Mansard Roof

Take a block with suitable texture

Use the surface-edit (on my keyboard it is the Alt Gr key) and change the shape so the lower end remains in width and the upper end is more narrow.

close surface editing and use the regular resizing-possibilities to have a thin board, rather than a block

now you can fiddle around the "block" to allign with each other to the roof you like

i think this is the best i can explain it here. the key is the surface edit mode through which you can individually change the shape of one side (the upper) of a block.

Avanar already gave you the easiest method. Create a complex roof is never easy but it's also possible to calculate the shapes (with a spreadsheet) to do a fine work with console commands. If you are interested (and not afraid by numbers) I can share my spreadsheet and try to give you some explanation.

Just a quick and dirty example of what i mean:

It is not easy to find the right angle. Small gaps can happen, if you are not working 100% accurate, but can be covered with beams or similar that cover the corner anyways. Or you follow the accurate path of Ozorvals with a spreadsheet.

Still it boils down to fiddling around with it. Roofs are a science on its own - there is no easy way, if you want it to be good

Quote from Axel5616

Thanks for the example! Yes, roofs are tricky. I'm going to practice this but it will take a while. I've never used surface edit.

It's going to be a learning process and might not be easy. In fact it will be frustrating. But once you managed you'll feel a deep satisfaction

You can open a spreadsheet with any excel like software. Open office or Libre office. Both free

Quote from Axel5616

I use console commands (specifically the size command) all the time. I don't have a program to view spreadsheets though.

You just need LibreOffice (witch is free) or any commercial equivavent to read it.

I share the file, if you want to try. It lets you do trigonometric calculations effortlessly; you just have to fill in the green boxes. Don't change anything else. In your case, you can also ignore everything related to conical roofs or roman tiles.

So you have two values to find, which are specific to your situation. The module is (to simplify) the width (in blocks) of a slope of your roof as seen from above, so generally half the width of your room, including the walls. The height is (to simplify) the height of your roof between the ridge and the top of the wall.

Once completed, the construction method is similar to what Avanar showed you. For example, you can find the exact angle in the first table (named "Angles"), and then you just need to use the /rotation command to correctly position your block IG. However, I recommend experimenting IG first to find a value close to your angle so you can more easily find the correct value in the table, which covers a wide variety of cases.

Furthermore, if you want to see an example, dismantle the barn I posted yesterday, its roof - quite simple - is made with the default values of this file.

This tip is worth its weight in gold. Thx for sharing.

Quote from FioO

This tip is worth its weight in gold. Thx for sharing.

Ok, start paying the gold But seriously, you're absolute right, i will use these tips and tricks in the future.

Quote from Elfradhr

Ok, start paying the Gold.

Damn you are right.

Gold_1774946960.blueprint

Ozorvals here is your Gold. 😊

Quote from Axel5616

I'm a little lost her. I'm not sure how to use your spreadsheet, where to put what, and what rotation command you mean.

That's what I was afraid of. I will try to explain this as clearly as possible and step by step, but it's not easy. Don't hesitate to ask and repeat questions if necessary.

The green boxes are the ones that correspond to your specific case and that you can modify. You should only read the others: they allow you to find the correct value for the commands you will use. The difficulty is to find the right box in each situation.

This time, I'm going to take a completely different approach to help you find the values for the two green boxes that correspond to your case.

To begin, you define the area that will be covered by the roof with four walls. On these walls, you place slope blocks whose diagonal corresponds to the roof slope. You can use the height of these slope blocks as the variable "h" in the spreadsheet, and their width as the variable "m".

Next, you'll place a tall, thin block against these slope blocks to form your roof, tilting it so that it's aligned diagonally with the slope block. To do this, you need to know the dimensions of this roof block and its angle of inclination.

Now, we need a numerical example. Let's say your slope block, at the top of the wall, has dimensions X4 Y3 Z1. You can use its height Y=3 as the "h" variable in the spreadsheet, and its width (or thickness) Z=1 as the "m" variable.

For your roof block, the simplest approach is to keep the same width X=4, arbitrarily choose a thickness, for example Z=0.125, and find the correct value for the height in the spreadsheet: it's in the "Straight slope length" table. Here, we'll choose the value for x1 (Y=3.162278), but any value in this table will work, depending on the situation. All that's left to do is type the command "size 4 3.162278 0.125" to get the roof block the correct size.

Now you need to position and tilt this block at the correct angle. This angle is found in the "Angles" table, in one of the two "Straight" columns. To find the correct value more easily, the simplest method is to roughly tilt the roof block in-game, read the value IG, and find the closest match in the table. Here, IG, we note that the angle is between 15 and 20°. The closest value in the table is 18.434949, so we can type the command "rotation 18.434949 0 0" and position the block.

The rest is simply a matter of repeating this procedure, copying blocks with INSERT, resizing them with the arrow keys, positioning them correctly using modular snapping… and once you've mastered the procedure and its underlying logic, you'll quickly end up with a complete roof.

There are many other little tricks to correct apparent flaws or build more efficiently, but I'll answer those as questions arise. This post is already quite long.

P.S. The blueprint is an example; the lower part was created using the values provided in this post.