Mekanism Noob

[Reddis]

The point of this post is to share my experiences with a pack I had never played.

I know Mekanism isn't part of (most or all?) FTB packs but this is my first time using it. I heard that it had 5x ore doubling and was so amazed that I added it to my Infinity pack. I decided that I am progressing through using 99% Mekanism and only going with other mods if I "have" to. (Big reactors feels mandatory to me)

At first I was very enamored with the heat generator. Completely free energy, I mean that is like solar, just cheaper to build right? I was a little frustrated that the ores seemed so sparse when I went mining but I decided that was to be expected for a mod that will give me 5x ores. Once I got up to 3x production I started having a huge bottleneck in the purification chamber so I started adding more electrolytic separators, and that helped, but I was still not producing anything at a reasonable rate of speed.

My next solution was to add more heat generators. I made this cool wall of them back to back, spaced out every other block, wrapped in universal energy conduit and encased in glass, 5 wide and 6 tall. Yes, 60 heat generators. While it looked pretty cool, it really sucked in all reality. I eventually fixed this problem with a big reactor.

I am now working on tier 4 of ore doubling and I want to say I am really enjoying Mekanism a lot. At first glance the mod has made it a lot easier to craft heavy duty factories, but there is a depth to it that feels very premeditated. The creation of steel ingots, the enriched alloy, even the fantastic offense and defense (for early game) of osmium armor, tools, and weapons! I especially love the universal energy cable and the pressurized tubes. So cheap and easy to make entry level stuff, but it scales up so well as your needs grow.

I know as I finish my tier 4 machines I will have to tear down my factory and rebuild it in a more ideal set up, and I am guessing again as I enter tier 5. I am really looking forward to figuring out optimal set ups. Anyway, I guess what I am really saying is it is nice to have to think about what I am building again, how this fits with that, how many of this I need to optimize that. If you have never tried Mekanism before, I want to strongly recommend it!

 

[Azzanine]

It is one of the more cerebral RF mods.
Also I hope you've looked in to the digital miner. I mean of course you have you are up to t4 ore processing.

In case you didn't know.
Essentially it lets you hand pick what you want to auto mine within a 64 block radius (the radius can be adjusted to be smaller if need be). You can use an ore dictionary filter to scoop up anything classified as an ore by typing ore*. The asterisks is a wild card so the miner will look for anything registered as oreWhatever. You can even set it to silk touch for a power cost increase.

Should solve your ore sparcness problem. Although I find it a little too cheap (balance wise), still less cheap than a MFR mining lazer though. As the machine will get you ALL the ore in a 64 block radius assuming you have the power. It gets pretty thirsty for power when fully stacked with upgrades and set to silk touch.


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[Reddis]

I have not looked at the digital miner yet but I sure will! I have had a heck of a time fixing my energy production issue and it still isn't where I want yet, but I'm getting there. Is Mekanism considered op or something? I'm kinda surprised to find such a great mod not included in kitchen sink packs.

 

[Azzanine]

The digital miner its self makes it op. Also how people just stop at ore tripling which is kinda simple to set up.

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[Reddis]

I definitely plan to get to 5x, just because that's why I am playing the mod =)

 

[RyokuHasu]

With mekanism in a pack you literally just need a few iron picks and go on 1 very fruitful mining trip and you never have to go mining again. With any Mekanism pack I rush the Digital miner after 1 mining trip using bare minimum machines and 2x processing. But really the mod gets into some pretty advanced stuff as you progress, such as various chemicals and plastics, long complicated machine lines to produce certain materials, and one of the best energy storage systems.

One thing I have to say is mass produce copper ingots, you will need a crap ton of copper for Solar Evaporation Towers, and you want to make several max height(18 blocks) of them.

FTB Horizons Daybreaker has mekanism, but many of the mods in that pack have been update since it's release. Not to turn this into a shameless plug but my pack has Mekanism as well as some other industrial tech mods that require a bit more thought like Pneumaticraft, Immersive Engineering, and Buildcraft as well as Logistical Pipes for storage and automation. It also doesn't change the recipes for stuff and the difficulty isn't set to hard. If you are looking for a good relatively easy pack to learn industrial mods with you might want to check it out.

 

[Lethosos]

Be ready to build "El Brino" if you wish to go full-on 5x ore multiplier. Heaps of copper, desert biome, and lots of power.

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[Reddis]

Not sure what El Brino is but it sounds interesting=)

 

[Lethosos]

Not sure what El Brino is but it sounds interesting=)

The Brine Tank. Major stuff gets a cute name in my books.

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[Azzanine]

With mekanism in a pack you literally just need a few iron picks and go on 1 very fruitful mining trip and you never have to go mining again. With any Mekanism pack I rush the Digital miner after 1 mining trip using bare minimum machines and 2x processing. But really the mod gets into some pretty advanced stuff as you progress, such as various chemicals and plastics, long complicated machine lines to produce certain materials, and one of the best energy storage systems.

One thing I have to say is mass produce copper ingots, you will need a crap ton of copper for Solar Evaporation Towers, and you want to make several max height(18 blocks) of them.

FTB Horizons Daybreaker has mekanism, but many of the mods in that pack have been update since it's release. Not to turn this into a shameless plug but my pack has Mekanism as well as some other industrial tech mods that require a bit more thought like Pneumaticraft, Immersive Engineering, and Buildcraft as well as Logistical Pipes for storage and automation. It also doesn't change the recipes for stuff and the difficulty isn't set to hard. If you are looking for a good relatively easy pack to learn industrial mods with you might want to check it out.

While Mekanism is quite quick to set up you are kind of trivializing the effort needed a bit. You need to set up a metalyrgic infuser and a crusher and the power production to run them. Not a lot of infrastructure is needed but it's not trivial either.

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[RyokuHasu]

While Mekanism is quite quick to set up you are kind of trivializing the effort needed a bit. You need to set up a metallurgic infuser and a crusher and the power production to run them. Not a lot of infrastructure is needed but it's not trivial either.

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and 1 good mining trip can do that. After I mine I make a basic windmill from Immersive Engineering, this can power all your machines fairly well until you rush something better. Then i make the infuser, and set up an enrichment chamber and a smelter. Followed by a crusher and a Biofuel Generator with wheat just hopped into it. I round of my rushed machine setup with a osmium compressor and start working on a Digital Miner. that's literally how my first few hours of mechanism always is. It's extremely easy and fast to get to a Digital miner which can just run of the 1 biofuel gen, after that I pretty much never have to mine again and it makes setting up the rest of Mekanism easier, it still takes forever to progress through Mekansim and takes the know-how but as far as early game goes you can get I do find it pretty easy and not a lot of effort is needed.

 

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Heat Generators are passive, but are trickle. Here's my suggestion: Set up a crusher to receive something you can farm plenty of (such as potatoes) into bio-fuel and have a series of bio-generators. They produce very good energy returns for very low investment. Alternately, look into making Ethylene for even better returns. Not quite passive, but very easy to set up recursive loop.

Wind generators are a relatively inexpensive way to power remote things like automated farms. Set them up on a tower, and run a power line down, for much better passive gen than heat.