Feature Req: New erosion type + improvements to current erosion

[Delta_Research]

So I was thinking about some interesting things that I have always struggled to make in World Machine properly.

1st Feature Request, a new erosion type, Wind Erosion
This would be immensely helpful in the creation of realistic dunes, mesa formations, and snow being blown across peaks and accumulating. I am thinking of a node with two inputs, the heightmap input and a ground hardness/vegetation mask that resists wind erosion. The device would also output a heightmap, wear map, and a deposition map where the ground is worn away and the resulting material is deposited.
Possible parameters for this are strength, and how long the simulation is.
This erosion would include creep, saltation, and suspension, approximated of course. (Or possibly another parameter would be quality)

2nd Feature Request, adding water absorption into the ground
This would make the erosion device behave more realistically, and this option would be toggleable and off by default. Water created during the simulation would be absorbed by the ground by a guide provided by the user, where black would be zero water absorption and white absorbing all water that flows over it. Areas on terrain that are white on the mask would be more susceptible to getting eroded than areas that are black, behaving similarly to the hardness mask of the erosion.
(Better interaction with water and erosion would be nice)

To me, the first one would greatly enhance my terrain but I have a feeling that many would still use their own method of creating dunes.
The second feature request is simply a nice touch to the erosion device, but I currently do not direly need it but I sometimes find myself wondering how my terrain would be if I had this feature.

[HYLK]

The first request is something much needed in my opinion, as many of the proposed use-cases are difficult and hard to mimic without such a device. Another probable use-case, would be the creation of a hill landscape, as a hill is just bedrock with soil on top of it.

The second feature request sounds really interesting! I think this is somewhat implemented with the Select Wetness device? I have played around with it and, when using an inverse of the map, it works quite well. The left is with a select wetness input and the right isn’t.

[Delta_Research]

Yeah wasn’t so sure if the second one already existed or not. Wind Erosion I would definitely use if it was implemented into World Machine. It could be integrated into the Snowmelt macro so it only blows away the snow until it exposes the rock underneath.

[Stephen]

Hi there,

As you might imagine, I’m quite interested in all things erosion.

Wind erosion is definitely useful and interesting for things like sand dunes and blown snow. I don’t currently have a good R&D implementation or model for aeolian erosion, so although interesting it’s still concept-phase.

A soil model, on the other hand, is something I’m very interested in. After all, outside of alpine areas that are mostly exposed bedrock, soil is what we see, and it has very distinctive and well-studied behaviors. I have a soil device in R&D that can produce fairly excellent results, but it’s definitely not anywhere near production quality yet. This is an area that will definitely have improvements in the future.