Terrain Tunneling/Arching

[Greendogo]

Couldn't you just have multiple heightmaps, each addressing "texels" that would otherwise overlap with the other heightmaps? The vast majority of the other heightmaps would be empty because there'd be no overlapping terrain (such as caves).

[silentthief]

Why we can't just define any empty space in terrain and handle it correctly (creating mesh for the space, texturing, modyfining terrain mesh to make a "hole")? Is this super complicated?

no, its not. the suggestions here are all for passing on more difficulty to the devs, because compared to 3D mesh editing/generation and conversion to NIF, editing terrain was simple. I believe it is not necessary to try a whole new approach to handling terrain, but I understand the frustration with how un-user-friendly 3D programs like blender can be.

ST

[Ace (SWE)]

Something like how the old engine Torque3D does this could also be used, in T3D if you want a hole in the terrain then you generally have two different options available for you;
Either you can remove one chunk of terrain, literally leaving a hole there in the heightmap.
Or you can create an interior model and sink it into the terrain, as terrain won't render/collide inside interiors.

Maybe one of those could be a possibility in the future, since they don't depend on completely changing the terrain system. All the first one would need is a flag for if a chunk of terrain should be loaded or not, while the second one would use a flag for if a static cuts through terrain and then some math for skipping the terrain inside it.

Though this would mean you'd have to manually model your tunnels and arches.

[Rhys]

I think it would be best leave this to custom 3d meshes made in blender/3dsmax. Terrain features like voxel terrain always look like crap because the detail level is not there and terrain editors that allow this are always very fiddly, getting something specific is very hard.

I would prefer to see heightmap terrain mesh double in density or more (subdivided), then introduce tools like erosion and etc.

[Markelius]

Based on reading this thread, I think defining "holes" in the terrain and/or being able to place heightmap grid objects would probably be the best idea. While voxel based terrain is cool, it's probably not the most ideal for use in a game like Morrowind and would probably be harder to implement. Having heightmap grid objects and being able to define holes in the terrain however would allow modders to create floating terrain or subterranean terrain that exists within the exterior world. As Ace said modders would still have to manually model arches and caves, but being able to create the holes in the terrain would make things like caves under a mountain much easier to create.

[PeterBitt]

I have another idea:
Would it be possible to export the world mesh of a single cell into a nif file, edit it and import it back to the game?
The idea would be to have terrain fully created by hand, improving on all the downsides that heightmap terrain has.
Its propably not that easy as the cells need to be merged together somehow.

I am talking about not having height map terrain at all, but completely model the terrain in a 3d application. Could the engine use that properly?

Examples for games with hand crafted terrain:
GTA 5 http://www.teachtechstuff.com/wp-conten ... _large.jpg
GTA 5 http://www.gameranx.com/img/13-Apr/gta-5-parachute.jpeg
Gothic 3 http://www.madvulture.de/G3AEE/Gothic3F ... 211_01.jpg
Gothic 2 (2001) http://images.derstandard.at/2013/01/15 ... 944689.jpg

[Biont]

Wouldn't that be a nightmare for mod support, bringing back something we all love: Re-creating distant land?

I'd probably prefer if OpenCS allowed for more sophisticated terrain sculpting instead of moving the terrain entirely into 3d modeling applications.

Also, it would be very difficult to handle a "Mega Mesh" in the engine. Look up some details about Rage/id tech 6, since that's probably where you are going.

[silentthief]

I have another idea:
Would it be possible to export the world mesh of a single cell into a nif file, edit it and import it back to the game?

Its already possible to do this, using the Morrowind utility, CellToNIF (ask on beth forum, fliggerty, or google it, you'll find it). This program works for any land, whether its from vanilla esm or user created content.

I have another idea:
Would it be possible to export the world mesh...to have terrain fully created by hand...

If you make a world map using NIFs instead of the terrain, you'll probably have a huge lag/FPS hit because more NIFs = more resources than land heightmap...

ST

[Tarius]

I have another idea:
Would it be possible to export the world mesh of a single cell into a nif file, edit it and import it back to the game?

Its already possible to do this, using the Morrowind utility, CellToNIF (ask on beth forum, fliggerty, or google it, you'll find it). This program works for any land, whether its from vanilla esm or user created content.

I have another idea:
Would it be possible to export the world mesh...to have terrain fully created by hand...

If you make a world map using NIFs instead of the terrain, you'll probably have a huge lag/FPS hit because more NIFs = more resources than land heightmap...

ST

Thats not nesessarily true.

[wheybags]

yeah, theoretically , one the hwightmap is loaded into memory, it should be pretty much exactly the same.
I do think it's a bad idea though, would kill landmass modding