StaTech Industry Part 3

Basebuilding Preparations

Today, the goal is to get the basic steam age infrastructure together and make just enough steel to get a steam mining drill. First up was some material gathering - oddly enough, some redstone for the non-main-quest progression, in addition to copper and tin.

More mining, this time for the required clay, was up next. Despite the nearby village having brick roofs, there wasn't any full brick blocks, or, at least, not enough for it to be worthwhile.

After the materials were gathered, some intensive crafting followed. First a bronze boiler, then a bronze mixer (for the better bronze mix ratio), then a brief detour making some bricks for the coke oven, finally a macerator, water pump, cutting machine, and furnace (seeing as how the bulk blasting was free and somewhat faster than a furnace, and how the cutting machine required lubricant, I decided to leave those for last).

While I worked on the later machines, I started the compressor going on the bricks needed for the coke oven. After getting the oven, I then started work on the steam blast furnace. I decided to take a brief break to go make a light ring, since I wasn't happy about crafting all the torches needed to light up an underground base by hand! A local meteor crater supplied the soul soul needed, but the glowstone required a jaunt into the nether. Fortunately, there was a lava pool nearby and I didn't need to waste diamonds on a pickaxe. More exploration around the overworld ended up with all three spectrum basic gems discovered, as an aside.

Some more crafting later, the early steam infrastructure was complete and I had my steam mining drill. Time to dig a base out. But first, a quick trip to mine some coal ore to be macerated into coal dust to fuel the drill.

Next time - actual construction of the base.