In the last update, (1/22/24), they added 2 new devices:
The crafting table and the crafting recipe.
How it’s used
These two devices don’t work alone. The crafting table can’t output any signals without the crafting recipe, which is useless without a crafting table. What it does, it opens a menu on the right side of the screen, which shows a bunch of tabs. These tabs act like vending machines, and let you trade an item (or two) for another item. These tabs are shown only if they are in the same crafting group as the table
What you might think It could be used for
The first thing I thought of when seeing it in the changelogs was a fast travel menu, but that can’t be done using crafting tables. the problem is that you can only detect if ANY item is crafted, not just one specific one. Another problem is that YOU CAN’T OPEN IT USING A WIRE. It does not let you open it from afar, nor close it forcefully.
At the time of the writing, you could not detect an individual recipe, but now you can.
Technical gimkit probably won’t be able to use it either, as all of its actions HAS TO BE DONE
A PLAYER, meaning:
-You can’t force a craft, or make a thing that deactivates requires two resources at the same time
How it’s still very good
I’m roasting the new devices too much. So here a few things it’s REALLY good at
making compact shops
Sell permits (need to buy a permit to sell stuff)
Making item trades take time (for realism)
Other ideas in comments
Conclusion of me roasting the new devices
The new devices aren’t as useful as they seemed and are very niche(?)
I think these are interesting facts. In my opinion, I don’t really care for the new crafting table device or recipes. I just don’t have a use for them in my games but I bet there are many others who really needed this. It’s mainly just a matter or opinion because some people may think that these features are useless and some may think it’s awesome and extremly helpful. Regardless, I believe sharing our opinions is nice to come up with pros and cons that support both opinions.
Pros and cons, agreeing with MaxmImm.
I believe crafting table is amazing, as it helps simplify the building and game experience, but you can remake the crafting table with checkers, triggers, and so on, so a technical player can remake the features, but not the device itself.
But just an opinion, I think it’s really cool and useful! (For me at least.)
To be fair, to solve the first problem with a fast transit system, just use CPT. The second is mostly just annoying, you could still have transport stations, which would be cool.
I see a lot of opinionated posts, like @Shdwy with how much he likes counters and how much he hates repeaters. He brings up reasons, wich is what i did.
I think part of it is that some of the other posts with opinions provide examples of what to do otherwise as well as more details on how the device works
while this guide mainly just points out the flaws of the crafting table