Yeah, that's certainly possible, and because the content of a cell isn't static, that reference can change when the script takes to long. However, it doesn't matter anymore! I've come up with a way to change what the player character looks like without having to update other characters. Simply change the nifs of the equipped armor pieces, update the player character, and then change the armors back to the way they were. NPCs are updated when a cell is loaded, but because the armors are restored after the player character is updated, they'll look the way they're supposed to, while the player character doesn't seem to be updated when a cell is loaded, and will therefore still look like what you want them to look like. I have it running right now, and it seems to work like a charm :) No more messing around with cloning armors :)