Editing Faces using the Set Editor

[Baeowulf]

Hello all!

I am playing an argonian, and I forgot to do one small thing before finalizing my face for the first time. However, since I am playing using a mod that changes the appearance of argonians, when I tried to fix it upon exiting the sewers, it screwed up the face that I had taken a few hours and 6 tries to get right :(. This also happens whenever I try to use the showracemenu console command. Is there a way to edit PC races in the set editor?

[majikmonkee]

Unfortunately, no. The PC faces are saved in the savegame files, and these can't be accessed through tools like the contruction set. I'm not sure why, but it doesn't seem anyone has come up with a tool that allows editing save game faces, I imagine there are some technical limitations preventing it.

[Ferryt]

I can't imagine how the showracemenu command could screw up a face. Keep in mind that it brings up exactly the same editor that you used when you first created your character, but that changing some of the values will result in changing some of the others. You have no control over this, but you didn't when you created your character the first time, either. You just have to be patient. I've used this to tweak my character's appearance on several occasions and never had a problem.

 

This is a dangerous procedure for those who are unfamiliar with it and you can totally destroy your character. Here's a step-by-step process, for anyone reading this and who thinks that showracemenu is a cakewalk, because it isn't.

 

1. Open the console.
   
2. Type "showracemenu" (without the quotes, of course).
   
3. LEAVE THE CONSOLE OPEN, even when the racial modification utility appears. I can't stress that enough.
   
4. Make the modifications you want.
   
5. Do NOT hit the "Done" button. If you do then you are totally screwed.
   
6. Hit "esc" to bring up a new menu.
   
7. Save your game and make it a new save. Do not override your last stable save.
   
8. Quit the game. You can do it from this menu or, as I do, use the console qqq command just to be on the safe side.
   
9. Restart Oblivion.
   
10. Load up your newly-saved game.
    
11. Check your character to make sure everything is in order.
    

 

If you don't follow this procedure to the letter (or, rather, by the numbers in this case), you will mess up your character in ways that you won't be able to fix. To be precise, showracemenu will give you the racial modification utility, but if you as much as touch that "done" button you will find yourself properly beautified, but everything else will be set back to where it was when you first started the game. This means you lose ALL progress you've made on your character -- skills reset to "5", etc.). If you alter your characters race, and not just appearance, you can't stop this from happening, even if you follow the above procedure, so just don't do it.

[whalecakes]

You would have to use Bash or some other tool to import the face into a plugin from a saved game, edit it in the CS, then import it back into the savegame.

 

And showracemenu kinda is a cakewalk. A better instruction set would be:

1. Type showracemenu into console

2. Change face the way you want

3. Don't hit 'done', open the console then hit escape (with the console open) to open the menu and save your game

4. Load the game

 

That's it.

You do not need to quit the entire game, though it is best to load only from the main menu as Oblivion does weird things when loading from an active game. (See: drain attribute notes)

You do not need to leave the console open while using the race menu, you only need to have it open when you open the escape menu; otherwise the save option will be disabled.

Altering your character's race will not reset your stats. It will, however, reset your appearance.

If you hit the 'Done' button on accident, you can always just import the finished face into another save file.

[Ferryt]

whalecakes, when I create an ordered list of instructions explaining how to do something, I make it as absolutely "people-proof" as I possibly can. In this case, I also included steps to prevent occasional glitches that can happen if they're left out. Follow my procedure, exactly, and you will never have a problem ... ever.

 

As for the issue with the "done" button, for anyone following this little excursion from the topic, this is based upon the built-in behavior of this function of the game and is well known and extremely well (and widely) documented in the Oblivion community. Use the "done" button if you wish, but you're doing so at your own risk. I've tested it and it works exactly as described in a multitude of places which warn you not to do it. Here's a list (no claim that it's complete) of what will happen to your character:

 

1. All of your stats will be reset to begin-game defaults
   
2. Racial bonuses will be applied to stats
   
3. Minor skill levels will all be reset to 5

• Note:
  
  • You will lose all progress in skills and stats from leveling
    You will lose any in-game abilities that you have acquired

I did, on one occasion, attempt to change the race of my character using this technique and it DID reset all that stuff, just like some sources say it will. Whether or not this will happen in every single instance I can't say because I've only tried it just that one time and maybe I made a mistake. According to the wiki, here, following my procedure should prevent this from happening. According to the Construction Set Wiki, altering race from within this application will force the above changes to take place. It depends, I guess, upon who you want to believe.

 

Finally, some people have reported issues with not closing down the game completely. Others have reported that all you need do is restart the game from the main menu. Again ... better safe than sorry. It doesn't take that much time to restart the game, especially if you've disabled the start-up movies.

 

My approach is to offer the most conservative advice I can give when instructing people in things that could break their games. Skipping steps might have no effect on success -- or it might result in disaster. It's not a given, so my advice is simply to take no chances and include every possible safeguard.

 

Back to the topic: whalecakes is correct. There are several ways of exporting a character's face so that you can edit it in the CS, and then import it back into a save game. Wrye Bash can do this and is usually the application people recommend for it, although there are some people (I'm one of them) who can't get it to run. You just have to be very careful using the CS to edit a character. It's not as friendly and fool-proof as the standard character editor and you can royally mess up a character's face in ways that might not be simple to correct. For one, you can make changes which aren't bilaterally symmetrical, which is good for making more "life-like" characters since people's features are never truly symmetrical. You have a lot more control over the actual values, too.

[whalecakes]

None of those steps have anything to do with any kind of glitches. You don't need to have the console open the whole time, and leaving it open the entire time does nothing. Having the console open counts as its own menumode, so saving is always possible as long as it is open. Any issues with loading are entirely unrelated to the use of the race menu. I am using a leveling mod, so that could be why changing the race doesn't kill my stats. So, aside from changing the race or hitting the 'done' button resetting your stats, there is nothing about the racemenu that can do anything even close to breaking the game.

Using it really is as simple as typing 'showracemenu' into the console, then opening the console and saving the game when you're done editing your appearance since the done button will reset your stats. There's no reason or benefit to making it more complicated than that.

 

Also, the construction set's face editor is awesome, yes:

http://i52.tinypic.com/2he8sgh.png

I like how the right pupil somehow managed to get as big as the left iris.

It is no different than the in-game race menu excepting the asymmetry options, so as long as you don't touch them there is no way you can royally mess up anything in any way that you could not do with the in-game editor. If anything it is easier to use as you can manually punch in values for the sliders and save the NPC as you go, which means if you don't like the changes you've just made you can hit 'cancel' to discard them.

Edited February 18, 2011 by whalecakes