Modding Help

[ub3rman123]

I've been looking for an evil castle for some time now, and never found it, so I decided to make my own evil castle. After a total crash, a few hard drive wipes :wallbash: , loss of information, several hungry cats, and a final cheer when I managed to place a wall on top of a mountain, I think I need some help.

1. Is it possible to get objects from other mods to show up in mine? I'm trying to get the Sithis statue to show up in the throne hall,

2. How do you write a script? I'm attempting to make it so that when I press a button, a cage opens and whatever's inside falls to the pit of lava.

3. I'm trying to build a mausoleum, and when I've placed all the blocks of walls and floors, they're all just barely off, leaving a big gap between 'em.

4. Can one reskin an object? I like the shape of the Skingrad castle exterior, but not the coloration. I've heard of something called NifSkope, though...

 

I'll post some other questions when I remember them.

-Sal

[exanimis]

1.yes, by moving the textures and meshes but please get permission from the original modder first

 

2. Start with Scriptname and then read about a million six tutorials. I'm not trying to be belligerent it's just that writing scripts isn't very easy and it takes a lot of time to learn how to do it properly

 

3. Use snap to grid. start by setting all the tiles at the same hight and ease them into place beside each other

 

4.again yes you can but that also takes a lot of effort to learn

 

I am trying to learn script and quest writing along with blender and nifskope while working on two of my mods, it's not easy. All I can suggest is that you read a lot of tutorials at The Elder Scrolls CS Wiki

 

Good luck with your mod

[dezdimona]

you can change coloring by using NifScope and just retexturing the mesh,then use the cs to Id it. Most modders are more than happy to let you use there mods or parts of .If your going to release it as a mod just credit them,unless they specifically ask you to contact them

http://www.softpedia.com/progDownload/NifS...oad-106411.html

nifscope

 

http://www.softpedia.com/progDownload/DXTB...load-53836.html

I use this to create textures,both are free

[Khet]

The TESCS wiki that Exanimus linked is a great source for information. It will cover everything from scripting (basics to advanced), how to retexture models using various programs (Most commonly GIMP, an open source image editor, and Photoshop), also how to make your own models (Most commonly suing Blender, an open source modeler, or 3D Studio Max)

 

 

Everything you mentioned is possible, though most of it takes quite a bit of learning, especially scripting and texturing. As for the tiles being slightly off, enable 'snap to grid' by clicking the button that looks like a grid at the top of the CS. It's the Seventh button from the right, next to the snap to angle. Snap to angle will only let you rotate objects by 45 degrees at a time. Those two functions are GREAT for building rooms and using large objects, but they're not recommended for smaller things such as adding furniture or other smaller objects.

[ub3rman123]

Okay, thanks everyone!

Remembered another issue.. With Landscape Editing, how do you specifically lower/raise terrain? I can only find buttons for 'Smooth Vertices' and 'Flatten Vertices'.

-Sal

[Khet]

With neither Smooth/Flatten vertices checked you're in the raise/lower mode. You simply choose the size you want, move the cursor to the part of land you want to edit and the click and drag UP to RAISE the land, and drag DOWN to LOWER the land.

[ub3rman123]

Okay, I'll try that out now.

[ub3rman123]

Suppose the meshes/testures come from an official plugin, and aren't in the Meshes folder? Could I still use the Sithis Statue from Vile Lair?

-Sal

[Khet]

Technically yes but I personally would not recommend it. If you're using any object that's not part of Vanilla Oblivion then you MUST make your mod dependant on the other plugin(s). To do this you'd simply load your mod, Oblivion.esm and VileLair.esp and then place the item. However, someone without Vile Lair wouldn't be able to see the stature (and they'd get the missing texture/mesh error) and Bethesda considers it illegal to redistribute their meshes/textures without making your mod dependant on the .esp. That is why most mods are released with either Oblivion alone as the depenant or Oblivion and Shivering Isles, since SI is treated more as an expansion pack than one of their DLCs.

[ub3rman123]

Okay, I'll keep that in mind. Wouldn't want to make Vile Lair a req for it as well as SI..

Meantime, does anyone know any evil-looking statues for the Cathedral and for exterior decoration (vanilla Oblivion or modder's resource)? And not the Daedric statues, at least not with the vanilla skin.

 

Oh, and I had an idea today.. In the war room of the place, there could be a general, you could ask him to send a battalion/army of undead to a city, then your character could go watch the fireworks.. It's too complicated for me (as of typing this), but I think I could make all NPC's respawn, so you could go on repeated rampages instead of just getting a ghost town after 20 NPC's.. Anyone think this is a good idea? Or bad?

-Sal