LE Death, the great equalizer.

[AshMuppet]

[DISCLAIMER]

Off the bat, I'm not sure this is the right forum.

In theory, I'm not asking anyone else to do this, as I rather intend to have a crack at it myself, but on the flip side, I do need aid, as I've never touched modding before.

 

Introduction.

Necromancy is the single aspect of this game, I like the most, while also being the one I'm most disappointed with.

There are many great mods out there, trying to rectify this, but I find they're either way too overpowered, or take the dark arts in directions I don't agree with. Which is fair, it's their mods after all.

 

I did however decide to have a crack at modding myself, hoping to maybe achieve the version of Necromancy I pictured.

 

The problem is, as stated, that I've never modded before. Now I don't expect to pull off anything fancy, just tweaks at first, but I was wondering if anyone knew of any source material?

I've always been better at "learning by doing" so reading lots of code and then figuring it out, never really worked for me.

ADHD make walls of text a problem, no matter how engaged I am.

 

So I came here. I was hoping some kind soul could maybe push me in the right direction.

Now, some of this is way beyond what's realistic for me, but I'm just going to throw the ideas out there, and if you feel you can show me where to check up on any one of them and get started, by all means feel free to comment.

 

1)

On a basic level, what I had in mind was altering summons to require an "upkeep". That is to say, damaging your magicka by a certain amount, thus lowering your overall mana, as you have to sacrifice some to maintain your animations. Quite a few mods do this already, but like I said, not quite like I want it.

Are there any tutorials available, that show how to alter spell properties?

Make summons last several days for the weaker ones, and leading to being permanent at the end, while not turn to dust nor unsummon once you enter a building and so forth?

 

2)

Replacing non-dead conjurations.

Since my entire focus is undeath, I never much cared for "summon familiar" or any of the Atronach's.

Does any one know whether I can replace these spells with other summons?

Like wraiths, Banshee's or spirits?

Obviously altering their abilities, so they're not too overpowered? I want any gain, to come at a cost. Necromancy is, after all, about bargaining with death.

 

The idea here, is that reanimations are lasting, but require a fresh body, a mana upkeep and possibly reagents, while spirits, being ethereal, can be drawn to undeath at any time, albietly not for very long.

 

I go with spirits and spectres as I never liked the "summon skeleton" spells. I never felt it was right that the skeletons just appeared out of thin air, nor disappeared upon death.

Again, do you know of a tutorial for anything like this?

 

3)

Crafting. I don't honestly think I'll ever get to this lvl, but in theory, I'd love to be able to "upgrade" my undead, or even require the more powerful reanimations to require reagents. Like a heart of what ever you're trying to animate, meaning you could in theory animate animals as well but you'd need to harvest the necessary organs from living ones first, before you could make a minion of one. Things like powdered bone and so on are also possibilities.

 

Ideally, one could ritualistically gather these mats from corpses, with a sacrificial dagger or the like.

 

Something similar has been done in:

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=12094

But while I like much of what he's done, I also find much of it moving away from what I fancy a Necromancer should be, so I'm wondering if I can be inspired, but go a sepperate way.

 

4)

Lastly, is it possible in anyway, to grant properties to a mundane object?

I've been toying with the idea, of bone wards, or bound skulls.

Requiring a human skull, some arcane reagents or what not, and a spell.

Thinking you could tie a spell or property, to a floating skull that accompanied you, and acted as a summon. Unlike spirits, it would be permanent, but unlike reanimations, it would be destroyed upon death.

You could tie utility spells (light, detect life or what not) to them, or possibly weak attack spells, and would require a new skull, for a new effect.

That way, you'd need to harvest skulls, infuse them, and could then summon one, if you had one ready made, on you.

I don't want them to be super powerful, rather the opposit, but I like the idea of conjuring these minions, again at a cost (probably a health loss this time) to do small things and aid with utility.

 

More than anything, I just like the idea.

I realise however, that this would require re'skinning an existing model of sorts, to be a floating skull... So this is not a priority atm, as I forsee it's way beyond my ability for some time now...

Still, if you know of a way ;)

 

5)

(Ok, lastly for real, this time).

Much of this would require me to alter perks, the conjuration tree (unless it's possible to add a new tree?) and even some spells.

Can you think of any ways, in which one could create entirely new spells?

I never liked poison or the like for Necromancers. Call me old school, but I like to stick to the process of death by natural decomposition (helped by unnatural magic).

As far as spells go, aging my opponents, withering their streangth and fatigue, and sapping their life is more my take on it.

If you've ever played Warhammer back in the day, think "Curse of years" in which the target started rapidly aging, untill either the spell was broken, or death's embrace.

All hostile magic I can think of, would be damage over time based, and if they died from the DoT's damage instead of from my minions, the spells would turn them to dust, as their bodies decompose. This again means they're useless as new minions, and for harvest.

So the power to kill, comes with the price of devoiding you new minions.

It's all about sacrifice.

 

 

Summary.

If you know of any tutorials, that would help me get started with any of the above, I'd be very greatful.

I've been wanting to get a crack at modding for a while now, but I'm sadly not very techy, so reading without example is giving me trouble.

 

 

Regards.

- Muppet

[WBGrock]

I'd ask (xilver) about creating new spells, as i believe he is the preeminent scholar in this arena. (Midas Spells in Skyrim. available on the Nexus or off Steam.)

[AshMuppet]

Hmh, thats definitely a possibility, but I imagine the big mod authors have enough on their plate already, not to mention get spammed by dead end projects and requests all the time...

I'd rather not trouble anyone with this.

Still if all else fails, but for now, I guess I'm just looking for tutorials, and the only ones I can find involve building dungeons... = \

Edited March 22, 2012 by AshMuppet