Technique Compatibility Matrix

This document provides 2D matrices showing how techniques work together.

Legend:

• ✅ = Strong synergy (designed to work together)
• ⚠️ = Possible (can combine with effort)
• ❌ = Incompatible (fundamentally different paradigms)
• ➖ = Same technique / not applicable

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Core Geometry Techniques

Key Observations:

• G2 (SDF) is fundamentally incompatible with polygon-based techniques (G3, G6, G9)
• G6 (Nanite) works great with traditional meshes, impostors for LOD
• G4 (Voxel) bridges SDF and mesh worlds - can convert to either
• G8 (Noise) is highly compatible with procedural approaches (SDF, voxel, heightmap)

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Geometry × Procedural Generation

Key Observations:

• P6 (Compute Gen) is incompatible with Nanite (needs pre-built clusters)
• P8 (Fractals) work excellently with SDF and voxels, poorly with traditional meshes
• P2 (Terrain) works well with almost everything
• G5 (Splats) don't integrate well with procedural generation (captured data)

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Geometry × Rendering Paradigms

Key Observations:

• R2 (Ray Marching) is the natural match for SDF, incompatible with most mesh techniques
• G6 (Nanite) uses R8 (Software Rasterization) internally
• R7 (Ray Tracing) works with traditional geometry, not SDF or pure procedural
• G4 (Voxel) is flexible - can be ray cast, converted to mesh, or marched

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Geometry × Texture Techniques

Key Observations:

• T6 (Procedural Textures) is the natural match for SDF and procedural geometry
• T7 (Triplanar) is essential for geometry without UV coordinates (voxels, SDF, CSG)
• G5 (Splats) have their own color representation, don't use traditional texturing
• T1 (Compression) doesn't apply to pure procedural (nothing to compress)

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Geometry × Animation

Key Observations:

• A2 (Skeletal) only works with deformable mesh representations (G3, G9)
• A4 (Procedural) is the natural match for SDF and procedural geometry
• G6 (Nanite) has limited skeletal support (world-space evaluation issue)
• A8 (Flipbook) is primarily for billboards and 2D content

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Geometry × Lighting

Key Observations:

• M4 (Lightmaps) requires UV-unwrapped static geometry - incompatible with SDF, noise, CSG
• M1 (Flat) and M7 (Toon) work with almost everything
• G3 (Mesh) is the most lighting-compatible representation
• M8 (Matcap) needs view-space normals, doesn't work with splats

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Geometry × LOD

Key Observations:

• G6 (Nanite) has excellent LOD support - it's the whole point
• L3 (HLOD) and L4 (Impostor) need concrete geometry to merge/bake
• G2 (SDF) has natural continuous LOD (reduce iterations) but no discrete/baked LOD
• L5 (Streaming) works with most approaches that have serializable data

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Geometry × Compression

Key Observations:

• G8 (Noise) is incompatible with all compression - it IS compression
• C3 (Octree) and C7 (DAG) are specifically for voxels
• G7 (Mesh Compression) only applies to mesh-based geometry
• C2 (Quantization) is nearly universal for any numeric data

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Geometry × Precomputation

Key Observations:

• PRE2 (Lightmaps) requires UV-unwrapped static meshes
• PRE8 (SDF Baking) can convert any geometry to SDF representation
• PRE17 (Caching) works with any procedural approach
• G8 (Noise) can't be pre-lightmapped, LOD'd, or AO-baked (no surface)

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Procedural × Procedural

Key Observations:

• Procedural techniques are highly compatible with each other - lots of ✅
• P2 (Terrain) + P3 (Vegetation) + P1 (Buildings) is a classic combination
• P8 (Fractals) is more specialized, harder to integrate with structured generation
• P6 (Compute Gen) enables most other procedural techniques at scale

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Rendering × Rendering (Hybrid Combinations)

Key Observations:

• R2 (Ray Marching) is difficult to combine with other renderers (different paradigm)
• R5 (Deferred) + R7 (RT) is a common hybrid (rasterize G-buffer, trace rays)
• R4 (Particles) integrates well with most rasterization approaches
• Most hybrids require careful depth/compositing handling

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Texture × Texture

Key Observations:

• T1 (Compression) is incompatible with T6 (Procedural) - nothing to compress
• T7 (Triplanar) + T6 (Procedural) is a powerful combination for SDF
• T3 (Atlas) has mipmap bleeding issues with T12 (Detail)
• T4 (Virtual) is a form of atlasing, complex to combine with regular atlases

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Animation × Animation

Key Observations:

• A2 (Skeletal) + A6 (Morph) is the standard character animation combo
• A4 (Procedural) + A2 (Skeletal) enables IK, physics, layered animation
• A5 (VAT) is somewhat isolated - baked simulation doesn't blend well
• A8 (Flipbook) is 2D-focused, doesn't combine with 3D techniques

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Lighting × Lighting

Key Observations:

• M3 (PBR) + M4 (Lightmaps) + M5 (SH) is the standard modern combo
• M7 (Toon) + M8 (Matcap) works well for stylized looks
• M8 (Matcap) is incompatible with M3 (PBR) - completely different philosophy
• Mixing lighting models (M1-M3) on same object looks wrong

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LOD × LOD

Key Observations:

• L5 (Streaming) combines well with everything (orthogonal concept)
• L1 (Discrete) + L3 (HLOD) + L4 (Impostor) is a common multi-level approach
• L2 (Continuous) is harder to combine (transitions vs discrete swaps)

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Spectrum Position × Technique Compatibility

Shows which spectrum positions each technique family works best with.

Geometry Best Positions

Rendering Best Positions

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Full Technique ID Quick Reference

For cross-referencing the matrices:

Geometry: G1=Billboard, G2=SDF, G3=Mesh, G4=Voxel, G5=Splat, G6=Nanite, G7=MeshCompress, G8=Noise, G9=Subdiv, G10=Displace, G11=CSG, G12=NURBS, G13=Heightmap, G14=SpriteStack, G15=StyleTransfer, G16=GeomImage

Procedural: P1=Building, P2=Terrain, P3=Vegetation, P4=ProcTexture, P5=Wang, P6=ComputeGen, P7=Grammar, P8=Fractal

Texture: T1=Compress, T2=Supercompress, T3=Atlas, T4=Virtual, T5=Synthesis, T6=Procedural, T7=Triplanar, T8=Palette, T9=Polynomial, T10=Fourier, T11=Neural, T12=Detail, T14=MaterialID

Rendering: R1=Forward, R2=RayMarch, R3=VoxelCast, R4=Particle, R5=Deferred, R6=Forward+, R7=RT, R8=SoftwareRast, R9=PRT

Compression: C1=Delta, C2=Quantize, C3=Octree, C4=RLE, C5=LZ, C6=Entropy, C7=DAG, C8=PCA

LOD: L1=Discrete, L2=Continuous, L3=HLOD, L4=Impostor, L5=Streaming

Animation: A1=Keyframe, A2=Skeletal, A3=AnimCompress, A4=Procedural, A5=VAT, A6=Morph, A7=BoneBake, A8=Flipbook

Lighting: M1=Flat, M2=Phong, M3=PBR, M4=Lightmap, M5=SH, M6=Probe, M7=Toon, M8=Matcap, M9=SharedMat

Precompute: PRE1=Mipmap, PRE2=Lightmap, PRE3=LOD, PRE4=ShaderCompile, PRE5=NavMesh, PRE6=CollisionSimplify, PRE7=AO, PRE8=SDFBake, PRE9=PVS, PRE10=TexCompress, PRE11=AnimCompress, PRE12=Impostor, PRE13=Cubemap, PRE14=MeshOpt, PRE15=OcclusionData, PRE16=Erosion, PRE17=ProcCache, PRE18=Cluster, PRE19=BVH, PRE20=Voxelize

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Mega-Matrix: Core Techniques (Abbreviated)

A condensed view of the most important technique interactions:

Reading the Mega-Matrix

Green diagonal clusters = compatible paradigms:

• Top-left (G2, P2, P6, T6, R2, A4): Procedural/Immediate cluster
• Bottom-right (G3, G6, R5, M3, M4, A2, L1): Traditional/Retained cluster

Major incompatibilities (❌ patterns):

• G2 (SDF) vs G3/G6/R5/M4/A2: SDF vs polygon paradigm
• G6 (Nanite) vs P6/G2/R2: Nanite requires pre-built clusters
• M4 (Lightmap) vs anything dynamic/procedural

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Compatibility Recipes

Recipe: Demoscene 4KB

Techniques: G2 + P4 + P8 + T6 + R2 + M2 + A4 All ✅ compatible - pure procedural, no stored data

Recipe: Mobile Game

Techniques: G3 + G1 + T1 + T3 + R1 + M4 + A2 + L1 + L4 All ✅ compatible - traditional retained, baked lighting

Recipe: Open World AAA

Techniques: G6 + G3 + P2 + T4 + R5 + R7 + M3 + M4 + A2 + L1 + L5 All ✅/⚠️ compatible - Nanite + traditional with streaming

Recipe: Voxel Sandbox

Techniques: G4 + P6 + T8 + R3 + M2 + A4 + C7 All ✅ compatible - voxel-focused stack

Recipe: Stylized Indie

Techniques: G3 + G9 + T6 + T8 + R1 + M7 + M8 + A2 + A4 All ✅/⚠️ compatible - stylized with procedural touches

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Incompatibility Patterns Summary

Fundamental Paradigm Splits

1. SDF/RayMarch vs Polygon/Rasterize
   • G2, G8, G11(SDF), R2 ←❌→ G3, G6, G9, R5, R6
2. Procedural vs Precomputed
   • P4, P6, T6, A4 ←❌→ M4, PRE2, PRE3, PRE7
3. Retained vs Immediate
   • G6, L3, L4, M4 ←❌→ D8-D10 techniques
4. UV-Required vs UV-Free
   • T1, T3, T4, M4 ←❌→ G2, G4, G8, G11

Why These Splits Exist