Let's get a few things straight about TCE, for those who aren't aware it's a particularly bad, low quality Thaumcraft addon which has grown infamy across the Thaumcraft community for the level of hate it's accumulated. It's owner, Wasliebob, is a self proclaimed "amateur programmer" who claims to know approximately 8 languages who is also responsible for "Forestry Extras", another similarly low quality addon with equality to it's Thaumic cousin in it's directionless purpose.
So why am I here to talk about it today? Well I'm here to, with as little personal attacking as possible, back up some of the comments I've previously made on the site as well as take the finger of blame off a friend of mine, as he seems to have been labeled as the reason behind the hate that surrounds this mod. This is not the case. If anything, it was my inclusion of the addon in my addon compendium that would be the first major point of attention this mod claimed before it's esculation in the community.
You can see the results of it's inclusion and it's inevitable removal here: link.
To shed some light on where I've sent you, I had initially posted my thoughts about the mod as a whole in the post dedicated to TCE, that post has been removed since then, however the link above will send you to a response made by SpitefulFox who quoted my thoughts directly. After a bit of back and forth, Waslie himself appears in the thread to apologize for his mod being "dumb" in my opinion, after which I both defend my statement and show him support for his mod, genuinely looking forward to the improvements he promised.
He then asks for any recommendations or advice. To which I respond swiftly with the following:
Ladies and gentlemen the proof of the pudding is in the eating and to this date, very little other than the slightest of grammatical fixes and other minuscule changes were actually made. Go ahead, download his mod and see for yourself. I don't say this out of spite for him not listening to a single idea, but it shows he is either unwilling to or just plain unable to comply to advice.
He replied afterward with the following.
Those who have tried his mod will know that these words are meaningless. The tiers of his trade items, while claimed to be by design, are still overpriced. I once did the math to find that the single cost of a Tier 5 item cost multiple thousands of gold and when traded yielded little more than potions and manabeans. Is this by design too?
As far as I can tell, and I admit to not checking recently, out of sheer lack of will, the air block is not used for anything other than a "isAir" check. It may be used in an infusion recipe, but that's besides the point. It's functionally useless to this date and presents a price for a worthless object.
The fire block isn't much better.
As promised however, he altered some documentation, with which I mean he took confusingly vague and lazy and made it slightly less vague.
But I didn't didn't give up hope, I finished 0.2's research and set out to give a new list of recommendations, they are as follows.
The major issue of the cactus block was fixed, I'll submit to that, regardless of it's mindbogglingly abhorrent execution and purpose. The water block, while simple, impressed me with it's potential, but ultimately was overshadowed by the following disappointments. What ideas he had were either uninspired or 'borrowed' from other mods or both and most alarmingly, the grammatical errors still existed. I'm not saying this to be annoying, I'm saying it because it shows the lack of care that goes into the development this "amateur programmer" shows towards what he considers his "work".
My contempt for TCE was finalized upon seeing a Tweet made by Waslie himself as follows;
There is nothing I can say in this post that isn't crystal clear in my response to this tweet, so I'll move on.
After this point I had cleared TCE from my mind and moved on to other things, I've gathered together mod makers, youtubers and texture/modellers in a skype chat for the sake of assisted development of better, quality addons to the thaumic universe as well as other, not affiliated mods. TCE plays rarely in our mind, however, it wouldn't be the end of it.
This is what I've come to set the record straight on. Blame has been placed on my friend, Vazkii, for instigating the TCE hate. Evidence of which is seen through his posts on MCF and Twitter, where he implies that the reason others hate his mod is simply because Vazkii hates it, or convinces others to this.
Let me be clear, I'm not trying to say Vazkii hasn't had a hand in some of the hate that surrounds TCE and Waslie has a valid point when he says that popularity begets imitation, however Vazkii's actions are in no way indicting entirely or even in large part to the addon's infamy. Incidently, what I've showed you should be enough to say that I deserve more blame than Vazkii for this infamy, but ultimately the fact of the matter, ladies and gentlemen, is that Thaumcraft Extras is a low quality, poorly functioning and uninspired mod and addon and for that reason alone is enough to decide where the blame of it's infamy really lies.
I leave this to your judgement, for those who have sifted through this wall of text and I hope this goes without incurring moderator wrath... I tried to keep it civil...
I'd like you guys to read this.
https://twitter.com/Succubism/status/434116792483475457
I didn't get a reply to this.
That's all.
EDIT: I've been asked to refer you to http://vazkii.us/irclogs/ - Post 5 "Thaumcraft Extras"
So why am I here to talk about it today? Well I'm here to, with as little personal attacking as possible, back up some of the comments I've previously made on the site as well as take the finger of blame off a friend of mine, as he seems to have been labeled as the reason behind the hate that surrounds this mod. This is not the case. If anything, it was my inclusion of the addon in my addon compendium that would be the first major point of attention this mod claimed before it's esculation in the community.
You can see the results of it's inclusion and it's inevitable removal here: link.
To shed some light on where I've sent you, I had initially posted my thoughts about the mod as a whole in the post dedicated to TCE, that post has been removed since then, however the link above will send you to a response made by SpitefulFox who quoted my thoughts directly. After a bit of back and forth, Waslie himself appears in the thread to apologize for his mod being "dumb" in my opinion, after which I both defend my statement and show him support for his mod, genuinely looking forward to the improvements he promised.
He then asks for any recommendations or advice. To which I respond swiftly with the following:
You asked for this. Bare in mind these are pre-update. I haven't yet seen 0.2
- You don't need your own thaumonomicon subcatagory for your stuff. There already are five subgatagories with which your items shouldn't deviate from. Keep them within those tabs so that it doesn't clutter the thaumonomicon.
- Your descriptions are minimal at best. Look at the Thaunonomicon entries, they describe, without breaking the fourth wall too much, what the item is, how you came across this research, what you use this item for, etc.
- Your taglines (with [TCE]) don't need to repeat the name of the entry itself. It makes it look lazy.
- Using ONE research aspect for not one but three out of four of your Wand Foci is abysmal. Yes you could argue that it's balanced by the cost, but when you remember that your items are one of the most costly items to make in the Thaumonomicon, it demotivates the user to make them.
- Fire Block and Air Block are as it stands now - Useless. Placing a block on your air block replaces that block with that you tried to place on it. I don't care if that was the intended effect, that's a waste.
- Also their textures.
- Admittedly, your pech trading system is cool and this was one of the ideas that turned me on to the mod, however Pech Summoning is too overpowered to consider fair to use. Especially with it's minimal aspect requirement to research.
- You don't need "tiers" for pech trading. This it just a resource sink. Looking into the math a Tier 5 trade item we'd need close to 8 thousand tier 1's to get one. This is too much.
- You need to explain the difference of Pech and Magic trade better.
- Wand Focus: Arrow is pointless. It renders bows useless for a start, but is still outdone by the Fire and Lightning Foci from Vanilla Thaumcraft.
- Wand Focus: Blink needs balancing. I do like this idea, but you're not the first to try it and blinking through walls, if it allows it, may not be received well.
- Wand Focus: Speed is redundant with the traveller's paving stone/boots of the traveller/haste enchantment.
- Wand Focus: Heal may be cool, especially with balance on usage but you need to go into more detail with this in it's entry as there is already a lot of dangerous stuff in Thaumcraft. People may just choose to not bother.
- Speaking of dangerous stuff, your dangerous instability on a majority of items is enough reason for people not to use your stuff. Reserve this option for end-game gear.
- Your trading system is basically the jewel of this mod. This alone would warrant a subcatagory in the thaunonomicon, once balanced, like for a sort of Pech/Thaum Villager currency for trading to avoid the draining of gold, diamonds and emeralds. I'd LOVE to see this be more indepth and balanced.
- Everything other than your Pech Trades can be in another subcatagory however. The Wand Foci should go into Thaumaturgy, Thaumcraft Extras (Which you don't really need) in Basic Information, Fire/Air block in Artifice.
- MOST IMPORTANTLY - FIX YOUR GRAMMAR AND TYPOS. Call me a Grammar Nazi if you want, idgaf. This is the stuff that your mod's judged on by everyone.
Ladies and gentlemen the proof of the pudding is in the eating and to this date, very little other than the slightest of grammatical fixes and other minuscule changes were actually made. Go ahead, download his mod and see for yourself. I don't say this out of spite for him not listening to a single idea, but it shows he is either unwilling to or just plain unable to comply to advice.
He replied afterward with the following.
Textures and entries are fixed already will work on balance for the next update, i keep the tab because its nicer to see though (for now)
The tiers and there price are intended, there worth is caclulated in there price.
Air block is going to be used for something later on, the tagline text i didnt notice since recently the latest update already changed it a bit.
Fire Block has an use now if you checkout the latest update you'll find out.
I am going to get research improvements asap
I hope getting an update out today.
Thanks for your feedback.
Best Regards Wasliebob
The tiers and there price are intended, there worth is caclulated in there price.
Air block is going to be used for something later on, the tagline text i didnt notice since recently the latest update already changed it a bit.
Fire Block has an use now if you checkout the latest update you'll find out.
I am going to get research improvements asap
I hope getting an update out today.
Thanks for your feedback.
Best Regards Wasliebob
As far as I can tell, and I admit to not checking recently, out of sheer lack of will, the air block is not used for anything other than a "isAir" check. It may be used in an infusion recipe, but that's besides the point. It's functionally useless to this date and presents a price for a worthless object.
The fire block isn't much better.
As promised however, he altered some documentation, with which I mean he took confusingly vague and lazy and made it slightly less vague.
But I didn't didn't give up hope, I finished 0.2's research and set out to give a new list of recommendations, they are as follows.
Okay here it goes.
[*]First and most alarmingly your earth blocks seems to spawn cacti that upon breaking the earth block beneath you can yield both that earth block and the cacti around them. This is a HUGE dupe glitch for cacti that alone would make your mod unusable for modpacks.
[*]The textures are better. Still needs a little work, but better.
[*]Water block seems pretty cool, actually. Might be a little OP, but still pretty decent, especially for farms.
[*]The fire block seems rather redundant and unbalanced when you consider what it can be used for. That and using fire itself yields the same effect with a more cost effective method. That and only colliding with the top of the block yields resource.
[*]Light block's a cool idea. I've seen it in Extra Utilities where it's done a little better but still a good idea. Texture glitches occur which have your block blink however.
[*]Light Shards are unneeded unless you have more planned for them than a light block. Best just continue to use Order Shards.
[*]You REALLY don't need a research block for the sake of an icon. This is a waste of an ID.
[*]Still don't see the point of an air block.
[*]Pech Trades need to be simpler. Still a very cost innefficient source of currency.
[*]Same with Magic Trades
[*]It would be unfair of me to say that descriptions are better because they're not. A minimal improvement, I suppose.
[*][TCE] tag is missing
[*]Typos and grammar errors still exist.
[*]Pech Summoning still unbalanced and unneeded.
[*]First and most alarmingly your earth blocks seems to spawn cacti that upon breaking the earth block beneath you can yield both that earth block and the cacti around them. This is a HUGE dupe glitch for cacti that alone would make your mod unusable for modpacks.
[*]The textures are better. Still needs a little work, but better.
[*]Water block seems pretty cool, actually. Might be a little OP, but still pretty decent, especially for farms.
[*]The fire block seems rather redundant and unbalanced when you consider what it can be used for. That and using fire itself yields the same effect with a more cost effective method. That and only colliding with the top of the block yields resource.
[*]Light block's a cool idea. I've seen it in Extra Utilities where it's done a little better but still a good idea. Texture glitches occur which have your block blink however.
[*]Light Shards are unneeded unless you have more planned for them than a light block. Best just continue to use Order Shards.
[*]You REALLY don't need a research block for the sake of an icon. This is a waste of an ID.
[*]Still don't see the point of an air block.
[*]Pech Trades need to be simpler. Still a very cost innefficient source of currency.
[*]Same with Magic Trades
[*]It would be unfair of me to say that descriptions are better because they're not. A minimal improvement, I suppose.
[*][TCE] tag is missing
[*]Typos and grammar errors still exist.
[*]Pech Summoning still unbalanced and unneeded.
The major issue of the cactus block was fixed, I'll submit to that, regardless of it's mindbogglingly abhorrent execution and purpose. The water block, while simple, impressed me with it's potential, but ultimately was overshadowed by the following disappointments. What ideas he had were either uninspired or 'borrowed' from other mods or both and most alarmingly, the grammatical errors still existed. I'm not saying this to be annoying, I'm saying it because it shows the lack of care that goes into the development this "amateur programmer" shows towards what he considers his "work".
My contempt for TCE was finalized upon seeing a Tweet made by Waslie himself as follows;
There is nothing I can say in this post that isn't crystal clear in my response to this tweet, so I'll move on.
After this point I had cleared TCE from my mind and moved on to other things, I've gathered together mod makers, youtubers and texture/modellers in a skype chat for the sake of assisted development of better, quality addons to the thaumic universe as well as other, not affiliated mods. TCE plays rarely in our mind, however, it wouldn't be the end of it.
This is what I've come to set the record straight on. Blame has been placed on my friend, Vazkii, for instigating the TCE hate. Evidence of which is seen through his posts on MCF and Twitter, where he implies that the reason others hate his mod is simply because Vazkii hates it, or convinces others to this.
Let me be clear, I'm not trying to say Vazkii hasn't had a hand in some of the hate that surrounds TCE and Waslie has a valid point when he says that popularity begets imitation, however Vazkii's actions are in no way indicting entirely or even in large part to the addon's infamy. Incidently, what I've showed you should be enough to say that I deserve more blame than Vazkii for this infamy, but ultimately the fact of the matter, ladies and gentlemen, is that Thaumcraft Extras is a low quality, poorly functioning and uninspired mod and addon and for that reason alone is enough to decide where the blame of it's infamy really lies.
I leave this to your judgement, for those who have sifted through this wall of text and I hope this goes without incurring moderator wrath... I tried to keep it civil...
I'd like you guys to read this.
https://twitter.com/Succubism/status/434116792483475457
I didn't get a reply to this.
That's all.
EDIT: I've been asked to refer you to http://vazkii.us/irclogs/ - Post 5 "Thaumcraft Extras"
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