World Generation

## Introduction

Each server in Chronicles of Elyria contains a unique procedurally generated world with its own unique geography, which results from a process called **World Generation**.

## World Generation

For this process, first the world's surface is broken up into tectonic plates. The interaction of these plates over time is simulated forming the shapes of the continents, as well as subduction zones, mountains, and volcanoes. Height generation algorithms are then run on the continents resulting in natural feeling terrain. A system of wind patterns and pressure systems is generated and combined with the latitude, used to produce a humidity map. The humidity and topology are combined to generate rivers, lakes, rain shadows (which alter the humidity map), and watersheds. Water sources, elevation, and geographical features determine soil types, as well as distribution of metals and other natural resources. Temperature is determined by latitude and elevation. These steps establish the biomes and their climate, which are then populated with plants, animals, and people. The last step is establishing the boundaries of Kingdoms, Duchies, and Counties.

## World Selection

For selection of the best 'seed' for each of the four initially planned game servers, SBS supported a unique process. This ended with the selection of the final world seed for each server and the possibility for all players to select their 'home' server for their accounts.

### Map Voting

In order to make the player community have a mayor say in the worlds they would play on, for each of the four initially planned game servers, SBS rolled out a 2-stage **Map Voting** process during game development. This process started with the generation of a large number of worlds (> 100), each initiated with a unique 'seed', to a level of detail that would reveal the size and locations of the continents of Elyria and the major climate zones and main biomes on the designated starting continent. Based on these intermediate versions, SBS preselected twenty for usage on the three continental servers (Angelica, Luna and Selene). These maps also got kingdom borders drawn in. In Round 1, the player community got to select 5 of these maps for either of the continental servers. In a second vote Round 2, more details were added to the rendered maps and the player community made their final selection for each server. For Oceanus, 8 maps were made avaliable to choose from. The process resulted in the 4 Maps of Elyria for each of the four servers.

More details on the Map Voting process, and the intermediate and final results are presented on this dedicated page: Map Voting.

### Server Selection

With the maps selected in the map voting process, the player community was enabled to select one of the servers for their account.

## Domain & Settlement Selection

After the map voting process, the world generation continues on a more detailed level for the four selected world maps (seeds) to give increasingly more detailed information on the Map of Elyria for each of the four servers. The first subsequent phase will provide the info needed for the player community to select their domains. The process of Domain & Settlement Selection is anticipated to take place in Q1 2019.

## Exploration

After launch the process of world generation will continue with each first step characters take in Elyria. More information on this may be disclosed in later stages.

## Addition / Regeneration

The addition of new features to the live parts of Elyria can be considered 'addition' and/or 'regeneration' of parts of the world. No concrete information on this process has been disclosed yet.

## References

1. ↑ Caspian, A World Being Built, 14 August 2016
2. ↑ Serpentius, Announcement of Map Voting!, 18 October 2018
3. ↑ Serpentius, Server Selection starts November 19th!, 16 November 2018
4. ↑ Serpentius, November 2018 Promo Comes to an End, 30 November 2018