How to draw a *single* vertex ?

[ThomasAn.]

That means I would have to waste a vertex array per shape; instead of a vertex array for the WHOLE system. Using more vertices per particle would kill performance. No? (both in number of vertices and multiple draw calls)

Or, it would have to be a vertex array of quads (is this even possible; vertex array or vertex arrays) ? And each quad having a circle texture assigned to it ? (even this already quadruples the computational load)

Can all these shapes be drawn in sfml with a single call to window.draw ?

[Laurent]

Yes of course, a single vertex array can contain multiple shapes. A single vertex array containing textured quads is the way to go for what you want to do.

[ThomasAn.]

Thank you.
I will look into that approach and adjust accordingly.