- Morrowind Grass Mod -

This mod covers various regions of Morrowind with grass. The grass was placed using a utility made by Yacoby, which can place meshes automatically across the landscape based on various random settings.

This release includes the regions of the Bitter Coast, Ascadian Isles, West Gash, Grazelands, and Tamriel Rebuilt's Maps 1 & 2. Each region has it's own esp file so you can choose which regions you want grass. The same 2 grass types are used through all regions, but this won't be the case in the next release. If you're using Morrowind Graphics Extender (MGE), you also have the option for the grass to be animated.

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Downloading & Installation


http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=7762

- Choose either one of these -

For Standard Grass:
Download the Grass_Standard zip file, and extract to the \Morrowind\Data Files\ folder. Tick the esps in the Morrowind Launcher and run game.

For Animated Grass:
Download the Grass_Animated zip file, and extract to the \Morrowind\Data Files\ folder. Follow the instructions in the FAQ below to install. Note that it requires MGE to use animated grass.


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FAQ

* Is this release any different than the beta version?
No. I uploaded it at PES so that it has a permanent home. I figured I'd call it v1.0 as it's no longer being tested, but nothing has been updated yet.


* When will the next version be released?
Probably as soon as some new grass textures are made. If anyone wants to help out with making grass textures, send me (Vality7) a PM at the official forums. I'm not currently working on this mod but if I can get some help then I will get back into it and update it.


* What might the next version include?
- More grass textures for more variation between the regions (this is definate)
- It will be better and more complete (hopefully)
- All regions, all seperate and optional esps - Bitter Coast, Ascadian Isles, West Gash, Grazelands, Solstheim, Sheogorad/Azura's Coast, Ashlands/Molag Amur/Red Mt, and all Tamriel Rebuilt maps as they're released.
- Light, medium and heavy version (maybe)
- Different texture resolutions ranging from 1024 to 256 that you will able to pick from depending on how well it runs (maybe)


* Do you need MGE to run this mod?
No, you only need MGE if you want animated grass.


* How do you get animated grass?
Animated grass is done by using Morrowind Graphics Extender (MGE). The animation sways according to the weather conditions, and it runs a lot better than rendering it through Morrowind, for some people there is no fps hit at all.

1. Download and install the latest version of MGE (or any version from v3.6.0 onwards) from http://sourceforge.net/projects/morrgraphext/files/.
2. Download and extract the Grass_Animated file.
3. Launch MGE, then run the Distant Land Creation Wizard.
4. Tick the mods that you want to create distant land for, including all the grass esps that you want.
5. Once you've completed the distant land creation, close MGE and make sure that the grass mods are not activated in the Morrowind launcher. Then you can run the game and enjoy.


* I don't want animated grass anymore, how do I go back to the normal grass?
Reinstall the standard version, making sure to overwrite any files, then tick the esps in the Morrowind Launcher, and run the game.


* I've got the animated grass working, but why can't I walk through it?
Make sure that the grass esps are not ticked in the Morrowind launcher. MGE renders the grass, so Morrowind doesn't need to. The reason the MGE meshes have collision, is that to optimize the meshes we removed the no-collision node.


* I've got the animated grass working, but why does the grass texture have weird floating bits above it?
You need to make sure you've installed the animated version and not the standard version. The animated version includes meshes that were edited specifically to suit MGE, so they need to be installed.


* Can I render the grass through MGE without using having to use distant land?
No, it's part of the distant land. A simple solution is to use distant land, but set the fog level very low. This way you get the original Morrowind fog, but with the animated grass as well as MGE's water and other MGE features.


* How can I make my game run faster while using this mod?
When rendering the grass through MGE, it runs with little to no fps hit, so I suggest using MGE if you can. MGE also has the option to lower the grass density, which you'll find on the last tab of the distant land creation wizard.

To make the esps lighter you could load up the esps in the construction set and delete some of the grass mesh types, they're grouped according to landscape texture, and can be found under the statics tab with a prefix of GRS_. Some other tips to help with performance - update your graphics card drivers, turn off or turn down AA (Anti-Aliasing) and AF (Anisotropic Filtering) in MGE (if you use it), or in your graphics card's control panel, also perhaps turning down your screen resolution if you must, or even reducing the resolution of the textures may help. I personally reccomend using FPS optimizer to help with performance - it has a 'hide small objects' feature which can really help.


* Why is there grass in places it shouldn't be?
After generating grass on each region, I've gone through and cleared out many stray meshes, such as around doorways, buildings and towns, outdoor fireplaces/campsites, and cleared some paths, but don't be suprised if you see meshes in odd places, I didn't clear them all. You will very likely see grass sticking out of rocks, trees and buildings etc, but this is unavoidable at this stage. You may also find the odd floating mesh on the tops of hills, though if you see any floating meshes around towns or flat areas, then it's likely that you're using a mod which alters the landscape, as the meshes in this mod are placed based on the default morrowind.esm heightmap. The Tamriel Rebuilt grass esp hasn't yet been optimized like the other regions.


* How does Yacoby's Mesh Generator work?
The program will place meshes randomly on the landscape, based on texture placement, based on the heightmap of the esp, and based on settings you input. So you can tell the program to place for example...grass_01.nif on tx_bc_moss.tga, as well as how randomly to place it and how often, then run the generator. It will go through whichever mods you want it to and place grass accordingly. So for this mod I generated grass on average of 3-4 textures per region. Note that this program can be used to place any kind of mesh and not just grass, for example trees, rocks and other kinda of flora. You will be able to use the Mesh Generator to generate grass onto any landscape mod such as Tamriel Rebuilt, Ald Vendras, Havish etc.


* Where can I download Yacoby's Mesh Generator?
Latest version is http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=23065. Note that you don't need to download or use this to play this mod, this is the tool I used to place the grass.

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Permissions: Please wait until the next release before releasing any mods using this grass, and please don't upload any of this elsewhere thanks.


Credits:
Vality - Grass meshes/textures & esps
Yacoby - Grass placement generation utility
Liztail - Animated grass

So I've uploaded it at PES now, it hasn't been updated since the beta, but I am looking for some help with making new grass textures so that I can update it. Send me a PM if you want to help.

:celebration: Woot! Thanks for making it an official release....I wish I had texturing skills to offer help.. :facepalm:

Great job! :goodjob: I've been looking forward to seeing more of your work.

And, I may be late in this, but welcome back.

Awesome.

Wicked. One question can we use the grass generater to create our own esp based on our whole mod list? I use a fair few mods that alter the landscape and it would be cool if I could use the ulitity so that I don't get any grass floating in the air. Anyhow brilliant work, really adds so much to the feel of the game.

yes you can.

Yes you can. I'll have a look for the ini files that I made to generate these with and upload them somewhere, it's been a while but I'm hoping I still have them. You have to do a bit of work to clean up the resulting esps though, such as clearing towns, paths, doorways, outdoor campsites etc.

Why don't you just make them ESMs? Then people could make compatibility patches and stuff.

Another thing- I had offered to make some grass textures for you a while ago, do you still want my help? If so, just tell me what I should try to make.

Thanks Vality, love your mods! Your mods are a significant part of what keeps me coming back to Morrowind.

A range of shades of the animated grass mesh/textures would be most welcome. From lush green through to pale yellow would be awesome. I've generated grass for my 2 MW installs. One that's got TR with normal bleak ashland MW. The other is green MW so I've got animated grass all over the island (yes it takes more work than just generating, there's cleaning up to do afterwards, I used the sledge hammer approach and just deleted named cells from the grass esp's, works pretty well). Anyway both installs have many more mods that have been grassed, Silgrad Tower, Ald Vendras etc for example. Being able to better match the colour of the grass to the under lying land textures I reckon would make things pretty much perfect.


On the OP, thank you Vality7 for the release. You, Liz and Yacoby's work on the grass in addition to MGE has made my MW game look and feel absolutely great.


:goodjob:
-KWM

Awesome thanks again.

Cheers from Adaqueril
AKA Aldanaril

brilliant,thank you Vality7 :lmao:

I wish we had my favorite "woohoo" smiley here. This would definitely get a use of that smiley....

Thanks for giving this to us Vality!

Very cool.

Question, for anyone:

What would a very low fog setting be that's like non-mge fog?

Around 1 or 2, the MGE view distance is just a multiplied version of the vanilla view distance, so setting it to say, 30, would be 30 times the original view distance.

Fantastic Vality7 it's finaly official :foodndrink:, will be reading all about this RELZ and play testing tomorrow.

Awesome mod. It definitely adds character to the game. It's especially good along the coastal regions. This will definitely be in my top graphic mods list for Morrowind. Thanks!

Is there any NM Visual Pack conflicts? v2.0. I just like the older one better.

Plus, can I install both: Grass_Tamriel_Rebuilt.7z AND Grass_Animated.7z ???

I have MGE and plan to install Tamriel rebuilt, IF that even works with MGE.

If you mean the texture replacer, then no there won't be any conflicts, this mod adds grass on top of the landscape.


Yes, the TR zip just contains an additional esp.

Thanks Vality for the personal response. Looking good! :thumbsup:

I remember someone experimenting with making the bottom of the grass transparent or something, which looked pretty good. Does anyone else remember?

Yeah, I remember that, it was exactly what you described, making the alpha near the bottom of the grass more translucent in order to "blend" with the landscape. An interesting concept indeed.

And, in response to the other thread question, you just use the esp's to generate your statics, which results in animated grass with no collision. If you were to check them in the launcher as well, you would have unanimated grass as well as animated, which looks very odd... and they might have collision as well, though my memory is hazy on that, so they may not.

I'm getting ready to install the Animated grass and was wondering why all the .ESP's when the direction say not to tick
these plugs in the launcher. If thats the case then why even place the ESP's in the data files folder and cluttering up my
mash launcher.

My apologies moderators for the double post, but out of common courtesy for other members here, I decided to move this
to its proper place.