[WIP] Jarek - Custom-Voiced Skeleton Necromancer Follower

[iMACobra]

Introduction

Hey guys, I'm making my very first mod and it's a custom-voiced follower. His name is Jarek and he is a millennia old necromancer so he has a lot of knowledge and Tamrielic history behind his belt. I really want to give him special spells to showcase his attained knowledge of necromancy and magic throughout the centuries but for now he only has the standard raising spells since I don't know how to make new spells yet. He also uses vanilla fire spells so he's not entirely useless by himself. Here's what he looks like:

 

Appearance

http://i.imgur.com/9dUbptp.jpg?1

 

Backstory

I don't want to give any backstory quite yet because I don't want to reveal anything that I might use for future story and quest material so all I'll say is that he was born in early years of the First Era so he's pretty damn old (just a few millennia).

 

Personality

For anyone interested in this part of him, he's kind of crazy because of the darkness of Necromancy that took a toll on him and can say very dark things at times but he isn't a murderous psychopath like the rest of the necromancers around Skyrim so he won't commit murders for the player. He is very historically knowledgable since he is from the First Era.

 

Features

• Custom-voiced (I already have a voice actor)
• 75+ lines of dialogue
• Uses human animations instead of the usual skeleton/draugr animations
• Uses raising spells
• Can resurrect mammoths and horses for some reason
• Can raise more than the usual two things the player can raise
• Uses fire spells
• Can wear armor but skin will show for the ones that do such as Hide, Scaled, Iron, clothing, etc.
• Has a standalone follower framework
• Has a TRI file for his skull so the jaw will actually move up and down when he is talking
• Possesses a staff that summons a random skeleton of a given race (Human, Orc, Argonian, Khajiit, Elf)

Notes on some of the features: I don't have a lot of dialogue lines for him right now because I'm not very imaginative in what he should say especially with the personality I've given him. He can raise more than the usual 2 things the player can. I've seen him raise 4 things at a time. I've given him fire spells so he isn't useless in a dungeon where he can't raise things (Dwarven Ruins w/o Falmer). The follower framework I've given him is borrowed from a tutorial so there are some problems with it that I might need to address. He holds a staff in his inventory but he doesn't use it because of the fighting style given in the Creation Kit so it'll be a little present for the player if you bring him along.

 

Features Planned

• Have his own (skeletal) horse to ride
• more dialogue lines
• His own custom-made outfit (the one in the picture)
• Vanilla armors specifically tailored for Jarek and the skeleton summons to wear (no human skin showing)
• Quest to search for the item Jarek's looking for
• TRI files for the rest of the racial skeletons (both genders) so I can use them as NPCs in the quest I'm planning for Jarek

Skull TRI File

In case I didn't make this point clear enough in the Features section, I've actually given his skull its own TRI file so his mouth will actually move when he is talking! Now it won't be so boring to stare at his scary face without any expression whatsoever. I've even given him brow ridge movements so you'll even know when he's angry or sad without him speaking. Why does his thick skull have brow movements you say? Magic duh! There's even an unused skeleton creature in the vanilla game data that has an angry expression on its skull. Enough of that, I fear that this feature is what'll get most people to actually look at my mod. As a disclaimer, I'm not releasing this TRI file or giving any permission to use it yet primarily because, so far, this feature is what'll make my follower mod stand out from the rest as far as I'm concerned. Besides, he uses human animations so that's partly the reason why he's even able to use a TRI file unlike Skjel the Gray, Xanthys, etc. Plus, having human animations will make him much more expressive with the usual idle poses that can be used during conversation. I will post a video showcasing the mouth movements and the voice later sometime next week.

 

Problems

I have been making this follower and had the idea to make him since mid 2015. I have quite a few problems I need to address with my mod and the biggest problems have to do with asset permissions. But first there are a few things I need to fix with my mod:

• Jarek's initial location is Anise's Cellar. Nearly, everytime I enter Anise's Cellar, Jarek doesn't Forcegreet me to initiate his intro dialogue like he's supposed to. I have to fix this by reloading the Autosave into Anise's Cellar in order to get the Forcegreet to work. Saving the game manually inside of Anise's Cellar and reloading doesn't work. Another problem is leaving the Cellar and going back in makes Jarek disappear from the game completely. The "moveto player" console command doesn't work either. Turning off the application and reloading the Autosave again fixes this. When installing Jarek's mod mid playthough, entering the Cellar, Jarek doesn't appear at all. Turning off game and reloading Autosave again fixes. All I have to say is I have to leave the Autosave feature on just for Jarek's intial intro meeting. Another less problematic issue is when dismissing him, he never enters Anise's Cellar afterwards. He just stands above the floorboard to the entrance down no longer how long he is away from you.
• Another issue I have is the follower commands. All of the vanilla follower commands work fine but when I trade with him and then leave the conversation and move to another spot, it takes Jarek about 5 seconds to respond and move to me after trading with him so somewhat of a slow reaction.

Now my biggest problem involves asset permissions.

• Part of Jarek's outfit are made up of clothing from lifestorock's Armored Skeletons/Immersive Creatures mod. I've asked for permission to use his skeleton armor assets for my own mod but he hasn't yet responded. I've sent him 2 messages in the last month (Dec. 3 & 20) and he hasn't responded to any of them. He was last on yesterday (Jan. 12) and still hasn't responded and hasn't even read my message this time. PyroToaster asked for lifestorock's permission to use his armors for Xanthys and got it so I should also be able to get permission to use his stuff. If I can't use Jarek's custom clothing, I'm gonna have to make him naked or somehow find better clothing for Jarek. I can't use Blender and alter meshes for the life of me. I'm also asking for the same permission to use the vanilla skeleton armors for the racial skeletons in my mod so even more of a reason why I need to ask for lifestorock's permission to use his stuff. Here are some pictures showing examples of what I converted with Bodyslide, Mesh Rigger and NifSkope:

http://i.imgur.com/3NL5xAh.jpg?2http://i.imgur.com/gTAsRjX.png?2http://i.imgur.com/M7BN9SL.jpg?2http://i.imgur.com/qoedv8G.jpg?2http://i.imgur.com/Ygd3rDW.jpg?2http://i.imgur.com/1yBciLz.jpg?2http://i.imgur.com/XxenwJc.jpg?2http://i.imgur.com/xdUiE4t.jpg?2http://i.imgur.com/nSeu8Ba.jpg?2

 

This is all I have to say for now. If anyone is willing to help me with any problems or has any questions please send me a PM or respond here.

Edited January 16, 2017 by iMACobra

[skinnytecboy]

1. Sounds like a SEQ issue to me. This is usually caused because your dialogue quest is start game enabled, so a reload is required to fix this. Ideally you should experiment with starting your quest via other means:

-Story manager (location change event)
-Trigger box and script*
-script on door to cellar*

*The last two could be problematic with any mod that alters the location.

Force greet: I often use scenes to make an npc force greet. (You create a scene and add a force greet package that points to your greet dialogue).

 

So for example, were you to go with the trigger box method, you could start quest and scene thus:

Quest Property MyQuest Auto ; point this to your quest
Scene Property MyScene Auto ; point to your greet scene
Int Property trig_count auto ; set this to zero

Event OnTriggerEnter(ObjectReference akActionRef)
If akActionRef == Game.GetPlayer() ;check it's the player
 If trig_count==0;
  trig_count += 1;
   MyQuest.Start() ; start quest
   utility.wait(1) ; breathing space
   MyScene.start()
   utility.wait(1)
   self.disable() ; remove the trigger
  endif
 EndIf
EndEvent

In regards to some of your other issues, I can't help thinking that you aren't testing with a clean save.

 

Tip; did you know that you can test straight from the first game menu? You can open console and COC straight where you need to be:

 

coc AnisesCabin01

 

Anyway, hope this helps and good luck

Edited January 15, 2017 by skinnytecboy

[iMACobra]

1. Sounds like a SEQ issue to me. This is usually caused because your dialogue quest is start game enabled, so a reload is required to fix this. Ideally you should experiment with starting your quest via other means:

 

-Story manager (location change event)

-Trigger box and script*

-script on door to cellar*

 

*The last two could be problematic with any mod that alters the location.

 

Force greet: I often use scenes to make an npc force greet. (You create a scene and add a force greet package that points to your greet dialogue).

 

So for example, were you to go with the trigger box method, you could start quest and scene thus:

Quest Property MyQuest Auto ; point this to your quest
Scene Property MyScene Auto ; point to your greet scene
Int Property trig_count auto ; set this to zero

Event OnTriggerEnter(ObjectReference akActionRef)
If akActionRef == Game.GetPlayer() ;check it's the player
 If trig_count==0;
  trig_count += 1;
   MyQuest.Start() ; start quest
   utility.wait(1) ; breathing space
   MyScene.start()
   utility.wait(1)
   self.disable() ; remove the trigger
  endif
 EndIf
EndEvent

In regards to some of your other issues, I can't help thinking that you aren't testing with a clean save.

 

Tip; did you know that you can test straight from the first game menu? You can open console and COC straight where you need to be:

 

coc AnisesCabin01

 

Anyway, hope this helps and good luck

Thanks for the advice! I fixed the problem with him not forcegreeting me when entering the cell by recreating the SEQ file in TES5Edit and he also responds right away with follower commands. I still have the problem with reentering the cellar and having him be absent sometimes. He's also completely absent when installing my mod mid-playthrough but these problems are also fixed when turning off the game and reloading an Autosave. He also doesn't ever reenter Anise's Cellar when dismissing him.

 

I do use clean saves (saves where my mod was never activated) when testing successive versions of my mod. I also use the coc AnisesCabinExterior01 command in the main menu to speed things up a bit.