Suggestion: Electric Pistons

    Name:
    Electric Pistons


    Description:
    Edit 7/18/2011:
    Electric pistons function just like normal pistons do, with an addition. If powered via electricity (wire, battery, crystal, etc), they will be capable of pushing/pulling many more blocks and up to ONE obsidian block. Two obsidian blocks will prevent the piston from pushing the obsidian blocks, but they can "crush" all other blocks against them and turn them into dropped items. This also applies to passing the push limit, it can keep pushing but it will crush the very last block that's not obsidian/piston related. Obviously if the first two blocks are obsidian or there's bedrock, etc. in front of it, it won't push them at all and fail to extend/pull them.


    Recipe:
    Truth be told, I don't know of a good crafting recipe at the moment because I'm drawing a blank. All I know of is that it'll require a regular version of the piston/sticky piston.


    Either version of the vanilla pistons can be upgraded to electric pistons, and a normal electric piston can be upgraded to sticky piston as well, the exact same way a vanilla piston can be upgraded to sticky piston-- using a slime ball. That's basically it.

    What about an additional variantion?


    Stronger pistons (as you suggested) and also extended pistons with a two block reach instead of the usual one block?

    It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than open your mouth and remove all doubt

    Eh, I don't think two block pistons would be very stable to implement. If you follow the changelogs and Notch's twitter, you'll see just how hard it was to get one-block extending pistons to work as is without crashing. I doubt two would be possible.


    Updated the first post with some new info.

    Why not entirely make those pistons electricity-dependant?
    Electricity isn´t very hard to get either when you are at the level of making pistons. And i must say, it works finer with octagonal movement than redstone, as its quite spacious.
    But Thats just my opinion.
    We´ll see what the future brings.

    Quote

    Buildcraft – spilling items.™

    Because if you did that, you would break all existing pistons that would rely on vanilla Minecraft's behavior. That, and I don't believe Alblaka is going to go that far to break saved games as I'm quite sure it'd cause quite some turmoil. I also have reason to believe it could corrupt worlds. Hence, an IC version of an upgradeable piston. It goes from normal piston to electric piston. I hope you understand where I'm coming from.


    Edit: Glad to see my suggestion was moved over to IC Squared suggestions board! :D

    Pardon the bump, but I thought about another feature difference for the electric pistons.


    First, I believe that if this happens to make it in, I would recommend allowing electric pistons to be upgraded. It would be simple.


    -C-
    CEC
    -C-


    C = Energy crystal
    E = Electric piston


    OR


    ---
    -L-
    -E-


    L = Lapotron crystal
    E = Electric piston


    Produces the Crystalline Piston, which is capable of taking and storing up to roughly one million EU, so a lapotron crystal could easily take and store it's energy.


    To help keep the original sense of using the pistons the same way, electric pistons without EU will simply act like vanilla pistons. They will take redstone regardless, but energy will allow them to behave in a more powerful manner.


    These pistons can also be "pushed" towards cables and/or MFE/MFSU blocks and, depending on which side they are on, can either discharge their energy into them or withdraw energy. It follows the same rules as the cables and emitting directions of the storage units.


    I suggested batteries and energy crystals being capable of decharging these so people can go mobile and tweak mechanisms without the need to recharge a battery/crystal completely. This allows for simply stuffing in a battery/crystal, withdrawing all the energy, taking it out and then using the wrench to properly take down the device. After once they are finished they can replace the piston and then fill it back up with the energy they withdrew via battery/crystal.