tAPI [WIP] [Alpha] Periodic Elements (Phase 1)

G

Ghaleon

Terrarian
~~Periodic Elements~~​

  1. Introduction
  2. Disclaimer
  3. Installation and Requirements
  4. Download
  5. Plans
  6. New Content
  7. Changelog

~~~~~~~~~~​


~Introduction~​

Well, none of you know me. Or, maybe this is years in the future, and if you are reading this, by now you DO know me. :dryadconfused:

I'm toying with creating this mod, because of an idea I had, after returning to Terraria after a short, 5-6 month hiatus. Primarily this was due to my learning that tAPI is now working with 1.2.4.1, and Mirai is getting her NE mods back in the game. After digging through the Released mods, and installing some, I found a few things that made me pause. Mainly this was the inclusion of Steel in different mods, with different ways to create it.

This, in turn, led to my speculating on a mod that would provide a baseline of sorts for different metals. Such as Steel, Bronze, Brass, etc. To create a universal standard, which all other mods could then draw resources from. Imagine, if you will, a newbie who wished to use a metal alloy in the game, that was not currently present in a mod or the vanilla game, so he decides to mod it. With my Periodic Elements mod, he would have the basis for creating Bronze within his world, which leaves his workload somewhat reduced. He can put my mod as a Base requirement for using his, and then his mod could utilize the Bronze that mine creates.

This spiraled, in my discussion thread, to a somewhat larger endeavor. To create as much of the Periodic Table of elements, as I possibly could. My hope is that this mod will become a standard for all those that use tAPI to mod the game. Why is this important, you might ask?

Well, first, and not that this is a huge problem, it is so all of these elements can have a fixed rate and value within the game. Anyone wishing to use Hydrogen, for whatever reason, could use this mod to acquire it for their recipes. Or maybe I'm just crazy and it's a silly idea. I haven't yet gotten enough feedback to know which is the case. I'm hoping, however, that this will be the first in a series of Universal mods, that add a lot of basic content, that can be used as building blocks for more things. So far the ideas that come to mind are different types of stone (Marble, Granite, etc), and different types of wood (Elm, Oak, Pine).

~~~~~~~~~~​


~Disclaimer~​

This mod is fully available to any other Modder for use with their mod. If you see an element within that you wish to use to build new items with, by all means. Just contact me about it, which is only a formality. My only real wish in this is to generate ever more content for Terraria, to expand on the already great stuff we have now. I will make a full list of all items created by this mod, so that they can in turn be used in recipes for any mods that use this as a Base, farther down this page.

As far as updates. If the time comes with tAPI is updated, but my mod is no longer functional, for whatever reason, I hereby authorize any other Modder the right to update it to the new version of tAPI, under the condition that I have vanished from the forums for a period of time longer than one month. So long as you keep my name associated with the mod. I don't want the mod to fall by the wayside, simply because I am no longer capable of either getting online, or working on the project.

~~~~~~~~~~​


~Installation and Requirements~​

--Requirements
1. tAPI r14a

--Compatibility
This mod should be compatible with most. I'm not certain why there would be incompatibilities, but if there are any, I will have them listed here.

--Installation
To install, place the .tapi file in your tAPI\Mods\Local folder, just as you would any other.

--Options
At present, there are no plans for Options you can change within the mod. However, I may put in some at a later time, that alter some features, such as making something more plentiful within the world.

~~~~~~~~~~​


~Download~​

As the mod is currently alpha, there are no downloads available.

~~~~~~~~~~​


~Plans~​

I'm breaking my plans into Phases, for now at least. To give some idea on where I'm going, and what needs to be done still. I'll try and update the Thread Title with the current phase, as we advance.

Phase One​
This is largely the planning phase. Sorting out my notes and figuring out all the stuff I need. Such as new Crafting Stations, items that need to be a part of the world generation, and basic components of the mod.

Phase Two​
In this second phase, I'll be working to sprite, or obtain help from a skilled spriter, to craft the most basic components of the mod.

Phase Three​
In this phase, I'll be adding the gaseous elements to the mod. This includes spriting the base versions of each.

Phase Four​
In the fourth phase, I'll move on to the basic versions of the solid elements.

Phase Five​
With this phase, I will be adding the liquid elements, as well as liquid versions of some of the previously released elements.

Phase Six​
With the sixth phase and beyond, I'm unsure of where I'll be at that time. In all likelihood, I will begin with making combination elements, as well as powder and liquid forms of the raw elements.

~~~~~~~~~~​


~New Content~​

At present, the mod has no real content. However, these are ideas I have for differing items. These items are subject to a change in name before the mod is released. These are just ideas.

Atmospheric Distillation System Mk. 1 (A.D.S. I)
Recipe: Glass, Wire, Metal Tubes, Fire (torches or some sort of Fire-based item)
(Note: This is a working theory, on the assumption I can find help with creating an item like the Extractinator.)
This station is fed Sealed Tubes, and in return you receive a vacuum tube filled with some of the more common gases found within the atmosphere.
Items Received: Nitrogen Tube(60%), Oxygen Tube(35%), Argon Tube(5%)
Additionally, if you use Bottled Water, you can receive either Hydrogen Tube(75% chance), or Oxygen Tube(25% chance)

Atmospheric Distillation System Mk. 2 (A.D.S. II)
Recipe: Glass, Wire, Metal Tubes(hardmode ore), Fire (possibly something else to make it more advanced than the Mk. 1)
This station is exactly like the A.D.S. I, however it is more advanced, and so you can get harder to find gases from the atmosphere.
Items Received: Argon Tube(40%), Carbon Dioxide Tube(30%), Neon Tube(20%), Helium Tube(6%), Methane Tube(4%)

Laboratory
Recipe: Unknown
This station is where most of the chemical work will be done.

Calcinator
Recipe: Unknown
This station is used with solid elements, to apply high temperatures, without exposing them to oxygen/air.

Mortar and Pestle
Recipe: Unknown
This station is used to grind solid elements into a Powder form, which can then be used in other mixtures.

Sealed Tube
Recipe: 1x Glass @ Glass Kiln (makes two)
This tube, which I may rename to vacuum tube, is used to hold all of the gases created by this mod. I'm using a similar recipe to Bottles, because the size would be about the same, and because of the manner in obtaining the gas.

Glass Beaker
Recipe: 1x Glass @ Glass Kiln (makes one)
This is for holding various liquids introduced by the mod. There may be other versions of this, depending on the types of liquid brought in.

Lead Box
Recipe: 2x Lead Bar @ Anvil
This is something I'm toying with, to be used with elements that give off harmful radiation. Or possibly a set of equipment to wear, that would protect you from it. I'm not sure yet.

Sodium Chloride
Option 1: This is spawned during World Generation. It would be a whitish crystalline formation, harvested in a similar manner as Mushrooms on the surface. An item to separate it into Sodium and Chlorine Gas, would be an Electrolysis Vat.
Option 2: Using a bottle at the Ocean to created Bottled Sea Water, which is fed into an Evaporator to leech out the water, leaving salt crystals. These would then be used in the Vat listed in option 1.

Other options I'm considering for the future, depending on how far this mod goes, would be to ability to take chemicals and craft buckets of Acid. This could then be used to create pools of acid, or acid traps. But for that I'd need more knowledge, and help with adding new liquids to the game.

~~~~~~~~~~​


~Changelog~​

  • December 29th, 2014: Version (0.00) ----- A plan is formulated. A thread is begun. My character's world takeover...imminent.

~~~~~~~~~~
For those with more scientific knowledge than I do, I'm sure questions will arise as to some of the practices I will
employ within this mod. In general, while I'm attempting to be realistic, I am also attempting to simplify
some of these processes, in order to retain a sense of FUN within the game.
Please keep that in mind before you comment or ask about something.
In a number of cases, I will more than likely "fudge" the numbers a little, to make it functional and fun.
I guess I should say that none of this should be practiced in reality. :dryadtongue:​
 

Attachments

  • Periodic Elements.tapi
    3.5 KB · Views: 228
Last edited:
Today, for your viewing pleasure, I present a highly limited version of the Mod that you can use.

Currently the only available item is a tube filled with Hydrogen. And the recipe is 1x Bottled Water, used at a Workbench. I also have the sprite for the Sealed Tube, but it is inaccessible because I haven't yet put in a recipe for it. I just needed it done as the basis for the Hydrogen sprite.

For now, the way to distinguish them visually is the Atomic Number "1", painted on the Hydrogen sprite. I'm not sure yet how I may change this in the future, to handle the various colorless gases.

For anyone reading this, I am interested in creating a tAPI device that acts in a similar manner to the Extractinator. If I'm unable to work that out, it will largely change how gaseous elements are acquired.
 
Thanks UD. I'm hoping it will. I have been getting all sorts of ideas for mods that could work with this.

One big thing is an Explosives mod, with new ammunition. For the explosives themselves, building grenades and bombs by manufacturing gunpowder, shrapnel, and bomb/grenade casings. The gunpowder would be made with sulfur, charcoal, and potassium nitrate. PN has the formula KNO3, so it would take Potassium + Nitrogen + 3 parts Oxygen to create.

For the most part, in my mods at least, I'll try to follow the formula as exactly as I can for recipes. In the case of new bullets, the base damage will be determined by the caliber of the brass shell casings, and the metal used to form the tip will augment this.

I'd like to also put in the manufacture of shaped C4 charges, satchel charges, white phosphorous, nitroglycerin, napalm, etc.

And that is just for that, given the various acids and other compounds, there are a lot of other weapons I want to build from this.

One idea I had, was with radioactive blocks that spawn during World Gen, to possibly have a mod where monsters will spawn near those blocks, but they will be radioactive versions, with attacks that inflict radiation sickness. And touching the blocks without protection will inflict you with the sickness debuff as well.

However, since I haven't begun to learn C# yet (hoping to find books at the local library on Monday), that is a bit of a stretch for me at this stage.

Currently I'm working on the Lab Table crafting station, as the base gases already have their sprites finished, along with the vacuum tube.
 
Well, it can be highly complicated. But with the Guide to offer crafting hints, and the mod that has the Pocket Guide you open with the G key, it's rather easy to discover any and all recipes within the game.

I'm also considering an NPC, the Mad Scientist, who will sell some basic things, and his speech will drop hints on chemical compounds.

As for complications, it is really only as complicated as people wish to make it. Some may not prefer to use a Bullet mod made using brass shell casings, gunpowder, and tips of varying metals. Then there are others who enjoy the added realism, plus the fact that such bullets will be more powerful than those already existing within the game.

Personally I'm all for anything that either adds in new content, or opens the possibility for new content. Because I want Terraria to have ever more content, in a never ending sort of way.
 
Last edited:
Interesting.

I may be coming at this from a different direction - I currently have a tiny mod that places the entire variety of initial ores during world generation rather than choosing one from each tier.

The aspect that seems to have the most bearing on game play is metallurgy and the resources that drive it, including things like multi-metallic minerals (galena, limonite, tetrahedrite, and meteorite), carbon inputs (charcoal from wood, or coke refined from mined coal), maybe flux (quicklime... refine from limestone? marble?). A wood furnace that could process wood into either charcoal or ash would also open an alternate path to potassium besides mining sylvite and saltpeter: burn wood to ash and a lot of soluble potassium carbonate is left behind which can be extracted by water.

Meteorite in particular is an interesting case: meteoric iron is a naturally occurring iron-nickel alloy, so meteorite bars presumably could be either separated into iron and nickel bars, or created from them without waiting for some to fall out of the sky if you can dig up some nickel.
 
Well, metallurgy is one part of this, but there is so much more that can be done with the chemicals, depending on how you use them.

I will have some crafting stations, but I don't want to flood in a bunch of single use stations. Where they have only a single real purpose. Then you end up with a HUGE base flooded with stations of this type, and there is really no practical purpose in it. Other than having to build ever larger bases to hold all your machinery.

At the moment, the Lab Table will be used for most basic functions. There will be an Industrial Laboratory available as a Hardmode replacement to the Lab Table, and will handle many more chemical functions. A grinder for turning solids to powders, a decay chamber for those elements that create things when they decay, as well as likely having a calcinator for applying heat when needed.

The Lab Table and Industrial Lab will be meant as the work horses of this mod. To handle a lot of the heavy lifting.

Creating Meteorite is a good idea for this, as you say so you don't have to wait for a meteor to fall from the sky. However, separating stuff into two items is a limitation, as far as I know. Since you can only get one thing from a recipe. So to get Iron or Nickel from a Meteorite, you would probably have an either/or situation.

This is how Hydrogen and Oxygen is currently made available. Bottled Water at the Lab Table, plus the Vacuum Tube, will enable you to get either Hydrogen or Oxygen, just not both at the same time. Mostly you will have to decide what you are aiming for, and choose the elements you need most at the time.

I have some help with the WorldGen, so really, anything that can exist within the world, will have some spawn during world generation. It will be based on how readily available something is within the real world. If it is very hard to find, it will also be difficult to find within Terraria.

Some things will only be found as part of another compound, and you must then extract what you need. An example of this I was just looking into, and also why I began the WorldGen research, is Salt. This will be spawned, and the source of differing things. For the moment, there is a process where you use water, and you can get Chlorine gas, Hydrogen gas, or Sodium Hydroxide as a result.

Similarly, for other elements, I'm using Wikipedia as a reference. Depending on how it occurs naturally within our own world, most likely it is how it can be found within Terraria. Fluorine gas is another example, where I will have Fluorite, a pinkish mineral, spawn within the world at generation. You then harvest it, and use it to manufacture the gas.

Work will be slow, as I'm going to be away from home starting tomorrow, until Sunday. I'm going to be using this time to gather as much research as I can to use offline, since my home internet is very weak.

As for your questions, the first step is to cover all of the elements on the Periodic Table. To find a way to introduce them in some way or fashion, so that they can be utilized. I will expand on things to add other mineral compounds as time passes.

More than likely, I'll turn this into a series of mods. This first one adding in the elements, and methods to extract or combine. Then a second mod for adding in a ton of minerals to the world generation, which meshes with this one. Stone types, such as marble, may find their way into the Minerals mod. Stone will likely be a part of that, so marble, granite, slate, shale, etc.

If I could crack how to script growing trees within biomes, I wanted to add more tree types, such as oak, elm, ash, and pine, to the different biomes. To offer more beauty visually. Of course, that could also help lead into a farming mod. Where you can obtain seeds to plant in dirt, and grow things.

We already have flowers and pumpkins. I see the next step as a mod to allow growing corn, beans, fruit trees, potatoes, and many other things. Of course, that puts in for a mod to cook/prepare all of these into consumables for buffs and healing.

It rather quickly snowballs, once you get going.
 
I'm back home and ready to start work once more on this mod. I've got wiki pages for all of the Periodic Table elements, so I will begin researching on the best ways to add things into the mod.

Another thing that I would like to tackle is making an animated crafting station, though the frames gave me a bit of a headache the last time I tried.

I'll try to have more up as soon as I'm able. I'll probably get a small release of 10-15 elements, in order to get some feedback.
 
Alright, so an update for all those interested. I've been doing my wiki research through all the pages I saved to my hard drive. So far I've picked out a few likely candidates for inclusion in a sort of pre-release to the mod. My difficulties at the moment lie with numerous compounds requiring others in order to extract or utilize in one way or another, with the result that it snowballs into ever more work to make things workable.

To avoid that, I'm trying to go with the simple things for the moment. So here is something of a teaser.

--------------------
Cryogenic Chamber - This chamber will be used to apply extremely cold temperatures to your elements, primarily for the creation of other things. One thing that will be fed into the Cryo Chamber will be bottled air. This will start a process for creating Argon, Nitrogen, and Liquid Air.

Electrolysis Vat - This vat will be used to apply electrolysis to certain liquids, in order to separate and provide new things. One example will be taking Salt with Bottled Water to form a brine solution. The two types of Salt (Sodium and Potassium), will each have their own form of brine to go into the Electrolysis Vat. In the case of the Sodium Brine, you can receive Chlorine Gas, Hydrogen Gas, or Sodium Hydroxide. Further electrolysis of the Sodium Hydroxide will enable you to receive the Sodium metal. Similarly Potassium Chloride will allow you to obtain Potassium in this manner.

Distillation Chamber - This chamber is used to distill things from liquids. Notably, at least in early release, I plan to use this for fractional distillation of liquid air, obtained from the Cryo Chamber. You can then obtain Neon gas and Nitrogen gas from this.
--------------------


Some others I have been reading about, but likely won't be in this early release, include the following:

Helium - This will largely wait until I can get a machine station to generate Natural Gas, which can only be placed deep underground. (To better simulate a natural gas pocket.)

Lithium - For this, I'm looking into adding Hectorite, a type of clay that can provide Lithium metal, the alternative is taking Lithium Chloride and Potassium Chloride together.

Calcium - This one will also come in as a salt, Calcium Chloride, which will be produced from Limestone, which can then use the Electrolysis Vat to give Chlorine gas and Calcium metal.

The main thing is to design the stations above, as they will provide a lot of functionality with most of the things within the mod. I need to obtain more wiki pages for some things.
 
Been a while since I have been on. I've lost my home internet, so I have to rely on coming to the public library now for anything. Which I haven't been able to do for a couple weeks.

I'm still tinkering with this. The main thing slowing me down is the sprites. That and the fact that my hard drive decided to go rabid a while back, and spent a couple days frothing at the mouth. Thankfully a format and wipe fixed it, but I've been recovering ever since.

I'm hoping within a week or two to have some kind of first version release, with some of the more basic elements available via WorldGen. After much time researching on Wikipedia pages I saved, I have found easy ways to add numerous elements, yet some are still difficult, with a convoluted method of processing things down to the base element. Those are going to take a while.

So far, this is the planned list of crafting stations, from the new material.

Lab Table - simple stuff like mixing
Cryogenic Chamber - this will handle all processes that require extreme cold. One in particular is taking air and turning it to liquid, for the refinement of nitrogen and others. But also to chill other elements and send them from gaseous to liquid states.
Compressor - an air compressor, that basically fills things with air, to be used primarily with the Cryo Chamber for liquid air.
Grinder - the grinder is used for pulverizing nearly any solid into a powder form
Calcinator - this is used to apply high temperature to stuff, without the presence of oxygen. Some elements need this in order to process without the taint of air
Electrolysis Vat - this handles all electrolytic processes, for the separation of various things

Other plans include a Decay Chamber, for the rapid decay of radioactive elements.

One teaser that I will ultimately attempt, possibly with help, is an addon to this mod called Nuclear Winter. The idea has been rolling around in my head for a few weeks now. If I can achieve it, it will definitely be an awesome thing.

The purpose of this addon is to build a Chernobyl Reactor, that is used like the items that summon bosses. However, when used, it runs the scripting similar to a Meteor, in which a large area is converted. Instead of normal blocks to meteorite, we instead take normal blocks and convert them to contaminated versions (via scripting similar to the spread of Crimson/Corruption).

It will be an irreversible change, for now. All tiles will receive a contaminated version, basically the reactor meltdown will turn your world into a nuclear wasteland. But anyways, that is just something I'm toying with, as a natural extension of the Uranium/Plutonium I'll be adding.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom