So me and my friends have been playing with the chutes. I do love how they are useful while still remaining realistically grounded. However, I find that they're kinda clunky to work with.
In particular:
There's too many different items you have to keep in your inventory (ie, elbow, 3-way, cross, etc)
Once you craft a section type, you're kinda stuck
It's difficult to lay out a pattern you want while juggling the different types of sections
I do understand that a lot of this is an intentional part of the difficulty, but I think there's a really slick rework you could implement that would solve these issues while increasing realism
Keep the "chute sections" item, but with some changes
Remove solder from the recipe
Rename to "Unsoldered Chute" (or similar)
Optionally, add a sheet-metal bending tool of some kind, and use that instead of a hammer
Instead of crafting the elbow, 3-way, cross chutes, etc, let the player directly place down chute section
In particular, make the chutes automatically connect to each other for ease of use. I'm imagining how redstone works in Minecraft, or how pipes work in most Minecraft modpacks
I know it kinda feels gamey, but it really makes it way easier to work with, and I'm sure there's animations or block models that can make it make sense
Finally, don't let the chutes work when you first place them.
Since they are "Unsoldered", the chutes will let items fall through if you try to use them
Instead, you have to go over the chutes with a torch/candle/soldering-iron + solder in your hands to complete them
Once they're all soldered, then you're good to go
And finally finally, if the user breaks the chutes, drop the Unsoldered Chute sections
In particular, this means that if you've already soldered, you lose the solder you used for that section
Or in other words, the idea is that you first bend the sheet metal into a round shape, then lay it out, and then solder it all in place. I think this system has a few benefits:
It's much easier to manage, there's really a couple items you have to manage at any given time
You can mess around and experiment with layouts without any fear of messing things up
But there's still some risk+commitment due to the solder not being refunded
And it's arguably more realistic due to needing to solder the chutes in place.
