Hi
I am obout to make a lot of ground and rock materials for a top view game, that will never get close to these materials. I have created a lot of materials both in here and in other 3D software over time, but now where i am making something aimed at a higher level than before, i would just pick the community for info that might be basic knowledge, but i for some reason or another haven’t noticed.
The standard materials i have made so far, has been blending two textures together, along with their OCC, NRM and SPEC maps, and then laying a variation texture on top of it all to make a large, but not so obvious repeating material.
But when inspecting the UE4 premade i notice some of them have this setup:
The “fade to flat normal over distance” part is pretty self-explanatory, but why include this? Is it to save performance of not calculating normals when so far away they dont matter, or is there another reason and if so, and when do you want to include this?
Are there any tutorials around aimed higher than the beginner level, since the ones i can find explains the more simpler things in material creation.
Tips and advices are much appreciated 
Cheers