Newbie needs help

[Telogenesis]

I'm working a few retextures of some armors made by several different artists and i need some help. I know to change the textures for the most part and how to view them in Nifskope but that is the end of my knowledge. Can someone point me in the correct direction on how to make my retextures into a stand alone mod, how to pack it from Nifskope, how to add a .esm or .esp , and how the .dds and xxxx_n.dds are different and why i need if i need to alter both textures for a piece. I will check this daily, I use GIMP 2.6 , have access to Photoshop CS3 at school, have Nifskope. Please help me!!

 

Also how do i change the background color on armor, like the one I started on has a marble texture for the armor and blue/turquoise texture for all the designs, i can change the blue but not the marble.

[Deleted1848331User]

To make your own standalone mod, add it to a folder in the correct folder (for any textures, put them in Textures, for meshes, in Meshes, for sounds in Sound, etc.) and then name the folder uniquely. You can also categorize your stuff by putting it into another folder inside that folder (this is starting to get confusing :P) such as Armor for armor, Weapons for weapons, and Clothing for clothing. Then you go into NifScope, open up the mesh you made the texture for, and apply it with the purple flower. Then click Save As from file, and create the same folders in Meshes as you did for Textures, and save it in the same folder but in Meshes. Then, (this is also how to make an .esp) open up the TES Construction Set, and click the open folder next to the floppy disc on the top left. Tick the box next to Oblivion.esm, and click Ok. After it loads, go into the Object Window and then go into (this is for armor or weapons or clothing or other things that you would use ingame like mugs or keys, or other miscellaneous things) Items -- *type* EX Armor and then on the right, where all the item IDs are, right click and select new. A box will pop up.

 

In ID, type a unique ID (EX: MyModArmor01) and then in Name name your item. After, there are many other things. Leave script at None, then in Weight type in your armor's weight (this is the example for armor :P) such as 10.00 for 10 pounds, then where it says Light, thats the armor type. Armor types are Light Armor and Heavy Armor. Light armor includes Fur, Mithril, Glass, etc, and Heavy armor includes Iron, Ebony, Daedric, etc. Heavy means it would have more armor rating than light armor would (at least it should). Going into that, where it says AR, put in how much protection it will give (Shields always have the most). All combined armor's maximum protection is 85 (as far as I know, only Daedric gives that much, maybe not). You can make this however much you want though. For health, it depends on how fast you want the item to break. To have it break fast, put it low, to make it break slowly, put it higher. Then for Value, that's how much you want the base price to be. The Mercantile skill determines the price it has when buying or selling with multipliers. For Enchantment, you can select one of the vanilla (ones included in the base game) enchantments, or you can make your own, but I won't go into that now. Then unless you don't want to be able to drop it, don't tick Quest Item, Hide Rings is for gauntlets that cover the player's fingers and would clip (show through) with the rings, Hide Amulets is for cuirasses that would hide the amulets you wear (such as a steel cuirass or fur cuirass). Playable is whether or not the player can use it.

 

Biped Object is what slots it will take up (cuirasses take Upper Body, greaves take Lower Body, gauntlets take Hands, boots take Feet, helmets take either hair or both hair and head, rings you should always make RightRing show that they reset correctly, shields take Shield, and so on). Then where it says Male, on Biped model, you put the (these are examples) Cuirass.nif, on World Model (the one you drop), you put the Cuirass_gnd.nif (gnd stands for Ground), then Icon Image is the image that is shown in the inventory, and they are found in Textures\Menus\Icons. The female side is exactly the same, but with the female versions of the mesh (they are often seperated in the folder with M and F folders). I think that covers the armor part...

 

Onto weapons (I feel like I'm writing a huge wall of text... Oh wait, I am.) now. Its the same as Armor, pretty much, but much simpler. Put in a unique ID (MyModWeapon01 for example), then name it. The type is what type of weapon it will be (For one handed blades, put the BladeOneHand tag, and make sure in NifScope the NiStringExtraData part says SideWeapon, and for two handed blades, put the BladeTwoHand tag, then if Nifscope make sure the NiStringExtraData says BackWeapon. For BluntOneHand and BluntTwoHand its the same, just make sure they have the right NiStringExtraData. Bows are very complicated to create, and staves are pretty simple. But the NiStringExtraData has to be BackWeapon for those.) Scripts leave at None, Enchantments I mentioned earlier, then charge is for uses, then where it says Ignore Normal Weapon Resistance is for whether or not it can hit ghosts and other special creatures. If ticked, it can, if not, it can't. Silver weapons, for example. After all of that...

 

...we can put the items ingame. Go to Cell View, and select a cell (Interiors, ICMarketDistrict, Tamriel, AnvilWorld, SkingradWorld, etc...) then drag your item into the Render window. Simple as that. Usually. To save the .esp, click the floppy disc on the top left, and then name it. That's an .esp. To make an ESM, you need a special tool like TES4Gecko.

 

The XXX.dds and XXX_n.dds files are both needed for a texture to function properly ingame. The _n stands for normal map. If you're just retexturing a file, then you can just copy and paste the normal map and rename it. (IE MyModArmor01.dds requires MyModArmor01_n.dds to be seen ingame.) Without the normal map, everything would be invisible. Normal maps also give more detail to a texture.

 

I think for now this is sufficient information :P If you need more, there's always the Construction Set Wiki.

 

EDIT: Also, if you're using other peoples' work, then you have to have their permission unless its a modder's resource, and give credit in the description and/or readme.

Edited June 28, 2011 by Guest

[Telogenesis]

ok , i copied over the _n.dds files with me new retextures, and saved them the way you said to, and i opened CS and got to adding NIF files for the Biped and it told me invalid directory. i trying to get the meshes from the meshes folder i saved, the armor is a one peice i believe i havent tried the original yet, http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=32969 is what i created a darker retexture for.

[Deleted1848331User]

The file path MUST be C:\*installation directory*\Oblivion\Data\*folder*, then your files.

[Telogenesis]

I messed up and saved the new meshes over the originals. Also im not sure which part of the body the armor is supposed to be on, its a full body armor so should i put it in as chest?

[Deleted1848331User]

Full body? If it covers your hands, feet, legs, and upper body, then you click Hands, Feet, LowerBody, UpperBody.