Redstone Energy Conduits

[namiasdf]

Implying that they would need to, along with these changes, bring along other changes.

It also will force you to use EU systems when you want on demand systems and use MJ systems when you want continuous systems. Though the exclusion of GT might make this difficult, for me whom plans to stay 1.4.7 4 lyfe, not too worried. I had already distinguished between the two systems long before these changes. I'm just happy that my fore-thoughts matched the intentions of the creator.

Is that intuition? >_>.

 

[SpitefulFox]

But a lot of MJ machines ARE on-demand machines! Show me someone, anyone, with a fully automated Inoculator. Even the machines that could reasonably be used in a continuous system could be used situationally. Not everyone's ideal playstyle is to set up ALL auto-systems to just pick things up for them. Making things like the Pulverizer demand constant attention is a massive middle finger to people who prefer manually mining over auto-mining.

 

[namiasdf]

No, no. I am suggesting that a re-organization of machines throughout these modpacks to fit with all these intents.

 

[PoisonWolf]

I don't build pulverizers and sawmills to be constantly running. I don't expect to be in the mines or running a quarry 24/7. I don't want to build an automatic tree farm or go woodcutting constantly just to get my money's worth. A lot of TE machines are extremely situational, so I see zero reason why they should all just waste power to punish you for not using them 24/7. Hell, the Rolling Machine is an incredibly niche machine considering that we're apparently supposed to be powering it at all times.

Yeap, I agree with this. Running quarries for the sake of running quarries....seem silly. It's like you're just cataloging the seed used to generate your world in an endless trove of barrels.

 

[egor66]

If any one is really that worried about mj power loss then gate the offending machines, old pack can use RP wire, newer packs RN wire, if you have a wall behind machines thats not already full of pipes/conduits then you could hide most all gates/wires, simple Has Work = turns on power/engines works fine in most cases.

 

[namiasdf]

It just means you can't have 10 billion MJ input for x time, use up that 10 billion then begin the 10 billion MJ input. Resource management =D

 

[SpitefulFox]

If any one is really that worried about mj power loss then gate the offending machines, old pack can use RP wire, newer packs RN wire, if you have a wall behind machines thats not already full of pipes/conduits then you could hide most all gates/wires, simple Has Work = turns on power/engines works fine in most cases.

I already do this with the rock crusher. It's an extremely niche machine, so it's not too annoying to reconnect it whenever I need it. If this starts to applying to machines I use more often, I'm going to have to put each machine on a separate circuit, which is going to be a lot of space and resources just so things can be "in theme". And if TE machines switched to this, it would almost completely invalidate the purpose of energy cells and conduits.

 

[lolpierandom]

I already do this with the rock crusher. It's an extremely niche machine, so it's not too annoying to reconnect it whenever I need it. If this starts to applying to machines I use more often, I'm going to have to put each machine on a separate circuit, which is going to be a lot of space and resources just so things can be "in theme". And if TE machines switched to this, it would almost completely invalidate the purpose of energy cells and conduits.

You could still use them as "buffer blocks" for when machines with high peak energy usage (ExB, for example) overload the normal capabilities of your energy network. I don't love or hate this change- it does encourage a lot of cool setups, but also dissuades me from using other cool ones. I chalk it up to inconsistent vision between many of the big buildcraft modders.

 

[Golrith]

The rolling machine is the one machine I disconnect from my MJ system, to stop it wasting energy, as it's idle 99% of the time. The advanced machines from extra bees have their own redstone energy cell, when not in use I throttle the output MJ to 1-2 MJ. That's enough to keep them running for my automated genepool, but not much wasted.
Now I've got to do the same for my entire base? Err, thanks but no thanks.

There's no reason for KL to change TE to match the BC ideal. Once the MJ hits a REC, it's in effect TE power. It can then follow it's own rules for it's own blocks. TE machines don't have to constantly draw power.

Seriously, the change to BC just feels like EU, with different types of cable for power flow, and a 100% lossy system. If you think it through, CJ made the strongest MJ producing item (the boiler), CJ had really the first lossy block (the rolling machine), and CJ has implemented the change to BC power pipes which is in effect forcing other mods to follow suit. Kinda feels like BC is being taken over and redesigned to work around the success of TE.

People loved the RECs and conduits, as it meant they could spend more time building stuff, instead of worrying about power. The REC was an easy way to see if your system was gaining or loosing power as you added machines. Now people will have to double their power setup to cope with the constant energy drain of every machine connected to the system. I don't really call that twice the fun.

 

[namiasdf]

I wonder if this will bring as much controversy as GT did. Everybody loving the controversy.

 

[Golrith]

True, it's a big change to a long established norm. Personally the old way of lossy pipes was better, as you could then instead use conduits to counter this loss, but at a much greater resource and energy cost. That seemed balanced to me. You get something better by paying more for it. Sure it got around the BC lossy system, but you've paid the energy/resource cost for this bonus.

Oh well, time will tell, as things settle down.

 

[Vauthil]

I wonder if this will bring as much controversy as GT did. Everybody loving the controversy.

Unlikely. People need to understand that these mods change over time and that while providing feedback on the changes is helpful, having an explosion over it isn't.

Additionally, I'm just making a personal extrapolation here (this is not Word of God, it's been a while since I've scanned the BuildCraft source for changes), but understanding how the old BC energy net ran versus how it runs now, I'd say a big consideration going into this was figuring out how to make the basic BC energy net run without the relatively high computer resource overhead it had on the back end in its older iteration. It was essentially always a no-brainer to use and encourage the use of conduit instead of conductive pipe for any large scale application simply because it was so much more kind to system resources to do so. Now I think that's been considerably mitigated, imperfect a solution as people may consider it. Sometimes there are compromises in vision that have to be made in the face of reality, and you have to dream up something else.

 

[namiasdf]

Well compromises are a fact and reality of design.

 

[egor66]

I wonder if this will bring as much controversy as GT did. Everybody loving the controversy.

No as its not near the same conditions, Both BC & RC are moving to what is there new systems, & yep TE has set the new standard, bit like look guys this is how it can or should be done, & TE works what greater idealism is needed.

 

[Bibble]

I made the point in another thread, but it seems a little more applicable here.

The two major systems (EU and MJ) used to be fundamentally different systems (talking pre-assembly table, here). IC2 was always a make-and-store system, where you could run it without storage blocks, but the intention was always to make energy to top off your storage. Even the nuke system shows this, as there is no penalty to stop-start.

BC was always an instantaneous system. You used the energy as it was produced, or it decayed and disappeared. The blocks using it (farms, quarries, fillers, etc.) were controlled by switching the engine on and off, rather than the machines themselves. There was an internal storage to them, but it was negligible.

The main change was made by TE, and it's rising popularity. It added storage, meaning that you could cycle and engine and use it's power later, and it introduced the processing machines, which are situational by design (as has been commented). The closest that was introduced by other was the rock-crusher in RC, which is pretty much supposed to quest chug through a quarry output, and not sit idle.

Other mods, like Extra Bees, followed the TE line, giving the machines storage and using it in bursts.

The changes are taking it back to the origins, and I'm not sure how it'll be received both by the wider community, and by the modders. Personally, I quite like the change in philosophy to differentiate the purpose between BC and IC2.

 

[namiasdf]

Personally, I had never really considered MJ and EU to be one in the same. Maybe it has something to do with the real world and what my education is for.

Finding a solution between mods should require some work. Power converters or the too-versatile steam-energy are counter-examples. Though, for what I have observed anyways, most people prefer the start-to-end game type of play style. They want an end goal to say they "finished" the game. I view my FTB base, as an infinite progression of creating things and then rebuilding them to be even better, for the sake of doing so and not because I have an end point in mind.

It's like giving an end-game to lego. I'd rather just play with lego and see where my imagination takes me, as nerdy/engineering-minded, that imagination is.