Area based things

[Sajuuk]

I fought myself from posting something here. Even know, the BTW icon in the upper left feels like FlowerChild's disapproving suggestion thread stare.

At some point yesterday I was thinking about metals and things, and the future of metallurgy.

The kiln requires a certain setup of blocks around it to work. I wondered what if a more advanced setup for players to advance would require something similar. Maybe a larger room, how much I dare not speculate, with that same sort of conditional setup. Maybe even require the player to arrange switches outside the chamber as it would be too dangerous for the player inside. I also won't dare to be too specific about what I think would happen inside but I hope it would be some sort of science. I imagined something like that uh, "Equivalent Exchange" mod's little magic box that converts types of blocks into others, like this idea would be some sort of violent massive furnace to powder stone and expose "trace elements." ...not copying it, I hope, and this idea is more elaborate and invested. Also in my mind it wouldn't be to just find diamonds and crap, but hopefully a future key item for the mechanized future of Steve.

Maybe too much thinking.

[echo off]

i've been thinking about it myself but from a different angle. considering how chests are a model, and if you put two of them next to each other the model changes, there might be a way to build machines that require a certain combination of blocks to be placed around each other. so you put down a hibachi, and if you put down a cauldron on top, the blocks change into a new block top, which is a model and called an "stovetop" or something. add belows and it changes into a new model. add bricks and it changes again. of course, it might now work. but perhaps using models instead of blocks the way chests do could have some value. especially since once it's the final model, it could be made to operate like a millstone or cauldron or whatever you want to code in.

oh so thanks for posting it. i feel the stare too, but now i can blame it on you XD

[Urian]

If I remember correctly from Flowers explanations, the kiln works by having a block check the surrounding blocks for the conditions. With the kiln this is the unfinished pottery block, having the same function with other blocks would require the mod to change all the blocks though and I'm guessing that would mean a heap of vMC-files changes and a ton of incompatibilities with other mods.

[Fracture]

As I recall one of IC's components needs a sealed obsidian room filled with water, no?

[Deepsniper]

not exactly... its designed to blow up right so to prevent it you build those rooms

[Urian]

I think the nuclear reactor (in IC1) checked for water around/above it and if it didn't find it then there was a higher chance of it exploding. If memory serves, Al said at one point that water wouldn't dampen the explosion since the nuclear reactor handled explosions a bit differently than e.g. creepers or TNT, it spawned an explosion entity so water didn't prevent it damaging blocks (or was that the nuke? It's been ages since I played IC.) The thing is, in either case it was also a block added by the mod - changing blocks from vMC in the same way could cause more problems.

[Fracture]

IC only adds the explosion entity and the reactor-- not the blocks it checks for.

I fail to see how a larger-scale block check would require a modification to vMC blocks.

[Battosay]

I fail to see how a larger-scale block check would require a modification to vMC blocks.

Agreed.

[Deepsniper]

Just to be the Devil's Advocate here I'm going to say that If this block that searches for values is a common enough block then we might have a bit of a problem seeing making this block a memory hog as it will look for a larger area.

[Urian]

IC only adds the explosion entity and the reactor-- not the blocks it checks for.

I fail to see how a larger-scale block check would require a modification to vMC blocks.

It's not the blocks that are searched for that's modified, it's the block that does the searching. In other words, you're fine using vMC blocks as the required blocks near (bricks for kiln, water for IC's nuclear reactor). The problem would be to have e.g. ores melting with the current system. Since Flower has said he's thinking about adding more functions to it and has mentioned ores, I guess that he's got plans for how to implement it in a more compatible way.

[BigShinyToys]

The kiln works Like this . The Pot / Crucible / Vase Block checks if 3 or more Blocks Around it are Brick and then If the Blocks Below the brick have stoked fire . the logic check is in the Pot / Crucible / Vase Block . For FC to make ores smelt in a kiln He would have to Change the ore code so it can do the same check the Pot douse now. That is why FC has not done it yet if it was easy it would have been added already.

[echo off]

that's not the only issue bigshinytoys... having a block regularly check it's surrounding blocks requires a bit of memory. the more blocks that do this, the more memory it requires. by using unfired Pot / Crucible / Vase, you end up only checking blocks that are relatively quickly destroyed after being created. it is unlikely people will have more than a few pottery wheels going, or more than a few kilns. in theory, even in extreme circumstances , there would only be a maximum of about 10 blocks checking their surrounding at any one time. 5 on pottery wheels, 5 in kilns. unless you leave unfired pottery lying around because you think it looks cool, at least. but if you change an old block that spawn in the world, it will constantly check it's surroundings until they are suitable. if this was the case for the coal iron block, you would have at least 2000 blocks checking their surroundings... and until you mine them up, that's a lot of memory. and 2 thousand isn't even realistic. i recently spawned a map with over 70,000 coal ore and 50,000 iron ore, all within 1 days walk from spawn (albeit mostly underground). FC would have to create new coal blocks (having items check their surroundings would be an even bigger headache) that you make from coal ore and long before then I suspect he would abandon the idea :)

[BigShinyToys]

I see that would lag the hell out of Minecraft even on the Best PC. So ok then Make a sub group of Brick Called Called slate . The slate Block would check if pottery is on top of it ounce per Block update . Upon finding Pottery or ore it will Then check for the correct arrangement of Bricks on the other sides And finally for stoked fire. This would Not use a Block ID and would Give a new Block called slate .The logic behind the bottom of the kiln being different is that the Pot comes off a Flat slate better than a Brick' ruff surface.

[Triskelli]

So if I'm following you right, Echo, then the correct solution would be to create some new block or item from the existing ore and let THAT block check its surrounding state. Maybe something like ground ore, that can be placed in a kiln one block at a time, and checks its surroundings once every time it "enters" the world.

The implementation being that you could filter harvested iron and gold ore blocks over a powered hopper and get this ground ore. That would then be passed into a Block Dispenser and be placed in a "conveyor" system where this sifted ore is pushed along by pistons into a Kiln. When the Sifted Ore is baked, then it would pop into the appropriate ingot, and could be then channeled into any of our current factory systems.

It's a half baked idea, but hopefully it'll solve the problem of Items checking their surrounding state.

[echo off]

i'm not 100% positive everything i said was correct, but i'm like 96.6% sure.

both your idea's seem very plausible, but we're probably all missing some major issue that FC would rather not take the time to explain. on top of that you're both getting rather close to discussing programming techniques, which i've been warned is a big "no no".

but i think maybe shinybigtoys idea makes more sense, as it reduces the number of checks to the kiln. it could possibly be further pushed to only check it's surroundings when "burning" or "powered" or something.

don't get me wrong, Triskelli, i'm desperate to find a simple way to automate things, but with your method, as i understand it, you would need more than one new block. i'm not sure the 'ground ore' would work.

but all this is irrelevant to me anyway. my idea wins, because it removes the 'check the world around me' part of the coding and replaced it with the more traditional millstone/cauldron method. chests and beds prove you can make one block id act like 2 both visually and functionally.