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Sea block pack 0.3.4 has been released. Check first post for download link.

Update 2019-4-28, version 0.3.4:

• Updates for recent changes in angels mods
• Switch over to angels charcoal. Decrease fuel_value to 4MJ
• Electronics tech unlocks metal mixing furnace
• Increase algae crafting speeds
• Use wood bricks instead of wood for ScienceCostTweaker sample scaffold
• Use wood pellets instead of wood for polishing wheel
• Use wooden board instead of wood for phenolic board
• Remove naphtha -> wood recipe
• Increase liquid fuel values. Adjust solid fuel recipes to balance. Increase blue cellulose required for algae liquefaction

Thanks for the update!
Always exciting to calculate everything from scratch again

Some changes are a bit odd (checked only marathon mode):
- simple steel recipe changed: 8 iron plates + oxygen -> 2 steel plates in a chemical furnace. Nice recipe so far, but this seems a bit cheap compared to advanced steel smelting, which basically has the same 4:1 ratio. Advanced Steel smelting gets better later, when you can use manganese or such
- The "better" electrolysis recipe with electrolysis cathode consumes a lot of steel. About 0.2 steel per slag? Imho not worth at all

Some things I found:
-The basic Green Algae Process is more energy efficient then the more advanced. It takes a lot more algae farms but without the electrolysis it takes only 6.5 MW to make 20MW worth of fuel instead of 9.7MW.
- Making Carbon doesn't get you fuel value anymore.

ukezi wrote: Sun Apr 28, 2019 12:32 pm -The basic Green Algae Process is more energy efficient then the more advanced. It takes a lot more algae farms but without the electrolysis it takes only 6.5 MW to make 20MW worth of fuel instead of 9.7MW.

I think, the basic slag producing is nerved a bit too much now, it produces only the half than before with the same power requirement. This makes the beginning a bit slower. The advanced one is not usable for ore gen, because it eats all the ore for the catalyst. Imho, instead of 80%, it should return the catalyst with a much higher probability. However, the idea of the new recipe is nice.
The advanced Green Algae recipe is nice for the excess mineralized water from sulfuric waste water treatment, but not, if the mineralized water is created with slag processing electrolysing. It will get better with better machines.
The basic green algae recipe is a bit too basic for my taste, why not add co2 to the normal water?
These proposals are more addressed to Angel...

EDIT: Thanks for putting basic logistics back before slag processing
EDIT2: Changed misleading wording

Three questions:
1. Was the wood block -> charcoal (for fuel) nerfed? I am pretty sure that it was 1 wood block -> 12 charcoal and now it is 1 -> 5, but does the changed fuel value cancel that change out? I do not remember the old values.
2. Is there any reason to EVER switch to the algae farming 2 recipe? With the added recipe of only regular water to algae, that seems INSANELY better than needing to spend both mineralized water and CO2 to produce algae, even if it requires more farms to produce the same amount of algae.
3. Also is it worth it to upgrade algae farms to MK2 or MK3?
Thanks.

Edit: I just did some math. Algae farming 1 recipe is much more energy efficient. Correct me if I am wrong.
Math:
To get 40 algae/sec w/ algae farming one takes 8000 KWS (80 sec x 100 KW/sec)
To get 40 algae/sec w/ algae farming two takes 9416.666 KWS, not even including the energy potential of the two charcoals needed for CO2 (8 MJ) or the energy required for running the flare stacks. (26.666 sec x 100 KW) for the farm + (0.666 sec x 125 KW) for the mineralized water + (3.333 sec x 100 KW) for the crushed stone + (20 sec x 300 KW) for the slag + (2.667 sec x 125 KW) for the CO2 = 9416.666 KWS

If anyone questions my number or wants to know how I get them please let me know. All machines are assumed to be MK1 (Not including the burner crusher).

NeptuneJr2 wrote: Sun Apr 28, 2019 7:29 pm 1. Was the wood block -> charcoal (for fuel) nerfed? I am pretty sure that it was 1 wood block -> 12 charcoal and now it is 1 -> 5, but does the changed fuel value cancel that change out? I do not remember the old values.

The old SeaBlock charcoal was 2.5MJ each, with a conversion ratio of 2.5MJ of charcoal per 1MJ of cellulose (not counting power or CO2 costs).
48 cellulose at 1MJ each (48MJ) -> 8 pellets at 8MJ each (64MJ) -> 4 wood bricks -> 48 old charcoal at 2.5MJ each (120MJ)

The new SeaBlock charcoal is 1.66MJ of charcoal for each 1MJ of cellulose.
48 cellulose at 1MJ each (48MJ) -> 8 pellets at 8MJ each (64MJ) -> 4 wood bricks -> 20 new charcoal at 4MJ each (80MJ)

When refining further to carbon, the current recipe is power negative. To make 9MJ of carbon, it takes 8MJ of new charcoal, 900KJ of steam, and 166KJ of electricity in a Mk 1 liquifier, for a net loss of ~66KJ per crafting cycle.

As a crafting ingredient, new charcoal will only provide ~42% of the final products per wood brick. And as a power source, new charcoal will produce about 2/3 of the power per wood brick, though the power difference is largely offset by the lack of CO2 and slag (I haven't yet calculated the exact values).

Unfortunately, cellulose sourced from arboreta has the same power/ingredient requirements as previously, as do the farming recipes, so the basic green algae recipe seems to be the most efficient coal source at the moment.

Some comparisons with algae farming between the two versions:

In 0.3.3, growing green algae with 8 mk1 farms produces 192 charcoal/min and consumes 2.4 MW, for 8 MW gross and 5.6 MW net power. That's after subtracting off the charcoal being used to make CO2.

In 0.3.4, growing green algae using the same recipe in 8 mk1 farms produces 114 charcoal/min and consumes 3.7 MW, for 7.6 MW gross and 3.9 MW net power. About 30% less power for the same area, but still a competitive option.

With the new basic recipe, 8 mk1 farms produce 50 charcoal/min and consume 1.1 MW, for 3.3 MW gross and 2.2 MW net power. Simpler and doesn't use as much of the power it produces, but still significantly less space-efficient and algae farms aren't cheap.

Also, for making mineral sludge, the new electrolyzer recipe is useless. You consume one electrode for every 5 units of slag, which is enough for 50 mineral sludge. Making the steel plate for that electrode costs over 100 mineral sludge using the early green science paths. You need productivity modules or the highest-tech smelting chain to break even. Geode washing is now by far the best option for making mineral sludge, which seems like a reasonable progression. I'd double the starting wind turbines, though, to avoid slowing down the early game with the change.

First: big thanks to Trainwreck and Angel (I saw him in this thread on a previous page) for this mod.

I have a stupid question: is it safe to suggest that Sea Block is stable to start a new marathon run or it is a work in progress and it's better to wait until new processes will settle down?

megapolis wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 12:50 pm First: big thanks to Trainwreck and Angel (I saw him in this thread on a previous page) for this mod.

I have a stupid question: is it safe to suggest that Sea Block is stable to start a new marathon run or it is a work in progress and it's better to wait until new processes will settle down?

The mod pack is very stable performance wise. Currently there have been and (I hope) will continue to be some changes to the power generation processes. Algae was changed quite a bit and hopefully will continue to be rebalanced a bit. Also very recently, the fuel value of enriched fuel was changed (making vegetable oil not as worth it), the fuel value of rocket booster were changed (making rocket booster power not as with it) and also the NaOH power loop was removed. It might be a good idea to wait a little bit for power to stop changing but it is still fun if you don’t mind remodeling a bit every once in awhile.

So what's the deal with these new electrolyzer recipes? Are the old ones supposed to still exist? Are the new ones supposed to just be a faster but more expensive version?

Ommand wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 3:07 pm So what's the deal with these new electrolyzer recipes? Are the old ones supposed to still exist? Are the new ones supposed to just be a faster but more expensive version?

The old recipe still exist but I believe it now takes longer. The new recipes are faster but require a electrode made of steel and carbon and requires higher tech levels. The general consensus is that it is NOT worth it due to the cost of ~0.2 steel/slag IIRC. It takes more slag to make the steel for the electrode than one electrode gets you in electrolysis.

StavroM wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 12:10 am

NeptuneJr2 wrote: Sun Apr 28, 2019 7:29 pm 1. Was the wood block -> charcoal (for fuel) nerfed? I am pretty sure that it was 1 wood block -> 12 charcoal and now it is 1 -> 5, but does the changed fuel value cancel that change out? I do not remember the old values.

The old SeaBlock charcoal was 2.5MJ each, with a conversion ratio of 2.5MJ of charcoal per 1MJ of cellulose (not counting power or CO2 costs).
48 cellulose at 1MJ each (48MJ) -> 8 pellets at 8MJ each (64MJ) -> 4 wood bricks -> 48 old charcoal at 2.5MJ each (120MJ)

Before the change, wood pellets had 12 MJ. Now they have 8 MJ. The new charcoal adapts that decrease factor (12x2,5 = 30 MJ <-> 5x4MJ = 20 MJ), which is fine, because it was very powerful before.

minno wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 2:18 am
With the new basic recipe, 8 mk1 farms produce 50 charcoal/min and consume 1.1 MW, for 3.3 MW gross and 2.2 MW net power. Simpler and doesn't use as much of the power it produces, but still significantly less space-efficient and algae farms aren't cheap.

Yes, i think the space requirements are the main problem of the basic recipe and requires to focus more on landfill at the start. So maybe the advanced recipe is not so useless, especially for excess mineralized water.

NeptuneJr2 wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 3:41 pm

Ommand wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 3:07 pm So what's the deal with these new electrolyzer recipes? Are the old ones supposed to still exist? Are the new ones supposed to just be a faster but more expensive version?

The old recipe still exist but I believe it now takes longer. The new recipes are faster but require a electrode made of steel and carbon and requires higher tech levels. The general consensus is that it is NOT worth it due to the cost of ~0.2 steel/slag IIRC. It takes more slag to make the steel for the electrode than one electrode gets you in electrolysis.

Oh wow I didn't even realize the crafting time had been doubled on the old recipe, I expected the new recipe to just be faster. I suppose that means we'll all have to switch to geodes.

Ommand wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 4:08 pm Oh wow I didn't even realize the crafting time had been doubled on the old recipe, I expected the new recipe to just be faster. I suppose that means we'll all have to switch to geodes.

That is astonishingly painful for early game progression. It was already hard enough getting up enough production to bootstrap into a reasonable amount of mineral sludge, and now it's nearly double the resources needed, if my back of the envelope calculation is correct.

Ouch. Guess it's time to go back to setting up small-scale production and then leaving the game running for 48 hours or so.

megapolis wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 12:50 pm First: big thanks to Trainwreck and Angel (I saw him in this thread on a previous page) for this mod.

I have a stupid question: is it safe to suggest that Sea Block is stable to start a new marathon run or it is a work in progress and it's better to wait until new processes will settle down?

The biggest issue with marathon is growing the power (steam engines mainly), as they require 100 iron plates each (same than default) and your production early on will be 3-6 plates/min. Also, the new energy you can use won't allow you to expand that much, so the added plate generation mostly breaks even with the investment, so you are just delaying the progression.

As stupid as it is, its better to do nothing for the first 4-6h but get a minimal science/power setup and research away till you get sludge processing

Weren't Geodes already better than Electolyzers in 0.16 (at least up until Electrolyser Mk4 with Modules) ? (In normal mode.)

Also, I'd guess that it's easy for Trainwreck to overlook all the changes in the individual mods, and these mods are not designed with Sea Block balance first !

BlueTemplar wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 7:42 pm Weren't Geodes already better than Electolyzers in 0.16 (at least up until Electrolyser Mk4 with Modules) ? (In normal mode.)

geodes has always been kinda better (power wise), but up until now they had both the science requirement and the space requirement going against them. I have yet to check the numbers for 0.3.4 but according to what others are saying in the thread, that space efficiency of slag processing might be gone

I think doubling the starting wind turbines and landfill would do a decent job of counteracting the halved electrolyzer efficiency. Increasing the starting iron plates when using marathon mode could also help.

StavroM wrote: Mon Apr 29, 2019 12:10 am The old SeaBlock charcoal was 2.5MJ each, with a conversion ratio of 2.5MJ of charcoal per 1MJ of cellulose (not counting power or CO2 costs).
48 cellulose at 1MJ each (48MJ) -> 8 pellets at 8MJ each (64MJ) -> 4 wood bricks -> 48 old charcoal at 2.5MJ each (120MJ)

The new SeaBlock charcoal is 1.66MJ of charcoal for each 1MJ of cellulose.
48 cellulose at 1MJ each (48MJ) -> 8 pellets at 8MJ each (64MJ) -> 4 wood bricks -> 20 new charcoal at 4MJ each (80MJ)

However in 0.16 the boiler ate halve the energy giving you 60 MJ of electricity. In 0.17 they don't and it gets you 80MJ of electricity.

It was smart to quickly get the Mk2 (Steel) Boiler for the 60% efficiency. Hopefully we'll get this aspect back.