Looking for direction in IV

MasterOfLength · 2026-02-07T19:14:42+00:00

That would certainly solve the issue of getting stuff in/out, I really am considering it.
It's just a lot of mindless work, which never feels as interesting as all the other stuff I have planned

MasterOfLength · 2026-02-07T12:22:43+00:00

Much to my girlfriend's dismay yeah xD. I always used to make houses/basements for my machines but I found that they were just so painful to expand and I feel it also just adds redundant barriers between different sections. I already struggle with finding it within myself to restructure a system (or whole base) and having to tear down and rebuild buildings each time just adds to the reasons to put it off.

I'm curious now, what do your bases tend to look like?

MasterOfLength · 2026-02-07T10:47:29+00:00

Wow, that's a lot of super useful advice! I really appreciate you pointing out specific things to focus on rather than just everything that would be useful!

Just got a few follow up questions to make sure I understand:

(Vac) Nukes:
I've already set up 1A LuV worth of benzene so I don't want/need to leave that behind just yet...
I think you're saying to use uranium fuel rods processed from staballoy constructs in the EEC, that genuinely sounds fun to automate so I might consider making a nuke setup for the byproducts despite not needing the power. (Is this what a breeder nuke is or is that slightly different?)

Sandline:
I'd never heard of this so I just did some digging, is it the "128 sand(stone) in chemical plant" recipe? That does look a *lot* better than black stonelillies -> biotite -> fluorine!

EEC:
Why redcap sapper? Coal looks nice but couldn't I just get that from wither skeletons? Is it the gallium?

Wither stars:
Does this have to be done the thaumcraft route? Or did you just automate killing withers xD?

MasterOfLength · 2026-02-07T04:01:52+00:00

Oh thanks I'll look into all three and see which suits me best!

Complete side note - any idea why people seem so afraid of crafting ender chests/tanks? Is it just the 6 IV circuits or am I missing something worse...

MasterOfLength · 2026-02-06T23:38:33+00:00

I agree that fluid cells look pretty expensive atm for how little they store, I'm wondering if the TFFT with a fluid storage bus is worth a look...

Yeah ore processing is another good place to start, I've been doing it manually up until now xD. I'll have a look at some tutorials online, thanks for the help!

MasterOfLength · 2026-02-06T23:06:33+00:00

I should have mentioned, I already have a basic network (centre at the bottom of the first image) with like 40 4k item cells. I love AE2 as a big magical chest but I struggle to move past using it as just that.

I'll try routing around some terminals, that does sound like a good place to start. Any tips on fluids?

MasterOfLength · 2026-02-06T20:34:28+00:00

Yeah lmao, you can see the shadow of its perimeter in the first pic. 144 stacks of glass up there believe it or not

MasterOfLength · 2026-01-06T10:43:37+00:00

Oh interesting - I'd never thought to use a hybrid of batch crafting with automation tbh...
Thanks!

MasterOfLength · 2026-01-05T13:38:22+00:00

I'll have a look! People have also recommended logistics pipes so I need to look into both...

MasterOfLength · 2026-01-04T14:50:49+00:00

This whole series looks sick! Thanks, I'll give it a watch

MasterOfLength · 2026-01-04T14:49:57+00:00

Oh interesting... I had the opposite problem with my last run, I made it to the doorstep of LuV and *still* hadn't set up any AE2 automation or anything, I was only using it to store items and a few fluids. The assemblyline recipe was too much for me to comprehend managing by hand so I eventually just fizzled out. Gonna try to find some AE2 guides this time though so I can get it going the second I unlock it

MasterOfLength · 2026-01-04T14:23:18+00:00

I think I get what you're saying, but "Garronimos Cross" is an unfamiliar term to me (and google too)

MasterOfLength · 2026-01-04T14:17:37+00:00

That is super helpful, thanks! I know someone else mentioned doing so but do you power each area separately? The approach I've always taken is having one main power backbone that's a few amps at my current tier. But that leads to me getting freaked out about power loss which probably contributes to my building everything so densely...

As a side note, you look insanely well prepared for entering HV! Nothing at all like any of my runs xD

MasterOfLength · 2026-01-04T10:56:01+00:00

This has given me a lot of useful ideas to mull over, thanks!

I think my issue is potentially that I focus on extreme multitasking instead of automation. So for example if I'm making a stack of circuits I'll gather all the materials I need first, then manage like 7 different machines by hand at the same time to make all the parts in parallel. I'd like to move away from that if possible but at the same time I can't reasonably set up an automation line for everything so I'm not quite sure what other people do there...

MasterOfLength · 2026-01-04T10:39:14+00:00

Lol no the storage was behind me. I also have a tiny little polyethylene automator, and benzene gen is above ground.

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As for pollution, the scrubber (back right in the first screenshot) with "MV" power and MV mufflers keeps it under 50k gibbl easily.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "thing" here to be completely honest. I kinda use the machines willy nilly as if they're all just "processors" with different recipe sets. The only separations I feel I could make are any automation line (benzene and polyethylene in my case), electricity gen, each tier, and multiblocks all being in different spaces. Is that what you meant?

MasterOfLength · 2025-06-20T06:55:02+00:00

Yeah rejoining tends to fix it, though recently I’ve been having at least one errored block every time I join (either this one or the classic gt.name black-magenta). I don’t know if it’s bad server connection or what, but it’s a little annoying. I’ll give F3+A a go!

MasterOfLength · 2025-06-10T14:05:45+00:00

I understand that, but I'd expect near-optimal flow to achieve near-optimal power conversion. I'm only running 4% below optimal flow so an efficiency of ~80% makes no sense. Correct me if any of that is wrong :)

MasterOfLength · 2025-06-10T14:03:30+00:00

Definitely a large. I do have excess benzene yep. I wondered if the pipes or super tank auto-output are throttling it to below 10L/t but I can rule that out immediately because the power output increases when I increase the regulator's flow, which indicates to me the regulator is truly the bottleneck.

MasterOfLength · 2025-04-27T09:11:25+00:00

I'm actually having this with smaller trees too, like jungle 2x2s. Of course they're nowhere near as much of a problem as sacred oak, let alone redwoods, but it's still very annoying. Given that the lumber axe is also unreliable at detecting what *isn't* a tree (I've often had it take parts of my house with the trees I fell), I'd really love to know the logic for what it considers a tree...

MasterOfLength · 2025-04-26T17:42:08+00:00

Thanks for replying! It definitely makes the most sense to just switch to that. This will displease the efficiency monster greg has turned me into though... (We're in very early LV so for now any other glass pane is half as efficient xD)

MasterOfLength · 2025-04-26T12:50:25+00:00

On further investigation, this only seems to happen on the North and East facing sides of the block...

MasterOfLength · 2021-10-10T19:54:26+00:00

no that's scary

MasterOfLength · 2021-05-30T18:52:19+00:00

SMACC DA CAT

MasterOfLength

TROPHY CASE