Question render a rope for visual effect only

Hi everyone, I was wondering how to render a line that looks like a rope but doesn't affect any rigidbodies or move any objects. Because this is only for visual effect I'm wondering if I can avoid using much complicated physics.

For more information, I'm working in 2D and the rope is supposed to resemble a leash.

 

Because the line/rope should look like it has physics...? It's a line that should be affected by gravity (or some imitation of it). I wasn't sure if I should use a LineRenderer with "gravity" coded in, or if I should use some physics component and, I don't know, set the mass to 0 so it can't affect any other rigidbodies in the scene.

If this is the wrong category can I repost my question in General Graphics? Should I delete this topic?

 

So you want a rope that doesn’t have physics but looks like it has physics? I don’t think this makes any sense…

if you want the rope to move realistically, it must “have physics” of some sort: either the built-in physics, or a custom solution you implement yourself. If you don’t want it to collide with other objects, just place it in a layer that is set to not collide with anything. (Btw, mass doesn’t have anything to do with collision detection, it has to do with collision response: that is, it won’t prevent or cause objects to collide, it controls how objects react once they have already collided)

Ways of doing this: create multiple rigidbodies and attach them to each other using joints, then you can render them using a LineRenderer. This is by far the simplest method, and the one I would advise to use if you’re starting out since it only uses built-in stuff and the amount of coding required is minimal.

Or, use an articulated body chain (only doable for 3D physics), or implement your own verlet/position-based simulation if you want absolute control over it. If you want to go this route, there’s myriads of tutorials about this all over the internet, one example: