LE Native Weapons, Horker Tusk Club Help with my mod

[bluntfang]

I recently returned to Skyrim after a six month hiatus. I dug around for some new mods, and was thrilled to add hunterborn to frostfall and RND. I love playing without going to town and using more native feeling weapons and equipment. With that in mind i have been scouring different mods to add in those that fit well and making my own additions to skrimshaw and survival skills.

 

The lack of items has led me to try my hand at some retexturing, the Blade of Hircine, http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/BladeofHircine_zps8315277e.png http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESVBladeofHircine_zps8db0424e.png.

 

The blade is intended to be made from mammoth tusk (with a wolf fur scabbard).

http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1421-44-05-94_zps102a217e.pnghttp://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1421-46-22-32_zps5d9d817b.png

 

When I tried to make my own custom weapons I came up short. Despite plenty of free time from being sick the last few days I still cant get the nif scripts to run in blender, (yes, I have fought with different versions of python and PFF and blender is the 32 bit etc etc). Having wasted the better part of today trying to get them to work I have quit for now. This is what I was trying to do: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/Horkerclub_zpse88a4a1e.png

What you see is done in nifskope,and works fine as a static mesh, but does not of course show up in game. It is a horker tusk and a human legbone, resized and stretched to fit. I was hoping to add some wrappings of some sort to secure the two. But, without decifering blender I cannot get them to work with just nifskope (since i need to make a 1st person nif with all the goodies apparently).

 

So, I am posting here hoping that someone who as access to working blender/max might be willing to throw these pieces together to create a workable nif mesh that I can retexture.

 

I hope to release a small weapon pack fo these more "organic" weapons, I would love to have the horker club in there as well. Let me know if you can help or if the idea is of interest.

Edited October 15, 2013 by bluntfang

[ghosu]

You don't even need nif scripts...you can add the new mesh to the .nif using .obj import:

 

http://youtu.be/WD7cmv5yCB4

 

I exported the pickaxe as reference.obj to my 3D Editor (Cinema4D), did some random edits (in your case this would be the mesh for the wrappings), exported it as new.obj. In NifSkope i selected the original NiTriShape, press CTRL C to copy it, select 0BSFadeNode and press CTRL V to paste it. Select the new NiTriShape and down below in Block Detail window the DATA line, FILE=>IMPORT OBJ and select new.obj. Rightclick on the new NiTriShapeData and MESH=>FACE NORMALS and MESH=>SMOOTH NORMALS, afterwards SPELLS=>BATCH=>UPDATE, set up the new texture paths to your new .dds and that's it.

 

Important: Some newer NifSkope versions tend to trash the models UV map so the texture won't show up - if this happens version 1.1.0-rc4 always worked for me.

Edited October 15, 2013 by ghosu

[bluntfang]

ghosu, thank you for your reply. I love your weapon mods. Mine are never going to be that caliber, but I appreciate the help.

 

OK, I have tried to do this. I can get the horker club to show up in game now, but only in my left hand.

 

When I try to put it in my right hand it shows up "sheathed" even when it is unsheathed. (The club has other issues as well, it holds still during a strike animation, but flips to the side when I move or it transitions. I think it has something to do with the meshes not being "joined" correctly.)http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1722-24-15-56_zps4da3084a.png

http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1722-26-05-27_zps6141715e.png

 

Oddly enough I am having a similar issue with a small carved wooden knife made from a re-sized spear.http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1722-23-56-05_zps3bf55230.png

 

In the CK both are set to be able to be equipped to either hand.

 

Any ideas

Edited October 18, 2013 by bluntfang

[ghosu]

Upload the whole mod (plugin, nif, textures) I'll check it if i find some spare time.

[bluntfang]

Ghosu, I would hate to waste your time (it might be the embarrassment of having you look at the mesh as well and wondering what the hell i was doing). I have managed to get the clubs working now in both hands: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1917-16-48-76_zps62e6e749.png

 

I was super pleased with that! I will see if I can get a sheath to work with them.

 

I also added http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1917-17-23-49_zps77cffc4d.png horker tusks on their own.

I will probably do some bones on their own as well.

 

Obsidian Ore Spear blade http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1722-25-12-18_zps9b3e7ed5.png http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1722-25-18-55_zps96a74823.png

 

And a sharpened wooden spear http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-1722-24-39-78_zpsc1f27948.png.

 

Have yet to figure out what I did wrong with the knife but I will keep at it. Still having grief with blender.

 

Are you aware of any existing wrap/bindings meshes that I might put to use via nifscope?

Edited October 19, 2013 by bluntfang

[Shadeybladey]

It doesn't look much like a club, more like a pick or those Monk weapons - kama? Mila Jovovich uses a pair in one of the Requiem films.

 

A club that is a bone with a skull for the head would be cool.

 

~.~

[bluntfang]

It does look more like a pick or a kama. The name is an easy thing to change. (To be honest I am considering making a "pickax" version with tusks on both sides and a longer handle for two hands). I am not sure how sharp horker tusks are, hence the club designation. Some animals have surprisingly sharp tusks (like boars), others, not so much. Everything I read says a walrus has sharp tusks, but what exactly does that mean? Sharp compared to what?

 

I can probably do a bone with a skull on the head. I will give it a shot later this week and show you how it looks.

 

I have tried to work with the sabre cat teeth, but I really don't understand the bones on that thing in nifskope. Its like bethesda used the whole sabre cat mesh and just deleted every thing but the tooth, leaving it attached to invisible bones higher up on the mesh. It is nearly impossible to rotate correctly. I am hoping I can figure out how to shorten it in nifskope.

[Shadeybladey]

I wish there was a mod like this when I was playing my Druid!

 

Will they be craftable? Recipes for crafting and tempering are easy to do, just quite fiddly and tedious.

 

The Forsworn should definitely be carrying weapons like these. I look forward to when this is finished.

 

Do you get stabbing animations on those spears? That was something Beth had in their Mod Jam week, but it never made it into the game. The mods I have seen have a sort of two-handed warhammer animation for spears. They had them in Morrowind, so I don't know why they could not be in Skyrim as well.

 

But then, Morrowind had nine extra skills as well.

 

That "flipping" over you see might be what vanilla just does. I notice that when using two War Axes or two scimitars. I use Dual Sheath Redux, but you have to have meshes for left-handed versions and with the Smithing mods I have made, there are no left-handed versions. So I do not get two sheathes with my own weapons, but you can use them dual-wielded, but they flip over at different times.

 

Do you use Cinema4D? I looked into making custom meshes, but the software was too expensive and the whole process too specialist for me. There are some good You Tube videos by a German guy showing how to make custom meshes and textures, but he uses Cinema4D.

 

~.~

[ghosu]

That would be me :D

 

Uhm, bindings...i guess there is nothing you can use in its current state so you have to cut it off another item/weapon using a 3D editor. Same process as shown in my video above, though instead of scaling the item you have to delete the polyons you don't need and import it to NifSkope - doable with any 3D editor you prefer.

 

Same process if you want to shorten something, in NifSkope you can only move the whole mesh or scale it along all 3 axis. You can move single polygon points as well to change the shape but that takes forever because you have to enter all 3 coordinates (x/y/z) for each single point by hand - can't move them using the mouse or whatever, therefor i would recommend to use a 3D editor.

[bluntfang]

Ghosu, yeah, I don't have issues so much with your instructions as my own struggles in blender. I don't have funds to actually pay for a 3d program, so if I can't make blender work I just do what I can within the confines of nifskope. So far I have done more than I thought I would be able to (haven't used blender for any of it so far). I realize that will sorely limit my models, but for now it is what it is.

 

Still working on the dagger, so nothing to show for there.

 

ShadyBladey: I will make them craftable, but probably not via the forge. I prefer to use the tanning rack, that way you can make them without having to go into a town (which is the whole point). Plus if you use frostall you can make a tanning rack and then make these.

 

The most annoying thing about making them craftable is the ingredients, there are not large bone or skull ingredients and i am reluctant to clutter up leveled lists. With my own game I get around this by using the "large animal bone" out of hunterborn but I don't necessarily want to make it dependent on another mod for release (it always will be that way in my own game, with skrimshaw as the workbench and more complex recipes).

 

As for the spears there is no stabbing animation, just the warhammer strokes. Sorry. I have no skill as an animator, it is way out of my league.

 

Some progress:

 

http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-2013-15-28-26_zps15cf3d2d.png Bone clubs

 

Bone clubs with skulls on the front http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-2013-15-56-71_zps9c470187.png http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-2013-15-47-08_zps23711c58.png

 

Two handed horker tusk pickaxe: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k65/bluntfang/TESV2013-10-2014-13-42-71_zps31d27e61.png

Edited October 20, 2013 by bluntfang