Cornerstone: Industrial Foregoing - Introduction

Industrial Foregoing (IF) is a remake of MineFactory Reloaded (MFR).  It includes most of the machines from MFR, with some slight tweaks here and there for balancing.  It also has new machines such as a wireless energy system that generates a field which can power any other IF machines that have the necessary upgrade installed.  IF is all about automation: create a farm that plants, fertilizes (and waters) a field, then harvests the crops.  The systems are interlinked, so in order to make fertilizer for your field, you'll need to collect animal waste from farm animals.  You can setup an automated breeding system with crops from the automated farm, then slaughter animals for food and Pink Slime.  You'll need Pink Slime for the high end upgrades and Laser Drill, which generates random Ores for a large amount of RF.

IF has a built-in manual, which I highly recommend creating and reading.  It also integrates with JEI, so information about blocks is right in the interface.

Cornerstone: Draconic Evolution - Introduction

Draconic Evolution is an end-game mod.  It has some very powerful armor, tools and weapons, and has the largest energy storage and energy production system of any mod out there.  A fusion crafting system uses a multi-block crafting grid and millions (or billions) of RF.  Item recipes include Nether Stars, scores of diamonds/emeralds/gold, and a new ore called Draconium.  Higher tiers require Ender Dragon heart(s) (yes, plural, as in you'll be fighting the Ender Dragon a whole lot) and Chaos Shards, which come after defeating the new Chaos Guardian boss.  Think Ender Dragon on speed, with attacks that will kill you outright unless you have the highest armor upgraded as far as it can go.

The energy storage system can be upgraded to hold 9,223,372,036,854,775,807 RF.  That's not a random string of numbers, that's the maximum value for a 64-bit signed integer.  Good luck ever filing that to capacity or coming close to using that much RF for anything. :)

Cornerstone: Applied Energistics - Introduction

Applied Energistics is all about storage and automation.  Say goodbye to fields of chests in a room, and dump all your materials into a single storage system called an ME Network.  Craft right in your storage interface, or build processors and molecular assemblers to build complex items very quickly.  Connect up to machines from other mods and outsource material crafting to those machines, and import back into your network.  Items and even liquids are 'digitized' into the ME network, and reconstituted when you need to extract them from the network.  Items take up space on the network, so if you need more space, just add more storage cards.  Access the entire network from a terminal, or create a wireless terminal and place wireless access points to make a virtual WiFi network.

Tips and Tricks

1. Get familiar with Just Enough Items.  The default keys to to show recipes (R) and show uses (U) for blocks and items integrates with all the included mods, and shows you how to make something or how to use it.  Some items can only be obtained by mob drops, but some can be created!  For example, you can obtain Blizz Powder by killing the Blizz mob, but they can be hard to locate.  Instead, you can place snowballs in a Fluid Transposer and pipe Destablized RedStone onto it to make Blizz Powder.  Use the @"mod name" search string to see all the items/blocks from that mod only.
2. Make a jetpack.  They are invaluable for navigating the Nether, reaching floating Slime Islands, and just getting away from enemies.  Craft some Slime Boots to wear while you are using your jetpack to negate all fall damage, and use the bounces to get around even more quickly that you would otherwise be able to with the lower tier jetpacks.
3. Build a Smeltery as soon as you can.  Start doubling all your ores, especially rarer ones like Gold.  You can also save some iron by casting gears in the Smeltery instead of crafting them.  Trust me, you'll need lots of iron for AE2, ExtremeReactors and Draconic Evolution.  Put Cobblestone in the Smeltery to make more blocks to expand the capacity of the Smeltery.  Place multiple Drains and Faucets going to multiple Basins and tables, to cast multiple pieces or blocks at a time.
4. Save Platinum in raw ore form until you have machines that can process it to double output.  Iridium doesn't spawn anywhere in the world, but can be created by processing Platinum the right way...
5. Build a Reactor.  Even a basic 3x3x3 reactor can output a decent amount of power early game, and can be scaled up over time to mid-late game use.  Use the Big Reactors simulator to play around with designs, or build my favorite design: a 7x7x7 (5x5x5 inside) Gelid Cryotheum-cooled reactor with 5 columns of fuel rods in a plus design.  Once you convert this to an actively cooled reactor be sure to use Super Laminated Fluiducts to input water and output steam.  A companion 7x7x7 (5x5x5 inside) Turbine will only use 25% of the steam generated, so set the fuel rods appropriately.  One 7x7x7 Reactor will support four 7x7x7 Turbines.
6. Build an animal farm and slaughterhouse.  You may also need to make an automated plant farm of some kind for breeding materials.  Industrial Foregoing has all the machines you'll need.  Save enough pink slime to fill a bucket, but wait until you have a Mob Imprisonment Tool to capture the Pink Slime mob that spawn when you dump the bucket in the world.
• Build a mob spawning room.  You can rely on vanilla mechanics, or use a Drop of Evil dropped from a Wither Skeleton to curse the grass and make Cursed Earth, which greatly increases spawning mechanics.  Use a Mob Crusher to kill and grab items and Essence, then pipe the essence into a Mob Duplicator.
• Gotta Catch Em All!  Try and capture at least one of every Mob, to throw into your spawner room as needed.  Throw your Pink Slime mob into the Mob Duplicator and watch it rain pink Slime drops.
7. Make a multi-block kitchen with Cooking For Blockheads.  Certain foods don't keep you very full, and leave you needing to eat again soon.  Variety is the spice of life!  Or just bypass eating altogether and make yourself a Meat Feeder, then use it on a container with Liquid Meat.  Put that Mob Slaughter Factory to use!   As long as you keep that item in your inventory, you'll automatically eat from it as needed.

Mod Documentation

Many of the mods included in AppleCrafters are extremely well documented by the developers.  Check out some of the wikis here.  Asterisks(*) denote mods which also contain in-game documentation.

• Thermal Series - https://teamcofh.com/docs/
• Applied Energistics 2: http://ae-mod.info/
• Extra Cells 2: https://github.com/ExtraCells/ExtraCells2/wiki
• *Extra Utilities 2: https://ftb.gamepedia.com/Extra_Utilities_2
• Extreme Reactors: http://wiki.technicpack.net/Big_Reactors

• Simulator - http://br.sidoh.org
• Reliquary: https://github.com/P3pp3rF1y/Reliquary/wiki
• *Tinkers' Construct 2: http://tinkers-construct-2.wikia.com/wiki/Tinkers%27_Construct_2_Wiki
• *Industrial Foregoing - https://ftb.gamepedia.com/Industrial_Foregoing
• *Draconic Evolution - https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/draconic-evolution

Cornerstone: The Thermal Series - Introduction

Thermal Expansion is one of my favorite mod series.  The machines just make sense, and it has changed over time to be even better.  If you haven't played recently some of the mechanics have changed, some things have been added, some taken away.  TE is a true backbone mod, many other mods rely on it for a framework to build upon.  TE handles ore generation, a power system called RedStone Flux (RF), fluid/item/power transfer pipes, and a suite of machines for different tasks.  Double ore output by pulverizing into dust, then smelt the dust in a furnace that runs on RF, not coal. Melt materials into fluids, then combine fluids with items to make new items.  Recharge items, or repair them.  Make snow and ice, lava and obsidian, from basic resources like water and cobblestone.

All of the machines, containers and blocks are upgradeable, and some can be augmented to perform new tasks or specialize in a certain task.  Increase output of the Pulverizer from 2 to 3 pieces, press gears or currency, power your generators with excess gems or enchanted items.  Store all of the experience you gain in a book, then extract that Essence of Knowledge and use it to enchant, repair or process in machines.

Cornerstone: Tinkers' Construct - Getting Started

The first thing you are going to want to build is a Smeltery, which can be used to double your ores, create alloys, and cast tool parts.  You can also skip right over the diamond requirement by casting obsidian blocks right in the smeltery, just combine 1 part lava and 1 part water!  Solid materials like ores and stone can be inserted into the Smeltery Controller, while liquids should be poured into a drain.  You can pour from a bucket, reservoir, or place a faucet over a drain.

Start off by collecting a stack or so of Clay, Gravel and Sand.  Combine to make Grout, then cook the Grout in a Furnace to make seared bricks.  Use the bricks to make a Seared Tank, Smeltery Controller, at least one Drain and one Faucet, a Casting basin and a Casting table.  Turn the rest of the bricks into blocks, then build a 3x3x1 multi-block structure including a drain, Smeltery Controller, and Seared Tank on any side.  Attach a faucet to the drain, then place up to 4 buckets of lava in the Tank.  You can also pipe lava into the tank using Hardened Fluiducts from Thermal Dynamics.

The Casting Basin can hold 9 ingots (in block form) of metals.  You'll need a Casting Table and an Ingot Cast in order to drain single ingots at a time, otherwise make sure to input metals in multiples of 9 and use your casting basin.  Casts are created by pouring 1 ingot of Aluminum Brass or 2 ingots of gold over a tool part that has been placed in the Casting Table; be warned this will consume the part so use cheap materials like a clay brick for an ingot and stone tool parts.  You can always drain any extra molten liquid into a Seared Tank, if you have too much and want to keep the material.  To drain from a Seared Tank back into the Smeltery, place the tank next to a drain, place a faucet on the tank so it is over the drain, and use the faucet and it should pour molten liquid right back into the Smeltery for use again.

You can melt different materials at a time, however be warned that some materials combine to make an alloy.  Some common alloys:

3 ingots Aluminum + 1 ingot copper = 4 ingots Aluminum Brass
3 ingots Copper + 1 ingot Tin = 4 ingots Bronze
1 bucket Lava + 1 bucket Water = 1 block of Obsidian
1 ingot Gold + 1 ingot Silver = 2 ingots Electrum
3 ingots Tin + 1 ingot Silver + 1 block of Glowstone = 4 ingots Lumium
3 ingots Copper + 1 ingot Silver + 4 pieces of Redstone = 4 ingots Signalum
3 ingots Lead + 1 ingot Platinum + 4 Ender Pearls = 4 ingots Enderium

There are many more, look up "Molten" in JEI/NEI to see their components.  Some math may be required to translate mB into ingots or blocks.

You can upgrade the Smeltery by increasing the size of the multi-block structure, but you don't need to make seared bricks with Grout!  Put cobblestone directly into the Smeltery and pour into casting basins and use the seared stone blocks to build the Smeltery even larger.  Seared Stone can be cast into ingots to form individual bricks if necessary.

Cornerstone: Tinkers' Construct - Introduction

Tinkers' Construct is a low tech mod all about making tools you keep for a long time.  Rather than slapping together some iron ingots and enchanting it, you create different tool parts out of many different materials with different properties and abilities, and combine those parts to make different tools.  Want a combination shovel and hoe?  What about a hammer that can mine 9 blocks at a time instead of the measly one a pickaxe can?  Make a crossbow that can fire faster and further than a bow can and reload much more quickly.  How about a laser gun that steals health with every shot? (ok, it's a little higher tech with the addition of PlusTIC.)  Smelt ores into liquids, combine them with other materials to make alloys, then pour the molten metal into a cast to shape a specific part.  Or triple your ores in the Ore Crusher and smelt them in overdrive, and create a stack of ingots.  Cook stacks of items at a time in the multi-block replacement for the furnace, it runs on lava!

You'll never break a tool again, because you can simply repair the tool using the core ingredients and bring the durability back up.  Play around with different material combinations as you explore the world and other dimensions.  Give your tool new abilities by applying rare materials like necrotic bones or emeralds.  Build the ultimate hotbar with tools designed to fit your playstyle.

Tinkers' Construct has a great in-game guide that will be in your inventory when you start the game.  Refer back to that manual often, and see what kind of new tools you can create when you just find the right resources...

Getting Started: Installing the client

The first thing you need to do is setup your computer with the AppleCrafters modpack.

1. Install Technic Launcher - https://www.technicpack.net/download (Make sure you have Java from Oracle https://java.com/en/download/manual.jsp)
2. Launch Technic Launcher.  If this is your first time, Standard Install is fine.  (Mac users, right click the downloaded file and choose open, then approve the Gatekeeper dialogue)
3. Go to the “Modpacks” tab at the top of the screen
4. Type AppleCrafters into the search box
5. Install pack
6. Before launching the modpack, make sure your Launcher is using optimal RAM.  A general rule of thumb is to use at least half your system RAM.  Go to “Launcher Options”, then Java Settings and increase the default memory (1GB) using the pulldown.

Guide to AppleCrafters

Welcome!  This page will be updated with helpful guides that explain some basics of using the mods included in the AppleCrafters modpack.