Deco Manipulation Improvements.

[dry wigeon]

So I've started dabbling with decos.

It was nice until it became frustrating. Specifically due to what I presume are tethered decorations, but I imagine that it isn't much better for untethered ones.

What would likely be an improvement here, would be for:

• decos to clearly mark what they are linked to, if anything,
• decos to be cycled between, similarly to subobjects - but preferably only within a an area to make things more manageable for heavily decoed vessels
• to have a deco manipulation menu that is easier to access than at present.
• to have more localized deco nuke options than craft-wide nukes via blueprint maintenance.
• even a click to open options menu could be helpful.

I know that there is likely something that I'm missing, and so I'd appreciate tips from people in the know, if this is also a knowledge check issue.

For instance. Deleting the pictured decos has eluded me for an hour or so - and I'm at the point of just deleting all decos and calling it a week.

[versed coral]

the last shift p menu shows decos and tether anchors

you can nuke locally by deleting the mounted blocks and using delete untethered decos, then ctrl z-ing the blocks back

you can cycle between decos on the same anchor with [ ], which is a feature in all menus with tabs

[dry wigeon]

Oh. That is good to know. I will practice that when I get back to decos. Thank you.

[nimble fractal]

Well this is almost the universe calling my name.

If you can't find a block with a decoration tethered to it.

1. Find any block with a decoration and turn on "Decoration Wireframe"

Next you can go into the "Decoration only mode" to find where deco's are tethered

Then all you need to do is hover over the block with the decoration to delete it

If a block is "Untethred" (Usually a deco mesh that is red) you can delete it by pressing Ctrl+X then clicking "Delete Untethred Decorations"

[dry wigeon]

This guidance is very helpful. Thank you!

[nimble fractal]

No problem

Also just some extra stuff

1. Blocks can only hold 200 deco's per block

2. Typing in "Mimic" in the search bar can help you find more complex meshes easier

3. Know your blocks. Sometimes if you can find the right mesh you can skip a good portion of decoration work. For example the periscope ontop of this machinery is only 3 meshes. The Autocannon base, a pole, and a barrel mesh I found in the search bar

Those small buttons were made with small fireboxes and flag posts

4. As a general rule of thumb. Most crafts with deco's won't really lag your game until you get either really high number of deco's (5K +)

Or if you have a lot of subobjects with deco's on them

5. Try and have some sort of "Deco Asset Platform" you can keep all the assets you make just incase you want to put them on your other craft for easier access. You can also prefab any block with deco's on it and paste the decorations with it. You can just paste the deco on a existing block if you paste on top of it

[dry wigeon]

This guidance isn't just helpful. It's epic. Thank you. ^_^

[dry wigeon]

Okay, so one thing that I'm noticing, is that in the menu or cheat sheet and such there doesn't seem to be a keybind for Deco menu.

I know that it's been mentioned to be Ctrl+X but I'm working with a heavily modified keybind set (and the original title isn't jumping out at me in the keybinds list).

So, what I'm currently doing is placing a decoration, deleting it, hoping it goes back to the previous decoration, and modifying from there.

What seems to be a candidate for improvement here:

1 - if there really isn't a listed keybind then list it (or make the name a little more obvious or less obscured)

2 - It would still be nice to be able to easily select or interact with a deco in place. Since many decos can be linked to the same block, maybe this could be kind of like scrolling a list of subobjects, except that these are linked to the same selected block, highlighting individually as cycled through, making things relatively manageable.

3 - Perhaps 'Decoration [Object Name] should be a name applied for searchability.

As an aside - the above assets platform illustrated probably depends on prefabs for copy-paste purposes.

Just some thoughts.

[versed coral]

1. keybinds list and build mode bottom left both list all build mode keybinds, you might find some useful things there
2. is this not what the deco menu is? no idea what you’re talking about
3. what? which search?
   aside - yes, is that an issue?

[nimble fractal]

There is also a keybind to place the block you have selected as a decoration with Ctrl+Shift+X

[dry wigeon]

In retrospect I should have given the default binds more of a chance. Found the 'Place/edit decoration' keybind and listing (I'd been using (my replacement of) the other keybind that BIG RAT mentioned above. I'll need to think up a less involved keybind for deco panel.

By search I meant the Blueprint Maintenance Tools. Mimics can apparently be found here. I figure that shortlisting all deco variants of blocks placed here might be helpful.

[versed coral]

why though

you have deco view

you can find mimics there because they're blocks and there's a block search

[dry wigeon]

Maybe I'm not seeing it. There's the add new decoration. How does one select an existing deco?

Oh... wait... one sec...

Oh! One needs to locate the active block 'point' on the deco's tethered point to gain access to modifying that deco.

That makes more sense. If one knows then one knows.

[versed coral]

huh

what

if you want to edit decos you open the menu from the anchor

I feel like that's intuitive

if you want to edit something, you go to where it is and press the edit button

[dry wigeon]

It does become intuitive - once one knows. Keep in mind that I only just discovered place/edit deco. I was using the other way to place decos.

(as I didn't think that was the keybind to bring up the deco panel)