Reputation ranks
Ranks only ever go up; points can drop but your rank stays.
About reputation ranksThis one was very competently done, with a skeleton story centred around upgrading "the World Engine". In practice that means working through different mods to create the necessary upgrades, and then watching the World Engine build itself in cutscenes.
Exploration
The world is made entirely of stone, so it's not one for sightseers. As you dig further out in the stoneblock world, you'll reach other dimensions. Teleportation mods make this less painful than it sounds, although some midgame quests require a lot of digging to find dungeons buried in the outer rings - there were slightly too many of those for my tastes.
The quest dungeons themselves are very well done, each centering around one mod in particular - e.g. Create, or Portal Gun. They often call on platforming abilities, and seemed of the perfect length.
Other more generic dungeons exist in each ring. These tend to be very rich on loot in the inner rings (the Nether dungeons in particular) and very loot poor beyond that.
The mod offering
There are a lot of mods in this pack, although quests do not force you through these. Many mods seem to be here to provide options - there are several storage mods, for example, and you'll only ever need one.
Particular focus is given to Oritech and Draconic Evolution, especially in the late game, although other technology focused mods include Industrial Foregoing, Mekanism, Create and Immersive Engineering. The magic mods in the pack (Occultism, Psi, Ars Nouveau, Malum and Iron's Spellbooks) are barely touched, although progression along Apotheosis' enchanting path is a core part of progression.
Resource generation is done firstly through villagers, and then through specialised cows and chickens - meaning that you'll never be short of resources. Although you may at times be short of the right chicken.
Pacing
Cataclysm and Twilight Forest bosses are in the pack. Some of the Cataclysm bosses appear first, and are much harder than the Twilight ones. The pacing is otherwise good, although the very late game really amps up the resource requirements (a collection of chickens is practically essential by this point). I did get bogged down with Industrial Foregoing's laser fluid drill, which gathers resources essential for progression incredibly slowly. It might be that there was a way to speed this up that I missed (that wasn't just craft two dozen identical complex machines), but it did mark the point at which I burned out, just before the end of the final act.
Summary
A world of stone might not be for everyone, but I would still personally recommend the first half of the pack. The quest dungeons are well put together, the generic dungeons are very rewarding, and progression flies along. Seeing the World Engine upgrade is a satisfying conclusion to each questline. The later half of the pack is more for the factory-minded, requiring a command of an array of tech mods, with magic by that point having been thoroughly sidelined. That half - while not for me - was nonetheless very well done, and there's a lot of joy to be found there by those with that kind of head.
