Land Elevation Question

I admit I'm not a terribly sophisticated land buyer. However, I do my fair share of research in trying to find the right sized plot in the right place at the right price. I finally settled on a nice little mainland plot being sold by a certain high profile land baron. Since its waterfront, land elevation is particularly important. Sometimes its obvious when land has been raised, lowered, or terraformed but not always. I decided to be safe and ask the customer service representative of the land baron if this land were already raised or lowered to its maximum height. She said no, that the land in its present state could be raised higher than its current elevation or lower. Great! I buy the land.

Not!, the land was raised to its max out of the water and thus couldn't serve my purposes. To give the land baron credit, the customer service rep was quick to refund my money when I explained the issue--which is much more than I can say for many people's experiences. It seems it was an honest mistake or miscommunication. The only inconvenience is the corresponding tier charge and transaction fees if I decide I can't find another piece that I like and convert the Lindens back to dollars. Ah well, live and learn.

My question is there a way to determine if an individual parcel of mainland has already been terraformed to either its max or minimum elevation before buying it and obviously testing it yourself? Clearly, I can't always rely on someone's word, and a less customer service oriented seller would just stick me with it. I don't buy land often, and I was wondering if I'm missing a dialog or tool that would help me. Also, when the big land barons win auctioned parcels, what state does LL deliver the land to them? Is it already set to its max or minimum level? Or, a neutral level in between?

All I can find in the knowledge base is a caution that land for sale is sometimes already terraformed and to watch out. Before I get smacked on my bottom, I did search the forums since I'm certain this has come up before, but I can't find it so please be kind. If there is a thread about this that I didn't see, a link to it would be greatly appreciated.

as far as i know u can`t see if it has been terraformed or not

darn, that's what I was afraid of. thanks.

To answer your question later on, LL delivers sims in the "neutral" state. You then have the +/- 4m from that state.

I know many resellers flatten out their plots as best they can, however I prefer to keep my land smoothed. This sometimes means that land won't go any higher or lower than how I left it, especially on a lumpy sim. However, I've always been happy to demonstrate the terraforming limits on any parcel I've been selling, in one case flattening out maybe 7 4096sqm parcels to try and find one which would go flattest.

i was gonna say the same BUT.....

Seafront parcels will always generate a high value but only if they have ENOUGH land with it, so it sounds like most of the parcel you purchased was underwater so the land owner raised it to make it more attractive.

I personally can not see the point of worrying about flat land, as long as you arnt on a cliff it can add to the attractive features of where you are.

There is only one thing I can think of that can be done to check terraform limits, and it requires both cooperation of someone who can already terraform that parcel, and a willingness to possibly distort the terraforming a bit from what it is now.

Have the seller select a 4M x 4M plot of land in the middle of the parcel. Then have them raise the selected area to the max allowed, and repeatedly undo to restore it to where it started. Then have them lower it to the max allowed, and undo repeatedly to bring it back.

In theory, on Mainland where you only have a +/- 4M limit and have to worry about such matters, what you will see is that at the max limits you'll see the last baked terrain profile for that square of land, offset + or - 4M from where it should be on the terrain map. The repeated undos *should* put that square of land back as it was.

The test can be repeated to spot-check various parts of the parcel.

If you raise an area to maximum, and then lower it 4M, you should restore the last saved terrain profile for that area. Allowing for distortions at the edges, from the land you haven't shifted.

On a private island, terraform limits won't usually be an issue, as they default to +/- 100 Meters from the saved values.

Thanks for the replies, it seems that currently the best way to buy land would be to have the seller demonstrate the current elevation. That's kind of a pain if the seller isn't online or doesn't answer IM's but I suppose its the best way to go.

It would be useful if there was a menu selection that demonstrated this without having to contact the seller. Perhaps selected land could glow blue if it were set above the original elevation and red if it were set below the elevation. While the original shape and elevation might have an outline so you could see exactly how much it was altered.

One more item on a long list of wants the Lindens must have by now.

Sorry, to be so vague...

There is a ctrl/alt/something that can show you the original layout of the land - lumps, bumps, holes, etc that have been craftily covered. Unfortunately, it's been so long since i used it, I cant recall the exact "code". Have a look for anything to do with terraforming in the knowledgebase, it's there somewhere.

Heck even cliffs are fine, I always take the default land then tweak it where needed as I build around the land. Flat land is simply boring, slopes, water etc. are fun .