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Interpreter Needed for Patch Notes for 74.8159

OK, anyone want to explain in plain English, just what the beep the last 2 items in the features section of the patch notes actually mean please.

TR
NWN_Töml

Comments

  • NWN_TömlNWN_Töml Member Posts: 90
    edited February 2018
    I dont understand ...and i have a lots of imagination guys.... it either. I just have some speculation what i could do with it if they mean the UVW map channel....
    Then you could add an opacity map over your texture for map channel 2!
  • DoubledimasDoubledimas Member, Mobile Tester Posts: 1,286
    edited February 2018
    I reckon they will showsome examples of the new features during today's stream.
  • MrDamageMrDamage Member Posts: 210
    edited February 2018
    hmmm!

  • TorgrimmerTorgrimmer Member Posts: 331
    Some type of computer/programming language. It your not a modder then dont worry about it.
    [Deleted User]
  • InflatableFriendInflatableFriend Member Posts: 57
    edited February 2018
    I'm not hugely profficient so if anyone wants to correct me then go ahead!
    My understanding is this:

    vertex colours is for shaders, means you can do snazzy stuff like model based ambient occlusion or shadowing or extreme stuff like:
    https://simonschreibt.de/gat/homeworld-2-backgrounds/ - The homeworld 2 backgrounds (famous for being amazing) didn't use any texture maps at all, instead they made it all with geometry and vertex colours with a doing gradients between them.

    or you can assign a different texture value depending on the vertex colour (this goes hand in hand with the next item), this is fantastic for terrain.
    https://www.glitchedpolygons.com/blog/2017/8/7/3-and-4-way-blend-shaders-done

    The additional texture streams (for a total of 4) mean that you can do stuff like the terrain mapping above, do dynamic damage (shader generates a mask allowing texture B to show through texture A), splatmaps, heightmaps, tint maps, super special vfx (think They Live), faked subsurface scattering, or just use multiple texture sets to paint up one mesh.

    Plus probably hundreds of other things I don't have an inkling about.
    TorgrimmerNWN_Töml
  • NWN_TömlNWN_Töml Member Posts: 90
    edited February 2018
    "model based ambient occlusion or shadowing".... :)

    haha.....maybe lightmaps too!!!!
    Post edited by NWN_Töml on
  • TarotRedhandTarotRedhand Member Posts: 1,481
    edited February 2018
    Does this probably mean animated skyboxes? Tint maps for placeables/tiles? Mind you this latter only needs a single image to implement, so what would the other 2 be for?

    TR
  • InflatableFriendInflatableFriend Member Posts: 57
    edited February 2018
    I think they're for whatever you want them to be for. Right now it's just support for multiple texture sets, it's down to the content creator to make the model, texture and shader that tells everything what it needs to de/be.

    You could do a skybox with a day texture, a night texture, and two types of cloud texture then write a shader to blend between them all depending on the various time/weather variables from the engine.

    You could do tint maps, (though I think they'd have to be on a per-shader (or model when per-model shaders come in) basis, so no easy tweaking them, I'd assume that if NWN2 style tint maps were introduced they'd be part of a set anyway.

    you could have texture sets that're used for many models (scenery and placeables especially) with a model taking what it needs from various sets (So rather than having a single 'City Textures 01' you'd have 'Wood 01' 'Metal 01' and so on using each texture as you need).

    Terrain with multiple textures...

    It's guesswork though, for all know it's a precurser to wrapping normals and tints into the mesh rather than .txi or the first step on the road to everything being PBR material based (.sbsar support confirmed?)

    As ever I guess everything's subject to change anyway!


    edit: Oooh, good call Töml, emissive textures would be nice.
    TarotRedhandSylvus_Moonbow
  • TarotRedhandTarotRedhand Member Posts: 1,481
    At this point am I allowed to go cross-eyed, go la-la-la, get a bad headache and stick my head in the sand. If you listen closely enough you might even hear the gears grinding as I try to process all of this new stuff. 8bf filters are beginning to seem less complicated by the day.

    Thanks for the reply.

    TR
    JuliusBorisov
  • FreshLemonBunFreshLemonBun Member Posts: 909
    It would be pretty nice to get tinting and texture swapping for tiles.

    Is there anything here which would allow spell effects like stone skin to only apply to specific body parts and be slightly transparent?
  • NWN_TömlNWN_Töml Member Posts: 90
    edited February 2018
    But about our custom shaders. They are broken right now! Or to be specific, the command in the txi file doesnt works anymore!
  • JuliusBorisovJuliusBorisov Member, Administrator, Moderator, Developer Posts: 22,714
    There's a new update in the patch notes:

    The old means of specifying a custom shader through the .txi had limitations. In particular, the .txi was initially intended to be a place to store information about a specific texture, not as a repository for other information. We’ve decided to create a new file type to encapsulate a material template. Instances of this new material file type, with a suffix ".mtr", can be shared across multiple meshes, and will specify things like textures, shaders, and uniforms.

    What follows in the patch notes is a sample material file that includes examples for all currently supported fields. http://blog.beamdog.com/2018/02/nwnee-8159-patch-notes-and-steam-beta.html
    NWN_Töml
  • NWN_TömlNWN_Töml Member Posts: 90
    Oh thank you so much!!!!!
    JuliusBorisovMrDamage
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