greyday01

I have an exterior stair leading up to a tower. To test the navmesh I got a giant to chase me up it. As he came up the stair half the time he was wading knee deep in the stair and then he fell through up to his chin. Do I need to drag the terrain up to just below the stair? I thought static objects would be enough.

Has anyone tried to get a giant to chase you all the way across Skyrim or a considerable piece of skyrim? Could you get one of the Whiterun giants to chase you all the way to Winterhold? In Morrowind I used to try and see how big a tail of monsters I could get chasing after me. Haven't tried in Skyrim.

I've got a tower embedded in the side of a mountain. Part of the original mesh is under the stairs up to it. I would need to do quite a bit more that to move a few vertices to reach the door so it seemed simpler to create my own navmesh. I really think Bethesda did a bad job with the original. It looks autogenerated and never cleaned up. There are islands that should be connected and almost look like they are but aren't including one 3 triangle one the size of a sliver between sections of the main mesh, and a 25 triangle island that is halfway up the mountain and has no access.

I'm trying to navmesh a section of exterior. It has 4 islands. 1 Big one and 3 others. I selected each with floodfill and dragged them down below the surface then started making my own mesh. It will work for a while. My new mesh island is listed along with the original 4 then suddenly my mesh disappears and is merged with the ID of one of the original islands. I don't know what triggers this merge because the original islands aren't even close to touching my new mesh. I've been saving my mod stage every few triangles and keep having to revert back. I'll get it done eventually, the square is about half meshed but it surely is frustrating. One question. The adjoining squares now show as edited though I haven't changed anything in those squares. Can I just after I finish the mesh I'm working on just delete the changes in the adjoining squares with TES5? I've been matching my vertices as close as possible to the ones across the borders.

I want to enable a NPC at the same time as the last thieves guild merchant is enabled. I could use the same xmarker that is the enable parent of the merchant and his stall but would that be subject to conflicts if other mods edit that cell or the thieves guild quests? Is there some other way to do this? I haven't used quests at all and I'm a bit uncertain about them.

Is there any way to copy or duplicate a navnesh? I wanted to copy the vanilla, move the copy slightly out of the way then drag the original underground and put the copy back in it's place for editing. Otherwise I'll have to remake the entire navmesh which would be a pain.

If using vanilla assets in the CK, don't edit them, duplicate, rename and then edit your renamed object. Give anything you create an ID starting with your mod's initials or other identifier. Makes it easy to find to make changes in them. Make many saves of mod stages. Just copy your esp to a separate folder and give it a name reflecting what you changed. Makes it easy to go back if you mess up. For things like meshes and textures make a folder structure something like Meshes-ModName-GreatNewFurniture and place your new furniture meshes in that folder. Easy to find, add to or delete entirely. Clean your mod often with TES5Edit. It is intimidating at first but Very useful. With a test mod try making changes then undoing them with TES5 to get used to it if you are new to it. Darkfox127 has some very nice videos on modding. Make a clean save after Telgen, maybe when you reach Riverwood, with NO mods installed (put your weapon away before saving as its annoying to do so after each time you open that save). Use that clean save when testing your mod.

Good advice by nerdofprey. It is really a good idea to get comfortable with Tes5Edit. Maybe try checking your mod for dirty edits at the end of each session or if you are nervous about messing up your mod make a practice mod. Do things like deleting objects instead of references, moving vanilla references and then using Tess to put them back where they belong, deleting a navmesh and then restoring it. Tess5Edit is an invaluable tool. I was really nervous of it at first but by using it I became much more comfortable. Just play with a test mod or make a backup of your mod and then explore it with Tess5Edit to see it you had some unintended changes. Oh about deleting an object from the object window. Since you deleted the object it probably deleted all the references of that object. You might have to find any cell that had a reference of that object. If in Tes5Edit you delete that cell the reference should be restored and the entire cell put back to its vanilla form. I think that's how it works anyway.

Turn off snap to grid and snap to angle. Click on and make invisible by typing 1 while selected any Fx like mist, light beams, banners, fires, NPCs and mannequins, and any other items that the vertices tend to get stuck on. Sometimes it helps to move your camera really close to the surface you want to place vertices on.

If it's for your own use you can use downloaded assets. It you are going to post your mod you need permission of it's creator and to state in your mod description where you got those assets. As to how, custom meshes and textures files can be added to your Meshes and Texture folders. I make a new folder in Meshes, name it "Someone's Meshes" and paste the meshes in there (I usually rename those meshes as well). Same with Textures. Then go in the CK duplicate an item of the type needed, rename it and edit it to use the path to the mesh and texture that you copied. You've now got the new item in your mod. For scripts copy the script into notepad. If you want to add a script onto your new or a vanilla item, go to scripts tab while you are editing you item, pick new script, give it a name and give it properties of the types your copied script has. Easiest to use the names the downloaded script has for the property names but you can change those and then replace their names with your own in the script body. Then paste the body of the script into your script and fill the properties. To copy a whole cell. I think there is a way. I've never done it. I usually do it the hard way by making notes and then recreating it piece by piece

Simplest is to go to Skyrim Nexus and download and install Nexus Mod Manager. It is fairly self explanatory. Using Mod Organizer is an other option. Golpher has some videos on installing and using it (Google Golpher and Mod Organizer). That program is a bit more, just slightly, complex but has some very nice features. It is no longer being updated as it's maker is working for Nexus now making an updated manager for them but it is completely useable in it's current form and I use it for everything except creating mods.

Google Darkfox127 custom containers. He has a number of very good videos that are very straightforward. Sorry I can't paste the link

The way I understand editing an external cell to accommodate a new building or changes in terrain is in that cell select a navmesh triangle and with floodfill select the entire navmesh then drag the entire thing down below the surface (I'm not sure how far down you need to drag it). Then create your own navmesh and finalize it. Please tell me if this will work. I've just put in a tower and stair and the vanilla navmmesh is partially buried now.

What is the difference between the plain Fxmists, ect and those with adjust appended?

Creationkit.com look for tutorials and then video tutorials. They are a good start. The only thing I've found they've got wrong is in the XYZ axis for moving and rotating. The actual keys are ZXC which are more convenient as they are grouped together. Then check out some tutorials by Darkfox127 on YouTube. He has some good ones. As for useful hints give everything you create for a mod the mod's initials as a prefix. Makes it easier to find your objects. Don't delete vanilla navmeshes, leads to crashes. Don't change vanilla objects as a rule (at least until you know what you are doing). Just duplicate then rename and edit your newly created object. Make a test mod with a test cell and just play around and use it for trying things out. Make a clean save with no mods installed, I like to make one when I reach Riverwood. Then install your mod and load that save when you want to check how your mod works in game. If you have a save after your mod was installed and then change your mod sometimes the changes you made won't show up as the original mod data got baked into your save. Make lots of saves of mod stages. Copy your esp file into a mod stage folder. If you mess up you can go back to an earlier version and not have to redo it all. Practice with TES5Edit. Try cleaning your mod of inadvertent changes often. The practice will be good for you.

I've just thought of a way to see where a cell will exit. Copy the entrance door and exit door of the interior cell. paste it in the exterior cell and overlap the entrance doors to see where the exit will fall. Continue with the next interior cell. I'll probably not be that fussy though. I'll try finding the Z axis difference between the entrances and exits and adding or subtracting that from the exterior door height. I won't sweat a 1000 difference or so but I'll try to get close and as long as the interior cells travel in approximately the right direction that will be ok. The map thing though. If I enter a cave near riften and open the world map the you are here pointer shows you your approximate location in the world. I don't need to track from room to room but I don't want the map to say that I'm in Whiterun either. How to you tell the ck where your cell is in the world?

How fussy are you about correlating interior cells to their exterior door? I have 4 cells I'm planning to tunnel under some mountains. The first exterior door is NW of the second exterior door. The First door is at height -3700 and the second door is at height -155. If I generally have stairs going up from one to the other in the four cells I might cut the height difference but I don't think I could cut the entire 3000 height difference. Also I'm not sure if I copied the interior cells to the exterior and lined them up they would reach. Does it matter? Also I couldn't really understand how to make your cell show in the correct location when you open the map from inside. The explanation just didn't make sense to me. Could someone explain how for me?

To make a coinpurse looking container just duplicate and rename a container then edit it so it uses the coinpurse mesh. It's the only way to change the category of in item. The rest I'm not sure how to do about it

Look at Frostfall. There is an option for when the player freezes to death to respawn in an inn or camp with damaged health. You could look how they did it. Possibly put Xmarker headings at the sites you want to spawn at then put tthose markers into a form list and when you die have one of those markers randomly chosen. That might work.

I suddenly started having crashes on loading a particular cell render window. I thought the cell was too full at about 85% or possible custom mesh problem. I tried deleting all custom items before opening render but that didn't help. I was able to cut the size down to 75% by eliminating some lights and moving my treasury section to a separate cell but still couldn't open the render window though I could go to that cell in game. Finally got the render window to open simply by making the render window smaller. I had been fighting the crashes on load for a week! My question, I noticed on opening most vanilla cells that the largest was about 33%. I could separate my stronghold into 3 sections: Private quarters, Common area and Servants quarters. Each area would be about 25% of max size. Some sleep and work packages would need to be redone but it would be possible. I like it better without the load doors to separate sections but it would probably be more stable. Would you recommend dividing the cell up or leaving it as one? What is the max cell % that you recommend?

Thank you. I do suspect size since the trouble started when I slightly enlarged the cell. I did put room bounds around sections of it. If I can get it to load I'm going to try to copy one section of the cell and paste it into a separate cell and delete that section from my cell. 85% might just be too big. One question, does anyone know the difference between paste and paste in place?

I've had a cell that was stable to months suddenly start crashing to desktop when the render window opens or on entering the cell. I fairly recently made a few changes, I enlarged a couple rooms by a total of about 10 floor spaces, modified some ingredients to be flora and added a couple mannequins. Could the cell be just too big? It's at about 85% full. I removed some lights and was able to get in, but then it crashed again. I was able to get in with the custom flora in place and replaced them all with vanilla ingredients, coc'd out of the cell waited a few days and coc'd back and crashed. I checked the editor error log and the only thing mentioning this cell was a couple sleep packages with no targets. Is it just too big? I could cut off a room to a separate cell. Or could it have been corrupted? I could I suppose make a new cell and recreate it but it would be a real pain. Any suggestions about how to fix this. It only seems to be this one cell.

Thank you for your advice. The part about removing added items before deleting the cell might be the cause of a problem I had been having with TES5. When I try to clean my mod and save I kept getting this error: Error saving Stronghod.esp.save.201_07_21: Record [REFR:0006EA23] (places RockL03 [sTAT:00018BA5} in GRUP World Children of Tamriel "Skyrim" [WRLD:0000003C]) can not be contained in GRUP World Children of Tamriel "Skyrim"[WRLD:0000003C] [00:00] Errors have occurred. At least one file was not saved. When I look in my mod in TES5 I see this Worldspace 0000003C Tamriel Skyrim 00000D74 Cell <Persistent Worldspace Cell> 000173AF Placed Object AMBWaterfallTallP[sOUN:000B62F1} 000173B0 Placed Object AMBWaterfallSmallP[sOUN:0001C13A] 00042494 Placed Object RockTundraLand01[sTAT:00039231] 0006EA1B Placed Object RockL03{STAT:00018BA5] Should I in TES5 RClick and remove all those placed objects then that 00000D74 cell as well? I have no idea where those came from but it looks like they shouldn't be there.

Unfortunately both. While taking things apart to see how they were put together I inadvertently made unwanted changes.

I've been trying to find a TES5Edit tutorial about how to completely remove all edits to a cell. Found lots about cleaning masters, a few that mention it could be done, but no step by step tutorials. Could anyone tell me how to do this? In detail like which pane and line to click in, the right or the left. And if you delete an entire cell does that delete any changes to the navmesh that you made (hopefully)? In the cleaning tutorials they show "Undeleting and disabling references". What if you want to undelete and put back where it was originally instead? A separate question I can't figure out. Say you changed all the bears in your game. In trying to undo this with tes5 what is the difference between removing all your changes to bears or accidentally removing all bears from the game in your mod.