Colony ME Access is a MineColonies + Applied Energistics 2 integration and quality-of-life addon designed to make managing larger colonies less tedious.
The goal of the mod is to improve the connection between your colony, its builders/citizens, and your ME network while also reducing some of the repetitive setup involved with MineColonies crafting workers.
This is currently an early release and will continue to receive additional MineColonies-focused features over time.
Connect your MineColonies colony with an Applied Energistics 2 network through the Colony ME Access system.
The interface provides ME connection information including:
The linked colony can then interact with the connected ME system through Colony ME Access features.
Place the ME Colony Bridge directly next to your MineColonies Warehouse.
The bridge needs to be adjacent to the Warehouse so Colony ME Access can expose items from your AE2 network to the colony's request system.
You do not need to run ME cables from your AE2 network all the way to the Warehouse.
Take an ME Linker and use it to connect the bridge to your Applied Energistics 2 network.
Once connected, the bridge can access the storage and crafting capabilities of that ME network.
The Colony Clipboard is used to manage the bridge and your builders.
A single Clipboard can store up to 10 linked builders.
After linking the bridge and builders, hold the Colony Clipboard and right-click normally to open the Colony ME Access interface.
Select a builder on the left side of the interface to view their current missing resources.
Resources can have several available actions depending on their current state:
Once crafted items become available, they can be sent to the builder.
Some MineColonies structures require specifically configured Domum Ornamentum blocks.
When the interface displays Pattern:
The Clipboard can hold up to 18 Domum Ornamentum patterns.
The Limit field controls how much of a particular item Colony ME Access is allowed to send.
Enter a number and press Enter to save it.
For example:
64 - allows up to 64 of that item500 - allows up to 5000 - unlimitedThis can be useful if you want to prevent your colony from draining important materials from your ME system.
The top of the Clipboard interface shows the current ME connection state:
A typical setup looks like:
AE2 Network
↓
ME Linker
↓
ME Colony Bridge
↓
MineColonies Warehouse
Colony Clipboard
├── ME Colony Bridge
├── Builder's Hut 1
├── Builder's Hut 2
├── Builder's Hut 3
└── ...up to 10 BuildersView your colony's builders directly through the Colony ME Access interface.
The GUI can display:
This gives you a centralized way to see what your builders are waiting for without repeatedly running between builder huts.
Colony requests can be fulfilled using items available from the connected AE2 network.
The interface distinguishes between resources that can simply be sent and resources that would need to be crafted.
This is intended to make AE2 function as a much more useful storage system for large MineColonies settlements rather than requiring constant manual movement of items between storage systems.
Colony ME Access can automatically teach compatible recipes to MineColonies crafting workers.
Instead of manually entering huge numbers of recipes into every crafting hut, the mod analyzes recipes that the worker is actually capable of producing and progressively unlocks them as the building is upgraded.
The system follows building progression roughly like this:
Level 1
Level 2
Level 3
Level 4
Level 5
At Level 5, the automatic recipe system is designed to allow the worker access to all compatible recipes instead of being restricted by the normal learned-recipe limit.
Recipes that MineColonies does not consider compatible with that profession are not automatically added.
The system also respects recipes that have been explicitly denied.
When enabled, colonies are periodically checked for:
Recipe updates occur automatically approximately every 30 seconds.
Automatic recipe management is disabled by default, so installing the mod will not immediately modify the recipes of every colony.
Automatic recipe learning can be controlled with:
/colonymeaccess autorecipes on
Enables automatic recipe management for the colony.
/colonymeaccess autorecipes off
Disables further automatic recipe updates.
Already learned recipes are not removed simply by disabling the feature.
/colonymeaccess autorecipes status
Shows whether automatic recipe management is currently enabled.
Management permissions are required to change these settings.
The Colony ME Access interface also includes several useful colony/building controls such as:
These are intended to reduce the amount of menu hopping required while managing a large colony.
Mod Version: 0.2.0
Minecraft: 1.21.1
Mod Loader: NeoForge
Colony ME Access is designed for use alongside:
Compatibility with additional versions or heavily modified MineColonies/AE2 installations is not guaranteed unless specifically listed on the download.
This mod is still in active development.
The current release focuses primarily on:
More features may be added as development continues.
Bug reports and feedback are welcome, especially for unusual MineColonies crafting recipes, modded recipes, or interactions with large colonies.
Important: This mod was developed primarily with the assistance of AI.
A significant portion of the programming, debugging, and implementation was generated or assisted by AI tools based on the features and behavior I wanted the mod to have. I directed the development, tested the mod in-game, compiled and debugged builds, and iterated on the functionality, but I want to be transparent that most of the code itself was produced with AI assistance.
Because of this, there may be unusual bugs, compatibility issues, inefficient code, or edge cases that have not yet been discovered.
Please report any problems you encounter so they can be investigated and improved in future versions.
This mod is an independent addon and is not affiliated with or officially supported by the developers of MineColonies or Applied Energistics 2.
