Help a n00b with body mods and such

[Ellaliaeya]

Hello my darling moddy bears,

 

I've been modding with some success only to fail miserably when I get too greedy or exploratory with my mods. My biggest issue has allways been with body and head meshes and textures.

 

I'm confused by the UNP, CBBE definitions in addition to skeletons and what have you.

 

Which is the body replacer?

 

And which is the skin tone replacer?

 

And WHY do some head/face skin tones clash with the body ones?

 

I tend to get my terminologies and understanding of all of these confused and I know I'm installing incorrectly. I'm getting purple hair and facial skin tones clashing with body skin tones with glaring neck seams to boot! Only on NPCs though.

 

Any recommendations on a good all-in-one skin tone so I can avoid the head vs. body clash? And what's the best order to install these specific types of things?

[Jeir]

Mesh = the 3D object.

Texture = the picture on the mesh.

UV map = how the texture lines up on the mesh.

Skeleton = the thing that gets animated. Modded ones have extra 'bones' to allow for new kinds of animation (e.g. body physics).

 

CBBE and UNP are the two main female body replacers. They replace the meshes/textures of the adult female body (player and NPC). They are incompatible with each other due to different UV maps.

XPMSE is the main skeleton replacer mod. Primarily used for body physics and changing where weapons are placed on the body.

Purple 'textures' means that the textures are missing.

 

As far as I'm aware, there's no such thing as a 'skin tone replacer'. Some character creation mods (RaceMenu, ECE) allow for new skin tones, but I don't believe any replace them, and in any case the entire body and face would be affected. You're probably confusing this for face textures, or for the dark/light head bug. I take it you installed some kind of NPC makeover mod? If so, reinstall it, and make sure you've read its installing instructions properly. It may have requirements (such as a hair mod, for the missing hair textures), or may have the 'facegen' files in a separate download. The Facegen files are essentially the files that control the makeup/warpaint etc. of a character, and are required if an NPC's appearance is edited in any way.

[Ellaliaeya]

Mesh = the 3D object.

Texture = the picture on the mesh.

UV map = how the texture lines up on the mesh.

Skeleton = the thing that gets animated. Modded ones have extra 'bones' to allow for new kinds of animation (e.g. body physics).

 

CBBE and UNP are the two main female body replacers. They replace the meshes/textures of the adult female body (player and NPC). They are incompatible with each other due to different UV maps.

XPMSE is the main skeleton replacer mod. Primarily used for body physics and changing where weapons are placed on the body.

Purple 'textures' means that the textures are missing.

 

As far as I'm aware, there's no such thing as a 'skin tone replacer'. Some character creation mods (RaceMenu, ECE) allow for new skin tones, but I don't believe any replace them, and in any case the entire body and face would be affected. You're probably confusing this for face textures, or for the dark/light head bug. I take it you installed some kind of NPC makeover mod? If so, reinstall it, and make sure you've read its installing instructions properly. It may have requirements (such as a hair mod, for the missing hair textures), or may have the 'facegen' files in a separate download. The Facegen files are essentially the files that control the makeup/warpaint etc. of a character, and are required if an NPC's appearance is edited in any way.

 

Yes, I meant textures - sorry! Okay this cleared everything up for me. Thank you so much!