Laser setup (basic)

Introduction

This is the basic tutorial on how to setup a laser cannon without amplification nor programming. We'll cover the parameters involved, along with Laser Camera, Laser Medium and Monitor blocks.

Pre-requisites

You need at least:

• one Laser Camera with at least one Laser medium,
• one monitor,
• a power source (RF or EU based),
• one temporary computer (ComputerCraft or OpenComputers), only used during build.

Beam frequency

Each laser has an adjustable beam frequency from 1 to 65000, included. Default beam frequency is 0, which is invalid. Be aware, that 1420 is a special beam frequency that will be covered in the Advanced tutorial.

Depending on its frequency, the beam color will change. More importantly, when two Laser or Laser Camera share the same frequency, the receiving block will absorb most of the beam energy, effectively boosting its own laser beam (see laser boosting in Advanced tutorial).

Video channel

Refer to Camera and Monitor to learn the basics on video channel.

Building

1- Laser Camera

Place the Laser Camera block where you want your laser beam to fire from. When firing, the laser beam will stop at any hard block encountered, so any block in the way will reduce your targeting spread.

A Laser Camera is both a Laser and a Camera, hence it has both a Beam frequency and a Video channel to be setup with it. In our case, we'll use Beam frequency 45000 and Video Channel 123.

2- Temporary computer for Laser

To configure the Laser Camera, we'll temporarily place a Computer right under it.

Right click the computer to open it's console.

Open the LUA interpreter by typing the following command:

lua

To access the Laser Camera, we need to open its proxy (OpenComputers) or wrap it (ComputerCraft). Type the command related to your computer:

-- for ComputerCraft
laserCamera = peripheral.wrap("top")

-- for OpenComputers
laserCamera = component.warpDriveLaser

Then we setup the Beam frequency and Video channel through the API:

laserCamera.beamFrequency(45000)
laserCamera.videoChannel(123)

Right click the Laser Camera with an empty hand to confirm its setup.

You may now dismount that Computer.

3- Laser medium

Laser beam energy is built through laser medium. You need at least one to output a beam. The more you add, the greater the beam energy will be.

All laser mediums shall be placed on a single line with the Laser Camera. Ideally, you put them on the backside of the output face you've chosen.

Each laser medium contains a gaz that'll be ionized with an equivalent of up to 100kEU. Whenever a beam is shot, the whole ionization is transferred, so you'll have to recharge the medium before the next shot.

4- Power connection

Each Laser Medium needs a power connection. Both RF and EU are supported. The Laser Camera doesn't require power connection.

Your raw power production directly influence your fire rate at full power: a 512EU/t reactor will take almost 10 seconds to fully recharge a single laser medium. You can shoot before those 10 seconds, but the beam energy will be reduced accordingly.

5- Monitor

When attached to a Laser Camera, the monitor becomes a targeting station: you can orient and trigger the laser beam emission from it.

To link our monitor with our Laser Camera, we need to set its Video Channel to same value: 123.

6- Temporary computer for Monitor

To configure the Monitor, we'll temporarily place a Computer right under it.

Right click the computer to open it's console.

Open the LUA interpreter by typing the following command:

lua

To access the Monitor, we need to open its proxy (OpenComputers) or wrap it (ComputerCraft). Type the command related to your computer:

-- for ComputerCraft
monitor = peripheral.wrap("top")

-- for OpenComputers
monitor = component.wrapDriveMonitor

Then we setup the Video channel through the API:

monitor.videoChannel(123)

Right click the Monitor with an empty hand to confirm its setup.

You may now dismount that Computer.

Usage

Once built, you can right click the Monitor with an empty hand to pick a target.

Your in-game GUI will change to a view at the Laser Camera location. From there, you can:

• move your mouse around to select a target
• use left click to cycle zoom level
• press space to shoot!
• use right click to exit the monitor

Warning: if your in creative, left click will break the monitor!

Hints

• read carefully what's above, there's a lot of hints in there :)
• laser shot is slightly delayed so it can be boosted (see advanced setup)