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Palette Tool

The Palette Tool (keyboard shortcut P) switches Eldiron into palette editing mode.

Unlike the main map tools, Palette is a mode toggle at the bottom of the tool strip. While it is active, Eldiron keeps the Palette dock open instead of switching back to the Tile Picker when you select geometry.

What It Is For​

Use the Palette Tool to work with the project palette as a board of fixed slots:

  • select palette entries
  • create new entries
  • clone entries
  • delete entries
  • swap entries by drag and drop
  • edit the selected entry color and material values
  • apply the selected palette entry to geometry and Builder material slots

Palette Dock​

When Palette mode is active, the lower dock shows the Palette dock.

The dock contains:

  • a palette board on the left
  • a material inspector on the right
  • toolbar buttons for:
    • New
    • Clone
    • Apply Color
    • Clear

New and Clone always append at the end of the currently used palette range so existing indices are not disturbed.

Material Properties​

Each palette entry stores both a color and a small set of material properties:

  • Roughness
  • Metallic
  • Opacity
  • Emissive

These values are used when a palette entry is applied through PaletteIndex sources, for example on sectors or Builder material slots.

Minimap Color Picking​

While Palette mode is active, the minimap switches to palette color picking instead of normal map navigation.

You can:

  • click to sample a color
  • drag to preview color changes continuously
  • release the mouse to commit the final change

Drag sampling creates a single undo step on mouse release.

HUD and Apply Workflow​

Palette mode still uses the normal geometry selection and HUD slot system.

That means you can:

  • select a sector and apply the current palette entry as its source
  • select a Builder host and use the HUD material slots to apply the current palette entry to a Builder material slot

Apply Color belongs to the Palette dock, not to the Tile Picker.

Global Palette vs Palette Dock​

There are two palette views in Eldiron:

  • the global Palette tree item in the sidebar
  • the Palette dock used by Palette mode

The global palette is primarily for selection and overview. The Palette dock is the editing surface used for:

  • drag-and-drop swapping
  • New
  • Clone
  • Delete
  • material editing

Opening the global Palette tree item does not enable Palette mode by itself.