[LE] Trying to make Serana replacer

[HyacinthCreations]

So I've been trying to make an npc replacer for Serana. Simple right? NO! My life is in SHAMBLES rn.

I have followed so, so many tutorials. Here is the exact steps I have taken so far:

 

1. I opened Skyrim, used RaceMenu to make a new face for her from scratch.

2. Exported the head

3. Opened up the creation kit, made a new file called Hyacinth_Serana

4. Loaded all the mods I used to make her (KS, kalilies brows) and ofc Skyrim, Update, and Dawnguard.

5. Found her in the actors menu

6. Exported her FaceGenData

7. Opened up Nifscope (with the new nif file) and changed her head texture path to textures/actors/character/FaceGenData/FaceTint/Dawnguard.esm/00002B6C.dds

8. Got the NEW .dds and .nif files that I exported from Racemenu. Renamed them and replaced the creation kit FaceGenData ones with the new files

 

That's all I could follow from the tutorials, because the only ones online both use MO2 to make overwrite files. Is that required? I don't have, or want, MO2 unless it's essential. Am I missing something else? Please help!

[Sphered]

The game reads the data in nif files, and the data found, affects things

 

What I suspect is stumping you, are the headparts being used in the creation kit, likely dont match the headparts in your face mesh. The strings matter. By strings, I mean the names in the .nif file headmesh, like EyesFemaleBrown whatever, has to match exactly with whatever her actor record in the game is using

 

You likely either need to use those headparts in your mod, or you need to rename the strings in the face mesh, to match her vanilla headparts names. This is usually harmless to do unless you are using high poly or otherwise very different parts which require their own tri files