BalrondNatureOptimizer

Balrond Nature Optimizer

Conservative compatibility and performance fixes for Balrond Amazing Nature 1.3.8.

Version 0.7.7 is intentionally narrow. It keeps the verified fixes that still match Amazing Nature 1.3.8, restores the bounded material-state guard, adds exact handling for the two small portals and floating ocean debris, and removes the obsolete 1.3.7 branches and the unreleased 0.8 runtime GPU experiment.

Amazing Nature 1.3.8 is a hard, exact runtime contract. The package depends on that release, the DLL declares a versioned BepInEx dependency, and startup additionally checks the loaded plugin metadata for equality with 1.3.8. A mismatch leaves the optimizer inactive instead of applying uncertain patches.

All settings are captured once at startup. Fully restart Valheim after changing the config.

What 0.7.7 keeps

• Allocation-free replacement for BalrondHashCompat.StableHash reflection.
• Serving Tray master disable, pre-mutation auto-registration block, and exclusions for four audited 196k-243k triangle food displays.
• Poison-geyser generation disable or one-time particle/light/spawner limits when geysers remain enabled.
• Swamp clutter and vegetation controls, plus Amazing Nature clutter density and non-instanced clutter controls.
• Opt-in, startup-only protection against Amazing Nature's overbroad force-alpha material pass.
• Optional one-time shadow removal on five audited heavy building templates.
• The Balrond Constructions null hit-effect compatibility repair.
• Verified vanilla streaming patches: distant-terrain slicing, exact ZDO comparer caches, StaticPhysics recheck cadence, and terrain-triggered clutter time-slicing.
• Session cleanup for the two current Amazing Nature caches and optimizer-owned state.

The old lava, Plains heat, biome-message width, status/stamina, Deep North, station/converter, Dverger, iced-tree, stalagmite, recipe, tutorial, tentacle, obsolete world-field, texture, mip, and heavy-tree LOD branches are not present in 0.7.7.

Monster Climbing

Disable Monster Climbing defaults to false, so Amazing Nature's climbing remains enabled unless the user deliberately turns this option on.

Amazing Nature 1.3.8 improved this feature: its Harmony postfix is still entered from every Character.CustomFixedUpdate, but expensive climbing checks are now limited by CheckInterval = 0.1 seconds. An eligible grounded monster can therefore reach two Physics.SphereCast calls about ten times per second, rather than on every 0.02-second physics step. The feature is still measurable in dense combat, while its movement benefit is also real; keeping it enabled by default is the safer gameplay choice.

When the option is enabled, the optimizer resolves only these exact 1.3.8 members:

• Character_CustomFixedUpdate_Patch.Postfix(Character, float);
• Character_OnDestroy_Patch.Prefix(Character);
• MonsterClimbing.States, with the exact Dictionary shape.

It first proves that the exact upstream update postfix is installed, removes it, verifies removal, then clears States, and only then removes the cleanup prefix. If any prerequisite cannot be proven, the dictionary and remaining upstream behavior are left intact.

New 1.3.8 prefab tuning

The portal and debris changes run once, after Amazing Nature registers its prefabs. They require exact prefab/component signatures and make no partial change after a signature mismatch.

| Prefab | Audited original | Default 0.7.7 change |

|---|---|---|

| portal_NatureSmall_bal | 8 looping particle systems, 6 AlwaysSimulate, total cap 5,600, one shadowed realtime point light | All 8 systems use Automatic culling, each cap is limited to 384, and only the exact portal light loses shadows. |

| portal_StoneSmall_bal | 7 looping particle systems, 4 AlwaysSimulate, total cap 5,400, one shadowed realtime point light | All 7 systems use Automatic culling, each cap is limited to 384, and only the exact portal light loses shadows. |

| FloatingDebris_bal | One looping vfx_water_su