Sagacity wrote: ↑04 Apr 2020, 00:45
The engine could simply assume that physics doesn't apply, until it should, for all statics, and then apply a flag to static that does suddenly need physics to be applied. Or something like that.
Sadly... the idea of 'static' doesn't really exist in Morrowind, all assets (the game) assumes that everything can be moved. As said elsewhere... the 3rd party hacks for Morrowind just assumes terrain stays the same when generating grass. That is okay up and until a new mod is installed or removed that changes the landscape. Woops...
OpenMW has to think of a more generic solution, we don't want to take shortcuts. Same things with how physics works. I guess we'll never be able to satisfy purists, but that also isn't our goal.
If a new mod changes the terrain and/or objects then the user simply regenerates the distant statics. People act as if that is a terrible boogeyman deal breaker when MGE users have been easily dealing with it for years now.
Jemolk wrote: ↑03 Apr 2020, 19:37
EDIT: Maybe a version of Fall in reverse, that tells the engine not to process physics on an actor, would work for everyone's purposes?
Implementing a flag is typically not very hard, but I guess making it easily accessible may be. Like, do you want that flag on every single object? Then you'd have to store it, which requires a change in the game file format. Otherwise you'd have to store them somewhere else, like some internal state where the engine has to look up first whether physics should be applied to an object, more like an override. You'd want to save that state though, so you could include it in the save file. I don't know, I feel the current solution is a lot cleaner. Or am I simply too uncreative?
If it has to be invoked by script, you could always just have it set by the script in each session independently. Of course, this raises the question of what order to process things in, and what happens in particular when you load a save file in an area where objects have this flag set. I mentioned Glow in the Dahrk, however, because it seems to have found a way to set the flag in the .nif file. The point of that is to allow interaction through sunrays, rather than collision precisely, but it looks by the name like it could be used to toggle collision generally (NiCollisionSwitch). That should be pretty workable, don't you think?
Mistahtokyo wrote: ↑04 Apr 2020, 15:22
If a new mod changes the terrain and/or objects then the user simply regenerates the distant statics. People act as if that is a terrible boogeyman deal breaker when MGE users have been easily dealing with it for years now.
I also still don't quite understand the hang up around the statics. I mean, I accept the point that 'nothing in MW is truly static'; however, it seems to be the case that some things are more static than others. A large boulder on a mountainside generally isn't intended to be interactive with the player or to move frequently, unlike a city gate or crate container. Same with terrain. In theory, it could be moved or changed at any time by a script or mod; however, surely it could be safely assumed that those events would be relatively rare? So, if it does get moved, is it not possible to just update whatever batched mesh you have for that cell at that time (even if it takes a couple of seconds)?
The original construction set has a separate tab for 'statics', so there is recognition in the data that some objects are 'almost static'. Can't those be treated differently by the engine than other, less static, objects?
Time4Tea wrote: ↑04 Apr 2020, 16:21
A large boulder on a mountainside generally isn't intended to be interactive with the player or to move frequently, unlike a city gate or crate container.
Funny you should say this -- the primary large static from vanilla Morrowind that I remember getting (re)moved via script is in fact a large boulder on a mountainside -- the rock at Khartag Point, to be precise. You are correct, however, that this doesn't happen often. There's Khartag Point, the Great House strongholds, Forst Frostmoth, and Mortrag Glacier, off the top of my head. Each of these is a one-time switch, as well (counting each stage of stronghold building as one time), with the exception that some mods repair Fort Frostmoth, meaning that switch happens twice. Then there are mods like Building Up Uvirith's Grave, which add buildings, but again, those buildings can't be demolished, so...maybe you're onto something? Like I said, changes to statics that should be visible from a distance do happen, and do happen via script; these are just the ones off the top of my head. I'm sure there's more. But you're right to say that they don't happen often. Mostly it's activators, rather than statics, that change, and there are very few large activators (I think only really the 'fence' part of the Ghostfence in vanilla, and that's just so it can be animated).
Time4Tea wrote: ↑04 Apr 2020, 16:21
A large boulder on a mountainside generally isn't intended to be interactive with the player or to move frequently, unlike a city gate or crate container.
Funny you should say this -- the primary large static from vanilla Morrowind that I remember getting (re)moved via script is in fact a large boulder on a mountainside -- the rock at Khartag Point, to be precise. You are correct, however, that this doesn't happen often. There's Khartag Point, the Great House strongholds, Forst Frostmoth, and Mortrag Glacier, off the top of my head. Each of these is a one-time switch, as well (counting each stage of stronghold building as one time), with the exception that some mods repair Fort Frostmoth, meaning that switch happens twice. Then there are mods like Building Up Uvirith's Grave, which add buildings, but again, those buildings can't be demolished, so...maybe you're onto something? Like I said, changes to statics that should be visible from a distance do happen, and do happen via script; these are just the ones off the top of my head. I'm sure there's more. But you're right to say that they don't happen often. Mostly it's activators, rather than statics, that change, and there are very few large activators (I think only really the 'fence' part of the Ghostfence in vanilla, and that's just so it can be animated).
Interestingly enough, the first thing that comes to mind for me are the dwemer ruins, especially their rotating doors - which are made up of two "statics" that are rotated every frame over a period of time by a script running on an activator. (Which also rotates)
Like the sphere doors from Arkngthand? Because honestly, that is essentially static when no one is there pulling the switch, so it also manages not to run afoul of this. Statics move around and do things, but not often enough to really cause a whole lot of problems. Though, as far as distant land type things go, simply having the actor processing range also apply to scripts, physics, damage, etc. would be plenty for me. I've grown to be rather happy with the view I get from an ECLD of 2.
But back to the topic of physics specifically -- it isn't statics that are the problem. It's actors. Having the ability to essentially use toggle collision as a targeted command on actors would also solve a lot of the problems we regularly run into. NoClipping mannequins would basically mean they wouldn't vibrate like crazy due to being partially embedded in an overlarge collision box. On sitting actors, it'd mean that they wouldn't have to be forcibly propelled into the air. On things that are supposed to be in containers, like fish tanks, it means they wouldn't be ejected into midair above the tank. It'd be less than ideal as a long-term solution, but it's not really intended as a serious solution to this specifically -- it's more a potential fallback for people to use whenever something goes seriously wrong. For example, did you know that levitating followers essentially NoClip, but only vertically, staying constantly at the same point on the z axis as you? Did you know this can result in them becoming extremely unwieldy, or getting trapped in the terrain? TCL as targeted would be useful for getting glitched followers out of tight spots long after a real solution to this problem is implemented. It'd just also allow us a workaround for these issues in the mean time. Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure it wouldn't solve the OP's problem, however.
The solution we go for for distant statics will include regenerating them on the fly when they get meddled with by the game. This isn't such a simple thing to do, though, and that's a big part of why it's not got done yet. If it didn't, then there'd be no disadvantage to doing what MGE XE does.
Time4Tea wrote: ↑04 Apr 2020, 16:21
Same with terrain...
Does this mean that the ground mesh could be manipulated? I could picture a mod that has earthquakes and the ground could move/change
I actually don't know if the terrain heightmap can be changed by a script during play (I was assuming it could). I agree it might allow for some cool effects
