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Suggestion Odd angles

Opi Vali

Active Member
Messages
216
I was wondering, is it possible that the Sim Settlement guys could make spacers that work for those odd angles in settlements so we can more easily line things up with the borders? As a example at Sanctuary in the water of the creek moving away from the bridge towards the lake, granite quarry & the little fishing pier just be on the wild mongrel there is a angle that follows the creek. None of the spacers has that angle quite right, unless I just really suck at lining things up. Which is always more likely than not.

If we can get those for each settlement it would make using plots let alone the junk town fences plots easier.

I maybe the rare bread who likes using all the build area and having it fenced in with just one entrance.
 
The 'Place Anywhere' mod is your friend here, just turn off snapping and placing becomes much more organic. If objects, especially floors overlap just make sure to change the height of one of them slightly to avoid texture flicker.

Edit: Should have said Place Everywhere, and as @Catallaxis pointed out it's not as easy in xbox.
 
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The 'Place Anywhere' mod is your friend here, just turn off snapping and placing becomes much more organic. If objects, especially floors overlap just make sure to change the height of one of them slightly to avoid texture flicker.

Well, he is on console... so maybe that Q P stick? I still think Place Anywhere/everywhere is the best tool...

John
 
You can also use the precise positing feature of Place Anywhere to "nudge" objects a specified distance along an object's axes. You can nudge in increments of 0.1, 0.5, 1, 5, and 10 units. 10 units is about 6 inches, I think.

A standard 1x1 floor piece is 256 units across.

A good way to create irregularly sized structures, such as, for example, a 1.5x1.5 floor is to place the first floor, use the PA options menu to copy its position, and then paste that position to another floor piece. The two floor pieces will then occupy exactly the same location. Then use the precise positioning tool to "nudge" one of the floor pieces precisely 128 units across. To resolve the texture flickering, just "nudge" one of the floors downward by 0.1 units and viola! It will look as though the floor pieces had snapping points in the middle.

Another good trick: when you're having trouble getting objects to snap together because other objects are in the way, is to use the Place Anywhere options menu to temporarily disable the objects that are in the way. Snap together the pieces you want and then re-enable the objects and everything will be in position with minimal hassle.

Grid snapping can also be used to precisely match object rotation to other objects, though using it with objects that have snap points requires a trick.

There are a whole bunch of tricks you can pull off with Place Anywhere if you know how.
 
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Grid Snapping, sigh, the 1st time I read that I was hopping for a grid overlay across the whole settlement to make things neater.
 
Grid Snapping, sigh, the 1st time I read that I was hopping for a grid overlay across the whole settlement to make things neater.

For 99% of my builds, I am not so worried about things snapping together exactly. Reason being, IRL things shift and settle over time. Place anywhere is just amazing with what you can do with it. I learned how to do a lot of this stuff from building model railroad scenery. Here's an example... bear with me.
ENH20191228124215_1.jpg


So this is a walkway that I built at Abernathy. The terrain goes up and down, and you can see how each slab isn't perfectly lined up. ALL of it was done using PA. One fairly critical thing I found out is that the slabs cannot be stacked a full height. Reason? When you walk down the path, you can get stuck at the edge of a slab because the height is too great. Going down is never a problem.
ENH20191228124133_1.jpg

Here you can see how the land form goes up and down. Right in the center where the three fence posts are, the path sort of buried itself into the ground, and didn't really look all that smooth. So.... I tore that out and made a gentle curve with the slabs using PA. I was also testing out the walkway for those uphill pathing problems I mentioned before. So I had to reposition most of the slabs for height. The rocks and some of the plant cover were added to cover holes underneath the walkway.

ENH20191229125917_1.jpg


Here's the area rebuilt. That big rock is actually 4 pieces that were stacked and positioned using PA. It adds some visual interest, and it looks like the path was built on top and over the outcrop. Super common here in New England.

ENH20191228124109_1.jpg


And this is the bottom end where the path curves towards the main house. You can see the holes underneath the walkways. They will be covered by groundcovers... I like using Creative Gardens for that.
ENH20191229224342_1.jpg

I added a few trees as viewblocks. More would be added on both sides of the path. But I like having lighted paths so I can see where in the hell I am going if possible.
ENH20200111125914_1.jpg

So I added these Japanese lanterns from Awarhero's Japanese decor mod. They require no power.... perfect for items like this. I also built a picket fence line along the path. Again, PA saved the day. The fences are not continuous, there are places where you can see old fencing and newer parts. Typical New England. I got the idea for the fence from the Minuteman National Park. There are parts of the original 'Battle Road' that go through private property, and this is just one of the methods they used to mark the paths and make it fit into the overall scenery.
Hope this helped some, and gave you some ideas of your own
 
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For 99% of my builds, I am not so worried about things snapping together exactly. Reason being, IRL things shift and settle over time. Place anywhere is just amazing with what you can do with it. I learned how to do a lot of this stuff from building model railroad scenery. Here's an example... bear with me.
Bear in mind that Opi Vali is gaming on an Xbox One.

Place Anywhere and Place Everywhere are different mods. Place Everywhere is exclusive to PC because it requires f4se, while Place Anywhere is the closest equivalent available for Xbox.

PA is substantially less versatile than PE. If you know all the tricks, then almost anything you can do with PE, you can also do with PA, but lot of those tricks are obscure and inconvenient.

For example, I wanted to make a path similar to yours (nice path, by the way), but I wanted to tilt some of the floor pieces to more closely match the lay of the land. It's not obvious that this is possible with PA, because it contains no controls for tilting objects, but you can do it.

I took a kitchen scale (because it's a physics object with a cuboid shape and a clear top and front) and dropped it on the ground. When it came to rest on the slope, I used PA to copy its position coordinates. I then pasted those coordinates to a floor piece, and now the angle of my floor piece matched the slope of the land. Using physics objects to capture and copy irregular angles is one of those tricks that is far from obvious, and it's kind of janky, but it does work.

EDIT: If the ground is uneven, you can even rescale the kitchen scale (heh) to be about the size of a floor piece, so that it will correctly straddle any small bumps and dips, before copying its position.
 
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Bear in mind that Opi Vali is gaming on an Xbox One.

Place Anywhere and Place Everywhere are different mods. Place Everywhere is exclusive to PC because it requires f4se, while Place Anywhere is the closest equivalent available for Xbox.

PA is substantially less versatile than PE. If you know all the tricks, then almost anything you can do with PE, you can also do with PA, but lot of those tricks are obscure and inconvenient.

For example, I wanted to make a path similar to yours, but I wanted to tilt some of the floor pieces to more closely match the lay of the land. It's not obvious that this is possible with PA, because it contains no controls for tilting objects, but you can do it. I took a kitchen scale (because it's a physics objects with a cuboid shape and a clear top and front) and dropped it on the ground. When it came to rest on the slope, I used PA to copy its position coordinates. I then pasted those coordinates to a floor piece, and now the angle of my floor piece matched the slope of the land.

Ahh..... but you can tilt items in PA. Not possible on Xbox to my knowledge because of the F4SE requirement ....You highlight the object without selecting it and hit your mouse button. Axis is selected by punching CRTL key. Each tap switches x, y or z, with z being tilt. If you end up doing an unintentional movement, you can undo it by hitting the backspace. That only works if you catch it before making another move.
 
Ahh..... but you can tilt items in PA. Not possible on Xbox to my knowledge because of the F4SE requirement ....You highlight the object without selecting it and hit your mouse button. Axis is selected by punching CRTL key. Each tap switches x, y or z, with z being tilt. If you end up doing an unintentional movement, you can undo it by hitting the backspace. That only works if you catch it before making another move.
Again, I suspect you're confusing PE and PA. I don't think PA is even available for the PC.

Rotating objects using PA is a substantially more clumsy procedure, and one that I don't think the author even anticipated.
 
I can certainly appreciate those on a console doing builds - and have seen many spectacular designs. My patience would have its soul crushed if I had to do it that way... I have tried to watch people on Y Tube do videos and about 5 minutes with the QPA stick, angles with a bread box - dear Lord, what you folks do to succeed.

I just wanted to thank the console users for their dedication - I have taken PE on PC for granted - and honestly, I wouldn't want to "go back"... it's like remembering the days of a modem - 56k was amazing for its time...

Anyway, thanks and much love and appreciation for your guys work, diligence, and thank you @Catallaxis for the support you provide to other users.

John
 
[QUOTE="MrCJohn, post: 83147, member: 266"
Anyway, thanks and much love and appreciation for your guys work, diligence, and thank you @Catallaxis for the support you provide to other users.
John[/QUOTE]

Thanks guys. It's one of the best parts of being here. Sharing ideas, techniques, and solid information is where it's at.

Just so I can finish out my photo story, here's a couple first person views of the pathway during daylight hours. I might put a few more plants in here and there, but it's basically done.

ENH20200119180530_1.jpg


At the rocks.... turn left.
ENH20200119180650_1.jpg


And look right
ENH20200119180619_1.jpg


Coming up to the curve.....
ENH20200119180724_1.jpg


Turning for home....
ENH20200119180751_1.jpg


Hope you folks liked the photostory, it took awhile to put together.
 
Again, I suspect you're confusing PE and PA. I don't think PA is even available for the PC.

Rotating objects using PA is a substantially more clumsy procedure, and one that I don't think the author even anticipated.
Yes, I certainly got the two names muddled up, far too similar.
 
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