Advanced Video Settings

From Dual-Boxing.com

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--MiRai 17:18, 19 June 2011 (CDT)

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What Is This?

This is a handy guide that will break down each video setting for World of Warcraft into a slightly easier slash command so that they
may be used in a window swapping macro.

“What is a window swapping macro and what the hell good is it?”

A window swapping macro is a macro that will fire when you swap game windows. If you currently use software which doesn’t have
this feature built in you can still use this guide and assign a macro to a key that you would press after you’ve swapped windows. The
second option is slightly less effective but can still be useful none-the-less.

Now, as to how it can be useful is for those people who do often change windows and like their main window to be at a higher video
setting than their slave windows. Of course, you could always just go into the Game Menu and change the Video Settings yourself
but, that quickly becomes tedious.

Those of you who use a multiboxing software solution which gives you the ability to swap your windows instantly may notice an
increase in swap time depending on which settings you choose to modify and by how much those values change in the windows being
swapped. This increase in time is hardware dependent and people with slower systems may experience a slightly longer swap time than
those with faster systems.

For example, swapping to a window that is currently using Fair settings and increasing those settings to Ultra on-the-fly during the
swap, will most likely increase the time it takes to swap regardless of how fast the system is.

However, if you’re only slightly changing the View Distance when you swap, the impact may be negligible; but, it is up to the GPU and
CPU on how fast they want to draw the new scenery -- A slight stutter may still occur.

As a reference, using a GTX 580 GPU I can see anywhere between a 1 - 1.5 second increase in swap time while heavily modifying video
settings on-the-fly. You may experience something similar or different depending on GPU make and model.

This guide was inspired by the original FPS saver macro for Cataclysm by Fef.

Video Settings

NOTE: If you choose to use values which are different than those listed in the tables below,
they will show as "Custom" in your Video Settings menu. Also, I have listed the CVars as they
are shown in the World of Warcraft console and while they look to be cAsE sEnSiTiVe, they are
not.

Texture Resolution

Usage:

/console baseMIP setting
/console terrainMipLevel setting
/console componentTextureLevel setting

Technically, not all 3 flags must be set in order to achieve certain settings but, doing so makes it much easier to track which setting
level you're actually using and it makes it much easier to explain. componentTextureLevel does accept a "7" but I am unaware of
what it affects.

Texture Filtering

Usage:

/console textureFilteringMode setting

For more information on Anisotropic Filtering (AF) (That's right, I just cited Wikipedia!)

Projected Textures

Usage:

/console projectedTextures setting

While any positive integer will enable Projected Textures, it is unknown whether values > 1 have any effect.

Shadow Quality

Usage:

/console shadowMode setting
/console ShadowTextureSize setting

Self explanatory // No notes.

Liquid Detail

Usage:

/console waterDetail setting
/console rippleDetail setting
/console reflectionMode setting

While reflectionMode does accept any integer between 0 and 3, 1 and 2 do not seem to affect it in anyway.

Sunshafts

Usage:

/console SunShafts setting

Self explanatory // No notes.

Particle Density

Usage:

/console particleDensity setting
/console weatherDensity setting

particleDensity may use any integer true to: 10 ≤ x ≤ 100.

View Distance

Usage:

/console farclip setting

farclip may use any integer true to: 0 ≤ x ≤ 1250.

Environmental Detail

Usage:

/console environmentDetail setting

While a setting < 50 or > 150 may be used, it does not seem to affect the distance at which objects are drawn.

Ground Clutter

Usage:

/console groundEffectDensity setting
/console groundEffectDist setting

groundEffectDensity may use any integer true to: 0 ≤ x ≤ 256.

Miscellaneous Settings

NOTE: The settings below are more or less for looks and do not necessarily affect FPS. It is not
necessary to include them in a window swapping macro since they will most likely be set once
and then left alone.

Pixel Shaders

/console ffx setting

This is a setting that does nothing by itself but is required to be enabled for ffxGlow and ffxDeath.

Full-Screen Glow Effect

/console ffxGlow setting

This is an old setting that was removed in Cataclysm which gives sort of a bloom/blur effect. I'm not sure if this is enabled by default
anymore but, while some people hated it and others loved it... I have included it for you all. This setting does not seem to be active in
all zones (e.g. Nagrand). Note: Requires ffx to be enabled.

Death Effect

/console ffxDeath setting

Another setting that was also removed in Cataclysm and I am unsure whether it is enabled by default. Some users have reported that
enabling this setting does affect FPS. Note: Requires ffx to be enabled.

Horizon Mountain Draw Distance

/console horizonFarclipScale setting

This setting sets the distance at which the horizon mountains can be seen.

Blood Effects

/console violenceLevel setting

This setting changes how blood looks in game.

Breaking It Down [NOT COMPLETE]

This section gives a quick example on how a window swapping macro may look like. You can copy and paste the following macros to
attain the default in-game video settings.

Good

/console baseMIP 0
/console terrainMipLevel 0
/console componentTextureLevel 8
/console textureFilteringMode 3
/console projectedTextures 1
/console shadowMode 1
/console ShadowTextureSize 2048
/console waterDetail 2
/console rippleDetail 1
/console reflectionMode 0
/console SunShafts 2?
/console particleDensity 60
/console weatherDensity 1
/console farclip 727
/console environmentDetail 100
/console groundEffectDensity 64
/console groundEffectDist 160

/console baseMIP 0
/console terrainMipLevel 0
/console componentTextureLevel 9
/console textureFilteringMode 4
/console projectedTextures 1
/console shadowMode 2
/console ShadowTextureSize 2048
/console waterDetail 2
/console rippleDetail 1
/console reflectionMode 0
/console SunShafts 2
/console particleDensity 80
/console weatherDensity 2
/console farclip 1057
/console environmentDetail 125
/console groundEffectDensity 96
/console groundEffectDist 200

/console baseMIP 0
/console terrainMipLevel 0
/console componentTextureLevel 9
/console textureFilteringMode 5
/console projectedTextures 1
/console shadowMode 3
/console ShadowTextureSize 2048
/console waterDetail 3
/console rippleDetail 2
/console reflectionMode 3
/console SunShafts 2
/console particleDensity 100
/console weatherDensity 3
/console farclip 1250
/console environmentDetail 150
/console groundEffectDensity 128
/console groundEffectDist 260