TES Skyrim SE 0.372

[DaedricServant]

Mirx you are not the only person to ask for ENB water. People asked Boris about it a while age and he gave a similar answer. It doesn't matter how many people ask it's not going to happen.

[ENBSeries]

I simply don't know idea how to make good water, but to keep it moddable and different everywhere as game have it. It's not GTA San Andreas, where water is all the same. Maybe i just need some idea to come, same as i did many features of old Skyrim with delays, because didn't know how to solve puzzles.

[Mirx]

ohh, ok, i hope in the future you can find a good idea to create a better water effect, but i understand.

[Anubis]

Well... there is some kind of water effect in SSE. It is some kind of displacement. Better to observe live.

First picture shows this effect on some Lakeview manor mod:


Second picture is water in Lake Ilinalta (effect is better when looking live water ingame)


(I am using Pure Waters mod - but this effect is visible withaout any water mods also - this picture: )

What appears to amplfy this effect is EnablePostPassShader > ENB Sharpen and luma sharpen options

Is it a long way to extrapolate some kind of water caustics effect from it ?

[ENBSeries]

Distortion and displacement are not the same. Water using normal map to have directions of distortion, mixing them in complicated ways and applying flow. But height of waves can't be computed from normal map, any attempts to do this will make displacement very weird looking. But even if this would not be a problem, to change water shaders must be patched or written new as replacements.

[Anubis]

Ok. Understood.

But what is the main difference between old Skyrim water shaders and SSE water shaders ?

[ENBSeries]

Old water was just a mix of textures with animated uv. New have flow applied, which is difficult enough code to patch it instead of to write new.

[Anubis]

There are some water texture mods, that replace vanilla water. Is it possible to enable some effects to these modded waters ?
(So that if someone wants to have ENB effects on water, then some certain water mod needs to be installed)

[ENBSeries]

Mods do not change facts i described already.

[Anubis]

Ok. Are you saying that even with mods enabled - original vanilla shaders are still used ?

I only ask, because the Pure Waters mod I am using, changes water visually completely - no water flow on lakes and large water bodies, different color of water, smaller ripples and more transparency. Everything is different - how the water looks and how it moves.
I thought that mods completely replace vanilla water.