Misbehaving Actors

[Ironman5000]

Hello im posting here cos i'm doing the finishing touches to a house mod, but in testing a few creatures are not doing they are supposed to.

 

- Farm animals I placed in a pen are somehow outside the pen in-game and the ones left inside look desperate to get out too.

 

- I added an alternative to a summoned demon using an activator, but the creature is attacking me once it's spawned deapite having only player faction.

 

Any thoughts on how I messed up, something I missed?

[MotoSxorpio]

Do you ever check out your plugins in xEdit? Sometimes you find things you didn't want from CS that CS does anyway. I tend to rely more on xEdit for fixing my playable mods than trying to do anything in CS/CK/GECK. Could also be finding something that overrides your plugin by chance...Older mods from Oblivion/Fo3/FNV tend to help have unintentional edits (dirty) all over the place. (Its not your fault, touching anything makes a damn edit :wacko: )

 

Edited for wrong word getting in there.

Edited October 12, 2015 by MotoSxorpio

[Ironman5000]

By "xEdit" you mean tes4edit I assume, well that would be something of a headf*#@ to determine the farm animal positions and why they jump the fence.

 

I cant imagine a mod which could edit my custom stuff though, even MMM. Ugh this will either result in cutting the said creatures and farm or not releasing at all...I can see why I never dabbled much modding earlier games.

[Surilindur]

You probably need to give the animals a "wander" AI package with a short enough range. One cell is still 4096x4096 units for reference. Also other farms with sheep might be of use. There is one somewhere Northwest of Skingrad with the man who gives you the quest to kill bears. That might be a good place to start looking if farms need some special treatment. I have never made any farms myself, though.

 

And about the creature, what aggresion did you give it? Give it 100 and it will probably go on a frenzy the moment it gets loaded. That is probably the first thing to check. :P

 

Hopefully that helps a little. I have mainly done scripting for Oblivion, and I still have much to learn about everything else.

 

Also, do you use the Construction Set Extender by shademe? It is vital for every modder, the CS is a pain in the butt without it. The reason I do not like the CK is that there is no Creation Kit Extender yet, so the thing is still a nightmare. Luckily, we have the godsend by shademe for the CS to save the day. And to keep me modding for Oblivion. :)

 

Edit: Ooops. I thought this was about Oblivion. Sorry. I have absolutely no idea how Skyrim does it.

Edited October 15, 2015 by PhilippePetain

[Di0nysys]

Actors are usually skewed off coordinate in many cases when viewing in game. I believe they're spawned at the nearest Navmesh vertex close to the drop location in CK.

I found the best way is to Link Ref my actor to a furniture or idle to make sure they stick to that location. If the animal doesn't have one, you can use an AI Package to Hold Location or a patrol package to a number of X markers within the pen.

I'd also check to make sure the Navmesh is properly setup.

As for the Demon, In the factions tab, right click and create a New Faction and assign it to be Player "Friend" faction. This should make sure it won't attack the player. U may also wanna assign it to be friends to "PlayerFollower" and "PlayerAlly" just in case.

Edited October 13, 2015 by Di0nysys

[MotoSxorpio]

By "xEdit" you mean tes4edit I assume, well that would be something of a headf*#@ to determine the farm animal positions and why they jump the fence.

 

I cant imagine a mod which could edit my custom stuff though, even MMM. Ugh this will either result in cutting the said creatures and farm or not releasing at all...I can see why I never dabbled much modding earlier games.

 

Yes, xEdit refers to the multi-game utility also known as: TES4Edit, Fo3Edit, FNVEdit, TES5Edit.

 

Actors are usually skewed off coordinate in many cases when viewing in game. I believe they're spawned at the nearest Navmesh vertex close to the drop location in CK.

I found the best way is to Link Ref my actor to a furniture or idle to make sure they stick to that location. If the animal doesn't have one, you can use an AI Package to Hold Location or a patrol package to a number of X markers within the pen.

I'd also check to make sure the Navmesh is properly setup.

As for the Demon, In the factions tab, right click and create a New Faction and assign it to be Player "Friend" faction. This should make sure it won't attack the player. U may also wanna assign it to be friends to "PlayerFollower" and "PlayerAlly" just in case.

 

 

Excellent advice, thank you Di0n...I might at some point use this new knowledge.

[Ironman5000]

You probably need to give the animals a "wander" AI package with a short enough range. One cell is still 4096x4096 units for reference. Also other farms with sheep might be of use. There is one somewhere Northwest of Skingrad with the man who gives you the quest to kill bears. That might be a good place to start looking if farms need some special treatment. I have never made any farms myself, though.

 

And about the creature, what aggresion did you give it? Give it 100 and it will probably go on a frenzy the moment it gets loaded. That is probably the first thing to check. :tongue:

 

Hopefully that helps a little. I have mainly done scripting for Oblivion, and I still have much to learn about everything else.

 

Also, do you use the Construction Set Extender by shademe? It is vital for every modder, the CS is a pain in the butt without it. The reason I do not like the CK is that there is no Creation Kit Extender yet, so the thing is still a nightmare. Luckily, we have the godsend by shademe for the CS to save the day. And to keep me modding for Oblivion. :smile:

 

Edit: Ooops. I thought this was about Oblivion. Sorry. I have absolutely no idea how Skyrim does it.

It actually is about Oblivion, not modded Skyrim in ages.

 

The demon creature does have high aggression...maybe 100 after all, will change it when I get back to it later to...75?

 

It could very well be a wander radius issue with the farm animals, maybe if I make a package with a very limited radius like 64 could help rather than using default ones. I am ofc using CSE, the CS sucks without it :tongue:

 

Actors are usually skewed off coordinate in many cases when viewing in game. I believe they're spawned at the nearest Navmesh vertex close to the drop location in CK.

I found the best way is to Link Ref my actor to a furniture or idle to make sure they stick to that location. If the animal doesn't have one, you can use an AI Package to Hold Location or a patrol package to a number of X markers within the pen.

I'd also check to make sure the Navmesh is properly setup.

As for the Demon, In the factions tab, right click and create a New Faction and assign it to be Player "Friend" faction. This should make sure it won't attack the player. U may also wanna assign it to be friends to "PlayerFollower" and "PlayerAlly" just in case.

Ah will definitely assign them all markers that should pin em down somewhat. Will try playing around with these factions, probably do a new one.

 

Cheers for the help guys, much appreciated I can't see how this advice would fail :smile: I don't know what it is about taking breaks which makes me return as a semi-noob all over again :tongue:

[Surilindur]

Ah, okay. No problem. :)

 

Most of the "normal" NPCs have aggression of 5, I think, and they still participate in fights. So try to keep it modest, 75 is still a bit high, maybe? Depends on what you are trying to achieve. :tongue:

 

The solution for "hold position" package in Oblivion is a "Wander" package with a range of something close to 0. Usually does the trick. Oblivion does not have idle markers like Skyrim, either, and the only way to "link" a ref to another is by the enable parent thing. Or at least I have not found any other way to link refs, and that has no effect on an actor's behaviour, only enable state. Oblivion also does not have too many player-related factions, PlayerFaction and PlayerVampireFaction are probably the two main factions?

 

But indeed, also in Oblivion, NPCs are apparently placed on the nearest navmesh point (yes, they are sort of dots, interconnected, not like in Skyrim). At least when spawned using PlaceAtMe. I suppose also when just loaded.

Edited October 16, 2015 by PhilippePetain

[Ironman5000]

Ah, okay. No problem. :smile:

 

Most of the "normal" NPCs have aggression of 5, I think, and they still participate in fights. So try to keep it modest, 75 is still a bit high, maybe? Depends on what you are trying to achieve. :tongue:

 

The solution for "hold position" package in Oblivion is a "Wander" package with a range of something close to 0. Usually does the trick. Oblivion does not have idle markers like Skyrim, either, and the only way to "link" a ref to another is by the enable parent thing. Or at least I have not found any other way to link refs, and that has no effect on an actor's behaviour, only enable state. Oblivion also does not have too many player-related factions, PlayerFaction and PlayerVampireFaction are probably the two main factions?

 

But indeed, also in Oblivion, NPCs are apparently placed on the nearest navmesh point (yes, they are sort of dots, interconnected, not like in Skyrim). At least when spawned using PlaceAtMe. I suppose also when just loaded.

Yeah i'm not used to modding Oblivion much, still finding my feet getting used to an older basic system.

[Surilindur]

Haha. And I am trying to get used to the new, more complex systems little by little. Trying to step out of my comfort zone a bit. But somehow I still tend to sneak back to modding Oblivion whenever I have a chance. :tongue:

 

Cannot wait to see what new Fallout 4 will bring to the table. I just hope their editor would be somewhere near the quality of the CSE, so I could actually consider building something and not just scripting.

Edited October 18, 2015 by PhilippePetain