[WIP] True Lichdom - Nexus Thread # 1

[jonniezombietronic]

This sounds like an excellent idea. I'll be watching for progress.

[Sindrie]

is this going to effect undead in any way? after all liches (spelling? lol) are the masters of the undead. This could be awesome, perfect for a necromancer.

[delfofthebla]

is this going to effect undead in any way? after all liches (spelling? lol) are the masters of the undead. This could be awesome, perfect for a necromancer.

I considered having Liches be allies with all undead. However, undead take up a majority of the enemies in Skyrim, so I felt like that wasn't a good decision to make. As of right now, there are no changes between Liches and Undead.

[dbfuru]

From the sounds of it this mod will be great! I really enjoyed The Illuminated Order mod for Morrowind, and also VenomByte's Lichcraft mod. I like the sound of all of the different lich types, though I think I prefer the phylactery lich over the others!

 

All the best with the mod, keep up the great work!

[delfofthebla]

From the sounds of it this mod will be great! I really enjoyed The Illuminated Order mod for Morrowind, and also VenomByte's Lichcraft mod. I like the sound of all of the different lich types, though I think I prefer the phylactery lich over the others!

 

All the best with the mod, keep up the great work!

 

Yes that seems to be the favorite from what I've noticed over in the Bethesda forums. Though the other two Liches are getting some feature reworks/additions to bring them up to the level of quality that the Phylactery Lich has. I'll be updating the main post with info once I've ironed out a few more details, so you may yet be interested in the others as well!

[dbfuru]

 

Yes that seems to be the favorite from what I've noticed over in the Bethesda forums. Though the other two Liches are getting some feature reworks/additions to bring them up to the level of quality that the Phylactery Lich has. I'll be updating the main post with info once I've ironed out a few more details, so you may yet be interested in the others as well!

 

It's not to say that they aren't good liche types, it's just personally I like the idea of having to constantly acquire a new host, I've always been into that sort of game play I suppose.

 

I would probably try them all, the Vampiric Lich also sounds like it could be fun. I think the true lich would be a bit too plain for me though!

[delfofthebla]

Yes that seems to be the favorite from what I've noticed over in the Bethesda forums. Though the other two Liches are getting some feature reworks/additions to bring them up to the level of quality that the Phylactery Lich has. I'll be updating the main post with info once I've ironed out a few more details, so you may yet be interested in the others as well!

 

It's not to say that they aren't good liche types, it's just personally I like the idea of having to constantly acquire a new host, I've always been into that sort of game play I suppose.

 

I would probably try them all, the Vampiric Lich also sounds like it could be fun. I think the true lich would be a bit too plain for me though!

Understandable, and quite frankly, I'm the same way. It seems most people that are drawn to the Lich concept have a particular fondness for the Body swapping/soul attached to an object aspects.

 

The Vampiric Lich is getting a bit of a boost in his overall featureset, but he still will have the same "feel" as he does now. The Traditional Lich however, will have some special things in store for him to make the experience more entertaining. He is undoubtedly the least gameplay changing out of the three though.

[dbfuru]

The Vampiric Lich is getting a bit of a boost in his overall featureset, but he still will have the same "feel" as he does now. The Traditional Lich however, will have some special things in store for him to make the experience more entertaining. He is undoubtedly the least gameplay changing out of the three though.

 

I think the Traditional Lich still has a place, I'm sure there are those who do not want those extra abilities.

 

I'm looking forward to your mod, it looks like it is shaping up to be a "killer" mod, of which there aren't that many for Skyrim yet (In my opinion of course).

[jonniezombietronic]

Speaking of the Lich model, I'd appreciate it if I could get some feedback regarding the current situation. I’m going to get a little technical in this post, so forgive me if something doesn’t make sense to you.

 

Originally, the plan was to have only 1 Lich model, and that model would be used for all the Liches. This model would appear as a unique skeletal body, with glowing eyes and a few extra special effects displayed on him. The model would also be able to wear all of the normal armors that are currently in game. I did not plan to alter these armors in any way though, so in the end, they would look somewhat awkward on the Lich model, due to the fact that the normal races actually have flesh (and are thus bulkier), whereas a skeleton does not.

 

While the above decision would be a bit immersion breaking in some ways, I really didn’t feel as though it would be worth it to put forth the time and effort to individually tweaking each of the armors just so that they would display correctly. Doing so would be very time consuming work that may very well be impossible to do correctly anyways.

 

If I did not do that, I would instead have a Lich model that already has an armor or robe “equipped” on the mesh. This would allow us to create a super cool looking Lich, but it would be slightly immersion breaking as well, since no matter what gear you equipped on yourself, you would always look the same.

 

I could have gone either way (and I still can), but I’ve been working on the mod with the mindset that I’d be going with the former. Even though the armors would look somewhat odd, I still wanted the player to be able to have them properly displayed on their character. I feel as though armorsets are a big part of the RPG experience, and so I did not want to take this away from the Player.

 

However, there is an issue that I've unfortunately come across using that method.

 

Here is a screenshot of the model using a full body robe (Please don't get too excited, this is a TEMP MODEL that I am using for TESTING purposes): http://4.imgland.net/tR07w.png

There's a small issue with the neck/torso not showing up under the robe (which I think is easily fixable to be honest), but I personally think that even though the robe should probably sag against his bones, it looks acceptable like this. If I could get all armors to work in a similar manner, I would probably release the model like that. Unfortunately however, that is not the case. Here is a screenshot using a non “fullbody” armor piece: http://4.imgland.net/qS761.png

Not..quite as good.

 

As some of you may know, armors in Skyrim work a bit differently than they did in the previous Elder Scrolls games. Armors actually replace the original body, rather than display the mesh on top of them. Because of this, the actual basic race model is actually a part of each armor mesh file. And as you can see, that very body mesh is being displayed, instead of the Lich model.

 

That can actually be fixed if I actually put forth the time to do so. (I’d basically have to edit each armor mesh individually, and replace the human parts with the skeletal ones from the final Lich model.) It’d be a pain in the ass, but it's very possible to do.

 

As of right now, the above issue applies to the traditional Lich, as well as the Demilich. The Phylactery Bound Lich is another story, but for now, just assume this doesn’t affect him.

 

Before I make any decisions, I’d like to consult you guys on what you think is the best option. As far as I see it, I’m left with two choices:

Manually edit each armorset in the game, creating a new mesh that has the Lich body instead of the normal race body.

-This would cause compatibility issues with any mods that modify the original armors in the game, and likely take a decent amount of time to do.

-Any armor I do not edit manually, will not display the Lich body in them. That means any custom armors that are not a part of the vanilla game will not display correctly on the Lich.

Create the Lich model with a unique mesh that includes some sort of armor or robe already attached to him.

-This would prevent you from being able to see any equipped armors on your body. You will always look the same, regardless of what you have equipped.

-There are no compatibility issues with this method.

Which would everyone prefer? (And if you have any other thoughts/comments feel free to bring those up as well.)

From the bethsoft forum.

 

I wanted add my 2 cents and didn't want to have to set up a new account.

Is it possible to make the Lich model have some flesh rather than just a skeleton? Make it a bit zombie like?

If not I think the bandages look is OK.

[delfofthebla]

Speaking of the Lich model, I'd appreciate it if I could get some feedback regarding the current situation. I'm going to get a little technical in this post, so forgive me if something doesn't make sense to you.

 

Originally, the plan was to have only 1 Lich model, and that model would be used for all the Liches. This model would appear as a unique skeletal body, with glowing eyes and a few extra special effects displayed on him. The model would also be able to wear all of the normal armors that are currently in game. I did not plan to alter these armors in any way though, so in the end, they would look somewhat awkward on the Lich model, due to the fact that the normal races actually have flesh (and are thus bulkier), whereas a skeleton does not.

 

While the above decision would be a bit immersion breaking in some ways, I really didn't feel as though it would be worth it to put forth the time and effort to individually tweaking each of the armors just so that they would display correctly. Doing so would be very time consuming work that may very well be impossible to do correctly anyways.

 

If I did not do that, I would instead have a Lich model that already has an armor or robe "equipped" on the mesh. This would allow us to create a super cool looking Lich, but it would be slightly immersion breaking as well, since no matter what gear you equipped on yourself, you would always look the same.

 

I could have gone either way (and I still can), but I've been working on the mod with the mindset that I'd be going with the former. Even though the armors would look somewhat odd, I still wanted the player to be able to have them properly displayed on their character. I feel as though armorsets are a big part of the RPG experience, and so I did not want to take this away from the Player.

 

However, there is an issue that I've unfortunately come across using that method.

 

Here is a screenshot of the model using a full body robe (Please don't get too excited, this is a TEMP MODEL that I am using for TESTING purposes): http://4.imgland.net/tR07w.png

There's a small issue with the neck/torso not showing up under the robe (which I think is easily fixable to be honest), but I personally think that even though the robe should probably sag against his bones, it looks acceptable like this. If I could get all armors to work in a similar manner, I would probably release the model like that. Unfortunately however, that is not the case. Here is a screenshot using a non "fullbody" armor piece: http://4.imgland.net/qS761.png

Not..quite as good.

 

As some of you may know, armors in Skyrim work a bit differently than they did in the previous Elder Scrolls games. Armors actually replace the original body, rather than display the mesh on top of them. Because of this, the actual basic race model is actually a part of each armor mesh file. And as you can see, that very body mesh is being displayed, instead of the Lich model.

 

That can actually be fixed if I actually put forth the time to do so. (I'd basically have to edit each armor mesh individually, and replace the human parts with the skeletal ones from the final Lich model.) It'd be a pain in the ass, but it's very possible to do.

 

As of right now, the above issue applies to the traditional Lich, as well as the Demilich. The Phylactery Bound Lich is another story, but for now, just assume this doesn't affect him.

 

Before I make any decisions, I'd like to consult you guys on what you think is the best option. As far as I see it, I'm left with two choices:

Manually edit each armorset in the game, creating a new mesh that has the Lich body instead of the normal race body.

-This would cause compatibility issues with any mods that modify the original armors in the game, and likely take a decent amount of time to do.

-Any armor I do not edit manually, will not display the Lich body in them. That means any custom armors that are not a part of the vanilla game will not display correctly on the Lich.

Create the Lich model with a unique mesh that includes some sort of armor or robe already attached to him.

-This would prevent you from being able to see any equipped armors on your body. You will always look the same, regardless of what you have equipped.

-There are no compatibility issues with this method.

Which would everyone prefer? (And if you have any other thoughts/comments feel free to bring those up as well.)

From the bethsoft forum.

 

I wanted add my 2 cents and didn't want to have to set up a new account.

Is it possible to make the Lich model have some flesh rather than just a skeleton? Make it a bit zombie like?

If not I think the bandages look is OK.

 

I probably should have posted that over here as well, sorry about that.

 

Of course, it would not be impossible, but the direction we have been working towards so far has been a skeletal model, and I personally would prefer it to be that way.