Noob questions about GECK Biped Objects

[Neilfry]

I'm new to modding and have a few questions about the geck. More specifically the Biped Objects when editing armors.

So I am trying to add an armor piece that uses a gun mesh but is a purely cosmetic item. Putting a pistol on a hip for example, that can be equipped and unequipped but doesn't actually do anything.

 

My first question is how can I move the meshes so that the clothing item appears in a different spot relative to the player. Currently I have my item under the "Backpack" biped object slot and the pistol mesh shows sticking out of the neck. I wanna know how to move it so it can be in different positions. I have tried editing the mesh in NifSkope but It doesn't seem to change the position. I hope that makes sense.

 

Second, am I able to create custom Biped Object slots so that multiple items can be equipped at once? Currently two items in the backpack slot replace each other when they are equipped. I either need to create new slots or allow multiple armors to be equipped in the same slot.

 

I hope I was clear in what im trying to do, and I appreciate any help :)

 

Thanks

[madmongo]

There's two things going on here.

 

First you've got the Biped Object slots in the GECK. The UpperBody slot is generally the entire body mesh, which will be the armor plus all of the human body parts that will be visible. Accessories use other slots, like the backpack slot for backpacks. The idea here is that if something is in that slot, you can't wear something else in the same slot. If you are wearing reading glasses, for example, you can't also wear sunglasses at the same time. So if you equip the sunglasses, the reading glasses get unequipped. If you wear something like a radiation suit, that takes up a bunch of slots, since you can't wear sunglasses over your rad suit helmet, for example.

 

For something like a fake wearable gun for cosmetic purposes, you probably don't want to use the backpack slot since that will block you from using other backpacks simultaneously. You can use one of the Body Add On slots or you can use something that isn't commonly used like the nose ring or earrings slot.

 

The Biped Object slots in the GECK have nothing to do with where the item is displayed on the character. The nif for the armor piece controls that.

 

In any armor/clothing nif, you have two basic things, the armature (aka the skeleton) and the object mesh. The armature has different bits, like three different parts for the spine (low, medium, and high), thighs, lower legs, upper arms, lower arms, etc. The object mesh gets "bone weighted" to the armature. Something like the knee pad will have high weights for both the upper and lower leg bones, because it will move and bend with both of those. A gun on your hip would likely be highly weighted to the pelvis, if it's in a holster that isn't flexible, or maybe highly weighted to the thigh bone instead of the holster is attached to the leg instead, and would be zero weighted to all of the other bones. You don't want your gun flexing around because you are moving your arm, for example. That would look silly.

 

I don't know how to parent objects to armatures in NifSkope or how to do bone weights in NifSkope. I don't even know if it's possible. I always use Blender for stuff like that.