Custom skinned NPCs fade out when on fire, why?

[BlahBlahDEEBlahBlah]

Hello,

Some of the NPCs I've worked on and created new skins for slowly fade out/disappear while on fire (then slowly fade in as the fire goes out).
Throw a molotov at them or hit them with a flamerthrower, are the most consistent examples.

My best guess so far is bad nifs/a misstep in my process/me being a big dummy. =P
So, any ideas about a specific bad'ness of a nif that could cause it?
A completely different cause, maybe?

Thank you.

Example of a skin nif that does this is available here: http://www.ledgeoftech.com/wp-content/uploads/MOD/Random/

Edit: I suppose I might have should have put the bgsm and textures in there too. Oops. =(

I can pop them in in a bit.

[BlahBlahDEEBlahBlah]

Could it be some kind of of texture/material change/record for when the model catches on fire that I'm missing from my nifs/skins, maybe?

 

This is all pretty outside of my field (yet, for some reason, I keep trying...just stubborn, I guess), so anyone with a better understand please, I'd really appreciate chiming in.

 

Thank you.

[montky]

@blahblahdeeblahblah

indeed, and apologies for a delayed response.

 

I have a conjecture on your hypothetical;

though take my reflection with a pound of salt

as my mod-fu in FO4 is not so good hehe.

 

we had to deal with similar issues for the "working lava lava-lamps" mod,

the shadows were not corresponding to the 'spite' of the lava animation properly...

and the TV's on a screen/ drag and drop .gif/.swf/.mov to a folder on a face-group problem...

not to mention, the hologram effect mod and energy-shield/energy-field doorway mod.

the image was turning up, but, it was all sorts of wrong colors and not any of the effects we wanted...

 

 

 

if you check out the texture switching ideas, and tilarta's "how to make a glow specular",

I'm thinking that's what's at play here...

 

when fire effects are applied, they are creating a point-lightsource,

or layer-switching and applying a 'burned decal'.

that lightsource is bouncing a light off-of the different texture, which does not have a layer calibrated to

that effect.

 

ie, it's looking for a specular layer or a diffuse or diffraction etc, which isn't there

compared to a vanilla base FO4 texture.

similarly, sometimes objects will appear all orange, or all blue, or all purple,

which indicates those particular maps are not being found...

 

so those are 2 possible hypothesis as to why you're getting that 'tardis materializing' effect.

I think it is more probable, the game is applying a light source and effect to your texture,

and the bumpmap or diffuse is not calibrated to that effect...

 

a third possibility for hi-end installs, is your texture is too large for the effect.

sometimes, a character with custom skin texture etc,

it will disappear after a few hours of gameplay and become invisible hehe.

we're still trying to figure out why this is happening...

 

 

 

I hope these give you some ideas and avenues to explore in the meantime,

until a more pro modder can arrive to assist you.

 

It's a really good question, and I will be interested to learn what the answer ultimately winds up being,

as it will have implications for some of the other projects I'm involved with hehe.

though,

flipside of the coin,

we may have unintentionally found some awesome effects to exploit too.

enemies that cloak while moving, sorta like the chupacabre and the invisi-deathclaw or the nightkin...

rad-beings, energy-beings made of pure rads that attack and can only be damaged by plasma etc...

 

it's like that Klinger of Starlight City accident;

klinger had their dialogue 'randomized', but, the randomize routine didn't discern between female or male settlers,

hence, Klinger would sometimes have female audio come from their mouth...

people immediately thought Klinger was a synth... poor klinger.

though, in the process, we found a way to make ambient quests more immersive hehe.

[steve40]

iirc, the immolation effect (e.g. applied by the molotov cocktails (after a critical hit?)) is done by applying a modified armor (skin?) to the npc. So if you are using a custom body, the fake skin effect probably won't be compatible, so the npc will appear invisible.

[BlahBlahDEEBlahBlah]

I'll look into the glow texture a bit more, Montky.

I need to go through your post a few more times and see if anything else clicks in my head.

And, yeah, the idea of leaving some of them this way as they're defense technique has most definitely crossed my mind. ;-)

 

I'd be okay/happy if they disappeared on death, instead of a chared corpse, Steve. Rather that than them fading in and out while (alight and) still attacking, which is what they do now. =/

Regardless, I'll look into the idea. Could very well still be them lacking a temporarily applied 2nd (3rd) skin/armor when set aflame.

 

Thank you. =)

[BlahBlahDEEBlahBlah]

Oh, I should point out this other item found during more testing over the past day or so.

 

Taking the APC as an example. The weapon is vanilla nif and skin (it just attaches under the custom nifs turret part via connect/attach point to a bone). That also disappears at the same time as the custom skin.

 

As another example, my Giddy wears collars and handkerchiefs, which also disappear along with the body when aflame.

 

That seemed to point towards a NPC setting rather than a nif/texture issue, but I can't imagine how that could be, so who knows (the idea that it's a setting issue just seems so non-intuitive, as opposed to it being an obvious nif/texture/material/missingtemp nif issue).

 

P.S. It's late, I'm tired, so I'm sure I'm mixing up my skeleton and nif terminology...please excuse the possible term inaccuracies. =/

[BlahBlahDEEBlahBlah]

Downloaded m150's collection mod (to compare because I know they work well...and because I really like their mods, heh).

 

Only things that really jumped out at me on a quick look through (other than just being better done across the board) was I'm missing the wet material and I have full precision in shaderflags2.

(I added in the wet material, but I didn't see any difference...but I was very tired, so I'll give that another go...but, just by the name, I wouldn't really expect a change)

 

Tried looking to see if there was a temporary 'in flames' effect/spell/etc that gets applied, like Steve suggested, but not seeing anything.

 

I feel like this is of those times when I'm just plain missing the obvious (it usually is because I get ahead of myself and forget things easily). =(

 

I looked back over Montky's post a few *more* times and, if I'm being honest, a lot of that goes over my head. I do get it enough to think that both your hypotheticals are perfectly reasonable...I'm just not sure how to proceed on some of it so will have to give that more thought. I will say that some of these are perfectly vanilla re-purposed textures and materials...but I also understand that they were originally for static objects and could very well be setup for differently than something originally intended for an actor/npc.

[montky]

@blahblahdeeblahblah

 

re post #7, you are too critical on yourself hehe.

different mods do different stuff, and it mightn't be a duplication, even if a

similar destination is arrived at, albeit via many different mods -

why? to avoid conflicts or other shenanigans hehe.

 

the plot thickens if its some other objects which also turn invisible while set on fire though,

that could be a clue.

 

 

 

the conjecture is tricky, because we're still reviewing the papyrus logs.

this is a glitch or issue that, once you notice it, like the mirrors thing or shadows etc,

you can't unnotice it hehe.

you're right, it is probably something exceedingly simple which is causing this bizarre 'temp-ghost effect'.

it is reassuring that pro modders are also having to scratch their heads a bit about this.

 

so, it could be the effect applied to the node/actor, it is keyed with texture or lighting info that

is not present in the modified texture maps.

(similar to how sometimes improperly textured objects may show up as all-orange, all-blue, or all purple in game)

having dealt with that for texture-swapping and for applying a .gif or .swf as a decal-surface, that might be at play here...

Method: open vanilla textures and difuse/specular etc maps, and compare with the HD texture maps...

use different lightsource instances behind and infront of the suspect textured object, and note what happens.

 

or, it could be that, the effect references the vanilla textures as a reference.

so, its hard baked into the fire effect.

Method: apply fire effect to a "test dummy texture object".

perhaps overwrite fire effect with a transparent base etc?

 

or, it could be that using ultra HD textures is taxing the memory of the game on high end HD installs or something...

Method: review the papyrus logs before, during, and after the 'temp-Ghost effect"

 

 

 

[BlahBlahDEEBlahBlah]

So...

(as per a recommendation from Montky) Removed all textures and materials from one of my APC turret nifs (just using this one to test out of all, as it's pretty basic).

Now it's (intentionally) a big purple/pink bubble gum balloon animal APC (which might tickle my funny bone if I wasn't so upset), and...

It still disappears in flames/Queen spit!

Tried it on a few other skins, too. Still same.

Triple confirmed a bit also, that along with any item the NPC has on it (not just the weapon, but also hat, scarf, armor, etc...) also temporarily disappears along with he NPC when the NPC is on fire (and temporarily disappears).

Leaves me with 2 things. A nif issue or an in game effect/decal application (like Steve40 and Montky mentioned)...but I can't track down either.

...if it looks like I'm flailing around a bit (in both testing *and* my posts structure) and being a little hard on myself, Montky, it's simply that I'm quite irritated.

This thing is driving me nuts. I should note that while this post is relatively recent, I've actually been staring at this particular issue for four or five months.

Only recently became obvious to the end-user, meaning I really shouldn't let it slide much longer without a more focused attempt to clear it up, because I introduced a flamethrower unit to my races.

 

Anywho, going back to try a few more things (tried a bit more of Montky's suggestions without much luck, but I may run through them again).

Got a couple other ideas about shaders and such I still want to try, also.

[BlahBlahDEEBlahBlah]

As I said earlier, I grabbed some of m150's creatures for comparison.

Any other good full new skins that people have done that I can dig into for comparison?

 

Maybe I'll check some of the dog skins, that's a good idea, those are full new skins (and would compare pretty 1to1 with my Giddy dog-horse skin).

 

Of the things I do, this is one particularly new *to me* process.