Weirdest Thing Happened . . .

[DicheBach]

I get the impression these forums are pretty quiet. Plowmanplow, you seem to be the only real 'regular' who is still hanging out and helping with problems a commitment for which you are to be applauded.

 

This is a really great modpack, and it would be a shame if the community using it died out. I have no idea what will happen when major OS changes in future occur, but for the time being I'm thankful that Tekkit Lite still works and there is still some community for the modpack. I can recall when I first played Minecraft, it was quite fun, but it kinda got a bit tedious and samey before too long. Then I noticed that the group of guys I was playing Arma 2 with also played Minecraft, and they got me into this Tekkit Lite mod. Now THIS! is what Minecraft should be all about is what I immediately realized! That is not a criticism of the vanilla game in any way; if anything a game that faciliates and promotes major modding communities is to be lauded for brilliant design, i.e., making a compelling base game, but not including so much that it will only appeal to a narrow segment.

 

So like I said in that other thread, I stopped playing Minecraft a year or more ago for various reasons, one of which being I was a bit burned out on the game. But I had been wanting to get back to it and wondering if Tekkit Lite was "still alive." Was quite pleased a week or two ago when I refound the Technic platform and resintalled the modpack.

 

Now on to the "Weirdest thing happened . . ." part of the thread . . . I'd count my self as a High-Level Beginner bordering on Intermediate user of Tekkit Lite. I have played probably 100 or more hours with it, and have done a lot. I've built lava pumps and lava generators, have fiddled a bit with automated fish farms, and solar panels and have of course made ample use of the mods most basic features (macerators, extractors, the various furnaces and generators). I seem to recall I made some Sterling engines at one point and have made use of the mining well on at least one occasion. Though to be honest I do not "know" any of this stuff at all, I am only marginally familiar with most of it.

 

I have yet to make any of the big time projects in the modpack: quarry, nuclear power generator, power armor, etc. nor have I explored some of the more exotic advanced scenarios that bridge the "magic" and technical aspects of the game and the modpack, for example setting up an "infinite nether lava mining with transportation features" (something I saw on Youtube that sounded really neat).

 

One of the things I find myself recurrently drawn to is the Mining Turtle. These guys are admittedly something of a mixed bag. They go under lava pools and become trapped (or destroyed I've never known for certain what happens to them when they get inundated by lava); they tunnel into major cavern complexes across waterfalls and right past spawner areas, which makes following them quite interesting. They only do exactly what you tell them to do, and it is a bit tedious to always be counting tiles, and giving the thing 4 commands just to make it move about 5 tiles in a complex direction (up, left, forward, up, etc.). However, I find they are a quite useful and easy to make and relatively low cost item.

 

I've found one of the best ways to use them (without programming or wireless commands, which I have barely checked in to), is to do a spiral stair case down to about level 25 with a pit immediately adjacent to it. Go back up to top and tell him to go down to the bottom. Orient him in a suitable direction and tell him to tunnel 50 and then follow along, scavenging unharvested stuff that he exposes along the way. Catch up to him, empty his cargo, transfer to bags or else a storage way station, and repeat another round of "tunnel 50." You can expose a LOT of the underground wonder in the game using this technique though as noted it is not without its "pitfalls" (get it!? PIT FALLS!?)

 

In my current game with world name "Body Electric" (seed was: 11001001SOS1001001indistress . . . or something like that . . . very nice type of balanced game world and if anyone wants the actual seed I can look it up) my spawn was in a very nice forest region, and I got my base all set up except there was no cattle. So I looked and looked in the immediate vicinity, but eventually I wound up just heading off on an expedition way to the south and finally found cattle in this arctic forest region of all places. Here I setup a "Cowpens" outpost and corraled a few head in with wheat. But I had failed to bring enough silk to make two one time use safari nets, so I had to go back all the way to home base with only one cow captured. By this time I had like 200 iron ore, 30 gold, 40 diamonds, etc. (I tend to hoard and still keep using stone tools LOL). I built a mining turtle (just one) and followed the  above procedure of boring down to level 25 ish and then started tunneling south, in the general direction of Cowpens which was 2423 meters away.

 

It is always interesting the cavern systems that one bumps through using this technique. The first one looked intriguing like it probably had several scores of each mineral in it, but was seemingly just a natural cave. The next one was quite a bit larger, canyon passages on the order of 20 meters tall, in flowing lava waterfalls, the walls festooned with minerals. With each of these passing voids, I of course had to handle a couple mobs before managing to block off my turtle tunnel, and found it tempting to diverge from  my primary mission to get that second cow and go on a tangent to "clear" these mineral rich areas, each of which is proabably scores of hours of gameplay which will require rail systems, and outposts to safely harvest and transport resources back to my main base.

 

The third cavern was quite literally amazing. It was under a desert biome and it must have been the largest natural chamber I've ever seen in Minecraft. I didn't count but it was at least 10 high and 50 x 30 across with major alcoves on multiple sides. Here I had to fight quite a few mobs as the turtle tunnel just came out right in the middle of one wall about 6 tiles up and with a 'staircase' right up to it. It turns out that this chamber was merely the first portion of what seems to be a truly gargantuan and sprawling natural cavern and mine complex, as I kept crossing sections of what must be parts of this same system for the next 50 or 100 meters.

 

Eventually, having had one close call where my turtle tunneled under a waterfall and I got ambushed by skeletons and fell down the waterfall and then had to get reoriented while fighting various mobs and reunite with my turtle . . . we entered a room that was quiet (no mobs) and the floor of the chamber was only 1 meter below the turtles bridge.

 

Here there was what I initially thought was my mining turtle, sitting in the middle row of the tunnel right where the tunnel must have broken into the natural chamber. But the weird thing was, there was another turtle on the other side of the room . . . I figured it was some kind of bug. It seems the first one was just a turtle, not a mining turtle. Beyond him about 10 meters further along, at the end of the "tunnel 50" I had ordered it to complete, sat my actual mining turtle. So where the heck di this other turtle (just a plain turtle) come from!?

 

There certainly was no turtle inside the mining turtle at any point previously, and yet, here my mining turtle seems to have either "dropped" a turtle or tunneled under a block that either was or became a turtle when it dropped. Else that turtle was there and my turtle just mined right through it?

 

I still have the turtle. I picked it up and put it in my bag. Me and my mining turtle continued our journey south, and I eventually accidentally "broke" him before his fuel ran out, so I just grabbed him and started tunneling a 1x2 in a direct southeast direction toward cowpens. After passing through a major mining complex (Spawner farm impending!) I did eventually get back to Cowpens last night and today I'm just going to sort gear and head back to main base with a cow and the spoils of my long underground journey (must have been close to 1600m total traverse distance

 

All in all a quite fun if not epic adventure, but finding that turtle was so weird.

 

Do turtles and other advanced items "spawn" naturally in tekkit lite worlds? Would it be some kind of bug that would cause a mining turtle to 'spawn' a second turtle!?

Edited July 30, 2014 by DicheBach

[plowmanplow]

It's possible that you stumbled across some odd duplication bug. It happens with that version of Forge/MC + mods.

 

I think the community is quiet because there is nothing new for this version of Forge/MC. Anything anyone wants to know there are probably 1000+ youtube videos detailing construction and usage. The other packs are more active because they are closer to the cutting edge and are still evolving.

[DicheBach]

You know I've never even looked at any of the other packs. Is there one you'd recommend that includes some of the same sorts of "technological" items?"

 

Oh, BTW, did you happen to see my thread asking about the settings on the inventory? I somehow accidentally changed the background color of my inventory and container window from the default, which I'd call "light and bright" to a "dark and gray." It is still useable but I much prefer the default settings, and I can neither guess what keystrokes I accidentally did to cause the change in format, nor can I find anything via searches that helps me to figure out how to revert the color scheme back to default. Its not the type of thing that a Youtuber would cover, though perhaps it is covered in a manual or ReadMe?

 

Honestly, I don't even know for sure what mod it is that is involved in the inventory and container windows in Tekkit Lite modpack (no other mods installed), so even if you are not familiar with the issue, even just a clue about which mod's "about" info to search through would be an enormous help.

 

Thanks for your help and thanks for reading my missive Plowman!

[plowmanplow]

Modpacks:

• Attack of the B-Team is pretty fun. Quite different.
• Tekkit (main) is fairly new and still evolving.
• Look for a PM.

As for the inventory, is the search box at the bottom outlined in white or yellow? Try double clicking in the search box. That is part of NEI (Not Enough Items).

[DicheBach]

Modpacks:

• Attack of the B-Team is pretty fun. Quite different.
• Tekkit (main) is fairly new and still evolving.
• Look for a PM.

As for the inventory, is the search box at the bottom outlined in white or yellow? Try double clicking in the search box. That is part of NEI (Not Enough Items).

 

 

YEP! that was it Double clicking the search at bottom changed it back to default. Thanks a million Plowman!

 

Will have to look up NEI and see what exactly changing that search box from yellow to default does

Edited July 30, 2014 by DicheBach

[DicheBach]

Really enjoying JCLite Plow