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Effects Guide

The Effects Module adds particle effects driven by the same Sweat % used by the rest of the system. Effects-only installation still needs a Body Mesh as its emission surface, but it does not modify the Body material or mesh. The effects to install are the Effects to Install check boxes on the Setup window's first screen (Falling Drops, Floor Stains, Breath, Body Steam).

For a non-humanoid avatar, or when the Modular Avatar motion pendulum cannot be created, Manual Mode, Falling Drops, and Floor Stains remain available. Auto Mode, Breath, and Body Steam are not created.

If the motion pendulum is created but the required Head/Chest anchors are unavailable, Auto Mode remains available. Breath and Body Steam are not created.

In-game controls​

Open:

Sweat → Effects

From there you can control:

  • All Effects
  • Falling Drops
  • Floor Stains
  • Breath
  • Body Steam
  • Body Steam & Breath Intensity, only if the optional radial was installed

2D and 3D particles​

The existing lightweight 2D particles are the default. 3D Particles (High Load) changes Breath, Falling Drops, and Body Steam to mesh-particle rendering. The motion, gravity, collision behavior, Floor Stains, and in-game effect toggles remain available in either mode.

  • Choosing Depth (High Load) under Look on the Setup window's first screen turns 3D Particles on together with Droplet Depth and Drop Splash. Flat turns 3D Particles and Droplet Depth off.
  • You can also turn 3D Particles (High Load) on by itself in Advanced Settings > Quality & Load.
  • Changing between 2D and 3D changes the generated structure, so press [Install / Update] again. Apply to FX is not enough.

The 3D body steam and breath look the same as before, and their Mesh Particle Active Polys in the VRChat performance rank are far lower (a default install's steam and breath: 96,000 → 92).

Falling Drops​

Sweat droplets fall from locations across the body, and they get denser toward 100% Sweat. Falling drops are small, round while slow, and stretch longer the faster they fall. 3D draws them as a teardrop-shaped water lens, 2D as a water drop lit by the scene.

Falling drops follow the sweat style: Anime with crisp white highlights and outlines, Realistic with a dark rim and a small glint. The style is picked only when the Base Module is installed; with only the Effects Module, the drops, floor stains, and splash use the Realistic look. An avatar already installed with 2.0.0 keeps the look it has.

Because the drops fall fast, at most 8 drops of a system are in the air at once. The default of Drop Particle Limit (Per System) is 12, and the strong-movement drops use two thirds of it (8).

With Base and experimental additional targets installed, an additional target can optionally emit its own Falling Drops. Separate surface-area and rate controls are available for those targets.

Default: On

Splash​

The splash is a short spray of small round droplets when a drop lands. It works with both 2D and 3D particles and follows the sweat style.

  • Drop Splash is off on a new install with the Flat look and turns on when you choose Depth (High Load). Advanced Settings > Quality & Load can also turn it on or off by itself.
  • The splash adds 2 particle systems and 2 material slots, so the VRChat performance rank can drop one step (for example 15 → 17 material slots: Medium → Poor).
  • Updating a 1.1.x 2D particle install keeps it without a splash. To use the splash, turn on Drop Splash and press [Install / Update].

Floor Stains​

Floor Stains are collision sub-effects emitted by Falling Drops. They are available only while Falling Drops is installed and enabled. Collision is limited to the world's Default and Environment layers; avatar/player layers are excluded. Some worlds may produce no stain when their floor collider or layer is incompatible.

Floor stains only darken the floor, with the same soft shapes as in 1.1.3. They have no gloss or glint, and they dry from the edge in.

Default: On

Breath​

Breath appears near the mouth when both conditions are met:

  • Sweat % is above the default 25% start threshold; and
  • the mouth is open according to the selected or automatically detected facial input.

Viseme input and VRCFT input are both supported. In both Manual and Auto Mode, synchronized Sweat % controls breath start, size, and cycle speed. Breath reuses the existing Cooki/SweatAmount Float, so it adds no synchronized Float parameter.

With the breath gate set to Auto, the system scans the Avatar Descriptor and Modular Avatar for v2/JawOpen and prefixed names such as FT/v2/JawOpen. Even when a matching Float exists, Auto starts on Viseme, then prefers VRCFT after detecting a real JawOpen open/close change. Once JawOpen has gone down to a closed value (below 0.015) and 8 seconds pass without it rising above 0.03, it returns to Viseme. If breath stops after you turn VRCFT off, set the breath gate to Viseme.

Breath is hidden from the wearer's own first-person view by default. Enable Show My Breath in First Person in Tuning (Effect Details > Breath) and press Apply to FX to keep it visible to yourself. It requires a valid Head bone and a Modular Avatar version that includes MA Visible Head Accessory, and it is off by default because it can overlap the camera.

Default: On

Body Steam​

Body steam was rebuilt in v2.0.0. Instead of one big puff rising from a point, many soft smudged wisps rise slowly from the area around each spot. The steam stays with the body when you walk. It is visible in worlds without a depth texture, does not glow in dark worlds, and leaves no grey smudge on pale skin.

Body steam begins fading in at about 30% Sweat by default and grows with the shared Sweat % value. It is led by the chest and shoulders, with lighter support from the armpits and thighs. The default setup enables:

  • Chest hollow
  • Left and right shoulders
  • Armpits
  • Thighs

The crotch and feet positions are off by default. The locations are chosen before installation in the Setup window under Advanced Settings > Effects > Body Steam > Locations (Chest Hollow, Shoulders, Armpits, Thighs, Crotch, Feet), and after installation in Tuning under Effect Details > Body Steam > Steam Locations with Apply to FX. A location that was excluded at installation needs [Install / Update].

  • The particle system count is unchanged and the maximum particle count is lower (at the default sliders: 12 steam spots 288 → 131; the 7 spots of a default install 168 → 95). The shader is lighter, but the wider steam draws more pixels up close.
  • The 2D body steam is the same at Standard, Low Load, and Lightweight. The 3D particle body steam is 0.65× Standard's at Low Load and Lightweight.
  • With Remote Low Load, other players see the same steam puffs at 0.6× density (3D body steam: 25% of the puffs).

Default: On

Custom Steam Points​

Custom Steam Points can be added to avatar Transforms in Tuning, under Effect Details > Body Steam > Additional Features — Custom Steam Points. Each point supports size, rate, spread, direction, and an optional mirrored pair. They require a valid Animator and MA Bone Proxy. Up to four custom emitter slots can be active; a mirrored pair uses two slots. More than ten combined built-in/custom emitters produces a mirror-load warning, and twelve total emitters is the hard limit. A combined rate weight above 4.0 is normalized proportionally. Validation and generated-asset refresh run during [Install / Update] or Apply to FX.

Mirror mode and shared intensity​

Body Steam in Mirrors (Tuning: Effect Details > Body Steam; press Apply to FX after a change) offers:

  • Full: the complete presentation.
  • Low (2D Reduced Opacity): 2D Body Steam draws the steam in mirrors at 0.8× the density of Full without reducing particle count. In 3D mode, Low currently has the same appearance and cost as Full.
  • Hidden: lowest mirror cost.

New installations default to Low. Updating an older installation preserves its existing appearance as Full.

Setup can optionally install a saved, synchronized Body Steam & Breath Intensity radial. The Setup checkbox is off by default, and the radial starts at 50% when installed. The range is 0.1× opacity at 0%, the existing appearance at 1.0× at 50%, and 1.5× opacity at 100%; 0% does not turn the effects off. It affects Body Steam, Custom Steam, and Breath together without changing count, speed, size, lifetime, or performance cost.

Reduce particle load

If you do not need a particular effect, disable it from the Effects submenu. Body Steam is usually the first optional effect to reduce when many avatars are visible.

Changing installed effects​

  • Breath, Body Steam, and Falling Drops excluded in Setup do not install their particle objects or dedicated FX layers.
  • To exclude an effect from an existing installation, turn its option off and press [Install / Update]. Only the corresponding generated objects are removed; shared automatic sweat calculations are preserved.
  • This is different from temporarily turning an effect off in the in-game menu. Importing the package alone does not remove unused particles from an existing installation.
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