Looking to create a speed set-up guideline.

[NauFirefox]

Hey folks,
I've been on and off playing FTB for a long time. I've run a couple servers, all until our group got bored with it. Generally the one thing that burns out most our people, is starting up.

Lack of resources, convenience, and storage issues (a personal peeve of mine), all build up and people never really finish projects they want to work on because they lack the materials to do it. They don't quite want creative mode. But they also don't want to put so many hours into farming thousands of quartz when they could wait for someone to get an automated quarry or something up. At the end of the day, this is just a playstyle for some of them, and we all have minor frustrations. But we keep coming back, and that's what matters.

What I'm looking to create. [With your help]

A step by step guideline for going from breaking trees with your hands, to automated farms and draconic armor. I'm looking to create guidelines for both Hard and Normal.

Yes, I do realize a guideline for hard is hypocritical in a few ways.

My old notes looked like this:
edit: to save space, I'll be editing this list to be the new NORMAL guideline.

Community
Getting started fast

• Glider
• charcoal
• potato's
• tinkers construct
• more charcoal
• Golden bag of holding / Miners bag
• Workstation
• botania sash and rings
• mystcraft

Early power

• Solar power
• Ender IO machines
• ME drives and Applied energistics
• Face the ender dragon?
• Quarry, of the ender variety

Late game

• Big Reactors

Mods to try

• Witchery
• blood magic
• engineering
• twilight forest

A small note, we don't follow this list religiously.
The list isn't for fun, it's for efficiency. The game is for fun.

I'll add the Hard list here as I create it.
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Early tools?
Early machines?

 

[Inaeo]

Maybe it's a playstyle thing, but I see some major differences in what you and I consider "early game.". By the time solar is an option for me, I already have basic infrastructure in place (else I couldn't build the panels) running on a different power system. Solar becomes reliable trickle backup power, unless I dedicate myself to making fields of them. In that case, I'll do my best to automate the process, which again, requires a steady power flow beforehand. Anyways...

People playing modded MC often forget that sometimes the best way to get started in a world is to play Vanilla. Punch your trees, make basic tools (maybe rush TiCo, I suppose), rush a bed if you see sheep about (because why deal with your first night naked if you don't have to?), basic hovel, and shaft to bedrock. Get some farms going early, because leather won't grow on trees, and living off apples and rotten flesh is no way to live. I prefer this approach because it is universally useful for most modpacks, and where I go from here often depends greatly on what mods and materials I have at my disposal.

If you have the leather for it, the Traveller's Gear (TiCo) and a hang glider are very useful early game. If you have the wool, bags are an easy way to make life more tolerable, thus I make them a priority before I spend a great deal of time mining (which means my mining trips last that much longer, and net more resources per trip).

The best advice I have after that is choose where you want to end up, plan your attack, and execute. I love the BiblioCraft Clioboard for this, as my memory is comparable to goldfish. In fact, BiblioCraft adds tool racks and shelves that help keep work areas tidy, whilst still having needed tools readily accessible. Never let anyone convince you that OCD is a bad thing - a place for everything, and everything in its place.

Try to enjoy the simple life of early game, because once its gone, there's no going back. And remember, "Those that fail to prepare have, in fact, prepared for failure."

 

[JaRyCu]

In vanilla, there's definitely room for a step-by-step guide because there are certain things you need to do in order to get to the next thing.

In Infinity, DW20, etc., there's no direct route to take. Maybe you're more comfortable jumping straight into Botania or Mekanism or TE. Maybe I'm more comfortable hunting for sheep and getting 3 planks to make a bed with, then digging a hole and immediately putting together a smeltery, making a stone hammer and mining down at Y6 for a bit.

I think your guide would be helpful for someone who's never played before, but I know when I first found Infinity a few months ago, I read every single "Getting Started with...." guide on the FTB site to see what each mod did and what sounded interesting to me. Heck, I still read the guides to see what I'm missing.

How are you going to decide where to start? Why do you go for a potato farm? I like wheat better as I can grind it into flour, bake it into bread, then bake that into toast.

I think your idea has merit...but I'm not sure how useful it'll be in the long run.

 

[Inaeo]

The best course may indeed be a Vanilla starter guide, with prompts as to which mods can be delved into at certain checkpoints along the way and notes for mod's that require certain resources in bulk.

For instance, Thaumcraft requires Shards and gold to get started. Seeing as gold can be a gating factor, it would be prudent to mention that a minimum of two gold are needed to start, while progression requires shards, shimerleaf, Greatwood, Silverwood, more gold, significant iron investment, and a boatload of glass. Maybe a note as well that the mod is relatively light on Redstone usage. This way, someone interested in this mod will know it is a good idea to start looking for and hoarding these things. Without this advice, players get discouraged when they constantly find themselves short of the materials needed, and have to break meaningful progress to go collect basic chores.

Other things to note are cross mod interactivity that either helps or hurts progress. Going back to the Thaumcraft example, something such as a Forestry Grafter (or Manasteel Grafter if Botania is also involved) can make the first Silverwood you find much more rewarding than the Vanilla prospect of one, or sometimes no, sapling after cutting g it down. Even noting that the Boots of the Traveller and a Sojourner's Sash stack in multiple ways, but your Server console will swear you "moved wrongly" every step you take. Maybe a suggestion for add-on mods, such as Node Tracked would be helpful - I know that early game "Node Humping" (running around the countryside trying to fill my wand after each crafting) is one of the mechanics that has kept me from progressing more than once - my savior this world has been a Botania Manasteel Capped Livingwood Wand..

Making a guide to get started in a Kitchen Sink lack should really be just this. Getting started. A basic outline of expected cost and known challenges and solutions for each mod would be handy, but after that, in depth guides already exist for most mods.

 

[Hambeau]

I may be wrong, but this guide strikes me as being for the type of player who doesn't really want to stop and smell the flowers, instead wanting to hit "end-game" as quickly as possible by eliminating trial and error. That's ok, as the game allows you to play the way YOU want to... I just don't see such a guide as being generally useful. If I were to use such a guide I'd probably never learn recipes and rely on the guide for that info.

For example, when I was first learning TiCo I saw the recipe for the tool forge was a tool station, 3 seared blocks and 4 iron blocks (this was before NEI showed every possible recipe for items). I built a few like that at first (I start new worlds every time I update a pack) then one time I had very little iron but a ton of aluminum so I figured "why not?" and it worked! From that point I'd watch various videos and see people with a lot of a 'useless' resource waiting until they had exactly what the recipe called for.

I'm learning new things all the time that are considered 'off the beaten path' (did you know you could put up to 3 taps on a smeltery drain?) and enjoy the experimenting, but that's just me.

 

[NauFirefox]

I may be wrong, but this guide strikes me as being for the type of player who doesn't really want to stop and smell the flowers, instead wanting to hit "end-game" as quickly as possible by eliminating trial and error. That's ok, as the game allows you to play the way YOU want to... I just don't see such a guide as being generally useful. If I were to use such a guide I'd probably never learn recipes and rely on the guide for that info.

For example, when I was first learning TiCo I saw the recipe for the tool forge was a tool station, 3 seared blocks and 4 iron blocks (this was before NEI showed every possible recipe for items). I built a few like that at first (I start new worlds every time I update a pack) then one time I had very little iron but a ton of aluminum so I figured "why not?" and it worked! From that point I'd watch various videos and see people with a lot of a 'useless' resource waiting until they had exactly what the recipe called for.

I'm learning new things all the time that are considered 'off the beaten path' (did you know you could put up to 3 taps on a smeltery drain?) and enjoy the experimenting, but that's just me.

I think of this guide as a map, pointing me to new fields of flowers, and what i'll need along the way. A big part of it is because of just how expansive Infinity is. Running into issues with glass in TC and similar issues cause frustration. And I'm looking to mitigate that. Not stop it, just help reduce it. Maybe I worded it badly. For example, I didn't know of a glider for the longest time. Now I can't play without it, it's easy to build and I consider it a must have first-hour item. A golden bag of holding was one of my first items I made with diamonds, and then I discovered mining bags, I could save the diamonds while isung a few mining bags to gather resources for the mod i wanted at that time.

These are the things I'm looking to collect. The most useful items, and the things they require. I didn't even know of charcoal for a long ass time, and that's bloody vanilla >_<

 

[Hambeau]

I think of this guide as a map, pointing me to new fields of flowers, and what i'll need along the way. A big part of it is because of just how expansive Infinity is. Running into issues with glass in TC and similar issues cause frustration. And I'm looking to mitigate that. Not stop it, just help reduce it. Maybe I worded it badly. For example, I didn't know of a glider for the longest time. Now I can't play without it, it's easy to build and I consider it a must have first-hour item. A golden bag of holding was one of my first items I made with diamonds, and then I discovered mining bags, I could save the diamonds while isung a few mining bags to gather resources for the mod i wanted at that time.

These are the things I'm looking to collect. The most useful items, and the things they require. I didn't even know of charcoal for a long ass time, and that's bloody vanilla >_<

Cool. One thing you'll want to look out for is that certain tricks are only going to work with multiple specific mods installed. A technique I use all the time in Direwof20 and Infinity Evolved (normal):

1. Build 4 vanilla furnaces and use them until I can get Redstone, Pistons and Iron.
2. Convert at least two of the furnaces into Extra Utilities Survivalist Generators after making a storage cell of some type, usually an EnderIO Capacitor. Burn coal/charcoal to charge the cell to run EnderIO's Sag Mill, for ore doubling with a chance of side products and Alloy Smelter for Ores/Alloys and faster cooking of food for step 3.
3. After I get a surplus of crops I convert the Survivalist Generators into Culinary Generators. These gems burn food instead of minerals for fuel. "raw" food like bread and potatoes produce power but their "cooked" versions, toast and baked potatoes produce more (I'm not sure if which mod produces toast, probably Pam's Harvestcraft).

The more "satiation" a food produces the more energy it has... With Pam's Harvestcraft you can get quite a lot of renewable energy, and with Agricraft enhanced seeds you can harvest a full stack of wheat or potatoes from a tiny plot 4x4 blocks in size. This example uses 4 mods in Infinity, 3 in Direwolf20 since it doesn't include Agricraft (it will also require larger farms). I usually keep the Culinary Generators around for emergency power after moving on to something bigger.

Hope this helps.

 

[Inaeo]

It sounds counterintuitive, but don't build a Big Reactor. Use the Yellorium + Sand = Cyanite recipe to go straight to the Turbine. Power the Turbine with this system:

http://forum.feed-the-beast.com/threads/free-power-the-self-sustaining-turbine.99521/

Using this, your power needs are taken care of for most people. Since you're skipping the resource investment of the Reactor, you can get the Turbine up and running that much faster.

You can start off with a small Turbine and fewer Boilers if you are strapped for materials, just make sure that it is producing enough RF/t to cover the Fabricator and Transposer, and it will run forever.