Problems creating reflective water in FO3 GECK and other troubles

[RaffTheSweetling]

Hi Prensa.

No that didn't work, but like I said, I had reinstalled the entire GECK, so had I inadvertently changed a configuration, reinstalling it would have reset that to default.

I have now reinstalled EVERYTHING. :(

 

The game, the Patch, FOSE, FOMM, GECK. Everything. Removed every .ini file and started from scratch.

 

No change at all.

 

My brother-in-law is a software engineer, and he believes it is a problem with GECK. Yet it has never done this, and I have reinstalled it 5 times. Re-downloaded it, used the patch. And nothing changed.

 

My mouse is a brand new Logitech. It is running normally. Switched to an old crappy mouse and that had the same problem. No difference. Opened the GECK without a single mod in it. Just the FO3 .esm and nothing more. Still can't click on the objects.

 

Yes, object window and cell window are fine. Can easily single click on things to select them. But the render window refuses to let me select by single clicking the left mouse button.

 

This is a nightmare. I really want to finish this darn mod. I finally got all those bloody unwanted masters out and the mod was running super smoothely. (largely due to your support I might add) and now I have a near-ineffectual GECK to contend with.

 

Big Sigh

 

EDIT - fixed this. Restarted the PC. :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash: :wallbash:

 

Good news though, by completely resetting my FO3 files. And installing only the DLCs and AA mod and my own mod folders for Textures and Meshes. then loading it in GECK, it has shown me that there were several other asset dependencies I was unaware of. so I need to get those fixed up.

 

Sorry for the dumb drama trouble. but thanks for helping Prensa

 

Griffin

Edited September 11, 2012 by RaffTheSweetling

[prensa]

Griffin - Hello!

 

A classic case of "Have you tried turning it off and on again?" :)

 

Just glad it's sorted!

 

Prensa

[RaffTheSweetling]

Hi Prensa, and Hi moderators. It just occurred to me that if Prensa and I don't leave any replies here in a month's time that could be breaking the rules regarding reigniting cold threads.

Hope you won't mind if we keep this thread active, even though sometimes we don't reply here super fast, this thread and the forum itself has helped me greatly.

Just wanted to say that.

 

Hi Prensa. I have a new question for you if you wouldn't mind. I am noticing that usually when I place enemies in my cell, usually leveled enemies, they appear normally, navmesh being obviously vital, yet sometimes when I place enemies like radroaches I can see them in GECK, they are visually present in GECK (Can even see their mesh/texture) but in the game they don't appear at all. Do you know what could cause this? Navmesh is there, finalized and everything. Nothing should stop them from appearing. Why don't they appear?

 

Second question. I was looking at "A Quest For Heaven" and trying to figure out how the creator added the songs she made for each cell. I can see them in the Songs folder, and see them in the Cell Data - Music Type list. Yet I have no idea how she made the GECK recognize the songs and add them into that list so that she could select them in Cell Data - Music Type for her cell. Do you know? Not talking about radio stations, or anything, just background music.

 

Last question. Again about radroaches, or any creatures, So If I had an alternate texture and wanted to make a unique creature with that texture, I need to edit the Model List for that creature and select the new body texture from that list, by putting the X in the box for my choice. But I have no idea how to make a new entry on that list. Do you know what I mean there?

 

hope you are doing well, Prensa.

And hope you guys (moderators) don't mind we keep this thread alive even when it is cold sometimes. :)

 

Griffin

[prensa]

Griffin - Hello!

 

"And hope you guys (moderators) don't mind we keep this thread alive even when it is cold sometimes."

 

Oh of course, commenting on old posts. Well it's general modding questions & open to all to view so hopefully others are getting some help out of this thread too, it's certainly got a lot of views. :)

 

"Hi Prensa. I have a new question for you if you wouldn't mind."

 

No problem, if I know the answers I'll help. I've got 2 out of your three questions & a possible for one anyway. :)

 

"yet sometimes when I place enemies like radroaches I can see them in GECK, they are visually present in GECK (Can even see their mesh/texture) but in the game they don't appear at all. Do you know what could cause this? Navmesh is there, finalized and everything. Nothing should stop them from appearing. Why don't they appear?"

 

This is puzzling, my first guess would be navmesh issues. But you say you've finalized.

 

Is the navmesh you are working on in parts? For instance, is there several unconnected parts? Or a downstairs? If so, look for your placed creature all over your cell.

 

If the creature is being "teleported" to a different location, it's probably because your mod is an .esp.

 

I think I detailed before about the .esp's not liking navmesh. Often you can find a navmesh is fine then leave the room & re-enter to find creatures/NPC's gone or bunched up in one spot seemingly as if navmesh has been scrambled.

 

Converting the mod to an .esm fixes this issue.

 

To put your mind at rest that this is the issue, you can make a copy of your mod & change it into a .esm with FO3 Plugin Utility:

 

http://fallout3.nexusmods.com/mods/5104

 

Just load it up in that & resave with .esm at the end will convert it properly to an .esm.

 

This fixes the .esp navmesh trouble.

 

Untick your mods .esp & tick the .esm version & test in game to see if your issues are gone.

 

Remember to go back to your original .esp file afterwards as GECK can only edit .esp's.

 

Dispose of the .esm version to prevent confusion.

 

Best to stay an .esp until your are all done with editing in GECK, just convert to .esm to test any issues like that with navmesh.

 

Other than navmesh, I can't think of anything that would stop a placed creature showing up.

 

"Yet I have no idea how she made the GECK recognize the songs and add them into that list so that she could select them in Cell Data - Music Type for her cell. Do you know? Not talking about radio stations, or anything, just background music. "

 

Adding music to cells is easy & can add a real unique flavour, I'm surprised more don't do it.

 

DCInteriors has a really fun use of unique music in an old chinese restaurant.

 

I guess the tricky part is getting public domain material, though Fallout's retro style means older music is suitable & that's easier to find in the public domain.

 

You place your song into the data folder:

 

Fallout 3\Data\Music

 

It can be in a subfolder within that if you want to keep it in a folder named for your mod to keep things tidy.

 

Music types in here seem to always be .mp3 so that's what I use for this.

 

Now in Geck, in the object window go to "Music Types" under "Miscellaneous".

 

You'll see all the vanilla music types here like default explore etc..

 

Just right click & select "new" as you would when adding any new item.

 

Give your Music Type a name & direct it to your music file in the Fallout 3 data folder.

 

Click OK.

 

Now go to your Cell in the Cell View window & right click on it to bring up it's data.

 

In the common data tab you will see Music Type. Clicking on that will give you a pull down with all the available Music types, find & select yours.

 

That's it! In game you should here your chosen music play in that cell.

 

"So If I had an alternate texture and wanted to make a unique creature with that texture, I need to edit the Model List for that creature and select the new body texture from that list, by putting the X in the box for my choice. But I have no idea how to make a new entry on that list. Do you know what I mean there?"

 

Yes, you've got it right. :)

 

The missing step to get your model in that check box list under "ModelList" is to add your retextured .nif model to the (in the case of a radroach) folder:

 

Fallout 3\Data\Meshes\Creatures\radroach

 

They have to go in that default path to show up in GECK properly.

 

You can customise your creature by extracting the radroach model with the BSA unpacker in FOMM mentioned before.

 

Using Nifskope you can change the textures to your newly made ones, save the .nif with a new name & add it to the above mentioned folder.

 

For retexturing you should extract the vanilla Radroach textures so that you can work off of something.

 

You can change colours or add detail over the top of the old texture.

 

For texture editing I use Paint.net:

 

http://www.dotpdn.com/files/Paint.NET.3.5.10.Install.zip

 

It's very easy to use, has a lot of plugin tools available & it's free!

 

Photoshop & Gimp are also options, though Photoshop's not free of course. :)

 

"hope you are doing well, Prensa."

 

Not too bad! :) Hope you & family are well too!

 

Prensa

[RaffTheSweetling]

Hi there, Prensa :)

 

Thanks for the awesome and speedy reply. I will check out the last 2 suggestions more closely and probably have follow up questions, but for now (and you really are awesome to reply so fast after I am so terrible and often don't reply at all :unsure: )...

 

The FO3plugin tool you recommended does not seem to work for me. I downloaded it, extracted it, and there was no .exe. just a lot of documents and weird files. Nothing that would load from/up a program / application to use as you said. Could you check it for me and see if you can find anything out of the ordinary?

 

About the radroach query, I don't want to fully retex the existing creature, I want to make an alternate radroach, (similar to what Martigen has done - I can even see his MMM body models in the list in GECK) just as an experiment, using a great retex I fond on the Nexus (glowing Radroach). Can I use your method to do that? (I need to read it super carefully, but I replied first because you don't mention creating a new unique creature.)

 

About the creatures not appearing -I don't have any problem with my Navmesh, it is a small cell, and the navmesh is very simple and clean. The creatures don't show up at all. Nowhere. I did rescale them (radroaches) to make them smaller. And renamed the reference of the creature to avoid changing the vanilla form. Also I tried bringing a Trog from The Pitt and whacking it in the same cell. This time i literally did a copy-paste of the Creature+idlemarker+pile of gore the said creature is munching on, and nothing. Like the raddies, Trog didn't appear either, and the .esp is using the DLC as a required master so it was loaded, it was fine, but didn't appear, again nothing. So bizarre.

 

Last question - have you much experience with game freeze? I am experiencing this right now on my new PC, it happens sometimes fast, sometimes slow, sometimes not at all. When I toggle collision and float around, it doesn't seem to happen at all. And the horrible thing is it happens mostly in my mod. Yet when tested on another computer it didn't happen at all using the same mod and same FOMM mod list. Any advice? I reinstalled FOSE, that didn't change it. I am thinking doing a reinstall of FO3 but that would suck obviously.

 

cheers Prensa.

 

My baby turned 3 months today :)

 

Griffin

[prensa]

Griffin - Hello!

 

"The FO3plugin tool you recommended does not seem to work for me."

 

There should be 3 files in there, FO3Plugin ReadMe.txt, FO3Plugin.link & FO3Plugin.jar.

 

The FO3Plugin.jar is an executable jar file & should work like a .exe when double clicked on.

 

Perhaps you do not have Java installed? It's a pretty common background structure for many programs, FO3Plugin does require it.

 

You can check by opening a command prompt window (type cmd into the address box in one of your folder windows). In the Command promt window type:

 

java -version

 

If nothing is displayed you must not have Java.

 

You can get or check on Java here:

 

http://www.java.com/en/

 

If you don't want Java or have it buut still can't get that to work, you can also use TESsnip to convert your mod to a .esm.

 

Got to FOMM - Tools - TESsnip

 

In TESsnip go to File - Open & load up your mod.

 

Now select your mod once it's loade & go to Spells - Make .esm & save the file.

 

You'll now have an .esm version.

 

I've not used TESsnip's version before for this but it seems to work just fine in a very brief test.

 

Remember as I stated above to keep your .esp version of the mod as it will be needed for further GECK editing. Just use the .esm for testing & then bin it.

 

"Like the raddies, Trog didn't appear either, and the .esp is using the DLC as a required master so it was loaded, it was fine, but didn't appear, again nothing. So bizarre. "

 

Very strange, do static items & clutter appear in the cell if you place them in?

 

You are editing the same version of your mod that is ticked in your load order?

 

You've not got a strange encounter Zone set for the cell? Check in the Cell view window in the Interior Data tab - Encounter Zone. If it is set to an encounter zone, try setting it to None.

 

"About the radroach query, I don't want to fully retex the existing creature, I want to make an alternate radroach, (similar to what Martigen has done - I can even see his MMM body models in the list in GECK) just as an experiment, using a great retex I fond on the Nexus (glowing Radroach). Can I use your method to do that?"

 

Yes, just click on the CrRadroach under Actors - Creature & give it a new name like "Big Ugly Bug" or whatever.

 

You then just assign it the new model that you placed in:

 

Fallout 3\Data\Meshes\Creatures\radroach

 

Remember to untick the old radroach model from that list so that only yours is ticked for your creature.

 

You can click on the Preview box to see what it will look like.

 

I don't know if you just got the textures (.dds) or if the mod came with models (.nif) already with the new textures assigned.

 

If you've got a .nif then just place it in the above mentioned folder & set it up in GECK.

 

If you've only got textures you need the vanilla radroach model, open it in Nifskope & point it to the textures (textures can be placed in your mods texture folder).

 

"Last question - have you much experience with game freeze?"

 

Are you talking about a complete game ending freeze from which you have to shut down?

 

If so, are you using a multi core computer?

 

If so it sounds like the Fallout 3 multi core bug.

 

Such freezes seem to happen mainly in small interiors, but not exclusively.

 

Fallout 3 has trouble with multi core computers, mainly with ones that have more than two cores & use hyperthreading.

 

There is a fix, you need to edit your Fallout 3 .ini file.

 

The one you want to change is:

 

For XP:

 

My Documents\My Games\Fallout3\

 

For Vista & Win7:

 

Documents\My Games\Fallout3

 

The file you want will be called:

 

FALLOUT.ini

 

Open the .ini with Notepad & change this line:

 

bUseThreadedAI=0

 

to:

 

bUseThreadedAI=1

 

& insert this line under it:

 

iNumHWThreads=2

 

Save & close your ini.

 

You may have already done this but a reinstall could replace your .ini & thus have overwritten the changes.

 

If you mean freezing that is intermittent, you're able to continue play afterwards, that is often associated with a either game settings too high or sound problems.

 

"My baby turned 3 months today"

 

Time flies dosen't it! :)

 

Hello Josie!

 

Prensa

Edited September 30, 2012 by prensa

[RaffTheSweetling]

Hi Prensa

 

If you really knew, just how depressed I had been, over my mod, which half a year of work has had poured into, to find it now experiencing inexplicable freezes, on my new powerful gaming computer, yes, only in small cells on FO3. How sad, frustrated, desperate and mad it made me to not know why these freezes were happening, yes, they were the game stopping freeze type which needs one to open task manager and stop the program to exit,

Prensa, if you knew this, then you would have an some inkling of just how unbelievably grateful I am towards you right now for telling me about that "Multi-core computer bug in FO3". It worked. (pardon my melodramaticisms, I am that grateful)

Words cannot describe. Thank you so very much.

I thought it was my mod. Thought it was my game. Thought it was my computer. Thought my luck was never going to change. A few lines of .ini settings and voila - PROBLEM GONE. :thumbsup:

 

You are the best.

 

I have not tried the other things yet. But I did notice about the creatures not appearing in the cell has made a little progress. The Trog I copy/pasted into the cell was set to initially disabled. Once changed it did appear. The radroaches not however. Perhaps because they are under a different name and not generic Raddies.

If I change the scale of an enemy after placing it in the cell, does this change the scale for all enemies of that type listed under that reference name? Or can I rescale an enemy in the same way an object can be rescaled without it affecting any other object of that name?

 

Thanks again Prensa. I don't even know how you knew about that bug, but it was right. I have four cores. My brother in law's PC has 2. This bug did exactly what you said and when and why, And your remedy for it worked. Thank you. :dance:

 

Griffin

[prensa]

Griffin - Hello!

 

"Thanks again Prensa."

 

Glad to have helped! :)

 

"I don't even know how you knew about that bug, but it was right."

 

I can't take credit for inventing the .ini fix, no idea who originally came up with that.

 

The Fallout 3 multi core bug has been known for a while though it's the sort of thing that's hard to pinpoint if you've never heard of it.

 

To anyone that helps out on here, the mention of freezing immediately rings that alarm.

 

I have that fix for it in a notepad ready to copy & paste as it crops up often enough. :)

 

"I have four cores. My brother in law's PC has 2. This bug did exactly what you said and when and why, And your remedy for it worked."

 

I had something similar when I first encountered this, my old dual core computer was unaffected but my new quad core would get that freeze. It seems counter intuitive as less powerful & older computers are less likely to be affected (as they are less likely to be multi core & use hyperthreading).

 

The belief is that it's actually the Hyperthreading that goes with many modern multi cores that is the trouble. Multi cores withoug that don't seem to be affected but it's not entirely certain.

 

Still, that .ini fix sorts it right out.

 

"The Trog I copy/pasted into the cell was set to initially disabled. Once changed it did appear."

 

That would definitely stop them from appearing. :)

 

Initially Disabled is used when a creature/object is not meant to be there from the start.

 

A script/trigger is often used to unable such things.

 

It will be a left over from your copying it from another location.

 

"The radroaches not however. Perhaps because they are under a different name and not generic Raddies"

 

That's possible, there are many "specific location" creatures in the GECK. That is, creatures that are designed to do something in a specific location & only work there.

 

Many situations in game call for creatures to appear to be behaving in a certain way so they are specially tweaked for this behyaviour, you may have inadvertantly used one of these specials.

 

You can check the creatures AI packages or if they have a script attached to them to see if they are tweaked for certain behaviour.

 

For example, CG02Radroach has an attached script to progress a side quest & AI Packages telling them to guard a certain reference. Custom AI packages could make a creature move to the set location, hence you don't see them where you placed them. Totally unsuitable for general placing.

 

Try CrRadroach, that's the basic radroach that all others are based of of.

 

In many cases the basic version of a creature has Cr at the begining.

 

"If I change the scale of an enemy after placing it in the cell, does this change the scale for all enemies of that type listed under that reference name?"

 

As long as you're changing the creature/NPC's scale after placing them, then you are only changing that specific one. Just like placing a static & enlarging/shrinkng it would not change all of the other uses of it.

 

The creature/NPC, if set to respawn, will even come back at that same scale in your location.

 

All other uses will remain unchanged.

 

Now if you DID want a creature/NPC to always be a specific size without having to adjust each time on placing, then you'd change their scale in their properties window, in the "Stats" tab under Base Scale with 1 being normal size. Obviously only alter this for your mod's custom renamed versions because you don't want to change vanilla creatures/NPC's.

 

Prensa

Edited October 6, 2012 by prensa

[RaffTheSweetling]

Hi Prensa, I have a new question for you, if you don't mind me changing the topic before I can confirm that I got the other problems fixed.

 

This one is about traps - I followed the tutorial I think to the letter, and did what also (I supposed) I thought was the correct thing to do regarding enemiy traps and enemy factions with 'owned traps'.

 

Created my own unique faction, made sure all enemies were members of that faction, then added traps, checked that the trap, each one, was owned by that faction. Yet, my raiders (these guys being the traps' owners) always seem to set their traps off. Bear traps, trip wire and pressure plates especially are the worst. I have tried to figure this out, but it doesn't seem to be clear what is causing them to walk right into (and die?!) beartraps and shotgun traps so constantly.

 

Any advice?

 

Also, I added the music exactly as you described and I still hear default music in the test cell. I am not sure why. EDIT again - Cancel that - I was using COC to test and this was why the music didn't activate. Leaving and reentering the cell triggers the music. Silly me.

 

Thanks Prensa. :)

 

Griffin

Edited October 10, 2012 by RaffTheSweetling

[prensa]

Griffin - Hello!

 

" Cancel that - I was using COC to test and this was why the music didn't activate. Leaving and reentering the cell triggers the music. Silly me."

 

Glad you got it working. :)

 

Custom music can really add a unique feel.

 

"Created my own unique faction, made sure all enemies were members of that faction, then added traps, checked that the trap, each one, was owned by that faction. Yet, my raiders (these guys being the traps' owners) always seem to set their traps off. Bear traps, trip wire and pressure plates especially are the worst."

 

Yes, I've seen this too. I'm not absolutely certain but as far as I can tell only landmines seem to pay attention to the ownership setting.

 

Other traps do not seem to be "smart".

 

I'm guessing it would be possible to attach a script to check who triggered the trap & do a sort of forced ownership but I've not tried that out in practice.

 

Prensa