Striker879

LOL ... I have no skills as a conjurer so you must know that certain individual quite well. If possible make the "pick a random" option be "pick the best one handed sword that isn't currently equipped" (I would think the damage rating for the sword would work well there). Those three options would allow the player to either select exactly which sword Umbra receives or to reserve a certain sword from those she might get. Better than the Bruma statue thing where you need to make sure you only have what you want the statue to wear when you meet Martin ... a big pain in the butt if you don't plan ahead. Can't promise I'll still be available for testing after around the end of the month or so (weather dictates when I head up north, and once there I don't have a gaming computer).

Yes a brother, sister or mother would work (that part is just backstory anyway). If Lenwin was apprenticing as a blacksmith it would also explain how she's able to keep her gear repaired (even during her exile). If Umbra's replacement sword had to come from the player's inventory it adds one more consideration for the player in the quest ... need to make sure I have a decent sword that I'm willing to part with. Kind of obvious I like complicated stuff, eh?

When you successfully pickpocket an item from a sleeping NPC they don't wake up (if you are caught you'll know it because they wake up, and if their responsibility is high enough you'll soon hear the "OK lawbreaker ..." speech). I like the idea that you would need to stay away for a while before seeing Umbra again ... I'd even suggest that you need to not have the sword in your inventory anymore (meaning you've already either traded it for the hat or completed the daedric quest by keeping the sword and then have stored it/sold it). This places the player in the situation of deciding their course of action before attempting to steal the sword. I can understand if Umbra goes back to work for Irroke then it's likely that Shafaye was probably the one who lost a partner (though the two beds in her house are single beds, as are the two in Irroke's). I'm just not clear on why the disposition loss for Schlera and Candice if you have previously had to get them to agree to bringing Umbra back. Unless the change in disposition is to make something easier or harder I don't find it adds much in any situations in the game (merchants are the only NPCs I bother to work disposition with other than to advance Personality after I've leveled up the skills/attributes I find more useful). I would tend to leaving Umbra with her armor and making it so the player can't use companion "cheats" to obtain it (giving her the ability to repair her own armor would be a plus). Even though it's leveled and as such not much of a cheat it still is part of what makes Umbra Umbra in my opinion. The player should be the one to give her a new sword though (so it would need to be a vanilla piece unless you wanted to get real complicated in the scripting ... says the non-scripter). Maybe make the name change something that doesn't happen right away. After she's been back in Pell's Gate for a while she decides to start using her old name. One piece to this is Irroke isn't an armorer, so what was Lenwin apprenticing with him for? If you decided to make him an armorer you'd need to add some forges and anvils etc. outside his shack. Does he then offer services? I can't really think of anything else he could have had her apprenticing for. Hopefully Inafog will pop in and offer some suggestions/opinions on the plan. Other than that I think what you have outlined is shaping up to flow well. I tend to dislike the "run the player around all of Cyrodiil delivering messages" type of quests. This is light on the travelling but heavier on the "hmm, which way will I crack this nut". For the people who don't like to go back and try over if they fail it just leads to the vanilla result (i.e. if you don't raise Umbra's disposition and get caught stealing the sword). For those who don't like to go back and try over you have that element of "am I ready" doubt before they try to steal the sword. For those who don't mind going back to a previous save and try again it's still a challenge to pickpocket the sword, or at least it was for my guy.

Either Umbra lived with one of the current residents (I guess both Irroke's and Shafaye's have two beds) or a house for her would need to be added. I tend to the not adding a house side for compatibility. The lore from the UESP wiki page for Umbra (the person) and what Irroke tells the player when asking about her don't exactly agree ... the wiki makes it sound like some villagers were killed (doesn't say Pell's Gate, but that is implied as it says Umbra was driven out as a result) while Irroke doesn't make any mention of deaths just that Lenwin/Umbra was his apprentice. She could easily have been living with Irroke and killed someone who lived with Shafaye or the other way around. Whichever way, the person who had a partner killed wouldn't likely let Umbra move in so she'd be moving in with the other. I've never had a feeling that anyone in Pell's Gate was a leader. Candice tells my character "Don't go stirring up trouble" every time I open conversation with her (my guy is still toting around the sword, unable to decide if her wants to keep it or trade it for a hat). Perhaps if you speak to any of the other Pell's Gate residents they direct you to talk to Schlera (same as they direct you to talk to Irroke if you are asking about Umbra when starting the daedric quest). Often it seems that marauder dungeons have bandits camped outside. I can't recall ever reading any explanation for that. I like to think of it as the more lightly armed bandits trying to displace the more heavily armed entrenched marauders (though the only spot I can think of that has them conflicting is Rockmilk Cave, and there it's Black Bow bandits and it's unclear who is trying to displace who). The problem with my previous "explanation" as to why Schlera seeks your help is that when the Fort Homestead cell respawns the bandits will be back (as well as the marauders inside). That's a limitation with every cave/ruin/dungeon in the game (would be far more believable for me if I cleaned out bandits this time, and next time was creatures and then the next time was conjurers etc). I still prefer the notion of needing to pickpocket the sword from her (if Umbra has a sleep package with unequip weapons and armor set you wouldn't necessarily need to use Give A Gift and SMYB). If the player got Umbra's disposition high enough beforehand she won't go hostile if you get caught in the pickpocket attempt. If you don't spend the time and effort to get her disposition up first and get caught you'd best have your good running boots on or be prepared for the usual Umbra fight.

I enjoyed the challenge of getting her disposition high enough via Give A Gift (was trying to avoid leveling Personality at that point so no disposition mini-gaming). With Enhanced Economy keeping my guy poor it was a strain on my resources buying/finding gifts for her. Every time I wasn't successful pickpocketing the sword she'd lose some disposition, setting my plan back. If the sword really does affect the person then you shouldn't be able to convince her to give up the sword while she still has it. Even after relieving her of the sword it should take some time for sanity to return. I like the idea of convincing the Pell's Gate residents to accept her back, but there is a problem of where would she live (Schlera has the only available room at The Sleeping Mare). Shafaye's house has a spare bed so perhaps Umbra could stay there after some further quest to convince Shafaye of Umbra's rehabilitation (maybe Shafaye will require you to have Umbra accompany you for some time beforehand ... the net result would be when you don't want Umbra along as a follower she can stay with Shafaye). Another option could be the Inn of Ill Omen private rooms (the first room on your left after you go down the hatch ... the second room is needed for Rufio once that Dark Brotherhood quest starts). Schelera could be a quest giver for the quest to get the other Pell's Gate residents accepting Umbra. She tells you that the bandits trying to displace the marauders in Fort Homestead haven't had any success and are starting to threaten Pell's Gate. She wants you to clean out the whole lot, bandits and marauders. Because Schlera is an archer she won't go into the fort herself so she has had to do her best keeping the bandits away from Pell's Gate.

Did you answer "Yes" when BAIN asked to be initialized? Details on how Wrye Bash's BAIN (and many more features) works can be found in the Mopy\Docs folder (Wrye Bash general Readme.html and Wrye Bash Advanced Readme.html).

There have been reports of some new "feature" foisted on the world by those wonderful folks at Microsoft that changes the OMOD file extension to ZIP. If that is at the root of your problem too then all you need to do after downloading the OMOD is change the file extension back from ZIP to OMOD.

You can find two different versions of ZKEC bouncing butt in SetBody Reloaded Blockhead Edition ... it includes the normal bouncing butt that is actually rigged to breast bones and the other one that uses special butt bones (and requires a compatible skeleton.nif and animations ... that's the version in the "data_Buttock BB" folder).

Unfortunately the default Umbra has no sleep or eat AI packages. Before I succeeded in pickpocketing the sword from her with the help of SMYB I tried using the console to give her a sleep package (addscriptpackage a3a5a) but would get caught every time (most NPCs that don't have a sleep package will only lay down a few seconds using that method). There are an awful lot of NPCs that lack eat and sleep packages ... as a result I have a rather extensive "to do list" for my own NPCTweaks.esp, a task that won't get any attention now until late in September. To properly achieve our goal with Umbra requires scripting as well, something that to date falls outside the scope of my present modding abilities.

We are of a like mind Inafog, at least on the first point. My current character has befriended Umbra via Give A Gift and he managed to pickpocket the a-cursed sword from her by using SMYB - Show Me Your Body (just so she'd unequip the sword ... honest). He dreams of whisking her off to Ardah when he becomes rich and famous. In the meantime he hasn't decided yet whether to keep the sword or trade it for a hat.

What you are probably running into is the long standing A-Bomb bug (stuck animations bug). If you use Wrye Bash you can fix it using the Repair A-Bomb menu item. If you don't use Wrye Bash you can use OAF - Oblivion Animation fixer. A couple of things to note about OAF ... first, the fix isn't permanent, so you'll need to rerun OAF periodically. I find the Legion rider torches are a good indicator. When you first start to see them trailing some lazy flame fragments it's time to rerun OAF. Second, if you use Oblivion Script Extender (OBSE) you will need to rename a copy of the OBSE co-save to match the fixed OAF save. When you run OAF on a save (let's say one named MySave07.ess) it creates a fixed save named OAF_MySave07.ess (using my example save). After you start using OBSE it always creates an OBSE co-save each time you save ... for MySave07.ess there will be a corresponding MySave07.obse. What you need to do is rename a copy of MySave07.obse to OAF_MySave07.obse to match the OAF fixed save. It's more complicated to explain than it is to do. - Edit - The Wrye Bash fix isn't permanent either ... it reports the percent to broken animation, claiming you don't need to fix it yet. I always do as soon as I start noticing the early signs. Running either the Wrye Bash fix or OAF doesn't cause any issues. Something else to note ... no renaming of co-saves is needed for the Wrye Bash version ... it keeps a renamed backup of the original save instead.

Here's two wiki articles that may help ... Oblivion reinstall procedure and Revert to vanilla data (the second one is a bit late to save you this time, unless you can locate that backup and it has some mods installed already). If it's the disk version of the game the disk uninstall is the best route. Also don't skip the registry cleaning step.

Looking at the stages of ND08 (The Sword of the Crusader) you may get some clues towards figuring out what's going on by comparing what your quest log says and the quest stages table at the bottom of this page (the text differs if the sword has been reconsecrated or not and if any Aurorans are left alive ... see stages 70 and 80, could be something is bunched into a knot there).

My current character is on the verge of doing the KotN (I use SM Plugin Refurbish so I need 15 fame to get the quest). In all likelyhood though it'll be fall by the time I get around to it (summer season isn't the time for gaming on the computer). Looking forward to both KotN and KotN: Revelations when I get back at it. Can't think of much else to be of help. All I can suggest is to use the console command "getstage <questID>" to figure out exactly where the game is at in the quest stages. Use the UESP Wiki page Oblivion:Knifghts of the Nine Quests to get the questIDs (you may also be able to figure out where you're at by checking your quest log and comparing what it says with the quest stages table at the bottom of each quest page). If you can figure out exactly what quest stage you're on you can try advancing the quest one step using the console command "setstage <questID> <stage>" (no quote marks or <> brackets of course).

The UESP Wiki reports these as the console location codes: NDPrioryoftheNineBasement, NDPrioryoftheNineHouse, NDPrioryoftheNineChapel & NDPrioryoftheNineUndercroft. The coc wait trick just give the game a chance to sort out things by allowing all the cells to reset without the player in the normally used game cells. If the problem is something that will benefit from getting a fresh start it will work ... if the problem is more resource related the problem will still be waiting for you when you get back to Cyrodiil. Looking at the UESP walkthrough I see you must have been to the Priory before to get the cuirass (I still have never done the KotN quest). To me that should eliminate a problem with the Priory itself. Have you had any hic ups along the way or used the console to force the quests?

Have a look through Bben46's Wiki article Revert to vanilla data for some pointers.

You need to be journeyman in Marksman (skill 50+). After drawing the bow with your attack key you hold block to zoom.

Here's a UESP Wiki page on console commands: Oblivion:Console Commands. Look at the commands "getav" (to see the current value) and "setav" and "getcrimegold" and "setcrimegold". Follow the linked Actor Value Indices to get the correct name for any values. Those commands require a target so to see your characters current fatigue value for instance it is "player.getav fatigue" (no quote marks) and to set it would be "player.setav fatigue XX" (with XX being the amount you wish to change it by ... -XX to lower it). To use it on other NPCs you just need to open the console and click on the target NPC to get their refID displayed and then you don't need the "player." part (so just "setav fatigue -75" to lower an NPC's fatigue by 75 points).

Yes you'll need to return to Tamriel to proper way to avoid the No Greeting bug.

Something else that occurs to me ... how are you creating these new NPCs? I'm Mr. Lazy and generally create a new NPC from an existing one (giving them a new formID), in fact I don't think I've ever created one from scratch now that I think on it. Here's a link to the CS Wiki page Basic NPC Creation Tutorial (the last update on the CS Wiki site broke all the links to pictures ... sorry). Have a look to see if anything there jumps out at you.

Open the console using the tilde (~) key found just below the Esc key on standard keyboards. At the console prompt type "coc center" (without the quote marks) and hit Enter. You will be transported to an open field with some trees in the distance. Using the in-game wait menu (by default the "t" key) wait for 3 full days and then some extra for good measure. Open the console again and "coc weye" (again without the quote marks). You'll be transported to the fisherman's shack at Weye and from there see if your problem still exists (you can coc to another location when coming back if you know the correct location code for that location).

Try the "coc center wait" trick. Open the console using the tilde (~) key found just below the Esc key on standard keyboards. At the console prompt type "coc center" (without the quote marks) and hit Enter. You will be transported to an open field with some trees in the distance. Using the in-game wait menu (by default the "t" key) wait for 3 full days and then some extra for good measure. Open the console again and "coc weye" (again without the quote marks). You'll be transported to the fisherman's shack at Weye and from there see if your problem still exists (you can coc to another location when coming back if you know the correct location code for that location).

Something else to try is start from a save outside of the city you are placing the NPCs (though by working from a save inside one of those inns should be OK). You aren't using anything that would touch races are you (so in the CS you are just ticking Oblivion.esm and your ESP)?

No the comment was either on a mod comments or perhaps a comment in image share. Could be the problem only surfaces after you enable archive invalidation because before you enable it the game is simply using it's default textures from Oblivion - Textures - Compressed.bsa instead of the replacement texture. From your list I'd look at Natural Habitat/Vegetation/Water and possibly Weather All Natural (more than likely the former, but I use neither so I'm guessing that Weather All Natural doesn't include replacements for any ground/grass textures). I think I recall reading something in Sounds of Cyrodiil mod comments about crashes too.

Sounds like a mod conflict to me. Look through your load order with TES4Edit for what other mod you have that changes Snak gra-Bura.