Thermal Expansion 3.0!!! No More Beta! Thanks KL!

[PhilHibbs]

If ANYONE thinks moving stacks is OP, wake up and put a redstone energy cell against a wooden pipe and see what happens.

It's not that "moving stacks is OP", there have always been ways of doing it in mods, but there has always been a cost, even if that cost is fairly low. Engines more powerful than the redstone one have always been able to move stacks like the RE-Cell can, Tier 2 RedPower machines could do it, and in the new BC you can use a level 7 Autarchic Gate to move stacks. There are no hard and fast rules about cost and balance, but it is generally regarded as rude just to implement similar functionality at a drastically reduced cost. You get accused of undercutting to gain market share. Right now we have a baseline cost for a device that can move single items fairly slowly, the vanilla Hopper. So if a mod block can move items more quickly, it should probably have a higher cost in some way. A Golden Hopper maybe?

 

[SonOfABirch]

well, remember that the cost of this duct is not yet known, and if it's anything like liquiducts and conduits then it's already pretty expensive.

 

[RedBoss]

Can we just enjoy the features before everything devolves into an OP argument?

We're getting TE back after a long hiatus. With NEW content and awesomeness! Why the hell is that not enough? Jeez.

 

[ShneekeyTheLost]

There will be sorting. ATM, facades and multipart are not supported. We'd like to support FMP, but it's still a bit buggy. Facades are something we'll look into, but we'll likely roll our own version there if we go that route.

Any chance of hooking into Forge Multipart API? That would solve your facade problem right there.

 

[Eyamaz]

Any chance of hooking into Forge Multipart API? That would solve your facade problem right there.

You quoted the line that answers your own question.

 

[ShneekeyTheLost]

You quoted the line that answers your own question.

Not really. The answer was 'not currently', my question was 'what are the odds in the future'. Slightly different there.

 

[Eyamaz]

Ah, true that. I'd like to see more FMP compatibility natively built into mods. Including automatically setting up which blocks can be cut via IMC or the FMP API.

 

[Omicron]

I have a feeling that that will be a big thing in 1.7. Right now the API is so new that almost everyone has had their own custom solution long before it existed. But 1.7 just ordered everyone a near-complete rewrite, and world compatibility is so shaky that nearly everyone will start new ones anyway. So there's a strong incentive to take the easy way out and work with the existing API this time, instead of trying to port over the old stuff.

 

[ShneekeyTheLost]

I have a feeling that that will be a big thing in 1.7. Right now the API is so new that almost everyone has had their own custom solution long before it existed. But 1.7 just ordered everyone a near-complete rewrite, and world compatibility is so shaky that nearly everyone will start new ones anyway. So there's a strong incentive to take the easy way out and work with the existing API this time, instead of trying to port over the old stuff.

This also depends primarily on how stable Forge Multipart can get. KL had questions concerning its stability. If it can prove that it is both stable and easy to use, I think mods will start moving to it.

From a user's perspective, I can see a lot of advantages to simply incorporating Forge Multipart into Forge itself. Microblock functionality is something that has been wanting for quite some time. From a coder's perspective, I can see why not.

 

[Golrith]

well, remember that the cost of this duct is not yet known, and if it's anything like liquiducts and conduits then it's already pretty expensive.

Indeed. You need the TE infrastructure to be able to craft conduits/ducts as we currently know them, compared to just using a crafting table with other mod transport options.

 

[Eyamaz]

From a user's perspective, I can see a lot of advantages to simply incorporating Forge Multipart into Forge itself. Microblock functionality is something that has been wanting for quite some time. From a coder's perspective, I can see why not.

This has already been stated that this won't happen because of the heavy use of scala. If it was pure java, it could happen.

 

[Steel]

This has already been stated that this won't happen because of the heavy use of scala. If it was pure java, it could happen.

Does the current design do something not allowed in Java? I'm not really familiar with what scala is.

 

[Eyamaz]

http://www.scala-lang.org/

I have no idea why he's using scala instead of straight java. I'm only just learning java myself.

 

[Pokefenn]

http://www.scala-lang.org/

I have no idea why he's using scala instead of straight java. I'm only just learning java myself.

Apparently it would have only been possible with scala IIRC.
Function based programming can do wonders it seems ;P

Or it was something like it woudnt be worth programming in java.... cant remember.

 

[Lathanael]

The whole thing can be written in java as as well. Using scala just makes it a little bit less of a headache for the programmer. Tbh i'd rather write it in 100% java than 2 languages as that can raise problems on its own...
And as Eyamaz pointed out: Forge is 100% java and most probably will stay that way. This means unless FMP is rewritten it won't be merged. It is kind of pointless to make new modders learn 2 different languages (assumeing they do not know any of them) instead of one.

 

[Beleriond01]

ability to send stacks of items just by changing configuration is likely to give itemducts label OP. i guess there might be an improved version of ducts that can send in stacks.

I understand the comment you're making though you should wonder...OP when compared to what? I agree it would be OP when compared to BC pipes, possibly the new LP pipes as well but I haven't played with those much yet.

Definitely not OP when compared to AE, however. At best it would mean the Itemduct is on par with the AE possibilities.

As a sidenote btw: in my OP I didn't mean the cost for an Itemduct that can transfer stacks should be the same...I'd actually expect that to cost something more.

Bel*.

 

[Cirom]

These item ducts look pretty awesome! Seems just like the old RP2 Pneumatic Tube functionality I missed so much - always go into the nearest possible inventory, unless specified otherwise. Many an awesome build of mine was based on this functionality, so it's nice to see this type of pipe return.

 

[Tybot]

Definitely not OP when compared to AE, however. At best it would mean the Itemduct is on par with the AE possibilities.

Well AE has power costs associated with moving items, plus it takes quite a bit of quartz to get an extensive network going. I don't know how many people are really advocating that moving stacks be really expensive, just some sort of increased cost vs single file.

 

[zacseow]

I think adding another tier to make the itemduct move stacks or perhaps an upgrade like how extra-util's transfer nodes are like.

 

[Fuzzlewhumper]

I'm just glad to have another mod I enjoyed so much back in the mix. Looks really nice!