ElysiumFic

Maybe the answer is to do both. Like, if you download a mod for one hair, there will be two versions inside, one DTX5 (more transparency but better quality when not transparent) and DTX1 (less transparency but poorer quality.) I've already got the DTX5 versions done. I suppose it doesn't matter if I replace them or add to them with DTX1 versions, the effort is going to be the same either way.

I agree. The transparency issue means also a lot of time I'm seeing stuff like this: http://i.imgur.com/UQUqESw.png Ugh! You can see the outline of her scalp INSIDE the hair. *headdesk*

I'm debating whether or not to gradually work on changing my hair mod DLCs in such a way that would eliminate a lot of the transparency issues but would result in a slightly poorer texture quality. This for comparison: http://i.imgur.com/ol9C4zh.jpg One is much more transparent than the other, but if you look carefully around the ends of the hair strands and at the hairline/wispy bit on the forehead, the quality of the the one WITHOUT the transparency issues is more...sketchy? Like looking at something drawn with a ballpoint pen vs. something painted with a high-quality brush. Despite discussing this with some very brilliant modders who know far more about textures than I ever will, it doesn't appear to be an issue that can be fixed. We're going to have to sacrifice quality or put up with intermittent transparency. Here's another view, closeup: http://i.imgur.com/ugYPiAS.jpg And with almost 200 hair mods to redo, it's going to be quite an undertaking. But if there's enough of a demand, I will work on it in my spare time. So, I put the poll before you. Take a moment to answer this quick, one-question poll please.

Trying to put together my Intro outfit replacer DLC for a few popular intro outfits, and I'm getting this glitch on every one: http://i.imgur.com/huRrvks.png Basically when the outfit transitions from "clean" to "dirty" after the explosion, it has this sort of problem until you get control of Shepard and can do a quicksave/quickload. I have seen people mention having this problem. Does anyone know if anyone ever found a cause or solution for it? My Google-Fu is failing me.

Okay, so I succeeded in adding custom armors and clothes to a DLC the way you described. Didn't work for hair. The mesh came through but the texture didn't. Might try again in the near future but it was a good first step. Then for shits and giggles I spent the rest of the night trying to use this tutorial to make a PCC with custom hair meshes and textures in it that don't cannibalize other meshes/textures. It was pretty easy and straightforward until I got to Step 5. All I had to do was clone both the mesh and the texture I needed (In other words, do Step 2 twice, once for the mesh and once for the texture.) In theory, if I could get it to work, it would mean all anyone wanting to do to change their hair is tweak the savegame file. But around just before Step 5 is where my understanding of how to do things fell apart. Up until then, it was astonishingly easy. Basically, trying to use one of the disheveled hairs I was trying to get to work originally in this thread: 1) I cloned the HMF_HIR_PROCustom_Cute_MDL mesh and named it HMF_HIR_PROCustom_Frizzy_MDL (because I like naming consistency.) 2) I cloned the HMF_HIR_PROShort_Diff texture (which is what the tpf replaces when you run it through TPF/DSS tools) and named it HMF_HIR_Frizzy_Diff 3) I went into Meshplorer and used the upk from the resource files to apply the proper mesh to HMF_HIR_PROCustom_Frizzy_MDL 4) I went into texplorer and used the dds to try to apply the textures. That's where I ran into my first problem. I got an error saying the texture I was using was in DDS_DXT5 when it needed to be in DXT1. Not sure what the proper process for converting that is; will have to research it some but I haven't had a chance to look it up yet. I tried converting it with Image Engine but that was just a stab in the dark and I'm sure it was the wrong thing to do. But the possibilities with this are lots of fun. The ability to have multiple hairstyles on a pcc and swap them out by just tweaking the savegame file. In my case, if it had worked, the changes would have been BIOG_HMF_HIR_PRO.HMF_HIR_PROCustom_Frizzy_MDL for the hair mesh and BIOG_HMF_HIR_PRO.HMF_HIR_Frizzy_Diff in the texture parameters for Hair_Diff and Hair_Mask. I just don't have quite a firm enough grasp of the process to pull it off, especially since I can't code beyond some very basic xml, my understanding of how to work with all things hex-related is limited to what I can easily mimic reading a tutorial, and I can't edit images. But it's been fun playing with it and hopefully once my brain has had a day or two to process everything I've worked on teaching myself tonight, I'll make some connections or grasp some concepts I'm missing right now. Meanwhile, if anyone wants to play with the file I made, I'll be happy to share it.

LOL Of course, rather than carrying on trying to mod my game I instead sidetracked myself trying to figure out how to make DLC. Yes, I do crack myself up. I don't need to do this but I'm just curious enough to want to try to see if I CAN. Anyway, most of what is on that tutorial you linked makes sense to me, except for the TLK stuff. Which I see from the comments you struggled with yourself at first. I can use the ME3ModManager's Mount.dlc creator to make the mount.dlc file, but in order to do that I need to have the tlk ID which it appears means I need the TLK. Okay, great, there's a tool for that and it's pretty easy to monkey-see/monkey-do with the tlk from other people's mods. YAY! I'm using the Liara Casual Wear (DLC_CON_LIAC) mod because it's nice and tiny. Except...I'm a little fuzzy on how to find the unique number for the ID. Once I get that figured out, assuming I haven't catastrophically screwed anything up, things are going to get FUN!

Hmm okay. I will play and let you know how it works out. :) Thanks so much. While I don't have the skillset to actually make this stuff happen, I always love figuring it out enough to get myself into trouble. :D

Oooh nifty! I will play with this. Thank you! Using gibbed to switch things up was actually something I was thinking of playing with, having one mod installed on CustomCute and another installed on ProJessica. God, life would be so much easier if Ash's hair had the same number of bones as these meshes, because she's dead in my game so no one is using her hair--ugh, that sounded a little grave-robbery and creepy, but you get what I mean. I could use the .upk to change her mesh and apply the texture there and then make the appropriate alteration in Gibbed. Okay, let me stretch my understanding of the process here, pose a few hypotheticals, and you can tell me if I'm completely misunderstanding how things work. Hypothetical #1--Is it possible to plug the already-meshed BIOG_HMF_HIR_PRO.pcc into the basegame CookedPCConsole folder, apply the texture to it, then swap it out for vanilla (not over-writing it, of course) and drop the modded .pcc into the DLC folder and run the AutoTOC? That would prevent having to run the treescan again, right? (Alternatively, if running the treescan was necessary, could I use something like this process to circumvent having to scan the whole darn shebang? I'm assuming if scanning is necessary, it's to build the .tfc file, right?) Hypothetical #2--If I wanted to, say, have four hair mods like I showed you above, two on CustomCute and two on ProJessica, I could mod CustomCute and ProJessica on the same .pcc file, then make two copies of the DLC, one with each version of the file. I'm very interested in the possibilities this presents for doing these hair mods without bodysnatching anyone else's hair, whether permanently via texture edits to the basegame or temporarily via DLC. What would really rock is if one could figure out how to give the casual outfits closet a "choose helmet" option where the selection is a whole array of these hairstyles. If I can figure out how to put just a hair mod in a DLC, I might make DLCs of all these other hair mods floating around (giving the appropriate credit to the authors, of course) and post them here on Nexus to save other souls the issues I've had. What does a DLC require besides the changed files in the CookedPCConsole folder and a TOC.bin? Is it possible to scavenge those elements out of another DLC mod and tweak them? (LOL I tend to jump in with both feet and try to figure out the most elaborate way of doing things--I would never have waited ten months if I knew there was a different way. Of course, this means I spend 5X more time figuring out the learning curve for elaborately modding the game than I do actually playing the game.)

*sigh* After having spent all day at this and having to roll it back again (thankfully not all the way to it's unscanned state) and having spent a week getting to this point, the idea of being able to save most of what I want to do as a DLC is very appealing. Please share your process with me? I'm looking for tutorials now but haven't found any yet. The ones I'm looking at all seem to be "you already know how to make DLC so now let's make them better" type things.

I guess that's probably part of my problem. I want to use the ALOT textures, but only because I'm sort of obsessive and have to have it once I know it's there. I don't actually pay close enough attention to all the scenery and detail to really require them. I should get rid of them and stick with things like HD mods for complexions and clothing. That problem in my last post, with getting the error? I seem to be getting that with most things I install now. I didn't notice it happening until I was in the process of installing the ALOT textures for Shepard and the squad, which is when my computer froze and I had to manually reboot. After that, maybe 1/3-1/2 of textures I tried to install actually were installed. The rest got that error. :/ So I'm reverting to a backup I made after I'd applied the bulk of the ALOT textures and seeing if it will go better. Might end up having to revert to my post-scan backup. If I have to do that, I'm saying f*#@ it and going with the bare minimum of mods I need to make the game what I want it to be. Forget the HD textures for most things.

Hmm this is weird. Watching the debug window as I install a bunch of textures and I'm seeing a lot of (Error: Export object has wrong class or name,) Usually this is after it's saved to a lot of the PCCs it's supposed to save to. Oh well. Not going to worry about it for now. If it turns out I start the game and everyone is a mutant weird thing then I'll worry. ETA: Okay, so since my paragon shep should definitely not have glowing red eyes after installing skin/eye textures, Imma go out on a limb and consider this a problem.

I like that. :smile: But yeah. I'm all about the immersion. Here's my fantasy of a Shep customization mod package, which probably isn't even possible, but it would absolutely be awesome if it were: The package would have a bunch of these hair mods together with an app similar to the one that comes with the Dragon Age: Redesigned companion modules (i.e. the app lets you choose precisely which version you want and installs it for you--of course I know that ME3 is a much more complex game as far as modding goes.) Bonus points if the app would let you choose the savegame you want to edit, makes the changes necessary there, and creates a new savegame file (thus preserving a backup of the unchanged one.) That would (hopefully) idiot-proof the process. Of course, it wouldn't need idiot-proofing (at least where the savegame edit is concerned) if there were a way to choose Allers hair or CustomCute or whatever during character creation. I know how to add face presets to the character creator in the coalesced file, but I haven't seen anything that would let you adjust which hair models are offered. It would also rock if it were possible to make some of these hair or outfit changes their own model instead of replacing a model already in the game (frex, it wouldn't replace Allers hair, or a clothing mod wouldn't replace the dress or hoodie or whatever.) I'd give anything to know how to make this stuff instead of understanding just enough to play around with it a little but never enough to make it actually accomplish what I wish it could.

I'd be very interested in seeing that. I've been wondering if there is a way I can stick all this in a DLC and just drop it in if I ever have to rebuild. As for hair mods, they're not particularly difficult if the author provides the .pcc and a .tpf. Then all you have to do is a couple small tweaks to your savegame (it does suck that you can't apply them UNTIL you have a savegame.) I still don't know what was causing the original issue I posted about with the textures not applying. They apply now (or they have in tests so far, haven't gottent everything set up again and tried it.) I've just had various issues getting to the point where I had everything set up again because things kept getting weird while I tested along the way, lol. I do like the flexibility of authors providing the resource files. If a hair mod overwrites Allers hair, for example, but I don't want to see Allers messed up, with the source files I can change another hair instead (assuming it has the same number of bones.) Same with armor or outfits. As for Femshep's hair--it's a roleplaying thing. Basically in my mind it goes like this: Beginning of game, she's got some pretty badass and/or sloppy hair. Because she's traumatized, right? Six months ago she pulled a Rip van Winkle, then she was forced to be responsible for the deaths of over a quarter of a million people, then she got arrested and is considered "disgraced" if you listen to the news. So she's not going to be a perfectly polished, put together soldier. While she's under house arrest, she's just all, "Pfft, f*#@ it, I do what I want." Something like, say, this: http://i1.wp.com/www.girlplaysgame.com/wp-content/uploads/MassEffect3-2015-08-31-10-34-08-25.png?resize=526%2C296 Then the attack on earth happens and she's back in command, and while she's still traumatized from all of the above, she's pulling herself together: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zzZEw4xHCnY/UkCoT18mtbI/AAAAAAAAAjI/N4jRBmHRCh4/s640/MassEffect3+2013-09-24+00-40-08-49.jpg BUT she's also not sleeping, probably not eating, being run ragged from one end of the galaxy to the other because apparently the leaders of all the other sentient races are children who don't know how to stop bickering while there's a crisis going on. And THEN she gets her ass handed to her on Thessia. So gradually she becomes more and more unkempt: http://40.media.tumblr.com/2c69542241fdba6438801497cd51e83f/tumblr_mt0y4nz5fO1sg46y3o1_500.jpg She pulls herself back together for the final attack on earth, but by the time she reaches the Conduit, if her uniform is in tatters I doubt her hair is going to be in a nice, neat bun. It'll be more like this: http://i0.wp.com/www.girlplaysgame.com/wp-content/uploads/MassEffect3-2015-08-22-15-11-31-15.png?resize=349%2C197 So there's a method to all this madness. :D

Yeah, that has been my process, too. Exactly as you mention here, except that I don't install the .mod files before the scan. For some reason I thought I was supposed to scan with nothing except the DLC mods installed. My outline wasn't clear, but when I ran the scan everything was vanilla except for the DLC mods. Basically I'm just following the process recommended on the ME3Explorer wiki, with the exception that this time I temporarily did a couple tests and then rolled the files back before scanning. So what happened in Step 3 is: Vanilla install + DLC test a couple easily rolled-back mods roll back to vanilla scan broke it Then, here in step 6, what happened was Vanilla install + DLC (step 4) scan backup everything test mods (step 5) revert to backup of scanned vanilla to undo any steps made in the test (because if I'd left them some of the mods would have been installed in the wrong order and therefore the textures I wanted to have when I was done might be overwritten) broke it I have no idea why reverting to the exact same files that had worked just a little while before would break it, but it did. So I started over and now things are working. For the time being. Will know for sure after I'm done installing everything.

No, I re-vanilla'ed everything before running the scan. I was trying to do was see if the mod worked on a completely vanilla game, to try to narrow down where it stopped working. So I swapped out the pcc and tested the texture with texmod (which of course wouldn't require me to run the scan.) Once I confirmed that everything was working BEFORE the scan, I swapped the vanilla pcc back in. I forgot to specify that in the document. Step 2.2.2 should have been "re-vanilla the pcc again." So when I ran the scan, all the files were vanilla. I know better than to run the scan on non-vanilla files. :smile: Here's where I am now (when I c/p it changes the outline back to start at 1 but it's actually starting at Step 4 when continuing from what I posted above. So these are actually steps 4- :cool:: 1. 1. Re-vanilla’ed. Game starts. Attempting Step 1 and 2 again. 1.1. Works so far. Now to extract and scan. Again. Ugh. 1.2. YAY! Success. Game loaded. 1.3. Back up scanned DLC. Commence applying mods. 1.4. Test of hair mod using texmod: 2. Add in a few select mods one or two at a time 2.1. Apply edited coalesced 2.1.1. Success 2.2. Test a few armor/clothing/hair texture and mesh mods 2.2.1. Success 2.3. Test a few more random mods—character textures, etc. 2.3.1. SUCCESS. Time to get cocky and try a lot files 3. GOING FOR THE GOOD STUFF: Apply textures 3.1. Revert to Vanilla + Scanned DLC to undo any changes made while testing in Step 5. Run TOCbinUpdater. 3.1.1. Ruh-roh. Infini-load. AutoTOC everything! 3.1.1.1. Tentative Conclusion: Sometimes in the process of scanning DLC something gets glitched. This is twice now that an attempt to scan a completely vanillaed game has broken it, once with r653 and now with r733 3.1.1.2. Corollary: Sometimes vanilla scanned DLC backups aren’t as vanilla as one would think, since I reverted twice to my “vanilla” backups before nuking everything and scanning again. 3.1.2. AutoTOC didn’t work. Time to try again. 4. Complete vanilla + repair then scan (since I know it's not the mods themselves breaking things when applied to vanilla files) 4.1. Finally worked. Theory: the reason it failed is because one of the auto-installers puts something somewhere other than in the DLC folder. No more copying DLC separately. Copy the whole shebang into backup. Alternative theory: one of the DLC mods has textures that are botching things up. 5. TEST MODS ONE BY ONE 5.1. While trying to keep to installation order recommended on the ME3Explorer wiki Mod Formats page (content DLCànon-DLC contentàmeshesàtextures) I will also attempt to keep as much as possible to the following hierarchy to avoid less important textures overwriting more important textures: 5.1.1. Environmental-->people (general)àpeople (specific characters)àshepard 5.2. Replaced meshes. Testing: SUCCESS 5.3. Replaced Coalesced. Testing: SUCCESS 5.4. Replaced ALOT/Characters/Alliance textures: SUCCESS 5.5. Replaced ALOT/Characters/NPCS: As you can see in Step 6.1 (Step 3.1 here) something went wrong. It was working fine, but when I reverted to all my vanilla files (with the scanned DLC that are also still vanilla) something broke, even though I was supposedly reverting to the same build that worked fine before. But so far so good on Step 8. I'm installing the ALOT textures from the .dds files instead of the .metpf files, so that I can install them in smaller chunks, test after each installation, isolate which files need to be rolled back if necessary, and thus isolate where things mess up a little more accurately.