Hybrid settings 2.0

Existor

Russian Federation4295 Posts

February 06 2014 19:49 GMT

tl;dr You can have Hybrid Settings on any graphic settings level - from Medium to Ultra - just add lighting=0 line to your variables (don't forget about Blob shadows, if you want them). In this thread below you will see optimized settings, that are between low and medium.

Hello, SC2 and TL.net community! After doing tons of settings tests with StarCraft 2, JaKaTaK with me managed to bring back well known Hybrid Settings. What was so unique in these settings? They were different from official ingame settings presets, and they took a place between Low and Medium. In StarCraft 2 you may notice huge difference between Low and Medium settings - shaders, tons of effects, etc.

You may check previous Hybrid Settings in this thread. It was and it is possible to get them without editing game resources, which violates Terms of Use. Just edit official game settings and adjust them manually through variables.txt, which can be officially edited by players, because variables.txt is just a file with your game settings "on paper" instead of ingame options and dropboxes with Low or Ultra variants.

Well, Hybrid Settings stopped working with patch 1.5.3 (big client-patch for WoL) and 2.0.0 (HotS patch), and there was no solution to bring them back, until now...

Brighter and not shiny

Low settings making game darker and a bit more color saturated. Medium and higher settings solve this problem by adding better lighting, entire brightness, contrast and colors become more easy for eyes, but Mediums also added shiny effect, which isn't beloved by many players so they still are staying at Low settings, even today in 2014. It's understandable - they want more clear graphic without many details and special effects. And the shiny effect was one of the most distracting sometimes, or just annoying. Especially with creep on winter and korean bright maps.

Unnecessary effects removed, important ones are back

On low settings you may notice, that you can not separate and understand when the Mothership Core is warping, and when Nexus builds just Probes. You also can't see which units are in warping process, because of low models. Force Fields sometimes are very hard to see on low settings, and they become clearly visible, brighter and "sharper" only on medium settings. Also cloaking effects aren't that good on low settings too. There can be tons of small things why Low settings aren't that good, but still, they are clear and do not distract with many unnecessary effects, like foliage or distracting glowing minerals when they are mined by workers.

Compromise between clearness and nice picture

Hybridic settings is a mixture of some most noticeable effects. For example on low settings you can not set Models to high, meaning that you will never see warping units or nice deaths from acid or flame. Or the creep, which is blocky on low settings, and has giggling-wiggling water-animation on Mediums or higher. You can turn Terrain to Low and turn that animation off, but creep edges become so sharp and pixelated... well, this was fixed too.

VampireCraft 2

Unlike previous Hybridic settings, here you will not see Shadows, at all. It means that game becomes even more clear and easy to read, because sometimes shadows may distract too: you may miss burrowed Widow Mine hole under shadow from a tree, or shadow from cliff will make it harder to see something small and important.

And we paid attention to those who prefer to play with basic shadows aka blob-shadows (black blob under air and ground units).

Installation on Windows

Choose your Texture quality which you prefer more.
Set Graphics Quality to Low (i.e. everything to low)
Find your variables.txt, located here / Documents / StarCraft II / .. and backup them, if you will want to return to old settings.
Close the StarCraft 2 game, if it's launched.
Copypaste the following code to the end of your original variables.txt:

antialias=0
bakeTerrainLighting=0
creeptrans=1
globalhdr=1
glossmaps=1
GraphicsOptionEffectsDetail=1
GraphicsOptionModelQuality=1
GraphicsOptionOverallQualityVer7[15]=5
GraphicsOptionPortraits=1
GraphicsOptionShaderDetail=1
GraphicsOptionShadowQuality=0
lighting=0
lightingLevel=2
lightingregionmapterrain=1
localhdr=1
lowqualitymodels=0
normalmap=1
particlelod=1
pixellight=1
portraits3d=0
preBlendedCreep=0
sampleFOW=1
shadows=1
shadowmapsize=1
simplifiedCloaking=0
simplifiedShaders=0
spec=1
splatlod=1
textureBasedFOW=1
use20shaders=0
useLowqualitymodels=0
Save and close variables.txt, and launch StarCraft 2 to try new Hybrid Settings.

Installation on Mac

Click anywhere on your Desktop.
Select Go from the system menu bar and select "Go to Folder": http://i50.tinypic.com/28vt2yw.png
Copy/Paste the following line:
~/Library/Application Support/Blizzard/StarCraft II
Press enter and you should now see your variables.txt files.
Copypaste the code from the above to the end of your original variables.txt:
Save and close variables.txt, and launch StarCraft 2 to try new Hybrid Settings.

To make game even more clear in terms of ground textures, do the next two steps:
- Set Textures to Low
- Change in variables.txt alternatelowtextures=1 to 0. This parameter may fix problems with pink/black terrain for those, who have this problem.
Change GraphicsOptionShadowQuality=0 to 1, if you want to change blob-shadows to no-shadows.
Change splatlod=1 to 0, if you do not want black-holes texture around static-burrowed units.
If you want to have Ultra settings (or any other) without shiny-effect, add lighting=0 to your variables.txt.
This will also remove all the shadows and give you different look of login/menu screen (check below in Known issues)
If you want a small perfomance boost, try to use bitdepth=16, it will change your ingame colors a bit, but for some users it can cause some problems. So, experiment with it.
To remove special unit deaths (from acid and flame weapons), you can turn on Reduced Violence option. It will simplify all the deaths in the game, but also remove everything with blood.
To remove Hybrid Settings, delete lighting=0 from your variables.txt and set everything in the game to your preferred settings.
You can customize creep edge: it can be sharp or smooth. creeptrans=0 will give you sharp creep edge, like on DIMAGA's or AcerCella's streams. creeptrans=1 will give you smooth creep edge, like on low settings.

There is one known issue right now, that are side effects of these new Hybrid Settings. Because we turned entire game lighting, login and menu screens have different... lookIt can not be fixed. The only way is to type your email and password quicker and login to the game, quicker switch to any of ingame screens (i.e. Matchmaking, Customs, Arcade or Replays)

If you have lag, purple terrain/models and FPS drops, try to clear cache from ProgramData / BlizzardEntertainment / StarCraft II (this folder might be hidden, google how to show hidden folders).

If you still have problems with FPS drops and lags, in "Arcade" search map called preloader and launch it. Do this every time you launch SC2 for a better performance.

If you modify any of your game settings (graphic, sound, social, etc) after copypasting Hybrid settings code, blob-shadows and some other Hybrid features may dissapear. This small problem may be caused by conflicts between some parameters, like between low shadows and medium shaders, which can not be reached officially through game options. Solution - repeat installation from the 1st step, from turning everything to low (except doing backup of your variables, if you already have backup)

The best solution to solve FPS problems and pink/black terrain is to do following steps:

Remove lighting=0 from your variables.txt
Clear cache from ProgramData / BlizzardEntertainment / StarCraft II (this folder might be hidden, google how to show hidden folders)
Turn everything in game settings to Low. Close the game.
Turn everything in game settings to Ultra. Close the game.
Turn everything in game settings to Low again. Close the game.
Make "Scan and Repair" in Battle.Net launcher (under SC2 logo Options > Scan and Repair)
Copypast Hybrid options to the end of your variables.txt
Launch the Preloader map (you may find it in the Arcade)

- OR-

Just repeat 2-3 times game repairing.

In this thread you will see different variations of Hybrid settings. Why those two presets are called Hybrid too? Well, because they have some stuff from Low and Medium settings, and in both presets you will see graphic settings combinations that you can not do through official game options. You can not have High models on low settings and you can not completely turn off shadows on mediums. In this thread I will tell you about some interesting possibilities with editing variables.txt. Thanks to AFSpeeDy and pharaphobia for Hybrid-Lows and Hybrid-Mediums.

Don't forget to check these settings with Hybrid Settings Lite, that have different versions of Low (brighter) and Medium (no shadows) settings

http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/starcraft-2/461090-hybrid-settings-lite

purakushi

United States3300 Posts

February 06 2014 19:54 GMT

Awesome! I was sad when the old hybrid settings no longer worked.

Also: "beaty" ><

InFluenza

Netherlands55 Posts

February 06 2014 19:55 GMT

Thanks a lot for this post! I always try to change my graphics a little bit in the viariables because I don't like blizzard's standards :D

Existor

Russian Federation4295 Posts

February 06 2014 19:57 GMT

On February 07 2014 04:54 purakushi wrote:
Awesome! I was sad when the old hybrid settings no longer worked.

Also: "beaty" ><

Oops, fixed

TurboMaN

Germany925 Posts

February 06 2014 20:02 GMT

Is it easier to see cloaked units with hybrid compared to low settings?

AFSpeeDy

126 Posts

February 06 2014 20:02 GMT

Loving it!

Existor

Russian Federation4295 Posts

February 06 2014 20:13 GMT

On February 07 2014 05:02 TurboMaN wrote:
Is it easier to see cloaked units with hybrid compared to low settings?

Cloaking is same as on medium shaders.

qwertyindeed

151 Posts

February 06 2014 20:23 GMT

Before settings graphics to low, which texture quality do you guys recommend?
edit: i also have another variables.txt at sStarCraft II\Accounts\xxxxxx\ . should i replace that one too?

Existor

Russian Federation4295 Posts

February 06 2014 20:30 GMT

Before settings graphics to low, which texture quality do you guys recommend?

Which you prefer most. Depends on your videocard memory and your preferences.

i also have another variables.txt at sStarCraft II\Accounts\xxxxxx\ . should i replace that one too?

Don't touch them. Not need.

JaKaTaKSc2

United States2787 Posts

February 06 2014 20:54 GMT

#10

BAM! Hell yea. So glad to bring this option back to you all with the help of Existor. I'd like to add a bit on texture:

Textures have an effect on what cloaked units look like. With low textures there are more straight segments on the cloak "blur". With medium and higher textures there is a more grainy quality to it making it (IMO) more difficult to see/notice. I'll come back with some screen caps to show you what I mean.

Deleted User 137586

7859 Posts

February 06 2014 21:01 GMT

#11

These settings turned all terrain bright pink O_o

[image loading]

JaKaTaKSc2

United States2787 Posts

February 06 2014 21:04 GMT

#12

That should fix if you clear you cache.

If you have lag, purple terrain/models and FPS drops, try to clear cache from ProgramData / BlizzardEntertainment / StarCraft II (this folder might be hidden, google how to show hidden folders)

If you still have problems with FPS drops and lags, in "Arcade" search map called preloader and launch it. Do this every time you launch SC2 for better performance.

Existor

Russian Federation4295 Posts

February 06 2014 21:04 GMT

#13

On February 07 2014 06:01 Ghanburighan wrote:
These settings turned all terrain bright pink O_o

JimmyJRaynor

Canada16185 Posts

February 06 2014 21:06 GMT

#14

i find that adding this line to variables.txt greatly improves performance without screwing up the graphics.

bitdepth=16

Existor

Russian Federation4295 Posts

February 06 2014 21:08 GMT

#15

On February 07 2014 06:06 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
i find that adding this line to variables.txt greatly improves performance without screwing up the graphics.

bitdepth=16

Oh, forgot this good option. Thanks for reminding. Added it to code in the OP

DannyJ

United States5110 Posts

February 06 2014 21:09 GMT

#16

Still pissed that they stopped letting people keep shadows but turn off other shaders. Think it was turn HDR off or something?

Deleted User 137586

7859 Posts

February 06 2014 21:13 GMT

#17

On February 07 2014 06:04 Existor wrote:

Show nested quote +

Cleared the cache, made no difference

Anything in these settings that might be causing it?

Existor

Russian Federation4295 Posts

February 06 2014 21:17 GMT

#18

On February 07 2014 06:09 DannyJ wrote:
Still pissed that they stopped letting people keep shadows but turn off other shaders. Think it was turn HDR off or something?

lighting=0 and GraphicsOptionShadowQuality=0 leads to no shadows. But I highly recommend you to use blob-shadows, because they make units more clear and bolded especially on bright maps.

Cleared the cache, made no difference Anything in these settings that might be causing it?

• Update your videocard drivers to the latest
• Repair the game through Battle.Net launcher

KrazyTrumpet

United States2520 Posts

February 06 2014 21:32 GMT

#19