Stop the Flop

[PAPVAFS11]

I've had this issue since I first started playing New Vegas and I'm skeptical that it can be fixed, but I'd like to ask anyways.

 

When an NPC is knocked down or knocked out and stands back up (as is the case with essential companions), they'll often make a ragdoll flopping noise when moving around despite no longer being a ragdoll. I'd like to know if there's any good way to stop this and how.

 

I've also noticed many occasions where NPCs will stand up without necessarily playing their "standing up" animation, which leads to them wobbling unnaturally in their ragdolled pose for a short time before snapping to a stand. This is another thing I'd like to prevent.

 

Has anyone had any success in dealing with these issues? I hope I'm not alone here.

[KiCHo666]

Maybe tweaking the Ragdoll setting would help. Not in GECK, because it crashes it instantly when you click on any of them. Instead use FNVEdit.
As to what each option does, I don't know, and I spent quite a bit of time figuring out how Havok physics works. :P

[mindboggles]

I've been slowly getting to the bottom of what I think the game is doing when it transitions from the ragdoll to keframe state. It appears Bip01 Spine01 (and likely Bip01 Spine1) factor in the game acuiring a new position for the keyframe system to re-start from (Bip01). The game also uses it to determine which animation to play (the one closet matching the actors orientation) when getting back up, it's limited to 2.

 

As for your question, the flopping noise you hear is the game re-alinging the actor to match the orientation relative to the Bip01 Spine01 bone and it can get ugly with rapid twisting of bones. I have a video of one of my new custom creatures which at full speed you hear the noise and notice some slight movement but it's not until you slow it down that you see some horrendous twisting of bones. I'm not sure what rotational controllers the game is using when it does this but if it works on Euler rotation then it might also be due to gimbal lock.

 

The get back up animations are special idle animations and are defined under game play so that they play automatically when certain conditions are met. For whatever reason the game has failed (possibly a timing issue) on that branch of the game play idles and has defaulted to a simply dumping the actor back into the mtidle (base idle).

 

@KiCho666, Geck Power up will prevent it from crashing when you access the ragdoll settings but I've had little joy with that as it appears the Geck is failing at loading up controllers (most likely the reason for the default geck to crash).

[RoyBatterian]

NVAC seems to have basic support for GECK now too and prevents a few crashes, at least according to my logs.

[KiCHo666]

Hey! I'll be damn, it really does work now! :smile:
Thanks for the info!

I really didn't bothered to try it out with powerup because I just assumed it would crash.

EDIT: But yep. Not much to do there and it's kinda weird. For example, Foot IK is disabled for Humans, yet it works in-game.

EDIT 2: Nope, FNVedit says it's broken. :P

Edited July 12, 2016 by KiCHo666

[mindboggles]

I think it's just a NV Geck issue, the Foot IK is there if it's working in game but the Geck is making a pigs breakfast of loading up the data. It's really strange you can setup Foot IK in the Body part data but it doesn't work, as opposed to head tracking which does?????

[PAPVAFS11]

From what I gather, fixing these issues is beyond my talents. I've come to realize I know a lot less about idle animations than I thought I did and the idea that characters have some level of ragdoll physics when standing brings back a lot of disturbing memories from GMod.

 

I appreciate the detailed answers, though. I was starting to worry I was on my own with New Vegas.