Tech mods: Why have a power system?

[CreeperShift]

That it is a mod with a power system that is complex, and actually has reason to using, compared to RF/EU?


You are asking about "what's the point of power when it is pretty useless (in terms of gating)" in essence, and Rotarycraft adds a power system which requires attention, and isn't just plug+play

No I was not. this is my original post, I don't know who started talking about rotarycraft:

I've only read the first page and don't really have time to read through all of them, so hit me with a stick if this has already been asked/discussed:

What's stopping some modder from creating their own energy system, let's say with somewhat realistic/complicated properties, and then creating cables/pipes/whatever that connect to both EU and RF machines, detects those machines and only provides rf/eu power to them equivalent to the power in the pipes, or even special strenghts like a pulverizer needing a high current before it receives energy, or even explode them. If there was a mod sorely focusing around generators and wireing, with a neat config that let's users add rf/eu compatible tile entities to the list with custom strenghts, maybe even a public repository where people can submit these, I would definitely use it. I would remove any other wireing from my modpack instantly.

While it's not going to be the best solution, at least with something like that we could theoretically create a more complex/interesting (for those that want it) energy system while still retaining compatibility to the 2 major energy systems. It would have it's limitations like not being able to change the machines speed by increasing current/voltage, but at least we could set realistic limitations/restrictions on machinery. Power loss and such would be handled by the cables, so isn't something to worry about.

EDIT: Something like this would also allow for a choice. Some modpack focused around being hard and realistic? Throw it in. Some modpack like Infinity? Probably not such a good idea.

TL;DR:

Energy mod that replaces RF/EU cables, detects connected machines and imposes it's slightly more complicated requirements (not too much energy or boom, certain energy current, whatever) on those.

 

[keybounce]

RotaryCraft pretty much does do exactly what you describe there.

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ReactorCraft? If Reika could solve the "must be chunkloaded" problem, I'd toss it in as a "You gotta be kidding but go for it anyways" end goal. And then, probably ignore it myself. (One of my players has described himself as not having a life, and I've seen some really impressive builds from him).

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I hope you didn't read my response, and particularly the word "problem", as a negative. Problems are fun.

I read it as "Your question is badly phrased", nothing more.

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RotartCraft adds machines that ore-double, etc. The only thing it doesn't do is dimensions... which are NEEDED seeing as the overworld is infinite

What if you want different dimensions to be different?
What if you want no dimension to have everything available?
What if you are trying to make a server based on the concept of exploring different worlds as an alternative to exploring different chunks?

What if you are bleep bleep fed up with mods that can't be turned on/off based on dimension (either "Only run in dimension 0", or "Run anywhere except dimensions -1 and +1").

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What do you use power for? Smelting, Grinding, etc. has been overdone to death and seems to just be a reason to get more resources, just to do what with? Make more power!

Generally speaking, in Minecraft, you can do the following:
1. Mine stuff.
2. Craft stuff.
3. Build stuff.

Any sort of automation system is going to help with one of those. It doesn't matter if it's called NPC's, magic, tech, mystical, Time-alteration, or "Here's a bunch of bosses and new environments to attack them in" ... actually, that last one really is different.

What do you use power for? To run that automation. Whether it's food for the NPC's, steam for the machines, vis or crystals for the magic, symbols on paper and explosions on the ground where you wind up for the mystical, brass and sand for the time alteration, etc -- you are saying that you want to either avoid, or speed up, one or more of those three segments of the game.

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Why have a <insert adjective here> system in the first place? Maybe it's that you want to have tools made of bedrock -- so you ask "what would it take to break bedrock; what's the world model/view where bedrock can be broken, and what does it give off?". Then you ask what it takes to make and power that bedrock breaker; then what it takes to make and power the devices that make and power, etc.

Maybe it's that you want to have lots of NPC's running around, some to help you, some to fight you; then, what does it take to keep your NPC's happy, and what do the enemy NPC's want.

Maybe it's that you want to wave wands and zap things at a distance; what does it take to make those wands, how does it all fit together, etc.

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Some of these become games in themselves. Thaumcraft and Blood Magic do a pretty good job of saying "We are a game in and of ourself". In doing so, they add a 4th term to "what can you do in minecraft". But from what little I've seen/tried of both, that 4th term is dominating.

RF seems to be "Lets not become a new game; lets just make the first 3 terms/aspects easier".

Rotarycraft, so far, seems to be in the middle. "Here's something simple that will help with the first 3 aspects. But if you really want to, here's a new 4th game -- making power just because -- that will give you crazy excessive excess". End-game RoC is overpowered -- no one sane will say otherwise -- but what it takes to get there is kinda excessive. Well, blood magic is also excessive in the end-game (bound pick, just for starters; I don't know it's real end game); thaumcraft is probably excessive as well (again, don't know the end game there either). (And if RoC's end-game is excessive, Rotarycraft is just "Because it's there!".)

Big Reactors? RF's end game? Because of the very large number of mods that give you new RF blocks, RF's end game can do anything.

But of them all, RF is the only one that I know of where the end-game doesn't require a new, 4th game.

(I have not played with Pneumatic craft's pressurized air system. I have not played with MJ / EU / etc systems.)

 

[CreeperShift]

RotaryCraft pretty much does do exactly what you describe there.

No it doesn't. It's a whole mod around technology and progression. Not everyone likes it. I am talking about a mod that sorely replaces the rf wireing with their own, WIRES. But with loss, a slightly more complex energy system like rf voltage and rf current, detects machines that it connects to and apposes it's slightly more complex requirements onto those machines. I don't want shafts and gearboxes. (Don't get me wrong, I love rotarycraft but it's not what I mean here)

 

[keybounce]

Ahh. Then I misunderstood.

Perhaps ElectricCraft? It has a concept of current and voltage, power loss, wires, and it can convert with RF.

 

[CreeperShift]

Ahh. Then I misunderstood.

Perhaps ElectricCraft? It has a concept of current and voltage, power loss, wires, and it can convert with RF.

No I don't believe any mod can do this right now:

Example:

generator from said mod produces 200 rf/t and is transferred via said mod's cables to a pulverizer. Said cable connects and recogises said pulverizer, but oh 200 rf/t is too much for the pulverizer and causes an explosion.

(this would be like imitating EU style, could be expanded in complexity/logic however said mod wanted)

 

[shadowfactsdev]

What I would like to see is a more primitive version of RotaryCraft that focuses in on primitive power systems like water wheels and wind power in order to power stuff like grind stones and band saws. I know there are some mods out there that do some of this but IMO are burdened with a lot of extras that may not be wanted.

calclavia is rewriting Electrodynamics for NOVA. His goal for the Mechanical module of EDX is for it to be fairly similar to

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No I don't believe any mod can do this right now:

Example:

generator from said mod produces 200 rf/t and is transferred via said mod's cables to a pulverizer. Said cable connects and recogises said pulverizer, but oh 200 rf/t is too much for the pulverizer and causes an explosion.

(this would be like imitating EU style, could be expanded in complexity/logic however said mod wanted)

A side note, from a mod developer's perspective, what you're asking for, a system that universally replaces all other cables, would be extremely complicated, take a long time to develop, and probably be more complicated that just using a different mod that already does what you want.

 

[CreeperShift]

A side note, from a mod developer's perspective, what you're asking for, a system that universally replaces all other cables, would be extremely complicated, take a long time to develop, and probably be more complicated that just using a different mod that already does what you want.

I'm a mod developer myself, so I'm aware of the difficulty of this.

The way you said replace all cables, I didn't actually mean copy and replace every single one. I simply meant their own set of cables.

I understand that using a different mod would be the easiest way, but then I would not get any of the regular RF mods.

 

[Type1Ninja]

I'm a mod developer myself, so I'm aware of the difficulty of this.

The way you said replace all cables, I didn't actually mean copy and replace every single one. I simply meant their own set of cables.

I understand that using a different mod would be the easiest way, but then I would not get any of the regular RF mods.

Here's my understanding, and I *think* I wholeheartedly agree and came up with this same idea independently:
An RF cable mod, for RF and intended mainly for RF, which adds some difficulty/complexity. Rotarycraft is it's own thing; it is intended to be used in it's own family of mods, not as an RF bridge.

 

[jordsta95]

but oh 200 rf/t is too much for the pulverizer and causes an explosion.

So like when you overpower a Rotarycraft machine?

 

[Chocohead]

So like when you overpower a Rotarycraft machine?

Or an IC2 classic machine. Or an IC1 machine. Or an old BC pipe. Not exploding was a new idea in terms of major power systems.

What the idea description sounds a lot like is completely overwriting the RF API as soon as Minecraft starts to force every (RF using) machine to work with that mod's way of enforcing voltage and current, which suddenly opens up all sorts of outdated API problems.

 

[Ecu]

@CreeperShift and @Type1Ninja, may I ask how your suggestions would solve the concept of power inflation, or long-term usage? As mentioned in my prior post, it is fairly common for people to create more than enough power for their current tech tier, each tech tier. So, if that is the general use-case for power (basically a gate you have to achieve to reach the next tier), why not just do that? What reason is there for actually transmitting power?

What I propose 'we' (the modding community) consider for 'power' systems is to literally use it as a tier system.

• Each tier represents technology progression (Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3, etc.).
• A power generator for a given tier will infinitely power all connected machines of the same tier.
  • Alternatively (and probably better), it could maybe only infinitely power all machines of a lower tier, and only one machine of equal tier.

I believe these rules actually will offer a system that reduces inflation (as if you provide higher tier power, it is a higher tier machine). Power systems will not use as much CPU time as connections could be cached and would not need to transfer values along, just check tier level of network. In addition, helps move the focus from the power system itself onto what you do with the power instead, encouraging mod authors to create interesting progression tiers.

To give an interesting example of this in practice you have a windmill, which produces Tier 1 Mechanical Power (T1 MP). You feed that into a generator which takes T1 MP and produces T1 Electrical Power (T1 EP). You make two of these setups and feed a transformer structure which takes two inputs of T1 EP and produces T2 EP, which can be used to run a electrical furnace to smelt. Alternatively, because you've created a T2 EP producer, you can feed its power back into some motors (T1 EP -> T1 MP producers) and power multiple T1 MP machines.

I feel this kind of design keeps the concept of gating machines behind power still. It just accepts the idea that power really is just a structure needed to progress, and therefore can be more optimized to specifically provide those features.

 

[Type1Ninja]

@CreeperShift and @Type1Ninja, may I ask how your suggestions would solve the concept of power inflation, or long-term usage?

A previous post I made stated that I had a two-part idea for balancing RF in general:
1) Hardcore Thermal Dynamics - just more complex RF cables; an alternative to Thermal Dynamics/EnderIO
2) A community made "Highwire: RF" pack (get it? You have to balance on Highwire? ), which contains every RF mod ever. This pack would be on github, and people would set the configs for every mod in order to balance them against each other. A basic standard would be given, set at medium difficulty - the costs of various common tasks (like smelting or pulverizing) would be set beforehand in order to assist with balancing.

EDIT: Just saw this.

Or an IC2 classic machine. Or an IC1 machine. Or an old BC pipe. Not exploding was a new idea in terms of major power systems.

What the idea description sounds a lot like is completely overwriting the RF API as soon as Minecraft starts to force every (RF using) machine to work with that mod's way of enforcing voltage and current, which suddenly opens up all sorts of outdated API problems.

I don't think it would be impossible to check if a machine extended the interface for RF machines. I also don't think it would be impossible to either get something into the API (or just individual mods) saying "this is a tier x machine" or "x is the max RF input," and then have the cable network itself destroy the block and make an explosion.

 

[Ecu]

A previous post I made stated that I had a two-part idea for balancing RF in general:
1) Hardcore Thermal Dynamics - just more complex RF cables; an alternative to Thermal Dynamics/EnderIO
2) A community made "Highwire: RF" pack (get it? You have to balance on Highwire? ), which contains every RF mod ever. This pack would be on github, and people would set the configs for every mod in order to balance them against each other. A basic standard would be given, set at medium difficulty - the costs of various common tasks (like smelting or pulverizing) would be set beforehand in order to assist with balancing.

What you're suggesting doesn't solve the problems I specifically mentioned at all. Given a period of time (generally short.. less than a week), any player on a server will generally be able to produce enough power to run any one of their machines (and in many cases, all of their machines). This means that on servers, at least, power is just a tiering mechanic and the actual value is pointless.

While this solution still has a sense of power inflation (a.k.a. someone can make a higher tier generator than another mod), it is handled differently in that its actually higher tier. This makes balancing such technology mods a whole lot easier as progression tiers for power are simple and easy to work with. Neither of your suggestions seem to solve the power inflation issue as well as mine would.

I'm all for being wrong in this, but I haven't seen anything yet that points to actually transferring energy being beneficial. The challenge of managing a power system is generally either too complex to be fun, or too easy to acquire that the calculations to transfer the energy from one block to another are essentially wasted as my idea would be the same, only less of a CPU hog. Am I missing something?

 

[Padfoote]

So like when you overpower a Rotarycraft machine?

Such as? Last time I used RoC heavily (back in the 1.6 era) machines typically got faster when giving them more power.

 

[jordsta95]

Such as? Last time I used RoC heavily (back in the 1.6 era) machines typically got faster when giving them more power.

It might be me mis-remembering as I never messed around with it too much. But I remember being careless with my machines/engines always made me cry... It may have been engines exploding when they got too hot/too fast/etc.

 

[Chocohead]

I don't think it would be impossible to check if a machine extended the interface for RF machines. I also don't think it would be impossible to either get something into the API (or just individual mods) saying "this is a tier x machine" or "x is the max RF input," and then have the cable network itself destroy the block and make an explosion.

Then you end up with a 2 tier RF system of those mods that implement tiers and max input and those that don't. I wonder which one people would end up using... Even if that did work, which it could if people cooperated, there would always be that mod that would have tier 1, MAX_INT input to ignore it. You can't win without defining tiers by input amount, which leads to other issues of where do you define the different tiers, which of course is different for different mods.

If it wasn't in the API, checking for everything that did implement it would limit it to that mod's cables only, which defeats the point of trying entirely as you could just disable every other form of RF transfer and use it's special cables instead, removing the need for anything else to do the checking.

 

[Padfoote]

It might be me mis-remembering as I never messed around with it too much. But I remember being careless with my machines/engines always made me cry... It may have been engines exploding when they got too hot/too fast/etc.

Certain engines would explode if they were damaged or you let them run too hot, yes, but I cannot think of a single machine that explodes if you give it too much power. This is ignoring the fact that many machines will now do multiple operations per tick when given enough power.

 

[jordsta95]

Certain engines would explode if they were damaged or you let them run too hot, yes, but I cannot think of a single machine that explodes if you give it too much power. This is ignoring the fact that many machines will now do multiple operations per tick when given enough power.

Oh, my bad for misinformation :/
It's been a while since I properly touched RoC, and last I touched it was with GT, so I may be thinking of GT machines not RoC ones :/

 

[Padfoote]

Oh, my bad for misinformation :/
It's been a while since I properly touched RoC, and last I touched it was with GT, so I may be thinking of GT machines not RoC ones :/

That definitely sounds like GT and not RoC.

 

[KingTriaxx]

Rain would also explode GT machines, and I've run RoC stuff underwater.