Modifying Exterior Cells

[malvekiar]

So, I'm pretty much completely new to the Skyrim Creation Kit and haven't built mods in any TES game since Morrowind.  I have a question about altering exterior cells.  I've found a location for a new compound I want to build my mod around, but the area obviously is cluttered with tons of stuff.

 

The static objects I'm pretty sure I can just disable via script once that particular stage of the quest is completed, but even after those are disabled the area is not quite flat enough to suit my purposes.   I'm really trying to limit modifying anything from the vanilla game, but this is quite probably necessary to achieve what I really want.

 

For changes to exterior cells (such as modifying the actual landscape), that won't actually change anything within the Skyrim.esm file correct?  I assume the changes to the cell would simply be stored in the .esp and overwrite the original in Skyrim.esm? 

[Guest]

Your mod will just alter the exterior cell.

 

If this cell has no objects pointed with a script, or any "important" object inside, then you can just alter it and live happy.

You will not change the Skyrim.esm, just doing some normal content alteration through a mod.

 

 

So, definitely YES, your assumptions are correct. (But before removing ANY item in the cell, or also disabling it (deleting it is better), right click on it, and check "use Info" if it is used somewhere, then you have to keep it.)

 

[malvekiar]

Thanks for the quick response, greatly appreciated.

[Guest]

You welcome.

[Veladarius]

A few things on changing exterior cells:

 

To disable items in large groups you can set what is called an 'Enable Parent' which is where an item is enabled or disabled depending on the enable state of another item. I used x markers as the parent item so I could keep them organized.

 

You can adjust the terrain but if you change the height difference too much you may have to adjust the navmesh as npc's can detect it if the height difference is within a certain amount. If you add any doors you will have to finalize the navmesh so the doors are connected to it or npc's will not enter. You can change the navmesh to an extent before the CK gives it a new ID number and replaces the old one with it. From playing with it you have to make a good amount of changes to it before that happens though. Replacing the navmesh should only be an issue if something else references it such as a door (the only thing that can directly reference a navmesh).

 

You can just use terrain pieces to change the terrain, you don't have to change the actual terrain. If you do change the terrain itself make sure you save it as it is easy for it to get out of hand.

 

Any large items you place that you don't want to change the navmesh for you can use a collision cube, sphere or plane to block actors from going through them. They are useful to keep npc's from wandering through temporary campfires or other things that don't have much of a collision geometry to them.

[malvekiar]

A few things on changing exterior cells:

 

To disable items in large groups you can set what is called an 'Enable Parent' which is where an item is enabled or disabled depending on the enable state of another item. I used x markers as the parent item so I could keep them organized.

Capture.JPG

 

You can adjust the terrain but if you change the height difference too much you may have to adjust the navmesh as npc's can detect it if the height difference is within a certain amount. If you add any doors you will have to finalize the navmesh so the doors are connected to it or npc's will not enter. You can change the navmesh to an extent before the CK gives it a new ID number and replaces the old one with it. From playing with it you have to make a good amount of changes to it before that happens though. Replacing the navmesh should only be an issue if something else references it such as a door (the only thing that can directly reference a navmesh).

 

You can just use terrain pieces to change the terrain, you don't have to change the actual terrain. If you do change the terrain itself make sure you save it as it is easy for it to get out of hand.

 

Any large items you place that you don't want to change the navmesh for you can use a collision cube, sphere or plane to block actors from going through them. They are useful to keep npc's from wandering through temporary campfires or other things that don't have much of a collision geometry to them.

 

All very good suggestions, thank you very much.  Regarding the navmesh issue you mentioned, one of the reasons I selected the specific area I did was the ease of fixing navmesh issues there.  I've probably already done 4 or 5 versions of the cell changes to try and figure out how to get the results that I want (a more level terrain in a specific area) with the most minimal possible impact.

 

I love the Enable Parent idea.  I hadn't thought about that before and that will make it significantly easier to cause the change to happen when I want to I think.  Again, thank you for the feedback, very very useful.