terrain vs objects

what is the benefit to having a terrain mesh instead of an object or multiple objects that make up your playfield?

i have been making a playfield using objects in GameSpace (I don't think i can even make a terrain mesh). its made up of boxes and planes and i collision detect my player and enemies with those boxes and planes. it drives around on them just as if it were a terrain mesh.

why would i use a terrain mesh instead of just doing it this way? what is the benefit?

with physics like JV-ODE, do i 'need' a terrain mesh, or will objects colliding work just fine?

confused...

Actually, I'm pretty sure physics libs DON'T work with Blitz terrains. In general you don't want to use them, just use a normal mesh modeled to the terrain's shape for your ground. They were implemented as a way to have terrains with more detail close to the camera; the idea was to speed up rendering by reducing polygon count for the terrain, but usually the cost of changing the terrain mesh every frame is more than the cost of the polygons that would have been rendered.

jv-ode lib does work with terrain meshes, actually which is why I ask.

i did notice with blitz terrains that there was a lot of changing of the terrain off in the distance, and it was quite noticable as you moved.. i mean it seemed to have been filling in detail but you could see it.

so, what you are saying is that blitz terrains are a way that blitz gave you a shortcut, a way that you could take simple parts, create a terrain, and have it handle the fill in on its own? and you could simply use objects, and hide them when they are far away (or whatever) to achieve the same effect?

I wouldn't use blitz terrains much either. Especially when you enable terrain shading. Best to use a mesh i'd say, or multiple meshes to make up your terrain. You quite limited to texturing blitz terrains as well.