Custom NPCs

[Hektus]

TL:DR Is it possible to assign a custom skeleton for an NPC in the CK?

 

I've been trying to familiarize myself with the creation of NPC's because of the dreaded "Dark face bug" that just won't go away. I figure if I understand the creation of custom NPCs well enough I'll be able to keep the bug out of my games, permanently. As soon as I realized that you could specify unique body meshes and textures to NPCs, I got pretty excited.... but I don't see anywhere in the CK that you could specify a unique skeleton, and it seems it would follow that if you can assign new bodies, why not a new skeleton? Is it possible?

 

Also, does the CK totally ignore the textures referenced inside the main player *body_*.nif files? I've always assumed that they mattered but after seeing some things about how custom NPCs are created I'm not so sure (I know that those fields are used in armor nifs, though, although it's possible to leave them blank and use the CK).

 

Thanks!

[Hektus]

Anyone? Still haven't figured this out.

[Dart98Rock]

In the Creation Kit: Character>Race>(what race you want to mess with). On the race screen (example Breton Race), go to BodyData. There you can change there mesh, texture and skeleton.

 

My bad, I looked back at the bodydata, and I don't see an option for the mesh.

Edited December 6, 2012 by Dart98Rock

[Hektus]

Yeah, I've seen that you can assign a unique skeleton when creating a new race. I was hoping you could do it when just creating a new NPC of an existing race, though.

[IsharaMeradin]

TL:DR Is it possible to assign a custom skeleton for an NPC in the CK?

 

I've been trying to familiarize myself with the creation of NPC's because of the dreaded "Dark face bug" that just won't go away. I figure if I understand the creation of custom NPCs well enough I'll be able to keep the bug out of my games, permanently. As soon as I realized that you could specify unique body meshes and textures to NPCs, I got pretty excited.... but I don't see anywhere in the CK that you could specify a unique skeleton, and it seems it would follow that if you can assign new bodies, why not a new skeleton? Is it possible?

 

Also, does the CK totally ignore the textures referenced inside the main player *body_*.nif files? I've always assumed that they mattered but after seeing some things about how custom NPCs are created I'm not so sure (I know that those fields are used in armor nifs, though, although it's possible to leave them blank and use the CK).

 

Thanks!

The texture files on the body mesh are overridden by assigned TextureSet in the CK. See SkinBody*, SkinEyes*, SkinHead*, SkinHand*, SkinFeet* etc... Do note tho that I have discovered that the texture set for the Head isn't fully used even tho it is assigned. The _s & _sk maps for head texture are still drawn from the head mesh assignment so for the head mesh it is best to reassign the texture location inside the nif file itself.

 

It is possible to have a custom skeleten for each race. See what Dart98Rock said above. It's correct for as much as the skeleton is concerned.

 

The various body parts have the nif assignment and texture set assignment within a series of Naked* ArmorAddon forms. All of which point to the SkinNaked Armor form.

 

However, none of that will solve the "Grey Face Bug"

To solve the Grey Face Bug, you need to locate the mod in question which has NPCs with grey faces. If the files are not loose in the data folder you either need to extract them from the BSA file and place them into the Data folder or you can open up SkyrimEditor.ini, go down to [Archive] and temporarily add the mod's BSA to the end of the list of SResourceArchiveList2=. After you've done that, load the mod up in the Creation Kit. Locate the corresponding actor record for the mod provided NPCs. Open them up and confirm that the "Is CharGen Face Preset" option is NOT checked. So long as it is not checked then the following should work. Exit the actor record (press OK if you need to save a change, else press cancel). If you did make a change, you need to save the plugin and reload the mod else it will not work. Once you are all ready, highlight the actor entry in the Object window but do not open it. Press Ctrl+F4. You should get a pop-up asking about exporting face data, say yes. When it finishes you should have the following:

meshes > actors > character > facegendata > facegeom > modname.esp > a NIF file with a filename that corresponds to the formID of the actor except that the first 2 digits will be 00 instead of whatever the CK showed for the mod.

textures > actors > character > facegendata > facetint > modname.esp > a TGA file & a DDS file with the same corresponding formID name.

 

If you did not use any actual color assignments, this is sufficient to get rid of the grey face bug. However if you did use color assignments, then you will need to rebuild the DDS file manually.

 

um... ok... found out my website with the tutorial is down :(

 

Well here's the local copy html snippets, either copy/paste and open as a new tab or just read around the code :P

It is talking about a mannequin, but a mannequin is nothing more than an actor so the process of fixing the grey face on a mannequin is the same for any other actor

 

<a name="MakeMannDirty"></a><p><ol style="color:#ffffff"><font size="5" style="color:#000000"><b>Making a Mannequin look like the finalized actor as best as Creation Kit allows</b></font>
<li>In the Object window navigate to Actors - Actor</li>
<li>In the filter box type player</li>
<li>In the resultant list that appears locate PlayerHouseMannequin</li>
<li>Right click and select Edit</li>
<li>Use the little arrows at top mid right and find the Traits tab, select the Traits tab  -- don't need to do this. this is just so you can see what is going on</li>
<li>On the bottom left is a box called Template Data with a drop drown box called ActorBase</li>
<li>Go thru the options and select your actor entry</li>
<li>Tick the box labeled Use Traits</li>
<li>Press Ok to close the actor window</li>
<li>The following steps are here to demonstrate why the later steps are necessary.
<ol type="a"><li>Save the plugin.</li>
<li>Exit the Creation Kit, make sure it is set to load and test it out in game.</li>
<li>You'll find that your mannequin has the 'grey face bug' common to many NPCs made in the creation kit.</li>
<li>Exit the game, Go back to the Creation Kit and load up your mannequin plugin along with all of it's masters</li>
</ol></li>
<li>Locate your character in the actors list, right click and choose edit</li>
<li>Make sure the box that says "Is CharGen Face Preset" is not checked -- Will not work if it is checked.
<br>Note: if you are also using this actor as a preset, it is preferred to make a copy of the actor record and use the copy rather than using the preset as a base.</li>
<li>Press ok to save</li>
<li>Locate the new entry in the Object window and press the key combo ctrl+f4</li>
<li>You will be asked if you want to save FaceGenData for the selected characters, say yes.</li>
<li>When done a box pops up that says Done. Press Ok to close that.</li>
<li>Save the plugin, then test it out in game.</li>
</ol></p>

<a name="MakeMannPerfect"></a><p><ol style="color:#ffffff"><font size="5" style="color:#000000"><b>Making the Mannequin truly look like your Actor</b></font>
<br><i>Note: this was modified and improved upon since my initial release.  The follow method is much cleaner in appearance and with less chance for error.</i>
<br>Before going on, I need to explain something. Player characters when created are layered with tint layers to create the face that is seen in game. NPC charaters however have all the face tint data merged into a single file. This is why you can create a preset actor and it looks fine in game, however the same actor as a placed NPC will not look correct. The ctrl+f4 used previously is intended to solve this problem. However, it is broken and does not export and merge the tint layers appropriately. It is for this reason that programs like Skyrim NPC Editor were created to begin with.
<li>Open the Creation Kit and load up your mannequin/preset plugin</li>
<li>Find your actor base and go to the <span style="color:#FFFF99">Character Gen Parts</span></li>
<li>Locate the FaceGenData you created earlier, should be skyrim/data/textures/actors/character/facegendata/facetint/yourmodname.esp</li>
<li>Open the dds file with GIMP and uncheck the option to load mipmaps -- here on out it will be referred to as the skin tone dds file.</li>
<li>Use BSAopt to extract the textures from the skyrim - textures.bsa file -- unless you have mod provided versions of the same face tint layers used by the actor</li>
<li>Look thru the output for the texture files that match the ones you have colors for that aren't showing up in the game should be BSAOutput/data/textures/actors/character/character assests/tintmasks</li>
<li>Open each dds file that you need colors for with GIMP, they should be black and white.</li>
<li>Copy all the black and white images and paste as new layers into the skin tone dds file.</li>
<li>Pick one tintmask to work with, and add a new layer.  -- layer menu, new layer option, pick transparency  --- in fact all new layers will be transparent.</li>
<li>Move the new transparent layer below the tintmask you are working with and flood fill it with the matching color listed in the Creation Kit. -- note to set the color value, double click on the foreground color displayed in the tools toolbox window. Enter the RGB values in the window that pops up and press ok.</li>
<li>with the tintmask layer selected, go to layer menu, transparency, color to alpha, change the color to white.  Only the black parts should remain.</li>
<li>You should see the color showing thru where the white was previously.</li>
<li>Merge the black & transparent layer down into the proper color layer.</li>
<li>Repeat steps 9 thru 13 for each tint mask being used</li>
<li>when all done, make sure the skintone layer is at the bottom of the stack of layers.</li>
<li>select the layer above it, go to layer menu and choose merge down option</li>
<li>repeat the merge down process till all the tintmasks are ontop of the skintone</li>
<li>export the file as a dds and overwrite the original Creation Kit face gen data file, do not apply any compression when you export.</li>
<li>Check it out in game.
<br>There could be some edging issues along some face tint layers, this is typically cause you used the stock tint layer but have a mod version in your data directory.  To correct re-do this set of steps and use the mod version instead.</li>
</ol></p>

O.o and I see I left out one important step.... When you have merged all the face tint layers except the skintone, select the merged layer and send black to alpha channel so that the skintone color shows with all the face tints.

 

If you do get some stray marks on the skintone dds from the ctrl+f4 process, just don't bother with that layer and make a new transparent layer and fill it with the correct skintone color and delete the original layer from the ctrl+f4 dds file. Finish flattening the image, export and overwrite the original face gen data file.

 

[Dart98Rock]

Adding it to the race is the only way I see how. If you want it only on one npc, or character, you would have to create the race, or just duplicate another and change it's skeleton, and place the npc to that race. If you want the skeleton for everyone you can just replace the old skeleton.

[Hektus]

Thanks for the reply. You did the Mannequin mod that makes it look like the player, right? I just uninstalled that finally because of the face/body mismatch (at first, by carefully following instructions, the face/body was good, but later on it reverted back and stayed that way). Anyways, not a big deal, I know that it must be quite a bit more difficult to get it working right on a mannequin.

 

To solve the Grey Face Bug, you need to locate the mod in question which has NPCs with grey faces. If the files are not loose in the data folder you either need to extract them from the BSA file and place them into the Data folder or you can open up SkyrimEditor.ini, go down to [Archive] and temporarily add the mod's BSA to the end of the list of SResourceArchiveList2=. After you've done that, load the mod up in the Creation Kit. Locate the corresponding actor record for the mod provided NPCs. Open them up and confirm that the "Is CharGen Face Preset" option is NOT checked. So long as it is not checked then the following should work. Exit the actor record (press OK if you need to save a change, else press cancel). If you did make a change, you need to save the plugin and reload the mod else it will not work. Once you are all ready, highlight the actor entry in the Object window but do not open it. Press Ctrl+F4. You should get a pop-up asking about exporting face data, say yes. When it finishes you should have the following:

meshes > actors > character > facegendata > facegeom > modname.esp > a NIF file with a filename that corresponds to the formID of the actor except that the first 2 digits will be 00 instead of whatever the CK showed for the mod.

textures > actors > character > facegendata > facetint > modname.esp > a TGA file & a DDS file with the same corresponding formID name.

 

I'm familiar with this process you just described but it doesn't seem to matter. Take the mod "Girls of Skyrim" for example. Clearly they exported all of the facegen data from the CK and packaged it in their mod. I can load their mod in the CK and see that CharGen Face Preset is unchecked and I can look in the facegendata for the meshes and textures and they are exactly as you say they should be, according to file structure and file name. Yet, the dark faces persist.

 

If you did not use any actual color assignments, this is sufficient to get rid of the grey face bug. However if you did use color assignments, then you will need to rebuild the DDS file manually.

[/Quote]

 

I don't understand what this means but could this be it? Unfortunately, I understand a lot more about meshes than textures. Is it possible to see if you will have the dark face problem just by looking at the face textures exported from the CK or is this a problem that is just created out of thin air by the game?

 

I attached a picture as one of the "Girls of Skryim" appears in my game. This is the vanilla mod, I have added no custom textures or meshes. Check out the mod and look at the file structure, you can see that they have included a complete set of meshes and textures for each actor.

[Hektus]

Adding it to the race is the only way I see how. If you want it only on one npc, or character, you would have to create the race, or just duplicate another and change it's skeleton, and place the npc to that race. If you want the skeleton for everyone you can just replace the old skeleton.

 

Thanks, I hope creating a new race is as easy as it sounds.

[IsharaMeradin]

I attached a picture as one of the "Girls of Skryim" appears in my game. This is the vanilla mod, I have added no custom textures or meshes. Check out the mod and look at the file structure, you can see that they have included a complete set of meshes and textures for each actor.

They include a complete set of meshes & textures so that their NPC will look the way they want despite what the player may have installed.

 

If you did not use any actual color assignments, this is sufficient to get rid of the grey face bug. However if you did use color assignments, then you will need to rebuild the DDS file manually.

I don't understand what this means but could this be it? Unfortunately, I understand a lot more about meshes than textures. Is it possible to see if you will have the dark face problem just by looking at the face textures exported from the CK or is this a problem that is just created out of thin air by the game?

If you don't do the ctrl+f4 and create the base face gen data files, you will get the grey face bug. If you do the ctrl+f4 and you did not assign any colors, warpaints, etc then the skintone should match up but the face will still be bland looking. If you did ctrl+f4 and assigned colors you can get a improper looking face as the default ctrl+f4 method is actually broken. That's why I spoilered the instructions for manually fixing up the ctrl+f4 texture file.

 

Is your attached image supposed to show the dark face problem you are talking about? If so, that is not the grey face bug. That face has color & detail it just doesn't match the body for some reason. Which could be caused by either a missing or improper head texture map. As I stated earlier the _s & _sk head maps are not used from the head texture sets and instead rely on the assignment in the nif file. If you have a different base setup than what the mod author had and the mod tries to use custom textures for the head via a texture set in the CK this very well could be the problem. At least it warrants checking out.