Clothing Expanded

[0kamikaze]

Hello, Nexus users. I am in the process of creating my first full modification here and I would like to have your input on every aspect of it. Everything from the mission statement, implementation, balancing, suggestions or recommendations.

 

CLOTHING EXPANDED

 

:Mission Statement:

One thing that has always bothered me about Skyrim is that you don’t have any reason to wear clothing. Statistically you may as well be naked, there’s no reason to take off your armor when you’ve acquired some. Clothing Expanded seeks to change that by having every non-enchanted, non-armored piece of Skyrim clothing affect the stats of non-combat skills.

 

http://i105.photobucket.com/albums/m222/0kamikaze/CE-Implementation_zpsf6d5c37c.png

 

:Explanation:

I have separated clothing into six different classes: Elite/Rich, Average, Poor, Destitute, and Suspicious. Each class of clothing provides some kind of advantage other classes of clothing don’t have or can’t match. I wish to keep this mod balanced by matching huge stat bonuses with just as large stat penalties alongside it. Using the Bandoliers mod as inspiration, everything is based around enchantments.

 

Elite Clothing: Large bonus to speech, penalties to sneak and crafting.

Fine Clothing: Bonus to enchanting and speech. Penalties to sneak and smithing.

Average clothing: Provides small bonuses to speech and crafting.

Poor clothing: Provides bonus to speech and sneaking skills, but a penalty to crafting.

Destitute clothing: Large bonus to sneaking skills but comes with a huge penalty to speech.

Suspicious: Sneaking bonus, speech penalty.

 

These class types aren’t the end of the story, I assign each skill a set of attributes which are laid out in a spreadsheet. The values are typed in and a number comes out. This way, there is statistical variety with clothes in the same class. This system was also created because I hope to make mod specific versions of this mod in the future.

 

Google Docs Spreadsheet (Still converting from MS Excel): https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0Amhl0hlaDMXfdE84Zkh1Q3BKNE5VLXhUVEtFSWt4YWc&output=html

 

:Method:

Thanks to the Bandolier mod, the mod will be done entirely with enchants and won’t have any silly script shenanigans. I have 12 different stat modifiers, a positive and negative for each of the six skills modified. These stats are hidden and a 13th stat, a base Magic Resist magic effect is made for every individual clothing item. This M. Resist effect allows me to have a custom item description, which amalgamates the dozen of attribute points into a cohesive description. It’s been important to me to prevent flooding the ‘Active Effects’ screen with 48 magic effects!

 

http://i105.photobucket.com/albums/m222/0kamikaze/CE--Description-options_zpsaaafe41e.png

 

:Descriptions:

I am entertaining two description types. One which is a colorful description and the other a to the point explanation of the stats the clothing affects. Please tell me which approach you prefer.

 

:Testing the Limits of CE:

I’ve personally assembled ‘best of’ sets to see the maximum stats one can get with CE clothing alone and have found the best sets provide up to 12 points for a single skill. As I have had no feedback, I am blind whether or not these bonuses are way too big or not and could use feedback.

:Caveats:

Because this mod uses enchantments, you won’t be able to further enchant unarmored clothing.

I need to know if Thalmor Boots/Gloves should be excluded from the mod. They are unarmored clothing but I remember the lengths folks have gone to acquire enchanted Thalmor Cloaks.

 

:Compatability:

At the moment, I can only think that this mod may unbalance the game a bit and was made with hardcore mods and economy mods in mind. I have no idea what happens if you’ve enchanted clothing and enable this mod. As this mod is still being built, if you think there are any serious issues with the way this mod is being built, or worried about balance please let me know so the alpha release isn’t a disaster.

Edited January 4, 2013 by 0kamikaze

[Deleted1308005User]

Flavored Description is my choice, and I love the idea!

By default the clothes are just boring, useless. Only good way to use them is to enchant them, but as enchantments ain't any stronger on clothing, it's just silly to enchant them. (Though there's couple nice-looking clothes)

 

ANY sort of "lore-friendly" variant system is great addition to game. Be it clothes, animals, weapons or anything.

 

Also, are you going to make new, retextured variants in addition to the original clothes?

[0kamikaze]

RIght now my concern is maximum compatibility. After I'm done with the Vanilla Skyrim clothing I will look and see if there are any DLC items which can be supported. I am looking into creating a version of a unqiue variant of CE for the mod, Skyrim Medieval Economy which to my knowledge adds a boatload of variants.

[kryptopyr]

I love the idea. My only concern is that it removes the ability to custom enchant the clothing. I actually do enchant clothing. It's a lightweight option that's good for sneaking, and particularly when paired with ACE-Enchanting (which gives enchanting bonuses for unarmored clothing), enchanted clothing can be a decent option for both sneaks and mages (I generally don't use really fancy/fine clothes though, so many of these might not interfere or could be compensated for by choosing the types of clothing that have the predetermined sneak bonuses.

 

Have you considered options that would allow you to add the effects without adding enchantments? It seems that you might be able to achieve nearly the same effects using perks, similar to the Custom Fit perk... where you give the player a perk that is conditioned to apply only when certain clothing is worn. I've been considering doing something like this only primarily with regard to certain armors (i.e. thieves guild armor makes you harder to detect, daedric armor enhances your ability to intimidate). The primary issue I see with doing it this way is that you'll have to weigh your values so that when custom enchantments are added the clothing doesn't become too powerful. You also wouldn't be able to add your custom descriptions...and I do like how you've described the effects (both versions of the descriptions are nice, though if given the option, I would probably go with "to the point").

Edited January 4, 2013 by kryptopyr

[sukeban]

I also vote for the Flavored Description. Skyrim's vanilla UI and descriptions is so blunt and terse, more expansive, "RPG-y" explanations are a very welcome alternative. Also let's you roleplay more :D

 

This is looking good!

 

And script-free is the way to be :D

 

EDIT:

 

Implementing via perks like in the above might be a good alternative to actually using Enchantments. Only thing I'd foresee would be that a) the condition situation for all those new perks would be highly complex, and b) you'd need a script to give those perks to players not starting a new game. If you're up to the labor, going with Perks would allow more flexibility/compatibility than using enchantments.

Edited January 4, 2013 by sukeban

[jack013]

couldn't you just add a second enchantment on each of the base' ("EnchArmorFortifyAlchemyBase" and such) you put on clothes -i think that's what's used for custom enchanting- that has a higher rating, then attach a conditions to check for the keyword amorclothing, poor, rich. just a thought. i 'unno.

[0kamikaze]

I actually would love to find a solution that fulfills the aim of the mod, preserves its depth but not take up the enchantment slot. The use of the enchantment slot prevents me from extending the mod into the realm of armors. I think if I were able to use one of the proposed alternatives and can include the stat changes to armors I could lower the buffs given to clothing across the board.

 

@kryptopyr I'm looking into the perks/magic/enchantment lists in the Creation Kit and I'm having trouble locating the Custom Fit perk, I am interested in seeing if the mod can indeed utilize perks, ensuring nobodies enchanting experience is miffed.

 

@jack013 As I am new to modding, I've only copied the system the Bandolier mod employs. I don't quite understand how the second enchantment/custom enchanting you're talking about works. Will this allow me to alter stats and clothing descriptions but allow players to further enchant their clothing, or is it just to simplify the modding process? If its the latter, a link to an existing tutorial or guide/wiki page detailing would be excellent. Though I am more concerned whether or not the method I'm using is inefficient and the methods you are talking about are better for performance/compatibility.

 

UPDATE: I've looked into the Perks list and I think it looks promising. I can see how I can bring over the values into a perk like an enchantment. The problem is I don't know how you can tie a perk to a piece of clothing. If that part can be solved, the only other problem with the move, no flavorful descriptions can probably be done through other means.

 

UPDATE2: I've figured it out, but correct me if I'm wrong here. For example, attribute 'Noticed' has +2 speech and -2 sneak. To apply this to clothing x, I create a keyword and add this keyword to the Magic Effect and Clothing Editor ID keywords bank. Result: clothing x has +2 speech and -2 sneak.

 

If this is viable, I may have to reconsider the scope of the mod.

Edited January 5, 2013 by 0kamikaze

[kryptopyr]

To tie the perk to the clothing item using keywords... You need to create a perk entry, select the "Ability" option at the top and find the spell you want to apply (create your spell using the same effects/values you would for your enchantments). Looking at the CK, it looks like FistsofSteel might be a better example than CustomFit. The perk FistsofSteel adds the "PerkFistsofSteel" spell ability to the player. The spell has multiple entries with slightly varied effect depending on what gauntlets the player is wearing. This is conditioned on a keyword. The keyword needs to be put on the clothing item and used in the condition statement in the spell. I don't think you need to add it to the actual magic effect itself, just the condition for that effect within the spell entry.

 

Now the problem with the above is that you have to add keywords to a lot of different items, which creates the potential for the mod to conflict with others since making this one change will overwrite other changes to that item made by any other mods. This doesn't necessarily make it a bad option, and one of the up-sides is that I believe you could also add your descriptions directly to the clothing item (since you're already changing the item, this would be a good place for the description).

 

If you wanted to maintain the absolute greatest degree of compatibility, then I think you could actually do it without touching any of the clothing items at all. If you don't want to alter the items, then you also need to find another way to condition the spell. Instead of WornHasKeyword, you might look at GetEquipped (possibly also GetIsUsedItem or GetIsID). It looks as if GetEquipped allows you to select a Leveled Item list as your parameter. You'll have to test it because I'm not positive that how well using a leveled list will work. If this actually works, then it makes your work a lot easier. You can just create several Leveled Lists containing all of the items that you want to apply a specific effect, then use that list as a condition, within the spell, for that effect.

 

If you don't alter the clothing items, then you could add your description to the spell itself (though I think this will cause it to show up in the Active Effects menu, which I know you're trying to avoid). However, if you created a single spell with all 6 effects (use the same list of clothing for each effect within that spell), then your description could look identical to what you've written above. It would be a single entry under Active Effects, not 6 entries. I'm not sure you'd want it to work that way, but I think you could condition the spell so that the player would only get the effect when wearing a full set of fine clothing (rather than get smaller effects piecemeal).

 

I also noticed that there is a GetClothingValue condition. Not sure if you'd have a use for it but figured I'd mention it.

 

I'm not sure if there is a benefit to using the Perk to apply a spell in this way, or if it would be simpler to just give the player the spell(s) directly. I suppose if you have a lot of spells, you could add each spell as a perk entry, this would allow you to start or remove all of the effects added by your mod just by giving/removing a single perk from the player. There are also specific Perk Entry values that you may or may not find useful (like altering buy/sell prices). Some of these can be achieved by using a magic effect, but there are many that are different.

Edited January 5, 2013 by kryptopyr

[0kamikaze]

I've just figured out what you've tried to explain. It seems like Perks are not only easier to implement, but avoid the potential overwrites other mods might make on top of CE. The problem is I don't see a way of automatically activating the perk. If I set a perk to be a 'trait', will this allow the perk to be activated without adding anything to the perk tree? Do I need to run a script/enchantment/spell to activate the perks ingame?

[kryptopyr]

You don't need to add anything to the perk trees. You can create a small script and attach it to a quest that will run the very first time the mod is installed. It would be a very simple script just to add the perk to the player, and it would only need to run once.

 

Basically you would create a simple quest, mark it as Start Game Enabled and add a script something like this...

 

Scriptname ClothingExpanded_START extends Quest  

Spell Property ClothingExpandedPerk Auto

Event OnInit()
Game.getplayer().addperk(ClothingExpandedPerk, 0)
EndEvent

 

These two topics go into a bit more detail...

http://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/657497-adding-a-perk-as-soon-as-game-starts/page__pid__5188633#entry5188633

http://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/558795-script-tutorial-script-initialization-on-game-load/

 

I've done this with several of my mods, and it seems to work pretty well. I generally use the method described in the second link (page 3), where I add a couple of stages to the quest to allow for any future updates. So my script will look like this:

 

Scriptname ClothingExpanded_START extends Quest  

Spell Property ClothingExpandedPerk Auto

Event OnInit()
If self.GetStage() == 0
             Game.getplayer().addperk(ClothingExpandedPerk, 0)
      Self.SetStage(1)
endif
EndEvent

Edited January 5, 2013 by kryptopyr