical for quite a while. Usually I try to setup a smeltery first and start on the tinkers way.

 

[malicious_bloke]

Long enough to get enough stuff for a generator, a macerator and a solar panel.

 

[huldu]

It depends on the rng of finding diamonds for me. It could take a few hours or days to progress to other ways of mining beside manual. Especially if you're using ic2ex with the new mfe recipe. The problem I have with ic2 is that I'm using it less every time. Other mods just does things better and in a far more "entertaining" way. Ic2 is just a grind and if you add gregtech on top of that... that grinding time would be better put to use in an Asian f2p mmo. I don't know tho, it all comes down to rng of finding whatever materials you need. Since I'm on 1.6.4 I don't have TE(/cry) or mystcraft. I miss TE lol...

 

[Yusunoha]

I usually grind for an hour or two first, to get the basic resources to craft certain items and systems in 1 go. after that, it's all modded for me

 

[Brilliance]

I tend to build a basic, un-automated ore processing area as soon as possible, as well as make a few Tinker's tools of a reasonable quality (steel if I'm playing with a mod set that allows steel production without going to the nether). After those initial few hours, I tend to spend at least a few days caving and building while thinking about what I'm going to do and where I want to put it. It's not unusual for me to go a week or two with the only tech being a basic 'Dump ore in hopper, get ingots'-setup.

 

[Akivar]

Usually I have been Rushing to get Machines Built and set up just to make one or two Items that I want...

However I just started work on a new project and starting a New SSP - Unleashed 1.1.4 and not going with any machines until I've established a fully functional base of operations. It's going to be a Pre-Tech Base. Something that all the people who wish to maybe download this Map will see and have a good start with. They'll have some options of which way to go and do things. - Basically I'm going to do as little mining and landscape destruction as possible. More or less displacement.

Then once this base is set-up.

Store-House - Farms, Animals "Maybe", then I'll go move to a new area clearing some kind of path for a MystCraft Area then, Thaumcraft, BuildCraft, Industrial Craft etc.
Try to seperate everything and work with only the things that need to be there. Such as one of every machine or so... or I can do something more advanced for the users without going too far away. Just depends. The main goal is to Establish a base then see what happens from there and start workin on Building myself a Dungeon for other players to explore.

 

[Neirin]

I kinda mix up my worlds. I tend to get into bees fairly quickly (very quickly if I find a few apiaries in a village) and my first 3 diamonds usually go towards a mining turtle to get the ball rolling on auto-mining. However, I tend to go pretty strongly vanilla for a lot of mob and crop farms, so I still do a lot of vanilla stuff weeks or months after starting. I'm also really bad about getting automated ore processing up in a timely fashion - in my current world my primary means of smelting is a TiC hammer with max lapis and auto-smelting and I've put in a good 24hrs or so of playtime.

 

[MigukNamja]

Assuming I have a decent start with trees around, vanilla is over in the first 60 seconds:

1. Punch a few trees down
2. Most of the logs into planks
3. Some of the planks into sticks
4. 1x crafting table
5. A few TiC templates
6. Starter TiC setup with starter wooden TiC tools

I'll then quickly proceed to stone TiC tools and try to find clay, sand, and gravel to get a TiC smeltery started.

From there, it depends. I used to rush the machines and try to get to the "end game" ASAP. However, the more playthroughs I do, the slower I take it each time.

This time, I'm not using any auto-mining techniques (no quarry, no turtles, no MFR laser, etc.,.) and all of my ores so far have come at the business end of TiC tools. I've been *gasp* somewhat enjoying IC2 exp. and its steep power requirement has thus far matched my slower pace of play. I only recently built a 6-chamber reactor and even then, 230 EU/t is just enough to keep an MFSU topped off with all the ore processing machines running, sans overclockers.

Iron is a huge bottleneck, but that's not a bad thing. It gets me out and about in the world. When I get bored with that, I'll work on bees so they start producing the iron for me.

In general, I'm in no rush and will only proceed to the next level of tech when I'm bored with the current one.

 

[Trunks9809]

I've been doing the Refugee to Regent Challenge on my playthrough this time around. I've only just hit the 'Iron' stage where basic machine unlock. So the 'vanilla' stage took me 3, maybe 4 weeks of play.

 

[GPuzzle]

Until I get enough silver ore to start Factorization, SC2 and Thaumcraft, the most "modded" thing I get is the TiC smeltery and a bunch of tools such as a steel hammer. That, of course, includes the fact that I allow myself to create a rolling machine and a clockwork engine to get rails, which I use in most of my worlds. It's actually pretty fun to do so.

 

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Depends on what you mean about 'vanilla'. With TiCo, I often won't even build vanilla tools, and with Natura, you can immediately start off by making your little 'mud hut' as a tree house inside the trunk of one of those huge trees. I also try to get some form of ore refining going early, which generally either means the AE grinder or a TiCo smeltry.