Connected textures

Blocks that join into one surface with their neighbours, like big windows or tiled floors.

Blocks of the same kind next to each other can join up, so a wall of glass looks like one big window and a floor of tiles like one surface.

items/blocks/glass/framed_glass.yml

framed_glass:
  type: block
  transparent: true
  texture: framed_glass.png                   # a single pane, with its frame
  connected-texture: framed_glass_inner.png   # the same pane without the frame
  connect: all

You only draw two textures, whichever mode you use:

Texture	What to draw
texture	The block on its own, with its border on all four edges
connected-texture	The same picture with the border painted out, seamless when tiled

Both must be PNGs of the same size. Lode Items works out how wide the border is and makes every tile itself: the border stays on each edge that doesn’t touch the same block. One pair covers all six faces.

connect · text

Which neighbours it joins. Each combination of neighbours is its own look, so the modes cost differently:

connect	Joins	Looks it uses
vertical	the blocks above and below (pillars, logs)	4
horizontal	the four blocks around it (bookshelves, panels)	16
all	every direction (glass, tiles, frames)	64

Looks are limited (see How many blocks). Solid blocks have plenty, but there are only 143 see-through looks, so at most 2 see-through blocks can use connect: all. The Framed Glass that comes with Lode Items is one of them. Use vertical or horizontal where they’re enough.

• Faces between two joined blocks aren’t drawn, so connected glass shows no inner edges.
• Corners where two joined edges meet stay seamless. Proper inner-corner notches would need the diagonal neighbours too, which is far too many looks.
• A connected block uses one texture pair for every face, and can’t also use rotation, textures: or model:.

Lode Items comes with two connected blocks in items/blocks/: Lodestone Tiles (solid) and Framed Glass (see-through).