I see you've played Diggy Buildy before: the new Minecraft Thread

[Minstrel]

The great and powerful pauli has mandated a new thread for Minecraft, so here it is. The old thread is here, for your reference.

We continue to play the best game for creative children: Minecraft. Many of us play with mods that radically expand the possibilities of play. If you haven't tried modded Minecraft, it has never been a better time to jump in.

Most of the active players spend time in IRC, which is a great place to find people who want to help you: irc.arstechnica.com #minecraft

As of this writing, CaptainCaveman and I are both running servers. CC's is a Vanilla server which he has kept going continuously for a remarkably long time, and he'd love to see more people on there. I'm running two servers featuring mods: one of them is using a modpack of my own devising, and the other is running Feed The Beast: Infinity Evolved Expert Mode Skyblock. Skyblock is a popular variant game mode in which you start on a tiny platform floating in a void and have to build everything, including the ground you walk on, from scratch.

Qchronod also runs servers from time to time. All of our servers are bridged to the IRC channel above.

I'm going to leave server details out of this post. Look below for ongoing server details and other fun.

See you in Minecraftia!


Useful links:

• Minecraft.net: get Minecraft
• Minecraft Wiki: learn about Minecraft
• Minecraft Forum: talk about Minecraft
• Minecraft CurseForge: mod, modpack, and texture pack host. Home of the Curse Launcher
• Feed The Beast: Minecraft launcher featuring very popular modpacks
• ATLauncher: another popular Minecraft launcher for modpacks
• Technic Launcher: yet another Minecraft launcher, severely maligned in some circles

If I've missed anything critical here, let me know and I'll update this post.

 

[Jonathon]

Oranging this thread, even though I haven't played in ages.

(I should play some Minecraft...)

Probably worth linking the Minecraft Wiki; it's one of the better references out there for Vanilla players.

 

[UnderwearYoga]

Oranging. I usually play with my son on the Xbox but I've started using PC so we can make some mods. The first thing he wanted to do was create a creeper that follows him around and fights with him. It was great fun.

 

[jandrese]

I'd add in the FTB wiki(s) for mod players.

 

[Robotank]

If I wanted to play on the FTB server that Minstrel is hosting - what's the process for getting my local client on the right set of mods and things? Any chance it is now magically and conveniently handled for me when I request to connect to the server?

Also, any additional graphical improvement mods that are recommended?

I haven't played Minecraft in years, and then it was mostly vanilla - so I'm overdue for seeing what the community is doing these days.

 

[jandrese]

Pretty much you download the FTB launcher, select the correct modpack from the list (you may have to search for it), and hit "Play". Once the game starts (after a lengthy patching process) select the "Multiplayer" button and connect to the server.

This little tutorial should probably be in the OP, with links to the launcher(s).

The holy grail of "Minecraft automatically syncs mods and configs when you connect to the server" has not been achieved, because Mojang is at best ambivalent about mods and closer to hostile. The launcher business is the closest thing we have and it is still a bit clunky.

 

[Nekojin]

I post. The world builds itself.


Sssssssss.....

 

[qchronod]

In the spirit of a new thread and the droves of visitors that are going to want to play on our Magical DiggyBuild Funtime Simulators. Here's a quick rundown of the current servers (with some fancy formatting that's a lot like how we used to list things.)

Server: Vanilla Minecraft
Version: MC-1.9.2
Address: http://www.unseeable.com
Whitelist: Yes
Admin: CaptainCaveman
About: The official Unofficial Ars Minecraft Server Mk.IX(?). Currently running with mcMMO, and full of interesting cities that people have

Server: FTB:Expert Skyblock
Version:FTB recommended (currently 1.0.4)
Address: minecraft.woodstock7000.electricdoorknob.com:25566
Whitelist: NO, everyone can have their own island
Admin: Minstrel
About: A real test of your knowledge of using dozens of the most popular mods. There's dozens of LPs and Streamers using this pack if you want to know more about it, or just join us and we'd be happy to help nudge you along the tech tree if you get stuck.

Server: EDK Creeper
Version: Custom modpack
Address: minecraft.woodstock7000.electricdoorknob.com
Whitelist: NO
Admin: Minstrel
About: Low-tech, Magical, Foody, Exploration Pack.

Server: QCD Modpack of the Timeperiod
Version: Not running at the moment
Address: http://www.qchronod.com
Whitelist: NO
Admin: QChronoD
About: Mostly run various packs from FTB or Curse, occasionally put together one of my own.

I'm curious if I've missed any of the "official unofficial" servers.
I) *ArsSMP1 (Statue of Liberty)
II) *ArsSMP2 (Newyork, MC University, Sphinx)
III) Golgar's First server (Golden Gate Bridge near spawn, Angkor Wat, numerous Dressgirl statues)
IV) Goglar's replacement server (NSEW Railways, Tigranis' Ice Palace, my bridges and chess set)
V) Golgar's 3rd server
VI) *Big Dino #1
VII) Big Dino #2 (The Pyramid, Clifftown, Jungle Rollercoaster)
VIII) *Big Dino #3 (Failed attempt at Iron Golen Factory)
IX) CC's Bukkit/Spigot World (current server)
*I have backups of these worlds

I might have to spend a little bit of time trawling the old threads to see if I left anything out. Also if anyone is able to get a hold of golgar and possibly see if he still has backups of those worlds on some old hard drive somewhere.

 

[Nekojin]

If I were in a Minecrafty mood, I'd be on that Expert Skyblock server. But right now, Shop Heroes has my attention.

 

[CaptainCaveman]

It looks like I first made an actual "Server is now online" post on April 20th 2014, so we're coming up on the two year anniversary of the Unseeable Minecraft server.

 

[jandrese]

Ack, old thread locked before I could copy/paste the source. Luckily I didn't go crazy on the markup.

Feel free to copy and paste this template:

• Mod Name
  • Primary Features:
  • Difficulty:
  • Relative Power:
  • Energy Type:
  • Wiki:
  • Mod Review Video:
  • Description:
  • Notable expansions:
• Buildcraft
  • Primary Features: Automated mining, Factory automation, Power generation
  • Difficulty: 2 (4 for Logic Gates)
  • Relative Power: 4
  • Energy Type: Redstone Flux
  • Wiki: http://ftbwiki.org/Buildcraft
  • Mod Review Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIXxZ77KhRg
  • Description: Buildcraft is one of the most venerable and most reviled mods in the game. There are two marquee features of this mod: pipes and quarries. The pipes, although inefficient on server resources, are cheap, powerful, and fairly easy to use in simple cases. It's power generation options are generally eclipsed by other mods, but sometimes all you need is a cheap redstone engine. The quarry is a machine that digs out every block in a potentially enormous chunk of the map, leaving enormous craters in its wake, if you need tons of raw material there is nothing like it anywhere else.
    While the pipes, pumps, and quarry are cheap, the pipe logic features required for more complex setups require very expensive and slow machines.
  • Notable expansions: More Pipes, Logistics Pipes, QuarryPlus
• IndustrialCraft2
  • Primary Features: Ore Doubling, Power Generation, Farming, Armor, Weapons, Mining tools, Automated Mining, Teleportation, Resource Creation
  • Difficulty: 2
  • Relative Power: 4
  • Energy Type: Energy Units (EU)
  • Wiki: http://wiki.industrial-craft.net/index.php?title=Main_Page
    http://ftbwiki.org/IndustrialCraft_2
  • Mod Review Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWb0wcLEjHY
  • Description: One of the oldest tech mods and one of the most complete, IC2 offers a little bit of everything, and is relevant all the way from your first Iron Furnace to your Quantum Armor suit. The one notable missing feature is a way to automatically move items from machine to machine and then into storage. The energy system used in this mod is idiosyncratic, but well supported by various "glue" mods. In particular, this is the only energy system currently in use where you have to pay attention to "voltage levels"--mistakes result in instantly exploding cables/machines. Read the wiki before you proceed. The automated mining in IC2 is kind of feeble compared to a Buildcraft Quarry, but also less destructive to the terrain. The automatic farming in this mod is generally considered to be more hassle than it is worth. Standout features include the Electric Jetpack, which is one of the cheapest and easiest flight options in the game (although it does require a trip to the Nether). The Diamond Mining Drill is available almost immediately and is a fantastic early game tool, especially when combined with a BatPack. Note that later work on this mod has frequently focused on making the early game a bit more difficult, so the Difficulty of the version you are playing may be up in the 3 range.
  • Notable expansions: Advanced Solars, Gregtech (which deserves its own entry), Gravitation Suite, Modular Force Fields

 

[jandrese]

• Big Reactors
  • Primary Features: Power Generation
  • Difficulty: 2
  • Relative Power: 5
  • Energy Type: Redstone Flux
  • Wiki: http://ftbwiki.org/Big_Reactors
  • Mod Review Video: Part 1, Part 2
  • Description: It generates power, absolutely craploads of power with even modest setups, and then you can switch your reactor over to a steam setup and generate even more power. Effectively unlimited power for a fairly modest cost.
  • Notable expansions: None, although you may need to convert from RF to other power types. This can be done with the Power Converters transformers, Mekanism universal cables, or Galacticraft Aluminum cables.

 

[jandrese]

A quick rundown of the Difficulty and Relative Power ratings, note that these are subjective and some mods have different components with wildly varying degrees of difficulty.

Difficulty:

1. This mod is pure quality of life. Everything is available up front with no cost. Example: Not Enough Items
2. This mod requires cheap materials/machines with low setup costs. Examples: Industrialcraft2, Buildcraft, RedPower, ExNihlo
3. This mod requires a modest amount of setup before it becomes useful. Examples: Thermal Expansion
4. This mod requires some expensive multiblock machines and probably at least a trip to the Nether. Some in-game "research" may also be required. Examples: Forestry
5. This mod require extremely expensive machines, lengthy and/or heavily RNG driven research, or enormous quantities of raw materials. Examples: Gregtech

Relative power:

1. This mod is worse than Vanilla, it is only used because some mods force it on you for extra challenge. Example: Difficult Life (which amusingly, would have an Ease of Use factor of 1, as it is pure quality of life, just the quality is making your life worse)
2. This mod is at best a sidegrade to vanilla. While it may not make your life any easier in the end, it does give you new gameplay options to explore. Or it may just be cosmetic. Examples: AppleMilkTea
3. This mod improves quality of life in some modest way. This mod's functionality is probably eclipsed by other mods at the high end, but it may have a place in the early game especially if it has a low Difficulty score. If it uses machines, the machines may have limited upgrade paths. Examples: Thermal Expansion, Flaxbeard's steam power, Mekanism
4. This mod greatly improves quality of life. Machines in this modpack are powerful and can be used for many purposes. It can handle very large quantities of materials or the equipment can trivialize combat. You probably need some mods in this category to complete some of the Difficulty 5 mods. Example: Industrialcraft2.
5. This mod is arguably overpowered, it effectively obsoletes other mods that provide similar functionality. Equipment available may made you an immortal God-King. Example: Big Reactors.

 

[Paltivar]

I was watching some minecraft on twitch this weekend, a group of streamers went in on a big server for their subscribers. Was pretty close to subscribing to play some SkyGrid, but maybe I'll come play some SkyBlock instead.

Do I need to get whitelisted someplace?

 

[Minstrel]

Paltivar[/url]":lmi1i2bo]I was watching some minecraft on twitch this weekend, a group of streamers went in on a big server for their subscribers. Was pretty close to subscribing to play some SkyGrid, but maybe I'll come play some SkyBlock instead.

Do I need to get whitelisted someplace?

The skyblock modpack has chunk claiming and on-demand starting islands, so it isn't whitelisted. Just drop on in and get hold of somebody who has ops to create you a new island, or join somebody else's island already in progress (with their invitation).

 

[Rubel]

Man, I just want to try to keep up with the mods my daughter insists are the best things ever. We had 1.8 and Forge going for a while, but after 1.9 I couldn't figure out a reliable source of updated mods. It all seems a tad chaotic from over here, which I guess is the ecosystem's joy and pain. Just trying to keep the household server up to spec.

 

[jandrese]

Mods typically lag about a version behind. A lot of FTB modpacks are still on 1.7(!).

 

[qchronod]

Man, I just want to try to keep up with the mods my daughter insists are the best things ever. We had 1.8 and Forge going for a while, but after 1.9 I couldn't figure out a reliable source of updated mods. It all seems a tad chaotic from over here, which I guess is the ecosystem's joy and pain. Just trying to keep the household server up to spec.

Client Side:
1.7.10 (or earlier)- Tons of Mods and Modpacks, easiest thing to do is use a launcher like FTB or Curse. You can also try to roll your own packs, but that takes a bit more fidiling around with forge versions and then testing to make sure that mods don't break each other.

1.8.x - Forge is fairly stable now, so many of the popular mods are starting to get ported over. They are all in alpha/beta stage and not recommended for anyone that doesn't want to deal with random problems and world breaking bugs. I've seen a nice selection of 'standalone' mods (i.e. don't use forge), but don't really follow them much since they tend to be much smaller in scope.

1.9.x - I'm not sure that Forge has really started putting lots of effort into this yet (though it's supposed to be much simpler of a port from 1.8, than 1.7->1.8 was). There are probably a few random mods already written for this version if you want to hunt them down on MCF (unfortunately most of the time when a mod is written w/o using forge, then it CAN'T be used with forge, that that means they won't be included in any major packs and are essentially relegated to the land of also-rans).

Server Side:
1.7.10 (and earlier)- Same as above, more mods than you can shake a stick at, and plenty of tools to make setting things up pretty simple.

1.8.x - Again Forge mods are only just getting released for public testing. Spiggot/Bukkit is probably where most of the life is for these versions. If you are using those, then the server is doing all the fancy bits, and players only need a vanilla client.

1.9.x - Forge is N/A, Spiggot is the goto (AFAIK Bukkit isn't being updated, but that could be wrong). Again server is doing the work and vanilla clients are all you need to play.


Hope that helps you Rubel. Depending on how old your daughter is (and her technical/magical capabilities) you could just have her bounce around between 1.7 packs for the next year. There are literally hundreds of packs out there, that would only require you to download a zip and run a batch file to start a server, and she would only need to select the pack from a list and press play.

 

[jandrese]

Someday in the distant future Mojang might make good on their Mod API promise from back when Notch was still "working", but I wouldn't hold my breath. The sad part is that we're basically hoping that Microsoft of all companies comes through with a proper mod API on their Win10 port.

The insane part is that Microsoft has a VS plugin for Minecraft, but it is for developing mods on the Java version. There isn't AFAIK any way to develop mods for the Win10 version.

 

[CaptainCaveman]

qchronod[/url]":3ny4p3fx]

Man, I just want to try to keep up with the mods my daughter insists are the best things ever. We had 1.8 and Forge going for a while, but after 1.9 I couldn't figure out a reliable source of updated mods. It all seems a tad chaotic from over here, which I guess is the ecosystem's joy and pain. Just trying to keep the household server up to spec.

1.9.x - Forge is N/A, Spiggot is the goto (AFAIK Bukkit isn't being updated, but that could be wrong). Again server is doing the work and vanilla clients are all you need to play.

Running the Spigot BuildTools generates updated Spigot and CraftBukkit server .jar files.

 

[MarkLT1]

Does anyone have any solutions (i.e.- mods) for playing with a controller on a PC? I am guessing it would involve some sort of auto-crafting type mod.

I've got an nvidia shield TV hooked up to my home theater. If I could use the controller (and more importantly, my 7-year-old could use the controller to play) I would instantly become "Worlds Greatest Dad" due to "life-size Minecraft on a 120" screen."

 

[jandrese]

The Win10 version of Minecraft supports the XBox controllers. I don't know about the nVidia Shield situation unfortunately.

 

[jandrese]

I was looking at Big Reactors again last night and started running some numbers after I managed to use all of the energy from my 3x3x3 Reactor setup. I finally understand where the author got their numbers. My basic 3x3x3 Reactor puts out just about the same amount of power as a 36HP Railcraft Boiler powering Industrial Steam Engines. The Railcraft boiler requires a LOT more upfront resources and processing (so much steel to cook), but can be setup to run indefinitely with a little help from Forestry. The Big Reactor will eventually run out of fuel if I don't keep mining.

However, I was also looking at converting the Big Reactor over to making Steam and ran into a problem. My small reactor puts out 2,760 mB of Steam per tick. I need 110 turbine blades to harness all of that, and at least two turbine facilities since they max out at 2,000 mB of Steam per tick regardless of size. While I have no doubt that they will produce a truly staggering amount of RF, that's a substantial upfront cost.

I'm guessing the best way to build this would be a 6x6x5 internal volume with 4 turbine shafts for 16 blades per level, giving you 64 blades per turbine and then one layer of metal blocks. Maybe 6x6x6 with two layers of metal blocks if the blades end up spinning too fast. So potentially two massive 8x8x8 structures just to handle the output of a single 5x5x5 reactor.

Looking at the Wiki some more, I'm not sure multishaft turbines are allowed, in which case the whole thing becomes even less efficient since I have to waste more space on each row of turbine blades. Each turbine ends up being more like 7x7x13. Another slight complication is that it seems I need 12 fluid ports per turbine, which means my reactor is going to be absolutely covered in fluid ports, consuming 24 of the 36 available block faces. That's going to be unsightly. Then again, I've seen a lot of discussion online that the ports are unlimited, but the official wiki claims that they're limited to 360mB/t, so I'm going to have to test to see who is right.

Edit: The wiki contradicts itself. The 360mB/t figure appears on the overview, but the page for the fluid port itself does not include the reference. I'm going to test and fix whichever is incorrect. I'm guessing it is unlimited since that's what everyone else seems to think. This would also mean you could conveniently just build the turbine directly adjacent to the Reactor and avoid messy piping entirely.

 

[Sagan :]]

You can set the steam input on a BR Trubine, you don't need to use all 2000mb/s, that is just the max it can take. You would also tune the reactor (with the cooling rods on the top) to only produce as much as you are accepting, making it far more efficient. One actively cooled reactor can support as many turbine's as you'd like as well.

Also, yes the ports are basically infinite transfer, the best way to make them is back to back, lining up 2 ports (one in, one out on each) on the reactor and turbine.

 

[jandrese]

I noticed that my reactor's fuel efficiency takes a dive when I insert the rods, so I've been running it full tilt constantly and just trying to use all of the energy.

IC2 Mass Fabs are really handy for dumping any excess energy.

I did discover that I could overrun the reactor with the Mass Fab, a BC Assembly table, Quarry, and some severely overclocked IC2 machines, which is why I'm looking at building the turbine now. In the meantime I just have a flipflop that shuts off the Mass Fab when the energy level drops below 10% and turns it back on when energy goes above 25%.

Also, in messing around in world and then again with the Simulator it seems like the materials you use for coolant in the reactor matter that much. Going from the worst reasonable material (Iron blocks) to the absolute best (Cyromethium) is only a scant few percentage difference in energy generation and heat. Gold blocks seem to be the sweet spot for being relatively abundant but still effective.

Looking at the wiki the materials seem to matter more in Turbines, but even there Gold blocks seem pretty good compared to the ones that need a stack of Diamonds to make.

 

[Sagan :]]

Ludicrite (if its enabled) for turbines ya. Super expensive but best solution. Graphite blocks are usually very good for reactors, at least until he ever turns on any overheat code. it's SUPPOSED to be most efficient and best at 1000C, but temp really does nothing now, Graphite increases reactance and super cheap/easy to make.

Turbines themselves only make sense if you are starved for fuel, they are more fuel effecient but take way more resources to make and max out at 27K RF/t. They are fun to make a look cool, but no reason to make them usually. I don't really like the whole mod much these days, just an I-Win button really. Advanced Generators is a great power mod tho, not super expensive to make, doesn't make insane power, and fun to build. It takes 3 multiblocks, plus lava source and coal to make fuel from to get max efficiency. They also scale pretty well starting out making a 100 or so RF/t for just a bunch of iron some redstone and diamond or two, up to a max of I think 25,000 or 50,000 rf/t. you can power it all from a huge tree farm -> charcoal setup if you want, but coal is cheap (the system turns into SynGas a fluid fuel to run the generator.)

 

[jandrese]

Tried building the Turbine today and was severely disappointed. Not only is it a hassle to build, but it's buggy. Mine claims it was delivering 5,000 RF/t, but with just 1,500 RF/t of draw hooked up it was not able to keep up, not even close. In fact it seems to produce less energy than the old 1,400RF/t reactor I converted over for this. Also, with the regular reactor you can knock a block out and put it back and all you had to do was hit "start" again on the controller. It was pretty friendly to adding/removing/moving ports around as necessary. With the turbine not only does it lose all RPMs, but it also dumps all of the steam and water and stored energy if you break a block. You have to restart it from zero every time you need to reconfigure a port and wait through the lengthy spin up procedure.

Annoyingly I had to make the turbine even bigger than I expected because it turns out you can only put the metal blocks on the 8 blocks directly adjacent to the shaft, you can't put them on the outer layer like the turbine blades, so Turbines are pretty much doomed to be long and skinny.

I did figure out a rule of thumb however. Each 8 block doughnut of Gold Blocks requires roughly 10 rotors to be spun up to 1800 RPM.

My recommendation is to skip the steam generation nonsense and just make your reactor bigger if you need more power.

Oh, and apparently the author has abandoned this mod. There is another guy who is trying to take over, but he doesn't seem to have a lot of experience yet.

 

[jandrese]

• Forestry
  • Primary Features: Automated Farming, Power generation, Resource generation
  • Difficulty: 3/5
  • Relative Power: 4/4
  • Energy Type: Redstone Flux
  • Wiki: http://ftbwiki.org/Forestry
  • Mod Review Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_f04Pt9v_g
  • Description: Forestry is basically two mods in one. The first half is about automated farming. The second half is a bewildering array of selective breeding and the RNG and eventually turning bees into unlimited resource generation. Forestry is the base for many unlimited power/resource generation schemes. Although technically forestry farms require a limited resource (Apatite), the burn rate on the fertilizer is so low and the deposits so large that it's effectively unlimited.
    Forestry's engines are all fairly limited and aimed at running its own machines. The tools in the mod are also mostly useful for beekeeping, although there are some tools that are a minor upgrade to vanilla iron tools.
    If you don't have Big Reactors or some insane combined solar thing in a modpack, the next best "big" power generation may very well be a forestry farm going through the biofuel creation process (somewhat involved to setup) to feed Railcraft boilers.
  • Notable expansions: Extra Bees, Magic Bees
• Railcraft
  • Primary Features: Minecart based factory automation, Power Generation, Automated Mining, Ore Doubling
  • Difficulty: 4
  • Relative Power: 3
  • Energy Type: Redstone Flux
  • Wiki: http://railcraft.info/wiki/
    http://ftbwiki.org/Railcraft
  • Mod Review Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0Lhh00 ... 2Bg4WU7nLe
  • Description: Railcraft is a venerable modpack that is supposed to be all about moving resources around using minecarts and producing everything from senic railroads to high speed commuter rail. In practice Railcraft's factory automation has a reputation for being more difficult to setup and underpowered compared to other mods. The high speed rail options are extremely expensive, can be difficult to set up (and fatal if incorrectly setup), and utterly outclassed by any mod that provides teleportation and even many mods that simply provide higher movement speed/flight.
    Railcraft was one of the first mods that experimented with multiblock machines, and the Buildcraft steam boiler was the premier power generation option in many modpacks.
    Railcraft includes Steel tools, which are iron tools with higher durability. Not very exciting unless the rest of your modpack has absolutely no tool options.
    This mod may remove the normal track recipe and replace it with one that is more expensive and requires a multiblock machine.
  • Notable expansions: None

 

[LodeRunner]

Sad to hear turbines are buggy like that. I was going to fire it up and build a second reactor to test with turbines.

 

[jandrese]

I was disappointed too. Apparently the super low yellorite use may be a bug too. Apparently there may be a bug that was causing the burn rate to be half of what was intended. In some versions you can even use it to dup your yellorite indefinitely by abusing the eject ore button. It is worth noting that Big Reactors is still technically in Alpha status.

 

[qchronod]

I wouldn't say that the turbines are buggy, more that it's not how they are designed to be used. They are for when you exceed the power production of a large reactor and don't want to rebuild it even more huge one.

The use case for the turbines is that you would design them to be able to produce massive amounts of RF/t and use some sort of logic to turn the generator coils on/off to fill your energy buffers. The rotors spin down much more slowly when it's not producing power, so it can idle for a more significant of time. Then when it starts to slow down too much, it would turn on the reactor and generate lots of heat in order to start creating steam to speed things back up.

Edit: I was unaware of the dupe bugs, but the halved fuel rate may be 'wrong' but if its consistent then that's what the true fuel rate would be.

 

[Sagan :]]

Actually, turbines don't produce more power than passively cooled reactors, not even close. A max reactor easily goes over 2 million RF/t, a single max turbine is 27,000 RF/t. By the time you build 74 max turbines to get back up 2M RF/t, you could have built a few more max reactors much much more easily. Turbines use in BR is for efficiency, they are up to 10 times more fuel efficient then passively cooled reactors.

I've also never seen the bugs jandrese mentioned, but it's modded minecraft, I'm sure they are there, just I've been lucky enough not to run into them.

 

[Wudan Master]

When my Vive arrives I'll be trying out the Minecraft mod, looking forward to seeing our server from VR.

 

[Alphamatroxom]

Wudan Master[/url]":jqdkqc4b]When my Vive arrives I'll be trying out the Minecraft mod, looking forward to seeing our server from VR.

I can taste the pixels

 

[Minstrel]

VR is the new "Sure you've done XYZ, but have you ever done XYZ while HIGH?!"

 

[qchronod]

Well, my plan for a BigReactor was going so well. I managed to make an inscriber so I could craft the computer in the reactor controller. Got the power tap and i/o ports, and a computer port so I could run Dire's fancy reactor controller program. Had most of the frame build, and decided to put in the fuel rods before I closed everything up....



The damned fuel rods need RTG pellets!! Which require plutonium!!! Which you only get from spent fuel of an IC2 reactor!!!!!!



So, that's going to be put aside for a while. But in the meantime I'm augmenting my waterwheels with an 8x Culinary Generator thats eating Epic Bacon! Each piece produces about 150K RF, and since it's an 8x gen, I'm making 484RF/t (when it gets food). I think I'm going to have to move my animal farm so that I will have enough room to run a couple of sprinklers to really speed up the production. (BTW, could I borrow a couple of eggs from someone? An ocelot spawned in my chicken coop and killed them all. I really don't feel like trying to spawn more with the chicken hammer.)

 

[LodeRunner]

Is that Skyblock Expert or something? Because for sure the stock recipe doesn't need that.

 

[qchronod]

Yeah, we're playing on the new FTBIESBEM pack. Please join us, either on the server, or just lurk in chat on IRC.

(I think it is pronounced Foo-tubby-sub-em)

 

[jandrese]

Yeah, I looked at the Big Reactor recipe and was like "hmm, the blocks aren't bad. Taps and ports and whatnot are stock, oh the controller is pretty expensive, and then the fuel rods had those pellets...

On the other hand, I'm up to the point where everything left wants BC gates so I guess I'm building an Assembly Table/laser, but all of the non-trivial power generation options require gates. I'm starting to wonder if I'm going to have to build the world's first windup industrial laser.

 

[qchronod]

I think we all started with water wheels. A triple wheel with extra source blocks on the bottom back produces about 80RF/t. Each laser for the assembly table transmits 40RF/t (5 diamonds make 2 lasers, so it works out fairly well).

Maxing out your laser capability is very important since all machines need several parts that the table makes (and some of those parts need absurd amount of energy).

Anyone have some experience with IC2 reactors?? The one I built is 100% safe, but its really damned slow, each cycle takes several hours, and I need 27 cycles to make enough plutonium. I've looked a bit online, but most of the designs I see are from years ago and I'm not sure if they still work safely (and are easily automatable).