Renee's Modding Thread Options

[Renee]

You need to find the texture file for the armor. It will be in a *.dds format. Open it with a graphics editor that supports .dds files (not all do). I use Paint.Net. Then just change the color and save it.

--------------------------------------------------

Oblivion example

Begin GameMode

if Gamehour >= 5 && Gamehour < 7 && dawndusk == 0
set dawndusk to 1
elseif Gamehour >= 17 && Gamehour < 19 && dawndusk == 0
set dawndusk to 1
elseif ( GameHour >= 7 ) && ( GameHour < 17 ) && dawndusk == 1
set dawndusk to 0
elseif ( GameHour >= 19 ) && dawndusk == 1
set dawndusk to 0
elseif ( GameHour < 5 ) && dawndusk == 1
set dawndusk to 0
endif

End

------------------------------------------------------------

Skyrim example

if ThisActorClosest.hasSpell(BrokenArmorDistr)

elseif ThisActorClosest.isdead()
elseif ThisActorClosest.GetDistance(PlayerRef) >= 50000
elseif ThisActorClosest.GetDistance(PlayerRef) <= 5000
elseif !PlayerRef.HasLOS(ThisActorClosest)
else

do_what_needs_doing_here()

endif

--------------------------------------------------

Any languages would do this, but rarely they've been written differently). Because of this always put the LEAST likely condition first (or possibly the shortest running query, if eg it's from a local function call, or local boolean test). This means the script won't be looked at as often by the game.



This post has been edited by Renee: Apr 9 2025, 05:58 PM

[Renee]

Specific instance of CrimeGold (CG only sets for this one particular instance, rather than every time the Crime Gold's Faction gets triggered.) This can be added to s specific object like a chest.

=----------------------------------------------------------

Faction Property CrimeFactionWinterhold Auto

Event OnActivate(ObjectReference akActionRef)

if akActionRef == Game.GetPlayer()
if IsLocked()

int crimeGold = CrimeFactionWinterhold.GetCrimeGold()
Utility.Wait(2) ;wait for lock picking menu to close
int newCrimeGold = CrimeFactionWinterhold.GetCrimeGold()
int diff = newCrimeGold - crimeGold

if diff > 0 ;player was likely caught

CrimeFactionWinterhold.SetCrimeGold(newCrimeGold + 100) ;add 100 to crime gold

Endif
Endif
Endif

EndEvent

This post has been edited by Renee: Apr 9 2025, 05:35 PM

[Renee]

Making a quest in Morrowind.

I'm outsourcing these tutorials because they're already so comprehensive. There are three links below. First link includes the VERY basic stuff: adding objects to the world, making NPCs, a lot of the window explanations, and so on. Second and third links lead straighter into the quests & scripting.

Construction Set basics tutorial

Morrowind Scripting for Dummies (UESP)

Morrowind Scripting For Dummies (Nexus), includes .pdf files.




This post has been edited by Renee: May 14 2025, 03:51 PM

[Renee]

Adding Mods to Xbox Series X

I'm making a tutorial for this because turns out, putting the mods I want on a console is harder than I thought it would be. Sure, it's easy to just start the game, go into the pause menu, click on MODS or CREATIONS, and there's a list of selections right there. But.... this is a limited selection straight from Bethesda. As it turns out, I wasn't interested in any choices which showed up, so the question is: how do we expand these choices? Maybe download from Nexus instead of Beth.net? Well there are several ways, lots of videos tell us how, but in a lot of videos, stuff is not clearly explained, steps get skipped, or the narrator's mumbling in a funny accent, making him/her difficult to understand.

The first method I'll discuss is getting content from Bethesda.net. Keep in mind, downloading from this website into the game is unreliable. I've been able to get some selections into my games, other times they don't show up in any Mods or Creations menus. . Literally hit or miss, this method is. DLing stuff from any Creations menus in a Bethesda game works better. Which is discussed in the section below.

MODDING FROM BETHESDA.NET - WIP

1). if you don't have an account with Bethesda.net, log in and make one on your computer, using Microsoft Edge to gain a bit of streamlining in the next step It's free!


2).For this next part, it helps if your Xbox is linked to your computer, online that is. They should be sharing the same Microsoft account, that is. This just streamlines the process. Here is an outside tutorial for that. Use Microsoft Edge to link accounts/devices if they're not already linked. Again, this streamlines everything.

2). Next step is to start the Xbox itself, and open the 'net. But how....? Here is where several videos failed for me, as this simple task wasn't nicely explained in all the ones I watched. If you're not seeing your Home page, press the Xbox button. On the top left side of the page, select My Games & Apps, okay? Very good. Microsoft Edge should be one of the apps since Xbox is a Microsoft product. If you don't see Edge, select "See All" and you might have to scroll to find the Edge icon. If your devices are linked virtually: PC and console, that is, and you already use Edge on your PC, Edge will ask if it's okay to share passwords and other info between the two devices once it opens: PC and console. I allowed this, which made it so my Microsoft username, email, and other info automatically transferred to the Xbox. 🎮

3). Type Bethesda.net into the Edge browser. Despite transferring info, the Bethesda website did not catch the password I use for this site. Perhaps because I didn't have Bethesda.net set as a Favorite thru Edge on my non-gaming computer. Now I do. I'm noticing a new Favorite icon, for Home.Bethesda.net just showed up on my Microsoft Edge browser's Favorites bar on my computer in real-time. Nice.

4). After entering the password if you have to, click on the three lined "icon" on the top left of the page. Scroll the page down. The bottom left is where mods and Creations are >>> although this could change in the future, Beth's site has changed several times over the years.
Now select the game you're wanting some changes in. I'm choosing Fallout 4. The left joystick on the controller acts as a rather clumsy mouse, while the right joystick scrolls the entire page up and down. There we go, a much larger list of mods can be seen now, BANG CRASH!! ... IF we don't see what we want, use the Search at the lower-top-left of the page. Categories can also be narrowed on the left side of the page (see, this is no longer true, categories are now somewhat to the top, so just look all over the page if Categories aren't immediately seen.)

5). If searching on Xbox, type what you want to see with the clumsy in-game keyboard (or a real keyboard, if this is allowed), press the Start button or ENTER, which should begin the search. Some searches take longer than others.
I just searched for Sinks in Starfield, hoping to find more usable water sources. Did not find any dedicated drinkable sink mods, but found Working Water Cooler, instead. Close enough. ⛲ Well actually it promises sinks should become functional: Replaces nearly all water coolers and sinks found in the world and ships with working versions based on my mod Functional Decor.


I also selected Landscape as a Fallout 4 Category and found "Spring in the Commonwealth", which pretties up the Commonwealth.

5). Whatever you want, click on the Favorite button for that mod, which is a heart icon. 🖤 (note, I'm not seeing this icon in the year 2026, now there's only Bookmark and Subscribe buttons). Click also on the download/Subscribe button, this saves the mod into your Library, which is (citations needed>>>>) in the Xbox app on your computer, if this has been installed. The app can also be found on the Xbox by pressing the main Xbox button and then pressing My Games & apps. 2). Highlight a game (but don’t select it). 3). Press the Menu (what used to be called Start) button on your controller, and then select Manage game and add-ons.
Select the game tile, and then select each checkbox for which items you want to install.
Select Install, to confirm the installation.
Note that games and add-ons will install automatically to your console’s default storage device. To learn more about managing your storage devices, go to:

At the top-right of this window is our avatar, which is Profile & system. Move the underline_cursor under Profile & System then go > Settings > General > Power options to adjust your power mode settings.
Go to Profile & system > Settings > System > Updates to adjust your system update settings.
=\. If you're in the Creations menu you may need to purchase the mod itself, which is an option below the Bookmark button.

6). Any mods should be in the game's Creations menu. If not seen, press the Options button on your controller (this used to be called the Start button, to the right of the main X button) and choose "Download all Creations in my Library". To see/manage them further, scroll up the Bethesda.net page and select My Mods (light gray) instead of All Mods.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

MODDING FROM CREATIONS MENU (Starfield or Fallout 4)

1). Open the game from the main Xbox window, or any icon which launches the game.

2). Select Creations. A disclaimer might pop up, telling us some legal stuff about the dangers of adding stuff to our games, yea whatever,,, but then, the Creations menu should fill your screen. If a message saying "cannot save to Bethesda.net" shows up, see the Troubleshooting section below. Otherwise, a huge list of choices should show, with the most popular mods of all at the top of the page, I assume. Press the left bumper to open the Search option, if stuff needs to be narrowed down.

3). Enter what you want in the search. Again, type what you want to see with the clumsy in-game keyboard (or a real keyboard, if this is allowed), press the Start button or ENTER, which should begin the search. After the search is done, press the left trigger to open a bunch of options, we can glance into our current Library of mods , for instance.
Again, I searched for Sinks in Starfield, hoping to find more usable water sources, this time using the game's Creations menu, as downloading from Bethesda.net didn't work. Found the exact same mod, Working Water Cooler, except this time I could download straight from the water cooler's page without losing the file somewhere between my game and its Library. 8.73 megabyates. "Are you sure you want to Download Working Water Cooler?" Hell yes! Sometimes we'll need to pay for the creation. Downloading takes time, sometimes. Be patient!

Often, there's an option to look at other work from the same author a choice or two below the Download button.

4). Downloading the mod automatically installs it, but to be sure, press the Y button. This shows the current mods in your game, and also the way they've been arranged. Console players who've never modded on PC who might be reading this: "Load Order" is very important. Some mods can clash with others, and sometimes overwrite changes; whatever's at the bottom of the order "wins". If I installed something into Starfield which made sinks and water coolers non-functional for instance, I'd better make sure it's not below Working Water Cooler when the game launches. Use the left bumper to move stuff up or down.

Pressing X in the Creations window opens options to purchase credits sometimes, for some games, because some Creations do cost money. 💰💰💰 Oddly, I got the water cooler mod working and installed in my game even though it said I don't have enough credits on my Xbox account, though maybe since I signed up & paid for GamePass a month ago, this allowed me to purchase Working Water Cooler, sweet! 💦💧

5). Finally, press the View button (to the very left of the main Xbox button), now there should be options to save or Restore the load order to Bethesda.net. We'll want to SAVE. This is important because in the future, if we need to uninstall our game, we can also Restore those mods we had in the past in one easy step, by pressing the View button button and selecting Restore. Voila 🍷

Starfield will confirm 'the load order has changed' or some such, after exiting the CREATIONS menu. Get in the game!

Keep in mind, loading Creations into the game sometimes disables Achievements, as it'd be all too easy to cheat by using some mod to get these without working for them. But so what, right? I'd rather customize my game than see artificial plaques go up in the game's Achievements wall, that's an easy tradeoff for me.



---------------------------------------------------------------------

TROUBLESHOOTING

If you get a message saying "unable to save current load order to Bethesda.net" when selecting Creations in the Start menu that's not in the game, this could be why..... Firstly, even if this message occurs, sometimes the Creation menu may still open. If so, here's some info I got from Googling:

1). If you are unable to save your current load order to Bethesda.net on Xbox, make sure your device is loaded to the proper account. Exit the game, open the 'net and make sure you're logged into Bethesda.net. Another possibility is: it may be due to an upcoming update; December 2025 was the last one. these will reset the mod load order. To avoid complications, it is recommended to save your console load order before the update. Here are the steps to save your load order:

2). Navigate to the Creations Menu and select the Load Order Menu. Or just press the Y button on an Xbox controller.

3). At the bottom of the Load Order Menu screen, select "Load Order Archive", or the View button on your controller. Now, any mods or creations you've selected should be on your monitor or TV. Select these one by one by pressing A, or delete by pressing X.

4). Press the View button (to the very left of the main Xbox button), now there should be options to save or Restore the load order to Bethesda.net.
Select "Save Load Order to Bethesda.net." Duh. If the "unable to save current load order to Bethesda.net" still occurs, and you've saved in the past,


5). Confirm by selecting "Yes," on a controller. If the Unable to save load order to Bethesda.net" message still pops up, it may be due to a game's update or a glitch. Here are some steps you can take to troubleshoot the problem:
1). Power cycle your console by pressing and holding the main power button on the Xbox itself until the monitor screen and Xbox button powers off. Now press & hold until it powers on, you may need to hold the main Xbox button on the controller too. This can help reset the game and resolve any temporary glitches, getting successfully into the Creations menu from the game. THIS HELPED ME, 12/24/2026. I could also save the FO4 load order to Bethesda's servers. Voila 🍷 If you're still stuck, continue steps below.

2). Disable mods: Try deactivating all your mods and then attempt to save your load order again.

3). Use the Load Order Archive: Navigate to the Creations Menu, select the Load Order Menu, and use the "Load Order Archive" option to save your current load order.

If After saving and exiting the Creation menu, if a message saying something like "The Creation selection/load order has changed", this is okay. Press OK. Load or Continue a gamesave. The game (Fallout 4 for me) should confirm that your "load order has changed", and you'll be able to activate whatever creations you've chosen, indicating the process is complete. Start the game and load a save. There should be a final confirmation message to activate any mods or creations. YES please, goshdammit!

]If there's a message saying "Could not log into Bethesda.net servers" when trying to select the Creations menu in the game,
1). Check your Server Status: Before proceeding, verify if there are any server outages or maintenance activities by checking the Bethesda Support Twitter account or their official website.

2). Ensure that your username and password are correct by logging into the Bethesda.net website thru your Xbox menus, Microsoft Edge the appropriate browser. If you have not verified your account, do so now.






https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ba6tBM7TQT8

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1aknl_ze...ME/edit?tab=t.0

This post has been edited by Renee: Jan 29 2026, 10:38 PM

[Renee]

STARFIELD TUTORIALS


Rather than write up some guides to learn this game I'll link to some of the better tutorials and guides I have found.

A no-fuss Guide to Starfield Space Travel -- Doesn't go into enough detail in print, but this site includes some helpful pictures,

Flying tutorial -- The in-game flying tutorial is too short in my opinion.

Starfield Pilot's Guide & HUD tutorial -- Another video. I figure if I watch/read enough of these I'll finally get the hang of flying in this game. This vid is somewhat annoying with the jam-boy music in the background but it's the most comprehensive tutorial I've found so far. He at least explains everything Vasco/Bethesda don't.

Docking our spacecraft to other space stations (video)

Building spacecrafts video

This post has been edited by Renee: Jan 21 2026, 01:27 AM

[mALX]

Adding Mods to Xbox Series X

I'm making a tutorial for this because turns out, putting the mods I want on a console is harder than I thought it would be. Sure, it's easy to just start the game, go into the pause menu, click on MODS or CREATIONS, and there's a list of selections right there. But.... this is a limited selection straight from Bethesda. As it turns out, I wasn't interested in any choices which showed up, so the question is: how do we expand these choices? Maybe download from Nexus instead of Beth.net? Well there are several ways, lots of videos tell us how, but in a lot of videos, stuff is not clearly explained, steps get skipped, or the narrator's mumbling in a funny accent, making him/her difficult to understand.

The first method I'll discuss is getting content from Bethesda.net. Keep in mind, downloading from this website into the game is unreliable. I've been able to get some selections into my games, other times they don't show up in any Mods or Creations menus. . Literally hit or miss, this method is. DLing stuff from any Creations menus in a Bethesda game works better. Which is discussed in the section below.

MODDING FROM BETHESDA.NET - WIP

1). if you don't have an account with Bethesda.net, log in and make one on your computer, using Microsoft Edge to gain a bit of streamlining in the next step It's free!


2).For this next part, it helps if your Xbox is linked to your computer, online that is. They should be sharing the same Microsoft account, that is. This just streamlines the process. Here is an outside tutorial for that. Use Microsoft Edge to link accounts/devices if they're not already linked. Again, this streamlines everything.

2). Next step is to start the Xbox itself, and open the 'net. But how....? Here is where several videos failed for me, as this simple task wasn't nicely explained in all the ones I watched. If you're not seeing your Home page, press the Xbox button. On the top left side of the page, select My Games & Apps, okay? Very good. Microsoft Edge should be one of the apps since Xbox is a Microsoft product. If you don't see Edge, select "See All" and you might have to scroll to find the Edge icon. If your devices are linked virtually: PC and console, that is, and you already use Edge on your PC, Edge will ask if it's okay to share passwords and other info between the two devices once it opens: PC and console. I allowed this, which made it so my Microsoft username, email, and other info automatically transferred to the Xbox. 🎮

3). Type Bethesda.net into the Edge browser. Despite transferring info, the Bethesda website did not catch the password I use for this site. Perhaps because I didn't have Bethesda.net set as a Favorite thru Edge on my non-gaming computer. Now I do. I'm noticing a new Favorite icon, for Home.Bethesda.net just showed up on my Microsoft Edge browser's Favorites bar on my computer in real-time. Nice.

4). After entering the password if you have to, click on the three lined "icon" on the top left of the page. Scroll the page down. The bottom left is where mods and Creations are >>> although this could change in the future, Beth's site has changed several times over the years.
Now select the game you're wanting some changes in. I'm choosing Fallout 4. The left joystick on the controller acts as a rather clumsy mouse, while the right joystick scrolls the entire page up and down. There we go, a much larger list of mods can be seen now, BANG CRASH!! ... IF we don't see what we want, use the Search at the lower-top-left of the page. Categories can also be narrowed on the left side of the page (see, this is no longer true, categories are now somewhat to the top, so just look all over the page if Categories aren't immediately seen.)

5). If searching on Xbox, type what you want to see with the clumsy in-game keyboard (or a real keyboard, if this is allowed), press the Start button or ENTER, which should begin the search. Some searches take longer than others.
I just searched for Sinks in Starfield, hoping to find more usable water sources. Did not find any dedicated drinkable sink mods, but found Working Water Cooler, instead. Close enough. ⛲ Well actually it promises sinks should become functional: Replaces nearly all water coolers and sinks found in the world and ships with working versions based on my mod Functional Decor.


I also selected Landscape as a Fallout 4 Category and found "Spring in the Commonwealth", which pretties up the Commonwealth.

5). Whatever you want, click on the Favorite button for that mod, which is a heart icon. 🖤 (note, I'm not seeing this icon in the year 2026, now there's only Bookmark and Subscribe buttons). Click also on the download/Subscribe button, this saves the mod into your Library, which is (citations needed>>>>) in the Xbox app on your computer, if this has been installed. The app can also be found on the Xbox by pressing the main Xbox button and then pressing My Games & apps. 2). Highlight a game (but don’t select it). 3). Press the Menu (what used to be called Start) button on your controller, and then select Manage game and add-ons.
Select the game tile, and then select each checkbox for which items you want to install.
Select Install, to confirm the installation.
Note that games and add-ons will install automatically to your console’s default storage device. To learn more about managing your storage devices, go to:

At the top-right of this window is our avatar, which is Profile & system. Move the underline_cursor under Profile & System then go > Settings > General > Power options to adjust your power mode settings.
Go to Profile & system > Settings > System > Updates to adjust your system update settings.
=\. If you're in the Creations menu you may need to purchase the mod itself, which is an option below the Bookmark button.

6). Any mods should be in the game's Creations menu. If not seen, press the Options button on your controller (this used to be called the Start button, to the right of the main X button) and choose "Download all Creations in my Library". To see/manage them further, scroll up the Bethesda.net page and select My Mods (light gray) instead of All Mods.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

MODDING FROM CREATIONS MENU (Starfield or Fallout 4)

1). Open the game from the main Xbox window, or any icon which launches the game.

2). Select Creations. A disclaimer might pop up, telling us some legal stuff about the dangers of adding stuff to our games, yea whatever,,, but then, the Creations menu should fill your screen. If a message saying "cannot save to Bethesda.net" shows up, see the Troubleshooting section below. Otherwise, a huge list of choices should show, with the most popular mods of all at the top of the page, I assume. Press the left bumper to open the Search option, if stuff needs to be narrowed down.

3). Enter what you want in the search. Again, type what you want to see with the clumsy in-game keyboard (or a real keyboard, if this is allowed), press the Start button or ENTER, which should begin the search. After the search is done, press the left trigger to open a bunch of options, we can glance into our current Library of mods , for instance.
Again, I searched for Sinks in Starfield, hoping to find more usable water sources, this time using the game's Creations menu, as downloading from Bethesda.net didn't work. Found the exact same mod, Working Water Cooler, except this time I could download straight from the water cooler's page without losing the file somewhere between my game and its Library. 8.73 megabyates. "Are you sure you want to Download Working Water Cooler?" Hell yes! Sometimes we'll need to pay for the creation. Downloading takes time, sometimes. Be patient!

Often, there's an option to look at other work from the same author a choice or two below the Download button.

4). Downloading the mod automatically installs it, but to be sure, press the Y button. This shows the current mods in your game, and also the way they've been arranged. Console players who've never modded on PC who might be reading this: "Load Order" is very important. Some mods can clash with others, and sometimes overwrite changes; whatever's at the bottom of the order "wins". If I installed something into Starfield which made sinks and water coolers non-functional for instance, I'd better make sure it's not below Working Water Cooler when the game launches. Use the left bumper to move stuff up or down.

Pressing X in the Creations window opens options to purchase credits sometimes, for some games, because some Creations do cost money. 💰💰💰 Oddly, I got the water cooler mod working and installed in my game even though it said I don't have enough credits on my Xbox account, though maybe since I signed up & paid for GamePass a month ago, this allowed me to purchase Working Water Cooler, sweet! 💦💧

5). Finally, press the View button (to the very left of the main Xbox button), now there should be options to save or Restore the load order to Bethesda.net. We'll want to SAVE. This is important because in the future, if we need to uninstall our game, we can also Restore those mods we had in the past in one easy step, by pressing the View button button and selecting Restore. Voila 🍷

Starfield will confirm 'the load order has changed' or some such, after exiting the CREATIONS menu. Get in the game!

Keep in mind, loading Creations into the game sometimes disables Achievements, as it'd be all too easy to cheat by using some mod to get these without working for them. But so what, right? I'd rather customize my game than see artificial plaques go up in the game's Achievements wall, that's an easy tradeoff for me.



---------------------------------------------------------------------

TROUBLESHOOTING

If you get a message saying "unable to save current load order to Bethesda.net" when selecting Creations in the Start menu that's not in the game, this could be why..... Firstly, even if this message occurs, sometimes the Creation menu may still open. If so, here's some info I got from Googling:

1). If you are unable to save your current load order to Bethesda.net on Xbox, make sure your device is loaded to the proper account. Exit the game, open the 'net and make sure you're logged into Bethesda.net. Another possibility is: it may be due to an upcoming update; December 2025 was the last one. these will reset the mod load order. To avoid complications, it is recommended to save your console load order before the update. Here are the steps to save your load order:

2). Navigate to the Creations Menu and select the Load Order Menu. Or just press the Y button on an Xbox controller.

3). At the bottom of the Load Order Menu screen, select "Load Order Archive", or the View button on your controller. Now, any mods or creations you've selected should be on your monitor or TV. Select these one by one by pressing A, or delete by pressing X.

4). Press the View button (to the very left of the main Xbox button), now there should be options to save or Restore the load order to Bethesda.net.
Select "Save Load Order to Bethesda.net." Duh. If the "unable to save current load order to Bethesda.net" still occurs, and you've saved in the past,


5). Confirm by selecting "Yes," on a controller. If the Unable to save load order to Bethesda.net" message still pops up, it may be due to a game's update or a glitch. Here are some steps you can take to troubleshoot the problem:
1). Power cycle your console by pressing and holding the main power button on the Xbox itself until the monitor screen and Xbox button powers off. Now press & hold until it powers on, you may need to hold the main Xbox button on the controller too. This can help reset the game and resolve any temporary glitches, getting successfully into the Creations menu from the game. THIS HELPED ME, 12/24/2026. I could also save the FO4 load order to Bethesda's servers. Voila 🍷 If you're still stuck, continue steps below.

2). Disable mods: Try deactivating all your mods and then attempt to save your load order again.

3). Use the Load Order Archive: Navigate to the Creations Menu, select the Load Order Menu, and use the "Load Order Archive" option to save your current load order.

If After saving and exiting the Creation menu, if a message saying something like "The Creation selection/load order has changed", this is okay. Press OK. Load or Continue a gamesave. The game (Fallout 4 for me) should confirm that your "load order has changed", and you'll be able to activate whatever creations you've chosen, indicating the process is complete. Start the game and load a save. There should be a final confirmation message to activate any mods or creations. YES please, goshdammit!

]If there's a message saying "Could not log into Bethesda.net servers" when trying to select the Creations menu in the game,
1). Check your Server Status: Before proceeding, verify if there are any server outages or maintenance activities by checking the Bethesda Support Twitter account or their official website.

2). Ensure that your username and password are correct by logging into the Bethesda.net website thru your Xbox menus, Microsoft Edge the appropriate browser. If you have not verified your account, do so now.






https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ba6tBM7TQT8

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1aknl_ze...ME/edit?tab=t.0

This is amazing!!! Thank you so much for this tutorial, I LOVE it !!!!!!

STARFIELD TUTORIALS


Rather than write up some guides to learn this game I'll link to some of the better tutorials and guides I have found.

A no-fuss Guide to Starfield Space Travel -- Doesn't go into enough detail in print, but this site includes some helpful pictures,

Flying tutorial -- The in-game flying tutorial is too short in my opinion.

Starfield Pilot's Guide & HUD tutorial -- Another video. I figure if I watch/read enough of these I'll finally get the hang of flying in this game. This vid is somewhat annoying with the jam-boy music in the background but it's the most comprehensive tutorial I've found so far. He at least explains everything Vasco/Bethesda don't.

Docking our spacecraft to other space stations (video)

Building spacecrafts video

This is wonderful! I am def going to need this! And I had no idea we could build our own space crafts!!! Thank you for this!

[Renee]

Cool. thanks, Alienware Lady. 👽

Now in this post, when it's done, I'm going to compose a draft on Papyrus theory (why Bethesda chose to use a new scripting language in Skyrim and latter games in the first place) as well as a standalone lesson on how to get Papyrus scripting working in the Creation Kit. I'm typing this from memory and my gaming computer is not up and running yet so there may be some things not fully explained, yet. Some of the text below was originally written to a friend as I tried to explain how Papyrus works, so for a while it'll be another work in progress until everything is organized nice and elegant, okay?

Papyrus Theory
Why did Bethesda abandon the older method of C++ scripting found in Morrowind and Oblivion? It's much easier to use, right? All we gotta do is write some code which makes sense within the context of the game, referencing this and that, depending what we're trying to accomplish. Make sure the script saves (compiles), and generally you're done. Extra steps are generally not needed, whereas with Papyus scripting, they are. So, first of all, and this is mostly for any absolute Papyrus newbies out there: Creation Kit scripts aren't stored in the .esps or .esms of Skyrim like they are for Morrowind, Fallout 3/New Vegas, and Oblivion. In the Creation Kit, Scripts literally have their own section in the Data folder. Scripts are literally their own objects, just like NPCs and Weapons and so on.... They can be moved and deleted straight from the Data > Scripts folders just like other objects mentioned. For a long time, I would try to write code in Skyrim's Creation Kit (CK) just as I would in earlier editors, only to get numerous error messages and I even broke my game in 2017. I was mega-frustrated! Like, why the [censored] did they switch to this brand-new language when the older one worked fine?

I do wish I could find some interviews with some Bethesda developers on why they switched scripting languages, but since I haven't been able to find any on YouTube, here's my theory.

In the older games, the game's engine was constantly trying to access all these Referenced objects from afar, from a main script attached to some quest, right? Maybe a script mentions a referenced NPC who's halfway across Cyrodiil or the Capitol Wasteland, and so on; nowhere near where we are, is what I'm saying-- The main thing is: Scripts in Oblivion and other early games run continuously, every 6 seconds the engine reads all scripts in the entire game until something, some If statement usually, proves true. So think about that, it's kind of wasteful, because most of the time, most scripts aren't reading true, so the engine constantly looks at them, and is constantly saying "nope,nope, nope" as these If statements are not getting their turn to cause whatever results. And when something finally = true, let's say an NPC's Reference ID is getting called upon for some reason, there's the possibility of a crash if any sort of issue with that person happens; maybe the person is in the wrong cell or worldspace, maybe he or she is no longer alive and so on.

Well with Papyrus, the idea seems to be, let's make all these objects into properties, attaching them directly to the quest itself. So, instead of the game engine constantly needing to reach all across the land looking for all the referenced stuff most of all, but also any base objects which happen to be near our character, Papyrus is trying to ensure the game engine doesn't have to work as hard. Which means every book, weapon, whatever objects mentioned in the script are now local to the quest itself. We're saying "here is everything you need to consider, all the objects are right here, game engine," which I'm assuming makes the process maybe more difficult for us, as we're the ones writing the scripts, converting all these objects and references into properties, but from the engine's perspective it's like; "you don't need to look all across the world, game engine..." Hence, this is one of the reasons Skyrim and Fallout 4 hardly ever crash or freeze. I mean jeez, my modded Fallout 3 was guaranteed to crash once every game session, to the point I'd constantly make saves and immediately load them, because I knew sometime within the hour the game would crash anyway. My modded Oblivion wasn't as crashy as Fallout 3, but it also was not nearly as stable as Skyrim on computer. -- In numerous questionnaires I've seen on the 'net, even as I privately ask friends here at Chorrol: "which game is most stable for you?" The answer is generally always Skyrim, while Fallout 3 suffers the most.


So, where do we start? Maybe you've tried to write some scripts in the Creation Kit like aaaBornoldTheMagnificentRef.Enable or some such code, only to get massive error messages. So you Google "how to write scripts in Creation Kit," and the Hello World tutorial shows up once again.

Bethesda's Hello World tutorial only goes so far, yet for years it was the only result which showed up over and over when I'd launch numerous Google and Bing searches. Hello World is great if you're trying to make some activators which affect a few strict in-game results, but I wanted to make timers, and all sorts of other fancy ideas. So I was stuck, for actual years I was stuck. But see, now that I know how Papyrus works I've had very few problems. The main thing; Learn how to use Properties, that was the main problem I had during 2017 into Covid times. Every object mentioned in a Papyrus script needs to have a corresponding property which goes along with it, and it has to be the right type of property. Book properties cannot be used for people or weapons or quests, for instance. Sure, "BorgnoldTheMagnificent" might exist in the CK's Object > NPC window, and you may have made plenty of saves with Borgnold in both the game and the CK, as both a base object and a referenced object, but if you try to write BorgnoldTheMagnificent into a Papyrus script without using NPC or Reference properties you won't get anywhere. The game's engine isn't even able to "see" scripts which haven't got properties constructed beforehand.

That is it, that is all, and once you learn how it works, how Papyrus wants us to do things, you will eventually never fail at getting scripts to compile, and then also work in the game. 🖊🖋I would say Papyrus is not initially intuitive; it requires us to build scipts almost like building blocks, but once you get the hang of it, it's an overall more stable system of scripting, which is part of why Skyrim so rarely crashes. Make sense? If someone at Nexus or here at Chorrol explained that to me way back in 2017 it would've saved lots of time.

I'll say it again. Everything, mostly everything: books, NPCs, objects, references, whatever, needs to be made into Properties, and then it's those property names which get used in scripts, not Gold001 or aaaWarriorReference or base items & named references already in the game, unless you've named those properties Gold001 or aaaWarriorReference or whatever. As we'll see in a moment,it IS possible to give a property the same name as it's got in the Object window, without getting redundant error messages. But the main rule is; Other than setstages and a few other bits of code which don't require properties to compile and work, you can't just write scripts in the CK and expect them to operate, or even compile. It took me literally years, from 2016 until Covid times, to get the hang of this.

But the advantage is, in Skyrim anyways, once a script is up and running in your game, its quest is bulletproof, in the sense I've never had a script not work a second time in someone else's (some other character's) game if it worked initially in a previous game.


Papyrus Standalone Lesson
So I've tried to explain the "why", but not the "how". Let me type up how; maybe I'll include this as the next tutorial in my modding thread. In this scenario, "Grothnaar" greets the player, giving him or her some money. To describe how this is done, we'll need to refer to the typical Topic-Info window where dialog gets structured along with scripts and script fragments, so let's pull up this link, please. Ugh, it's rather small. I had to Alt + mouse wheel to make that image bigger. But as you can (hopefully) see, it's the typical Topic-Info page full of boxes, slots, and windows, similar to what's in the GECK and Oblivion's Construction Set Quest windows. Except it's also way different in the way it processes scripts. The actual Script box we'd see in earlier editors beneath the Conditions window are now two boxes, at the very bottom. Anyway, up top are the Topic Text slot and Response Text window; what we click on in the game to cause an NPC to speak, and then what they actually say. All of that works exactly the same in Skyrim's Creation Kit as it does in eariler editors. We've also got a bunch of toggles we can use to flag stuff on or off, such as "Goodbye" will cause the NPC to stop dialog and maybe walk away, "Has LIP File" and "Force Subtitle" are used to allow the game to access pre-recorded dialog or silent text, and so on.

The Conditions window is also pretty similar to earlier editors. GetIsID focuses on certain people, GetFaction and GetStage narrows stuff down to specific factions or moments of a quest and so on. All of that's the same, or close enough, to older editors.

The part I'm talking about is mostly at the bottom. I don't have a bunch of pictures to link to so I'll try to describe what to do while googling for various images. The two boxes at the very bottom, left to right, are the Papyrus Fragment [Begin] box and the Papyrus Fragment [End] boxes. The begin box gets triggered mostly at the start of dialog and the End box as, or after, dialog ends. From what I recall, there isn't much difference between these two boxes as per how they work in real-time, in the game, but it's THOSE boxes I am talking about, okay? You can type what I like to call a "semicolon script", like ;Grothnaar responds to player in either one of those, without worrying about properties at all, or you can type a Setstage like GetOwningQuest().SetStage(X) into either one, assuming some stages have been pre-arranged in the Quest Stages tab. Neither of those bits of code requires properties, but to move on and compose other scripts, we'll need to start adding properties, okay? Can't do this yet, though. Not until we compile the script.

So press the Compile button, either one. If there's no issues with the script fragment(s) just typed, a blue icon should appear in the "Script Name" window on the very right. Usually, the name of the script is gibberish. In this example link I'm barely able to see TIF_0109995 is what the CK randomly named the script, however, it's possible to right-click on the icon and pretty sure it's possible to rename the script icon to something useful, in plain English, although I don't have my computer up and running yet, so 'citation needed here'. Maybe I'd name the gibberish "aaaGrothnaarGreetingScriptFragment" or some such. This rename gets stored somewhere in the Creation Kit. Pretty sure it also gets written into the script itself, becoming its official scriptname. Notice the script icon in this blurry image is also no longer blue--it is yellow as well. That's because it's had properties added; the icon changes color as we modify the script, adding properties and such, which helps us keep track of how far along it's been developed. Now, we can also right-click on that script icon and select "Edit Source", which is how we view the script so far for this moment. Or we can right-click and then select Add Properties, pretty sure. I'm going from memory here, but pretty sure that's how we begin the process. OR, we can left-click (highlight) the icon and press the Properties button. It is greyed-out in either example image I linked to, I think if we left-click the icon (blue, or blue + yellow) this allows us to use the Properties, Add, or Remove buttons. We can add pre-written scripts added by Bethesda just with the Add button (really convenient, this is one of the better features of the CK), or Remove the blue icon we just compiled, but let's move on. We want to add one (or several) properties....

Either way, right-click on the icon and select Edit Properties, or simply press the Properties button, either method causes the Properties window, which is smaller, and I believe it temporarily, sometimes overlays the main dialog window. I'll just describe from memory how it works. Obviously, first thing to do is press the Add Property button, which which opens up the panel in this link. The Type scroll-bar shows the types of properties available, such as Quests, Books, References, NPCs, Weapons, Sounds, and so on. And we can name the property whatever we want. It's this NAME which will eventually get used in the script fragment we'll later write in one of those Papyrus boxes at the bottom of the Topic-Info quest page, Begin or End, and GET THIS, this process allows us to be redundant! So, we can't just type Gold001 into a Papyrus box and expect it to process without a corresponding property, but the CK allows us to name the property "Gold001" and that will work without the editor screaming at us to rename the property/"the CK already has an object with that same name!" So we name it, press OK, and this panel pops up next. Well, it's the same panel which showed up before, when we first pressed the Properties button or right-clicked > Edit Property, except now we get to link the property we named to an object in the game. And the cool thing is, oftentimes if we named it something already in the Object window, it'll autofill into the right side of the panel. So if I named a property Gold001, and then select this in the left window (where it says Property Name) the Pick Object scroll-down on the right will sometimes autofill "Gold001", or whatever object we're going for. BUT, the property name also doesn't have to correspond to the actual name, therefore, I can name the property "Gold" but have it correspond to Gold001, or whatever I'd like, this sort of flexibility comes in handy sometimes. Typically though, I'd like to have the property name == the actual name, which often saves an extra step. In this case I can now press OK and Ok again, closing the Properties panels, returning to the Topic-Info page, or I can keep adding more properties. It seems tedious, pressing OK, then Add Property, then choosing a Type from the scroll-bar, and then naming it, but after a while the process becomes somewhat relaxing, even Zen-like, assuming I'm adding property after property at this time.


Click OK, Voila, that property, or any others I added just now, is okay to use in a script fragment, for this moment, when Grothnaar greets us, but only for this particular dialog moment. We cannot keep using this same property for other dialog or quest moments in the future. Each property, unfortunately, is standalone, and must be reconstructed for other moments. But let's continue... I can now click OK and OK again to close the Property panel(s), click OK to close the Topic-Info panel itself, click OK a second time to close the entire Quest window, (which saves any properties-linked-to-objects, or any other changes made so far...., so very important to continually close and reopen these windows) Then reopen the Quest window, and the Topic-Info page, and finally type Game.GetPlayer().AddItem(Gold001), X into one of those Papyrus boxes, if I want Grothnaar to pay my character when he first meets him or her.

So see, it's not intuitive, in fact it might seem tedious as well, but that's pretty much How it's done. Now let's have another look at the script icon, whether it's blue or blue+yellow.

After right-clicking the icon, and selecting Edit Source, you can then see the script so far, which might look something like this.... (note: the script in these spoiler tags is just an example.)



....see, the Sciptname is up top, just as it was in earlier editors, except we didn't have to manually type it, it showed up there, automatically, after compiling from either Papyrus box, and then renaming the script fragment later on.... we can also see a variety of properties have also jumbled their way into the main script; we've got properties for a Float timer, one for an unrelated Quest, and finally a Misc Object property for Gold001. All of that shows up, arranged in place automatically, without us having to retype any of that, though we can also make manual changes into the script itself if we want, similar to how it's done in eariler editors. In the example above, I manually typed & added everything from "Scriptname aaaTimerScript extends Quest" to "EndFunction", so it would work properly as a timer, and my person also gets paid at some point.