Tweaking xmls to my liking - several questions

[TheSurvivior01]

First time poster with several problems to which I couldn't find answers here or on Steam (Alpha 16.4)

 

1. My random seeds only use Forest (acting as woodland), Pine Forest (acting as deep forest), and plains (still plains but more like Middle Europe than Central America). My only problem here is, that I want the plains to use a different default block than plainsGround. I found a workaround in creating a fake main biome with a prob=0.9 subbiome that overpaints everything with a grass block but on the horizon the hills still look brown (I'm also not sure if it's going to be a performance issue). Is there a way to change default blocks for biomes at all?

 

2. I reduced the cell size by half to 900 and gave a lot of prefabs a min/max of 1 (to avoid repetition) like that

<prefab_rule name="wildernessGroup">
		<prefab name="pond01" min_count="1" max_count="1"/>
	</prefab_rule>

with matching wilderness rules

<wilderness_rule name="wildernessDefault" spawn_min_max="0,50"

But I still get multiples within a single biome. Is it possible, that the wilderness rule overrides the prefab rules and if it comes up with a random number that is higher than the available prefabs, it then simply fills it up ignoring any min/max prefab rules?

 

3. I have tried to only get a single hub of each type with this

<hub_rule name="townSmall" spawn_min_max="1,1" />

but it doesn't seem to work, neither did

<hub_rule name="townSmall" min_count="1" max_count="1"/>

 

4. I experimented with another custom biome based on the snow biome that is always in complete fog but I can't get it to work, not even with the most extreme settings:

<weather>
		<Temperature min="-35" max="5" prob="1"/>
		<Fog min="100" max="100" prob="1"/>
		<CloudThickness min="100" max="100" prob="1"/>
		<Precipitation min="0" max="0" prob=".0"/>
		<Precipitation min="50" max="100" prob=".75"/>
		<Wind min="0" max="20" prob="0.7"/>
		<Wind min="30" max="70" prob="0.2"/>
		<Wind min="80" max="90" prob="0.1"/>
	</weather>

Whatever I tried, no fog at all ingame.

 

I will be very grateful for any tips and insights.

[Tin]

First time poster with several problems to which I couldn't find answers here or on Steam (Alpha 16.4)

 

1. My random seeds only use Forest (acting as woodland), Pine Forest (acting as deep forest), and plains (still plains but more like Middle Europe than Central America). My only problem here is, that I want the plains to use a different default block than plainsGround. I found a workaround in creating a fake main biome with a prob=0.9 subbiome that overpaints everything with a grass block but on the horizon the hills still look brown (I'm also not sure if it's going to be a performance issue). Is there a way to change default blocks for biomes at all?

 

2. I reduced the cell size by half to 900 and gave a lot of prefabs a min/max of 1 (to avoid repetition) like that

<prefab_rule name="wildernessGroup">
		<prefab name="pond01" min_count="1" max_count="1"/>
	</prefab_rule>

with matching wilderness rules

<wilderness_rule name="wildernessDefault" spawn_min_max="0,50"

But I still get multiples within a single biome. Is it possible, that the wilderness rule overrides the prefab rules and if it comes up with a random number that is higher than the available prefabs, it then simply fills it up ignoring any min/max prefab rules?

 

3. I have tried to only get a single hub of each type with this

<hub_rule name="townSmall" spawn_min_max="1,1" />

but it doesn't seem to work, neither did

<hub_rule name="townSmall" min_count="1" max_count="1"/>

 

4. I experimented with another custom biome based on the snow biome that is always in complete fog but I can't get it to work, not even with the most extreme settings:

<weather>
		<Temperature min="-35" max="5" prob="1"/>
		<Fog min="100" max="100" prob="1"/>
		<CloudThickness min="100" max="100" prob="1"/>
		<Precipitation min="0" max="0" prob=".0"/>
		<Precipitation min="50" max="100" prob=".75"/>
		<Wind min="0" max="20" prob="0.7"/>
		<Wind min="30" max="70" prob="0.2"/>
		<Wind min="80" max="90" prob="0.1"/>
	</weather>

Whatever I tried, no fog at all ingame.

 

I will be very grateful for any tips and insights.

 

1) Go to the biomes.xml to change the terrain block..

<subbiome prob="0.1"> <!-- Plains Sub Biome Clustered Trees -->
  <layers>
   <layer depth="1" blockname="[color="#FFFF00"]plainsGround[/color]"> <resource blockname="gravelPlusIron" cluster="1" prob="0.1" rwgGenerationType="all" /> </layer>

 

2) depends on how many prefabs you have in the wilderness group and how many it actually calls from your min/max of "0,50".

If you only have [example]: 10 prefabs in the wilderness list and it calls for 50 prefabs in a cell; Depending on how you set it up, it'll run through that list to place 50 prefabs no matter what limitations you place on it.

 

Easiest (imo) is to have 50 prefabs in the wilderness list so you have enough prefabs to run through and also use prob=""

It will read from the top down of that list and place your filler prefabs under you min_count/max_count of those you really want to appear in every cell.

-Or- make a dummy prefab rule that has nothing and use that as the filler in the list.<prefab_rule name="none"/>

 

[example]:

<prefab name="pond_1" min_count="1" max_count="1" prob="1"/>

<prefab name="pond_2" min_count="1" max_count="1" prob="1"/>

<prefab rule="none"/> <-- filler for the rest.

 

No matter what it'll not be perfect so you'll need to tweak as needed.

 

3) Each cell has a chance to place a hub (city/town/rural) depending on the terrain it wants to place it in. If the terrain can't support a hub, it wont.

 

4) To test the weather settings you'll need to skip time to day 2 so the weather effect kick in depending on your settings for when the next day time occurs.

If you want the fog that comes with the rain you'll need to set it up so it has over 70% clouds.

If you just want the wispy fog then you need to adjust the:

<ParticleEffect prefab="ParticleEffects/p_snowstorm1" [color="#FFFF00"]ChunkMargin="7"[/color]/>

*Note on ParticleEffect: You can not have 2 of the same particle effects in the same biome BUT you can make a block that uses that particle effect and put it into biome through the biome decorations [use sparingly]*

Lower the value [in whole numbers] the more dense it will be, at a performance cost.

 

If you want it foggy 24/7 no matter what you can add a spectrum (if it isn't using one) or change the existing spectrum.

[Example]

<spectrum name="foggy" /><spectrum name="rainy" />

Valid spectrums that I know of:

rainy/foggy/bloodmoon/wasteland/snow/desert/pineforest/forest/water/plains or don't specify one.

burnt_forest spectrum for the burnt_forest is hard coded but you can add a spectrum to change it.

Spectrum's: Will change the whole biome with little cost.

[TheSurvivior01]

Thanks for the response - that cleared up several things, especially the weather/fog related.