The Dark Faces bug : How to fix it?

[Alzender]

I recently installed skyrim SE with a lot of mods and encountered the famous "Gray/Dark faces bug" on some of my NPC's. I read a lot about it and I now know why it happens.

I tried to look for fixes such as this one : http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/67581/?tab=4&&navtag=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nexusmods.com%2Fskyrim%2Fajax%2Fcomments%2F%3Fmod_id%3D67581%26page%3D1%26sort%3DDESC%26pid%3D0%26thread_id%3D3019239&pUp=1

but I don't know if it applies to skyrim SE (it was written for skyrim (oldrim) edition). I also tried to understand what was explained here: https://bethesda.net/community/topic/3995/new-way-of-handling-facegen-data-for-npcs-in-sse-incompatibility-for-mods-modifying-vanilla-npcs

but my knowledge in modding and CK is far too limited to understand what I had to do to fix my problem.

I am using MO2 to handle my mods and I'm not even sure the different methods I read here and there can apply to it. :sad:

This is why I am posting here, desperate to find answers and help to fix my problem.

What I really need, is someone that can take a bit of his time to explain me step by step like a child what to do EXACTLY in the CK to fix the Dark Face bug on some of my NPC's.

Thank you very much in advance for your help ! :happy:

Edited June 25, 2017 by Alzender

[texashokies]

In the CK go to the npcs in question and select them then press ctrl-f4 and a window will come up asking if you want to export face gen data for all selcted npcs. Hit yes and say yes to all warnings and it will tell you when you are done. It should now be fixed.

[Alzender]

Could you please explain me exactly how to do this?

 

I never used the CK and I don't even know if I have to load all the ESP's (since I don't know which are the ones causing the problem exactly) or only those causing it? (I have something like 250-300 ESP's).

Edited June 25, 2017 by Alzender

[M7k]

Did you find a fix?

[thumbincubation]

Ok, walk up to one of the NPCs and point at them. Use ~ to open console, and then use the console mouse to click on them. You should see their console ID number appear beneath them. The prefix of the number will tell you which mod they are from, by comparing it to your load order, either in LOOT or perhaps MO has it, but I've never used MO. Once you know which mod it is, you're ready for creation kit.

 

Go to bethesda.net, download the launcher. When you have the launcher open and running, you should see a few different creation kit options. Make sure you have the one for Skyrim SE, rather than Fallout or whatever. Download and run the creation kit. Allow it to unpack the scripts archive, and you should see some new folders appear in your data folder.

 

With the creation kit running, you will need to go to file > data > and select the mod in question. Double click it, so it has an x in the block, then hit "active file." It will take a few min, to load everything up.

 

in the object window (vertical, left side) expand the Actor tree until you have the right race/sex of the NPC. (Just typing the NPCs name into the box has never worked for me. It always forces me to follow the tree expansion.) Say the NPC is a Breton female, once you've expanded to Breton females, find their name. Click once to highlight, then press your CTRL + F4. It should prompt you to ok facegen export, after which you should see new meshes and textures appear. if you haven't previously had loose Meshes and Textures folders, they will appear. If you did, you should see, within them, new folders for actors, which lead to facegen (facial geometry for meshes, and facial tint for textures, I believe, but I'm not in a position to open CK and confirm, at the moment.)

 

Once you have those, your NPC faces, from that particular mod, should be fixed. You may be able to get away with closing CK without saving, as long as the files are in the right path, but I'm not sure whether the game will know to look for them or not. I'd suggest making sure you have a clean copy of the mod saved somewhere, in case you want to revert, and save before closing.

 

 

If you see they're fixed, but others aren't, you may need to repeat the process for a different mod. My guess is the mod author didn't include the facegen folders in their .bsa.

[TheAngryMudcrab]

I have noticed the same issue but only with some vampires in my game. Not sure what causes it or what would be making it effect only vampires, and at that only some vampires

[UlfricsRevenge]

I have a personal mod where I changed hundreds of NPC faces, hair, gear, etc. When I ported it over to SSE, all of them had the black face bug. I didn't understand why, because from my reading it said all you have to do is load the plugin, make one small change and hit save. The CK, I understood, would properly export all these faces. I read there was no need to fo ctrl-f4 anymore because it was automated. I almost gave up on porting my own mod, but then in a hunch I went through each of the hundreds of NPCs I changed, highlighted them, then did the ctrl-f$ thing. Sure enough, the black faces were fixed. Since then I've gone into that plugin several times to make small adjustments (not to faces, which would require that I ctrl-f4 them again, but to outfits and weapons). Each time, the CK does it's thing, creating some sort of face files (I'm wondering if there's an option in CreationKit.ini to stop that?) but happily that doesn't mess up the faces in game. My one time ctrl-f4 function solved the problem.

Edited January 2, 2018 by JoeJett

[themikatoon]

Open console, click on the affected character, type in setnpcweight 35 ,click enter. Voila. Sometimes it only gets to a one shade darker face than the rest of the body but still better than messing with the CK. Also the wrenches mod was the reason I got the error, but I still have it because it's a good mode, some console using on my gray faced people is no biggie in exchange.

[thelegg77]

Where are the meshes and textures folders located on the CK? After using control and f4 I cannot see the exported data anywhere.

[Algabar]

Where are the meshes and textures folders located on the CK? After using control and f4 I cannot see the exported data anywhere.

 

Meshes: .../skyrim Special Edition/Data/meshes/actors/character/FaceGenData/FaceGeom/...

 

Textures: .../skyrim Special Edition/Data/textures/actors/character/FaceGenData/FaceTint/....