Prettier Bandits

[Banana Banana]

Hey, I have tried for a while now to remove the green colors using CK. I am not sure if I am doing something wrong, or if Mod Organizer and CK don't want to play together nicely.

 

What I tried:

- Simply changing the value of the Green-color entry to equal the default chestnut color in Miscellaneous/ColorForm

- Removing the color from "Available Hair Colors" in Character/Race/WoofElfRace

- Changing all the default hair colors in actor/actor/actor/WoodElfRace to the default chestnut.

- Outright deleted the color entry from Miscellaneous/ColorForm

 

Even on a new save, wood elves still get the green hair.

 

Which file am I missing? Or is it Mod Organizer? Though, CK seems to correctly creates the new .esp in the overwrite folder, which also displays the changes when opened up in CK again.

[Guest Long John]

@EinarrTheRed - Please, how's things doing according to your previous issue back on 30/05/2016?

 

 

Before I get asked, I didn't use KS hairs because of the way its set up.  Its not a master file so I'd either had to make a bash file or import all the hair models into PB which would have massively increased the file size.  I really wish the author of KS hair would make it a proper master which would make it much easier for modders to use... but oh well.

 

If the author of KS Hairdos - Renewal were to make it a master file than there wont be as much room to sort it by if there are incompatibility issues. When it is a plugin it has the possibility to be sorted anywhere from the top of the plugin file load order section to the bottom max of the load order.

[EinarrTheRed]

Hey, I have tried for a while now to remove the green colors using CK. I am not sure if I am doing something wrong, or if Mod Organizer and CK don't want to play together nicely.

 

What I tried:

- Simply changing the value of the Green-color entry to equal the default chestnut color in Miscellaneous/ColorForm

- Removing the color from "Available Hair Colors" in Character/Race/WoofElfRace

- Changing all the default hair colors in actor/actor/actor/WoodElfRace to the default chestnut.

- Outright deleted the color entry from Miscellaneous/ColorForm

 

Even on a new save, wood elves still get the green hair.

 

Which file am I missing? Or is it Mod Organizer? Though, CK seems to correctly creates the new .esp in the overwrite folder, which also displays the changes when opened up in CK again.

 

Hi, sorry for the delay I've been away longer than I planned.  I'd gotten pretty burned out with modding Skyrim from putting way too many hours in.

 

To change the hair color you would need to edit it in CK.  In the color form list there should be a matching the hair color form with an RGB value used by the actor (I don't have CK available right now or else I could tell you exactly which form to change).  Change that value to whatever color you wish to use and that should do it (but don't rename anything. just edit the RGB value; renaming stuff would cause issues and you'd have to then edit the racial list and the actors).  I haven't tested whether that will require starting a new game.  Sometimes Skyrim stores some of this info within the save file which means the effect won't actually take effect until you start a new game.  From what you posted, having deleted the color file (containing the RGB value) I suspect Skyrim is storing that internally in the save file, so a new game may be necessary before the changes take effect.  If you test this, let me know if you see the changes in a new game or the current save.  MO wouldn't be relevant in this particular case.

 

In other news I'm working on getting things back up and running.  I have a couple of changes planned for PB.  One is to update the hair colors.  Several didn't like the greenish hair for wood elves so I may remove that as well as tweak some of the other colors.  The other planned change is to use a batch file to update the leveled lists, racial hair colors, etc.  This should mean that other mods that added to the various bandit, warlock, etc. leveled encounter lists won't interfere with PB and vice versa.

 

After that I plan to get started on PB 2, which will work on some of the other NPC groups not included in PB such as Forsworn, Stormcloaks, hold guards, legionaires, etc.  With PB 2 done I have some other mods I want to get finished.  Can't give an ETA yet but I'm working on getting there.

 

EDIT:

 

After a bit of sleep something else regarding the unchanging hair color occurred to me this morning.  Keep in mind I haven't the time to check or test this right now so this is just a possibility.  When I created PB it was necessary to export the facedata and geometry of every altered actor.  A lot of info gets stored in facedata that we have no way to directly look at or edit.  Skyrim seems to often use this, but not always (one of the things about Skyrim that I find both puzzling and annoying).  Anyway, point being is it may be storing the RGB hair color value in the exported face data.  Solution, alter the hair color as explained above, then identify which NPC actors use that hair color and re-export the facedata (select the actor(s) in CK and then use Cntrl + F4 to export the data) and re-save the esp.  That *may* resolve the issue you reported, pls let me know if you try it and it works.

[Banana Banana]

 

EDIT:

 

After a bit of sleep something else regarding the unchanging hair color occurred to me this morning.  Keep in mind I haven't the time to check or test this right now so this is just a possibility.  When I created PB it was necessary to export the facedata and geometry of every altered actor.  A lot of info gets stored in facedata that we have no way to directly look at or edit.  Skyrim seems to often use this, but not always (one of the things about Skyrim that I find both puzzling and annoying).  Anyway, point being is it may be storing the RGB hair color value in the exported face data.  Solution, alter the hair color as explained above, then identify which NPC actors use that hair color and re-export the facedata (select the actor(s) in CK and then use Cntrl + F4 to export the data) and re-save the esp.  That *may* resolve the issue you reported, pls let me know if you try it and it works.

 

Yes, that did the trick. Thank you, thought I was going crazy with that.

[EinarrTheRed]

Great to hear, thought that might be it.  Amazing what a good nights sleep can do for the mental faculties.  LOL

[EinarrTheRed]

UPDATE:

 

I've got Skyrim mostly re-installed and running.  I'm going to spend the rest of this weekend sorting through my installed mods and making sure everything is up to date, maybe add a few new mods.  Once that is done I'm hoping next weekend to get back to work on Prettier Bandits p1.  Right now my to do list is just 3 items, tweaks the hair colors and make them more natural, update the leveled lists with a batch file rather than editing them directly in the esp (this will make PB better able to work with other mods that add things to the leveled encounter lists), and check for a reported dirty edit and fix if necessary.  I'm hoping that won't take long to get done (shouldn't, other than the leveled lists its simple checks and changes) and then I'll be ready to start on PB 2.

 

For PB 2 I'm still sorting who will be included, but my current list includes:

Forsworn

Stormcloaks

Townguards

Imperial Legions (add some female legionaires)

Vigilants of Stendarr

 

Feel free to post suggestions for anything else.

[Banana Banana]

I think you cover most large factions now. Only other stuff I could think off at the top of my mind would be Vampires and the random encounter "Hunters".

 

 

[EinarrTheRed]

Hunters are doable.

 

Also, will be removing hoods from some outfits, particularly thieves, in both PB 1 and 2.

[EinarrTheRed]

Okay, this past weekend I spent just playing Skyrim for fun.  And it was indeed a lot of fun getting re-acquainted with Skyrim which even after a few years of playing still manages to surprise me.  Found a mountain valley at the end of a steep narrow path I never knew was there and would be an ideal location for... something... one day.

 

All that aside, it also gave me a chance to look at my own handiwork (i.e. Prettier Bandits) in game and sort of "see" it again.  I ended up making notes.  There are indeed a couple of grey faces that need to be fixed, one case of an open neck seam I found, and a few other things.  I'm also thinking way too many of the NPCs have eye make up that is much too dark, so I'm going to look at maybe going back through and lightening that up when time allows.  Hair colors, the blue-black hair is going to become less blue and more black, same with some of the other colors.  I am going to keep a green-black hair for the wood elves, but I want to make it more subtle, just a faint greenish sheen to otherwise black hair.  The other wood elf colors will become more brown shades.  For dark elves I'd had some purplish colors I plan to adjust those to some browns, a dark purplish black (again going for a subtle purple sheen, not obvious purple).

 

I am also contemplating what would be a major addition.  I'm thinking of adding to the existing encounter tables so that their are more actorbases in each list.  There are two reasons for this, one it would just give more variety which would be nice; but second it would help somewhat alleviate the "naked bandit bug" in PAHE.  While work to get rid of that bug is ongoing, its been ongoing for a long time and the bug has always proven annoyingly resilient.  While I hope it gets wiped out soon, doesn't hurt to have a "plan B".  The downside to this is it means I'll have to make about another 320 actorbases, export face data and that's gonna pretty much double the file size of the mod.  The up side is you'd be seeing more female enemy NPCs and more variety.  For those using PAHE, it would also mean the naked bandit bug would take longer before starting to become a problem.  I haven't decided yet, but its something I'm considering.   Feedback always welcome.

 

That's about it for now.  I've got one other mod project that for the moment is mainly for personal use but might see eventual release that I'm working on.  I also just picked up a project building a location for a friend's mod and that's going to be a lot of fun (both because I love building locations and my friend is fun to work with).  Once I get the new location squared away and anything left to do with PB done I'll move on to PB 2 and then finally start Smexy Bandits which is going to be... special. I've got a lot of good surprises on the drawing board for that project.

 

Thanks for the patience, feedback and encouragement.

 

[treezspk]

hey, does anyone run or know if this will work with OBIS installed? http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/31264/?  

 

I did some quick searches but couldnt find anything so sorry if I missed something

[EinarrTheRed]

At this point probably not.  Although PB doesn't currently make many edits to the leveled list, it does make a few.  I don't know if the other mod edits the actorbases but if it does then it one or the other would overwrite what the other had done.  One of the changes I'm working on is to have the changes to the leveled lists added with a script which would allow PB to work with other mods that add actors to the leveled lists.

[treezspk]

@EinarrTheRed That would make sense.  Yea OBIS basically revamps the entire bandit population of Skyrim, giving them more variety and imo making them a bit more difficult.  He does say this on the nexus page: 

 

None of these bandits are anywhere but in the level lists. SO if there was supposed to be a bandit there, it will only be there, NO PERFORMANCE HIT

I think the two would compliment each other nicely if they ever end up being compatible.  (Not pushing for anything just saying lol!)

 

Great idea for a mod, thank you, and wish you the best of luck with it!

[EinarrTheRed]

Thanks, and I understand the desire to have both and its something I'm working towards making possible, and will also do later with Smexy Bandits.  Many of the "bandit" type mods make them tougher, change their combat abilities, etc.; sometimes with controversial results.  That's partly why for Prettier Bandits I stuck to making it a cosmetic appearance mod instead.

 

For those not clear on why there might be a conflict, all encounters in Skyrim use one of many leveled lists to determine what you encounter.  In most cases this is a list that is made up of 6 sub lists which in turn may include another sub table before you get to an actual actor base or a series of templates that lead to the original actor base.  It may sound complicated (and it sort of is), but its also a pretty handy system once you understand it.  The important point here is that when a mod maker edits a list in the esp file, that overwrites the leveled list from vanilla Skyrim.  This is what PB currently does.  While I'd have to double check if PB actually adds to the bandit lists (I don't recall that it does but I made so many edits its hard to remember them all, I do recall I edited the WEThief and WEAdventurer lists a bit to add some additional types), the other mod mention above would overwrite any changes to those lists with its own, meaning any additional bandits I might have added wouldn't appear.  IF the other mod doesn't modify the actor bases of the vanilla bandits, which PB specifically does, then the two mods might be partially or even mostly compatible (at least as far as functioning).  But I couldn't say for sure without downloading that mod and opening it up in CK to check.  I just don't have the time to spare with other projects right now.

 

What I am intending to do in hopefully the next release of PB is change the edits to the leveled lists so that they are made by a script when the game loads.  Its more complicated doing it that way but the up side is that it would mean that you could use another mod that edits the lists and PB would still add its changes without overwriting anything.  As for the actor bases, can't do anything about that, if there is a conflict there (and I don't know if there is), I don't see any way to resolve that.

 

 

Oh and for PAHE users, here's a hint / tip.  I sometimes see comments about liking Deadly Wenches or similar mods that make bandits tougher.  In PB (and in fact even vanilla encounters) try snaring some of those hostile adventurers or mercenaries you encounter.  They are set to always be 110% of your character's level and will continue to level up even after being enslaved (leveling as your character levels).  PB did add more combat perks to those encounters so they are tougher.  Thought I'd pass that along.

[EinarrTheRed]

Have been working on tweaking the hair colors to make the greens, purples, etc. more subtle.  Am currently testing the changes in game.

 

I'm also working on an additional change.  I'm testing adding duplicates of the existing encounters to the encounter tables and actor bases.  The reason for this is to help alleviate the naked bandit bug in PAHE.  For those who don't know what this is or why it happens, here's  a very brief explanation.

 

In PAHE when you enslave an NPC it gets cloned, specifically the actor base (and in newer versions the leveled actor base) gets duplicated and made a slave.  Unfortunately something causes the outfit of the original actor base to be removed so future encounters with an NPC of that actor base have no outfit (clothing or armor; weapons and other inventory items are unaffected).  By creating duplicates of each actor base (my plan is to make 4 duplicates of each actor base and each leveled actor) it increases the number of actors Skyrim can draw on to create random encounters and reduces the chance you'll see one naked, for awhile anyway.  Its really only delaying the inevitable.  I believe there is a way I can do this without adding to the amount of facedata I have to export, which increases the file size.  I'm working to begin testing this now and hope to have solid result by this weekend if time allows.

 

If you don't use PAHE, this won't affect you and you won't see any difference.

[EinarrTheRed]

Progress Update:

Working on adding in the duplicate female actor bases*.

• Witches - 100% done
• Warlocks - 70%
• WEThieves - 100% done
• WEAdventurers - 90%
• Bandits - 30%
• Thalmor - 0%
• Hair color adjustmetns - 95%

* (I'll also have to add duplicates of all the males to keep the encounter tables balanced, for now I'm focusing on just getting all the female ones done and will probably do a release after.  I may set up a poll to see if there is any interest in "updating" the appearance of the males with new hair, etc. before adding in the male duplicates to the tables and doing another release; there are pro's and con's to that I'll discuss later.  Doing the releases in stages will help me catch mistakes quicker, and I'm sure there will be some given I'm having to edit literally more than 1,000 NPCs at this point.)

 

I've also updated the Witches to have their own outfit type.  Right now this is the same as the warlocks but it provides the ability to bash a patch and use outfits from other mods.  For example, say you wanted to use the Sexy Robes mod as outfits for your witches, that's now easier to do either by directly editing the PB esp or using Wrye Bash and making a patch.

 

I'd like to add some additional variety to the tables but that will probably have to wait til after this next release.  Right now I'm focused on just adding these actor bases and updating the encounter tables.  Once that's done I can switch back to adding new content.

 

Future goals will include:

• new actor bases for the above categories, especially the witches and Thalmor where the current limited actor bases are most noticeable.
• start adding new factions such as the Vigilants, Hunters, Forsworn, and Vampires; possibly the Afflicted.

The Forsworn and Vampires are two groups I want to take some extra time with.  For the Forsworn I want to include some better facepaint / tattoos.  For the vampires I'm experimenting with different "looks" ranging from "almost human" to "feral".  For the Vigilants I plan to also include an update to Keeper Carcette, which will make her the only unique NPC included in the mod.

[EinarrTheRed]

Had to take a bit of a break due to RL work but am getting back to working on PB this weekend.  As of now it looks like the duplicates I've been adding to the leveled lists may be unnecessary as of the current 7.0 release of PAHE (which may have finally eliminated the naked bandit bug, we're not 100% certain but it looks that way).  For now I'm going to leave the duplicates in and finish up adding them to the remaining factions.  If the bug is gone it won't hurt anything and all I've lost is the time spent on it and I can remove them in the next version.

 

However, this comes with a catch and I'd like some feedback before I proceed.

 

If I leave the duplicates in and you enslave one, for now it won't hurt anything and you probably won't even notice the difference.  However, I only added these to help alleviate the appearance of the "naked bandit bug".  If that bug truly is gone there's no point in the duplicates, meaning I'd likely remove them in the future and instead replace them with some additional actors to add more variety to the lists.  The down side is if you've enslaved a duplicate and I remove them, that slave will most likely disappear.  It could theoretically cause a CTD or two, but mostly you'd just have slaves disappear since the actors would no longer exist.

 

So here's the question.  Would those using PB prefer I remove the duplicates now and just focus on finishing the update and maybe add a few new actors to the lists?  Or, leave the duplicates even if they get deleted in a future version (likely the one after this next one)?

 

The downside to deleting the duplicates now means losing that work.

 

Regardless the next version will include the following changes:

• Updated hair colors
• Reduced make up, especially the dark eyes.
• More Thalmor in the Thalmor encounter lists
• More WEAdventurers in the Mercenary, Brawler, and Hostile Adventurer lists.

[Banana Banana]

If you think you are going to remove them in the end anyways, I would remove them now. Otherwise it would be a quite a gamble to enslave any NPCs if they could just disappear after the next update. A few naked bandits for a bit longer is less punishing.

[EinarrTheRed]

Weekend progress update.

 

I've gone ahead and removed the duplicate actors from the leveled lists.  Partly because its looking like the naked bandit bug might finally be fixed and also because I tend to agree with hanshanshans regarding the future impact.

 

As of this morning the Thalmor faction has been updated and there are now twice as many actors in that factions leveled list.  These are not duplicates they are new female actors each with their own individual appearance which doubles the variety there.  The top end Thalmor wizards went from 1 female to now six individuals.

 

After some further testing I think I resolved the issue that caused me to flag the actors as unique, so in the next release they'll all be unflagged as unique again.  This means the auto-renamer in PAHE will work on PB slaves again.

 

Additionally, I've been doing a lot of internal clean up and organization, that's still in progress.  Among the changes, every edited actor, hair color or anything else now has the 'PB_' prefix in the Form ID used in CK.  For most of you this will make no visible difference in game play, its purely a "under-the-hood" type of change.  Those of you who like to tinker with PB further in your own games will find it handy for filtering PB content for editing, which is exactly why I added it (to make it easier on myself and preserve my sanity ).

 

I'm also adding some new features which I'll be documenting and explaining on the next release, including how you can use them in your own games to customize PB NPCs even further.

 

Overall this next update is about as extensive a change to PB as the initial release.  But I think at this point all the organizational work, templates, etc. needed will be there going forward which will make adding more factions and content in the future easier and faster.  So after a reasonable public beta test period after the next release, and assuming that goes well, then my focus will shift to adding more factions to the Prettier Bandits "family".

 

I don't usually give ETAs but I'm aiming to have the next release, 0.8 ready in about a week.  Stay tuned!

[Banana Banana]

 

After some further testing I think I resolved the issue that caused me to flag the actors as unique, so in the next release they'll all be unflagged as unique again.  This means the auto-renamer in PAHE will work on PB slaves again.

 

Oh, I though that was a feature! Some other mods require NPCs to be unique, especially beingfemale comes to mind.

 

 

Happy to hear about the ETA, and thanks for the clean-up!

[EinarrTheRed]

Nope, it was something I did to prevent some grey face and open neck seams that were randomly appearing.  I think I've fixed what was causing that so there shouldn't be a need for them to be flagged as unique now.  We'll know for certain once the next release has had a good public beta test.

 

This is also getting close to being the last beta test and reaching that point of going to v1.0 (meaning I'll move the mod out of the beta category).  I'm pretty happy about that and looking forward to being able to focus on adding new factions in the future.

 

I do have some new features planned, but keeping that under wraps for now.

[Tenacious01]

Is apachiiskyhair 1.5 absolutely needed? I have 1.6-Full, but my game crashes when I try to have both 1.5 and 1.6.

[EinarrTheRed]

ApachiiSkyHair 1.5, no.

 

ApachiiSkyHair for Females 1.5, yes. 

 

Yes, both are used, the ApachiiSkyHairforFemales 1.5 adds hair models not included in ApachiiSkyHiar 1.6.  I've no idea why your game would crash loading both, that sounds very odd as the two mods were intended to be used together.  In my own load order I load Hair for females first, then ApachiiSky Hair 1.6; but as far as I know the load order shouldn't matter (neither has a dependency on the other and both contain all the files each mod needs).

[karlpaws]

Is apachiiskyhair 1.5 absolutely needed? I have 1.6-Full, but my game crashes when I try to have both 1.5 and 1.6.

 

Females 1.5 and Full 1.6 are separate branches. 1.5 full and 1.6 full won't fulfill the requirements.

 

I guess you don't need 1.5 or 1.6 Male hair

 

[EDIT]

 

I guess this is what happens when you get distracted before clicking the post button.

 

 

 

[EinarrTheRed]

Heh, yup.

 

And no for now the male hairs aren't needed since PB is focusing on female NPCs.  That's what I've had requests for.  At some point I've thought about polling and seeing how much interest there would be in doing the same for the male NPCs, we'll see.  I have nothing against giving them better hair and so forth, just hasn't been any interest expressed in it.

[EinarrTheRed]

Here's some screen shots from the 0.8 release with some of the revised hair colors (among many other changes).  Will be publishing the 0.8 version tomorrow!

 

I'll post more screen shots as I get time, been pressed making last minute checks of the new release and some RL demands on my time.