Zjarek:
I'm not particularly attached to my current proposal for chemical engineering.
The idea as is (Multiblock reactors, Heat/pH/Water/Concentration, reactions, etc.) was born out of a combnation of:
- My ignorance of chemistry
- K.I.S.S. (Keep it simple stupid) approach
- CPU-load considerations
- Personal plebtasity
Again, I'd love to hear other suggestions on how to do this.
@I don't know:
I like the idea to use scrap in reactions. The random concentration (and by extention, the idea to make other/more reagents have random properties ) is pretty neat.
My suggested method for concentration would make no distinction between different materials, rather the concentration is tied to what reaction you are currently using.
(I.e. a reactor can only run one reaction at a time, so you can only add the stuff related to that reaction.)
(I'll try to draw up some picture mock-ups of what the system could look like, in the next few days.)
In terms of balance then, you can simply limit what reactions scrap can be added to. (I.e. the really good-stuff reactions don't allow scrap.)
[EDIT]
Reading through the old posts again, and giving it a second runthrough in my brain, I came to realise that not all reactors have to be equal in terms of what they need.
To be more specific and clear, I realise that not all reactors have to have pH/Heat/Concentration/Water.
In fact, one could simply define that all reactors have a ReactionVariable 1 to 4.
What text is displayed to the user (Heat, pH, Concentration, Water) can be defined per reactor.
For example, a pressure vessel could have "Pressure", "Mass", "Heat" (does not always require 4, can have less)
A mixer could have "pH", "Water", "Mass", "Density"
A magic cauldron could have "Chicken Guts", "Chakra", "Manna", "Cake"
It would provide more flexibility in terms of naming and realism, though introduce more complexity with defining reagent effects.
I.e. reagents would define Param1 to Param4 changes, though Param1 for a pressure vessel is pressure and Param1 for a mixer is pH, so making the reagent usable in both could complicate things.
Though, it places the added complexity in the hands of the modder, not the user, so that should be possible to manage.
[/EDIT]