The point of bees?

[hisagishi]

So I mean really whats the point of bees? The things they give just doesn't seem to justify the cost of time investment. (even if you semi automate it)

The only reason I could see having bees would be to have them produce some of the harder to find materials, such as oil. All the ores and such can be had from a simple quarry or any of the other mining methods.

What do you guys use bees for?

 

[un worry]

my current setup (mid-to-late game, Unleashed+Gregtech) is 12 alvearies with automated frames, housing:

• 1 refined (producing oily & refined propolis to fuel five 36HP boilers ... basically meets all my MJ and EU needs)
• 5 valuable (for the iridium. set myself the challenge of resource gathering for gravichest and fusion reactor without quarrying)
• 1 ruby (for processing into chrome)
• 1 diamond (just because)
• 1 volcanic|infernal (producing phosphorous for centrifuging lava -> tungsten and electrum)
• 1 impregnable (for titanium into mixed metal alloy etc)
• 1 emerald (for trading with villagers for mystcraft pages, and tree saplings)
• 1 Pure (for collecting aspects for use in Thaumcraft)

I've also bred and build up my stocks with Lapis, Sapphire, Earthen, Rusty and Corroded (cause you can never have too much copper)
A regular quarry would yield much of these materials, though the Ruby-Chrome and Ferrous-Iridium would fall short for end game Gregtech

 

[Niels Henriksen]

and the bees dont make big holes in the ground, they dont cost energy (except for frames), they dont make cobblestone that you need to void.

 

[Yusunoha]

So I mean really whats the point of bees? The things they give just doesn't seem to justify the cost of time investment. (even if you semi automate it)

The only reason I could see having bees would be to have them produce some of the harder to find materials, such as oil. All the ores and such can be had from a simple quarry or any of the other mining methods.

What do you guys use bees for?

if 1 bee doesn't give enough resources, multiply it a few dozen times, then it'll be worth it

 

[RamblinWreckGT]

I'm just about to start my first attempts at bee breeding (got lots of Meadow bees and honey combs stored up, as well as some silky combs for the eventual apiarist's suit), and I have no idea what I'll actually be trying to accomplish. So I'm using them for fun and for another challenge to tackle. Sure, I could always do it another way, but I haven't seen what it's like to do things this way. It's the same reason I'm building my energy production around ethanol instead of piping in nether lava this time around. Sure, it's easy as hell to set up a chunkloaded pump and ender tank and completely forget about it until it's time to move it a few chunks over, but I hadn't done anything with Steve's Carts or really even Forestry (hopefully breeding biofuel-friendly trees will get me into that), so I wanted to give that a go. Lots more resources, lots more time, lots more complexity, but lots more reward. There are times when I want the cheap and easy way, and there are times when I want lots of machines and moving parts all buzzing along on their own to make me feel like I've really made something substantial. That's why I went for Steve's Carts instead of MFR or Forestry farms, seeing the minecart that I assembled myself do what I designed it to do is very satisfying.

 

[PhilHibbs]

I use them to have fun playing the game. What's the point of anything in Minecraft, after all?

 

[twisto51]

Infinite free resources without ever leaving your base. Seems pretty straightforward.

I use them for glowstone, uranium, honey, royal jelly, pollen, oil, flux removal, node moving, very good exp farm, etc. It isn't a question of what bees can do for you, it is more of a question of is there anything they can't do for you?

 

[Ripley]

In my previous ftb world I wanted all the wall of my underground lair to be made of glowstone brick.
I could have mined in the nether for ages for glowstone(you need a lot for these bricks), instead I bred a bee to get glowstone, quickly made a few princess duplicates and voila! Tons of glowstones .

 

[Hammerson]

I like bees, they're so
Yellow and black, and yellow
And black and yellow

(example of a bad haiku according to H2G2)

The appeal of bees as means to an end is getting a replenishable supply of certain rare resources.
But the main appeal is bees as an end in themselves. Collecting hives, setting up the increasingly clever ways of automation, getting those weird and rare ones. Working out breeding strategies. Setting up outposts in different biomes to get started with less tolerant bees. Breeding super-bees. Working up to alvearies. Getting started with tree breeding (although it's technically possible to do that without bees at all). Making it all look good.

 

[Bomb Bloke]

The other side of the bee-coin is their effects.

You know the beacon blocks? Those things that chew up massive amounts of resources to get going, in return for something that has very limited range, effects, and is a huge chore to move? Those things no one ever bothers to build unless some mod recipe calls for one?

Well bees do what they do, but so much more. And once you've got a serum for a given effect, you can apply it pretty much anywhere you want in your world at minimal cost.

You want experience? Stand near a few explorer bees, a dozen or so at once will make your level meter tick over fast enough to make your head spin.

Healing, speed and so on are also available, but bees also offer negative effects that you can use in traps. Unstable, in particular, kills very quickly (something like two hearts a second per hive) - get a dozen of THOSE going in a pit and anyone without apiarist armour will die should they fall in.

 

[Vasa]

i like bees , but im bee noob never got better than noble bee .
but i just like them , i can get some different tipes of trees that are not in world gen and i can make honeyed slice and i like when they make so much flowers around apiaries and so

 

[PhilHibbs]

My friend likes to just plant random trees around the apiaries just because of the pretty coloured leaves.

 

[whizzball1]

They are overall pretty useful. It's fun to try to breed every bee, it gives a sense of accomplishment. If you can get them to max production it makes them actually useful. I don't do survival at all unless it's an FTB style map. I just do bees to do bees.

 

[hisagishi]

Hmmm, alright I'll give you that they are extremely valuable when you need to do specific things. Thanks guys, you have opened my eyes. I'm now a beeliever (heh).

Kinda off topic, is there a flow chart of sorts with forestry bees/trees and the bees/trees from extrabees/trees? NEI is nice but charts are MUCH easier to follow.

 

[loboca]

http://ftbwiki.org/Tree_Breeding
http://ftbwiki.org/Bee_Species

 

[Runo]

uranium, uranium, and uranium

 

[The Mobius Archives]

Bees are yet another mini/meta game. They're a collector's dream (or nightmare). They provide resources yes, and effects both positive and negative, but mostly they're a game unto themselves.

Some of the challenge comes down to "what can I do with bees that I can do with other systems" and "What can bees do better that other systems cannot".

 

[whizzball1]

Hmmm, alright I'll give you that they are extremely valuable when you need to do specific things. Thanks guys, you have opened my eyes. I'm now a beeliever (heh).

Kinda off topic, is there a flow chart of sorts with forestry bees/trees and the bees/trees from extrabees/trees? NEI is nice but charts are MUCH easier to follow.

I am absolutely ready for you. http://forum.feed-the-beast.com/threads/the-ultimate-breeding-flow-chart-compedium.33248/
Bee Drive filled with flowcharts.

 

[Mero]

I did them for fun and the challenge of breeding them without Extra Bees and getting all the bees.

 

[Greyed]

So I mean really whats the point of bees? The things they give just doesn't seem to justify the cost of time investment. (even if you semi automate it)

The point of bees is to make the rest of the game basically pointless. As someone else pointed out, "what don't you use bees for?" Why mine? Bees! Why combat for XP? Bees! Why explore? Bees! Why use the mechanics of other mods to do things those mods can do? BEES!!!!!!

Prime reason why any world I create drops Forestry post-haste. The name of the game is Minecraft. Mine... and Craft. Not Insect Breeder.