Renee's Modding Thread Options

[Renee]

Mod-making thread basically, which focuses heavily on quest-making. The first two tutorials (How to make a fetch quest and how to make a kill quest) are very hand-holdy. They are designed for those who are just starting to learn the art of quest-making. Other tutorials get more advanced, as my wacky ideas have pushed their boundaries.

Just click on any of the links in the post below this one.


Bethesda Units. (How distance compares in-game to real-life).

Xpadder Walkthrough page. Xpadder is a site which allows gaming controllers to mimic the key & mouse functions. Xpadder, or similar programs such as Joy to Keys, are absolutely crucial to get the most out of older games such as Arena, Daggerfall, Morrowind, and Oblivion, for those who prefer controllers. They can also be used for newer games (Fallout 3/NV or Skyrim) to provide alternate controlling scenarios during times when a game's native D-pad arrangement needs to be shut off.




This post has been edited by Renee: Apr 16 2024, 06:27 PM

[Renee]

More Dynamic NPCs! Game: TES III: Morrowind

One of the first mods I looked for in this game was something which makes Morrowind's people actually move around. Especially those people who stand in the same spot (usually in indoor locations), literally for months. I figured this would be a quick search. Surprisingly, I still haven't found something which does this. There's gotta be a mod out there which makes the NPCs of this game wander a bit? Even if it's from one side of a room to the other?

Never did find anything, so far. But good news: it's pretty easy to make our own More Dynamic NPCs for Morrowind.

I'm going to start with Arrille's Tradehouse in Seyda Neen. Now, I don't really have a problem with shopkeepers or merchants standing around. It makes sense that they'd tend to their counters, waiting for somebody like us to amble in.

Recommended: Nighttime Door Locks makes shopkeepers and home-owning NPCs lock their doors after dark. This dispels the illusion of people who stay put in the same cells 24/7 to some extent.

CELL & RENDER windows
1). I am going to start with Tolvise Othralen. This is the lady who wears green & yellow, and always stands next to Arrille. Find Seyda Neen, Arrille's Tradehouse, and find Tolvise in the Render window Double left-click on her in this window. Unlike Oblivion's CS, clicking on her in the CELL window will not open her NPC panel.

2). Click on the AI button. This is located toward the middle bottom of any NPC's panel. The AI Data panel pops up.

3). Look toward the left side of this panel, where the AI Packages window is. And notice this: Tolvise already has a Wander package!!! ... In fact this is true of a lot of NPCs who eternally stand around. A lot of them DO have Wander packages. Which is why they'll occasionally take two steps in one direction, and then go back to standing around.

4). Double left-click on Tolvise's Wander package. The Distance slot is what we want to change. By default, a lot of indoor NPCs have a Distance of anywhere from 0 to 30, which is not very far. No wonder they barely move.

5). So this is easy to change. I like using binary numbers, such as 128, 256, 512, 1024, and so on. 256 is a good number for Tolvise (the Tradehouse is not very big) but for places which are larger, such as guilds, I'll choose 512 or 1024.

6). Click Save (or just press Return or Enter on your keyboard) twice, closing the package and AI Data panels. We'll usually have to manually click on Save to close the NPC's panel.

It is best to use the Render window, going into Cells which we know we want to influence, and clicking on each NPC just like I did with Tolvise. We can also make changes from the Object window, however it's not always easy to know which NPC we are changing, and personally I want to know. Because not all of them should wander about, in my opinion. Anyway, I just gave most of the NPCs in Balmora's Council Club the same treatment, for instance.

Note that some NPCs will have a AI button which is grey, and we can't click on it. Most of the NPC's info is Blocked. I'm not sure why Bethesda did this, but there's gotta be a reason. Maybe they didn't want a bunch of people walking into each other (which is what they will do sometimes, if the majority of them have broader Wander packages).

7). For such NPCs, I'll simply toggle Blocked (lower right corner of the NPC panel) off. Then I'll click Save. Reopen the NPC. Now we can change their AI as desired. And then I always toggle Blocked back on with these NPCs before saving. Because there's gotta be a reason why their info was blocked in the first place.

Like I said, occasionally they will now walk into inanimate objects, or each other! In my opinion, this is better than having a bunch of people standing around like statues, though. They will now clomp about, wandering into other rooms occasionally if their Distance is large enough. It really changes the feel of interiors, right?

In situations where we have to steal something, such as the diamond which must get stolen during that first Thieves Guild quest, it is possible to wait for them wander into another room, making thievery less frustrating, and more possible.

Final note: Some NPCs don't have a Wander package, instead they'll have Follow or something else. DO NOT change these packages unless you really know what you're doing. They are there for a reason, usually something quest-related. And also, I never try to add a second package (Wander, or whatever) to these folks.

https://web.archive.org/web/20200218144534/...aithful-squire/

This post has been edited by Renee: Apr 22 2024, 06:04 PM