Unwrapping, faces and LI

[Sunbleached]

Hello! How does unwrapping and the number of faces affect LI? I noticed that the same model with a different UV and the number of faces has a different LI. why is this happening and how to save resources on this?

[arton Rotaru]

It's the number of vertices which count against the land impact (download weight). A vertex can only hold the data of one position coordinate, one UV coordinate, one normal vector, and some more types which aren't relevant for SL though.  A UV split doubles the vertices along the split. A material boarder creates duplicates as well. Same for hard edges.

So the strategy is to split UVs at hard edges, and on material borders if possible, to save resources. Because, if you have duplicates from hard edges already, the UV split, or material border won't create any further duplication there.

You may notice a different vertex count in the viewers import window.

Edited September 18, 2019 by arton Rotaru

[Kyrah Abattoir]

I can't be bothered to check but I believe that each unique SL "face", also counts towards your object's complexity.

EDIT: Do keep in mind that LL intent on re-balancing LI & complexity calculations in a near future.

Edited September 19, 2019 by Kyrah Abattoir

[ChinRey]

On 9/19/2019 at 7:22 AM, Kyrah Abattoir said:

I can't be bothered to check but I believe that each unique SL "face", also counts towards your object's complexity.

I does indeed. Each face of a mesh is treated as a separate "submesh" with its own vertices and everything. That often means vertices will have to be split and it can also mean that the compression algorithm won't be as efficient. Usually the difference isn't enough to affect the land impact but sometimes it can.