Minecraft Mod & Modpack Reviews

This mod certainly feels like someone adding a bunch of things into Tinker's Construct that they thought would be cool, but didn't have the technical experience to implement those ideas fully. The idea of adding Domains (not entirely explained what they are, but I believe are a field around the player that does different things to enemies inside of it) to your gear is something that seems like an interesting idea as a more fantastical addition to Tinker's Construct and adding unique Domains to the Minecraft bosses could've been really cool to see, and I will say that the Warden's Domain was pretty cool. However, I think this mod suffers the most from not having a clear vision with the Domains, items, and bosses.
The Domains are added like other enchantments would in Tinker's Construct, though they require getting something called an Aura Forma to add to your gear first. The process to make it is really tedious since the Forma can only be used to make the Aura Forma and all of the crafting ingredients that are used to make it come from mob drops (like Iron Golems) and don't have alternative uses outside of it. That's not to mention that some of the Domains feel random in ways that almost feel like jokes, if not for the insane cost to even get to experience the "joke".
Some of the items are also questionable. The mod adds an item that you get when you get to low health for the first time that protects(?) you briefly. It has no use other than to be crafted into the "Sacred Weapon" that immediately out-damages anything you can make in Tinker's Construct significantly. Even though it's difficult to craft (2 netherite blocks are required), there no longer becomes any reason to chase other weapons in Tinker's Construct because it would immediately become irrelevant once you get the Sacred Weapon. It would've honestly been a really cool addition if you have to find the relic and them go through several stages across both the smeltery and foundry, such as making a large array of different weapon parts made from different materials, that could've made it a fun goal to chase without immediately invalidating everything.
My biggest complaint is how bosses were changed, primarily the Wither and Ender Dragon. The Wither was effectively given a "random bs go!" effect where it constantly summons Wither Skeletons riding Skeleton Horses with full mending Netherite Armor and Sharpness 5 Netherite Swords, along with Wither Skeletons with Power 5 bows. It can be upwards of 10 of each spawning every few seconds and it becomes significantly more annoying than anything. The only solace is that the drop rate for the gear from the Wither Skeletons is quite high, which means you can quickly get entire full sets of mending Netherite gear relatively easily (or melt down for even more Netherite and diamonds in a Foundry). Having the Wither Skeletons have worse gear but be a transition period between the Wither's flying phase and grounded phase could've made it more balanced and add something new to the Wither. The changes to the Ender Dragon were the most, in my opinion. The Ender Dragon was given around 1000 hp (according to Jade) with high resistance and requiring the crystals to be destroyed before you can do damage at all, making the fight a complete slog to get through... if you do it normally. For some reason, the Ender Dragon was made extremely weak to bed explosions (possibly one-shotting or two-shotting), which makes the change to its hp sort of baffling because the Ender Dragon is now both extremely time-consuming to kill and immensely trivial. Just having the change to the crystals would've been a nice addition, along with maybe a unique attack to make the fight feel fresh while not making it painful to get through.
I definitely feel like if the mod developer went back and put in more focus on the Domains rather than some of the more random inclusions, this could be a fresh way to change up Tinker's Construct, but the general lack of focus on its main selling point, making the player-obtainable Domains lackluster, and changing bosses in ways that don't feel needed or satisfying very much soured my taste for this mod.

I added this into a kitchen sink modpack I made for myself that used Vampirism and Werewolves so I figured this would've been a good addition. I will say that it pretty easily integrated itself with Tinker's Construct and even added the new materials to world drops. I also do like the aesthetics and personality with the different alloys that can be made, along with the other additions that made the usual weapons in Vampirism feel more interesting.
One of the main issues with the mod itself in gameplay was that the new alloys and weapons felt kinda overpowered. I managed to find a cutlass in an Overworld chest that used the Vampire Hunter exclusive alloy for the blade, with completely outclassed the damage my current weapons could output. The flavor text for the buffs for each alloy, while adding a lot of character, didn't show what they actually did, so they felt like filler.
However, this issue is completely overshadowed by the fact that the mod requires another mod (Tinker's Domain) made by the author that's not disclosed on the mod page and, without it, prevents the game from starting. It also doesn't help that the error that's given telling you to download the other mod only gives the file name of the mod, not its actual name, which makes it more difficult to find. It also doesn't help that the dependency (Tinker's Domain) heavily weighs down this mod with some of the baffling changes it makes to bosses and additions that do not feel cohesive at all.

ZenithX is a poorly made clone of Essential.

It allows you connect to another persons computer by routing through its servers rather than doing port forwarding. Unlike Essential, this mod has no privacy policy

The vibecoded UI (that clearly copies Essential) frequently bugs out when inviting players forcing you to back out and try again, and networking performance breaks down if you have more than 1 player. (Though again, who knows what they do with your data when you give it to them)

The mod also advertises being open source but displays no source code

At least the Essential team paid workers to make their data extraction mod rather than completely relaying on AI.

Use E4MC for a better, safer alternative.

what can I say that hasn't been said? this is made with love, it is so meticulously put together with every detail being fine tuned. I recommend the cobble version if you aren't entirely opposed, but this one is fantastic.

I would enjoy this modpack more, but the modpack is too heavy. Even though, I spent a lot of time and built so many structures. Apotheosis and apothic enchanting make this pack unique, I would really like to see more great packs with apothic enchanting. One of my biggest issues with this pack is create mod. It would even help somehow in progress, but I've seen too many modpacks with this mod and it makes me sick.

I really don't like skyblocks, but that one is something else. It was my first modpack to play and I feel so nostalgic about it, that's why my rating is so high I think, but that is really great way to start with mods and modpacks.

Giving this one a score is hard because I did like it... for a bit.

I chose a fire fighter as my first build, and then switched to an evocation mage. Problem was, the mage gameplay got pretty stale. I was cleaving through bosses easily and the game had basically become a boss rush. I had spell abilities that made it so my spells froze bosses so I just stood there spamming Tiro Burst and other evocation spells and then killing them. To make it more difficult, I activated the cursed ring or whatever it's called.

And instantly sapped all the fun I had from the modpack.

Bosses became insane damage sponges. Often requiring me to cycle through all my big damaging high mana cost spells to kill just their ads. Dungeons became utterly infuriating to explore because the individual mobs dealt huge amounts of damage and had bonkers health. Oh, and fall damage because excessively lethal, too.

Normally I would have just gone back down to the intended difficulty, but you literally can't. The ring is unequipable and permanently modifies your game. Now, with apotheosis in the pack, it probably wouldn't be that difficult to modify yourself in a way to brute force yourself through the modpack. Problem with that is apotheosis does not benefit the magic mod in this pack in really any way. So I would have to switch my entire build away from magic to beat this modpack, and that is made infuriating by... Create!

Why the hell is Create in this modpack? Why the hell is it necessary for material progression? You made an RPG modpack and then had CREATE be necessary? I wouldn't be as mad if the mechanics were built around full scale automation, but they aren't! 1. You can bypass basically all of Create's own progression using the coin shop. 2. None of the materials are needed in high enough quantities to necessitate any scaled automation. 3. Who wants to build factories in an RPG modpack?

Create means that while switching my skills is as easy as right clicking an item, switching my build is an excercise in futility because I would have to craft so much stuff, and level the new gear I just made, or transfer the levels from my previous gear, which requires orbs that are dubiously hard to get.

But the most major sin of the modpack isn't any of that. I could excuse most of that. But it's instead the paid content. Paid content in a minecraft mod? Who the hell do you think you are?

I'm working on a more detailed review of RLCraft for another platform, but I'll leave some cliffnotes here.

• RLCraft is really weird. Like I've played a lot of modpacks for a lot of years, and I've really played nothing like it. This is also viewable from the fact that "RLCraft" is now its own mod genre on the various platforms.
• It is frustrating. For different reasons at different stages of the game. The early game you are extremely vulnerable, mostly directionless, and underleveled to use a lot of gear. The midgame you are spending a lot of time nigh-invincible grinding for XP for god enchants for endgame. The endgame you are hoping your build can hold its own against the Lycanite's bosses because if it doesn't, you're just gonna have to make the whole thing again.
• Heat/Cold is infuriating, oftentimes doesn't make sense, and can be entirely negated with two items.
• Lycanite's is Lycanite's

These are all negatives, but I actually really like RLCraft. It just has a lot of questionable design decisions made by someone who clearly didn't realize their jokey modpack made for friends would become one of the biggest piece of Minecraft media on the planet. The fact of the matter is that if you play RLCraft, and you like it, there are... basically no other modpacks like it. Shivaxi genuinely made a novel modpack based on a kitchen sink framing with internalized, non-quest-based, progression (the questbook doesn't count, it's basically just a compilation of different items from all the different mods with useless rewards). I hope one day to discover a modpack that builds upon the frame that is RLCraft into something truly good.

But it really doesn't deserve all the hate it gets. And it definitely doesn't deserve all the praise it gets. If you're like me and you spent most of your modded Minecraft time hating this modpack, give it a shot yourself. You might be surprised at what your opinion metastabilizes into.

The big kahuna itself. Honestly, I just can't get past it. I tried it a long time ago and made it to steam and then quit immediately. Then I tried it again and made it to MV and then quit again. Honestly my biggest gripe with it is the inventory management. I'm normally alright with some grind: I put serious hours into RLCraft and Pyanodons, and the grind here wouldn't be so bad if I had the means to actually automate it, but to automate it without AE2 requires such a ridiculous amount of materials (mostly steel) that I spent multiple days trying to automate just LV circuits (look, I got to 300 hours in a Pyanodons save in Factorio, beat bobs+angels, and beat other modpacks as well. I'm alright with grindy automation normally) and that wasn't from not understanding how the automation works, it was just from the sheer resource gathering and crafting for all the assemblers, pipes, covers, and other various machines. It just wasn't fun, and I don't see myself sticking around until I finally can get to AE2. Hell, I'd settle for just having autocrafting gated off, just... give me a bigger inventory. Diamond chests weren't enough: I had like 12 of them filled up before I quit, not to mention the 10s of drawers also fulls of materials I couldn't even use.

The depth is insane, the optimization is insane. The sheer breadth of content is awe-inspiring. But ******* if there isn't a 10 mile high wall between me and it. Just give me AE2 for the love of god.

I'm not dropping it yet, I imagine I'll come back to it and continue ramming my head against my automation projects, but for now, I'm going to try some modpacks I know are actually completable within a year, and won't take me 300 more hours to unlock the one mod that would make it bearable to play.

I had a lot of fun with E2E. It's implementation of just about every mod was amazing across the board, and I had a decent throughline until the end.

...There are a few problems though, and they pretty much all manifest around the late mid-game/early endgame.

• Blood magic never wants to play nice with AE2. I'm kinda a blood magic hater in general, it's a mod that is exceedingly tedious until you get one mechanic (the well of suffering) and then becomes a waiting simulator. But I never got it automated beyond just having AE2 put stuff in a chest next to the object I needed to use, and manually doing it. The documentation in game is exceedingly poor and unfinished, and most of the wikis online are for other versions. So I just made all the endgame stuff myself with it.
• If you build most of your infrastructure using mekanism pipes, it will destroy your save, and likely force you into a value proposition between reworking your entire infrastructure or dealing with the lag. Mekanism pipes are the easiest to use but absolutely destroy your tickrate. Ideally, you want to do as much through AE2 as possible, but you might not even realize that before it's far too late.
• Industrial foregoing also suffers from the aforementioned problem, but also is the source of some critical infrastructure such as mob grinders and wither builders, that you can't really sideline.
• ... To add even more to the tickrate problem, there are no tickrate-friendly methods of generating enough mana to satisfy a midgame botania setup. It seems as though the mod is encouraging you to get through to mystical agriculture as fast as possible in order to make it so you can do terrasteel and manasteel without sucking up valuable mana. Mana generation itself isn't that hard, though.