Enigmatica 2: Expert - Extended

I have found this modpack while browsing on Curseforge and after the first try out I can say it's like an expanded Minecraft.
The Quest Book's chapters is nicely arrenged, the tasks are easy to read and it contains useful tips.
And it's good the mods are gettin updated/replaced with forks.
I can recommend this modpack to both new and advanced Minecraft players.

E2EE is a great modpack that often gets overshadowed by its 'predecessor', E2E.
People often treat it as 'modpack with bugfixes for E2E' and then compain that it changed too many things and everything is different, "It is not E2E anymore!'.
What is not obvious that maybe 3-4 years ago it was indeed a small extension + bugfixes modpack that was still majorly E2E, but with years it is already an entirely different modpack. But how can you convey this idea when your modpack is called Enigmatica 2 Expert: Extended?..
We can say that its name is its bane...

And while this modpack was indeed based on E2E, only some basic structure of E2E left - maybe gates system and basic relations between magic and tech mods - everything else was reworked, tuned and fixed. Author is trying to introduce creative ideas and make early, mid and lategame different from any other modpack that you've already seen. I may be not the biggest fan of some of these mechanics (singularities, looking at you), but others are creative, interesting and useful. Even Peaceful mode got its unique interaction!

Even skyblock mode, that is usuall 'add Ex Nihilo and it's done' is also an interesting experience - it is no longer 'sift gravel to get every resource in the pack', it is much more involved and forces to do small automations and plan routes on how to progress.
Some things that are obtained in Overworld have to be produred via complex processing chains, so Skyblock is considered 'harder' version of E2EE that tests player's knowledge. And you can go Peaceful Skyblock for even more complex progression! But it never boils down to mindless grind like 'you need 64 cobblestone for 1 furnace', everything is easy and automatable if you're 'expert' enough.

Still, I personally can't say this modpack is perfect - a difference from E2E, regular NuclearCraft was removed and NuclearCraft: Overhauled + Quantum Minecraft Dynamics were added. Those mods almost don't have an exposure to minecraft community and are incredibly complex for a game, in my opinion.
These mods force player to know each small detail on how each multiblock component works and interacts with other components, which can be interesting only for a small subset of players who like tinkering with their reactor in creative or download external Planners. QMD goes even worse - it just offers complex math formulas and expects me to do calculations before I even consider doing something. And no external Planners this time. I personally don't like mods with such 'figure out yourself' approach.
Still, it is not mandatory to explore those mods to the fullest and some alternative ways exist (+schematics), so it is passable and you can complete pack almost without exposure to NCO or QMD.

Modpack performance is superb, author definitely has some obsession and constantly tries to make loading time as small as possible and the whole gaming experience smooth. It can be even be migrated to Java 25 in just few steps, adding even more performance gains.
This modpack is still actively supported and new versions with bugfixes or small changes are published almost each month. Together with active community in Discord it is comforting that you're playing 'active' modpack and not some fossil which was abandoned 7 years ago and got no updates at least to such basic mods like AE2.

All in all, it is one of the best modpacks I've ever seen and it can hold its stand even compared to such superstars like DJ2 or original E2E, so I urge you to try it.

E2EE is an amazing pack, and has really made me hate all kinds of "artificial" gated progression that other packs use. E2EE uses a combination of organic progression via crafting recipes, and many ways to get to the same goal.

In my run, I just didn't feel like actually going to other planets with the rocketry mod. Making that choice in other packs would've killed all progression, but in E2EE it was more of a challenge to find the other ways to get the materials I needed - because there was always another way. I built an absurd, way-bigger-than-normal particle accelerator just to make the crystals I could've easily gotten on another planet... but that's what was awesome about it :)

Performance in the pack is quite good compared to other 1.12 packs, but the biggest thing I did not enjoy during my playthrough was having to care about things like TPS lag, and actively architect around it. Compared to modern minecraft packs, it's definitely a lot worse. That's a fun killer. I'm not sure if that kind of issue is fixed with cleanroomMC nowadays, maybe.

To start off I completed E2EE 3 times, one normal solo run, one team peaceful run and one solo skyblock run. They all should add to ~1000 hours of playtime combined.

Quests:
Quest lines that have been reworked/improved in E2EE compared to E2E are really good. Best example of this would be Thaumcraft quests, original quest line from E2E was really lacking in quality. Quest rewards have been rebalanced but they are still mainly loot boxes.

Custom ore processing:
Ore processing has been improved mainly due to buffing the "Refining" infusion enchantment from Thaumcraft. There is more steps including magic to the ore processing to get even better yield or chance for byproducts but in most cases first step is enough. I used next steps only for one type of resource that was quite tricky to get.

Computer mods:
Some of the mechanics like printing blocks from computer mods are needed in order to progress. They are all explained in tooltips for player that might not have required programming knowledge.

Peaceful mode:
While this mod is not super hard it comes with really nice features for other modes. If the game is beatable in peaceful mode you can craft loot from mobs and bosses which provides another option to progress. For gaia spirit can be crafted and automated if you do not want to fight the boss.

Mechanics variety:
Modpack developer nerfed "Mainstream" options and mechanics like Mekanism Ethylene power generation and Angel Ring for example. This encourages player to find options from other mobs. Good example might be flight, getting angel ring requires a lot of EU2 power and NC:O irradiation which might seem like a "scary" mechanic. This item is not super expensive but requires some knowlege to be able to obtain it. Other options for flight might be Beacon with custom block for secondary effect (there is block that will give flight and you can add block that will make the beacon effect work for single player in whole dimension), final armor from Thaumcraft addon progression gives flight as well, you get access to semi-creative flight in Thaumcraft even earlier. There is more options I just listed ones that I used.

Skyblock experience:
Early game of skyblock is probably one of the most unique ones I played. For ore gathering you can use standard Ex Nihilio sieves but they give only a few types of resources and processing drops from them require in world fluid interaction with seared stone fluid. Iron can be gathered from trees and gold can be obtained by turning pigs in pigmans. After you have ore generation done and enter mid-game the experience is pretty simmilar to the normal run, you will have to use more expensive skyblock recipes for items that you would find by exploration.
Late game skyblock is where the difficulty starts showing. To reach end goal in skyblock you have to use most of the mechanics in modpack. Most notable QMD, Bees, NC:O. In normal run you could skip hard parts by exploration but in skyblock you have to take the long harder route.

Exploration:
Exploration is super rewarding in E2EE. The rewards are mainly tied to exploring other planets using Advanced Rocketry. You can find fluids to pump out using pumpjacks or some pumps if fluids are placed in world. Planets also can spawn blocks that are needed in progression for some mods. For example you can find NC:O fuels, QMD liquids or EnderIO liquids. Most of these things would require big setups but some of them can be skipped by exploration.

Magic mods:
Magic still feels kinda left out like in E2EE. Thaumcraft is way better included in progression than in E2E but Botania, Astral and BM still don't have that many uses so there is no reason to create powerful mana generation or a lot of max tier blood magic altars. In recent update I have not played BM is getting more uses so hopefully this will continue for all magic mods.

Development:
Modpack developer is active on Discord and is open to suggestions. If you find a bug or some mechanic that feels grindy you can reach out and possibly contribute to improving the E2EE experience.

Performance:
Never had any issues and modpack developer is constantly trying to improve the preformance. This also comes with some downsides because convienient but laggy options (IC2 ejector upgrades for example) might get disabled in future updates to improve servers performance.

(I am one of "developers" of this masterpiece, being the one that invented Peaceful-only mode in most of ways, gave more ores to planets and overhauled Numismatic Dynamo to support every metal.)

There is a lot of ways to where to start with this...

The amount of custom content and mechanics and definitely a highlight. Just look into all new JEI categories, that provide additional great info on all your obscur-ish and favorite mods! The author of this even codes their own "mods" in crafttweaker's script for better experience!

The skyblock mode is also one of a kind, being technically active in normal overworld in terms of changes, which made a huge impact on how resources are obtained... with burning pieces in liquids, crushing unusual blocks, exploiting the weak animals for their drops and other things; it is very interesting once you get past gimmick-infused early game.

The questbook is amazing for mods where effort was done, such as Thaumcraft-verse; many bits and pieces are explained in a grid of quests, that even reward you with even more bits and pieces (curious, isn't it?), and ending with overhaul to Thaumic Additions' items that are no longer just "the OP item takes effort" alloys for TC.

Speaking of addons... there is a lot of them, for Tinkers, for AE2, for TC (as mentioned before), for IE... they expand on a lot of stuff that is set up by their parent mods.

Changes to mods themselves (via ASM modifying) are widespread too, mostly to get around limitations or to put it above and beyond what it was designed for, like accepting thousands of RF/t or dozens of items. The ability to do it at all is inspiring.

Non-linearity of original E2E is kept here and upgraded to heaven, with routes to get around needing to do technical or magical progression, or killing any bosses; this part is not completely finished, but the details and recipes needed to skip doing machines, if you are wizard by blood, is nothing short of astonishment.

Ore processing... oh the new ore processing line... you start with normal native clusters and then ascend to increasingly more complicated magical processes to get more powerful ore chunks that are smelt into various amount of materials, depending on how much effort you put into it. IMO, very good custom mechanic, that prompts as much engagement as you decide.

Computers. There is a lot of programming you can do, in any way you want. And it is all useful in some capacity. You should like robots and mechas as tech guy watching this review, isn't it?

Now for parts that I dislike:

• I do not agree with all gimmicks done to make early game more exciting; sometimes enough fun is enough, and manual work, that is automated by delegating this manual work to robots, could be tiring to handle.
• While skips done by dedicating your attention to obscure parts are exciting in their own, it can lose that charm once the way to them is discovered somewhere else and it just becomes 4.44x stronger way to get certain resources via this funny gimmick (that is sometimes incomprehensible, like IC2 crops).
• Despite how combat-focused the pack is at times, via TConEvo and buffs to TC and I&F, there is not many enemies to fight; your targets are mostly not-very-difficult bosses and enemies buffed by Scaling Health mechanic.
• Despite overhaul to UUM line and replication, the item values are still kind of unbalanced, with early game items costing a lot of matter and midgame materials costing almost nothing.
• The endgame in general is mostly the same, you go for same complex grind on top of ultimate table and get ultimate ingot to make ultimate utilities... There is a lot of things that speed that up like PackagedAuto and other AE2 extensions, so it is at least fun to set up.
• There is some other minor things I wanted to mention, but can't remember. ech.

Playtime: around 400 hours for Peaceful, 51 hours for Conflux IV%, ~30 hours on latest alpha in Peaceful.
9.5/10.

The amount of work hours this pack has received from it's creator, Krutoy is out of this world.
Quests:
Quests are highly descriptive, guiding and definitely not dull. They also offer non-game breaking awards like the original E2E did.

Progression:
Feels really good. There's a lot of small increments of nice stuff drizzled in to get the dopamine flowing. Progression is non-linear as well, allowing you to complete the pack normally (doing everything), skyblock (not using any in-world materials), tech-mostly (skipping most of magic) or magic-mostly (skipping most of tech). This allows people to go for their most preferred way of playing, and the modpack feels like half of a kitchensink pack - you can choose what you do, yet you still benefit from the progression available.

Tech: Lots of nice tech-based mods in this pack. There's clear progression (both in RF/t and mods themselves). From easy to make mods at the start but cumbersome building (Immersive Engi, Immersive wires and IC2) through nuclearcraft CE (way better than normal NC) all the way up to EnderIO, thermal etc.

Magic: Mainly thaumcraft, botania (tech mod haha), astral sorcery and blood magic - the usual 1.12.2 experience - but they have a lot of "additional" custom uses for tech (as a supplement), or many buffed/nerfed aspects. Very customized by the creator, and the quests for magic are really good too.

Customized assets/progression: I think this pack is #1 or #2 in complexity of it's custom systems

• Item expire in fire
• Diverse material requirements that are not annoying like GTCE
• Custom assets, mechanics (UU-matter replication is different for example)
  Like I said before, the pack offers so many custom experiences and automation prospects that it's finally a fun challenge to automate something, instead of throwing it all into one "do-all" machine.

Storage:
AE2 is mainly used by me. There's a lot to store though - I used everything from labeled crates, storage drawers. Nothing to complain here - lot of good options, none of them are "required"

World and generation:
Ice and fire dragons provide very useful loot if you can manage to defeat them.
Twilight forest exists and is built upon, but nothing from it is required
More animals are added via certain mods - but they are not useless/fodder - they actually have a custom-build purpose to them by the creator

Optimization and performance:
Surprisingly way more performant than the original E2E - the creator of the pack spent thousands of hours optimising the pack, removing entities spamming lag. He's also a master optimizer from what i've seen - telling other devs how to optimize their mods, looking for faultlines.
I've played this pack with shaders on from start to finish with a i5 4670k and GTX1070 - never dropped below 40FPS, even at the endgame. Now that I bought a i7 12700k and RTX4080 i never drop below 144FPS and I'm pretty far so far.

Overall:
My favourite pack of all time - surpassing even Infinity Evolved, Unleashed and DEFINITELY the original E2E pack where I only had to use gas burning generators from mechanism to "win". Now I finally feel "challenged" but not in an annoying way (lookin at you, GT new horizons)

10/10 pack.