Hairs and BSAs

[Beard of Socrates]

Hi all

 

Lately been trying to import a few custom hair styles to FNV. I have no problem with them as loose files, but I've been trying to get them to work with head-wear.

 

I'm aware that to do this the meshes need to be in a BSA, but when I import it into the game the hair completely vanishes. It's not a missing mesh, as an exclamation mark would be present.

 

Thanks for any help with this!

[Tefnacht]

What program do you use to create the .BSA?

 

If you use FOMM, you might need to give the file an extra tweak with a Hex editor: The address 0x20 might just be 0B yet you want it to be 1B!

[Beard of Socrates]

What program do you use to create the .BSA?

 

If you use FOMM, you might need to give the file an extra tweak with a Hex editor: The address 0x20 might just be 0B yet you want it to be 1B!

Hi

 

I can't seem to find the line that you're referring to in HxD. This is what I exactly did, starting from exporting the obj, from the nif, to getting an egm with the conformulator.

 

 

 

 

Imported everything into the Geck, and everything appears to work so far without any issues, minus the hair.

 

Making the BSA:

 

-Created a new folder the desktop to make the proper file path.

 

-Same was done for meshes and textures.

 

 

Gave it a proper name. Example: Mymod - Meshes.bsa and Mymod - Textures.bsa to work with the esp. No compression. (unless there is a recommended setting...)

 

-I deleted the hair folder, as the BSA should handle it now, to my understanding.

 

-Archive invalidated them, so I can load them up into the Geck.

 

-Went into the Hex editor, and can't seem to find the line you're referring to. Maybe I'm just inept at this. =P

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks again for the advice. If you need any more info please ask, as I still can't find a solution to what I"m doing wrong. =(

[Tefnacht]

Wow. That is the most comprehensive posting of a problem I've ever seen. Awesome.

 

As far as I can tell you're doing everything right, except the very last step. Your screenshot of HxD shows your BSA to have 01 00 00 00 at address 0x20.

 

0x20 is a unsigned word (4 byte) that holds bitflags which describe the content of the BSA. Your BSA says 01 which means it only contains meshes (no textures). Therefore the game doesn't bother to look inside your BSA for textures.

 

Change it to 03 (which means meshes and textures) and you should see your hair.

 

This webpage has a description of what exactly is going on with that 0x20 uword: http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Tes4Mod:BSA_File_Format#Header

 

I apologize for telling you to change it to 1B, that was just my “solve it all” solution. 1B would tell the game that your BSA contains: Meshes, textures, sounds and voices (LIP files). It became a (bad) habit for me to just set that bitflag for all my BSAs.

 

Good luck.

 

 

Edit: There really is no reason to have two separate BSA files. But in case you want to keep them separate, your MyMod - Textures.Bsa file needs to have 02 at address 0x20 (textures).

[Beard of Socrates]

Wow. That is the most comprehensive posting of a problem I've ever seen. Awesome.

 

As far as I can tell you're doing everything right, except the very last step. Your screenshot of HxD shows your BSA to have 01 00 00 00 at address 0x20.

 

0x20 is a unsigned word (4 byte) that holds bitflags which describe the content of the BSA. Your BSA says 01 which means it only contains meshes (no textures). Therefore the game doesn't bother to look inside your BSA for textures.

 

Change it to 03 (which means meshes and textures) and you should see your hair.

 

This webpage has a description of what exactly is going on with that 0x20 uword: http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Tes4Mod:BSA_File_Format#Header

 

I apologize for telling you to change it to 1B, that was just my “solve it all” solution. 1B would tell the game that your BSA contains: Meshes, textures, sounds and voices (LIP files). It became a (bad) habit for me to just set that bitflag for all my BSAs.

 

Good luck.

 

HxD Example.jpg

 

Edit: There really is no reason to have two separate BSA files. But in case you want to keep them separate, your MyMod - Textures.Bsa file needs to have 02 at address 0x20 (textures).

 

Thanks for the prompt response!

 

So I revised everything and combined the meshes/textures into one BSA. Brought up the Hex editor and the value was already 03 in the new BSA. I tried 1B as well, just to be on the safe side, and no luck.

 

 

 

 

Any other suggestions you may have come across before? I haven't had problems with using BSAs for others files in the past, but with hair this is baffling. If you think there might be something I could be forgetting to mention I could send you the files if you're interested.

 

Again, thanks for you help.

 

[Tefnacht]

That is really, really odd. Your BSA header looks completely correct.

I've never dealt with hair and BSA myself. So for the fun of it I just packaged the hair mod I am using in my own game of Fallout 3 (HairPack by Yoshikinakota) which uses loose files into a BSA to see if it works.

It does. I built the BSA with FOMM 0.13.21 and it actually came out working without needing to hex edit it. The header was good (using 03 at 0x20) right out of the gate.

The hair mod I use in New Vegas (Body by Race) is packed in a BSA and the header looks exactly like yours, except that it is compressed (07 07 instead of 03 07 at address 0xC.)

So there must be something else going on here. I am actually a little stumped right now :/

Sorry.

If you feel like it you can PM me your files and I'll give it a whirl.