Quote - And is there an other reason than faster rendering which makes you guys want to use normal maps?

Maybe those questions are silly because I am missing the point. But currently I dont see any reason why realistic rocks could not be generated all within Vue. What Im thinking of is taking for instance a standard Vue rock and then working on the color and bump displacement mapping by using noise/fractal noise functions.

Oops.  I forgot to add that I use texture baking to speed up rendering because generating the texture while rendering is much slower. 

www.youtube.com/user/ShawnDriscollCG