Convert the dust to Redstone...
Notice I said dust, forcing me to find Redstone ore first and get some machines built before I can manufacture tons of Copper on-the-fly afterwords..
(course, this was pre-Plasticcraft, lol)
I'm assuming that this isn't possible with vanilla IC2? I know that Glowstone = Redstone+gold dust and iron = copper + tin, but I didn't know that you could get redstone out (that would make my life much easier)
Looking at the start, the process appears to be:
Get macerator, use single use batteries to power macertator, to get materials for generator, etc.
But, to get the batteries, you need coal dust, for which you need to power the macerator, which you can't do without the batteries. That's the reason I usually go Generator+Macerator then extractor and electric furnace, and then move onto the other machines.
Ok, it seems that some manner of location affects crop growth. Do we know whether it is biome, or the material under the crop block?
Making an educated guess, based on the Ferru growth requirement, I'd guess that it'd be block-based, rather than biome based.
I've found that reed-based crops grow incredibly quickly in my desert home (yay, stickreed!). I might try plonking some earth under my melon plants to see whether that has any real effect.
Also, has anyone had any luck working out nutrient/hydration degradation rate, or is it all still just nocturnal shooting?
O, this has been puzzling me just recently. I'm trying to work out why the tool for crop analysis is designed to be so different from the way I percieve the rest of the mod to be.
For example, it is the only tool that requires a separate power source to function, rather than having an internal one, charges as with other such tools. This would, to my mind, make it easier for quickly checking the stats of a seed pouch to work out where it needs to go, in a plantation.
It's also the only mobile device to posses it's own GUI. I understand that there's a lot of information to convey with the seed analysis, but the way that that function and the "plant checking" one have been bundled together makes me think that both were needed, but the devs only wanted to introduce a single new tool, so they jury-rigged it together to try and combine the two.
Finally, more of a suggestion than a question. Would it be possible to include the relevant destinctive characteristics of the seed bags in the tooltips, or change the sprite somehow when it gets analysed? It's just quite difficult to keep track of which pouch is which when you're looking after a counple of cross-breeding beds.
This isn't a criticism, I'm actually genuinely interested in the thought processes that led to the decisions.
For power, I generally use 1 (or two) Geos to begin with, progressing up the chain to MFE and MFSU in due course.
With respect to finding specific materials, there isn't a fool proof way, but looking at the "OV-map" so to speak can be helpful. For example, if the value changes 10+ from one block to another, then it's likely that a diamond vein is going just out of reach of the miner. Smililarly, a gradual build=up is more likely to be due to coal. I usually find best diamond-results from spots of 100+, but that does also, sometimes, just yield a lot of iron.
It's mostly guesswork, but you can apply a little thought and knowledge to it, too.
Edit: I would say, that one good way of lava harvesting is to wander to the nether and grab it from the side of a lake. One better way is to find a nether fortress, get a nice stack of fire immunity potions and take a walk in the lake.
I suppose what you are looking at is a method of automating the turning of the soil. Something like a plough or rotivator would probably be the way to go, but they're a little less portable.
Perhaps something along these lines?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotary_tiller
Ok, my input, for what it's worth.
I've recently been playing the tekkit mod on my server at home, and the 1.0.0 additions make geothermal quite significantly more useful as a form of long-ish term mobile power.
I'll take a stroll to the nether with a fire-resist potion and a couple of stacks of cells, and wander around a lava lake for a few minutes, until they've all filled up. Then, two geothermal generators topped up with about 20-30 cells apiece will power a diamond-OV miner away from my base, for it's entire cycle.
Now, I've not been too fussed about nuclear at the moment because of it's high initial cost and because, the way I prefer it (i.e. completely unattended, with no risk of explosion) it just provides a moderate source of energy for an extended period, which a bank of about 15 solars on the side of my house do quite happily, and will keep me going for the forseeable, or until I get bored with the buildcraft side of things and come back to play around with the IC2 stuff.
I'd say that the log would be something along the lines of:
Disconnected transport modules require to transmit all data regarding reassembly through the ether, wirelessly (hence the frequency transmitters). However, modules connected directly (although, I'd say that there should be a higher "burst" energy transmission) don't need to broadcast the signal, instead sending it directly through the wire.
I'd equate it somewhat to the difference in power consumption between wired and wireless network cards.
There is also the argument that reassembly would be a matter-regeneration operation similar to the one which takes place in the matter fabricator, which explains the large power usage.
I think a good way of adding challenge and use to teleporters would be to have the transmitting pad suddenly have a large excess of energy (as might be generated by the disassembly of a person), perhaps 50% of the receive power, and the relieving pad having a sudden demand of power.
This would give the effect in the original post, to an extent, i.e. rapid travel between two directly connected pads would retain some of the energy within the system,
But, wouldn't this defeat the point of the chests? If the point is that it should store your valuables safely when you are not around, making it require energy would just be adding a way for people to break in.
All they'd have to do would be to cut the cable, and wait for the power to run out, and they could loot your stuff easily.
I think that one of the larger issues with solar arises from the "maintenance-free" side of it:
Lets say that you need a large number of EUs for a project, or running a base. You have the option of either building a colossal nuclear reactor, and watching it for the entire duration of running, to prevent it overheating, or you could build a load of small reactors, which will run for a few hours, and then run out of fuel, giving you energy, but still at a fairly hefty cost.
Or, you can build a stack of solars, log them onto copper cables, and leave it for an IRL night. Plonk a Mass Fabricator on there, too, and you have a load of diamonds into the equation, too!
Now, I'm not saying that I have a big solution, but the main issue is arising from the ability to "fire and forget" the solar generators, which, as the most powerful renewable source, makes them OP, for the moment.
Perhaps one method would be to stop them generating when no one's in the vicinity? Or take them down to the levels of wind and water?
I like the idea that the reactors take a significant amount of energy to start, but not so keen on the "masses of power indefinitely" thing. As far as I can tell, there is somewhat of a cost-work-energy conversion rate going:
Renewables - High cost - no work - low energy
Fuel-based - Low cost - high work - med energy
Cold Reactor - High Cost - low work - med energy
Hot Reactor - High Cost - High Work - high energy
Essentially, all the generators fit somewhere. Adding an essentially unlimited supply would reduce the entire thing to a race to fission, while as it is, you can look at these forums and see people who prefer the no-work high-cost renewables, to focus on a different area, or the people who want to run nukes for a little while and save enough energy for a long time, or even those who prefer a tree farm to power generators. An endless supply of clean energy is a taget, but never attained.
I'd probably recommend either a limited lifespan and fuel addition, to slot into the current scheme.
A different way of looking at it would be to have some way of setting the output in the reactor (fuel/catalyst/etc.), and have it only work safely if it draws ONLY that level, if there's higher or lower draw, then heat would build up and it would eventually explode. That would make it good for times when you need a burst of energy (to charge MFSUs, for example), but it wouldn't be a "fire and forget" type device.
You can macerate the bars back into dust, thus making "Powder Storage blocks" a Moot point.
Of this I was not aware (it's not on the wiki, as far as I can see). But I'd still quite like to be able to store my rubber, redstone and glowstone dusts in a way that I can get the material back again. Just to make my chests a bit nicer.
Unless I misunderstood, I don't think that this suggestion is to create something from buildcraft (i.e. a fixed block that allows the static storage of a liquid). It's more like an extra capacity bucket. So, I'd probably go with I agree on this one, but the capacity would be quite difficult to determine (making it sufficiently balanced to be useful, but not making either buckets or cells redundant). Might it be worth making it "leakey" so it looses some of it's liquid over time. That way it'd still be useful to harvest lava/water/etc. for immediate use, but you couldn't take it on long journeys (you'd need a bucket), or store it for later (cells).
Or maybe a powered UU matter converter which needs X amounts of matter to run, returns Y amount of item, given a specific template.
X being a constant for a given machine, possibly with the option to increase or decrease depending on tier/power input, and Y being determined by the value of the resource needed.
The template would be an example of the item in question, used to simplify the process of matter usage (and make it make a little more sense), and to make sure that you are able to actually get the item before the game gives you more.
My general view on the matter is that it's an emergency resource. If I'm building a big item (Nuclear Reactor, bank of Solars, Quantum Suit, etc.) and suddenly realise that I'm a few items short, I can fabricate the missing bits rather than upping sticks and mining it out. So, UU matter-generated resources should never be easier to generate en masse than the harvested equivalents.
Ok, to be clear, I'm not talking about tiered storage blocks (9 iron = 1 block, 9 blocks = 1 new block, etc.), I'm talking about making blocks more universal.
By this I mean that, while you can make a lapis block, you can't do the same with redstone or glowstone (not at a 1:1 storage:reclamation rate), or with rubber. Just let us store these resources in a way that makes sense.
Also, and I know it's a little more out-there, but possibly powder-blocks, to prevent us having to smelt our copper and tin to save inventory/chest space before realising that we need it for bronze stuff further down the line.
Recipes: Same as other storage blocks.
