NuclearCraft - A Modern Physics Mod
- Thread starter turbodiesel4598
- Start date
Then, I hope yourMeh, in this case I'll just do regular backups
My base, or Cobbleton as I call it, never really looks "nice" per se. In fact it always looks like I've been running poorly managed nuclear tests now that I think of it.Then, I hope yourcraterbase will look nice with that reactor.
1. My plan is for the mechanics to be similar, but allow for more fuel rods, flexible sizes etc.
2. It's just the way the tile entity is coded - to prevent issues with another fuel of a different type being used after one has just finished, it waits until the result slot is empty.
3. The particle accelerator will have two uses - as a synchrotron or as a collider - these will be used to create synchrotron radiation and new elementary particles, respectively, which in turn will have other uses.
Ah yes, of course. So, it sounds like uranium and thorium should be made rarer, and perhaps thorium fuel needs to be a little more tempting.
Comparators do now read the heat of fission reactors (the comparator needs to be reading the controller), so that will make your plan much easier.
I think I might be getting Thorium from multiple mods. I believe Magneticraft is also generating Thorium, and so I'm seeing it to excess.
I noticed the reactors can share walls last night, so you can save a tiny bit of resources there. I now have a pair of 13x13s adjacent.
I don't think that's an exploit; it makes a reasonable amount of sense and it looks cool.
I'm still not sure how I'm going to work with all the fuel types. My thinking is I'm going to study the fuel chart on the NC wiki, and start with three reactors with three "basic" fuel types. So U-233 and U-235 in one, because they have the same heat values, etc. I'll attach a sign of some sort (Nuclear Control 2 prolly) listing which fuel types are safe to use in that reactor (anything <= same h/t) but primarily use only that one fuel type.
Another reactor would be for the big fuels, like HEP/HEP Oxide. Technically that reactor should be safe to run just about any type of fuel, but it would be pretty inefficient since its going to be jammed with a high proportion of coolant.
Lastly I'm thinking I might make a few small reactors (5x5 or something) that will be "speed" reactors which will process thorium. Spent thorium produces a viable fuel. I forget which. P-239 or U-233 I think.
I don't think that's an exploit; it makes a reasonable amount of sense and it looks cool.
I'm still not sure how I'm going to work with all the fuel types. My thinking is I'm going to study the fuel chart on the NC wiki, and start with three reactors with three "basic" fuel types. So U-233 and U-235 in one, because they have the same heat values, etc. I'll attach a sign of some sort (Nuclear Control 2 prolly) listing which fuel types are safe to use in that reactor (anything <= same h/t) but primarily use only that one fuel type.
Another reactor would be for the big fuels, like HEP/HEP Oxide. Technically that reactor should be safe to run just about any type of fuel, but it would be pretty inefficient since its going to be jammed with a high proportion of coolant.
Lastly I'm thinking I might make a few small reactors (5x5 or something) that will be "speed" reactors which will process thorium. Spent thorium produces a viable fuel. I forget which. P-239 or U-233 I think.
Are they compatible? You can just disable the nuclearcraft version if you want to in the configs. (which doesn't help with existing worldgen, but you can make a personal rule to trash the wrong kind; I did that when I erroneously left the NC worldgen on)
This was probably obvious, but just another fyi: speed upgrades do make machines run less efficiently. This can matter to people who want their energy production to have as little overhead as possible.
So efficiency-wise its more sensible to run multiple isotope separators than a single separator with multiple speed upgrades.
This isn't a problem, just a nice thing to know.
So efficiency-wise its more sensible to run multiple isotope separators than a single separator with multiple speed upgrades.
This isn't a problem, just a nice thing to know.
There is one thing that I've noted so far (finally starting on balancing NC for my pack [Although, it might be good as is]), is the number of fuels available. I don't know whether to assume that my players will actively use the majority of them, or if they'll just stick the easiest to make fuel in every time. I know I could force the former by largely decreasing world gen, but I know that approach is too harsh for some of my friend's playstyles(who love their stacks of materials).
Now, I was hoping to nerf the starting fuels heavily, to incentivize using at least 1 breeder to get into the better fuels, but that's impossible with the current config set. Any thoughts/suggestions on this?
Now, I was hoping to nerf the starting fuels heavily, to incentivize using at least 1 breeder to get into the better fuels, but that's impossible with the current config set. Any thoughts/suggestions on this?
By breeder in this case do you mean a "speed block" reactor?
To begin with you could consider severely reducing the amount of plutonium that can generate, and moderately reducing the uranium, and leaving the thorium more or less alone.
Yes, unless there's an easier/faster way that I'm not seeing.
I would like to avoid that if possible, but as you have actually used NC so far, I'm inclined to try it. I am considering using veins for these ores, however, so while it will promote getting the most out of your fuel early, I'm also concerned that they'll find a vein, and ignore breeders. Obviously, in the end, my players will find a way to go the "easy" route if they want to, but I want to nudge them towards the better fuels if possible.
I think I misread you: I thought you were concerned the players would ignore the weak-ass fuels and just run straight for HEP and such. This would be my larger concern, and its the one I addressed.
I guess my thought process was: if you have quarries of any kind (and in the fission age you probably do) then you're going to be finding tons of "nuclear" ores. Its really easy to pick and choose what you want. But by reducing the amount of "native" plutonium, you force players to acquire via depleted cells from other reactions.
Having veins of the stuff throws a wrench into the plan though. I'd be really tempted to stop plutonium from generating in veins at all.
Keep in mind there's no real "easy" versus "difficult" fuels. The heat/danger of a HEP reactor is just a matter of making sure you add more coolant than you normally would, but you're going to be doing that with any reactor anyway.
The greatest difficulty currently comes from the production chain to oxidize your fuels for the most potent types. The only way I know of to get Oxygen is via electrolysis of water. Electrolysis is slow as hell, so you'll want to spam the machines a bit and create a production chain to utilize it.
The "easiest" fuels then are non-oxidized low enriched uranium or thorium-bred uranium. But I'm suggesting you encourage their use via world gen cuz they're weak.
I guess my thought process was: if you have quarries of any kind (and in the fission age you probably do) then you're going to be finding tons of "nuclear" ores. Its really easy to pick and choose what you want. But by reducing the amount of "native" plutonium, you force players to acquire via depleted cells from other reactions.
Having veins of the stuff throws a wrench into the plan though. I'd be really tempted to stop plutonium from generating in veins at all.
Keep in mind there's no real "easy" versus "difficult" fuels. The heat/danger of a HEP reactor is just a matter of making sure you add more coolant than you normally would, but you're going to be doing that with any reactor anyway.
The greatest difficulty currently comes from the production chain to oxidize your fuels for the most potent types. The only way I know of to get Oxygen is via electrolysis of water. Electrolysis is slow as hell, so you'll want to spam the machines a bit and create a production chain to utilize it.
The "easiest" fuels then are non-oxidized low enriched uranium or thorium-bred uranium. But I'm suggesting you encourage their use via world gen cuz they're weak.
You know, this is why I need a full night's sleep. I was under the assumption that the "better" fuels required depleting the "easier" cells, but apparently you can just separate mass quantities to get the ingredients for most of the "better" cells if you wanted to. According to my NEI, it looks like the MOX cells are the only ones that work that way.
Way to create a problem where there is none, I guess...
However, I will take your advice about the plutonium.
Another question. How important is lithium to NC? From what I can tell, it's only used for fusion reactors, right? The default configs generate a ton of lithium ore, and it's ore-dict with Mekanism's lithium, which makes the later Mekanism stuff way easier then I want. However, if you do need a bunch of lithium, making people rely on Mekanism... (Actually it isn't a bad idea, since Mekanism's reactor is also gated behind it's lithium production, I would just have to increase the NC's output, or decrease Mekanisms power output.)
@turbodiesel4598, I would LOVE to see Mekanism's gases integrated with your cells. (Oxygen, hydrogen, etc) I'm not sure how feasible it would be for you, but I would love to give my players a choice between using Mekanism's way of getting gases or your way. I'm actually going to MT it in manually, I think, but it's just an idea.
Also, your plating recipes (iron, basic, etc) are... weird with the ore dict. I can use your tin/iron plating in other recipes, but other tin/iron "plates" don't get used in your standard recipes(they do, however, in the heavy duty workspace). Your "basic" plating is ore dict with lead, and your lead isn't ore dict at all.
ALSO, I just want to say that this is what I wanted Big Reactors to be, so thank you again for this.
Way to create a problem where there is none, I guess...
However, I will take your advice about the plutonium.
Another question. How important is lithium to NC? From what I can tell, it's only used for fusion reactors, right? The default configs generate a ton of lithium ore, and it's ore-dict with Mekanism's lithium, which makes the later Mekanism stuff way easier then I want. However, if you do need a bunch of lithium, making people rely on Mekanism... (Actually it isn't a bad idea, since Mekanism's reactor is also gated behind it's lithium production, I would just have to increase the NC's output, or decrease Mekanisms power output.)
@turbodiesel4598, I would LOVE to see Mekanism's gases integrated with your cells. (Oxygen, hydrogen, etc) I'm not sure how feasible it would be for you, but I would love to give my players a choice between using Mekanism's way of getting gases or your way. I'm actually going to MT it in manually, I think, but it's just an idea.
Also, your plating recipes (iron, basic, etc) are... weird with the ore dict. I can use your tin/iron plating in other recipes, but other tin/iron "plates" don't get used in your standard recipes(they do, however, in the heavy duty workspace). Your "basic" plating is ore dict with lead, and your lead isn't ore dict at all.
ALSO, I just want to say that this is what I wanted Big Reactors to be, so thank you again for this.
You got it right regarding Lithium. Its required for fusion. I can't tell you anymore than that since I haven't played with fusion yet (on the weekend maybe)
He's already fixed the plates ore-dicting on his side I think. Might even be in the latest release, he did it last week or so.
I don't really know much about mekanism. Is there any reasonable cost associated to getting those gases? You can probably minetweak that yourself via an added shapeless recipe if you figure it doesn't harm the balance. Personally I like the idea of alternative oxygen extraction processes; there's better ways than electrolysis.
He's already fixed the plates ore-dicting on his side I think. Might even be in the latest release, he did it last week or so.
I don't really know much about mekanism. Is there any reasonable cost associated to getting those gases? You can probably minetweak that yourself via an added shapeless recipe if you figure it doesn't harm the balance. Personally I like the idea of alternative oxygen extraction processes; there's better ways than electrolysis.
Well Mekanism's separator used for oxygen, hydrogen, and ditrium. Pump water and power in, it splits into 2 hydrogen and 1 oxygen. Pump in heavy water, get 2 ditrium and 1 oxygen. It's pretty power hungry (and I've turned up the power on it for my pack), slow without power hungry upgrades, and decently pricey.
Tritium is using an expensive (a few thousand copper, I think?) multiblock structure. You use that structure to turn water into brine, then reuse or build the same structure to turn brine into lithium. Then you use evaporators to get tiny amounts of tritium... It's an involved, expensive process.
I'm fairly certain ModTweaker works with Mekanism machines, so I'm not too worried about the recipe. Thankfully, I'm still in balancing stage, and my server won't get wiped for another month or so. I don't normally get much outside perspective when building my server's packs, so I have to say, this is quite helpful.
@turbodiesel4598 you might be amused to know that this HEP-Oxide reactor is actually stable.
Its turns on for around 2 ticks per second (not precisely but around there). The heat manages to accumulate to the point you see it in one image before it gets drained out by all the cooler blocks before the next 2-tick pulse happens.
Obviously this isn't amazing for on-the-spot power output, but in terms of squeezing out extra power per cell of fuel its kinda neat.
I have room to get a bit more power out. Wild guess, probably at least another 50k.
A comparable "safe" HEP oxide 13x13 reactor can probably generate around 305K RF/t. I haven't fully optimized that one either.
Question: other than speed blocks, what else can affect the longevity of a fuel cell, or is the wiki just outta date? The wiki says 1020s for HEP Oxide, but mine lasted just shy of 179s.
Regular reactor total output: 1,083,321,000
Pulse Reactortm total output: 1,948,547,673
Important note, these values also perfectly represent the different output rates per tick, demonstrating that there's no weird spin-up times behind the scenes ruining my efficiency.
Its turns on for around 2 ticks per second (not precisely but around there). The heat manages to accumulate to the point you see it in one image before it gets drained out by all the cooler blocks before the next 2-tick pulse happens.
Obviously this isn't amazing for on-the-spot power output, but in terms of squeezing out extra power per cell of fuel its kinda neat.
I have room to get a bit more power out. Wild guess, probably at least another 50k.
A comparable "safe" HEP oxide 13x13 reactor can probably generate around 305K RF/t. I haven't fully optimized that one either.
Question: other than speed blocks, what else can affect the longevity of a fuel cell, or is the wiki just outta date? The wiki says 1020s for HEP Oxide, but mine lasted just shy of 179s.
Regular reactor total output: 1,083,321,000
Pulse Reactortm total output: 1,948,547,673
Important note, these values also perfectly represent the different output rates per tick, demonstrating that there's no weird spin-up times behind the scenes ruining my efficiency.
Just to wrap this project up: this is about as comfortable as I feel pushing the pulse reactor:
As best I can tell, the "true" rf/t is closer to around 80,000 RF/t here. We're definitely not really producing 700,000 RF/t over any appreciable amount of time (4 whole ticks in a row will make your base go sadface) but it does squeeze considerably more life out of a fuel cell. Kinda neat imo.
As best I can tell, the "true" rf/t is closer to around 80,000 RF/t here. We're definitely not really producing 700,000 RF/t over any appreciable amount of time (4 whole ticks in a row will make your base go sadface) but it does squeeze considerably more life out of a fuel cell. Kinda neat imo.