JaRyCu's Builds - Sept 2016 - Infinity Evolved Expert Mode

[JaRyCu]

Day 3 - Automating Things

Today I began the process of running down 2 rabbit holes at once. As I stated previously, I know I'm good at tech and I'm going to rely on that. I understand it, I know how it works, and it's reliable. The problem that I've found so far is providing energy. Today I put up 3 solar panels on top of my mountain and tunneled them straight down into my machine room. That doesn't provide a lot of power, but I figured out how to upgrade my machines to be faster AND use less power, so the panels seem to do the trick. They have the unintended benefit of running out of power at night, meaning I can sleep in peace because the machines can't work with no power.

I also decided I needed something that can mine for ores for me so that I can focus on other things. It took a lot of work, and I have to duplicate one of my machines three times over, but it was worth it in the end. I present to you the Digital Miner:

Spoiler

I attached it directly to my solar panels so that it would get first dibs on the energy, and I also hooked up a large diamond-plated chest to the back of the machine to collect all of the ores. This thing is amazing! It has to be at least partly magical: It's directly over my base in the mountain, yet it's pulling ores from everywhere and not doing any damage. Our mining worlds use faster machines, but this is chugging along nicely considering I've not upgraded it and it has hardly any power yet.

Given my need for more advanced machinery, I've also expanded the machine room:

Spoiler

As you can see in the image, there are a lot of new machines. I now have 4 Metallurgic Infusers. Each holds a different material. From left to right, they hold a) redstone, b) coal/carbon, c) diamond, and d) obsidian. I need to re-arrange them so that I can automate the transfer between the machines, but for now I can move the parts as I need them. In the back center of the picture, you can see a regular TE Pulverizer. It's fast and sometimes I need dust to craft, and it's easier to stick it in there than to reconfigure my machines' input/output options. On top of the 3rd Met. Inf. you see an Osmium Compressor. It does 2 things total, but it does them well so it can stay. Close to the bottom-left, you can see a charging station and a teleporter. Yes! That's right! I can teleport across my world now. I have a portable teleporter as well, which was the reason for the charging pad. Now, if the crimson cultists attempt to kill me, I can simply *poof* and be back in safety.

Finally, on the back wall of the room, is a very interesting machine. It's called a Storehouse and claims to be able to store almost a thousand stacks. I've been able to empty all of my chests into it and there is plenty of room leftover, so maybe there's some truth to it.

Spoiler

Remember my magic book that I created from my picnic yesterday? Well, I read through it last night before bed and found out that I can do a lot of things with it. There are a lot of blank pages, but I found that some of them filled themselves in when I accomplished simple tasks. I'm preparing to try something really big, so I built an altar today.

Spoiler

It calls for me to channel essence in for the spells, so I'll have to build those sections up to see if they work. I built the structure out of better materials, using diamond blocks and nether quartz so that I can create really complicated spells.

Tomorrow, time permitting, I'll see if I can channel whatever essence it's talking about and see if magic is real, or if this book is total fiction. I hope it's real - it looks like there is a lot of power to be had!

 

[JaRyCu]

Day 4 - Flight...well...sort of....

Today was a momentous day in my new world! I've been growing increasingly cramped and claustrophobic in my cave, so I've taken to adventuring through the world. After I went total bad@$$ Michonne on a herd of cows, I managed to skin enough of them to create a glider that would hold me and all of my armor. I climbed up to the tallest peak of my mountain, said a prayer, and jumped and soared like the birds. It was glorious!

Spoiler

After sailing for well over a kilometer, I came across a weird structure.

Spoiler

I tentatively approached it, and, when no traps were sprung, I checked the chest in the center. I found this odd, many-sided container.

Spoiler

I went out into the field and then set it off, running backwards in case something deadly came out of it. After it starting spinning, the sides changed colors, it rose off the ground, and then it exploded in the air. I heard an unearthly scream, and then fireballs were being launched at me from something invisible in the air. I circled around where the fireballs were coming from, but I could never see the monster throwing them so I headed for the forest in order to lose it. After a few hundred meters, I guess it gave up pursuit because I didn't hear from it again. (I'd show you pictures, but it was invisible!)

I also did some serious power upgrades today!

Spoiler

The little solar panels were doing nothing for me, so I decided to merge them into bigger ones and hope for an efficiency increase. Man, let me tell you, they put out so much power! While my miner finished processing the sections I'd programmed into it, I decided to build a new house for myself. As I said, I was getting tired of my cave, and I wanted to be elevated from sea level to help stay away from the monsters.

It took quite a while to do, but here is my new home:

Spoiler

I haven't moved my machinery into it yet, but I did move my bed into the 2nd story. I love the view that it has for me, and I can also keep an eye on the altar I'm building. Speaking of the altar! I added a new power structure to it. I haven't really figured out how it all ties together, but I'll need this essence stuff in order to power my spells.

Spoiler

For those of you reading this, somehow your comments have been sent via intergalactic transfer and I'm receiving them on this planet. If you have any advice, or if you see things trying to kill me, please let me know so that I can avoid them or do them better.

Until next time, this is Officer JaRyCu, signing off.

 

[Boqzo1]

Looks awesome! I love watching you progress through the pack. You're house looks great, definitely better than most houses I can build

 

[JaRyCu]

Day 5 - Magical Updates

I've been researching a lot lately, pondering if I should dive into magics and see what truly holds this world together. I've come across more of those Crimson Cultists, and I'm worried they're channeling something into this world that will do it great harm, and I've finally decided that I need to find a way to combat them. They are too numerous at their worshiping idols to charge in head-first and take them out; I'd be overwhelmed by their numbers. I need something I can do from a distance.

I started playing around with my magical portal, and I think I've hit upon a very useful and simple solution.

Spoiler

The spell I made is a simple mining spell. In very simple terms, I just point my right arm at something and speak the word "PROMIN" and a small ball of brown dirt flies out of my hand. Whatever ground it hits is instantly mined up. It takes a good bit out of me, but I figure with time and practice I can get more endurance at this.

I decided to poke my head over the mountain and see if I could take out that cultists with it.

Spoiler

The dirt ball had no effect on the cultists at all, but it decimated their altar. In the image, you can see one of the balls I sent flying at them. Their altar literally exploded when I hit it, and they all seemed to come out of a trance and just looked around. Perhaps they'll move on now.

I'm also getting a better grasp on the magical flowers. I've bred one that will eat my surplus of coal and turn it into magical energy. I managed to get 6 of them out of my first crop, but it didn't appear to up my energy production. No matter how much coal I threw at them, they seem to share it amongst them. Odd behaviour, but I'll keep an eye on it.

Spoiler

It also turns out they have their own altar of sorts. I started making magical runes on it so that I can make more powerful things.

Spoiler

I managed to make two rings for myself today. The first will store mana, as this energy is called, and the second will generate it as I walk around. I also replaced my diamond armor, which has experienced a lot of wear and tear, with armor made from iron dipped into a pool of the mana. I loved the diamond armor, but this armor seems to feed off the magic stored in my ring and doesn't take damage. I'll have to see about enchanting it to make it more protective.

You'll also notice in the picture above that I've setup a third altar. (Look at the top right corner of the picture.) It doesn't seem to give off any cool effects or anything that shows it's doing anything, but I think it'll be very powerful. I've had to use a lot of my own blood to create the runes, but once I completed the circle of them, it seemed to shimmer and become more powerful. I'm going to have to research and see what else it can do and if I can make it even more powerful, and I'll have to see about harnessing farm animals for sacrifice to it. There aren't many more spots on my arm that I can cut to get more blood, and I'm feeling very weak as well.

I'll leave you today with an updated overview of my base.

Spoiler

 

[JaRyCu]

Day 6- Starting to Look Like Home

Today things really started moving forward for me. After accumulating chests full of resources and trying out alternative storage methods, I decided the only way to go was to recreate the fully-automated storage system from my crashed ship. Unfortunately everything burned to useless parts when I crashed, but I've noted several meteors as I've explored the land around my new home. According to our history texts, meteors similar to these hit Homeworld eons ago and contained that secrets that made our current tech development possible.

I grabbed my pickaxe and sword, as well as my glider, and headed off. After digging through two of the meteors, I surprisingly enough had all that I needed: The 4 Mystical Inscriber Presses. Armed with these, I knew I could start my network.

A few hours later, and I had done it! I'd prepared the "brain" of my system, the Controller, and built 8 drive bays. Each bay is capable of holding 10 drives. For now I've only made 12 small drives, which is more than enough to hold all of my stuff. I also attached an upgraded terminal to the front of the controller that will allow me to make things without having to walk to another table.

Spoiler

I forgot that you haven't seen the inside of my home. Here's a view from the corner letting you see the entire downstairs:

Spoiler

For reference, the door into the home is directly behind the 2 diamond chests in the center of the screen. The white floor block is my Ender Elevator system. Instead of wasting space with stairs or ladders, I opted to use some of the Ender Pearls and created a system the instantly transports me up or down. I've even added a basement level to my home to house all of my machines.

Spoiler

This isn't the most recent photograph, but you can get the idea. I've managed to upgrade all of my cabling to handle more RF. I've also upgraded the simple machines into Elite Factories that are capable of processing up to 7 stacks of materials at one time! They're drawing over 2K RF/t, so I needed massive power storage. The cables that I'm using store approximately 500K RF inside of them, then I have a 6 capacitor bank holding 6M RF and an Energy Cube storing another 2M RF. It's not a lot of power, but it more than meets my needs at present. Once I build a few more digital miners and have loads of ore coming in, I'll have to up the power. I'm already researching nuclear reactors to see what I'm able to build from what I have.

For now, though, I'm relying on the power of the sun. Giving my new computerized storage, it's very simple to craft what I need. I've upped my production to 10 Advanced Solar Generators and they seem to be able to power my digital miner and all of my machines without getting behind. I'm very impressed with them. The only way to show them to you is to give you an overhead shot of my base.

Spoiler

I wasn't sure if they were going to be worth it as they are VERY expensive. By my calculations, I used the following materials to make all 10 of them:

• 360 glass panes
• 540 redstone
• 370 iron ingots
• 360 osmium ingots
• 80 osmium dusts
• 12 gold ingots

This list doesn't count the materials that went into my machine room to produce the alloys and other machines necessary to make all of this. In the end, it's so worth it! I have enough room on the hill to add 10 more and I shall see about doing that soon.

By the way, here are my factories at work:

Spoiler

The Enrichment Factory automatically feeds into the Smelting Factory. I did a few tests tonight. I was able to turn 7+ stacks of iron ore into 14+ stacks of iron ingots in less than 60 seconds. I did add in the speed and energy upgrades to them, and they were just amazing. I'll have to build sound dampeners for them soon, though, as they can be heard all over my home and even out into my valley.

Magical Updates

On other fronts, I'm making big progress with my magical spells and abilities. Today I discovered 2 more spells! The first allows me to shoot balls of light out. When they hit something solid, like a tree or the ground, they stick and light up the area just like a torch. I even found that I can color them so that I can see them more easily. Now I don't have to waste my wood by building sticks to make torches. This is great!

My second spell is my first offensive spell. I'm now able to shoot out a ball of energy that hits with both fire and magic energy. It's not very strong yet, but it can take out things from a distance. Now I don't have to worry about all of those living skeleton archers - I can shoot them from farther away than they can shoot me from.

Spoiler: Before & After Light Spell

If you look directly in the center of the 1st photo, you'll see a small ball of light traveling towards the tree in the center. In the second shot, it's hit and now that tree and the surrounding ground is permanently lit up.

While I was exploring today, I found 2 new animals I've never come across:

Spoiler

The 2nd animal was gigantic, standing 3x-4x as tall as me. I whacked it several times with my sword, but it only look annoyed. I didn't even make a dent. I'll come back later when I have more powerful magic and see if I can take it down that way.

Finally, I'll leave you with a beautiful sunset from this world. I can't get over how pretty the evenings are here; I just wish they lasted longer.

Spoiler

 

[JaRyCu]

Day 7 - MOAR POWER

I fear the connection with your world has been broken. I no longer hear or feel the comments from users about what's going on here, and I think I've been lost in isolation with only the zombies and dark mages to keep me company. I hope that this isn't the case. There were strong echoes from a user named @Plasmasnake and another from @GamerwithnoGame that helped to guide me when I first started, but now even they've gone silent.

The days have become sad and lonely. Most of the time I have only the sound of wild cows to keep me company, or the sound of my tools as I expand my base. I've begun to go a little crazy - don't argue, I can sense it as I talk to myself more and more. I've started to become obsessed with power as well. Not the magical kind, though. I'm still wary of that and I'm slowly delving into it.

No, the power I am after is literally more power. I redid my storage a little so that I could add in machinery to literally make things for me. I programmed the machinery to make all of the components of my solar generators and then set them loose. I can now make 10 of the advanced generators in the time it would take me to make 1 component before!

Spoiler: Crafting System Upgrade

I've also added upgrades to my digital miner so that it's chugging along at 8x-10x the speed, which is necessary in order to keep up with the demands of my power addiction.

In addition to the solar upgrades, I've also decided I needed power that can be generated at night and during storms. I have found out the hard way that processing tons of ore during extended thunderstorms can drain my RF reserves very quickly. When that happens, my entire storage system goes down and I lose access to everything stored in my drive bays. Down in my machine room, I carved out a large hole in the side wall and made a small reactor.

Dangerous?

No! It's not dangerous. I didn't have enough uranium (yet) to make the dangerous kind, so I used the non-radioactive yellorite reactor. While I was at it, I decided to upgrade the look of my machine room. I also upgraded two of my infusing machines, added a SAG mill, and added a slice & splice. Then, since I had upgraded everything else, I decided the option to store more power would be nice, so I upgraded my entire capacitor bank so that it now holds 30 million RF. I have it wired so that it can accept up to 20K RF/t, so it filled very quickly.

Spoiler: Updated Machine Room

I don't have pictures yet, but I've also replaced all of the cheap torches with the magical spell lighting. Now I don't have to worry about burning down my new home.

Here's an aerial shot of my solar hub:

Spoiler: Advanced Solar Generator Hub

Finally, I have come to the realization that I'm going to need wool. A lot of wool. In order to make the cables that run my computer system, it takes SO. MUCH. WOOL. I've setup a small enclosure for sheep, along with machinery to shear them and a small wheat farm so that I can feed them. Finally, I placed a machine in their pen so that I can automatically breed them when I choose.

Spoiler: Sheep Farm

Do you know how LOUD sheep are once you've bred 40-50 of them? Extremely loud. Luckily I've found that I can make a weird blocky-looking object out of their wool that somehow absorbs the sounds they make. Unfortunately, it also absorbs the sounds of any monsters that come up at night, so I have to be very careful around their pen.

I'm unsure of what to do next. Obviously I don't have enough power. I NEED MOAR POWAH.

I also need to see where these mysterious black giant men are coming from. The zip all around and get mad at me just for looking at them. They also hit VERY hard. Some of the more advanced machinery I'd like to make calls for their heads, so finding out where their home is will help me to gather more of their heads to make more machines to make MOAR POWAH!

(On a side note, I really could use more ideas for where to go next. I'm slowly working on the magic aspects of the pack, but I don't understand them like I do the tech. If you have any ideas on things you'd like to see, please leave them in the comments!)

 

[RealKC]

I suggest working towards a fusion reactor from mekanism

 

[Boqzo1]

Creative energy cell or RIOT! just kidding, perhaps go into automating more with AE?

 

[KingTriaxx]

Better still, Mekanism Turbines.

Visit the secret cow dimension. (Ars Magicka 2).

 

[fimbrethil]

I love your exploration updates. Maybe work on some magical objects to facilitate travel so you can more easily explore this world and possibly access others. I like Botania's sashes since they can be accessed very early in the mod.

Also if you have botania questions, please message me, I'd love to help!

 

[JaRyCu]

I suggest working towards a fusion reactor from mekanism

I actually watched a 30-40 minute tutorial on the fusion reactor yesterday or the day before. It looked awesome, but I have no idea what I'd do with all of the power.

Creative energy cell or RIOT! just kidding, perhaps go into automating more with AE?

I'm not even thinking about Avaritia for now lol! I'll get there eventually, probably. Maybe.

As far as automated mining, that digital miner is amazing. It does everything the ender quarry does, but doesn't take near the power. I can even tell it exactly what ores I want, and that's all it will give me. It has a 32 chunk radius, too. (Or is it 32 block? I've no idea - it just says "32" in the display.) It's given me enough diamond ore so that, after making 27 advanced solar generators, I still have almost 1000 diamonds in storage.

Better still, Mekanism Turbines.

Visit the secret cow dimension. (Ars Magicka 2).

Secret cow dimension? Wasn't that from Diablo II: LOD? I was telling @Boqzo1 that I'm loving AM2 by the way. I watched DW20 do 4 part LP on it before I started it. Unfortunately, it's been updated since he did the LP so I can't follow along with what he did. He also did it in Creative Mode instead of Survival, so it's taking a little longer for me to power up. Throwing lights everywhere doesn't give a lot of magical XP.

I love your exploration updates. Maybe work on some magical objects to facilitate travel so you can more easily explore this world and possibly access others. I like Botania's sashes since they can be accessed very early in the mod.

I'm actually working on an exploration post now. I'm puttering around with the Mekanism jetpack. I want to get into bees and farming, maybe even trees and butterflies, too, but I don't want to do them close to my base. @KingTriaxx and I were discussing a month or two ago things that could be done with Railcraft, so I figure I may go out a few hundred to a few thousand blocks if I can find a nice plains biome, and then build a full railway out to it so I can get back and forth.

One reason I'm doing this Blogplay is to force myself to stick with something. I have severe Game-ADHD, meaning I'll get into something, then start something else, then go do something else, and guess what? I'm also doing like 4 other things while I'm doing all of that. A project like this forces me to explore more and see what's up once you get to the end game on the mods. Draconic Evolution is the only one I've ever gotten close to end game on, and that was on my server when Infinity Evolved: Expert Mode came out last November.

 

[KingTriaxx]

You'll want to book a trip there. Trust me.

My go to leveling spell was always a touch mining spell. At the time there were three power levels so I could set it to low and strip-mine stone and not pick up any ores, but my level would sky-rocket. Then I could go back and fortune up the ores, or pick them out with the much higher mana reserves afforded by the higher level.

If the distance to a plain is more than a thousand blocks, I recommend ender-rails from EnderIO. Believe me, laying several thousand rails by hand is an exercise in patience.

 

[JaRyCu]

You'll want to book a trip there. Trust me.

My go to leveling spell was always a touch mining spell. At the time there were three power levels so I could set it to low and strip-mine stone and not pick up any ores, but my level would sky-rocket. Then I could go back and fortune up the ores, or pick them out with the much higher mana reserves afforded by the higher level.

If the distance to a plain is more than a thousand blocks, I recommend ender-rails from EnderIO. Believe me, laying several thousand rails by hand is an exercise in patience.

I was either gonna do the ender rails or rig up one of Steve's Carts that lays the rails for you and just let it go. I think the ender rail would be the way to go, though. I saw either Hypno or GamingWithCaffeine do a build with ender rails and it looked pretty neat. Can they carry passengers, too?

 

[KingTriaxx]

Yup. Direwolf used one on his quarry last season.

 

[JaRyCu]

This post is dedicated to @fimbrethil who suggested the I do an exploration post.

Day 8 - Exploring What's Around

Yes, I left that image wide open so everyone has to see it. You know why? It's because I've achieved flight with my favorite jetpack ever! So far I've had the pleasure of using the Angel Ring, the Simply Jetpacks jetpacks, and even the IC2 methods of flying, but this is my first go-round with Mekanism flight. I'll have to say that it's my favorite, and it was by far the easiest to make with the least investment. (It might be because I waited so late into my playthrough to get flight that it was so easy to make, but either way, it was simple as could be!) Even setting up the electrolytic thing-a-ma-bobber to separate the water into H and O2 was a piece of cake, so I don't know why I didn't do this sooner. After I took this picture, I upped this jetpack to an armored one, which gave me full armor. I love this thing! I've also made the Mekanism boots that let you fall from any height without dying. That way I don't have to waste fuel descending - I can just turn off the pack and free fall to the ground. AMAZING!!!!

To start tonight's adventure, I went and created 2 golden bags of holding, grabbed my glider and tools, and set off flying due south. From what I could see on land, that direction only held an ocean and I wanted to see how far across it was. It turns out that it was only a medium-sized sea. Easy to cross in the air, but too far to build a railway or other form of ground transport. I basically flew up to the (vacant) slime islands above, equipped my glider, and coasted until I hit land.

Spoiler: Landfall

I flew and flew and flew. Each time I'd get low to the ground, I'd fire up the jetpack again, gain some more height, and then coast for a while on the glider. I'll include some of the more memorable shots below.

Spoiler: Cool Things I Saw

At one point, I was caught in a horrible sandstorm. I don't know if the elephant made it, but I'm sure he did. I've yet to find anything that can hurt them.

The sandstorm lasted through the night, but I emerged into a field of flowers that bordered on an autumnal forest, and I caught a stunning sunrise over the horizon. It was so beautiful I had just stop and watch.

That night I was passing over a wasteland when the moon rose. Even though I'm on an alien world, seeing the moon like this in the sky reminded me on the nights on Homeworld when only one moon was visible.

This village apparently sprung up around an ancient witches' gathering place. They had built all of their buildings around it and even erected a large protective wall. Little did they know, however, that the witches had left two spawners in the ground below the ring. Once I dispatched both of them, the villagers celebrated me as their hero and invited me to come back whenever I wanted.

The witches of this world seem to have a lot of power. Apparently the group that built this circlet was able to raised the earth itself almost up to the slime island. They destroyed 1/4 of the island, but apparently the slime washed them out and they perished in the long fall.

On other notes, I'm beginning to understand how to automate the production of basic resources. I believe I detailed in a previous diary entry that I'd started a sheep farm. Well, it's working even better than I thought that it would:

Spoiler: Spoils of the Sheep

That image shows it right before I emptied it the SECOND time. I currently have over 5000 pieces of wool in my inventory. I only wanted a few hundred, but I guess now I'll have to see what I can build. Perhaps a giant jumpy house?

I also setup a tree farm since I was always in need of wood.

Spoiler: I Got Wood

Finally, I'm moving forward with building outlying bases for other resources. I've come across a large patch of the shimmering flowers, the kind that produce mana off of the sun and off of the moon. It's only 200-300 meters behind my base, just over the mountain in the large flower field. I built enough basic rail ties to connect to it, but I'm trying to figure out how to transport the mana back. I don't have any pictures to show yet, but here's how I'm producing creosote down in my machine room:

Spoiler: Creosote Production

I created a structure with 27 tanks in it. Each tank can hold 16 buckets of Creosote Oil, meaning that I can hold 432 buckets of creosote oil before I hit max capacity. I also had a voice from the heavens (named @Boqzo1) reveal the secrets of time dilation to me. In an epic voice, he said "JaRyCu, make a torcherino and click it." Well, I wasn't about to turn down that booming voice, so I did, and it sped up the coke oven by 400%. I may make more of these things.

 

[Steampunkr]

I believe Botania has a "minecart with mana pool" that should take care of that problem

 

[JaRyCu]

I believe Botania has a "minecart with mana pool" that should take care of that problem

Yeah, I built one of those as well as the mana pump, and I lined them up, but I'm not really sure how to get the mana pump to turn on when there's a cart in the station. I was getting tired and had some actual work to do last night, so I'll work on that more tonight when I get home from work.

 

[KingTriaxx]

You have to pump mana from a pool through the Mana pump into the minecart. Direwolf did an episode about it here: LP S7 Episode 113

 

[JaRyCu]

You have to pump mana from a pool through the Mana pump into the minecart. Direwolf did an episode about it here: LP S7 Episode 113

I just finished watching that episode. It completely blew my mind. Not just the train thing, which I'd already seen Riskable demonstrate (along with the spectral rail), but just geez golly gee wow. Now I have to go and watch the other several hundred episodes of that season to see how he did the rest of it.

 

[KingTriaxx]

Build a void world, build there because it has no terrain, or other interesting things. Problem solved.

Yeah, that's one of his better builds.