sky_blur_cluster_chance in 1.69.1.1

[Commander McLane]

I'm not completely sure about this one, because I'm not completely sure how it's supposed to work.

I want to change the appearance of the sky in a specific system, namely Bixein in Galaxy 3. Without any changes there is one green nebula visible in the system. I have made it brighter with sky_blur_alpha, changed its colour to blue with sky_rgb_colors and made it bigger with sky_blur_scale. But to whatever value I set sky_blur_cluster_chance, it remains one single nebula. Only if I set it to 0, the nebula disappears. But any value between 0..1, and also ridicilously large values, don't seem to have an effect.

I don't know if this is a bug or a feature. Probably the number of nebulas for each systems is hard-coded in the galaxy seed? It seems, however, that for interstellar space I get a different, randomized appearance each time I am jumping in, without changing the variables.

[JensAyton]

sky_n_blurs sets the number of blurs. sky_blur_cluster_chance affects the probability of them forming into fewer but more complex nebulae.

[Commander McLane]

Ah! Thanks, Ahruman!

Is sky_n_blurs new or can I already use it in 1.65? You know, my knowledge of keys, methods and commands is basically limited to those documented in the wiki. And this is not one of them.

EDIT: Hm, tested it. Seems to be a newly introduced key. In 1.69.1.1 even if I set sky_n_blurs to 1000 I get my well-known, single nebula.

EDIT AGAIN: And if I set sky_blur_cluster_chance to something small like 0.01, I don't get the same number of blurs, spread apart instead of clustered, but I get no blurs at all.

[JensAyton]

Weird. sky_n_blurs is not new.

[Commander McLane]

Now I managed to get at least some distribution of the nebulas with sky_blur_cluster_chance. It's really a matter of fine-tuning, as I found out.

But sky_n_blurs doesn't work. I even had a silly idea and played with the syntax, just in case it might by sky_blurs_n instead. No result.

[JensAyton]

Weird. Does sky_n_stars work?

[Commander McLane]

What shall I say: I've tried

Code: Select all

        "sky_n_stars" = 10000; 

and: "Oh, it's full of stars!"

However increasing the number to 100000 didn't seem to add more. Perhaps there is an upper limit?

Encouraged by this then added

Code: Select all

        "sky_n_blurs" = 10000; 

and now the sky literally turned white. Blurs and nebula everywhere!

So I'm wondering what I have done wrong before. I've taken sky_n_stars out again, but left sky_n_blurs untouched. Fired up, launched ... nothing. Black sky.

So: Perhaps sky_n_blurs is somehow dependent on sky_n_stars, only executed when also the latter is present?

*****

By the way: What would be a range of default values for both?

[Commander McLane]

Some further tests reveal that also the combination

Code: Select all

        "sky_n_blurs" = 1; 
        "sky_n_stars" = 1000; 

or even

Code: Select all

        "sky_n_blurs" = 1; 
        "sky_n_stars" = 1000; 

result in an almost completely white-with-nebulas sky.

So I guess that the two variables are somehow intermingling in a not-intended way, especially sky_n_stars influencing sky_n_blurs.

The values

Code: Select all

        "sky_n_blurs" = 50; 
        "sky_n_stars" = 100; 

produce a halfway believable result, but of course also most of the stars are gone now (not that they were recognizable in all those nebulas before...). On the other hand I don't see a difference to

Code: Select all

        "sky_n_blurs" = 1; 
        "sky_n_stars" = 100; 

or

Code: Select all

        "sky_n_blurs" = 0; 
        "sky_n_stars" = 100; 

for that matter.

[JensAyton]

I’m boggled. But since I’m supposed to be swapping out the entire sky implementation soon anyway, I’m not going to do anything about it right now.