Using two-handed Sword as one-handed

[DivisionNDK]

Hi,

 

I recently discovered hucifer's "The Witcher 2 - Geralt Light Armor and Witcher Swords" mod and would like to use the included Steelsword (two-handed) as an one-handed Blade. What is necessary to get it work? Maybe someone could give me a short tutorial for the Creation Kit (my first try made the blade invisible :confused: but it worked as one-handed).

 

many thanks in advance :thumbsup: (pls excuse my rusty english -> I'm for germany)

Edited March 8, 2012 by DivisionNDK

[Stemin]

Did you ever figure this out?

[Stemin]

No? Anyone?

[Stemin]

I don't think this is possible with just the creaiton kit. I think you need to edit whatever framework is used to render the wielding and swinging motions. I tried setting a two-handed weapon as one-handed, wield either hand, and then changing the animation to one-handed and your character wields and swings and invisible blade while the sword is still strapped to your back.

[Stemin]

Alright. Did some more searching around. Came up with an answer, but not sure on specifics. It seems you have to make the changes in the creation kit, but you also have to load the weapon in nifscope and change the NiStringExtraData entry. This is where my research varied on the answer. Some said you just have to change the value from to read 'WeaponSword(#)' instead of 'WeaponBack(#).' Another guy said you just had to change the number # from a 3 to a 4.

 

I'm not sure how this works if you're not changing the vanilla weapons. I know in the creation kit it's possible to create a reference of say the Daedric Greatsword and call it Awesome Sword, and you can have your very own sword with your very own ID, but I _think_ it still uses the vanilla settings in nifscope. I think in order to create an actual new weapon you'd have to totally copy all the graphics first and then make the changes in the creation kit and nif scope to the copy.

 

But I don't have nifskope installed yet to try any of these things. I was hoping an expert might chime in here.

[Stemin]

Quick update before I go to bed if anyone's at all interested in this... I installed BSAopt, and fired up nifscope. I tried extracting the 1stperson nif and greatsword nif of the weapon I was trying to change. I went in to edit the NiStringExtraData entry and came to the conclusion that the numerical value is tied to the text that's there. I went into the string editor and entered WeaponSword for both .nif files and saved them under different file names from the original .nif. Fired up the creation kit and went to change the assigned .nif file to my weapon and it gives me an "invalid directory" message when I select my .nif. I had them in my skyrim data directory with the .esp I was editing. I tried moving them right into the skyrim directory and still got the same message. That's all I have time for tonight. Work in the morning. I was hoping by duplicating the .nif and assigning them to my reference item in the creation kit I could use the original graphics, and yet reassign where the item is attached to the player by editing the meshes data. It was a good theory. I just can't figure out the practice.

[Stemin]

FIgured out the invalid directory thing... I guess whatever directory bsaopt extracts to.. say for example /meshes/weapons/draugr/ you have to recreate that directory structure in the /data directory for it to work in the creation kit. Weird.

 

Didn't get the two-handed/one-handed thing to work yet though. I think maybe I must either have to change the .nif data somewhere else in the creation kit or I did something wrong in nifskope when I changed the values in the .nif files.

 

I'll post more when I have it. I can't believe nobody's interested in doing this. I guess major modders are creating one handed weapons from scratch and they don't need to do this.

[Stemin]

Ok. Turns out it was very simple. The problems I was running into were because I was trying to manipulate a copy instead of just changing the original.

 

If you just want to take a two handed weapon from the game (or a mod) and turn it into a one-handed weapon, it's a pretty simple thing. First off you have to take the .nif files. You're going to have to edit the 1stPerson nif file, for example 1stpersonsteelgreatsword or 1stpersondwarvengreatsword or whatever. You might have to make the same changes to the regular file steelgreatsword.nif or dwarvengreatsword.nif. I'm not sure. I made edits to both files when I did it.

 

Load the .nif in nifskope, go to your block list, and then locate NiStringExtraData. Click on it. This will open the NiStringExtraData table. You will find a string entry that reads "WeaponBack" Don't bother with changing the numerical value as this seems to be a crapshoot. Instead click on the little "txt" icon and it will bring up a text box. In that box you can make your change. Type in "WeaponSword" and save the .nif file. You don't need to change anything else.

 

After this, go into the CK, select your item from the object list (not a reference in the render window) and change the appropriate fields from two-handed to one-handed. This part is pretty self-explanatory. I believe there are 3 fields in total, two of which are in the upper right hand corner. You can change the first to one-handed, the second to right-hand. I believe the only other part you changed was there is a box that asks about the animation used. (this might be under the art and sound tab) You can change that to the appropriate one handed animation.

 

If you have questions about that part I can look at the Ck again and give you more detailed steps, but it seemed self explanatory to me for anyone with the most basic knowledge of the CK.

 

If you want to make a new item instead of a replacer, it takes a few more steps and that's where I was getting issues. This is basically done by copying the .nif files (naming them something else), and then there are some additional changes in the CK needed. The part I was missing was creating a new 1stPerson World object for my first person view.

Edited June 2, 2012 by Stemin

[Perraine]

Cool info, thanks I've been thinking about doing this for a few items (just for myself) ... Did you have any issues with the scale of the weapons? I created a copy of the Imperial bow for myself, re-textured it, created arrows for it and turned it into a Skyforge Steel Bow and Skyforge Steel Arrows, All works perfectly in game, names.crafting, tempering, no problems ... except ... the bow is about 1.5 times normal size in the inventory AND when slung on your back, but it's the right size in first person view ??? <shrug>

[Stemin]

Cool info, thanks I've been thinking about doing this for a few items (just for myself) ... Did you have any issues with the scale of the weapons? I created a copy of the Imperial bow for myself, re-textured it, created arrows for it and turned it into a Skyforge Steel Bow and Skyforge Steel Arrows, All works perfectly in game, names.crafting, tempering, no problems ... except ... the bow is about 1.5 times normal size in the inventory AND when slung on your back, but it's the right size in first person view ??? <shrug>

 

I'm honestly not sure. I did scale the item down when I placed it, but I can't tell for sure if it had any effect when you actually wield it. In first person mode I compared it to my Daedric sword and it's hard to tell if it's any bigger or not.

 

When in third person mode, the weapon doesn't appear awkward or anything, but it IS just a slight bit long when he wears it on his hip. It still looks ok, but on any hilly terrain it does sometimes clip through the ground.

 

I didn't compare the deadric sword in third person, so I'm not sure if this is typical or not, but I believe it is based on my memory.

 

I had asked about scaling in another thread, trying to decide if it was the game engine that scales items or the rendering itself, and I got the unsatisfactory answer that it was "both."

 

I haven't done any rendering in 3ds yet (or blender, I have both), but I do do some 3d rendering for work in autocad. Autocad has historically been used for 2D items, blueprints and such so I only used the basics, but the point is, I'm used to working with a scale.... I.E. I enter actual sizes 2", 3", whatever when I render the object. I've watched a few youtube vids on rendering and so far I haven't seen this brought up yet.

 

Likewise a lot of tutorials here on the nexus don't cover the rendering part usually because they say there are other tutorials on rendering out there. I'd like to see a tutorial that uses 3ds max, but actually shows the rendering part from start to finish FOR skyrim, and not just a generic rendering tutorial.

 

I'm sure they're out there, I just don't know where to find them. The tutorial thread is pages and pages of information to look through at this point.