GT5u storage organization tips?

1st Official Post

    I'm in a peaceful single-player game with IC2, GT5u, GemBlocksForGreg, and some utility mods (none of which add any worldgen or crafting recipes), and I've been thinking about relocating my stuff to under a large crop-farm I built, but that would also mean moving the chests I use for storage as well. I was wondering if anybody had tips to share that might help me organize my new storage better. If there are some non-obvious reasons for such a move being a bad idea, I'd like to know about those as well.

    Sorry, your reply is a bit late (I've started new worlds with different mods a few times). In that world, the crop-farm is at -652,128,-647 while most of my chests were near 127, 65, 208. Thus it would take several hundred item pipes to move the items that way (riding a minecart in the overworld between the two places took 3 minutes 13 seconds, so I built some rails in the Nether, though I think there was a weird issue where at one end I usually couldn't board the Nether minecart unless I closed and relaunched Minecraft). Anyway, that's not really what I was asking about. I'm more interested in tips regarding how to arrange the chests, and how to decide which items should go in which chests. Such tips would help me even for newer worlds, at least until I'm able to build AE2 storage systems.

    SpwnX, did you write your second post of this thread before reading my response? If you read my response first, I'm quite confused that you're continuing to talk about BC pipes, and frustrated that I'm still being misinterpreted.


    Some problems with your suggestion of diamond pipes:
    1. In the MultiMC instance I was describing in the OP, I didn't have BuildCraft. (I was trying to see if I could play GregTech without other major mods, which I think is technically possible but not all that attractive)
    2. Without a system to help me decide what items to keep in which chests (or groups of chests), it's a bit impractical to set up diamond pipes.
    3. In my current instance, I haven't found diamonds yet, and I plan to eventually build some AE2 storage, so I don't see a lot of value in setting up pipe-based item sorting.


    Let me try rewording my question one more time: how should I group the chests I put my items in (before AE2 storage)? alphabetically? by category? (if so, what categories (and possibly subcategories) are good for GregTech items?) some other system?

    • Official Post
    Quote from MauveCloud

    SpwnX, did you write your second post of this thread before reading my response? If you read my response first, I'm quite confused that you're continuing to talk about BC pipes, and frustrated that I'm still being misinterpreted.


    Some problems with your suggestion of diamond pipes:
    1. In the MultiMC instance I was describing in the OP, I didn't have BuildCraft. (I was trying to see if I could play GregTech without other major mods, which I think is technically possible but not all that attractive)
    2. Without a system to help me decide what items to keep in which chests (or groups of chests), it's a bit impractical to set up diamond pipes.
    3. In my current instance, I haven't found diamonds yet, and I plan to eventually build some AE2 storage, so I don't see a lot of value in setting up pipe-based item sorting.

    I guess thats what I get for reading things lightly.

    Quote from MauveCloud

    Let me try rewording my question one more time: how should I group the chests I put my items in (before AE2 storage)? alphabetically? by category? (if so, what categories (and possibly subcategories) are good for GregTech items?) some other system?

    Generally categories and dozens of chests with signs that tells you what are inside them.
    Like "logs and planks", "ores" , "ingots", "crushed ores", "dusts", "tiny dusts/nuggets", "tools", "manufactured goods", "industrial goods" , "redstone things", "plants" and whatever more seem fit to deserve a chest on its own.

    Quote from SpwnX

    Generally categories and dozens of chests with signs that tells you what are inside them.
    Like "logs and planks", "ores" , "ingots", "crushed ores", "dusts", "tiny dusts/nuggets", "tools", "manufactured goods", "industrial goods" , "redstone things", "plants" and whatever more seem fit to deserve a chest on its own.


    Thank you. My preliminary storage setup in my current instance is somewhat like that, but I wasn't sure whether I should maintain that style of organization once I put in the floor of my large house. I'm a bit curious why you suggest grouping by form (e.g. ingots vs. crushed ores) before/instead of by material, though.

    • Official Post

    Because of their processing destination and leftovers from get-go processing
    (need one copper? Lets crush an entire stack of copper ores as its the final step and I don't plan to use it for anything else in the meanwhile)
    Usually the crushed ores chest is pretty much the chest beside the macerator auto-outputs.


    Do I need plates and i'm out of them? Look for ingots.
    Out of them? Dusts. Process (generally more than I need) to ingots.
    Out of them? crushed ores. Throw them into the macerator again and get some dusts.
    Out of them? ores.
    Still out of them? Stop looking and go finally mine.


    Material classification is not necessary for me because of InvTweaks (order things generally alphabetically inside the chest) + NEI (highlight search mode) to look for exactly what I need.


    Also, if you were to classify per material you would have way more chests than you wish. Its an option you can have though.


    You know, a chest for diamond, redstone, iron, copper, lead, tin, antimony and whatever more material you come by takes space.

    Okay, that makes sense. I already have InvTweaks installed, though I haven't used NEI's highlight search mode much.


    BTW, your comment about throwing crushed ores into the macerator again for dusts makes me wonder whether you're aware that it takes less time and total EU to use the forge hammer for that (10 ticks and 160 EU total vs. 400 ticks and 800 EU total, when both are at LV). I'm aware that once one has built the Universal Macerator, the potential for byproduct dust output probably outweighs the efficiency, but in lower tiers, the forge hammer seems to make more sense for converting crushed ores to dusts.

    I actually assumed he was referring to the byproduct version myself.


    I always organize the same way: I have chests for dusts, ingots, broken ores, tiny dusts, nuggets, plants, foods, mob-parts, wires+pipes, tools, circuits/circuit-parts. Then it gets weirder. I have chests for IC2/GT stuff, tools, "anything MODX related", etc. Once my chests fill up too badly, I start pushing things to Jabba barrels or some equivalent.


    My system is pretty crap.

    Actually, Jabba looks like a good mod for helping me store items I have large amounts of (e.g. mudstone/shale rubble), though one detail in the FTB wiki description of the mod seems a bit off: it says the barrels "can convert anything of the same Ore Dictionary entry to another." However, that doesn't seem to apply to cobblestone or rubble - limestone cobble can be macerated for calcite dust, and conglomerate rubble can be shoveled for a chance of copper nuggets, so I tried to convert other types of cobble/rubble to them, but it didn't work.

    Does it actually say ore dictionary? Jabba barrels are certainly known to perform unification on items that are functionally identical. So if you have two types of copper for instance. But I've never heard of this extending to all oredict scenarios.


    If you're particularly interested in blocks that can hold a lot of one thing, are you aware you can make Quantum Chests now? They're similar, and native to 5u.

    • Official Post

    It is the ore dictionary, I've had dyes all being unified to cactus before from it using it with a mod that adds all dyes under the same entry.

    145 Mods isn't too many. 9 types of copper and 8 types of tin aren't too many. 3 types of coffee though?

    I know that you believe that you understood what you think I said, but I am not sure you realise that what you read was not what I meant.


    ---- Minecraft Crash Report ----
    // I just don't know what went wrong :(


    I see this too much.

    I was quoting the FTB wiki page for Jabba before (http://ftb.gamepedia.com/JABBA). On the mcf thread about it, it says "Barrels automatically convert ores/ingots/dusts from one mod into another." The changelog mentions removing "block" from the valid ore dictionary prefixes, so I think the FTB wiki page over-generalized. I might try later setting up barrels of wrought iron and annealed copper to see if those will accept regular iron and copper for conversion.


    I'm aware that GT5u has quantum chests, but even if they don't consume power to store items (which is implied by the lack of voltage detail in their tooltips, but not explicitly stated on the wiki), the engraved crystal chips in the crafting recipe for the lowest-tier quantum chest can only be made in an HV-tier (or higher) precision laser engraver. I'm still pre-steam in my current instance, so it may take a few days before I'm ready to make those.

    Quote from Chocohead

    It is the ore dictionary, I've had dyes all being unified to cactus before from it using it with a mod that adds all dyes under the same entry.


    Craziness. And kinda scary.


    Quote from MauveCloud

    I was quoting the FTB wiki page for Jabba before (http://ftb.gamepedia.com/JABBA). On the mcf thread about it, it says "Barrels automatically convert ores/ingots/dusts from one mod into another." The changelog mentions removing "block" from the valid ore dictionary prefixes, so I think the FTB wiki page over-generalized. I might try later setting up barrels of wrought iron and annealed copper to see if those will accept regular iron and copper for conversion.


    I'm aware that GT5u has quantum chests, but even if they don't consume power to store items (which is implied by the lack of voltage detail in their tooltips, but not explicitly stated on the wiki), the engraved crystal chips in the crafting recipe for the lowest-tier quantum chest can only be made in an HV-tier (or higher) precision laser engraver. I'm still pre-steam in my current instance, so it may take a few days before I'm ready to make those.


    Woops, makes sense.


    I'm also not sure if you can move a quantum chest w/o losing contents, like you can with jabba barrels via the dolly.


    You certainly cannot move a quantum tank with liquid in it w/o losing the liquid.