Alternative non-anvil detector block recipe

[Whisp]

I originally wanted to wait until after the big release to see the changes made, but since this can still take a while, I'm just going to put it out there, primarily to get the opinion of others on the suggestion.

I'd like a way to craft a detector block pre-steel. I have the habit of regularly starting new worlds, because I often mess with worldgen or mods that I then don't want to play anymore.
Therefore I played through the tech tree from beginning to end quite a few times. And lately it really bugged me that I can't automate stuff (primarily farming) before I hit steel. Without BDs it's no fun to build a timer for farming, if you don't want your pistons to trigger every few seconds.
So I end up most of the time just building a hemp farm with 40 to 100 plants and reeds just along any water streams I can find and then it takes ages until I'm motivated to build automated farms for it, because the harvested amount suffices quite a while if you don't want to build with wicker or rope blocks.

Because of that I think Steve should be able to build a DB earlier on. Of course it should be significantly more expensive. For example use two blocks of lapis, that would account for Steve not having adequate technologies at that time and therefore producing a lot of waste and make it expensive enough that players want to keep the DB production to the absolute necessary until they reach steel.
That way farms with bio clocks would have a use before players are able to build high efficient farms with the use of lenses. This also would have the positive side effect that DBs, which are just able to see if this single block is empty or not, are technologically a bit separated from buddy blocks, which are advanced enough to detect changes in any neighboring block.

tldr:
There should be a more expensive version of the DB craftable without an anvil to enable automation before reaching steel.

If the mentioned technologies should already be altered with the big update in any way, this suggestion can of course be closed.

[Itamarcu]

There should be a more expensive version of the DB craftable without an anvil to enable automation before reaching steel.

If the mentioned technologies should already be altered with the big update in any way, this suggestion can of course be closed.

That's a nice idea, but you should always suggest to solve a problem, instead of suggesting a way to solve a problem.
Well, in any case here's my opinion:

I think that this will give you the possibility to farm earlier using the DB, but I don't think that's a good solution. It would be better to have a device that just detects the growth in a different way, but this can just be summed up in the following suggestion: "I think that until you reach steel, you basically can't automate anything except for mob farms and millstones. I want to be able to auto-farm my stuff/plants earlier in the game".

[Stormweaver]

This is kinda disheartening.

The block detector and buddy block are improvements on a design, not the design themselves. For pre-steel automation, BUD pistons are cheap and effective, if more space consuming than their anvil-crafted counterparts.

[Whisp]

I think that this will give you the possibility to farm earlier using the DB, but I don't think that's a good solution. It would be better to have a device that just detects the growth in a different way.

Thought about that possibility, too, but I couldn't think of any kind of block/contraption that wouldn't be made completely redundant once the DB is available.

This is kinda disheartening.

The block detector and buddy block are improvements on a design, not the design themselves. For pre-steel automation, BUD pistons are cheap and effective, if more space consuming than their anvil-crafted counterparts.

Thanks for your view on that matter. I've never used classic BUD contraptions before, because my mind had them sorted in the "bug using" category. Since they apparently are generally accepted and provide the needed functionality, this issue is resolved as far as I'm concerned.

[Sarudak]

I was of the "it's a bug" opinion for vanilla BUDs. Kinda like the redstone to obsidian thing.

[Ambrason]

If you think the BUD pistons are in the "bug category" there are also regular old dispenser timers, they're not perfect but they're still cheap and more effective than harvesting by hand.