Westeroscraft Texture Pack Megathread

[lemonbear]

I'm wondering if less drastic tonal variation would work? Or perhaps variations in shade? I like the new textures, but I do agree it could use a bit more variation if we can figure out the right way to do it without it looking too busy. I remember Thamus was messing around a bit with some more overlay stuff with the terrain sets that might be interesting.

 

[Emoticone11]

Here's a texturepack with the old terrainsets for anyone who still wants to use them:

Dropbox

www.dropbox.com

 

[Thamus_Knoward]

In geology and related fields, a stratum (plural: strata) is a layer of sedimentary rock or soil, or igneous rock that was formed at the Earth's surface,[1] with internally consistent characteristics that distinguish it from other layers.

From the same article:
They may extend over hundreds of thousands of square kilometers of the Earth's surface. Strata are typically seen as bands of different colored or differently structured material exposed in cliffs, road cuts, quarries, and river banks. Individual bands may vary in thickness from a few millimeters to a kilometer or more. A band may represent a specific mode of deposition: river silt, beach sand, coal swamp, sand dune, lava bed, etc.

They may or may not follow the topography of the land depending on how erosion and geological processes have shaped a particular piece of rock. As such I think it is quite difficult to get strata (not striations) right by just using texture as opposed to through terraforming.

Below you see some experimental macro-strata (about a 3/4 of a block in size) extending over a repeated pattern of 16x16 blocks:


To me, it looks odd how regular it is, how it doesn't follow the terrain, and how it just looks like the surrounding rock in a different color up close. Additionally, just this overlay alone weighs a proud 4 Mb. I'm sure we could do more elaborate trickery with several repeat patterns at different heights of the mountain, but at that point, I think it is more feasible to simply add one or two variants of each terrain set and achieve a similar effect through terraforming and improved blending between terrain sets with overlay (like sand and dirt blend now for instance).

I've made the following principal rock textures with color subsets:

Igneous rock - specifically hardened magma:

Volcanic stone:

Terrainset Ocean:


Metamorphic Rock:

Eastern Islands:

Eyrie:

Iron Islands:


....

 

[Thamus_Knoward]

...
North:


Limestone - Karst-type:

Westerlands:

Reach:

River:


and Sandstone:

Arbor/Dorne:


RedMountains:


Stormlands:


The feedback I gathered is this:
- On large faces some of these are too monotone (particularly the limestone).
- Some textures lack depth/ contrast (again the limestone).
- It would be nice to have strata (eyrie).

So my suggestion is a combination of different approaches:
- Add vertical overlay CTM for limestone similar to the dark streaks you see in the photograph
- Add one alt color and pattern (with increased contrast/depth) variant for each set which you can sprinkle in with terraforming (emote would have to add new blocks for these)
- Add a smooth blending overlay between all terrainsets, their variants, and the corresponding pebble blocks which will essentially give you 4 terrainset blocks per set (current, variant, wet and dry pebbles)
- Optionally: We can then decide to add streaks or discoloration patterns on a large scale with overlay_repeat (similar to the Eyrie example above).

I believe that only the sandstone one really benefits from adding large scale streaks. I also really need to rework that texture as it is probably the worst one. Limestone imo only needs a variant with more drastic and more regular erosion. If the blending was better I'm sure you could just mix eastern, eyrie, and iron islands sets into some realistic-looking strata.

Maybe we could get an expert in geology to give us their input because ultimately a good understanding of what we try to do will give us the most realistic results

 

[Thamus_Knoward]

There is always the question of control the builders want, should, or need to have. I'm almost throwing my suggestions overboard again after I added an improved 16x16 pattern to the westerlands set:


Don't know the best way forward.

 

[lemonbear]

Can you show what this looks like at Banefort? I actually really like this new version of the Westerlands terrain set with the more subtle but still visible color variation. However, I can't quite tell if it was made brighter than the current version without a comparison shot.

 

[Thamus_Knoward]

without overlay:

with overlay:

The overlay brings variation in hue but takes away contrast.

 

[lemonbear]

I think it looks good, but would it be possible to try a slightly more cool-toned version of the overlay?

 

[ItsPabs]

That small hue shift looks really good to me. I think it would make the blocks more interesting when viewed up close as well. The old terrain blocks seemed interesting up close and made each rock feel unique, while I noticed that with the new terrain all the rocks feel the same when viewed on close inspection. This hue shift might help quite a bit with making each individual block stand out a little for smaller uses (like rocks on the side of a path, rather than a whole mountain full), However, I've not seen how this looks up close. It might be awkward with it all being the same texture, but it might fix what I felt was missing from these new terrain set that the old terrain set had.

Think about in real life how a specific type of rock might be effected visually by the dirt/dust/other rock types around it. You definitely get variations in color and hue in real life even with the same rock type, so I think this change makes sense.

 

[DutchGuard]

I wouldn't call myself a geologist, but I have studied geology at an academic level with relation to building stone.
It might help to have different textures for the main two types of stone, sandstone and limestone. If you're feeling ambitious, go for the UK's main building stones: portland stone, bath stone, slate, granite, carboniferous sandstone, red sandstone, and chalk (with added flint perhaps).

Honestly, it just can't be done well with a mass replacement of textures. In most cases, stone patterns are painterly, not like noise and not monolithic. In my opinion, the best possible results would be achieved by building stone formations by hand in-game, with streaking, strata, staining, fissuring, spalling, added using a pallette of similarly coloured blocks to create subtle colour changes. I am aware this is a difficult, if not impossible task.

One other suggestion that I thought of was to add some kind of clinging vegetation which could be added to vertical faces. This might help break up the monotony in a perfectly valid way. Genus Saxifraga would be a great place to start. The Banefort cliffs, even with the tasteful smattering of grass blocks, still looks quite bare to me.

 

[Enah]

So, is there a chance to get a more yellowy-pink reach terrainset like was there before? the cliffs around oldtown-bandallon are now... bland and clash immensely with the wetter parts below. I'd hate to have to drop my progress by 10-15% for the cliffs...

 

[Thamus_Knoward]

If you're feeling ambitious, go for the UK's main building stones: portland stone, bath stone, slate, granite, carboniferous sandstone, red sandstone, and chalk (with added flint perhaps).

I'm pretty sure that I can easily adapt the four principal rock textures I've created to match these. But if we go ahead and reinvent the way we do the terrainsets, and thus geology on our map, we will need a solid guide, maybe some smart scripts, and probably a team of editors to implement the changes.

Honestly, it just can't be done well with a mass replacement of textures. In most cases, stone patterns are painterly, not like noise and not monolithic. In my opinion, the best possible results would be achieved by building stone formations by hand in-game, with streaking, strata, staining, fissuring, spalling, added using a pallette of similarly coloured blocks to create subtle colour changes. I am aware this is a difficult, if not impossible task.

This is exactly what meant by my point about the level of control above, right now terrainsets fulfill a 'fire-and-forget' function where builders don't have to be geology experts to get something that looks somewhat right while those that know what they're doing or those that try to recreate a specific look have to bend over backwards to get there. I like the idea of making it super modular without trying to cram too much into one texture. That hue I added with 4 MB repeat_overlay CTM could be its own block then builders can decide themselves if they want a random pattern, striations, strata or whatever. It's a similar situation with plates that have food on them and clean plates, sure you can work with it, but is it the best way? I don't know. "Fire-and-forget" has its benefits too. It's nice not to have to worry too much about every rock formation, and in the grand scheme of how we do project management (i.e. builders being able to shape a certain chunk of terrain to their own specs), it is nice not to have to worry about a region looking jumbled because now there are 80 odd rock types to choose from.

 

[AerioOndos]

In some areas builders already make striations using mixtures of blocks, like the Eastern Island stripes in the Giants Lance and what Cash with light stone at Wullvillage3. I think we might end up with a mixture of fire and forget for less frequented areas and interesting features and hand done striations/strata where there is interest.

 

[Aslanio]

My only complaint are the green patches throughout the iron islands and eastern islands blocks, they've made some of my stuff look a bit silly when it's in-land or underground.

 

[Iwan]

I think we might end up with a mixture of fire and forget for less frequented areas and interesting features and hand done striations/strata where there is interest.

This would probably be the ideal approach. Find something hacky that makes the vast sprawls of untouched terraset terrain not look too bland, and make an effort to improve terrain at and around points of interest (potentially with additional 'blending' terrain blocks) by hand (or WE tool). The challenge here lies in both finding a feasible solution to large scale overlays that aren't too memory intensive, and in the immense workload of updating much of the terraforming, and if it's only to paint in rock variations.

 

[_Simbaa]

May I ask whos idea it was to outdate 80% of the server & texture pack by changing the terrain sets? right now, there is not a single block that blends well with them. Projects that had their gradients designed in a way to blend in with the old terrain set are now fucked over by it, Furthermore you might aswell mix in sack blocks into a river terrain set gradient and you wont spot any difference, (river terrain set now is basically a sandy texture framed by green/grey border) check out Felwood for a prime example of that, further pretty much every schemset that uses some sort of combination of slab blocks and terrain set is ruined now, such as ForestDetail which sees a wide use in The North (around WH) riverlands and such.

 

[_Simbaa]

Like the only way how to fix this mess I think is to either:
a) re-texture all the building block textures - cobblestones, bricks, stones to blend in with the new terrain set, while trying to make sure that it doesnt fuck up the projects even more... which in turn would outdate all the remaining textures since we are suddenly going hyper-realistic
b) revert the changes
c) redo the 80% of the server

 

[lemonbear]

I have no issue using arbor cobble to blend with the new Westerlands terrain set, and I need to do systematic replaces for all of the rock schemsets because they don't come in Westerlands. There are many such existing options to fix up terrain set use. However, we have repeatedly said over the years of our server existing to not treat terrain set blocks like normal cobble blocks and mix them with your stone mixes.

 

[Iwan]

May I ask whos idea it was to outdate 80% of the server & texture pack by changing the terrain sets?

You may. As far as I can remember, the terrain sets were a random mix of cobble and stone blocks since forever as a placeholder solution until we managed to get decent rock textures done. I'm certain that this has been the case since 2013 or so when we introduced them, and blending terrain sets and building blocks was discouraged for exactly that reason.

Like the only way how to fix this mess I think is to either:
a) re-texture all the building block textures - cobblestones, bricks, stones to blend in with the new terrain set, while trying to make sure that it doesnt fuck up the projects even more... which in turn would outdate all the remaining textures since we are suddenly going hyper-realistic
b) revert the changes
c) redo the 80% of the server

Man, I'm sure glad we're not being overly dramatic.
You had the opportunity to chime in with your apparently very strong opinions on the matter since January 10th. There were frequent snapshots of texture development and you can see lots of your concerns discussed in the following posts.

In most cases, stone patterns are painterly, not like noise and not monolithic. In my opinion, the best possible results would be achieved by building stone formations by hand in-game, with streaking, strata, staining, fissuring, spalling, added using a pallette of similarly coloured blocks to create subtle colour changes.

Noise is not always random. You can definitely achieve an at least pleasing result or a base for manual (=WE) improvement, by using clever noise functions. We can run volumetric noise like a 3D perlin on terrain set blocks ingame with a single WE command. Tweaking the parameters is the tricky part. I agree that we should consider adding additional blocks to show subtle colour changes and highlights.

 

[Emoticone11]

May I ask whos idea it was to outdate 80% of the server & texture pack by changing the terrain sets? right now, there is not a single block that blends well with them. Projects that had their gradients designed in a way to blend in with the old terrain set are now fucked over by it, Furthermore you might aswell mix in sack blocks into a river terrain set gradient and you wont spot any difference, (river terrain set now is basically a sandy texture framed by green/grey border) check out Felwood for a prime example of that, further pretty much every schemset that uses some sort of combination of slab blocks and terrain set is ruined now, such as ForestDetail which sees a wide use in The North (around WH) riverlands and such.

Hi Simb,

I'm not sure what you mean by "outdate" here. The change to the terrainset texture was made automatically & retroactively to the entire map, so it cannot have outdated anything in the usual sense of the word. Do you perhaps mean instead that you think it made 80% of the server look worse, e.g. by not blending stylistically with the existing brick blocks?

Like I've mentioned previously in this thread, the new textures are still being improved upon in the future. As such, I welcome any constructive feedback, but what you've written here is simply not useful. What I'm trying to glean from your post is that (a) you don't like the border on the river terrainset texture, and (b) don't like the smoothness of the river terrainset textures. I definitely agree with the former looking at Felwood, and I think having a slightly more muted texture w/ lower contrast would help make it more similar to the old terrainset tiles as well. If you (and anyone else who notices the new terrainsets don't look right in some areas) could just say specific things like this explicitly, it would be much more helpful.

With regards to the cobble slab blocks used with terrainsets (e.g. in rock schemsets), I agree that this is a problem - but looking at it now with the old terrainset, it was pretty clearly always a problem. Look at this image, for instance. The slab blocks clearly stick out; we just deemed the noise to be low enough to be acceptable. I think this is still the case with the new terrainset, but what we really should have done a long time ago is add stair/slab/wall/fence blocks for the terrainsets. I aim to redress this in the near future.

I'm not sure why people always jump to "wipe everything and and redo it!" as a solution to things getting deprecated by texture changes. There's a team of people right now that's already made significant headway on replacing the entire northern forests with the snowy spruce block. We can certainly update rock schemsets in existing projects with the aforementioned terrainset variants (once added) using a WE script. All of this is far more trivial than redoing an entire project.

I've uploaded a texture pack with the old versions of all of the terrainsets linked earlier in this thread (also here for your convenience). You're free to use that if you do not find the current iteration of the new terrainsets to be up to your standards.