[LE] Quick Questions, Quick Answers

[IsharaMeradin]

Hey, I reskinned a skeleton from Skyrim using testskeleton.nif & created a new actor, race, armor & armor addon entry for it but in-game it stands in the t-stance & has no animations.

You can see the axe it should be holding floating around in the air & it's glowing eyes move independently of the head & it zips around the world space, just with no animations.

I'm wondering if the nif I used was wrong. It's the only skeleton nif in the meshes folder I extracted from the BSA. Is it an unrigged mesh or is there a setting I may have forgotten to change or add?

I'm using nifskope rc4, if that's relevant.

 

Sounds like your skeleton doesn't have a skeleton. :P

 

You probably wanted to use "Meshes\Actors\Draugr\Character Assets\DraugrSkeleton.nif" for the visible body mesh. While using "Meshes\Actors\Draugr\Character Assets\SkeletonS.nif" (male) & "Meshes\Actors\Draugr\Character Assets\SkeletonF.nif" (female) for the internal skeletal bone nodes that the animations communicate with.

 

At least those are the files in use by the stock skeleton actors.

[TurelimVampire]

Is it possible to do all that stuff within nifskope? Because I don't know how to use any 3D modelling programs.

[IsharaMeradin]

All you were wanting to do is make a visual change to the skeleton and set it up as a custom race and actor so that the original skeletons were untouched right?

 

If that is the case, then I would do it as follows:

• Duplicate the stock skeleton race record
• Duplicate the stock skeleton body armor record
• Duplicate the stock skeleton body armor addon record
• Edit each of the above so that they point to the duplicates rather than the original stock
• Locate, copy and rename the NIF file used by your duplicate skeleton body armor addon
• Open that NIF file, find the texture file entries
• Locate, copy and rename the texture files
• Edit the NIF file to point to your renamed textures
• Modify the textures as desired
• Double check all records to ensure that they are properly linked
• Test in game

[RawrARawr]

Is there a way to make a leveleditem list based on the npcs level, rather than the players?

[TurelimVampire]

 

All you were wanting to do is make a visual change to the skeleton and set it up as a custom race and actor so that the original skeletons were untouched right?

 

If that is the case, then I would do it as follows:

• Duplicate the stock skeleton race record
• Duplicate the stock skeleton body armor record
• Duplicate the stock skeleton body armor addon record
• Edit each of the above so that they point to the duplicates rather than the original stock
• Locate, copy and rename the NIF file used by your duplicate skeleton body armor addon
• Open that NIF file, find the texture file entries
• Locate, copy and rename the texture files
• Edit the NIF file to point to your renamed textures
• Modify the textures as desired
• Double check all records to ensure that they are properly linked
• Test in game

 

 

Ok I tried that & when I previewed the skeleton it said something like "animation: unable to map bone npc root [root] on skeleton.nif" & mentioned something about "havok behavior controller". I put one in the world space & I couldn't left or right click on it & it wouldn't move with the Z, X or C widgets & I couldn't delete it so I had to just close the CK. Reopening it & previewing the skeleton gives the following warning - "MODELS: Could not find root bone to init root for BipedAnim on 'EncSkeleton01Melee1HRed' (047BFBE3)"

 

I found this page where someone has a similar problem : http://niftools.sourceforge.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=4447

 

"For your mesh to be animated using vanilla skeleton.hkx (i.e. file "characterassets\skeleton.hkx"), you have to use same name of NiNode you want to be animated as is used in that skeleton.hkx - in this case it is "RuinsGate01", otherwise you get error message "Unable to map bone RuinsGate01…"."

 

Any ideas? The tutorial I watched on YouTube never mentioned of that & the guy didn't have such problems.

Edited February 15, 2017 by TurelimVampire

[IsharaMeradin]

1. I think there is a lot of confusion going on because we are talking about a skeleton race with a body that looks like a skeleton and a skeleton mesh that provides the rigging for animation movement. The word skeleton is being thrown around a lot...

 

2. The rigging or skeleton that you use on the race needs to contain each of the nodes that are in the body mesh (the one that looks like real bones). If it doesn't, there will be issues.

 

You will need to open the body mesh file in NifSkope and look at its structure. Open alongside of it in NifSkope the skeleton or rigging mesh and ensure that each have the same bone nodes. The body does not need all of the bone nodes, but every bone node it has must be present in the skeleton or rigging mesh. If they don't match up, you'll need to replace one of them with a file that does match up.

 

I am sure there are plenty of mods that provide custom skeletons and at least one that provides a playable skeleton race. Look around and see how they were made. That's the best I can offer at this junction.

[TurelimVampire]

Ok, thanks. I'll have a look at it again.

[Levionte]

Does anyone know how to change the impact sound for an actor? To clarify, I'm talking about the "crash" sound that's made when the character is struck by any type of attack. I've tried making new impact sounds and an impact set, which is assigned via custom material type in the Race entry in the creation kit. It really seemed like that's what I was looking for, but it's not working for me. And I tried adding "hit" sounds to the actor in the actor entry, but that didn't do what I wanted either. I don't want the character to "say" this sound, I want to replace the actual impact sound effect. Any help would be appreciated.

[Elias555]

I have a spell that uses MoveTo on an actor. An explosion is meant to occur on hit of the projectile like most spells but it doesn't. I've tried using PlaceAtMe(MyExplosion) but that doesn't work. I put it in the MGEF too. Nothing seems to work but occasionally the explosion is there and I'm not sure why it's not the case 100% of the time.

Any ideas?

Edited March 9, 2017 by Elias555

[Pickysaurus]

Does anyone know how to change the impact sound for an actor? To clarify, I'm talking about the "crash" sound that's made when the character is struck by any type of attack. I've tried making new impact sounds and an impact set, which is assigned via custom material type in the Race entry in the creation kit. It really seemed like that's what I was looking for, but it's not working for me. And I tried adding "hit" sounds to the actor in the actor entry, but that didn't do what I wanted either. I don't want the character to "say" this sound, I want to replace the actual impact sound effect. Any help would be appreciated.

 

This may be no help to you, but Icecreamassassin (Legacy of the Dragonborn creator) ran into a similar issue and said he had to update the sounds in NIFScope as well as CK for it to work.

Edited March 8, 2017 by Pickysaurus