Mythical Golden Bunny
Empress of Light
Intro
Simply put, Microbulbs are little lights that light up the block or wall in front of them. Technically, they're wiring components so they're are invisible unless the usual qualifications for seeing wiring tech are met (holding wire, traps, a mechanical lens, etc. etc.). They can also be placed and removed easily with the Grand Design. Now these lights are highly concentrated and thus only light up the object right in front of them, making them impractical for other uses other than building. Their main trick is allowing you to prevent light/dark physics from blocking, well, blocks and thus allow for more versatile building.
As an example, say you wanted a house without any visible interior, just a full exterior view without any actual rooms. These little bulbs make it so it doesn't get progressively darker on your build as the light fades due to the way shadows work on blocks farther away from a light source or the sky. Or perhaps you want a bridge with thick 8-block wide supports but don't want the shadows to affect the build as the blocks get deeper in.
These come in a few variants...
Microbulb- 5 silver, Tooltip: Wiring - Shines a highly concentrated light 1 - block behind a block or wall, though it's solar powered
Dim Microbulb - 3 silver Tooltip: Wiring - Shines a highly concentrated 1- block light behind a block or wall, it's a bit dim dim one. And it's solar powered.
Wonderbulb - 75 silver Tooltip: Wiring - Shines a highly concentrated 1-block light behind a block or wall anywhere.
Dim Wonderbulb - 65 silver Tooltip: Wiring - Shines a highly concentrated 1 - block light behind a block or wall anywhere, though it's a bit dim
The dim bulbs allow for a bit of variety and allow you to manipulate the lighting of your build just a bit more. Though As you may have noticed there are wonderbulbs as well...
Cons and Balancing Breakdown
-There are regular Microbulbs; which you may have noticed are solar powered, meaning they only work on the surface, or heights of 1 and above. Their lategame counterpart the Wonderbulbs lack this limitation. As I've mentioned, they're easily placed across the whole screen with the Grand Design, thus allowing them to potentially be abused for the sake of spelunking, trivializing spenlunker potions and other solutions to a certain degree all the way to the last ore post-Mechs, Chlorophyte.
-They do not count as valid lighting for the sake of NPC spawning, even if the entire room is lit up with them.
-Perhaps a positive but since they're solar powered, the regular and dim Microbulbs automatically turn off during the night unless powered by a switch or some other trigger.
-The Wonderbulbs are post-Golen, which admittedly is extremely late into hardmode. Though this is because the element of spelunking is still present with all the hardmode ores littered around the world. I felt like post-golem was appropriate since after Plantera, Chlorophyte becomes even more valuable with the lategame class armors, thus the microbulbs would be tempting to use as opposed to Spelunklers.
Closing
So yeah... I hope you like the suggestion and I hope I managed to convey what I meant to say within my head. I felt like my wording might have been awkward in some spots but I hope the meaning came through regardless. If you have any feedback to help refine the suggestion I'm happy to hear it.
Simply put, Microbulbs are little lights that light up the block or wall in front of them. Technically, they're wiring components so they're are invisible unless the usual qualifications for seeing wiring tech are met (holding wire, traps, a mechanical lens, etc. etc.). They can also be placed and removed easily with the Grand Design. Now these lights are highly concentrated and thus only light up the object right in front of them, making them impractical for other uses other than building. Their main trick is allowing you to prevent light/dark physics from blocking, well, blocks and thus allow for more versatile building.
As an example, say you wanted a house without any visible interior, just a full exterior view without any actual rooms. These little bulbs make it so it doesn't get progressively darker on your build as the light fades due to the way shadows work on blocks farther away from a light source or the sky. Or perhaps you want a bridge with thick 8-block wide supports but don't want the shadows to affect the build as the blocks get deeper in.
These come in a few variants...
Microbulb- 5 silver, Tooltip: Wiring - Shines a highly concentrated light 1 - block behind a block or wall, though it's solar powered
Dim Microbulb - 3 silver Tooltip: Wiring - Shines a highly concentrated 1- block light behind a block or wall, it's a bit dim dim one. And it's solar powered.
Wonderbulb - 75 silver Tooltip: Wiring - Shines a highly concentrated 1-block light behind a block or wall anywhere.
Dim Wonderbulb - 65 silver Tooltip: Wiring - Shines a highly concentrated 1 - block light behind a block or wall anywhere, though it's a bit dim
The dim bulbs allow for a bit of variety and allow you to manipulate the lighting of your build just a bit more. Though As you may have noticed there are wonderbulbs as well...
Cons and Balancing Breakdown
-There are regular Microbulbs; which you may have noticed are solar powered, meaning they only work on the surface, or heights of 1 and above. Their lategame counterpart the Wonderbulbs lack this limitation. As I've mentioned, they're easily placed across the whole screen with the Grand Design, thus allowing them to potentially be abused for the sake of spelunking, trivializing spenlunker potions and other solutions to a certain degree all the way to the last ore post-Mechs, Chlorophyte.
-They do not count as valid lighting for the sake of NPC spawning, even if the entire room is lit up with them.
-Perhaps a positive but since they're solar powered, the regular and dim Microbulbs automatically turn off during the night unless powered by a switch or some other trigger.
-The Wonderbulbs are post-Golen, which admittedly is extremely late into hardmode. Though this is because the element of spelunking is still present with all the hardmode ores littered around the world. I felt like post-golem was appropriate since after Plantera, Chlorophyte becomes even more valuable with the lategame class armors, thus the microbulbs would be tempting to use as opposed to Spelunklers.
Closing
So yeah... I hope you like the suggestion and I hope I managed to convey what I meant to say within my head. I felt like my wording might have been awkward in some spots but I hope the meaning came through regardless. If you have any feedback to help refine the suggestion I'm happy to hear it.
