My first Mod project: Knights of Madness

[Oblivious12]

Ok, Hello TES Nexus! I'm Oblivious12, and I'm new to modding. I'm working on my first mod, nothing special, just a modification of the DLC Battlehorn Castle plugin by bethesda. What I want to do is expand the Castle a little, make the barracks a bit larger, add some new NPCs (some new knights, Archers manning the walls, a gateman, a stableboy, etc.), add an East and a West Tower, And make all the knights and archers use Madness Armor and Weapons. But in the Future, I want to add a quest for the Knights of madness, a Backstory, etc. As of now, I have the Secondary barracks laid out (still need to add NPCs, clutter, and better lighting, as all I'm using right now is candlesticks.), and I've got the East Tower Completed, and linked to the Exterior of the Castle, but When I activate the .ESP file for the Mod, "Knights of Madness.esp", Oblivion Errors out when I try to load the game I had set aside for testing. What am I doing wrong? Should I deactivate all of my plugin files?

[Vagrant0]

You cannot have one .esp reference things in another .esp. Also, releasing anything related to official mods would likely be illegal since that content is only for people who have purchased the mod.

 

If the reference issue isn't the problem, than it is likely one of the thousands of other mistakes someone who isn't familiar with modding could make. Or conflicts with other mods you have.

[evilkoal]

is it being loaded after the dlc? if so then i have no idea :)

[Oblivious12]

Well this mod is just for myself, to get myself acquainted with modding. But what your saying is that I have to edit the actual DLC Battlehorn Castle .esp in order to get what I'm trying for? and I'd have to convert the Shivering Isles ESP into an ESM in order to get Madness Armor into my Mod? I had been wondering if that might be the Case, but had hoped it wasnt. However, Since it is, I'll just have to make a backup copy of my Battlehorn Castle .esp. However, this does put a bit of a damper on my plans, but I'll get around it.

[Oblivious12]

OK, I'm reworking it using the original .esp, and I'll just add the madness armor in-game with Toasties mod. However, I have another question now. I've finished the East and West Towers, And am Currently toying with the notion of using a secret passage from the private quarters to get into the West Tower, as there is likely no alternative, unless I want to go cheap and use a portal. Also, I know there are mods that give Armor Stands, but is there any sort of thing that has an Armor stand (scripted) that displays a set of armor? I know they use it in SI (to display madness and amber armor in the smithys) and in Knights of the Nine (to display the Crusaders Relics), but is there any coded into the esm?

 

And then heres another question: Will anything I've already put in the Castle (I.e. companions, items, mannequins,) Be lost?

[Sypron]

As for the armor mannequins, the SI and KoTN are different. The SI ones are simply a model of all the armor pieces glued together. They are interactive, and you can't really adapt them properly for your mod. The KoTN one basically works like this. If you say 'Place helmet" it check to see if you have the helmet then if you do it sets a variable to 'true' and makes a helmet model appear in the world. If you try to claim it, it checks the variable, makes the model disappear and gives it back to you.

 

If you want to use this yourself, you have to:

-Break up the armor into the appropriate ones for the stand

-Do some basic scripting (possibly copied and edited from KoTN).

 

So you can do it, but you'll need to edit the meshes.

[bben46]

There are already several mods released that modify Battlehorn Castle. They all require the DLC to be installed to work. I think it is OK to release a mod that changes something in the castle as long as the original is required - just as we can change things in the original Oblivion as long as we still have the original installed.

[Oblivious12]

Battlehorn Castle IS required for this mod, as without the .bsa\textures and meshes, nothing will be there. However, here is an update:

 

as of now: I have added the basic area of the new battlehorn Dungeons, East and West Towers are complete and fully functional (fixed a problem where if you entered from the battlements you'd be stuck in the geometry and fixed the doors), I have made a modification to the Musuem Area, adding display cases, four pedestals for the armor displays I'm working on, and i've linked the dungeon area to the rest of the castle. I've also added a stableboy, with complete AI package, and a castle steward. The steward still needs an AI package, and dialouge, as does the stableboy, but I have tested it, and so far haven't found any errors.

Next up:

I will be completing the Dungeons, and linking it to the new Armory as soon as that area is complete, and I have added to the dungeons a set of secret passages that will lead to the future Castle Substructure.(Castle Substructure refers to the very foundations of the castle)

After the dungeon is complete the next on the list is the castle Substructure, a maze of tunnels that wind through the foundations of the castle. I'm debating on adding a secret exit to the castle, one that goes through the castle substructure. Also I have been working on adding a markerless quest to learn the fates of the Knights of the True Horn that left or died over the years. That of course, is just an idea. However, I have the basic design of the substructure worked out in my head, and the dungeon only requires lighting and clutter.

I do have another question though.

How would I script a secret passage. I looked at the ones the original battlehorn Castle used, and attempted to alter a copy of them to open a DIFFERENT secret door (I have created the ref using the original doors as a template), but it keeps giving me a syntax error:

Syntax error, must use a reference or reference variable for this type.

 

Any suggestions?

And thank you for the information on the KotN armor stand, I'll have a look at it and try and create my own as quickly as possible; although this means I'm going to have to either find a way to make it display any armor OR decide which armors I want to display. I'll figure it out though.

 

Currently the Barracks have been shifted to the bottom of the list until I get better at scripting AI packages.

However, I should soon have an alpha version of this mod Posted on TESNexus.

 

Also as of now I'm keeping track of the Version. The Current version is now 0.1 alpha.

 

Thanks for the support guys,

Oblivious12

[Oblivious12]

Ok, I've been working on it some more, and I've run into another problem: I added a group of marauders that will randomly attack the castle, and I set their AI packages to find and the target for find to be the Battlehorn portcullis. Only one problem now: The portcullis doesn't work. Neither the switch nor using the portcullis works anymore, and I checked the linkage between the two, the open scripts, and compared it to the original, and couldn't find any reason why its not working. Does using a find package on a door make it not work? Oh yes, and I've added lighting to the dungeon, and linked it to the other two areas its connected to (the armory and the substructure), and hashed out the basic area for the armory, added opening doors to the dungeon, finished all the prison cell doors (they all work now) added lighting, and begun adding clutter. at this moment I've added a table and chair to the front office area of the dungeons, and a bed to the dungeon mini-barrack (for the jailer), and fixed a minor problem with the door archways (They all were flat-topped, and left a large gap between they're top and the arched ceiling). The current version is 0.11. Thanks for the support, later.

[Oblivious12]

Ok, We're up to 0.2 alpha, sorry I haven't posted in a while, I ran into some problems with Oblivion and have spent the last two weeks fixing oblivion (Several mods I had installed went nova on me and had to be removed, and reinstalling oblivion is not on the top of my list for things I wanna do), mainly fixing several terrain Geometry holes that have been randomly appearing, and stopping my game from going berserk when I Fast Travel(None of the custom content shows up and oblivion says all the save games are corrupt and I have to restart oblivion). However, I have been working on fixing the problem with the Castle Portcullis, and believe I have found the cause: The attacking marauders I added have a Find AI Package, with the portcullis as the target. So as soon as Oblivion is back to being stable again I'll fix it. However, New with 0.2 alpha:

 

A new Name! The Name is now "Battlehorn Castle Improved" and yes, I'm aware of a similar mod Called Battlehorn Castle enhanced.

 

Fixed a bug where going through one of the doors sent you to the Imperial City Sewers (one of the non-teleport doors, oddly enough, the door would open, and you walk through, and poof! you get a loading screen and your in the sewers!)

 

The Armory Area is completely lit

 

Note: Past this point I will be doing a lot of work on it at once, and the version will jump from 0.2 Alpha to 0.5 Beta, as the majority of the work will be done in the next week, as I am currently on spring break. As of now, Which I am calling 0.3 Alpha, I've got the Armory Complete, and Have fixed the bug that caused the portcullis to not work, as well as a freak bug that caused oblivion to duplicate EVERYTHING, marauders, guards, castle, and quest. I've fixed this FOR NOW, I'm going to have to disable the quests and all the extraneous crap that is not modified in my mod so you can run it with the original battlehorn, thus ensuring that you have to have battlehorn castle for it to work. However, at this point, I'm pretty sure that without the Battlehorn .bsa file you won't see much of anything anyways.

 

Anyway, coming up in 0.5 Beta:

 

I will put in the Treasury\vaults and Castle substructure

 

I'll add NPCs to the Dungeon, along with a few minor structural changes, namely a small increase in the size of the Prison Barracks

 

Make the Secret doors in the dungeon work, which begs the question, Anyone know how I can do that? I tried using existing scripts, but it wouldn't accept the new object refs for the new doors, saying the ref IDs weren't Valid. If I can't get them to work by 0.5 Beta, I will remove them and leave the passages open for now. Also debating moving around the room arrangement, perhaps having the barracks before the dungeon, with the armory off the barracks, and the dungeon beyond the barracks, as opposed to have the dungeon lead to the Armory, and substructure, and barracks, and from the armory to the Treasury.

 

Add AI Paths, which brings up another question: How do I do that?

 

Once I am up to 0.5 I will post the mod on this site.

 

Alright, thanks for the Support!