xLODGen - Terrain LOD beta 128 for FNV, FO3, FO4, FO4VR, TES5, SSE, TES5VR, ENDERAL, ENDERALSE

[kranazoli]

Hi,

 

If I find something like that:

 

 

Could it be because, when I generated xLODGEN this mod wasn't active?

So, with xLODGEN again, maybe can fix issue like that?

(or not, this is a mod issue)

 

That's an old mod:

 

Heljarchen Hall Mine and Farm

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/275?tab=posts&BH=5

 

 

Thank You!

[sheson]

Hi,

 

If I find something like that:

 

 

Could it be because, when I generated xLODGEN this mod wasn't active?

So, with xLODGEN again, maybe can fix issue like that?

(or not, this is a mod issue)

 

That's an old mod:

 

Heljarchen Hall Mine and Farm

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/275?tab=posts&BH=5

 

 

Thank You!

LOD only matches the load order it was generated for. If you add or remove mods that alter anything related to terrain, objects or tree and you have visual issues, generated LOD for the current load order.

 

The screenshot looks like it shows loaded cells and not LOD.

[kranazoli]

LOD only matches the load order it was generated for. If you add or remove mods that alter anything related to terrain, objects or tree and you have visual issues, generated LOD for the current load order.

 

The screenshot looks like it shows loaded cells and not LOD.

Okay, Thank You Sheson.

I posted at the mod topic, but I guess it is an abandondedmod. (but minor issue)

 

So, Thanks!

[Mebantiza]

Hello. Using this (SSE) to update a Classic World space. Just getting started with it and have a couple questions.

 

I started more or less @ default 512, and, the coasts and water looked like .....bad. I upped the resolution of everything except lod4 to 1024 (Dx1). This resulted in smoother looking coastlines, not great , but a lot better. Interior water still look like shapless, ill-defined blobs however. What sort of settings will take to get those to start looking somewhat real? Or, is that beyond what I can expect out of Xlod? 

 

The original versions lakes and other waters looked no better. Xlod has improved the coastlines and mountains a great deal.

 

 

Another question. In the CK, I have about 20 log errors, example > Failed to load Data\Meshes\Terrain\NewWorld\NewWorld.32.64.64.BTR, Request result is 1 

 

 

Is this one a too-be-expected-but-ignore thing, or some flaw in the original worldspaces creation?

[sheson]

Hello. Using this (SSE) to update a Classic World space. Just getting started with it and have a couple questions.

 

I started more or less @ default 512, and, the coasts and water looked like .....bad. I upped the resolution of everything except lod4 to 1024 (Dx1). This resulted in smoother looking coastlines, not great , but a lot better. Interior water still look like shapless, ill-defined blobs however. What sort of settings will take to get those to start looking somewhat real? Or, is that beyond what I can expect out of Xlod? 

 

The original versions lakes and other waters looked no better. Xlod has improved the coastlines and mountains a great deal.

 

 

Another question. In the CK, I have about 20 log errors, example > Failed to load Data\Meshes\Terrain\NewWorld\NewWorld.32.64.64.BTR, Request result is 1 

 

 

Is this one a too-be-expected-but-ignore thing, or some flaw in the original worldspaces creation?

LOD water is a shader and there is only one type per worldspace. Only water defined on exterior CELL records has water LOD. The texture settings do not influence LOD water.

 

To improve coastlines increase the quality of the meshes (lower valures) and/or set Optimize Unseen.

 

No idea about the CK error. What is the lower left SW corner in the lod settings file? And what are the worldspace Object Bounds on the WRLD record?

Edited April 12, 2019 by sheson

[Mebantiza]

I re-generated the meshes and textures using your new settings. That resulted in a much improved world map, and, the actual Lods look fine so far, from my limited wandering around so far.

 

I loaded up CK and checked its logs. Still same 20 meshes it says it cannot load. To expand on this matter, I also ran it on another mod with a much smaller worldspace, and it also shows about 5ish or so meshes, same idea. I am going to re-run that space with settings as well, though, tbh, I dont expect to see any difference as the space is tiny compared to the New World space I am working on. Also, that smaller world space was interesting in other ways. The original file has 100s of texutres and meshes. When I updated it using XLod, it dropped to like 30 textures lol, a fraction of what he had. I suspect, but dont know for sure, that he might have had Tamirel selected in the old CK or Oscape maybe when he made them.  Interesing results.

 

 

The specific chunk? It was left 0/0. I am not quite sure what impact that would have on textures or even if it was needed, so, just left it at default for time being.

 

The bounds are:*

Nam0  x -57

           y -43

Nam9  x 62

          y 51

 

Not sure what this means, but I am working on a seperate update esp for that WS, and it has different values

 

-32

-32

 

33

37

 

To see the mesh errors in log, I need to open any cell in CK, I usually just use 0,0 and that is where when the errors get reported.

Edited April 12, 2019 by Mebantiza

[sheson]

I re-generated the meshes and textures using your new settings. That resulted in a much improved world map, and, the actual Lods look fine so far, from my limited wandering around so far.

 

I loaded up CK and checked its logs. Still same 20 meshes it says it cannot load. To expand on this matter, I also ran it on another mod with a much smaller worldspace, and it also shows about 5ish or so meshes, same idea. I am going to re-run that space with settings as well, though, tbh, I dont expect to see any difference as the space is tiny compared to the New World space I am working on. Also, that smaller world space was interesting in other ways. The original file has 100s of texutres and meshes. When I updated it using XLod, it dropped to like 30 textures lol, a fraction of what he had. I suspect, but dont know for sure, that he might have had Tamirel selected in the old CK or Oscape maybe when he made them.  Interesing results.

 

 

The specific chunk? It was left 0/0. I am not quite sure what impact that would have on textures or even if it was needed, so, just left it at default for time being.

 

The bounds are:*

Nam0  x -57

           y -43

Nam9  x 62

          y 51

 

Not sure what this means, but I am working on a seperate update esp for that WS, and it has different values

 

-32

-32

 

33

37

 

To see the mesh errors in log, I need to open any cell in CK, I usually just use 0,0 and that is where when the errors get reported.

xLODGen only generates the files is has to - ignoring the lodsettings files SW corner and object bounds - for which CELL/LAND data exists. Since files contain 4x4, 16x16 etc cells it will fill the missing CELLS/LAND with the default height. It will not create any files for which no data exits at all - since the entire file would be just default height/textures. Typically this works out (in the game). 

 

Usually the bounds on the WRLD record match the CELL data in the plugin, so based on the top right 33, 37 coordinates the "highest" for that area would be level 32.32.32 which covers the cells from 32, 32 lower left to 63, 63 top right. This includes the cells 62, 51 or 33, 37.

 

The game defines where LOD starts with the *.lod files in the lodsettings folder. But it only defines the lower left starting corner in the newer games (older games also had the top right corner) so now it is anyone's guess what the top right corner should be. The lower corner is 96, -96 for Tamriel for example, I suppose it may be possible the CK is looking for files all the way up to the opposite +96, +96 in that case. Maybe it just keeps going until it doesn't find files and the message are merely the information.

 

The xLODGen log prints 3 lines of interest:

 

The data and area that has been found in the loaded plugins:

[Tamriel] Land height: -27000, Water height: -14000, Scanned: 16384 CELL records, Found: 16384 LAND records for area [-64,-64] to [63,63]

 

The line that shows what the lodsettings file says:

[Tamriel] LODsettings: Level 4 to 32 stride 256 from -96,-96 to 0,0

0,0 means the top right corner is not defined. 

 

The area for which files are generated (maybe limited further by the chunk setting)

[Tamriel] Building terrain LOD textures [-64,-64] to [63,63]

 

Update the *.lod file to a lower corner that is closer to the real worldspace dimensions, like -64, -64 or -32, -32 and see if the CK messages change.

Edited April 12, 2019 by sheson

[Mebantiza]

Land height: -2048, Water height: -34000, Scanned: 4126 CELL records, Found: 4114 LAND records for area [-32,-32] to [31,33]

[NewWorld] LODsettings: Level 4 to 32 stride 128 from -32,-32 to 0,0

 

The 3rd line had an extra bit of information > NewWorld] Building terrain LOD textures [-32,-32] to [31,63] 16/4

 

Not sure if the 16/4 means anything 

[sheson]

Land height: -2048, Water height: -34000, Scanned: 4126 CELL records, Found: 4114 LAND records for area [-32,-32] to [31,33]

[NewWorld] LODsettings: Level 4 to 32 stride 128 from -32,-32 to 0,0

 

The 3rd line had an extra bit of information > NewWorld] Building terrain LOD textures [-32,-32] to [31,63] 16/4

 

Not sure if the 16/4 means anything 

16/4 are internal resolutions for textures.

 

OK, since the left is already -32, -32 I guess we need to debug CK or we will never really know. I suppose you could also test a lower stride of 64 or 32. I am not sure it has an effect in the newer games anymore either.

[Mebantiza]

To follow up my the water (world map) quality, I upped the setting to 5, from 10, and that was much better still. Even at 10, smaller bodies of water and coastlines are still fairly crude. I find at 5, while smaller bodies of water are still a little angular, they are fairly representative in terms of overall shape and size. 10 does not seem up to the task and mostly makes a mess of water. I tried that setting (10) on Falksaar, and it made a complete mess of all water tiles. I may just go for max quality, or 3 possibly, to test this further.

 

As for the CK, it continues to complain about missing NIFs it cannot find. If anything, the count is now up to 24, from the previous 20. I have not yet tried modifying anything to address this. This result is consistent with all 3 worldspaces I have modified recently. Only difference being the number of errors each WS reports as 'missing. 

 

One thing it could be, is, in the main WS I am working on, there is a series of buildings, kind of a small estate. It does not appear at all on the world map, and it seems that its objects are not being generated at all. Those could be the 'missing' nifs the CK is looking for, as the world map is completely devoid of any object lod in its location.  The WS has very few objects to generate and that estate is the only one of note outside of a few solitary structures (which have appeared).

[sheson]

To follow up my the water (world map) quality, I upped the setting to 5, from 10, and that was much better still. Even at 10, smaller bodies of water and coastlines are still fairly crude. I find at 5, while smaller bodies of water are still a little angular, they are fairly representative in terms of overall shape and size. 10 does not seem up to the task and mostly makes a mess of water. I tried that setting (10) on Falksaar, and it made a complete mess of all water tiles. I may just go for max quality, or 3 possibly, to test this further.

 

As for the CK, it continues to complain about missing NIFs it cannot find. If anything, the count is now up to 24, from the previous 20. I have not yet tried modifying anything to address this. This result is consistent with all 3 worldspaces I have modified recently. Only difference being the number of errors each WS reports as 'missing. 

 

One thing it could be, is, in the main WS I am working on, there is a series of buildings, kind of a small estate. It does not appear at all on the world map, and it seems that its objects are not being generated at all. Those could be the 'missing' nifs the CK is looking for, as the world map is completely devoid of any object lod in its location.  The WS has very few objects to generate and that estate is the only one of note outside of a few solitary structures (which have appeared).

Is it printing a message about BTR (terrain LOD) or also BTO (object LOD)? Object LOD files only exist for areas where there are objects. Seems more and more likely it is just a notification.

[Mebantiza]

Just the terrain meshes ie > Data\Meshes\Terrain\NewWorld\NewWorld.32.64.0.BTR, Request result is 1. 

 

I guess it is not even trying to make objects out of those structure (no LOD files for them), I thought I saw an object lod missing in an eariler log (since lost). 

 

Got the water looking perfect, using quality 3. Doubt 1 will do much more for it, but 10 is to crude and angular. Now if it would only draw roads lol.

[sheson]

Just the terrain meshes ie > Data\Meshes\Terrain\NewWorld\NewWorld.32.64.0.BTR, Request result is 1. 

 

I guess it is not even trying to make objects out of those structure (no LOD files for them), I thought I saw an object lod missing in an eariler log (since lost). 

 

Got the water looking perfect, using quality 3. Doubt 1 will do much more for it, but 10 is to crude and angular. Now if it would only draw roads lol.

If I get grass baking to work some time this year hopefully, baking of objects top view is next on my list.

[Mercury71]

Hi. I screwed up with SSE so that it did not output to the folder i made outside Skyrim SE.

 

Did target as below...

 

"D:\Modding Skyrim SSE\5. LOD Realated\xLODGen.42 (1)\xLODGen\xLODGenx64.exe" -sse o:"D:\SSELODGen_Output"

 

But ended up in...

 

Output: D:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Skyrim Special Edition\Data\meshes\terrain\Tamriel\

 

Anyway to fix this for me?

[Mebantiza]

Just wanted to share the current result of working with this wonderful new tool.  After a lot of fits and starts, redoes and so on, here it is. 

New World (map) (by Breti 2014), with a number of updates for SSE (WIP). I have no before shot, but, trust me when I say, it was nothing like what you see here. Think vanilla unmoded  skyrim map circa 2011 and you get the idea.

 

This is with Vivid Weathers and A quality world map. This accounts for the coloration of the terrain you see here, which may or not, match what you have in your game.

 

Tree Lods are not currently set up properly for this world space. Terrain - water - objects only.

 

Edited April 17, 2019 by Mebantiza