Tech mods: Why have a power system?
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So..... it wouldn't/would less irritate you if a power system that looks like that from rotary craft or something and EU are used instead of EU and RF?
That would bug me less, yeah. It would bug me a lot less if the two systems were actually used for different tasks, and a task you could accomplish with one could not be accomplished with the other. It would bug me the least if both were from the same mod/family of mods and there was an official, agreed-upon lore explanation for that, even if it's as simple as "RF is inefficient for rotational energy." I would be perfectly happy if, between the two of them, any tech task could be accomplished, as is the current state with RF.
@Type1Ninja to give you a perspective from another person who's not a huge fan of RF I'm going to jump in briefly. For me, RF generation isn't a huge deal, I neither like it nor dislike it (ignoring BR, I'll get to that later). If I want to, I can easily build a large generator room and go crazy with that part, which is what I like. What I dislike is the power transmission. It feels like a "throw a line of conduits down and walk away" system, which while a lot of people like it, I'd prefer to have a system a bit like the IC2 powernet, but with a handful of changes that I can't quite remember right now. The Big Reactors bit is one where I both like and dislike it. It's great because of the config settings and that I can set so much with it, but in the end it still feels like a system in which it's the system to use for power gen. So that's why I dislike RF. It just feels weird to me when I'm using it, but I understand why others like it.
I am curious about something though. You've mentioned the automation process behind setting up the power gen, however, would you still like RF if the transmission aspect of it was slightly more difficult? Perhaps not IC2 powernet or RoC level, but more difficult than it currently is.
I am curious about something though. You've mentioned the automation process behind setting up the power gen, however, would you still like RF if the transmission aspect of it was slightly more difficult? Perhaps not IC2 powernet or RoC level, but more difficult than it currently is.
This is a good post. I totally see where you're coming from, and it's clear that you see where I'm coming from.
I would definitely like it if RF transmission was more difficult; I think I mentioned it a couple times earlier. Automation processing is where the difficulty is, not necessarily where I want it all to be. If I could have both, I'd be very happy indeed.
(I've cooled down to "not angry anymore," so that's good)
This is a good post. I totally see where you're coming from, and it's clear that you see where I'm coming from.
I would definitely like it if RF transmission was more difficult; I think I mentioned it a couple times earlier. Automation processing is where the difficulty is, not necessarily where I want it all to be. If I could have both, I'd be very happy indeed.
(I've cooled down to "not angry anymore," so that's good)
I wouldn't be surprised if you've mentioned it a bunch and I've missed it, that's what I get for skimming things quickly.
So now the question is, what would be your ideal power system? If you could take RF as it stands right now and change it to how you want it, what would you change? I'm curious as to what you say; the last large power system debate I remember on here basically boiled down to ignoring forum rules, and the positions of either "RF is good because KingLemming made it" or "RF sucks because TE" (paraphrasing everything here obviously).
I don't know exactly how I would change it. If I had to organize rebalancing, I'd probably grab the devs and some experienced players from IC2, Rotarycraft, Gregtech, Thermal Expansion, and EnderIO. I'd then do a long discussion. That, however, merits it's own topic with heavy involvement from multiple forum moderators. I'm not going to start it.I wouldn't be surprised if you've mentioned it a bunch and I've missed it, that's what I get for skimming things quickly.
So now the question is, what would be your ideal power system? If you could take RF as it stands right now and change it to how you want it, what would you change? I'm curious as to what you say; the last large power system debate I remember on here basically boiled down to ignoring forum rules, and the positions of either "RF is good because KingLemming made it" or "RF sucks because TE" (paraphrasing everything here obviously).
If I had to actually do the rebalancing, I'd probably go with something similar to IC2 + Gregtech in FTB Ultimate, just because that's the only real non-RF system I've ever played with. I'd quickly rebalance it with the above groups in mind, though.
Also, it's totally possible for a sort of "Hardcore Thermal Dynamics" mod to come out, with rebalanced transport/storage, but not actually replace Thermal Dynamics. We really can have the best of both worlds.
(pack authors would pick which one they wanted when creating their packs; the argument that people would just use the easier one is invalid)
I don't know exactly how I would change it. If I had to organize rebalancing, I'd probably grab the devs and some experienced players from IC2, Rotarycraft, Gregtech, Thermal Expansion, and EnderIO. I'd then do a long discussion. That, however, merits it's own topic with heavy involvement from multiple forum moderators. I'm not going to start it.
If I had to actually do the rebalancing, I'd probably go with something similar to IC2 + Gregtech in FTB Ultimate, just because that's the only real non-RF system I've ever played with. I'd quickly rebalance it with the above groups in mind, though.
Sounds like it could be an interesting hybrid system if done correctly. That's something I wouldn't mind seeing.
Also, it's totally possible for a sort of "Hardcore Thermal Dynamics" mod to come out, with rebalanced transport/storage, but not actually replace Thermal Dynamics. We really can have the best of both worlds.
(pack authors would pick which one they wanted when creating their packs; the argument that people would just use the easier one is invalid)
Now this is the part that has me quite interested. This would be a fairly good way to make both sides of the debate happy without taking away anything that either side currently has. The only issue would be if the mod author is interested in optimizing their downloads, since I have a feeling that most people will float towards Thermal Dynamics rather than the new mod. That could prove to be a bit of a turn off for the dev.
The only way to make RF balanced (kind of a stupid thing to say really, it's like saying how do you make blocks balanced) is to incite modders to make mods that make it challenging. All you'd need is someone to make a pipe/wire mod that replaces the usual methods with more nuanced pipes. Doesn't have to be lossy but you could make it so the pipes will not transmit if over or under a certain threshold. Kind of adding a low, med, high voltage aspect. Maybe make ducts that are high yeild but only attach to cells and other pipes and not machines.
Then either in the same mod or a counterpart mod make machines that have specific quirky power requirements, maybe not have a power buffer any power that enters the machine is wasted if not used. Like a furnace that gets hotter the more rf per tic is going in to it making it faster but more dangerous to be around. Or a pulverizer that can only take 64 rf per tic give it too much or too little and it doesn't work or make it so it gives a higher chance for ore doubling or secondary outputs.
You also don't have to resort to explosions either, wlile it's effective it's a kinda cheap way to balance.
What is missing for me in most RF mods is there's no nuance to them, no need to regulate/turn off anything just hook everything up in a line on the best fluxduct and let her rip.
Has anyone ever wondered why energy cells allow you to stymy their output? Yes, TE cells allow you to control RF output. The only thing I can think of is so you can limit the output to things like quarries so it doesn't suck down all your juice at once. But once you match the requirements for this you don't need to worry.
This isn't a fault with RF either, it's an excellent tool. You don't curse the inventor of the paintbrush because of uninspired artists paint trivial derivitive works now do you.
Now as for having this work in FTB packs... that will never happen. To make RF more nuanced you need a concerted effort between like minded modders and pack makers to not add mods that trivialize RF. The current popular packs will never have technical RF mods as the players that play those packs are not interested. It will only work in a niche alternative setting.
You cannot as a modder force hardmode on to the mainstream, look what happened to old Greggy boi. Removed from the mainstream pack of the time and relegated to his own community. Sure he's probably better off but being shunned by the FTB community is something most modders wouldn't welcome.
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Then either in the same mod or a counterpart mod make machines that have specific quirky power requirements, maybe not have a power buffer any power that enters the machine is wasted if not used. Like a furnace that gets hotter the more rf per tic is going in to it making it faster but more dangerous to be around. Or a pulverizer that can only take 64 rf per tic give it too much or too little and it doesn't work or make it so it gives a higher chance for ore doubling or secondary outputs.
You also don't have to resort to explosions either, wlile it's effective it's a kinda cheap way to balance.
What is missing for me in most RF mods is there's no nuance to them, no need to regulate/turn off anything just hook everything up in a line on the best fluxduct and let her rip.
Has anyone ever wondered why energy cells allow you to stymy their output? Yes, TE cells allow you to control RF output. The only thing I can think of is so you can limit the output to things like quarries so it doesn't suck down all your juice at once. But once you match the requirements for this you don't need to worry.
This isn't a fault with RF either, it's an excellent tool. You don't curse the inventor of the paintbrush because of uninspired artists paint trivial derivitive works now do you.
Now as for having this work in FTB packs... that will never happen. To make RF more nuanced you need a concerted effort between like minded modders and pack makers to not add mods that trivialize RF. The current popular packs will never have technical RF mods as the players that play those packs are not interested. It will only work in a niche alternative setting.
You cannot as a modder force hardmode on to the mainstream, look what happened to old Greggy boi. Removed from the mainstream pack of the time and relegated to his own community. Sure he's probably better off but being shunned by the FTB community is something most modders wouldn't welcome.
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I am not talking about power gen here as power gen is the same for every tech mod, x fuel in =y power/work out. Even RotaryCraft follows this paradigm. Where it differs is transmission and useage requirements. I have not seen or heard of any mod that does anything special with RF useage that requires some sort of regulation.
That being said I could give that pack a geeze.
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That being said I could give that pack a geeze.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk
So, it is true that in the old days, when you smelted a villager, you got an emerald and 50% of the time a banana hammock? I always wondered where you harvested them...
More seriously, that is another argument that really complicated power systems might be cool, but appeal to a small player base. On the other hand, your comments about the de facto standardization of RF are quite interesting. I am not sure what I think about it. The reduction of diversity will upset the liberals ;-) But having something standard allows people to focus on other, hopefully innovative mod ideas in areas outside power systems. It sounds like a mixed bag to me.
For me personally I have always liked both RF and IC2 power systems. I eliminated IC2 from my packs because I felt that it fell into a black hole, and when it finally surfaced again it was being GregTechified. Don't get me wrong - I actually liked GregTech circa Mindcrack pack. But things with GT are more complicated now a days, and not necessarily from a mod mechanics standpoint.
The other thing that colored my perspective a bit was tick lag. Overall the TE power systems were more server and client friendly than the other mods.
I have to say, though, I like the current RF mod culture. Where IC2 had machines, mining, power, crops, recycling, jetpacks, etc. in a single mod, RF today has a number of mods that fill each of these niches with their take on what it means to be a jetpack, generate solar power, etc.
And I wouldn't mind having a more complicated power routing system as long as it is optional. I play with folks that have varied technical ability and thinking patterns and it would be unfair to have them face a square peg/round hole situation just because.
(I hope the above makes sense. It's early AM where I am at and I have had no coffee. :\)
The other thing that colored my perspective a bit was tick lag. Overall the TE power systems were more server and client friendly than the other mods.
I have to say, though, I like the current RF mod culture. Where IC2 had machines, mining, power, crops, recycling, jetpacks, etc. in a single mod, RF today has a number of mods that fill each of these niches with their take on what it means to be a jetpack, generate solar power, etc.
And I wouldn't mind having a more complicated power routing system as long as it is optional. I play with folks that have varied technical ability and thinking patterns and it would be unfair to have them face a square peg/round hole situation just because.
(I hope the above makes sense. It's early AM where I am at and I have had no coffee. :\)
Speaking as someone who has only just begun venturing into the modded Minecraft scene I can say the following:
I briefly played modded Minecraft in the Tekkit days, played around with IC and BC, never played deep enough or long enough to discover or use EE. It was fun, but I was mostly playing it as Vanilla minecraft with just the few added bonuses of facilitating resource collection which all went towards my building endeavors.
Coming back now, many years later, I am amazed to see the progress that has been made in modded Minecraft. A lot of anti-RF players will ridicule people like me who love multiblock structures, but I don't care. I love multiblock structures, I love the aesthetics that come along with them and the consequences that come along with them, having to build around them when placing them in your bases. Even after a few months I see myself moving away from the single block machines that are prevalent in TE or EnderIO and giving IE, PneumaticCraft and Magneticraft a shot to see how those mods work. I'm still very much in the process of discovering all the mechanics and features involved in those mods.
Maybe one day I will get bored of RF and all the "EZ-mode" features it brings, in fact its quite probable. But I will simply repeat what others have said, Minecraft is a sandbox game. I understand that the continued popularity of RF mods and the powercreep associated with them affects the modding scene negatively. But the community can fix that. Modpack makers can tailor mods to their liking through the use of Modtweaker to obtain the desired result. The niche for harder and more challenging gameplay can be met (and is already met, for the mostpart, there are a few Gregtech based modpacks and such, as far as I know). Just like how I see myself eventually moving away from RF and maybe giving Reika's mods a try, perhaps for the most part the players who are accustomed to RF now will do the same and gravitate to "harder" tech mods. So I really don't see the need to vehemently declare that RF is ruining the community. It really isn't.
Its almost like there's this philosophy where you have to tailor your mod to please the highest amount of players possible. I am pleased to see that a lot of modders are realising the futility of this and moving away from that design philosophy (I am excited to bear witness to what asie will do in the future). The beauty of a sandbox is that you can shape whatever you're working with in whatever way you want. I don't see why anti-RF players aren't satisfied with the notion that there are and will be modders and modpack makers that will come along to satisfy that particular niche.
The modding scene will change based on the demands of the many and that will never change. Trying to affect that by telling people what they should and should not enjoy out of their sandbox experience is ridiculous. If modders who do not enjoy RF or powercreep in general they should not feel forced to put out mods that "have to" offer something just as powerful if not more. Modders should just create mods that they enjoy making and playing with. The community will do the rest, RF lovers and haters alike.
I briefly played modded Minecraft in the Tekkit days, played around with IC and BC, never played deep enough or long enough to discover or use EE. It was fun, but I was mostly playing it as Vanilla minecraft with just the few added bonuses of facilitating resource collection which all went towards my building endeavors.
Coming back now, many years later, I am amazed to see the progress that has been made in modded Minecraft. A lot of anti-RF players will ridicule people like me who love multiblock structures, but I don't care. I love multiblock structures, I love the aesthetics that come along with them and the consequences that come along with them, having to build around them when placing them in your bases. Even after a few months I see myself moving away from the single block machines that are prevalent in TE or EnderIO and giving IE, PneumaticCraft and Magneticraft a shot to see how those mods work. I'm still very much in the process of discovering all the mechanics and features involved in those mods.
Maybe one day I will get bored of RF and all the "EZ-mode" features it brings, in fact its quite probable. But I will simply repeat what others have said, Minecraft is a sandbox game. I understand that the continued popularity of RF mods and the powercreep associated with them affects the modding scene negatively. But the community can fix that. Modpack makers can tailor mods to their liking through the use of Modtweaker to obtain the desired result. The niche for harder and more challenging gameplay can be met (and is already met, for the mostpart, there are a few Gregtech based modpacks and such, as far as I know). Just like how I see myself eventually moving away from RF and maybe giving Reika's mods a try, perhaps for the most part the players who are accustomed to RF now will do the same and gravitate to "harder" tech mods. So I really don't see the need to vehemently declare that RF is ruining the community. It really isn't.
Its almost like there's this philosophy where you have to tailor your mod to please the highest amount of players possible. I am pleased to see that a lot of modders are realising the futility of this and moving away from that design philosophy (I am excited to bear witness to what asie will do in the future). The beauty of a sandbox is that you can shape whatever you're working with in whatever way you want. I don't see why anti-RF players aren't satisfied with the notion that there are and will be modders and modpack makers that will come along to satisfy that particular niche.
The modding scene will change based on the demands of the many and that will never change. Trying to affect that by telling people what they should and should not enjoy out of their sandbox experience is ridiculous. If modders who do not enjoy RF or powercreep in general they should not feel forced to put out mods that "have to" offer something just as powerful if not more. Modders should just create mods that they enjoy making and playing with. The community will do the rest, RF lovers and haters alike.
This bit I felt I needed to address. Typically, the people who dislike RF (me for example) don't like it because of the "magic block" feeling, and the multiblocks are a perfect example of a fix for that. I'd rather have most machines be multiblocks, except for the possible performance issues with that many of them. So you may have this bit a little backwards.
As for the part on how modders should do their own thing, I agree that they should, but the amount of pressure on them to use RF as it currently is is a bit crazy. I'd ping Reika and let him talk about the demands he gets to use RF, but it isn't worth his time. So yes, there is a mindset that you have to please players as a modder, because if you don't many will flame you simply because they can.
So you mean automating potions without MFR or AE or EnderIO is trivial? Sure.
CC + add-ons for the rescue!!
I already made a script to automate inscribers that only uses one and uses simple tables for the recipes, if I did it right I only need to change the recipes in the table and it should work
That may be true. I just had the assumption that most anti-RF players had that mindset because I remember reading either here or on the FTB subreddit that "pretty multiblock structures don't solve RF". Which is true to some extent, as some multiblock structures are still fairly simplistic in usage, the only thing that really changes is the material cost. Basically a replacement to nested crafting.
I understand that its hard to always maintain a thick skin in situations such as these, not everyone is capable of doing that and sometimes even if you are you could easily crumble if exposed to it for a long time. But considering the amount of time and effort that goes in to modding nowadays it really should be the #1 priority of any modder to do it for the pure enjoyment of it. There are always going to be assholes who will pressure modders for one thing or another but that should not get in the way of your project.