Tellus

Tellus

Tellus is a mod that replicates real-world terrain, roads and buildings in Minecraft by converting various open-sourced geographical datasets into chunks in real-time. It focuses on realistic elevation (30m globally with more detailed coverage for areas that support it), biome placement, cities, buildings, and climate-driven time and weather, aiming to transform Minecraft into a playable, voxelised map of the Earth.

Inspired by and partially based on Gegy’s Terrarium: https://modrinth.com/mod/terrarium

Survival note: Some survival features are still missing (including certain features and biomes). While a survival world is possible, upcoming updates may break those worlds; for now Tellus is better suited for testing and exploration than long-term survival.

Internet & data note: Tellus requires an active internet connection and will not work offline. It gradually streams terrain datasets, (e.g. land cover, climate, and weather data) so expect ongoing data usage that varies with how much of the world you explore.

Server support note: Tellus must be installed on the server, but is not required on clients. Official server support is not available yet; for now you should create the world in singleplayer first, then move that world to the server (with Tellus installed) so new chunks generate with Tellus.

Note: generative AI was used to assist with the creation of this mod.

Features

• Earth-scale terrain generated from geographic elevation data
• Highly customizable terrain generation (scale, height limits, and more)
• Built-in terrain preview screen for visualizing settings before world creation
• Biomes placed to match real-world climate regions
• Real-time weather and time systems (optional)
• Dedicated Distant Horizons integration
• Voxy real-time chunk ingestion support
• In-game map teleport UI for choosing real-world locations

Distant Horizons Integration

Tellus supports Distant Horizons to render planet-scale terrain far beyond vanilla view distance. When DH is installed, distant terrain is built using Tellus data and settings instead of generic vanilla sampling.

• Approximate mode: Tellus takes advantage of a a specific feature in DH that samples elevation, land-cover, climate, and water and more data directly to drastically improve generation speeds when using DH, although discards certain features such as accurate foilage and structures (e.g. villages, ruined portals)
• Detailed mode: Tellus falls back to DH's chunk-based generator for far terrain, which is more accurate but significantly slower.

Because Tellus worlds are Earth-scale, use of DH or Voxy is strongly recommended and is almost essential for comfortable exploration and long-distance views.

Some commands

• /tellus map: Opens the GeoTP map UI (requires permissions).
• /tellus weather: Shows local Tellus weather and time information based on your current in-game position.
• /tellus config weather enable_realtime_time <true|false>: Overrides the real-time time setting on the server (requires permissions).
• /tellus config weather enable_realtime_weather <true|false>: Overrides the real-time weather setting on the server (requires permissions).

More commands will be added over time.

Settings

These options are available in the "Customize World Generation" screen when creating a Tellus world.

World Settings

• World Scale: Controls how many real-world meters are represented by one block. Lower values create more detailed, larger worlds; higher values compress distances and features. Current limits are 1:1m to 1:500m per block, with larger scales planned up to 1:40km.
• Terrestrial Height Scale: Multiplier that converts elevation above sea level from meters to blocks. Higher values produce taller mountains and landforms.
• Oceanic Height Scale: Multiplier that converts elevation below sea level from meters to blocks. Higher values deepen oceans and trenches.
• Height Offset: Shifts all terrain up or down by a fixed number of blocks. Use this to raise or lower the entire world.
• Sea Level: Sets the waterline in blocks without shifting the terrain. Set to Automatic to track the height offset.
• Max Altitude: Upper world limit in blocks. Set to Automatic to let Tellus compute a safe cap based on your scale settings.
• Min Altitude: Lower world limit in blocks. Set to Automatic to let Tellus compute a safe floor based on your scale settings.
• River/Lake Shoreline Blend: Distance in blocks used to smooth river and lake edges into nearby terrain.
• Ocean Shoreline Blend: Distance in blocks used to smooth ocean coastlines into land.
• Limit Shoreline Blend on Cliffs: Prevents shoreline smoothing on steep slopes to preserve sharp cliffs.

Ecological Settings (work in progress)

These options are currently locked and not adjustable yet. They describe what will be configurable in a future update.

• Land Vegetation: Will enable grasses, flowers, and small plants on land.
• Land Vegetation Density: Will control how dense land vegetation appears.
• Tree Density: Will control how many trees spawn in eligible biomes.
• Aquatic Vegetation: Will enable kelp and seagrass in water.
• Crops in Villages: Will add village farm plots during village generation.

Geological Settings

The cave and underground generation system is still work in progress, so expect changes here.

• Cave Generation: Toggles underground cave generation.
• Ore Distribution: Enables vanilla ore distribution in Tellus worlds.
• Lava Pools: Enables underground lava pools.