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Merge to Static Mesh

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⚠️ This is the SplineCraft Demo (evaluation) edition. Every feature works exactly like the full plugin; only how much you can build with it is capped, an on-screen watermark is shown, and it does nothing in Shipping builds. Full list: Demo Limitations.

Merge to Static Mesh is an editor-only action. It bakes all of the actor's generated geometry — posts, sections, tubes, knobs and polygons — into a single StaticMesh asset and places a StaticMeshActor with it in the level.

This is the recommended path for large static structures — long fences, railings, roads, tracks, walls — once the parameters no longer need to change. Instead of hundreds of components you get one mesh that the engine treats as ordinary static geometry.

Workflow

  1. Fully configure the structure — the spline shape, posts, sections, knobs, polygons. After the merge the parameters are no longer editable (see "Limitations").
  2. Set the Merge Settings — these are the engine's standard FMeshMergingSettings: material merging and simplification, lightmap UV generation, and so on. The defaults are fine for most cases.
  3. Press Merge to Static Mesh. A confirmation dialog appears. A new StaticMesh asset is created under /Game/Meshes/, and a StaticMeshActor is added to the level.
  4. If needed, turn on Replace Spline Actor before the merge — then the SplineCraft Demo actor is removed and only the baked mesh is left in its place.
  5. Enable Nanite on the resulting StaticMesh (in its settings). Nanite handles culling and level of detail at any distance itself — no manual LODs required. For a large fence this is the best result for performance.

Parameters

  • Merge Settings (FMeshMergingSettings) — material simplification, lightmaps, merge options.
  • Replace Spline Actor — remove the spline actor after the merge and keep only the mesh.

Both parameters are only available on a level instance of the actor (not on the Blueprint class).

What ends up in the result

  • Posts, sections, tubes and knobs — from both modes, Line and Curve.
  • Polygons — the polygons' procedural mesh is baked into a temporary static mesh before the merge and is included in the result too.
  • Build Scenario preview — if a scenario is assigned and its Preview Progress is scrubbed up so geometry is shown, that previewed geometry is baked in as well. This is how you get a single mesh for a structure you designed as a growing scenario: scrub the preview to 1, then merge.
  • The opening markers in the viewport are a pure editor highlight and do not make it into the merge.

If there is nothing to bake — no mesh configured and no scenario preview shown — the action reports it with a message instead of doing nothing silently.

Limitations

  • Irreversible. The baked mesh is not linked to the actor. To change the fence you have to bring the SplineCraft Demo actor back (if Replace Spline Actor was on — from history or from scratch) and merge again.
  • One big mesh. Occlusion becomes coarser than when each section is its own component: the engine hides the mesh entirely or not at all. For very long structures, split into several actors and merge each separately.
  • The collision and lightmaps of the baked mesh depend on the Merge Settings and on the StaticMesh's own settings — check them after the merge.

See also