Elleh

Sooooo, here I am again. I put mods aside for a long time, but I am picking them up again. But.... as I am putting finishing touches on my custom armor, I have discovered a new and frustrating bug. The situation: I have attached some hair to the hood of my armor. I have set the shader property of the hair trishape within the hood nif to exactly match the shader for vanilla Bethesda hair (and hooked up my textures). When wearing the hood and changing the character's hair color in the race menu, the hair tints show up properly. And here is the problem: The color doesn't stick. If the hood is removed and then put back on, the hair attached to the hood defaults to a dark color. This was also experienced by a friend who tested the issue for me. Under normal circumstances, the hood's hair defaults to a dark color every time. He also reported that custom colors were not working, but I have not tested that myself yet. I have tried messing with the shader property a bit. I have tried unchecking SLF2_Vertex_Colors (Obviously, it just makes the hair totally untintable)I have tried setting the shader type from Hair Tint to Default I have also tried messing with the skin partitions. Within the nif, I have tried setting the hair trishape to 141 and 41 (long hair), and to 131 and 31 (hair)I have tried setting the hood and feather trishapes to 131 and 31, and to 141 and 41In the creation kit, the hood armor addon occupies biped slots 31(hair), 41(long hair), and 43(ears). I have not tried changing these yet. Any ideas? I did a bit of searching and saw this problem mentioned in one other place, but no solution was offered. :C

Copied from main post. Help me decide, plz! Question: Would it be bad if this mod required SKSE?? I have worked out a method to allow the player to reinforce the armor with a special spell, to ensure that it is useful over a long period of time. There are two possible ways to do this: The SKSE version is far more simple and elegant, and allows NPC's to benefit from the "reinforcements".... but would be useless without the script extender. The Vanilla version is not as flexible, a bit messier, and would require lots of workarounds to let NPC's get the upgrades (so I probably won't bother).... but doesn't require a script extender. Personally, I <3 SKSE. But I could see why someone would be irritated that an armor mod would require it.

Yeah, I'm thinking I'll just need to make a new weapon to get the same effect - high cost, high reward. Like I said above in my edit, maybe lower the damage, up the speed, and either give it unusually high Crit damage, or a one-shot-kill chance a la Mehrunes' Razor. (Which would be highly appropriate, actually.... ahaha.../inside joke)

I tried something like that. What happens is, he just tries to re-equip a different bow over and over and over while in combat. I'll force him to unequip the standard bow, then equip the longbow...... then he'll unequip the longbow and the cycle just starts over......

That's the problem exactly, actually. I'm trying to get him to use a bow from Recurve Longbows . The bows are powerful, but have a super slow draw time. This makes the damage per second equal "0". So the NPC thinks the bow does zero damage. -_- He'll use it if there are no bows in his inventory; but even so, he'd be just as likely to pick up a wooden bow off the ground and use that instead. I could try fiddling with it a bit, but it's the draw time that keeps the bow from being seriously OP. EDIT: You know..... I'm thinking I'll just make my own weapon for the purpose of this character. (Not saying anything against Grantiz's mod - it's still uber badass). I make it huge, but keep a more normal draw time and less damage. Then I could give it an enchantment with a small chance to one-shot things, like Mehrunes' Razor.

Nope. Tried exactly what you had, and it doesn't seem to work. As before, he equips the bow but switches to something else the minute combat starts. Like I said: it is a weapon that, under normal circumstances, an NPC would never want to equip/use. After looking at the UnequipItem page, it appears there is some weirdness with NPC's and weapons. Meh. -_-

Huh. Okay.... off to try that. Didn't think I had a problem because the compiler didn't yell at me. *Shrug* Be back soon.

Tried to do a little trick with the EquipItem function to force an NPC to equip a weapon he typically would not use. It does cause him to equip the weapon, but trying "abPreventRemoval = true" appears to not work. He can still unequip the weapon.... which puts a major wrench in my little plan. Preeeety sure I got the syntax right, but just in case this is the bit of script on a MagicEffect: Weapon Bow = (BowList.Getat(0) as Weapon) SomeActor.EquipItem(Bow, abPreventRemoval = true) Can someone confirm this as a bug? And if it is, is there a known workaround or another function to try?

When it's done. ;) I don't really have a deadline. If I did, I promise I would let you all know. I do have a day-job, sooooo free time is entirely dependent on my weekly schedule.

If I knew it wouldn't take ages I would.... X3. I'll probably pick out a set of the most varying ones. The first and sixth are two of my personal favorites - and I think the first one would be a good candidate for "daedric". We'll see what happens..... And thank you. :) I'm glad you like my work! Ooooh, I think I'll do something unique for the Atherial crown. I haven't decided what yet, 'tho. It will likely be a more elaborate design, as it is meant to be a rare and powerful artifact.

Hey, I see a lot of people are still talking about the "unable to login" bug. lpha and I appear to have "fixed" the problem on our end simply by deleting our cookies. In my specific case, I deleted cookies and temporary files from Internet Explorer. For hours I've been able to login, logout, and stay logged in on all sites as usual. Does this work for anyone else? Or is it just a fluke?

In response to post #8578003. Thanks for mentioning this! I was having the exact problem described above, but deleting the cookies from both of my browsers seems to have cleared it up. Let's just hope it stays that way. *crosses fingers*

Hi! Wow, I haven't worked on these for a while (bad, bad me!). As I looked at them, I realized they needed a lot more work to be really top-notch. i.e. There is a rather large gap between the circlet and the character's forehead, and I did a pretty poor job of unwrapping them - I really wasted a lot of pixel space. However..... if this doesn't bother you too much I put up a "rough draft" here. The current version contains exactly what you see in the screenshots, and will work for human and elven females only. Don't know when I'll get around to fixing them up, but hopefully these are tolerable for now. ^_^

You just need to make sure you have a COC marker heading to teleport to. ;) From the "Lokir's Tomb" level design tutorial on the CK wiki: "When testing, it's helpful to use the COCMarkerHeading. These markers are only used for testing - when using the COC console command, this is where you will appear. Only one of these markers should be placed per cell. If a cell has a pre-existing coc Marker, simply move it before saving the plugin. Like all markers, if it's hidden, press "M" to show it. If you are having trouble finding it in the Object Window, simply type "COC" into the filter box and select the *ALL category."

Oooooooooh, I see how that works! So it really was just that simple. Thanks BotOwned! So I guess the hardest part will be figuring out what combo of multipliers is best. But that will just be a matter of reading and experimenting. This all seems a lot more doable. ^_^

Hi guys. I have yet another noobish question involving scripting. Hopefully this one is pretty straight forward. I'm trying to figure out how to alter my follower's combat style on the fly using some sort of spell or power. I see that SKSE has some super useful looking functions but aaahhh..... I don't quite understand how to use them. Probably because I barely understand papyrus at all, yet. Blagh. First, can these functions be called from within a Magic Effect script? If so..... uh.... how? I don't even know if/how a Combat Style could be defined as a property. On the CK wiki, the SetCombatStyle page says that "SKSE does not provide CombatStyle properties as of yet." Sooooo.... how would one be capable of using the combat style script at all? Would there be a way to use formlists like the pages for "GetCombatStyle" and "SetCombatSyle" suggest? I'm sure it's something fundamental here that I am not understanding. My alternative would be to use the aforementioned SetCombatStyle function and have the script read into a list of predetermined styles. I feel pretty confident I could work that much out as thankfully the wiki page gives an example. But I don't really want to do that unless I simply cannot find a way to alter the combat style directly. It would give me waaaay less flexibility. For example: I want to be able to order him to fight with only a bow, only a sword, or a combination of both (by altering equipment score multipliers). I want to also be able to tell him to fight offensively or defensively (by altering offensive/defensive multipliers). And I want to be able to do these things independently from each other. With powers. Yes? Or am I going about this all wrong? Should I try something other than combat styles?

Thanks. ^_^ I hope to put out some kind of beta soon, too. My schedule can be a tad unpredictable so I can't say when, but I'll try to keep this thread updated as I work out the kinks. This would also be a good place to ask what kind or armor rating and enchantments ya'll think this thing should have? I'll probably make it somewhere between leather and Thieves' Guild - any more would be pushing it, in terms of how sturdy it visually appears. Even that might be overkill, but I want it to remain useful well into the game. For my personal playthrough, I am going to combine it with some customized bound armor spells that will stack onto the overall armor rating. I wonder if there is another way to incorporate a similar mechanic? A way to "reinforce" it with spells perhaps? I absolutely cannot release my personal bound armor spells, as they are just alterations of existing mods. Anywho... ideas are welcome!

You'll need Blender or 3ds Max (or others - Maya, Cinema4D... etc.), Gimp or Photoshop, and Nifskope. Once you choose a modeling program and get familiar with the basics, just use your favorite search engine and look for tutorials. I typed "Blender sword tutorial" into google and got a ton of useful hits. Or try "low poly sword tutorial". Or even "Skyrim custom weapon tutorial insertprogamnamehere". From there you'll need to pinpoint a tutorial on how to export a nif from your chosen program. 3dsMax has a nice one, if you can get a hold of the program. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVPicWtxTWk The rest is rather similar to modifying existing weapons, like the CK tutorials describe. Google is your friend. ;)

=============== EDIT 9/21 Yes. I really am still working on this. Ha! Anyway, I'm in the process of integrating the armor into the world. I am hung-up on a couple things though, the biggest involving a spell. Question: Would it be bad if this mod required SKSE?? I have worked out a method to allow the player to reinforce the armor with a special spell, to ensure that it is useful over a long period of time. There are two possible ways to do this: The SKSE version is far more simple and elegant, and allows NPC's to benefit from the "reinforcements".... but would be useless without the script extender. The Vanilla version is not as flexible, a bit messier, and would require lots of workarounds to let NPC's get the upgrades (so I probably won't bother).... but doesn't require a script extender. Personally, I <3 SKSE. But I could see why someone would be irritated that an armor mod would require it. ================ Hi everybody! Um. So. I've been working on some custom armor from scratch for quite some time, and it is slowly nearing completion. The armor was initially made for myself, and is something of a "learning mod" where I have been teaching myself modeling and all the ins and outs of adding new content to the game. It is by no means perfect, but despite all that I'm feeling pretty good about it. I'd like to release it to the community eventually. That's were you guys come in! As I am putting finishing touches on the initial 0 weight model, I'd love to hear opinions and suggestions from players and those who have more experience creating armor than I. Brief concept overview: First of all, this armor was created with a specific character in mind, so the design reflects that. I currently don't have the intention of making a male version, as that would take a ton of work and I do not really have the drive to do it. :C (Sorry Dovahbros, I really don't hate you. It's just. Yeah.) This armor was designed for a lightly armored spellsword/mage, and is meant to look well-worn and rugged. It is not meant to be flashy, expensive, super sexy, or elaborate - rather, blend into the vanilla game. It should appear to be well-made, but with patches and alterations made after a lot of use and travel. I am planning on calling it "Hedge Mage Armor". I don't believe that name has been taken, so I'm calling dibs. :tongue: Lots of big pics below! Marmoset Toolbag shot. (For funsies.) http://i1107.photobucket.com/albums/h383/EllehBella/scene_zps59c94a73.jpg From various angles without ENB (Click the spoiler, plz!): It's pretty low-poly - about the same as Beth's meshes. I am looking into fixing up some of the awkward pointy areas on the hood, bewbs, and left-hand "sleeve", provided I can keep my UV's mostly intact. (Call this a newbie mistake. If I knew what I know now about mesh-flow, my approach would have been different.) I am in the process or sorting out small clipping issues, and dealing with some small but unfortunate UV stretching. Any additional suggestions are welcome. :smile:

.... uhhhhhh...... Well my scripting skills are nearly non-existent, so consider this an elaborate bump. From your first post, it's a little confusing figuring out where you're having an issue. Are you saying "how do I create a resurrect spell that doesn't preserve items?" I.e. Resets inventory? Or "How do I get the Midas Magic spell to work for my purposes"? I haven't looked at the Midas Magic spell, so I can't say for sure, but you'd probably just need to chop out the bit with the chest. This might be a good starting point: http://www.creationkit.com/Resurrect_-_Actor The second example might even be exactly what you need - just remove the ActorTypeNPC keyword. All that would be need then was to create some sort of timer that only allowed the effect to run after a certain amount of time. A while back, I made a post here asking for help with resurrecting a specific actor and adding a timer. http://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/939054-teleporting-and-then-resurrecting-npc-scriping-help-needed/page-3 The difference there is that the script is attached to the actor and not a magic effect. It also accounts for the resetting inventory problem, but the bit with the chest and form lists could just be cut out entirely. Your only problem would come from resurrecting humanoid NPCs - they'd be nekkid if they don't have all the parts of their default outfit. This is mentioned by someone else on pages 3 and 4. But if your spell only works on animals, it wouldn't be a problem. Food for thought, I guess? Eheh. ^^;

Yeah, that's what I was saying. Well, I guess it technically is glowing. But if the mesh glows white, and the texture is nearly-black, and the result is normal-eye-white - is it really that different from not glowing? I bet if you tweak it, you could get a perfect balance. I confirmed my theory after reading through the mod's comments. On page 25, the author says "Update: New version 1.3 has different eyeballs, they are darker to make the eyeballs themselves less glowy, meaning the glow is pretty much from the iris now. The old files are still downloadable as Optional Files in case someone prefers the whole eyeballs to glow". If you go back to earlier pages, you will see people commenting about the entire eyes glowing. If you know a bit about modeling, you might be able to manage to make a nif with separate tri shapes for the iris and sclera. The sclera could use an e-map shader and the iris could us the glow shader. Or, you could place a circular plane in front of the iris, export it as a separate tri shape, give it a strong glow and make it partially transparent with an alpha property. Or you could duplicate the eyeball and place a copy just slightly in front of the original. You could then make the front mesh glow, and use alpha transparency to make everything but the iris and invisible. I assumed vanilla Skyrim did something like that until I researched into it further - that's what I meant about a "decal mesh" in my earlier post. It'd work the same way as blood on weapons. You could also look into how draugr eyes work. Don't know much about it, but it's more of a special effect/spell type thing.

Okay, after a bit of fiddling around I'm pretty sure I know what's going on here. It's a bit surprising, and pretty simple. I tried copy/pasting the shader property directly from the Dawnguard vamp eye nif, and pasting it into my custom dremora eyes. (That Underworld mod uses the same shader type, btw.) The only texture I changed was the diffuse, and I changed the emissive and specular colors to something more appropriate. In game, the eyes glow without the aid of a glow map or glow shader type - I'm assuming the "Eye EnvMap" shader type has glow built in. Thing is, the entire eye was still glowing in a similar manner to that screenshot I initially showed you. Dark parts not glowing, orange mixing with red emissive color, etc. What I think is happening here is just a clever manipulation of the intrinsic properties of Skyrim's glow. After carefully comparing the nifs and textures of vanilla Skyrim, Dawnguard, and that mod, I am almost entirely certain of this. Here's how I believe they did it: For that mod, they set the emissive color to white at a fairly high intensity. The diffuse texture that is applied then interacts with the glow. The irises are a very brilliant and light blue, thus the white light being emitted from the mesh "shines through" the blue like a gel filter. Voila. Blue glow. To compensate for the entire mesh glowing, the sclera was made a very dark gray. You can clearly see the difference when comparing it to a normal vanilla eye texture. When the white glow shines through that, it is dampened by the increased amount of black and balances out into something that appears to be a normal, non-glowing white. As for glow being built into the Eye EnvMap shader type, vanilla eyes compensate for this by having the emissive color set to pure black. Obviously, the color black cannot emit light. Science. So there you have it. You can have eyes that both glow and have an environment map. Instead of using a glow mask to dictate where the mesh glows, you just need to get crafty with the diffuse texture.

Of course. :) Steam is required for Skyrim. Even if you have a store-bought hard copy (as I do), you need Steam to activate it. You can use both the Steam Workshop and the NMM to download, install, and manage mods simultaneously. I prefer the Nexus myself, but I use both. So let me just say - good choice and welcome to the community!

... as far as I know, you can only have one shader type per tri shape. I assumed vampire eyes somehow used a decal mesh (like blood on weapons), but I just had a look and that wasn't the case. Vampire eyes use the standard eye nif, so maybe it's something there? Maybe it is a decal somehow? The nif has a "BSDecalPlacementVectorExtraData" node, but I'm not totally sure what that Is for, and I can't seem to find any "vampire eye decal" in the CK or BSA's. And yes, the diffuse map refers to the "main texture" or the "color map." I'm going to look into that mod and at Dawnguard, because I think Dawnguard vamps have something slightly different. At least, when I first played it I got a pretty cool effect: But that turned out to be a glitch, I think? Curious...... EDIT: Had a look at the "eyesmalevampire" nif from Dawnguard. First thing..... Dawnguard actually uses a separate nif, unlike vanilla (obviously, ahaha.). The mesh most definitely glows - and glows a very bright orange. There is no glow map flag, and the shader type is EyeEnvmap. How then....?? I'm going to try grabbing the shader from that mesh and put it on my own.... see what will happen.... I very much want "legit" glowing eyes for my character as well.

Don't know exactly how to do this yet, but I want to figure it out. The problem is that you can't use an emissive mask and an environment mask at the same time in the same shader property. Like you described, you can make the mesh glow but you can tell it where to glow. It is worth mentioning that the color and intensity of the glow is affected by the colors of your diffuse texture. If you have an area on the diffuse map that is completely black (or just very dark), it wont glow. So with some eyes you can get away with it, such as: The outer parts in the diffuse are black, so they don't glow. The actual emissive color is a bright red, so that mixes with the orange-y pupil. I know that wasn't very helpful, but I'll come back if I find something. :smile: