New 1.18 version terrain generator disappointment....

[DrEngine]

I was in doubt a long time whether publish it or not. One reason is overall positive reactions to new version. The second reason is I don't want to be much negative about VS cos I highly appreciate Tyron and others developers work.
I'm a long time player of VS (our 15000 hours MP world). I've found a lot of fabulous places, amazing mountains including huge caves, flooded valleys, great landscapes.

I play new 1.18 RC. I've played it a lot of hours in creative mode using fast fly speed to see a much as possible landscape in a short time. And I should say I'm disappointed:

- landscape forms are very clean mathematical geometry like; it seems like charts / graphs; terrain is missing some unevenness/irregularities; more and more I've found these I'm more and more frustrated;

- landscape is missing solid/undivided mountains (many of them are cut to "pieces"); if some is solid/uncut they are missing caves;

- landscape is missing huge interesting caves;

I've uploaded some examples to demonstrate my findings:

- new generator (geometric shapes of landscape)
https://we.tl/t-NqOtekQrh7

- old generator (fabulous places in old version, that I'm not able to find similar ones in new version)
https://we.tl/t-RXkysUUSav

 

I'd like to see that I'm wrong and new terrain generator can produce amazing places like in old generator. But I haven't found it in new version yet.... :-(((

What do you think?
 

[Streetwind]

I brought this up to Tyron after the release candidate went up, asking whether the team was planning further work on world generation. The answer was yes, there is further work planned, but not in 1.18. The lore update was already delayed too much to spend even more time on this at the moment.

So for the time being, we'll need to wait until this update is out and refined, and work on 1.19 starts. IIRC Tyron suggested once before that the theme of 1.19 could be "de-jank 2.0", and if the players consider the terrain janky, that seems perfectly in theme to tackle for that update

In the meantime, I've been trialing this mod, which shifts the weighting of landforms around some and adds a few custom ones. It doesn't get rid of all the sins, like floating islands and shattered mountains, but my gut feeling says its made them a bit more rare and the world feel a bit more natural. Sample size of about a dozen worlds tested without the mod (creative flight exploration), and one world currently in testing with it (actual gameplay). Maybe give it a try as well?

[Narcosis]

Long-time player and forum lurker here.

To be honest, one of the biggest overall problems with VS is the amount of initial investment it takes to progress the game; for that you need appropriate land and you bet you'd want it to be perfect. This strive severely limits the areas you can actually settle down to have unrestricted growth, while also sporting decently nice views around. I found out, it often takes countless hours of running or "cheating" by flying around to scout the perfect spots and that's not where the searching ends at. You need appropriate geological structure, access to all resources and minerals... then you'd also want to have the good traders around AND most importantly - the area needs to be relatively safe and sound, with possibly no temporal instability; bonus points if it's very stable underground as well and there's caves with stuff below. There's so much to factor in, but when you find a perfect spot, It's like you won at the lottery, haha.

After spending some time in 1.18, I have to confirm the terrain is... different. Quite vastly, I'd say. The length of fields is bigger, the distance you often have to travel between ranges also grew. In comparison to previous maps, the world feels much bigger but in a way, it also seems less diverse; that said, it's difficult for me to say whether it's better or worse. I'd say it's different and in my case, I kind of grew to like it as the time passed. In overall - minus the new strange generation glitches, more "floating rock formations" and some uneven terrain generation - it does feel much more natural and realistic; the upheaval is responsible for it in the most part as it doesn't change the generation, it simply raises the terrain it is on, creating these natural, wave-like hills which definitely add to the overall feel and can produce some really nice looking vistas. I'd say it a move in the right direction but it'll need tweaking; luckily, everything in generation can be configured to your taste. From what I've checked, if you reduce upheaval to zero, it will produce very much pre-18.1 landscapes.

My main complaint is that new generation is incompatible with pre-18.1 and produces vastly different results now. It's understandable, since game is still in active development so we have to deal with it occasionally, but it was still disappointing when it turned out I won't be able to play on the world I previously managed to get.

That said, I'll share one nice new seed here: 801461586. you will start in the hills; the terrain there is nice if you want to settle down for sorta Swiss feel; that said, if you'll move further to the west, besides the dunes, there's a vast open field with a mountain range to the north and forest to the south. It is very stable temporally and best of all - has quite good deposits of iron underneath and there's plentiful of resources in the area, whilst the surrounding biomes have a lot more to offer as well. Best of all, there's a survival goods trader at the edge of the field! I highly recommend it for a fresh new start.

[Thorfinn]

Personally, I kind of like it. Though admittedly I'm looking more for gameplay than anything else. I've even stopped caring about traders. I'd rather build everything myself than buy it, or even loot ruins, but I will break cracked vessels for the first few days.

In my opinion, the fun is in playing the hand you were dealt. Not that you have to build on bauxite just because that's your spawn, and not that I'm looking for perfection. Just good enough for now. The first home is usually on copper, and I'll walk away from it when I'm ready for iron.

Anyway, rugged terrain is just part of the hand you were dealt. Keep on the move until you find a couple three copper deposits and make the best of it.

[Maelstrom]

On 4/9/2023 at 6:42 AM, Narcosis said:

<snip>

That said, I'll share one nice new seed here: 801461586. you will start in the hills; the terrain there is nice if you want to settle down for sorta Swiss feel; that said, if you'll move further to the west, besides the dunes, there's a vast open field with a mountain range to the north and forest to the south. It is very stable temporally and best of all - has quite good deposits of iron underneath and there's plentiful of resources in the area, whilst the surrounding biomes have a lot more to offer as well. Best of all, there's a survival goods trader at the edge of the field! I highly recommend it for a fresh new start.

One problem.  The trader and ore resources are not seed dependent.  Others using this seed may not see any iron in the indicated location and may have a furniture trader.

The geology will be the same which is enough for me.

Edited April 10, 2023 by Maelstrom

[Davis]

On 4/9/2023 at 2:44 AM, Streetwind said:

I brought this up to Tyron after the release candidate went up, asking whether the team was planning further work on world generation. The answer was yes, there is further work planned, but not in 1.18. The lore update was already delayed too much to spend even more time on this at the moment.

So for the time being, we'll need to wait until this update is out and refined, and work on 1.19 starts. IIRC Tyron suggested once before that the theme of 1.19 could be "de-jank 2.0", and if the players consider the terrain janky, that seems perfectly in theme to tackle for that update

In the meantime, I've been trialing this mod, which shifts the weighting of landforms around some and adds a few custom ones. It doesn't get rid of all the sins, like floating islands and shattered mountains, but my gut feeling says its made them a bit more rare and the world feel a bit more natural. Sample size of about a dozen worlds tested without the mod (creative flight exploration), and one world currently in testing with it (actual gameplay). Maybe give it a try as well?

I'm with you on this one Streetwind. I think this was a good start to refining the land generation systems and furthering it. However, some more work needs to be done. I too find floating islands and shattered mountains more often. 

[Thorfinn]

What is a shattered mountain?

[Erik]

I personally really disagree with the notion that 1.18 is a letdown when it comes to world gen. For all that changed, a lot also stayed the same: The landforms, i.e. the general shapes of the landscape, barely changed, basically only adding 6 new landforms, just increasing the variety in world shapes. The real big change to world gen is also quite a simple one: Vertical upheaval, which is simply smoothly raising or lowering the terrain (in some areas), which mixes with the landforms to create a lot more vertical variety in the terrain (and there are optionally also oceans, basically doing the same thing but always lowering the terrain and in a much more limited area).

These changes lead me to generally observe more varied, interesting and believable terrain. The best thing is how the vertical upheaval leads to a much grander scale of the world, as it is now less flat with giant vertical mountain walls in-between, but also but features some gradually rising huge mountains with real valleys. There are still a lot of areas that look exactly like 1.17 world gen, uneffected by vertical upheaval and oceans while using old landforms. It only adds to the variety, which is imo the most important thing for world gen.

[DrEngine]

I definitely don't think 1.18 is a worldgen letdown. Upheaven and other features made terrain more realistic. 

I only listed some issues that aren't very well made:
- a lot of shattered mountains (it seems they are everywhere)
- some geometrically shaped hills missing unevenness/irregularity (see images)
- huge long caves missing

(for me) very hard to find place I'd like to settle down.

[Thorfinn]

I'm still not getting it. When one is speaking of shattered mountains, does that just mean exposed rock?

[DrEngine]

17 hours ago, Thorfinn said:

I'm still not getting it. When one is speaking of shattered mountains, does that just mean exposed rock?

No, that means mountains cutted to sharp tall pieces, where is not much space between pieces (no valley, not even space to walk between them). 

[Boukyaku]

I have to agree. When I saw the new terrain I felt like I could see the math/graphs instead of feeling immersed. 
I love the old terrain generator so I hope they keep on tweaking the new one to fix that. Or give us the option to select which one we want to use if that's possible. 

[Rhyagelle]

I really love the new generator. A lot. I usually spend about an hour or two looking for great places to settle down though, so if people want perfect every step of the way, then this kind of generation will probably never appease them. 

[Maelstrom]

23 hours ago, Boukyaku said:

Or give us the option to select which one we want to use if that's possible. 

Nope.  There is only the one terrain generator in 1.18.  What you can do is tweak the parameters.  I would expect you can tweak those parameters to get a similar result to pre1.18 generation.

[Rufkut]

I've found that terrain generation in rc.2 1.18 compared to 1.18 stable is definitely different. The stuff generated in the initial unstable releases were really great, I found several flowing realistic eye catching landscapes without a thousand tiny lakes and tiny hills. 1.18 is superior is general but the terrain generation in the stable release is "off" in my opinion. 

[Herald Rejn]

yes, for me 1.18 new terrain generation is not something great too. I was hyped for 1.18 but after playing for few hours im like ''really? Is that all we get in 1.18?''

[Thorfinn]

After a few more hours of play, I'm liking it quite a bit. Used to be that finding copper or tin or lead or really anything except quartz in an exposed cliff face was quite unusual, but it is really quite different to be able to build a ladder up a cliff and dig a mine into the vein. Usually to get views like that I'd have to travel to some mountain range or build a nerdpole, but it's quite nice to build a mining camp with a great vista. In fact, I'm rethinking my early game to take advantage of the changes in 1.18.

[LJim]

Same, to play devil's advocate, I like that everything is more spaced out now, with more plains in-between. Now I do think there is room for improvement of course. I still am not seeing oceans or really large bodies of water; mountain ranges also seem less organic. But overall I can't say I'm disappointed.

I have hope that in the dejank update, Tyron will continue to improve on the formula.

[DrEngine]

12 hours ago, LJim said:

I have hope that in the dejank update, Tyron will continue to improve on the formula.

Changing or improving terrain generator does have one major PROBLEM: it breaks continuity of terrain. We do have stable many years living server with a lot of players. Changing terrain generator like now with 1.18 means game map reset and a lot of work to continue and keep players. We've made it now. It was really huge amount of work. And should we expect another generator reset next upgrade ??? This is ridiculous.

I think the change of map generator should be game upgrade itself (no other changes) and should be very well tested and proven to avoid corrections in another upgrade (because of that PROBLEM).

Geometric terrain forms are terrible, horrible. And if we'll get another generator upgrade next version, I'll be angry.

I really love Vintage Story but I should say I think Tyron and team have underestimated terrain generator change complexity....

 

[Hafthohlladung]

4 hours ago, DrEngine said:

Changing or improving terrain generator does have one major PROBLEM: it breaks continuity of terrain. We do have stable many years living server with a lot of players. Changing terrain generator like now with 1.18 means game map reset and a lot of work to continue and keep players. We've made it now. It was really huge amount of work. And should we expect another generator reset next upgrade ??? This is ridiculous.

I think your experience is likely one that is shared by a lot of people, this type of game genre tends to have players potentially investing thousands of hours building up just 1 map.

But the unfortunate reality is that Vintage Story is by it's own admission "Early Access" and everytime you start a new map, you have to be mentally prepared that at some point it will not be able to keep up with the progression of the game.

Edited April 23, 2023 by Hafthohlladung

[Rufkut]

1 hour ago, Hafthohlladung said:

I think your experience is likely one that is shared by a lot of people, this type of game genre tends to have players potentially investing thousands of hours building up just 1 map.

But the unfortunate reality is that Vintage Story is by it's own admission "Early Access" and everytime you start a new map, you have to be mentally prepared that at some point it will not be able to keep up with the progression of the game.

Yeah I can totally relate to that. My first actual world was in 1.13 to 1.17, invested over 600 hours over several years I'd assume. I like games which allow me to play at my own place and picking up where ever I left off. I can see how it'd be a challenge for long running multiplayer servers.

Thankfully, I found a nice scenic island in a preview of 1.18. Its resource rich and interesting enough to support all of what I'll ever do and I exported the schematic of my base from my other world to it. I was hoping to do some occasional sailing but sadly stable 1.18 terrain generation has created a massive continent in all the new chunks even though the world parameters was set "islands/continents" before.

 

Regardless, its definitely early access and amazing for what it is and will become with the people behind it.

[Echoweaver]

I think I agree that the new terrain generation, at least with upheaval set to default, generates some pretty unnatural landscapes. I spawned into a shattered mountain/floating island region. It's lovely if difficult to navigate. I need to explore further to see how common that is.

Ocean-sized bodies of water seem to only be created if you change the default worldgen settings.

But here's a question -- since salt water and fresh water behave very differently, how do you tell which you have?

[Branislav Kostic]

Not a fan of the new world generator, looks nice but it's too difficult to traverse.

[Rhyagelle]

I've spent a while in 1.18.1. It's got beautiful generation. I think it's more difficult to traverse now because mountains and hills seem more "realistic" in how they spawn. Which means you're almost always traversing some sort of up ascending geographical feature. 

[imperialwaltz]

I'm not a big fan of it so far. It almost makes me wish we had an toggle-able auto-climb feature similar to minecraft because I play with a controller and I'm just hopping up and down hills no matter which direction I go.

The floating islands thing is cool if it's intentional.

It's taken me awhile to learn what I'm doing and have fun with it but I'm really enjoying the game otherwise and there are certainly a lot more pretty vistas than in previous versions.