Overview
While Biomes already provide a nice way to create a basic shape for your terrain through their Base Shape/Global Noise settings, Shape Layers provide a much more sophisticated and powerful set of features to lay out your terrain exactly as you need it for your project.
Most of the Shape Layers are designed to give your terrain a basic structure for e.g. mountains, oceans, hills or valleys, using tools such as sculpting, stamp and procedural layers, path and polygon shapes and rivers. This means that, by default, they tend to work on the lower levels of World Creators level step system, so that the filters have as many levels as possible to work on (although you can of course adjust this).
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Different Shape Layers
World Creator offers a range of different Shape Layer types to help you create the terrain you want, with more Shape Layers coming in the future. The following Shape Layers are currently available in World Creator:
Sculpt Layers
Sculpt Layers allow you to create a base shape for your terrain using brush and deformation tools. For a full breakdown of all the functionality the brush layer offers please visit the Sculpt Layer documentation.
 sculpted shape |  sculpted shape blended onto the terrain |
Stamp Layers
If you already have a height map that you want to use in your terrain, Stamp Layers are the way to go. They provide an easy and intuitive way to position and blend your existing data into your terrain, while integrating nicely into World Creators' otherwise procedural workflows.
 positioning a stamp layer |  applied stamp layer |
Landscape Layers
This Shape Layer type currently offers procedural patterns such as cliffs, craters, volcanoes or islands, each with its own set of parameters to customise the geological feature to your liking.
 procedural crater |  procedural islands |
Primitive Layers
Primitive Layer are similar to Landscape Layers in that they add procedural shapes to your terrain though they only offer basic geometric shapes like circles, gradients or polygons.
 crater using a donut primitive layer |  valley from to gradient primitives |
MapTiler Layers
MapTiler Layers provide direct integration of high quality real world elevation data into World Creator. Simply add the layer, follow the login steps described in the MapTiler article (only needs to be done once), find a real world location to add to your terrain and let World Creators filters enhance your result.
 MapTiler world view |  MapTiler mountain with World Creator filters on top |
Path Layers
Path Layers allow you to modify your terrain at a lower level to create mountains and valleys, or use its features to create smaller details such as roads.
 valley using paths |  paths used to create a mountain road |
Polygon Layers
Polygon Layers allow you to create a custom shape by placing individual vertices. You can then control the height and slope of the inside and outside of the shape to create larger features in your terrain.
 flat polygon area |  polygon mountain |
Model Layers
Model Layers allow you to import your own custom 3d geometry into World Creator and add it to your terrain.
 model layer |  model layer with multiple instances |
River Layers
River Layers allow you to add rivers and valleys to your terrain. They offer many different river types with full customisation to create your ideal river network.
 rivers on the base terrain |  terrain with rivers |
Next: Using and working with Filters