Need help with Fade Nodes, bones, collision boxes, and Textures

[ZeroCore]

I'm having problems making a new weapon (a hand gun, NOT a melee weapon) for Fallout 3. I'm using GMax (the freeware 3DS Max) and nifskope.

 

Here are the problems:

 

1: applying textures:

 

I'm not terribly sure how to get a texture onto the mesh with nifskope and/or GMax, and I could really use a walkthrough on how to do this and how to get it successfully into Fallout. I know how to make .DDS files (that's no problem at all), the trick is just getting them in there. After a bit of experimenting, I'm starting to understand them, but I think a walkthrough on them would help.

 

2: Fadenodes:

When I try to bring a model into Fallout 3, it says "base node is not a fade node. Model cannot be picked.". Can someone please offer a way to fix this? I really don't understand the nifskope nodes, how to create them/manipulate them.

 

3: when making a new weapon from scratch, I understand that I need 'bones' to tell Fallout exactly where the weapon is held, its reload animation (which I'm not terribly worried about at this point), and where the projectile is fired from. I really, REALLY need a walkthrough on how to make these work.

 

4: Collision boxes: I have no idea how to make these. Can someone give me a walkthrough on that please?

 

Can anyone please give me some help with these issues? I've tried checking multiple tutorials on the internet, but they're either not specific enough, or not intended for meshes and textures going into Fallout 3.

[Ghogiel]

1: I'm guessing you can literally drag a dds file into the material editor in gmax. Then drag that material onto your mesh.

 

2: open in nifskope, see that top NiNode probably named Scene Root? literally just click on the NiNode part and just type BSFadeNode.

 

3: you only need 1 bone for weapons (sort of). Bones are converted to ninodes when mesh object are linked to them and you would use them to make the hierarchy of the nif correct so that animations would function correctly on them, to know what hierarchy looks like and what to name your mesh objects and bones, you haven to refer to the weapon you are looking to share the animations with, say assault rifle. You just replicate that structure in scene and it'll export all set up.

 

Anyway, the weapon needs a weapon bone, this is what is attached to the characters hand when they equip it. You can just rclick in nifskope, node>attach extra data> NiStringExtraData. In the name field type 'Prn' And in the String Data field type 'Weapon'. IIRC.

 

4: there are tutorials for collision, Oblivion is the same work flow.

Edited September 24, 2011 by Ghogiel

[ZeroCore]

1: I'm guessing you can literally drag a dds file into the material editor in gmax. Then drag that material onto your mesh.

 

2: open in nifskope, see that top NiNode probably named Scene Root? literally just click on the NiNode part and just type BSFadeNode.

 

3: you only need 1 bone for weapons (sort of). Bones are converted to ninodes when mesh object are linked to them and you would use them to make the hierarchy of the nif correct so that animations would function correctly on them, to know what hierarchy looks like and what to name your mesh objects and bones, you haven to refer to the weapon you are looking to share the animations with, say assault rifle. You just replicate that structure in scene and it'll export all set up.

 

Anyway, the weapon needs a weapon bone, this is what is attached to the characters hand when they equip it. You can just rclick in nifskope, node>attach extra data> NiStringExtraData. In the name field type 'Prn' And in the String Data field type 'Weapon'. IIRC.

 

4: there are tutorials for collision, Oblivion is the same work flow.

 

 

As goes bones, once again, once I make them in GMax, how do I link/merge/attach them to the main body of the weapon? I've tried a ton of different combinations, and nothing seems to work.

[Ghogiel]

To create a hierarchy use the select and link tool.

[ZeroCore]

To create a hierarchy use the select and link tool.

 

 

 

Thanks. ^^

 

Speaking of hierarchy, when I open a mesh up in GMax (say, for instance, the laser pistol) how do I check how the hierarchy is arranged for that weapon?

[Ghogiel]

If there isn't a button called schematic view, it should be under graph editors.

[ZeroCore]

If there isn't a button called schematic view, it should be under graph editors.

 

Okay, I found where the hierarchy is (graph editors, like you said). One last question regarding bones; do I have to do anything to them other than placing/linking them for Fallout to recognize what bones do what?

[Ghogiel]

Name them. The whole point of setting up the hierarchy and making bones in scene is so that when you export the weapon will animate correctly with zero faffing about in nifskope. So all pivots, transforms, node and mesh object names are just exported straight out of the box to exactly match what ever weapon you are basing it on, as in what animation set you want it to use.

 

the really important node names are probably the ones that begin with ##. those will be the objects that are actually going to be targeted by the character animations, and end up being the moving parts. Other things you can often name how ever you want.

[ZeroCore]

Name them. The whole point of setting up the hierarchy and making bones in scene is so that when you export the weapon will animate correctly with zero faffing about in nifskope. So all pivots, transforms, node and mesh object names are just exported straight out of the box to exactly match what ever weapon you are basing it on, as in what animation set you want it to use.

 

the really important node names are probably the ones that begin with ##. those will be the objects that are actually going to be targeted by the character animations, and end up being the moving parts. Other things you can often name how ever you want.

 

Thank you once again. ^^

 

Unfortunately, now I'm at another roadblock; I can't get the model successfully into Geck. I've copied the hierarchy of the weapon that my weapon resembles, applied the UV map texture, and exported the whole thing as a .NIF into Fallout's meshes folder AND I've moved the .DDS I used for its texture into Fallout's texture folder. When I go to create a new weapon in Geck and choose its mesh, it says that it loaded the .NIF file but the mesh doesn't show up in the preview screen or when I actually try to insert it into a cell in the game or when I put in into an NPC's inventory. Yes, I have created a texture set with the .DDS I've used for it before hand, but still the mesh doesn't show.

 

I don't know what to do at this point. If you could, please tell me what to do.

[Ghogiel]

open the nif. go into the BSShaderPPLightingProperty block details, shader flags, and untick SF_ShadowMap, and SF_shadow_frustum.