Today In Skyrim (Spoilerific), Like the other one, but with added spoilers!!! Options

[mALX]

EDIT: A free one for Claire. (From before I gave him his tattoos.)

Look at the expression on Jerric's face !!!

[Grits]

Jerric’s expression is what made me take the shot. I swung the camera around to make a save and caught him leering.

Aww, Buffy just wants to stand on a chair behind Jerric and braid the hair on his back.

Buffy has an open invitation!

Jerric returned Anka to her shop in Dawnstar (turns out she’s from JK’s Skyrim), delivered Lydia to Proudspire Manor where she can spar or whatever with Jordis, and after a mini-vacation in his Solitude apartment dropped Abiene off in Whiterun so she could return to her routine at the temple.

He’s feeling a need to get off the roads and explore. That means Lildereth. Jerric needs to restock his travel rations first (drinks plus various sturdy pies and pasties), so he’ll want to head across the lake to use the Hammer-Helms’s oven and empty their mead barrels. I expect he and the elf will leave in the morning.

[Acadian]

Oh, I know who Anka in JK's Dawnstar is! Coincidently, Buffy just picked up a hostage rescue mission herself - Katla (of Katla's Farm near Solitude) was kidnapped and is being held in a cave clear the other side of the map.

Yup, grabbing a woodsister is very helpful for scouting and exploring off road!

[Grits]

Acadian, those kidnappers do not mind taking a road trip! Now Anka is wearing a huge spear on her back that she picked up in a scuffle along the way. It does not seem to impede her porch sweeping.

Jerric and Lil have been wandering around enjoying some fine autumn weather on the Whiterun plains. They stopped in at Greenspring Stronghold to visit Mithilion the Hammer and his ghostly bride Lardrumph. Those two don’t mind some occasional company. Jerric has an idea that they might offer up their spare beds as a sort of hunting lodge for visitors from Cyrodiil. There are a lot of two-legged varmints in the area. Jerric knows an Orsimer knight who might like to come north and thin the herd.

As sometimes happens they met an orphaned lad in their travels. Jerric invited him to live at Lakeview and be his kin. Some might have first asked the folks at Lakeview who will be raising this boy, but not Jerric. Anyway he knows they have plenty of seats at their table. So now Jerric has a new audience for his tall tales and Lil has something to think about.

[ghastley]

That all reminds me that I wanted to ask you how you're doing your custom NPC's. I have Fluffie and Fuzz being followers in each other's game, but it took AFT to make them be followers properly. That's excessive for my needs and I'd like to do it a simpler way.

Also, has anyone tried equipping a follower with the Bound Bow spell? I'm finding that Fluffie is just carrying the thing on her back once she's cast it, and doesn't actually use it as a bow. Since I didn't remember to give her a melee weapon, she was running in with her fists.

[Grits]

All of my custom followers use the vanilla “Follow me, I need your help” dialog. I used parts of this tutorial to learn how: TES Nexus link. They need to be rank -1 in the CurrentFollowerFaction and rank 0 in the PotentialFollowerFaction and use a voice set that includes the follower dialog. Also they need a relationship with the player (I use Ally) and a high enough disposition (75) to allow them to be recruited.

If you want a non-vanilla voice set there are mods that expand the dialog for some of the other sets. I used More Follower Voices Plus Khajiit Marriage to give my hold guard followers the hold guard voices. They were hilarious.

I gave Mithilion the male orc voice. It’s neat to hear it coming out of this huge high elf.

I’ve never tried the bound bow with followers but I’ve seen a mage follower from Scrabbulor’s Companions and Followers use one. AFT is very finicky about load order. When I see Lil running in with her fists I know that AFT has slipped too far up.

[Acadian]

Grits, that’s funny about Anka! Nice looking orc stronghold – courtesy of ghastley I’m guessing? No surprise that Jerric can’t resist the soft tug of an orphan. They really pull at your heart. Buffy lives out of her saddlebags and doesn’t even own a home so (fortunately) adopting is out for her. Somewhere deep behind those dark elven eyes, it seems there is some nesting instincts in Lil?

Ghastely, don’t know anything about making custom followers but am quite happy with AFT for regular followers. Also I’m afraid I can’t help on the bound bow question. Never tried giving a bound weapon spell to a follower.

*

Buffy currently has five active quests, all radiant. She’s currently escorting Katla (of Katla’s farm) back home after rescuing her from a bunch of falmer all the way over in Darkwater Cave Pass near Darkwater Crossing. That rescue mission was as a courtesy to the Companions. She also has two radiants for the College Arcanium, one for the Dawnguard and a bounty one for the steward of Falkreath.

Her primary ‘affiliation’ remains the College, where she holds the rather unimpressive title of Arcanium Field Researcher working for Grumpy Orc. She also helps keep all the court mages supplied with magic goods to sell, mostly scrolls, soul gems and staves. That aspect is nice because it keeps her on quite a regular ‘circuit’ around all of Skyrim. As you recall, there is certainly never any moss allowed to form under Superian’s hooves.

This post has been edited by Acadian: Nov 18 2015, 12:09 AM

[Renee]

I'm not claiming to be the best NPC follower creator at Chorrol, but I just learned how to make my own a couple weeks ago. My biggest problem was that I didn't know NPC followers are limited to certain racial types, and if your NPC is not one of these racial types , your NPC can't be a follower, assuming you choose a racial voice type that the base game doesn't recognize (High Elf Haughty is an example here). I only learned about this after reading a random YouTube post which mentioned that not all voice types will work. I found a mod that fixes this?, but only by Luck. Anyways, that's how I got a couple Thalmor followers for Master Baytor.

I will post the steps I took as I learned to make my own followers here in this Spoiler tag



Baytor is on hiatus right now. Claire is about to wrap up some sort of Mara quest called Book of Love (which I believe is vanilla). Then she's going to visit the Dawnguard. And then she's going to visit the Vigilant of Stendarr headquarters. Vigilant of Stendarr Quests is a David Brasher mod? I just discovered. I know DB from Oblivion, his work is always tops, so I'm pretty psyched that my cleric will now be able to become a Vigilant as well.


Grits: Whoa what happened to that boy's legs? Okay never mind I see them now. How many children has Jerric adopted so far? Sounds like more than one? WHOA I want that More Follower Voices mod. YES.

Acadian: Nice to hear about what Buffy (not Barbie, ha ha) is up to. I saw your post over at Beth in the Silly Names thread. Anyways, those "grumpy orc" quests are fun. I've had a few characters suss out books for him too.

This post has been edited by Renee: Nov 17 2015, 11:20 PM

[Grits]

Acadian, it’s great to hear about Buffy’s rounds of Skyrim. Jerric’s eyes are always peeled for a glimpse of blonde horse, blonde rider, and intermittently blonde fox. How kind of her to supply the court mages and at the same time remove such dangerous goods from the hands of the lawless. I’m sure Grumpy Orc has never had such a productive Arcanium Field Researcher!

That is indeed ghastley’s marvelous Greenspring Stronghold mod. Jerric is on track to build ghastley’s Ilinalta Den in the near future. He is finally leveling up slowly enough to suit us both, but now he needs one more level to get the mod started. Like Buffy he has no interest in property of his own, but he has a need to feel rooted without settling down. A network of friends gives him that sense of connection. He loves knowing that there are floors all over Skyrim where he can crash for the night. (And even some beds. ) You are right that Lil keeps her nesting instincts deeply hidden, usually even from herself. Young humans remind her that time passes more quickly for some than for others. Her heart wants what she thinks her life can’t accommodate.

ghastley, I look a look in the CK and found something interesting. The follower I’ve seen does not have the bound bow spell, she has the bound bow weapon and bound arrows in her inventory. Hmm. Here is a screenshot of her inventory in the CK.


ADDED: Renee, this is Jerric’s first adoption. Lil adopted Gralnach in one of her games and sent him to Lakeview Manor, which has the same family living there as in Jerric’s games (my Clan Hammer-Helm people). Jerric has met orphans in past games but never had a house with beds where he could send them. He woke up at Lakeview “Feeling a Father’s Love.” That was a shock. He thought he could just drop the kid off and stroll away.

I can’t wait to hear about Claire’s Vigilant quests! Neat!


This post has been edited by Grits: Nov 17 2015, 11:24 PM

[mALX]

That all reminds me that I wanted to ask you how you're doing your custom NPC's. I have Fluffie and Fuzz being followers in each other's game, but it took AFT to make them be followers properly. That's excessive for my needs and I'd like to do it a simpler way.

Also, has anyone tried equipping a follower with the Bound Bow spell? I'm finding that Fluffie is just carrying the thing on her back once she's cast it, and doesn't actually use it as a bow. Since I didn't remember to give her a melee weapon, she was running in with her fists.

Does she need arrows? (or do they come with the bound bow?)

[Acadian]

Does she need arrows? (or do they come with the bound bow?)

The bound bow spell conjures the bound bow with 100 bound arrows. That aspect of the bound bow is a nice improvement over Oblivion's spell that gave you a bow but no arrrows.

[mALX]

Does she need arrows? (or do they come with the bound bow?)

The bound bow spell conjures the bound bow with 100 bound arrows. That aspect of the bound bow is a nice improvement over Oblivion's spell that gave you a bow but no arrrows.

Oh, okay. Yes, agreed: Kind of defeats the purpose of using a bound bow spell if you have to lug arrows around!

[ghastley]

I'm still trying to figure out what happened, but I created Fluffie the NPC with ranks -1 in CurrentFollowerFaction, and 0 in PotentialFollowerFaction, in an inaccessible holding cell. Using prid xxxx, moveto player pulled her out, but now both ranks were now showing as -2!

I suspect residues of AFT, which had been removed with the prior incarnation of Fluffie, Resetting via console made her work properly, sort of.

I gave her the bound bow (and arrows) via inventory, instead of spell. The only difference was wearing the arrows on her back. She still wouldn't use it as a weapon, and grabbed a long bow from the first dead bandit to use instead. At one point, I saw that she had both the bound bow, and her Stoneflesh spell in her left hand. I could try removing all potential left-hand spells to see if that frees it up for bow use, but if she's preferring other choices over the bow, it probably won't be helpful.

I gave her a better normal bow, and she's using that as a primary weapon, as suits her class and combat style.

On the other hand (literally), the bound sword spell works for NPC Fuzz, although I couldn't persuade her to dual-wield two, and the bound sword is sometimes invisible. If she gets another melee weapon, she'll use it in her left hand, and the bound sword in the right.

Adding the two observations makes me think that left-hand is a special case with NPC's and followers. I'll make another sister for bound battleaxe and see what happens. And I'll add her to a game that has never seen AFT.

The objective here was to create a follower who looked harmless (no weapons, no armour), but could summon both when needed. So far, it's a limited success, and an ordinary destruction mage would work just as well. The next step was to be adding a script to restrict the NPC from using physical weapons/armour so they could carry them without changing their style. And after that, the Daedra Seducer transformation, with the sprouting wings, etc.

[Grits]

Strange that moving Fluffie altered her faction ranks. I suppose even if she would use the bound bow weapon from her inventory it wouldn’t suit the purpose of making her look harmless, since the weapon hangs around on the back after a fight. The follower I’ve seen use hers has no other weapons and no spells at all in her spell list. I read somewhere that a modder used a script to make their follower cast the bound weapon spell when combat starts. That’s over my head so I’m afraid I didn’t make a note of where I read it, sorry.

A Skyrim Daedric Seducer would look awesome! I love the mods I’ve seen with horns and wings.

I made a holding cell like you suggested for my sometimes-needed NPCs. It’s the Tavern Between the Worlds. It’s turning into a real tavern because my navmesh skills could use some polish and I feel sorry for the NPCs who get left there. Jerric uses coc to get in and pick up his companions. Pretty soon he will want to go there and buy everyone drinks.

[Renee]

Good luck, ghastley. You'll figure it I'm sure.

I had to deal with a rather odd glitch in Claire's game, which I just figured on my own, but I had to return to an earlier save. All the sudden, I noticed Claire was one-shot-killing everything she came across. And she wasn't taking any damage. I looked at her steel mace in the inventory, and was surprised to see this weapon now did some crazy amount of damage, like 7,278 damage. And all her armor now had armor ratings of "0" (zero), yet she was impervious to damage. This was unacceptable, of course.

I haven't got a clue what caused this but now that I'm playing an earlier save, I think it must be this mod I've got that adds weapon & armor degradation. It's the only thing I can think of. :shrug: But I've had this mod for months now.

Anyways, I didn't have to go back too far. Claire is on her way to Riften, to re-do the next Book of Love quest, and then visit the Dawnguard. I added a Lord Haaf-Mersey NPC to her game, by the way. He is (should be) currently in the Bee 'n' Barb, melord. I have this wacky idea that whenever Claire does Dawnguard stuff, she will do it with LHM. And LHM will have Lakeview Manor just like he did in my Xbox game, and Claire will be able to stop by and visit him. Heh heh....

[Grits]

Renee, that’s so neat that you’re putting LHM in Claire’s game. LHM and Cleric Claire, fighting evil together! I love how rich the Skyrim world can be when we layer in our own creations. The Book of Love is perfect for Claire. I’m glad you could find a save before that weird damage issue.


Jerric, Lil, Darnand, and Ulfe are adventuring with Jerric’s buddy from Anvil, Rhano. (A Grits NPC.)

Jerric was asked by the Whiterun Guard to negotiate peace with the dragon who lives at Shearpoint. A trek across the plains and up a mountain seemed like the perfect way to introduce Rhano to Skyrim.

There were a few scuffles on the way. Rhano fell right in with the group. Jerric gave him exploding arrows so he could tell which archer was responsible for which kills, and also so he didn’t blame Lil if Rhano shot him in the ass. Lil does not respond positively to criticism of her aim from people who step in the way of her shots.

Unlike Lil, Rhano is a combat archer second who prefers his swords first. He stalks straight forward shooting until he reaches melee range, then he whips out his blades and slices whatever is left to pieces. Jerric gave him a bunch of swords to try out. He favors an ebony sword and an ebony scimitar (mod).

The dragon did not wait for them to reach its lair. It opened negotiations by setting everyone on fire from the air. It missed Ulfe and the horses because they are not fool enough to go anywhere near a dragon.

The fight was glorious. As usual Jerric did not see Lil anywhere, but he recovered eight of her arrows later so he knows she was somewhere in the rocks doing what she does. Jerric took a position where he thought the dragon would land, and he was right. He was not expecting a dragon priest to pop out of the sarcophagus right next to him, though. The dragon priest and dragon fought shoulder to shoulder against Jerric for a bit while Rhano charged up the hill behind them. Jerric unleashed the full mayhem of his frost runes against the two of them, fueled by absorbed dragon priest fireballs and dragon fire.

After the battle Darnand reminded Jerric that he had been asked quite some time ago to collect some dragon heartscales for Tolfdir. They had recovered the required special dagger a long time ago, so long ago that Jerric had forgotten its purpose. It was still rattling around in his pack along with assorted items including Dwemer junk for his gyro game, a doll he carries in case he meets a little girl who needs a doll, books that he keeps forgetting to give to Darnand even though Darnand is standing right next to him, a packet of moon sugar for the next time he wants to get baked with Kharjo, and various alchemy ingredients that he suspects might also have recreation use. Now there are also some heartscales in his pack. We’ll see how long he carries them before they find their way to Tolfdir.

The gang is presently outside Raldbthar. They spotted it on the way over the pass from Shearpoint. Jerric and Darnand have not forgotten their quest for Aetherium shards, though Darnand has not had the time to discover the modern names for the locations on Katria’s map. One of the locations she marked could be Raldbthar. They’re about to find out.

[Acadian]

Sounds like Rhano fits right in with the gang. Jerric the Jerricatronachbattlemage, the shadowy archer, the mage and now a capable ranger. How neat to bring him up from Anvil. I'm sure the weather's a shock to his system. I'm glad to see Lil share's Buffy's thinking of 'Why send an elf where an arrow can go?'

[Renee]

Good lord, a fight with two dragons at once? *shivers* Rhano sounds like a good one to have around. Combat archers rock, as long as you can keep out of their way!

a doll he carries in case he meets a little girl who needs a doll

A hahahahaaaaa so true!

I just made an Imperial Soldier follower NPC for Claire's game named Stephen Opp. I am going to try that Additional Follower Voices mod, hopefully it works and we can hear new voices. I gave him the MaleGuard option, which has been completed according to the info at THE Nexus.

[ghastley]

My latest character is a pure mage, and would like to pick up a melee follower before going to Labyrinthian, so she went and found Kharjo. His Moon Amulet is in Frostmere Crypt again! I've never had that quest point me anywhere else, so I loaded my entire load order into TES5edit to see what's overriding it. Nothing! The selection should be random, and it's using the same criteria as each location in my Khajiit Hearthfires, where I get genuinely random bandit lairs.

Actually, I do have one thought. I load a save at the exit from Helgen when I start a new character, rather than start in Helgen itself, as there's too much "controls disabled" going on before, and the exit is the first "quiet" point. I suspect Kharjo's quest is enabled at game start, and the aliases are already filled. There's no need for that, but the check box may default to on.

This post has been edited by ghastley: Nov 24 2015, 02:54 PM

[Grits]

Acadian, companion Lil often gets the last laugh in fights. Since she looks for cover it takes her some time to find a position once the action starts. Then after Jerric and some tough opponent have been whaling away on each other, Lil’s first arrow can be the final blow that sends Jerric’s foe sailing across the room.

I’m amazed by how much fun Rhano brings to the party. I gave him the same voice set that Erik the Slayer has. His battle cries are epic!

Renee, this time it was a dragon priest (Krosis) and a dragon, which was neat because the dragon was still alive and on the ground when Krosis popped out. I had never had that happen before. Usually the dragon is dead before my characters get to the Word Wall where Krosis sleeps. Jerric’s ranged attack is unreliable against a flying dragon, so he charged up there hoping to tempt it to land so he could nail it with runes. Big fun. Claire’s new follower sounds like fun! I loved hearing the different comments you get from non-standard voiced followers.

ghastley, I don’t think I’ve ever gotten Frostmere Crypt from Kharjo. I remember getting Lost Knife Hideout a bunch of times in a row. I wonder if I was re-starting someone from their Helgen save when that happened.


Raldbthar did contain an item that Jerric and Darnand were looking for. Katria made an appearance when they found it and cheered them on to their next step. Jerric plans to go to the college next, however. He suspects that since Katria is dead her sense of time will allow some detours. Anyway Darnand may have some luck at the Arcanaeum pinpointing their next location. If it is near Riften they will probably go get Mjoll. Jerric would like to see bladesman Rhano’s reaction to the full glory of a Nord woman with a really big sword.

While they were in Raldbthar Jerric’s one-handed skill hit 100. Perhaps it was Rhano’s influence.