What's the one thing that "sold" you on BTW?

[Gargantuan_Penguin]

Wow. Thanks guys. If this is what I can come back to, I should leave the forum unattended for a day while I play Dwarf Fortress more often :)

it is like the " wonder" enchantment. a random magical event will happen when you leave for a day. in this case it was good but sometimes. *shudders*

[Derzuel]

I came for the platforms.
I stayed for the rope.

To put it simply when I looked at what BTW had to offer the ability to have a platform I could stand on and go up and down with very little input on my part was very attractive. When I realized how much more was actually made accessible to me by the mere presence of rope, I was hooked like a crack addict. Sure the tech tree provides some rewarding challenges, but the satisfaction that such a simple concept offers means that for me this mod cranks it to 11 in terms of awesomeness.

[Caboose]

...The Yogscast video.

[BinoAl]

I was sold when he first released it. I guess the block that really got me when it came out was either the hibachi or the light block, but the bd really solidified things.

[RaustBlackDragon]

My history with BTW is quite an interesting one :)

I used to HATE the mod, and I thought FC was a deranged sociopathic genius with an irrational hatred of wolves and a truly sick sense of humor.

...Okay, yeah, I wasn't THAT far off the mark :), but I thought it in a bad way, you know what I mean.

I hated the mod, but after seeing the Yogscast video, I recognized that it was a truly amazing one, so when people asked me if using BTW with the Voldemort Mod was possible, I asked FC on the MCF BTW thread.

Me: Flowerchild, do any of the changes you made depend on changes you made to the wolf class? Some people are asking if it would be possible to download your mod and then add my Voldemort Mod over it.

Flowerchild: Yup, overwriting that class will prevent wolves from producing dung, which is a central item in the BTW tech-tree. In other words, our two mods are not compatible.

Me: But like, would it crash?

FlowerChild: Hopefully.

This prompted me to post this on my mod's thread:

"Dear god, say what you will about this guy, but he's a master at this little game he plays with people.

It's like he's a baker who hides a razor blade inside every one of his pastries, and refuses to make razor-free pastries under any circumstances. He will not budge on this point. If you want his pastries, you have to deal with the razor-blade surprise.

And people still buy his pastries, as he knows they will, because HIS PASTRIES ARE JUST THAT GOOD.


The guy has serious problems, but he's an amazing modder."

This resulted in a conversation with one of my users, who was also a BTW fan, and this eventually resulted in FlowerChild himself posting on my thread, and clearing up a few mistaken notions I had. Eventually, after a little back-and-forth, I reached a sort of reconciliation with him, and wished him luck with BTW.

However, Flowerchild being Flowerchild, a few BTW fans saw that he posted on the thread and were slightly confrontational with me, saying the next "skill" i should work on is "Don't act retarded" or something to that effect. Admittedly, it was rather constructive, and the confrontation could have been far worse.

Back to the topic: What sold me on BTW?

This. The issue hadn't even gotten that bad yet, and yet FC posted this:

"Please take it easy on Raust guys. He's obviously a well-intentioned modder that is donating his time and effort to the community and asking for nothing in return.

Regardless of whether you agree with his design-decisions or not, I do think that's worthy of a certain amount of respect and gratitude.

Remember that the Better Than Wolves community is a very large one at this point, and that directing the animosity of that community towards this mod would be no better than what happened when the Yogsbox community got directed towards Better Than Wolves.

I apologize for the disruption of your thread Raust. I really don't want that to go any further if at all possible. "

This (particularly in light of how some now-popular youtube stars who used to be my friends have turned me into an incredibly offensive running gag and cared nothing for the consequences it had on me, forcing me to pretty much leave youtube because their fans wouldn't leave me alone no matter what I did) convinced me beyond any reasonable doubt that FC was a good guy. Since the awesomeness of BTW was already a given, the only thing remaining was compatibility with the voldemort mod. When that happened, as a result of a botched attempt to bring it to multiplayer, I immediately gave it a spin, and the rest is history.

[jorgebonafe]

I got to know the mod from the Yoggscast video. Then I started playing with it, and the rest is history :P

Everything in the mod is awesome, specially how the mod adds so many different things in a way that its not just a bunch of random useful items, it actually has a logical progression and connection between all the blocks, items and changes added.

But what really sold me, I guess, was the mechanical power.

[RenEvo]

Stability, felt like a continuation of the vanilla game and not a detraction, frequent updates.

[kregoth]

I originally got really bored and fed up with minecraft and the direction it was taking so I started to look for mods that might help improve the experience. at first I must have over looked the topic for BTW 5-6 times before finally reading the whole thing. Everything before that I never was interested in because it either added things that made the game way to easy or it added things that made no sense for minecraft.

After trying BTW I loved it, it gave you all these cool tools that fit really well into minecraft, and it didn't just hand them to you or where absurdly easy to make like every other mod. BTW is and continues to be the only way I play minecraft and probably be that way for the unforeseen future :)

[Elensaar]

What first brought me to try BTW was the mechanical power system. I saw Battosay's sorter, and the elevators, and loved the idea of having to run the axles to run my machines. The thing that made me keep it as part of my "default" install of Minecraft though, was the fact that it feels like part of the original game. I like Buildcraft, it's fun to play with, but my BTB-game doesn't really feel like Minecraft anymore. And I've had that problem with most mods. BTW feels like part of the original that Mojang just "forgot" to put in... :)

[Xekrom337]

cement, when it was an endless wave.
good times.

[whynocheese]

Subbed to the Yogscast because my friend told me they were good and at that time I loved Minecraft but I couldn't play more than an hour or two before completely having to start over for some reason or another. I would only play Mc immediately after I had watched a LP of Minecraft, and after I had basically exhausted the standard LPs I came to find they were not my cup of tea as they were more about jokes and having a stupid gimmick then actually playing Mc, so I grew to hate them, yet I continued to watch. After a few weeks I saw the Yogscast review of BTW, I liked it mainly because the waterwheels and windmills looked cool. Yeah I know I was one of those people. I went on the McForums to download and play with it for an hour and then go back to watching Youtube. But then while I was on my TMI world adding the windmills to make another "Ye Olde English Town" I noticed two things. One you could make a interesting network of gearboxes and axles to have a sort of power line, and two, I could now give my buildings purposes. I was ecstatic at the idea of building a dockyard with platforms to be able to have a true warehouse, build an actual carpenters cabin, build a lighthouse, and most of all build a factory system. At the time is was a simple (auto) dung farm and a auto granary, but those few things made fall in love with the idea of making a vibrant economic powerhouse of a town instead of just a bunch of empty shacks. When villagers came I was happy because I would get my townspeople for my jobs and be able to just sit in a governor's palace on top of a great hill over looking a magnificent city. Needless to say I haven't yet built my city because I now just am too much a perfectionist to actually be able to build more than one building without stop. Even with that (imho) severe limitation I still see it happening one day and know when it does I will have a city that rivals that of many other cities that Minecrafters have built and mine will be better because it is Better than Wolves.

Sorry if it is a little incoherent, I am tired and am at the end of a caffeine rush so bear with me please.

[origsgtpepper]

I was unsure for a long time (heck I think I remember seeing it when it first came out but I had just started playing vanilla and there was so much to explore) but what really sold me was the elevator, I can still remember seeing it for the first time and thinking "O dear god the possibilities.....".

[gungad]

I came for the elevators, but I fell in love with all the automation and the tech tree.

[SterlingRed]

There wasn't really 'one thing' that sold me on btw. I hadn't really played any mods seriously before this one. I liked vmc, and I'd always wanted a mod that could blend with minecraft the way it was and add to it, rather than create it's own system. All of the tech mods I'd seen before never really integrated the original game at all.

I did find the mod from Yogscast, following the wake of that disaster and their mishandling the issue I no longer watch their channel. But I do play BTW. Religiously. What most attracted me to it was it's simple complexity. I have always loved mc for it's simple concept that results in millions of possibilities and playstyles. I've always wanted the game to provide me with the blocks/tools and leave it to my imagination on what to do with them. After the piston, Mojang quit adding things like this and I grew more and more frustrated with the games potential that it's creators were wasting.

I came across BTW and I knew instantly. It is perfect. It gives me the tools and lets me decide how to use them. It's creator is committed to the development of a good mod rather than fans, money, or popularity. FC also does not sacrifice his own mod by maintaining compatibility with others. He does what he wants, with a flair of humor at Mojang for their 'updates' that were literally wasting the games potential. I think vmc is doing much better under Jebs command, but I can't imagine it without BTW. Thanks FlowerChild!

[Awfulcopter]

I like that all but the simplest projects require infrastructure and planning.

The Hibachi is my favorite example of this, because it needs three inputs (redstone, mechanical power and some sort of timing pulse). The windmill, that requires a mechanical power output and a redstone input (to disable it in the storms) is another good one.

I like the multistep manufacturing of Steel (and lots of other BTW blocks), and hope that that idea (produce goods, combine those goods into better goods) gets expanded on as the tech tree grows.

[TheAnarchitect]

I came for the windmill and the half, quarter and eight blocks.

I'm a designer. I used to be an architect, but the economy. So I play minecraft to give myself an outlet for architectural urges I can't fill otherwise. Now, There are dozens of Mods I could install that would give me more architectural options. But any designer knows that design is about problem solving, not just creating pretty objects. Better than wolves was the only mod that increased my design options while also giving me more interesting problems to be solved with design.

[Flesh_Engine]

I'd have to say that i picked it up because of FC's mission statement (which he took down from the MC thread apparently) and he's got that "guru" vibe going that makes everyone trust his judgement on stuff. Oh, and he likes Skinny Puppy ;)

[Heilkaiba]

I was introduced to the mod by the Yogscast but didn't really get into it until later. I don't remember the exact details but I guess the way the mod flows fluidly from vanilla and provides actual aims are why I was hooked.

[Husbag3]

Aimlessly browsing through the MCF and "now with added wolf rinds"

[Shengji]

I came for the cement - had a statue to build in my main world and thought it would be a neat shortcut.

I stayed for the utility - In those days there were lots of little bits and pieces that just made life or the aesthetics of my base a bit nicer.

I was sold on the game progression - As the tech tree formed BTW quickly went from a "I'll have a strop if I have to uninstall it" to a "I want no game of minecraft without BTW". The pacing and design is perfect.

[CreeperCommando]

People seem to be typing strange things like there was a Minecraft without BTW???

Seriously though I can't remember anything that really 'sold' me into playing BTW, I had tested Mo creatures, BC, IC, maybe Millienaire and a lot of small mods here and there before BTW.
Remembered that I noticed BTW first around the time the waterwheel recently came out and got later on interested in FC referring to another thread of his about his mod name (Mod-thread had an interesting amount of name change requests, first assumption was there was something important behind it all).
I went on reading some of the first pages of the 'wolves are a bad idea thread', well at least the parts FC wrote, as this had a lot of thought put into it and I found myself sharing his ideas (learning that you usually can't expect a stranger to have unlimited love put into his own creation as main thing)(also learned that the only part, of my assumption mentioned earlier, that had something important behind it was in fact the name, and all those namechange-requests only made me dread the MCF-community, for the sheer silliness of it all).

I don't remember any specific point in time where I became addicted to this mod but I remember that even in the beginning when I didn't even have a clue about the philosophies behind this well tuned piece of craftsmanship that this was something I hopelessly missed as soon as I removed it from MC, and that has never really happened with other mods (well except for the Blitzkrieg-mod for Company of heroes, but that's another story).

[Wgurgh]

I was starting to get a little bored with vanilla, but had always thought that I could move on to mods once that happened so started looking around. I tend to look into something like this a lot before I install one, and decided on EE because I have always liked alchemy. Problem I had was it seemed almost like cheating to me, I felt it was quite overpowered for the work needed. It also seemed to go far away from vanilla, but I thought that was what I was looking for at the time. I happened on a few references to BTW as far as compatibility, so decided to look into it some.

What really "sold" me on at least trying it was the "ages of progression" though. Not so much what I could do once I got through the ages, but the fact that the ages were there. I have not, and probably never will, rushed through the ages. I take my time with them, enjoying the different things I can do at each level.

Also, while going through the wiki (still had not installed BTW or even decided for sure I would) I saw some of Battosay's videos. I guess I don't have the imagination to see what is possible that much, but I kept coming up with new ideas from watching his. I watched the interview about leaving forge video too and was impressed with FC's commitment to doing things his way and the way he stuck to what he thought was right.

Then there was this little section in the MCF OP, about improved minecarts. That was the moment I was sold for sure, I love my minecarts. I decided that even if I never really got into the rest, would be worth the mod for that alone. I downloaded it and within a few hours I knew I would be keeping it. The sense of satisfaction from getting an automated system working the way I want, the reason to build buildings to house those automations, yeah I am hooked. Been playing MP in Edolas lately, and love the community part of that, but I do miss BTW things there.

FlowerChild, sometimes I love the things you say, sometimes they upset me, but either way I always respect you.

[Roablin]

BTW was published right at the time when I was looking for a mod to fill the holes in vMC redstone. I was in fact looking for specifically two things, toggleable light blocks and minecart boosters, two things that BTW had from the beginning. A simple mod that had the two things I was looking for, in addition to the hibachi which I thought was coolest thing ever drove me to download. The one major downside though was the lack of custom graphics and my impression that the modder would soon abandon his mod. As useful as it was, it appeared that FC had made BTW simply to make a point. It was my intention from the start to only use this mod temporarily and not on any legit worlds. How happy I am to have been proven wrong. Cool features kept pouring out, and with the arrival of custom graphics I decided it was a keeper.

[redrew89]

What originally sold me on BTW were the detector rail variants added after Mojang implemented booster rails. I had previously used Feanor's Minecarts Advanced mod for more useful track detectors, and had also messed a bit with other BTW features, like the Cauldron. However, when FC added those, along with tweaks to powered rails themselves, I adopted BTW as my mod-of-choice. As the tech tree developed, I forgot entirely about the detector rails, and started getting excited about automation. :P

[Sarudak]

Good to hear that Flowerchild plays dwarf fortress (the greatest game of all time).