Hi. First-time poster here. I started using World Machine just last week and I’m loving it! Thanks in large part to WM’s superb erosion functions, my sci fi and fantasy maps are looking better than ever.
Now to my question: Is there a way to work separately with individual tiles within a Tiled Build? Specifically, I’d like to be able to subject different tiles to different kinds and degrees of erosion and other filter effects. For example, I’d like to be able to erode higher-elevation tiles differently than lower-elevation tiles, and I’d like to be able to apply Terrace or Curve effects to some select tiles but not to all of them. But so far, when I use the Tiled Input Device, it seems I’m only able to subject an entire tile-set (an entire world) to the same filter device or series of devices en masse.
I’ve tried a couple of workaround strategies (which I won’t bother to detail unless asked) but they’ve proven cumbersome, time-consuming and unsatisfying. Any expert advice would be greatly appreciated!
World machine works in world space, which means all filters work on whole terrain at once. But if you want elevation based effects, you can use selectors to select where you want your effect applied, then plug that into mask input of your filters.
Generally speaking, you really wouldn’t want filters applied on a per-tile basis in almost any reasonable situation, as there would be no transitional areas or cohesion to the terrain; everything would change abruptly at tile edges.
I think what you most likely want to do is use a Layout Generator or selectors (Height based, etc) to direct where to apply certain effects. You can turn on an overlay in the Layout View to show you where the tile boundaries lie; you can use this information to help plan where to draw your shapes.
Let me know if you need me to go into greater detail on this method, or if you’re trying to do something else completely from what I"m talking about above…