CORE86

Industrial reactor engineering for Minecraft 1.20.1 (Forge)

About

CORE86 is a technical mod focused on reactor operations, steam power flow, and accident management. The design direction is "operator realism": you build physical reactor layouts, run tests from a console, manage control rods and coolant, and handle the consequences of mistakes.

Current development is centered on the RBMK-inspired reactor line:

• fuel / graphite / control / steam channel structure scanning
• dynamic rod drive and SCRAM behavior
• xenon poisoning and experiment mode
• staged meltdown with persistent invisible radiation zones

Features

• Multi-block reactor validation and channel mapping
• Unified reactor console with manual and grouped rod control
• AZ-5 / SCRAM logic with drive-state constraints
• Xenon poisoning telemetry in reactor UI
• Steam production pipeline for turbine-side integration
• Post-meltdown radiation model with dose accumulation
• Dosimeter item and debug command (/core86 radiation info)

Installation

1. Install Minecraft 1.20.1 and Forge 47.x.
2. Drop the built core86 jar into your mods folder.
3. Start the game and create a world.

Development

Requirements

• JDK 17
• Git

Setup

1. Clone the repository.
2. Open the project root in IntelliJ IDEA.
3. Run:

./gradlew genIntellijRuns

4. Use the generated Minecraft Client run configuration.

Build

./gradlew build

Built jars are generated in build/libs.

Reactor Steam Loop

• Reactor tech channels output steam_water_mixture, not clean steam.
• The steam separator keeps registry id steam_condenser for world compatibility.
• Separator sides are directional: back accepts mixture, up outputs clean steam, down outputs water.
• Turbines accept clean steam only.
• Water return is externalized through pipes and pumps; players build that loop.
• This phase has no separator multiblock and no rotational power requirement.

Asset Workflow

To keep art clean and avoid folder noise:

• Blockbench source files live in art/blockbench/
• Runtime block textures live in src/main/resources/assets/core86/textures/block/
• Runtime item textures live in src/main/resources/assets/core86/textures/item/

Suggested working pattern:

1. Keep editable sources in art/blockbench/blocks/... and art/blockbench/items/...
2. Export only final PNGs to src/main/resources/assets/core86/textures/...

Project Status

This project is actively iterating and balance values are still in flux. Expect frequent changes to:

• reactor thermal constants
• control rod timing
• experiment-mode risk curve
• radiation tuning

Contributing

Issues and pull requests are welcome. When reporting bugs, include:

• exact game version
• forge version
• mod list
• reproduction steps
• latest log snippet

Credits

• Built on Minecraft Forge MDK
• Gameplay direction inspired by large Create-adjacent engineering mods and simulation-first mod design