[WIP] Skykids - Child races & other technical goodies - No more armor patcher! New CotS R2 Race!(6/22/15)

[Redflyingmonkey]

Mean thread ? Does that mean we can be mean in this thread ? 

[Grumpf]

ROFL!!! Nooooo I spent hours cleaning it aaaarg...

 

Main thread, main... Jee!  

 

Raaa * forgotten...

 

Ok well I spent 4 hours learning Dutch and I'm French speaking. See got an excuse.

[Redflyingmonkey]

T'inquiètes je galère aussi ! 

[Spyder Arachnid]

So quick question regarding the NPC replacer, do you plan on adding support/addons for mods that add children?

 

Currently using Expanded Towns and Cities and it adds a few new children to the game. I know there is a few other mods out there that do the same, so thought I'd ask if in time, you plan on adding support for those mods in the form of an addon or something.

 

Thanks!

[Rez Delnava]

I don't have the official roadmap for future SK plans, but I think support for outside mods, mods that add generic townie kids, will come after reworked/additional presets are made; and then once the presets are done, I think bandit kids is a high-ish priority for en_hawk and JerWA.

 

But the process for converting them yourself is an easy enough process, but time consuming:

Using these two guides:

http://wiki.tesnexus.com/index.php/Adding_a_Follower_NPC_to_Skyrim

http://wiki.tesnexus.com/index.php/Using_a_face_made_with_Chargen_Extension_on_an_NPC_for_Skyrim

 

I won't go into details, but you basically open the mod in question in TES5Edit, add SK as a master, then change the race to SK. Next you'd make the face you want in Racemenu, and from there follow those guides.  There is a trick with the nifmerge too though; it works best on facegen parts that match vertex numbers so you may need to take an existing SK head duplicate and rename it to match the Form ID of one of the kids found in the mod you are altering.

 

If you're interested, PM me and I can walk you through some of the details.  There is one thing that is still perplexing me and thats the tintmasks: the ones exported by Ctrl+F4 are low quality, the ones exported by CGE are not properly compressed to a format Skyrim can use for faces and the compression technique used by most .dds tools leaves terrible artifacts. en_hawk was working on a solution, but I never heard what that was.

[Spyder Arachnid]

I don't have the official roadmap for future SK plans, but I think support for outside mods, mods that add generic townie kids, will come after reworked/additional presets are made; and then once the presets are done, I think bandit kids is a high-ish priority for en_hawk and JerWA.

 

But the process for converting them yourself is an easy enough process, but time consuming:

Using these two guides:

http://wiki.tesnexus.com/index.php/Adding_a_Follower_NPC_to_Skyrim

http://wiki.tesnexus.com/index.php/Using_a_face_made_with_Chargen_Extension_on_an_NPC_for_Skyrim

 

I won't go into details, but you basically open the mod in question in TES5Edit, add SK as a master, then change the race to SK. Next you'd make the face you want in Racemenu, and from there follow those guides.  There is a trick with the nifmerge too though; it works best on facegen parts that match vertex numbers so you may need to take an existing SK head duplicate and rename it to match the Form ID of one of the kids found in the mod you are altering.

 

If you're interested, PM me and I can walk you through some of the details.  There is one thing that is still perplexing me and thats the tintmasks: the ones exported by Ctrl+F4 are low quality, the ones exported by CGE are not properly compressed to a format Skyrim can use for faces and the compression technique used by most .dds tools leaves terrible artifacts. en_hawk was working on a solution, but I never heard what that was.

 

That's nice and all, but I use ECE, not RaceMenu. So I don't even use CharGen.

 

But thanks though.

[MidbossVyers]

Out of curiosity, what is the default head size for Sky Kids in the event that I want to manually adjust it using Race Menu, as opposed to disabling RaceMenuPlugin.esp?

[Guest Grestorn]

I've created a Follower for Skykids. I'd like to offer it to en_hawk to put it onto the Skykids page, if he'd chose to do so, since it solely based on their work.

 

The follower is called Yorick (no, not related League of Legeds or Hamlet ... ) and he's a 15 year old Redguard boy who's all alone since his parents passed away. 

 

A bit more background story is available through a letter which is in his inventory. 

 

I'd love to give him a bit more personality with some unique dialog, but I don't like mute text and I cannot voice him myself, since I don't sound like a 15 year old and I'm not a native english speaker, either. 

 

If you're willing to help him survive in Skyrim and teach him how to stand for himself, you can find him in the Sleeping Giant Inn in Riverwood. And don't worry, he's a really capable archer and also knows how defend himself with a sword. 

 

Please note that besides Skykids itself, you'll also need Apachii's Sky Hair mod as well as LogRaam's Eyes of Beauty for Yorick.

 

Here you can download the mod: Yorick.rar

 

[China Cat]

I've been using RCOTS but I've seen people say that this mod is more stable, but in what way? If it's more stable performance wise than I'd consider using this instead, no offense to Glouf, I think RCOTS is great. But after installing quite a few mods I've had trouble with performance, using things like Enboost, SSME and SBW have helped somewhat, my fps is fine in most indoor places and often better in dungeons. I have alot of mods installed but I don't think it's too many, it seems it might be certain ones, I suspect it might be interesting and inconsequential NPC that's effecting my performance but I can't say for sure as I'm not too knowledgeable on the subject. I want to try and uninstall those npc mods but I think some of my other mods rely on it. I know my PC is quite old, I'm running Bootcamp on a 2011 iMac but I was able to play vanilla on high quality with no issues. Sorry I digressed a bit there I just wanted to know if Skykids was more performance friendly, but if anyone could make suggestions on my other points that would be appreciated, thanks.

[Guest Grestorn]

RCOTS tends to give me reproducable CTDs in certain areas. Since Skykids has a different approach it seems to be more stable in general. 

[Spyder Arachnid]

I've been using RCOTS but I've seen people say that this mod is more stable, but in what way? If it's more stable performance wise than I'd consider using this instead, no offense to Glouf, I think RCOTS is great. But after installing quite a few mods I've had trouble with performance, using things like Enboost, SSME and SBW have helped somewhat, my fps is fine in most indoor places and often better in dungeons. I have alot of mods installed but I don't think it's too many, it seems it might be certain ones, I suspect it might be interesting and inconsequential NPC that's effecting my performance but I can't say for sure as I'm not too knowledgeable on the subject. I want to try and uninstall those npc mods but I think some of my other mods rely on it. I know my PC is quite old, I'm running Bootcamp on a 2011 iMac but I was able to play vanilla on high quality with no issues. Sorry I digressed a bit there I just wanted to know if Skykids was more performance friendly, but if anyone could make suggestions on my other points that would be appreciated, thanks.

 

I can help ya (note: no offense to Glouf in any way, he just started work on a messed up mod to begin with and did what he could with it).

 

RCotS is a mess file wise and asset wise. Very buggy (if you can't tell from the thread), and overwrites a ton of vanilla assets, along with other mod assets. It is built of Jittek's old CotS mod, which was rather outdated and did the same thing. Glouf took it, and did his own variation on it, but it still suffers the same bugs and glitches that the old one has (along with a bunch of new ones that have been added). As with the vanilla assets, it overwrites the original races and makes them use the RCotS assets instead of their own. The armor he provides overwrites vanilla armors and even some other mod's armors (like UNP Mashup for example). It is not standalone AT ALL like he claims it is, as it overwrites a ton of vanilla stuff and other custom mod's. And on a side note, seeing as he hasn't removed any of the nudity from it yet and still has revealing/lewd outfits for the children, it is probably going to get shut down soon because of the new policy.

 

SkyKids on the other hand, is truly standalone. It does not overwrite vanilla assets or other mods. It comes with it's own compatibility patches for some cosmetic mods, without any hassle from you. As well, no nudity and skimpy/revealing clothes! So no worries there. It doesn't have any affect on performance and works quite well alongside any other mods. But the main thing to take away from all this, is it is STANDALONE. No more affecting vanilla assets and messing up other mods you have. It operates completely on it's own. It even has Drow and Monli race addons from here on LL, and followers as well to go along with it. And comes with a vanilla child replacer as well that is really well done and doesn't have kids running around in skimpy clothes.

 

SkyKids is much cleaner and easier to work with in the end. Completely standalone and isn't all complex with tons of different parts. Hope that helps.

[China Cat]

I see, I might just remake my Rcots character in SK then, I've just been trying to narrow down which mods I can remove to make my game more stable. If I remember correctly when Rcots replaces child NPC's it requires interesting and inconsequential, which I believe are a significant part of my fps loss. If SK allows me to replace the vanilla NPC kids with skykids, without requiring inconsequential/interesting that would be ideal. Thanks for the help

[Drukla]

Hello (again ) en_hawk. I have a question (again )...

¿Can you give me another explanation about how the skyproc patch works?

The last time I came here was to tell you that I download some armors from LL (I gave the link too), but some of these armors works and others not. Well, I said (too) that I deleted my game, so I install all again, but I put all the armors (from the link posted before) before fun the patch and now all the armors work fine. Well, yesterday I downloaded other armors of the same page (the page I posted before) and then I installed them in my Skyrim, using the wrye bash I activated them and then ran the skyproc patch like the description says (at least all that I understood), but those armors don't appears, so I think that I have to do something more... I'm proving other thing now, ¿I have to delete the older SK Swapper Armor.esp before run the patch to that the new armors can be adjust to my character like the others? Explain me please, what I have to do when I install a new armor to the patch works fine? The patch don't gave me problems like the other times, I think that I learned how to use well the patch, but now I wanna know the correct procedure (a better explanation, may be) to don't have to ask for help every time I have a problem... Because all the other mods that I'm using I know how it works, so I have no problems because I tested all of them and I don't have a lot of mods... Only your mods, the momo's jump, the hell sword, running with bow, the Saber's swords, the armor mods of here:

http://www.loverslab.com/topic/15220-armor-conversions-for-yii-techniques-labors-cots/

and other not very important mods

 

[shadowfox]

Hello (again ) en_hawk. I have a question (again )...

¿Can you give me another explanation about how the skyproc patch works?

The last time I came here was to tell you that I download some armors from LL (I gave the link too), but some of these armors works and others not. Well, I said (too) that I deleted my game, so I install all again, but I put all the armors (from the link posted before) before fun the patch and now all the armors work fine. Well, yesterday I downloaded other armors of the same page (the page I posted before) and then I installed them in my Skyrim, using the wrye bash I activated them and then ran the skyproc patch like the description says (at least all that I understood), but those armors don't appears, so I think that I have to do something more... I'm proving other thing now, ¿I have to delete the older SK Swapper Armor.esp before run the patch to that the new armors can be adjust to my character like the others? Explain me please, what I have to do when I install a new armor to the patch works fine? The patch don't gave me problems like the other times, I think that I learned how to use well the patch, but now I wanna know the correct procedure (a better explanation, may be) to don't have to ask for help every time I have a problem... Because all the other mods that I'm using I know how it works, so I have no problems because I tested all of them and I don't have a lot of mods... Only your mods, the momo's jump, the hell sword, running with bow, the Saber's swords, the armor mods of here:

 

http://www.loverslab.com/topic/15220-armor-conversions-for-yii-techniques-labors-cots/

and other not very important mods

 

Drukla, I think I have found your problem. All armor mods and mods adding or editing armor records have to be above the armor patch in the load order for the patcher to patch them.. Unrecognized plugins get sorted by BOSS after the skykids armor patch. I recommend adding all unrecognized plugins to your boss userlist so that they load above the armor patcher.

[Drukla]

 

Drukla, I think I have found your problem. All armor mods and mods adding or editing armor records have to be above the armor patch in the load order for the patcher to patch them.. Unrecognized plugins get sorted by BOSS after the skykids armor patch. I recommend adding all unrecognized plugins to your boss userlist so that they load above the armor patcher.

 

 

Thanks for your answer. But how did I add those plugins to my userlist? For example, I have this userlist:

 

OVERRIDE: SK Drow Child Race.esm

AFTER: Skykids.esm

 

OVERRIDE: SK Monli Race.esm

AFTER: Skykids.esm

 

ADD: monli preset1.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: monli preset2.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: monli preset3.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: SK Lolydia.esp

BOTTOM: Companions

 

ADD: SK Drow Taldyn.esp

BOTTOM: Companions

 

ADD: SK Vanilla Child Replacer.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: SK Vanilla Child Replacer HF.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: SK Vanilla Child Replacer DB.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: SK Child Armor Swapper.esp

BOTTOM: Dynamic Plugins

 

And that's my userlist for the moment.

 

You have the reason, the armors that doesn't appear in my characters are under my armor swapper.esp in the load order, but I don't know how to add the plugins.

 

Those are my plugins that doen't appear in my characters but I have already installed:

 

Blackrockshooterx117.esp

FairyAngel.esp

FX117 Chainmail Pack.esp

NeroFX117.esp

SaberArmorFateExtra.esp

X117 Male Pack.esp

X117Clothes.esp

X117DaedricChainmail.esp

X117FightersPack.esp

 

And those are the armors that aren't shown properly. I tried deleting my older armor swapper.esp and then running the skyproc patcher.jar again, but I had the same result.

Also I tried changed the position of my armor swapper.esp, putting my armor swaper.esp in the last position of my load order with the Wrye Bash. But I had no results. So how I do to add those plugins to my userlist. What I have to write to my userlist?

This?

 

ADD: Blackrockshooterx117.esp

BEFORE: Armor Swapper.esp

 

ADD: FX117 Chainmail Pack.esp

BEFORE: Armor Swapper.esp

 

ADD: NeroFX117.esp

BEFORE: Armor Swapper.esp

 

ADD: SaberArmorFateExtra.esp

BEFORE: Armor Swapper.esp

 

ADD: X117 Male Pack.esp

BEFORE: Armor Swapper.esp

 

ADD: X117Clothes.esp

BEFORE: Armor Swapper.esp

 

ADD: X117DaedricChainmail.esp

BEFORE: Armor Swapper.esp

 

ADD: X117FightersPack.esp

BEFORE: Armor Swapper.esp

 

 

¿Please explain me how do I do? ¿That's the correct form? And the last thing, sorry for my bad english

PD: I attached my mod list, may be helpful

[Raykonnen]

I put my userlist like this:

 

OVERRIDE: SK Drow Child Race.esm
AFTER: Skykids.esm

OVERRIDE: SK Monli Race.esm
AFTER: Skykids.esm

ADD: monli preset1.esp
BOTTOM: Overrides

ADD: monli preset2.esp
BOTTOM: Overrides

ADD: monli preset3.esp
BOTTOM: Overrides

ADD: SK Lolydia.esp
BOTTOM: Companions

ADD: SK Drow Taldyn.esp
BOTTOM: Companions

ADD: SK Vanilla Child Replacer.esp
BOTTOM: Overrides

ADD: SK Child Armor Swapper.esp
BOTTOM: Dynamic Plugins

ADD: X117 Male Pack.esp
BEFORE: CharGen Morphs.esp

 

I'm using only the Male Pack, and it's working. Try the same thing with the others, maybe it'll work too.

[Drukla]

I put my userlist like this:

 

OVERRIDE: SK Drow Child Race.esm

AFTER: Skykids.esm

 

OVERRIDE: SK Monli Race.esm

AFTER: Skykids.esm

 

ADD: monli preset1.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: monli preset2.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: monli preset3.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: SK Lolydia.esp

BOTTOM: Companions

 

ADD: SK Drow Taldyn.esp

BOTTOM: Companions

 

ADD: SK Vanilla Child Replacer.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: SK Child Armor Swapper.esp

BOTTOM: Dynamic Plugins

 

ADD: X117 Male Pack.esp

BEFORE: CharGen Morphs.esp

 

 

I'm using only the Male Pack, and it's working. Try the same thing with the others, maybe it'll work too.

Thanks, I will try that.

 

[Drukla]

 

I put my userlist like this:

 

OVERRIDE: SK Drow Child Race.esm

AFTER: Skykids.esm

 

OVERRIDE: SK Monli Race.esm

AFTER: Skykids.esm

 

ADD: monli preset1.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: monli preset2.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: monli preset3.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: SK Lolydia.esp

BOTTOM: Companions

 

ADD: SK Drow Taldyn.esp

BOTTOM: Companions

 

ADD: SK Vanilla Child Replacer.esp

BOTTOM: Overrides

 

ADD: SK Child Armor Swapper.esp

BOTTOM: Dynamic Plugins

 

ADD: X117 Male Pack.esp

BEFORE: CharGen Morphs.esp

 

 

I'm using only the Male Pack, and it's working. Try the same thing with the others, maybe it'll work too.

Thanks, I will try that.

 

I tried that and works, thanks a lot.

 

[arr0w]

a few questions. Firstly, many of the boys seem to have girl hair and faces almost like they got mixed up. I know that the boy npc replacer isnt done yet so im not worried about it just thought id mention it. secondly, i have a npc follower i made, using a previous save, saving the face data after ingame char. creation. the npc has a major seam/skintone difference between the torso and head, at the nex. how would you suggest to fix this? while hopefully maintaining overall face look/shape??

 

[Guest Grestorn]

a few questions. Firstly, many of the boys seem to have girl hair and faces almost like they got mixed up. I know that the boy npc replacer isnt done yet so im not worried about it just thought id mention it. secondly, i have a npc follower i made, using a previous save, saving the face data after ingame char. creation. the npc has a major seam/skintone difference between the torso and head, at the nex. how would you suggest to fix this? while hopefully maintaining overall face look/shape??

 

I've also created a male follower (see previous page) for SkyKids and went through the same problems. 

 

What you have to do is to use Ctrl-F4 in the CK to save the .nif and .dds files. But these are created all wrong for Skychild NPCs, so you have to edit the created mesh with NifScope and put in the correct texture files, especially you have to correct the path to the dss file (the path has to start with "textures/..."). 

 

Good luck!

[ChipyChops]

Have a look at this too, nif merge is pretty cool

 

http://wiki.tesnexus.com/index.php/Using_a_face_made_with_Chargen_Extension_on_an_NPC_for_Skyrim

[arr0w]

 

a few questions. Firstly, many of the boys seem to have girl hair and faces almost like they got mixed up. I know that the boy npc replacer isnt done yet so im not worried about it just thought id mention it. secondly, i have a npc follower i made, using a previous save, saving the face data after ingame char. creation. the npc has a major seam/skintone difference between the torso and head, at the nex. how would you suggest to fix this? while hopefully maintaining overall face look/shape??

 

I've also created a male follower (see previous page) for SkyKids and went through the same problems. 

 

What you have to do is to use Ctrl-F4 in the CK to save the .nif and .dds files. But these are created all wrong for Skychild NPCs, so you have to edit the created mesh with NifScope and put in the correct texture files, especially you have to correct the path to the dss file (the path has to start with "textures/..."). 

 

Good luck!

 

okay i really hope this makes sense... Firstly i have a LOT of experience working with pre-made assets, vanilla skyrim, ect, but when it comes to using and MAKING assets from scratch im really confused as to the process. So let me do this step by step so hopefully it makes sense.

1.) im using MO, trying to keep a relatively clean Data folder.

2.) the mod this is for, i already made and it SO FAR only uses an .esp

3.) So after making it and testing, i moved it out of my data folder and packaged it to be installed through MO like any other DL'ed mod

4.) next step is to follow what was said above. Im assuming that since im running CK through MO that the files will be on my Overwrite.

5.) Okay so if im correct, to re-package it to be installed, i can just make a folder and emulate a/the folder path needed, how it would look in skyrim's data folder, re-archive it and install and it should work fine?

(i think already that all above already makes sense, i just want verification)

6.) now, as for the renaming of the textures path.. if i just put in the path textures/gsnfjsrgt/sbhbegkd.. whatever, to where im GOING to place the textures, they WONT display in nifskope YET if i do exactly what ive said so far, UNLESS i make my folder structure where it will be once installed and nifskope is set up correctly. Right?

 

I hope this makes sense, im just looking for clarification on the best/accepted way to do this.

one other thing is that it exports a head .nif? where is it specified in CK for THAT npc to use THAT mesh?? O.o

 

EDIT: Dot worry too much about figuring out the above. I realize now, again, why i switched to MO soooo easy compared to every other way there is, once you get your set up up and running. 

[Basstanck]

Hello ,

 

please can someone help me ?

my problem is for the sk armor patcher , when i run it , it says "java.io.FileNotFoundException" SK Child Armor Swapper.esp (Access denied)"

then it close and i'm screwed , then i start to cry !!

i did search on google but when i try all the solution it still does'nt work ....

please help me ......

[en_hawk]

Hello ,

 

please can someone help me ?

my problem is for the sk armor patcher , when i run it , it says "java.io.FileNotFoundException" SK Child Armor Swapper.esp (Access denied)"

then it close and i'm screwed , then i start to cry !!

i did search on google but when i try all the solution it still does'nt work ....

please help me ......

Do you have windows UAC enabled and steam installed to the program files directory?

[Basstanck]

yes its installed where it should be , but what is the windows UAC ? i mean i have tried to run it as admin but when i right click on the".jar" i cannot select "run as..."