Modding with Nifskope

[JeremeW5257]

I'm fairly familiar with using Nifskope, but can't seem to get one thing to work. I want to change the body texture path from textures/actors/character/female/femalebody_1.dds to something else. What I'm trying to do is create a look of skin tight armor by simply making the default body texture file something else (a chainlink version of the body texture). I can link the new texture path in Niskope, but when I view it in game it doesn't work. I save before exiting and do everything else that I would normally do to change texture paths for armor and clothing.

 

I'm sure it's a very simple fix, but can't figure it out.

 

Any help would be appreciated.

[mrpdean]

From what you described I can't see any reason why it shouldn't work, unless the game is ignoring the texture in the NIF.

 

It's possible the texture in the NIF is being overridden by a Texture Set. You should be able to check this using the CK.

 

I've not had any experiencing texturing characters so hopefully someone more knowledgeable will come along.

[JeremeW5257]

I know, there's no logical reason why it doesn't work. If I apply the same process to change textures for armor and clothing, it works fine. There seems to be a bug or something else effecting only the femalebody_1.dds file. No matter what I link the texture path to in Nifskope, it links it the the default texture path in game.

[SineWaveDrox]

I'm not entirely sure, but I believe it has to do with the Shader Type and Shader Flags in the BSLightingShaderProperty. I'm not sure what they should be set to for what you're trying to accomplish, but what you could do is just delete the BSLightingShaderProperty from the body, and then copy the BSLightingShaderProperty from an armor or clothing piece (anything that's not skin), and then change the textures to what you want. I've never tried it before, but it seems like it might work. If you try it, definitely make backups, because, like I said, I've never done it, don't know for sure if it will work.

[JeremeW5257]

I'll give it a try and see if it helps. Thanks for the tip. Somehow it seems to work for the Sleek Steel body armor. The chainmail part is just a retexturing of the body mesh, to look like skin tight armor. At least, it seems to be. I'm trying to get that same look on a custom body mesh that I made for my followers.

[Fistandilius]

I've actually done this before, so it should work. Are you changing the body texture in an armor.nif or in the actual player .nif? And does the texture show up properly in Nifskope but just not in the game, or is the texture messed in Nifskope? Because if it isn't showing up properly in nifskope, you might have selected the wrong part of the mesh or have a typo in your new texture path.

Edited December 3, 2013 by Fistandilius

[JeremeW5257]

The .nif file that I'm trying to change is cuirass_0.nif. It's a female armor file, but part of the female body can be seen. I want the female body part if this .nif file to look like skin tight armor. So when you equip the armor, the expose body parts appear to be wearing a skin tight chainmail armor. It should be easy to do...just change the body mesh part of the .nif file to a different texture path.

 

I tried insanitymans tip. It worked, but not all the way. The body mesh no longer has the default femalebody texture file, but doesn't look exactly like the desired texture either. It looks correct in Nifskope, but in game it's much darker. No matter how much I try to lighten the texture up, it still looks dark. This problem is even stranger than the original problem. Now part of the new file seems to work but not all.

 

I'm using it for now, because it gives me more of the desired look, but would like to make it a little lighter in color.

 

Any ideas?

[SineWaveDrox]

Not entirely sure on that issue, I've never encountered it. Maybe try messing with the values in the BSLightingShaderProperty? Only other thing I could think of would be to check the armor in the Creation Kit to see if maybe a texture set is being applied to it, possibly messing it up, perhaps? But those are only random guesses, I've never tried to do something like this, nor have I encountered that issue before. Good luck though, hope you get it figured out.

[Fistandilius]

The .nif file that I'm trying to change is cuirass_0.nif. It's a female armor file, but part of the female body can be seen. I want the female body part if this .nif file to look like skin tight armor. So when you equip the armor, the expose body parts appear to be wearing a skin tight chainmail armor. It should be easy to do...just change the body mesh part of the .nif file to a different texture path.

 

I tried insanitymans tip. It worked, but not all the way. The body mesh no longer has the default femalebody texture file, but doesn't look exactly like the desired texture either. It looks correct in Nifskope, but in game it's much darker. No matter how much I try to lighten the texture up, it still looks dark. This problem is even stranger than the original problem. Now part of the new file seems to work but not all.

 

I'm using it for now, because it gives me more of the desired look, but would like to make it a little lighter in color.

 

Any ideas?

 

It sounds like it's possible you could have an issue with your alpha map if it's just a case of the texture being darker than intended.

[ghosu]

Try to rightclick on the NiTriShapeData of the darker part and MESH=>FACE NORMALS, that's the most common fix if the texture is shown darker and not affected by shader settings at all - though that normally only happens when you edit/change the mesh itself so it could be something else. If it doesn't help you should upload the file.

Edited December 3, 2013 by ghosu