BuildCraft Vs RedPower

[Honeyderp]

If you do BuildCraft properly, what advantages are there of using RedPower tubes?

[theprolo]

Less lag, quicker, won't spam stuff when there's nowhere to go... There's tonnes of advantages.

[Honeyderp]

Less lag? They're both visible in the pipes/tubes, and unless the pipes are overflowing, there shouldn't be a difference. And do you mean quicker with or without golden pipes?

[stringburka]

Redpower:

Far easier to create a good sorting system.

Sorts faster

Better in small places

Buildcraft:

Faster over large distances (I think)

Better handling of liquids (in my opinion)

Pipes are cheaper than tubes

I also THINK that engines use up more CPU than sorting machines/filters when you don't need the sorting.

Personally, I use tubes within my factories/bases, and buildcraft to move stuff (and all that juicy lava for my geothermals) from one part of the map to the other.

[disconsented]

Don't forget all the extra things in RP like deployers, filters, colour assignment, igniter etc...

Also Mag Tubes are ludicrously fast

[gavjenks]

Redpower:

* Vastly more capabilities. Most notably assemblers and deployers and block breakers, without which a huge number of machines are not possible and which buildcraft has absolutely no replacement for that I know of. But also, as mentioned, igniters, etc. Also, redpower pumps are the only way in the game to drain and fill a pool automatically with actual source blocks, which is awesome.

* It is way less UGLY than buildcraft is. Seriously, buildcraft blocks look like they are drawn by a little kid with a crayon, compared to redpower's sleek animation and satisfyingly realistic look.

* Much better pipe management. By being able to paint pipes, you can have 16 different lines crossing by each other with no interference. In buildcraft, you can use stone or cobble, and that's about it (and cobble is slower too!). Packing a bunch of condensed stuff into an efficient room is thus extremely easier with redpower. Additionally, a bunch of the things you need separate complicated pipes for in buildcraft (like iron and gold and insertion pipes and wooden pipes blah blah) are done inherently in redpower, making it much simpler and easier to get started and to make complex things without making silly little decisions yourself that the computer should be able to handle (e.g. why would you ever WANT items to spill onto the ground if the inventory is full?). ALSO, by using retrievulators and transposers, a single side of a container can be input and output both, which is not possible with BC as far as I know. Also allows more compact machines.

* Infinitely better timing control than buildcraft. In buildcraft you have slow and fast, basically. In redpower you have every increment from 0 to hundreds of seconds 0.05 seconds at a time, and you know exactly what that timing is (to integrate with CC, etc.).

* Much less lag than Buildcraft when used correctly. Yes, they both have items in tubes, but filters send a whole stack of items at once, so redpower has the potential to have 1/64th as much item-in-tube lag as buildcraft does when used responsibly. Also tubes push items faster than plain pipes, which means fewer items in tubes at a time (unless you want to make more complex decisions like gold pipes, which restrict your space decisions and take more thought, and even then it is still more lag to move a stack than in redpower, by far).

* No warmup time on filters and transposers, compared to buildcraft's very long warmup. This also makes much less lag if done correctly. You can't AFFORD to turn off buildcraft engines when you don't need them, so you have to leave them on and waste CPU, whereas redpower only has to use resources exactly when you need them.

* Much MUCH better sorting and logistical control, especially since the blocks are compatible with all the logic gates and wireless redstone. Again, since BC engines require a long warmup, it is impractical or impossible to control them with precise logic, which makes precise machinery a pain in the ass and inefficient.

* Better compatibility with things like frame motors, since it is the same mod and they are designed to be compatible.

BuildCraft:

* More useful liquid handling system

* More useful power transfer system (Although both of these are possible with redpower by moving buckets or lapotron crystals around in ender chests)

So basically, I suggest using buildcraft if you want a lava pumping system into geothermals, or if you want to wirelessly send IC energy. That's about it.

[Honeyderp]

Well, I'm convinced RedPower is better. Now I'm just using rail craft, just so I can make carts fly when they hold my stuff. I mean, flying carts are way cooler than a straight line of blocks.

[ajhockey]

I'd say RedPower's tubes are better. They're quite smart, and in conjunction with a sorting machine, they can make a rather compact sorting system. Buildcraft pipes had the potential to be faster until RedPower's Mag Tubes were introduced.

[Viktor_Berg]

As mentioned previously, BC is better at handling liquids, and it also has teleport pipes, which makes item transfer over long distance easy and painless. In SSP, there is an added bonus of Logistics Pipes, but since this is the Tekkit subforum...

Otherwise, I really prefer RedPower.

[gavjenks]

The thing about liquids though is that most of the liquids are used FOR buildcraft itself... so it's really not terribly great to have a better liquid handling system when the other mods don't even need to handle liquids like yours does in the first place.

The only things I can think of for why you might want liquid handling outside of BC is for nuclear reactors to compress snow and for lava from the nether to power geothermals. The nuclear reactor thing doesnt count though, cause IC2 pumps go directly into compressors. So literally lava farms in the nether is the ONLY reason I can think why anybody would care about better liquid handling?

[stringburka]

I'd REALLY not recommend teleport pipes. My experience is that they eat items and liquids. I think it's much better to use ender/void chests and sorting machines.

Personally though I like how buildcraft looks. I love the moving engines. I know it eats CPU, but on single player I don't find it that much of a hog. If you have an older computer you might think it a drawback though, I can understand that. I've even set up a 2*2*8 Redpower Engine array to keep my refineries going, just because I love that big machine working at full speed. I'm thinking of making a pneumatic generator just to get EU out of redpower engine arrays.

gavjenks: Buildcraft's handling of liquids looks so frakkin' good and is very intuitive, compared to redpowers pump/bucket/chest/transposer systems. And I LOVE my geothermal generators - they're simply my favourite generator, period. If you've got a big pool of lava, putting up 6 or so geothermals connected to a tank connected to a BC pump takes like 5 minutes and gives about the same output as a decent nuclear plant (though it won't last as long). That can be done with IC2/RP too, but not in a way that's as intuitive and pretty as BC's handling.

[Viktor_Berg]

I've never had such problems with teleport pipes. Then again, 3.1.0 is quite buggy and pipes may sometimes disappear, which is what you might have experienced as disappearing items/liquids. 3.1.0 is SSP though, Tekkit runs 3.0.7 which I've so far had no problems with.

[gavjenks]

gavjenks: Buildcraft's handling of liquids looks so frakkin' good and is very intuitive, compared to redpowers pump/bucket/chest/transposer systems. And I LOVE my geothermal generators - they're simply my favourite generator, period. If you've got a big pool of lava, putting up 6 or so geothermals connected to a tank connected to a BC pump takes like 5 minutes and gives about the same output as a decent nuclear plant (though it won't last as long). That can be done with IC2/RP too, but not in a way that's as intuitive and pretty as BC's handling.

Yes I already agreed that BC is more intuitive in its liquid handling (though not agreeing on the visual appeal, blech. RP's pumps are so much more obviously beautiful, with pressure rivets and actual pipe look, and subtle rust and slime on the grates, and a pump that is probably the coolest looking machine in the game and makes me want to set up pumps just to look at it)

However, aside from your geo farm, what other use is there for intuitive liquid handling that is relevant if you aren't using buildcraft?

-No need for cooling engines with water

-No need for pumping oil

-No need for pumping fuel

-Really no need for lava aside from geos

-No need for water for nuclear cooling, since IC2 pumps can go directly into a compressor

...*crickets*...

[Viktor_Berg]

Why would you not use BuildCraft? It is useful for so much - automatic crafting and supplying (Logistics Pipes), Forestry, Advanced Power Systems (fusion generator), automated large-scale building (builders, fillers, templates, path markers) and mining (quarries, mining wells). Yes, for some applications, like sorting systems (not based on Logistics), RP2 is better, but if you don't use BC, you are really denying yourself a bunch of fun toys - some of which (spoilers!) require BC energy.

[gavjenks]

Why would you not use BuildCraft? It is useful for so much - automatic crafting and supplying (Logistics Pipes), Forestry, Advanced Power Systems (fusion generator), automated large-scale building (builders, fillers, templates, path markers) and mining (quarries, mining wells). Yes, for some applications, like sorting systems (not based on Logistics), RP2 is better, but if you don't use BC, you are really denying yourself a bunch of fun toys - some of which (spoilers!) require BC energy.

In order of what you listed:

Logistics pipes - These do not exist in tekkit.

Forestry - This does not exist in tekkit.

Fusion generators - Buildcraft is terrible for reactors. Since you can only move a single item at a time, you have to use up an unnecessarily large number of slots in the reactor for coolant. Really advanced, high energy reactors are much safer with whole stacks of ice being delivered at once.

Templates - These are kinda nifty as a concept, but in practice, I've never seen even one person actually use them. I'm guessing the reason is that anything which is actually complex to build that you would WANT to use a template for, like airships, doesn't work with templates, because it can't handle miniblocks or wires on the sides of things, or stuff that has to be built in a certain order (like frame, then cover, then block), or orienting frame motors correctly, or liquids, etc. Templates are great for dirt houses... but so are my own two hands, you know?

Quarries - No, blech. These cover the exact same 9x9 area that IC2 miners do, and unlike IC2 miners, they are much more difficult to pick up and move, AND they rape the landscape with a huge gaping hole, instead of surgically picking out the ores. Mining wells are even WORSE - why in the good God's name do they leave hundreds of horrible little mining pipes that they don't pick up after themselves? AND they only cover 1/81th the area of an IC2 miner. It might as well be called the "I don't care if my world looks like an evil clowns on stilts convention, as long as I can get my ores super inefficiently" machine.

[Viktor_Berg]

Logistics pipes - These do not exist in tekkit.

Forestry - This does not exist in tekkit.

Understandable - I mostly play SSP where I can add those mods (and I do), but you can't quite discount Forestry, some Tekkit servers manually add it.

Fusion generators - Buildcraft is terrible for reactors. Since you can only move a single item at a time, you have to use up an unnecessarily large number of slots in the reactor for coolant. Really advanced, high energy reactors are much safer with whole stacks of ice being delivered at once.

I was talking about the Advanced Power Systems addon for BuildCraft. Sadly, it's SSP-only, too.

Templates - These are kinda nifty as a concept, but in practice, I've never seen even one person actually use them. I'm guessing the reason is that anything which is actually complex to build that you would WANT to use a template for, like airships, doesn't work with templates, because it can't handle miniblocks or wires on the sides of things, or stuff that has to be built in a certain order (like frame, then cover, then block), or orienting frame motors correctly, or liquids, etc. Templates are great for dirt houses... but so are my own two hands, you know?

Templates are great for a large amount of similarly shaped constructions. In the next Technic, where BC3 will be SMP-compatible, we will get the ability to combine templates with the Path markers, which will make it incredibly easy to, for instance, build long underground tunnels with complex decorations automatically.

Quarries - No, blech. These cover the exact same 9x9 area that IC2 miners do, and unlike IC2 miners, they are much more difficult to pick up and move, AND they rape the landscape with a huge gaping hole, instead of surgically picking out the ores. Mining wells are even WORSE - why in the good God's name do they leave hundreds of horrible little mining pipes that they don't pick up after themselves? AND they only cover 1/81th the area of an IC2 miner. It might as well be called the "I don't care if my world looks like an evil clowns on stilts convention, as long as I can get my ores super inefficiently" machine.

You do realize that you can set up a custom quarry size, up to 63x63, right? Also, no need for ugly holes, you just set them up underground (I prefer layer ~24ish for gold and diamonds) and nobody will ever know. They are also completely mainenance free until they run out of stuff to mine, and they mine down to bedrock just fine. Also, they will happily mine out all that obsidian if you just pour a bucket of water into the quarry frame.

As for mining wells, yes, they are subpar as a primary mining device. However, with a proper application of IC2 solar arrays (MV or HV) and some RP2 frames, you can create a machine that literally mines out a strip of land down to bedrock almost instantly (about 5 seconds), then moves forward and does the same. Yes, it's ugly, but that's why you either do it far away from your base, or if your game/server has Mystcraft/Multiverse installed, in another dimension.

[gavjenks]

Templates are great for a large amount of similarly shaped constructions. In the next Technic, where BC3 will be SMP-compatible, we will get the ability to combine templates with the Path markers, which will make it incredibly easy to, for instance, build long underground tunnels with complex decorations automatically.

Eh... I guess. Most of my decorations are heavily dependent upon miniblocks though, so that would still fail.

If and when templates become compatible with redpower, then they would become effing awesome.

You do realize that you can set up a custom quarry size, up to 63x63, right?

Oh nope, didn't know that. That's useful then. I will look into it on non EE servers I'm on. So okay, buildcraft useful IMO then for:

* Geothermal lava farms

* Wireless IC2 power

* Raping the land for minerals efficiently ("far away from your base" usually means close to somebody else's current or future base, so not 100% ideal, but that's also their problem =P)

[Viktor_Berg]

Don't forget fillers, which can help you either clear or fill huge swaths of land (up to 63x63x63) VERY quickly. They also have the ability to cut down RedPower rubber trees using the Flatten program, so that you don't have to muck around with an axe.