Noob needs help creatig a custom weapon

[Saress]

First of all i want to say that i have read this:For those of you with modding ambitions:, READ THIS BEFORE POSTING. And i think that my request meets the requirements.

 

I was looking at all the grate mods in the texnexus and at some point decided to make something on my own. And after a while of thinking i decided that making a weapon would be the easiest thing to do. First thing first was reading tons of information about modeling and stuff like that and i decided to stop on Zbrush. So i made the model in Zbrush and started researching on what to do next. Found out about nifskope that i need either blender or 3dsmax ,well stuff like that. After reading even more information i finally think that i made everything needed to add it into the game and that's where most of the problems appeared. The first thing is that the materials i use on the sword in 3dsmax don't seem to transfer to .nif files. If there's anything else except making a texture to make it look the same as it looks in 3dsmax i would like to know that. Another problem is that parts of the mesh that don't have any textures at all on them( i thought that it looks good with only the materials from 3dsmax) cant be seen when inventory is opened in the game. The last for now is that there's five textures in nifskope that can be applied so i want to know witch of those is for the normal map? I'll add screens as follows: Reender inZbrush, Reender in 3dsmax(one of Luchaires screenshots is used as background), screenshot of when inventory opened, and screenshot of the sword in the game (please never mind the quality of the screenshots, my pc is horrible so i have to run with lowest settings possible).

In the end i want to apologize for my poor English.

[Triforce1]

Sounds like a common beginner's problem. For starters, the 3ds Max materials will not go with your sword. To fix this problem, create a UV Map for it, and make a texture in any image program. I like the GIMP, because it is free and works very nicely with Oblivion. Oblivion uses .dds images for texturing, so you'll need this plugin to be able to save the file as one. Once you have made this texture, save it into the Oblivion directory (ex. Bethesda Softworks\Oblivion\Data\Textures\[your name]\...). For normal maps, I will assume you decide to use the GIMP. Download the Normal Map plugin. With your texture open, go to (off the top of my head) Filters-Map-Normalmap. Then, there are some things to mess with; tool around until you understand. Generally, you might only need to mess with (again, off the top of my head) Value, which makes the depth variations greater or smaller. Then, say okay, and save this in the same location as your original texture, named the same thing. However, make sure that it has an _n after the file name (ex. sword.dds for the texture, sword_n.dds for the normalmap). This denotes a normal map, and Oblivion will find it for you. Now, back in Max, make sure that your sword is all one object. Then, apply your texture to it. Export it as a .nif, yadda yadda, you seem to have that all done. Now, open the .nif. You should only have one texture slot (purple flower). The texture should be there. (**Note: That last part SHOULD work. However, it has never worked for me. Simply apply any image (we want a file location) that will go onto the model in Max. Then, when you export, simply change the texture location in the .nif to your texture. That is what I always have to do). Just make sure not to forget collision. Then, save over your old .nif, wherever it was that you had it. That's that.

 

Oh, and another thing. It seems that you are having issues with the rotation of your sword model. In Max, make sure your sword model runs straight up the x-axis, with the hilt through the origin. Then, once exported and all that, NifSkope should place the sword exactly the way Oblivion wants it. If still not right, choose the NiTriStrips of the actual sword model and right click. Go to Transform, Edit. Then, rememberin what went wrong in Oblivion and frequently saving and checking back, move the sword around. Trial and error, really.

 

I hope this helps. Certainly took long enough to type. :biggrin:

[jaysus]

under the stickies is a link to the tescswiki which has some tutorials that will suit you...

some things i can answer right away are:

 

max mats are not exported to nifs except for diffuse maps (or was it bump...damn vacations lol)

 

you still need the textures the mat uses in a folder in your oblvion directory and all 3dworldspace objects (anything but menu

icons) need a normal map with the samename_n.dds as a name (the n is the important part)

 

the normal map itsel does not need to be asigned anywhere to the model - oblivion does it itself but it needs to be in the same folder as the original tex and have the same name plus the "_n" at the end (and needs to be dds with mipmaps obviously)

 

to get a an inventory icon you need to make one or assign your sword a vanilla one in the cs

 

as to material and shader properties:

 

these are adjusted in nifskope under the texture-properties block - but usually only the standard shader blinn or somin is used or the highlight shader for reflective materials...

but i suggest to read the tuts to get all the special effects possible right

good luck...

 

also if you did your model in zbrush you should check you poly count ;) and maybe go over it manually or somin and kill some... 4000+ polies seem to be fine for most users by now even tho id still say 1000 to 3000 should be sufficent

[Saress]

Thanx to both of you ,but I'll have to wait a while to start continuing my "work"(haha) on this sword cause the next week is the first week of the new year of studying and i am a total blockhead :wallbash:

[Saress]

AHH screw my last post i just cant stop thinking about how to do it right so i spent all night (again) on watching/reading tutorials about lots of different things i need to learn. Haha just wrote some pretty big text on how i dont know how to merge meshes into one when it hit me and i actually managed to do it just now haha are you guys helping me telepathycly or something? Haha every single minute i get more and more hipped up about how i even if slowly make progress and someday Ill make the sword (and be heck of proud about that :D even knowing that what i do is nothing compered to most of other people around here) :)