My personal issue with IC2 and similar mods

[Neko303]

Some mods don't have the right mindset. I love IC2, don't get me wrong. It was the 4th mod I ever used and the last 3 were just bookcases and armor stands. Punishing players for experimentation is not the right mindset for a minecraft mod. Buildcraft is guilty of this too but IC2 is the larger culprit.

Back in vanilla, I never had a creative test world. Redstone was rather plentiful and most things weren't that expensive but the most important thing was, most things don't get destroyed unless your messing with lava and fire or making TNT cannons. That's what IC2 felt like, playing with fire and lava in a wooden house and building TNT cannons. Once you got the hang of things and learned how it worked, everything turns out fine. Until then, things usually went up in flames or resulted in explosions to the face. The thing is punishing players for messing up stifles creativity.

My friends and I would have private servers for ourselves. In vanilla, we made a railroad system. we all hopped on and messed around until it worked. When we were playing IC2 building would start with half of us logging out and checking what doesn't blow up. While we were building an airship with Redpower2, we were just randomly slapping things together and laughing at how trees got stuck onto our frames. Even if you didn't know what you were doing (believe me, most of us didn't) we weren't afraid of "helping" out. Worst case scenario, our block breakers started eating themselves.

IC2 felt like Murphy's Law: The Game. Gregtech cranked it up to 11. Honestly, I don't mind the costs, just how easily GT stuff blow up and result in chain explosions. In Redpower, incompatible wires didn't connect. Thermal Expansion machines didn't blow and let you get pretty creative with them. TE engines were also much more forgiving.

This post is just my opinion. I'm kinda urged to make a reverse Gregtech mod. Won't make things cheaper but instead makes things more forgiving. Creativity is the heart of Minecraft after all. What do you think and what's your opinion?

 

[PeggleFrank]

You can still be creative with IC2. It's just meant to punish you for screwing things up.

There isn't much clay to work with in IC2, though. Most of the machines have a specific purpose that can't be used to do anything interesting or dynamic.

If IC2 implemented frames instead of RP2, it would still be just as fun to muck around with, but you would be required to make an at least somewhat sensible design to actually make the thing work. RP2 just tends to be a bit more subtle and less in your face when you don't set something up correctly.


All mods punish you in some way for messing things up. The consequences are just more subtle than IC2's consequences. In TE, if you don't set up your power network right to power your machines, you go without power. In RP2, if you don't set up your frame machines right, they can smash wiring against the ceiling and delete it, wasting your resources. In BC, if you make power loops your pipes will blow up. Do you see the consequences that every mod has?

IC2 is quite harsh if you break things or if you don't understand what you're doing. Gregtech takes that to the next level. It doesn't mean that they're too hard, or they're unbalanced, it just means that you have to be a bit more careful when setting things up.




I'm tired. I may have screwed up the context.

 

[Mjw]

blah blah blah

aw why did you remove the counter in your sig?





i'm too lazy to look at a google doc

 

[Fuzzlewhumper]

aw why did you remove the counter in your sig?





i'm too lazy to look at a google doc

I looked at it for ya.

I give it a 2 out of 5 Internets. It didn't have any fancy graphics, no music, not even an animated gif of a certain cat.

 

[namiasdf]

IC2 is my favorite mod of them all heh. EU is a fun system. Greg tech makes it so much more rewarding.

 

[SonOfABirch]

"I don't like IC2 as when I didn't know how to use it it punished me"

What a boring game it would be if it was super easy to get everything right first time.. :/

 

[egor66]

What I take form this is, has the fun been lost in all these mods & one in particular, for me its yes & no, I enjoy making machine systems & automating, testing how items work with each other is a big part of this & yes the one mod that makes this more or less impossible I do not use atm, not really for this reason more for the antics of the author him self. but yes I get it, I pity any one coming to these packs atm as with out some grounding its easy to get swamped by the many many mods in each pack & the sheer number of items, but that said its very addictive as well with the speed taht MC & the mods has been changing updating since I started, its a little mind boggling to even consider how I would manage now starting out fresh.

I will not comment on GT as I fear I may lose my temper, the rest of the mods in the packs all have there own good & bad points some are fine alone some are way to OP when used along side xx mod, this the team spent a lot of time ironing out to at least attempt to make the packs as balanced as they can be.

As to some of the other mods you mentioned there BC pipes are under going an over haul & we will see some item pipes from another well know mod that I beleave will take the mod scene by storm, put it this way if you like any mod thats not updating &/or adding new or improved items is stagnant & is being left behind by the mods that update & roll out new strange, weird & wonderful items, search the forums for is IC2 dead or the likes posts, IC2 as a mod updates seldom & ppl complain, as a core mod for addons it still doing well.

So you can please every one all the time ?, I for one enjoys things as they are atm, when the day comes I do not, well you can guess the rest.

 

[Loufmier]

"I don't like IC2 as when I didn't know how to use it it punished me"

What a boring game it would be if it was super easy to get everything right first time.. :/

it would be too easy indeed. but there is a difference between "game is difficult" and "game is a dick". and it seems that second applies more to IC2(and it`s modpack expansion addon) than first.

 

[Tabu]

• Ask a Question
• Do Background Research
• Construct a Hypothesis
• Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment
• Analyze Your Data and Draw a Conclusion
• Communicate Your Results

You went right to step 4...
Step 2 is very important, if things blow up you clearly skipped that step. That is not the mod punishing you, it is you punishing yourself.

 

[Neko303]

All mods punish you in some way for messing things up. The consequences are just more subtle than IC2's consequences. In TE, if you don't set up your power network right to power your machines, you go without power. In RP2, if you don't set up your frame machines right, they can smash wiring against the ceiling and delete it, wasting your resources. In BC, if you make power loops your pipes will blow up. Do you see the consequences that every mod has?

IC2 is quite harsh if you break things or if you don't understand what you're doing. Gregtech takes that to the next level. It doesn't mean that they're too hard, or they're unbalanced, it just means that you have to be a bit more careful when setting things up.

My issue is in multiplayer, my friends prefer to share a base. Jolly cooperation and all that. None of us want to be that one guy who blows up the whole base. We make tons of mistakes. Hooking up a energy cell to itself and short circuiting it was one of them. We lost about 10,000MJ before we realized it was short circuiting itself. It's a loss but it's not a big one. I didn't know about the RP2 wires disappearing. I mentioned BC but didn't go into it. Thaumcraft 3 has a punishment for messing up too but it's not too harsh IMO.
When my friends who were new to FTB tried it out at first, they gave me all their IC2 machines and told me "Hook this up for me, I don't want it to blow". When they messed with RP2 they weren't afraid of jumping right in and playing around with logic gates until they worked. I had to troubleshoot a few times but they weren't afraid of trying.

IC2 is my favorite mod of them all heh. EU is a fun system. Greg tech makes it so much more rewarding.

I agree, it is. It's just that being the manifestation of Murphy's law deter people from getting into it.

"I don't like IC2 as when I didn't know how to use it it punished me"

What a boring game it would be if it was super easy to get everything right first time.. :/

None of us got anything right the first time.
I feel that it should encourage experimentation rather than looking up the answer by letting us try again until we get it right. When we do get it right we tend to go "All right, noone touch it. We don't want another one to blow!" and treat it like Jenga.

• Ask a Question
• Do Background Research
• Construct a Hypothesis
• Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment
• Analyze Your Data and Draw a Conclusion
• Communicate Your Results

You went right to step 4...

Step 2 is very important, if things blow up you clearly skipped that step. That is not the mod punishing you, it is you punishing yourself.

At this point, most of my IC2 losses were from accidental right clicks
The problem is "Hey, wanna play this sick Minecraft Mod with me? Here, read this... and this...and that...aaaaand one more page there" Forestry is so much newbie friendly with their interface. They have a mini tutorial packed in each machine as well as a "Not working? Your missing this." page. IC2 feels like one of those hard to learn, and easy to master things. It's not very inviting to newer folks.
While we prefer diving head first into games with just the basics, we did look up a bit more for IC2 but even then we made a few newbie mistakes. That's just natural. Losing so many resources to slip ups deters us from trying again.

 

[sir_schwick]

I started playing modded minecraft with v1.4.2 Tech World. The first mod I decide to get into is IC2. Of course I didn't realize how NEI worked or how many recipes GregTech changed. It was very rough going, but made transitions to TE and RP2 seem miraculously intuitive. So basically I agree it is not neophyte friendly in the least.

 

[RedBoss]

There is definitely a huge learning curve in modded minecraft. It's compounded by a lack of proper documentation, constant changes, and the sheer volume of individual mods available. Some mods, like AE have fantastic information on their website, others lack even a decent explanation on their MCF post.

You can't really be mad at the OP for feeling this way. It can be argued that the majority user base of Minecraft itself is mainly young children. A 13 year old who sees his favorite YouTuber with a jetpack will definitely want to play a pack like FTB. So now we have a middle school student attempting to play a mod designed by someone who based their mod on years of engineering experience (just using that as an example). What we get left with is frustration.

The dangers in vanilla minecraft are obvious. Lava & flames are dangerous. Skeletons are not your friends. What isn't so obvious, will not kill you. Redstone contraptions don't blow up, at worst they cause lag or annoyance.

Should mod packs come with disclaimers? The 1.5 Beta packs had such a warning system. What should be done about documentation? Why isn't the official FTB wiki not at the top of search engine results? Should complex mods like GregTech be forced to accompany an update with explicit documentation via the wiki? Posts like this will not decrease unless we address some of these questions.

 

[Jemjem787]

Doesn't feel that way to me, not that hard to not make things blow up.

 

[Loufmier]

Should complex mods like GregTech be forced to accompany an update with explicit documentation via the wiki?

i dont think its a good idea. while lack isnt a good thing, but having another dose of eye cancer isnt good either.
yes. i do refer to new fusion reactor control whatever thingy.

 

[Neko303]

One of my worlds, I built a cabin near the spawn that led to a mystcraft world named Tutorial Island. It briefly explains the "getting started" process for each mod and what the mod does. Most of my friends still start out with Thermal Expansion or go for Applied Energistics' for doubling ores. While some may be cheaper they told me the primary reason was "They know how IC2 works but we don't want to make a mistake" A lot of IC2 mistakes are accidental slip ups. It's less of an issue of knowing and more of an issue of getting used to it. I know this wouldn't happen but a few changes would make it a lot newb friendly such as making machines take longer to mine, even with a efficiency 4 diamond pick, so people would instinctively realize "Oh right, this isn't the right tool" and keep the wrench mechanic as is. Machines and wires could simply refuse connection without a proper transformer like in RP2.

Gregtech Machines have one thing I really like: It reminds you of the proper EU input and includes a blueprint on how to build his multiblock structures. There's only 1 friend I can make IC2 stuff with and that's because we have the same experience.

I'm blaming too much on IC2. There's stuff that can go wrong everywhere. It's just that, when somethings going wrong in IC2, theres less time to react to it. I set my house on fire and we manage to put out that wing before it spread to the main building. BC engines about to blow, it starts blinking red. I messed up my programming with computers and accidentally armed my house against my guests... well, noone lived. That was entirely my bad.

 

[Revemohl]

But IC2 (and thus Gregtech) is the only mod like that. Guess why no other (popular) mods blow everything up if you put a cable in the wrong place? And I'm so damn thankful for that.

 

[Jemjem787]

If people are so concerned about machines blowing up, someone should add to the config, that machines won't blow up if used the wrong power source. Will easily fix this concern and won't affect anybody who disagrees with this.

 

[Harvest88]

If people are so concerned about machines blowing up, someone should add to the config, that machines won't blow up if used the wrong power source. Will easily fix this concern and won't affect anybody who disagrees with this.

Well now GT in the efforts of forcing people to not use IC2 machines to get around the ridiculous Overclocking costs, that in at least 1.5.2 and beyond that the machines are automatic versions as soon as they're crafted. So you can now know the voltage with the GT nerf of normal IC2 machines.

 

[KirinDave]

If people are so concerned about machines blowing up, someone should add to the config, that machines won't blow up if used the wrong power source. Will easily fix this concern and won't affect anybody who disagrees with this.

Objectively and provably: not a good solution. If it were, no one would complain about GregTeech.

 

[egor66]

Objectively and provably: not a good solution. If it were, no one would complain about GregTeech.

What! people are complaining about GT no way, sry I had too.