Landform.json description ?

[DrEngine]

I'm looking for more detailed description of Landforms.json config file. Any tip? Some source ?

[Thorfinn]

Do you understand Perlin noise? You need to have that firmly in-hand before that file makes sense. It's a fairly involved thing (I have several textbooks on it) but I'm sure there are YouTubes that explain enough so you could limp through it, tweaking things here and there.

[DrEngine]

13 hours ago, Thorfinn said:

Do you understand Perlin noise? You need to have that firmly in-hand before that file makes sense. It's a fairly involved thing (I have several textbooks on it) but I'm sure there are YouTubes that explain enough so you could limp through it, tweaking things here and there.

I study new technical knowledge every day in my job. No problem to study Perlin noise or whatever else. But for studying you need some source. I want to avoid fiddling with Landforms.json in "try and error" style. It could take a lot of time. To have technical description of Landfroms.json is MUCH BETTER way. Thats why I'm asking.

Do you have any links ? 

Landforms.json file does have a lot of config parameters. 

1. I need to know what landform given name looks like ? So I can make decision what landform I want to have more in map and what landform not. Landforms do have names of course but it's not clear how the landsform looks from it's name.

2. I need to know exact description what functionality do individual parameters have. I can make some estimation from parameter's name but only estimation. So it could be tedious process of try to change parameter and see what happen. This can take a lot of time. So much better would be to have parameters description to avoid such a terrible process of "try and error". Does it exists ???

THANKS for any tip / link !!!!

[Thorfinn]

Spent some time on-line looking for something decent, but shoot, it's tough. My books are decades old; they aren't even listed on Amazon. And there are indeed lots of YouTubes on it, but most are tailored heavily to coding the mapgen algorithm itself rather than giving much insight into parameters for an already existing algorithm. Low signal to noise ratio, as it were.

Of all I found, this is probably the best, though if you find it a little much, check out the second link for an introduction.

 

 

And this is one of the more approachable introductions that has enough meat to be worthwhile. Strictly speaking, it's still more of a coding video, but she takes the time to explain and demonstrate concepts like octaves.

 

Edited January 16, 2025 by Thorfinn

[DrEngine]

@Thorfinn THANKS !!! I think I can change terrain generation a lot by changing landform Octaves, YKeyPositions, Weight, and others ONLY.

What is "Use climate map" ??? Can I limit landform generation to some climate defined by min/maxTemp ???  Ditto min/maxRain ???

What is "mutation" ???

 

 

[Brady_The]

Tyron made a tool available, which should help you in your endeavours: https://tyron.at/vs/landformcreator.html#

There's also @CreativeRealms, who just recently updated/rewrote a worldgeneration mod. Hours of content should still be available on his twitch page: https://www.twitch.tv/creativerealms.

He also has a dedicated VS Discord server thread for the mod, in which you could probably ask for assistance explaining a couple of things. I am sure he'd more than happy to help out a fellow land generation enthusiast.

4 hours ago, DrEngine said:

Can I limit landform generation to some climate defined by min/maxTemp ???  Ditto min/maxRain ???

If I remember correctly, this is exactly what it means.

4 hours ago, DrEngine said:

What is "mutation" ???

Mutations are variants of landforms. You can, for example, have a "cliff" landform and then mutations (or variations) of it. I don't know how exactly they work, though.

Of course there is also the wiki, that could clear up a couple of things, even though articles on the wiki can be slightly out of date: https://wiki.vintagestory.at/Modding:WorldGen_Configuration/en

Edited January 17, 2025 by Brady_The

[DrEngine]

@Brady_The THANKS!   

Yes, the tool is good for clear view how YKey changes distribution of mass.

Mutation seems like it happens with "chance": 0.20, so here for example with 20% probability landform looks different (defined in mutation). That seems clear too.

QUESTION: names of landforms are key values related to some code in VS that does know how to generate "cold mountains" for example. So I CANT change this names to not to lost the relation. ???

I can test how individual landform looks simply by deleting all content of landforms.json and keeping only ONE landform. I suppose whole map will be filled with that landform. Right ???