Ahh. So you clearly play a different game than I do.
Do I believe in automation? Since hoppers and comparators, yes. But what's the line?
How hard is it to build a sorting system with hoppers, storage minecarts, comparators, etc, without just duplicating the "glider rows" system? Could you come up with a new and different system using vanilla mechanics?
How easy is it using sorting pipes? Or buildcraft/Ic2 pipes? How much work does it take when the system does that much of the work for you?
You are using mods that go from "barely sufficient for it to work" (vanilla) to "90% of the work is done for you".
Developing your plan as resources come in?
Once you have frames (to move a complex setup, which pistons cannot), plus mining lasers, plus transportable energy, you have "flick switches to mine it all". Add in computer automation, and you have all the resources you need as easily as pulling it stack by stack from NEI.
Where's the work? Where's the risk?
When a mod that just wants to simplify stuff (extra utilities) adds in stuff to disable mob spawns in very large areas, what happens to risk again?
I don't care if I can or cannot build any type of system in Vanilla.
I do not and will never play Vanilla again.
I tried it when 1.6 came out and after about 3 hours all I could think about was what mods I wanted to add to do the mining for me. I've been playing MC since early beta. Most of that time, playing daily, was spent mining for resources. That's all I did, log in, mine, log out, day after day, month after month. Then maybe once a month I would build something and back to mining.
I quit liking the direction that Vanilla has been going a long time ago. I can't remember the last time something was added that I actually liked or wanted.
That's why I play MODDED MC.
If I wanted to play Vanilla or anything similar to Vanilla, I wouldn't be playing Vanilla or be on the FTB boards.
"As my resources come in?"
Sometimes you don't find copper, or tin or whatever to make the machines you need. Forestry uses buttloads of copper and tin. You can't always make everything until such point as you get the resources you need.
You might have a plan that you want to do this then this then this, but if you lack the resources to do the first or second step, you must do something else until such point as you actually get the resources you need.
Ender pearls are a big one. Until you go to the end to gather them in mass, they are a very very rare resources.
I personally won't use EE to make stuff like that.
"Frames?"
There is no RedPower in Unleashed.
I no longer play a modpack that includes frames so that point is way outdated.
As I said, each updated Modpack I play brings new challenges.
I may or may not use Quarries, but without RP to do my sorting that leaves me with BC sorting, which I don't like, or setting up an AE network, which I have never done. AE requires large amounts of Quartz for a storage system which will hold everything from a full quarry. (I don't destroy any blocks).
So as of now, Turtles do all of my mining for me, tunneling with just the Tunnel program(because I have neither the time nor the desire to learn how to actually program them).
Thus the as resources come in.
"Where's the work? Where's the risk?"
Been there, done that.
The risk is me not paying attention and getting raped by mobs. I don't care that much about risks, at least not like you want. If I wanted massive risks in a game I would play one of the many other games I have that are actually challenging.
The work is building the systems. Laying everything out so that everything fits together and isn't just some huge jumbled spread out mess of everything. Sometimes it requires a bit of landscaping.
I've done plenty of work in MC.
I've been playing since Jan 2011 and have been playing it daily since.
