Why do people like Thermal Expansion so much?

[DREVL]

Agreed, he listens to all the comments about the mod, and even if he might not implement them, you know he's actually paid attention to them. Speaking of which, a direct recipe for Hardened Energy Conduits wouldn't go amiss.

indeed. I love the idea of the tiered conduit. That being said, direct hardened conduit would sho be nice.[DOUBLEPOST=1389277167][/DOUBLEPOST]

It may benefit you over the long run from having to constantly craft hammers and wire cutters which are used to make plates and wires. It's a solution to a problem that was created by the devs in the first place.

whats funny is that the metal former by default is so stick'n slow... Its like the coke oven or blast furnace.... It is a usefull tool if your forecasting for a major project to which you can come back to in about 10-15 minutes. On the spot forming and you want to blow your brains out. I've decided to instead just stay with the stupid hammer and cutter.

 

[Jadedcat]

A lot of people seem to be going with the "its cheaper" theory. So I thought I would do some maths

Macerator vs Pulverizer to cover the ore doubling bases in IC2 TE3

Macerator plus Generator

Spoiler

Iron furnace = 5 iron plates plus 8 cobble
3 iron plates
RE battery 3 tin 1 rubber 2 redstone


So Generator:
8 iron
3 tin actually 2.33 but we'll call it 3
1 rubber
2 redstone
8 cobble

Macerator =
2 cobble
3 flint
1 electric circut - 1 iron plate 3 copper 6 rubber 2 redstone
Basic Machine casing = 8 iron plates

So Macerator:

9 iron
3 copper
6 rubber
2 redstone
3 flint
2 cobble

All together:

15 iron
7 rubber
4 redstone
10 cobble
3 tin
3 copper
3 flint
_____________

Only one of those that can be tricky to find is redstone since its a bit lower down the rest can all be found incredibly easily at least in a high enough amount to get this started.

TE3 Steam Dynamo and Pulverizer

Spoiler

Steam Dynamo

2 copper gears = 8 copper 8 cobble (I am not counting the sticks geez)
3 copper ingots
1 transmission coil = 1 silver 2 redstone
1 redstone

So Steam dynamo =
11 copper
8 cobble
1 silver
3 redstone

Pulverizer

1 piston = 1 iron 4 cobble 3 planks 1 redstone
1 machine frame = 4 glass 4 iron 1 gold
1 reception coil = 1 gold 2 redstone
2 flint
2 copper

So Pulverizer:

5 iron
2 gold
3 redstone
3 planks
4 cobble
4 glass
2 flint
2 copper

Total for Pulverizer and Steam Dynamo:

13 copper
12 cobble
5 iron
6 redstone
4 glass
2 flint
1 silver
3 planks
2 gold
________

Gold and silver are both harder to find than redstone (unless FZ silver is on) and tend to be the throttle point on this. This is for most players more expensive than some iron tin and copper. The addition of silver and gold makes it higher up the expense tree. So TE pulverizer and dynamo is more expensive than the starting tier of IC2.

IC2 adds a bronze pick that can be made and used to harvest all the materials for its starting machines. With TE3 alone you are going to need an iron pick, no middle alloy pick for you.

The most expensive ore doubler is the RC rock crusher. That needs diamonds and steel.

Sorry but math wise IC2 costing more than TE to get started doesn't add up. Resource wise TE3 is more expensive. Of course the dynamo makes more power than the generator but TE3's base tier takes more power than IC2's base tier. Resource to output IC2 is cheaper than TE3 . TE3 just feels cheaper because you don't need to make the tools. I did not count the tools in the math because you won't be using up much of the hammer or wire cutters making just the macerator and generator.


Steam Dynamo = 80RF/t 8 mj/t = 20 Eu/t
Generator = 10 EU/t

Macerator can take 2Eu/t to start and upgrades to 32EU/t
Pulverizer uses: 40 rf/t no upgrades

So one steam dynamo can power 2 pulverizers at their base speed and 1 generator can power 5 macerators at their base speed.


This was done using the DW20 pack and configs.

 

[Grimnights]

I think people like it because the machines are so easy to use and cheap, for my taste a little too much all-in-one wonderblocks/ducts and I really hate teleporting things, but people just prefer the easy way instead of transporting things with pipes/rails like it's more realistic (the way I prefer it).

The more cheap/overpowered/usable-for-even-the-dumbest your mod is, the more people will use it, easy concept.

Just because something "feels" easy doesn't mean it is that would be intuitive. Also if you want to touch on realism, if I have to use a special tool to make sure some thing basic, like moving a simple machine works then that company would have gone out of business.

As for the on topic, everyone else has said it better.

 

[fleutius]

Jaded that actually suprised me, but nice info.

And actually TE would keep being more expensive, if considering all the things like wires/tools needed for a basic setup (Atleast i think, havent done the math

 

[Golrith]

Nice in depth analysis, amazes me how people miss that TE needs one gold ingot and some redstone minimum for each machine. My custom pack has mek and TE, both heavy gold users. I had to do custom world gen to give it a boost, and even still, it's easy to run short.
TE is a hog for resources, but the usage makes sense so you don't feel the grind that you need to get more resources. At one early point, I was so short of redstone, I made a Mek "Pulverizor" (forget the actual name) and took my silk touch mob drop pickaxe to get some redstone ore blocks, 24 redstone per ore. Used almost all of what I manually mined up in one go on conduits.

 

[PierceSG]

Either a Crusher or Enrichment Chamber, both of them does different stuffs and can process different items. Probably an Enrichment Chamber for ores.

 

[MoosyDoosy]

The only real difference between Thermal Expansion and IC2 is the tedium. Thermal Expansion is rewarding, intuitive, and user friendly. IC2 is punishing, tedious, and requires more "steps" due to hammer and wire usage. Also having to harvest rubber trees.

 

[Golrith]

Either a Crusher or Enrichment Chamber, both of them does different stuffs and can process different items. Probably an Enrichment Chamber for ores.

Sounds right, always have difficulty with the names of mek blocks
But I love the fact that I had a resource shortage, using NEI, I could see a solution for something I could build that would help. Love that sort of thing.

 

[KingTriaxx]

Great numbers, but you made a mistake. You included the steam dynamo in the TE listing, but did not include the generator in the IC2 listing.

 

[PierceSG]

7 weeks into my SSP now and I'm still in my hovel....damn you Procrastination! /shakes fist[DOUBLEPOST=1389279928][/DOUBLEPOST]

Great numbers, but you made a mistake. You included the steam dynamo in the TE listing, but did not include the generator in the IC2 listing.

Jaded probably got Electric Furnace mixed up with Generator.

 

[DREVL]

I horde my copper too much to start with IC.

 

[Jadedcat]

Great numbers, but you made a mistake. You included the steam dynamo in the TE listing, but did not include the generator in the IC2 listing.

You are right I did the math on the wrong machine. The generator is much cheaper. No idea why I used the electric furnace considering it can't output power.. silly me. Fixed the list and the math. TE3 is more expensive by even more than before.

 

[KingTriaxx]

Awesome. Now the counter argument.

True, the TE3 startup is more expensive, however the idea of gold and silver being an issue is mitigated by them both being found around the same levels as redstone, so it's not going to require an extended trip, as opposed to the potential requirement of going a significant distance to locate IC2 rubber trees, or even MFR rubber. It's good you didn't account for the cost of tools, because IC2 requires a treetap as well unless you're using MFR rubber.

One thing you did not account for, that I'm unable to test at the moment, is cabling. I know that IC2 used to be able to transmit by touch but I'm not sure if the new one can. I don't know if TE3 dynamos can output without conduit. If not then the costs go up for both, but by more for TE3.

That said, I do still think that TE3 makes more sense because the Pulverizer has additional output. I can put one iron and one tin through the macerator and get a guaranteed two iron and two tin. With the Pulverizer, I have a chance to come out with three iron, two tin, and one ferrous.

 

[Jadedcat]

Awesome. Now the counter argument.

True, the TE3 startup is more expensive, however the idea of gold and silver being an issue is mitigated by them both being found around the same levels as redstone, so it's not going to require an extended trip, as opposed to the potential requirement of going a significant distance to locate IC2 rubber trees, or even MFR rubber. It's good you didn't account for the cost of tools, because IC2 requires a treetap as well unless you're using MFR rubber.

One thing you did not account for, that I'm unable to test at the moment, is cabling. I know that IC2 used to be able to transmit by touch but I'm not sure if the new one can. I don't know if TE3 dynamos can output without conduit. If not then the costs go up for both, but by more for TE3.

That said, I do still think that TE3 makes more sense because the Pulverizer has additional output. I can put one iron and one tin through the macerator and get a guaranteed two iron and two tin. With the Pulverizer, I have a chance to come out with three iron, two tin, and one ferrous.

Treetap is 5 planks.... that is not expensive. And actually you still don't need it. if you chop and IC2 rubber tree that has that rubber spot.. you get the rubber. So technically you need an axe. and unless I spawn in a taiga biome I have never had an issue finding IC2 rubber quickly. *shrug*

Redstone is in much larger columps and spawns more frequently than gold and silver.

 

[AlanEsh]

Many many biomes (BoP) have plenty of easily located rubber trees of both types; this ain't your ftb 1.5 worldgen.

 

[KingTriaxx]

Silver has never given me a problem, probably because it almost always spawns right with Lead and I have no problem finding lead.

I've always had more trouble finding Redstone than even Diamonds. Gold tends to be easily visible.

 

[SatanicSanta]

Silver has never given me a problem, probably because it almost always spawns right with Lead and I have no problem finding lead.

I've always had more trouble finding Redstone than even Diamonds. Gold tends to be easily visible.

Yes but getting Silver requires 3 iron

 

[zilvarwolf]

Yes but getting Silver requires 3 iron

At least! Lately I've been starting with TiCo early, so odds are I've used 4 iron (bucket + pick head) to get silver. Or in horizons, 4 iron, 1 copper, and 1 tin (damascus steel)

 

[YX33A]

At least! Lately I've been starting with TiCo early, so odds are I've used 4 iron (bucket + pick head) to get silver. Or in horizons, 4 iron, 1 copper, and 1 tin (damascus steel)

I admit, I haven't used the FTB launcher for a while(peeked at it again whist trying to locate some old java parameters for running the game smoother), but Horizons is sounding more and more interesting.

As long as it doesn't have any sort of "Meteor Mod" I think I might use it. IIRC it has AM2 in it, so I'd be basically set.

 

[AlanEsh]

I find gold to be in very short supply on my Monster 103/104 world.