I have a cliff texture that projects on x,y,z axis (so they dont stretch when the terrain is too steep). It works great up close, but for some reason as I move away from the texture, the texture on the z-axis (the default (floor) axis) disappears while the x and y textures remain visible from a great distance.

Is there a way to fix this? I've dug through the material editor for hours without luck.

So far the only work around I've found was increasing DetailLayersViewDistRation, but I'm not quite certain how much detail layers impact game performance. I can't imagine its a freebie, otherwise the function wouldn't exist.

In SB2 adjusting the view distance of z-axis texture can be done with CVar "e_detail_materials_view_dist_z". Default value for it in SB2 is quite low compared to values for x and y axes. Assumably it's the same in SB3, but CVar is not available.

*scratches head* Great. Another limitation. I really did pick the perfect engine to get back into modding.

Hopefully some Crytek official might have a solution for us. I'm crossing my fingers. This is a pretty big deal, as minor as it might seem. It makes terrain-based levels a serious PITA.

I'll stick to an increased DetailLayersViewDistRatio for now and give it a run later on.

DetailLayersViewDistRatio tends to have a pretty big impact on the framerate when viewing wide areas from a high vintage point. I've seen up to a 18 fps drop from the highest point of my level. This is with a radeon HD 5870 and an i7 780. I fear lesser systems will struggle big time. The issue is, I can't live with a lower DetailLayersViewDistRatio if there is no way to fix the z-axis' disappearance.

Oh crytek gods, let there be a solution! I promise I'll make this level awesome!

I see the following console variables, do they do what you need?

variable: e_TerrainDetailMaterialsViewDistXY
type: float
current: 2048
help: Max view distance of terrain XY materials

variable: e_TerrainDetailMaterialsViewDistZ
type: float
current: 128
help: Max view distance of terrain Z materials

Yes sir, that's exactly it!

How would I go about ensuring this is applied when people load my mod/level? I know how to apply it for myself via console / autoexec.cfg... but I want to make sure people who play my level get that effect too.


And while we're on the subject of cvar's... how does one find out what they are?

You can never be sure cvars are applied correctly in pure game mode...

Hover your mouse over the cvar value, and you will get a tooltip popup telling you what the cvar is.

So there's no way to apply cvar values when people start the level?

Oh son of a bitch, that damn e_TerrainDetailMaterialsViewDistZ cvar doesn't even work ingame, only in the editor. Its a mod and a single-player level. Why the hell are these things locked?! I'm really starting to dislike working with Crysis 2. :/ Great level design tools, but we're cut right off at the balls.

Is there no way to force these things in a mod? Are there any crytek devs who can comment on this, give us some info?

Not sure how much it helps you but I took note of this issue and I'll present it to the right people.

Here's a screenshot to show the jarring difference. The only other work around I found to this issue caused a whopping 10-15 fps drop, while this simple cvar caused no drops.

As you can tell from this screenshot, I might as well can this project if I can't find a solution to this problem.

Apparently you can work around this by adding cvars into XML files that are loaded at the start of the game. Instructions here: viewtopic.php?p=817775#p817775

I'll keep trying but it doesn't seem to work with <e_TerrainDetailMaterialsViewDistZ value="2048" GAME="SP"/>

Adding CVars in XML-files seems to be just another way of utilizing them. Restrictions are still in effect.

I figured as much. This is NOT a good turn of events after a month of busting my ass on this thing.