Tutorial: 3ds Max Skinned Meshes Into Game

[hoodz]

After experimenting on werewolves without success, I'll have to add to this thread here x]

It seems like that no matter what I do, it is completely impossible to edit/attach/bind any mesh to the werewolf model/skeleton.

Like - adding a standard 3dsmax teapot or any other custom mesh to creatures like the frost atronach works just fine if I fix the *.nif in Nifscope later on, no problems with that, game is happy and loads the new files.

 

Like so:

http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/6683/teapot.jpg

 

If I try to add the exact same meshes to the werewolf, repeating the same steps, the game crashes instantly as soon as any instance is placed in the world. Both when the player is transforming and when spawning a werewolf using the console.

I made sure to triple-check that the new mesh/tweaked mesh has valid UVs, is properly skinned, blocks fixed and properties correctly set up, even went line by line and compared my values of the tweaked nif to the one that ships with the game. Still no luck at all after several attempts.

Did anyone of you guys have more luck with that? Kinda getting frustrated over this. :wallbash:

 

I havent done any modding but Ive been messing around with the console because I broke something ofcourse...

I found a strange broken mesh of the werewolf around my character when I used the setrace command when I was transforming back

So I think this broken mesh is some sort of blend shape which is equipped/placed around your character when you transform, if you edit it or add anything to it the amount of verts/vert numbers wont match with the second blend target which has the exact same amount of verts and vert numbers and thats why its crashing I guess, as stated before im not too experienced with all this modding for Skyrim and im just guessing atm but I was planning on changing the werewolf too so would liek to know why it keeps crashing

 

What you could try is locate both models and then add the exact same teapot to both files to see if it works but I highly doubt there are 2 files as normally blend shapes are stored in a single mesh

[Derrax]

I havent done any modding but Ive been messing around with the console because I broke something ofcourse...

I found a strange broken mesh of the werewolf around my character when I used the setrace command when I was transforming back

So I think this broken mesh is some sort of blend shape which is equipped/placed around your character when you transform, if you edit it or add anything to it the amount of verts/vert numbers wont match with the second blend target which has the exact same amount of verts and vert numbers and thats why its crashing I guess, as stated before im not too experienced with all this modding for Skyrim and im just guessing atm but I was planning on changing the werewolf too so would liek to know why it keeps crashing

 

What you could try is locate both models and then add the exact same teapot to both files to see if it works but I highly doubt there are 2 files as normally blend shapes are stored in a single mesh

 

Hmmm.. I haven't thought about this particular thing. Problem is that I don't see any other werewolf meshes, at least not in the folders I've looked at so far. But you're right, he DOES change a bit when transforming. That doesn't quite explain why the crash occurs when I just spawn the werewolf using the console, as there I saw no transformation..

 

Well Skyrim does use blendshapes as separate meshes! (malebody_0.nif and malebody_1.nif)

The buffness-slider at the character creation screen morphs between the two meshes, which indeed are vertex-count wise identical. Just have to keep an eye open for the darn werewolf mesh no. 2 then. There only is a malebodywerewolf_1.nif, I don't see anything that is postfixed with _0

Edited December 1, 2011 by Derrax

[hoodz]

 

Hmmm.. I haven't thought about this particular thing. Problem is that I don't see any other werewolf meshes, at least not in the folders I've looked at so far. But you're right, he DOES change a bit when transforming. That doesn't quite explain why the crash occurs when I just spawn the werewolf using the console, as there I saw no transformation..

 

Well Skyrim does use blendshapes as separate meshes! (malebody_0.nif and malebody_1.nif)

The buffness-slider at the character creation screen morphs between the two meshes, which indeed are vertex-count wise identical. Just have to keep an eye open for the darn werewolf mesh no. 2 then. There only is a malebodywerewolf_1.nif, I don't see anything that is postfixed with _0

 

I dont know what youre trying to add to the werewolf but why dont you start with altering the model for testing purposes, for example sculpt the ears to make them really long as a test to see if this works.

Was going to make a major mod for the Werewolf transformation but seems I also have to wait untill this gets figured out...

 

Another thing I noticed when I was messing about with the console is that the beginning phase mesh of the transformation did not go away anymore, so maybe its stored in or around the body mesh just the visibility is disabled?

Now im really guessing here as I havent unpacked anything yet, I really hope this gets figured out as I was planning on making different transformations for some races

Edited December 2, 2011 by hoodz

[Derrax]

Seems to be unrelated to specifically Werewolves.

I did more tests in the meantime and tried the same stuff with the Trolls. Seems like the problem is related to the shader(?)

 

The main difference between the Atronach and the Werewolf / Troll is that the latter have a NiAlphaProperty for the transparent parts of their hair-patches.

When I delete that property in nifscope, the modified troll in this instance loads fine in game, but is invisible. When the property is there, the game will again instantly crash the moment an instance is placed in the world.

 

I read what Ghogiel wrote about that property in another thread and made sure that the threshold and flag is set correctly (flag 4844, threshold 100 in the case of the troll), by default the exporter uses wrong values here, but this seems to have no impact onto anything at this point. Still crashes. I need some input here >:0 What am I overlooking?

[Ghogiel]

Interesting behaviour you are reporting. I'd have to conduct my own experiment.. as is I'm not sure what to think.

[Derrax]

I'm not sure what to think either x] Maybe I'm just overlooking something utterly obvious, but I couldn't think of what.

[jimhsu]

I havent done any modding but Ive been messing around with the console because I broke something ofcourse...

I found a strange broken mesh of the werewolf around my character when I used the setrace command when I was transforming back

So I think this broken mesh is some sort of blend shape which is equipped/placed around your character when you transform, if you edit it or add anything to it the amount of verts/vert numbers wont match with the second blend target which has the exact same amount of verts and vert numbers and thats why its crashing I guess, as stated before im not too experienced with all this modding for Skyrim and im just guessing atm but I was planning on changing the werewolf too so would liek to know why it keeps crashing

 

What you could try is locate both models and then add the exact same teapot to both files to see if it works but I highly doubt there are 2 files as normally blend shapes are stored in a single mesh

 

Hmmm.. I haven't thought about this particular thing. Problem is that I don't see any other werewolf meshes, at least not in the folders I've looked at so far. But you're right, he DOES change a bit when transforming. That doesn't quite explain why the crash occurs when I just spawn the werewolf using the console, as there I saw no transformation..

 

Well Skyrim does use blendshapes as separate meshes! (malebody_0.nif and malebody_1.nif)

The buffness-slider at the character creation screen morphs between the two meshes, which indeed are vertex-count wise identical. Just have to keep an eye open for the darn werewolf mesh no. 2 then. There only is a malebodywerewolf_1.nif, I don't see anything that is postfixed with _0

 

Or try manually SetRace ing the werewolf and see if that works.

[TwiggySkyrim]

Just dropping in to say that I have succesfully imported some things into the game using the method in this tutorial.

So far just moving vertices around, not adding cuts etc.

 

3DS Max 2010 (x64), nifskope with newest .xml

 

Worked a treat, thank you good sir!

[TwiggySkyrim]

Hmm.. I've ran into an interesting bug.

 

Crazy skin deformation on any weight between min and max. If the NPC is either full weight or no weight the mesh works fine. Also, if I only update either the the 1 mesh or the 0 mesh it works fine on all weights. I definitely havent changed vertex numbers.

 

I'm guessing it's done with some kind of morph targets? I'm pretty confused as to whats causing it.

[Ghogiel]

Hmm.. I've ran into an interesting bug.

 

Crazy skin deformation on any weight between min and max. If the NPC is either full weight or no weight the mesh works fine. Also, if I only update either the the 1 mesh or the 0 mesh it works fine on all weights. I definitely havent changed vertex numbers.

 

I'm guessing it's done with some kind of morph targets? I'm pretty confused as to whats causing it.

basically morph targets, so it's vertex order. if you reorder them between the 2 morphs it'll obviously splat. both _0 and _1 need to be the same mesh basically, specifcially the vertex order.