I personally don't like the look of soul gems in vanilla Skyrim. I would love to see the Morrowind style gems. Anyone currently working on this or willing to do it?
This mod for morrowind gave the best looking soul gems I've ever seen.
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/fms/Image.php?id=90006

Thanks,

Zach

Once the CK is released, I cannot see any reason why you cant use those models in Skyrim.

You wouldn't be able to use the exact same meshes. They'd have to be re-made. Not sure how they could tell, really, but.. figured I'd add that before a mod comes along and warns against using resources from older games.

It's only an issue if he ports resources from one game to another, then releases it. If he keeps it to himself it's all good.

Interesting. I asked about moving a mod from Oblivion to Skyrim and someone told me that I'd have to make alterations to it to get it to work. The issue of Beth not supporting moving content from one game to the other wasn't relevant as I was talking about a mod. I still couldn't just port the meshes and textures anyway as they wouldn't be compatible. Is that correct?

As I recall, Star Boi made some very impressive hires http://www.oblivionmodwiki.com/images/7/7f/Soulgemsleviathan.jpg for TES4:Oblivion which were based on the shape and design of the original Morrowind ones. As those models were all created by Star Boi and the collision, particles and icons by Tarnsman; those could be implemented without any problems.

Well, you'd need permission to use them ofcourse (unless Star Boi is willing to make a Skyrim version himself); and then there's the potential problem with the new UI window where you get those close-ups of the item. Not sure if that requires a separate model file or not

Anyways, you can check his work out http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=10403


Greetz,

Milt

They should be compatible. yes.

Plus, you could find and download someone's home-made soul-gem models like the Morrowind style ones. The mod you linked is, as far as I know, home-made models made by a modder - not from Morrowind. Also, I believe someone else made soulgem models in the same style for Oblivion as well. Either should work. The model format has not changed. Technically you should be able to do it right now. It's worth a shot if you're interested in messing around.

Open your meshes.bsa and find the soul gem models. Note their file name and directory. Create directories in your Skyrim/Data folder to match the location of the soulgem models. Rename your downloaded meshes to match the names of the soulgem models found in the meshes.bsa. The game should automatically use those meshes instead of the ones located in the bsa. Also put the textures where they belong according to the downloaded model's texture path, which is how the downloaded model's textures should be archived.

I certainly don't mind trying my hand at it. I see that the mod maker of Souly Soulgems is "Earth_Wyrm," and he gives permission to make alterations to his work as long as credit is given, the original files are included, and an attempt to contact him is made before publishing. (If I don't get a reply in a week, it's a go.)

The readme directed me here and that's where I found out the conditions:
http://www.zyworld.com/redwoodtreesprite/ModderOks/ModderOKs-Reuploading.htm

One question, do I have to worry about the physics and how they are applied to the objects when moving from Morrowind to Skyrim? Is that handled in any way by the meshes? I have more experience skydiving than modding graphics. I have never skydived.

Physics are a part of the meshes themselves, and the meshes in the Oblivion mod had physics built-in. Not so much for the Morrowind ones. You should have no problem using the meshes made for Oblivion. Try those first.
(Models made for Morrowind will have no physics unless you add them manually or add physics using a program like Nifscope. Working with meshes made for Oblivion should be much simpler)

Okay, I'll check out the OB mod first. I prefer the textures of the MW one, but they both look fantastic. I'll give it a try and see what I come up with. Thanks everyone for the help!

If you can successfully get the game to use your chosen models instead of the defaults that would be a good first step and we can move on from there.

Almighty, the directory is as follows:
meshes\clutter\soulgem

In this folder I find the following .nif files:
soulgemblack01
soulgemcommon01
soulgemgrand01
soulgemgrand01
soulgemlesser01
soulgempetty01

All of these are pretty self explanatory, and probably what I need to change.

These are also in the folder, but I don't know what the heck they are referring to. Maybe it's something in the game I haven't encountered yet?
soulgemholder01
soulgemholderstand01
soulgempiece01
soulgempiece02
soulgempiece03
soulgempiece04
soulgempiece05

I'm gonna give it a shot and see what happens.

And I got a big, red exclamation mark.... I'm pretty sure I placed the files properly. The texture folder should have the same file structure as the mesh folder, correct? Or am I mistaken?

Sounds like the texture is in the wrong location, but it's definitely trying to use your chosen mesh.
The required location of the Texture is relative to the mesh. The .nif file contains the target location of the texture. So, you can either open it in nifscope and see where it's pointing or the easier way is to install it as if you were installing it for Oblivion, but in Skyrim. Let's say you were installing that soulgem mod for Oblivion. You would put the textures in "Oblivion/Data/Textures/InsterFolderNameHere". You're going to have to put in the same place, only in the Skyrim directory. Youre using the Starboi one right?

Assuming you're working with the "Leviathan Soulgems". You need to put the textures in "Skyrim/Data/Textures/Clutter/Gems/" so that the meshes know where to find them.

Oh, so the .nif has the location of the texture, I didn't know that. I'm working with leviathan soulgems by Star Boi at the moment just to see if this will work. I'll make the changes in the texture directory. I didn't know the .nif directed to the texture.
I'll try it real quick.

Yes. It is in the .nif file that the texture's name and location are defined. Hopefully the location is defined beginning at "Data" and not at "Oblivion" if it's starting at "Oblivion" you're either going to have to make a folder called Oblivion and see if that works, or use nifscope to change where the texture is found.

I placed the textures like it was installing in OB. However no dice. I've downloaded nifskope. It seems that 0 niNode references the .nif file's original file name. I had to rename it to get skyrim to recognize it. Is that an issue. All the directory references seem to go to the proper locations... of course this is the first time I've used this program. So I might be interpreting it wrong. 0.o

I'd have to look at it myself to know for sure. Try referencing a texture that you know works in Skyrim, such as a texture from textures.bsa.

I haven't been able to work around the Red Exclamation point. I tried everything I suggested. Possibly a new .nif format they're using.

I was able to confirm this by trying to open a Skyrim mesh in Nifskope and it does not work. Looks like it's a new version of .nif they're using. We will have to wait for new tools.

For the lulz I tried loading a Skyrim Mesh in Nifskope I got this error:
"""failed to load file header (version 14020007, 20.2.0.7)""
"failed to load nif from 'C:/Users/Home/Desktop/meshes/clutter/soulgem/soulgemgreater01.nif'" "

Any idea what this might mean? It happens any time I try to load a Skyrim mesh in Nifskope.

I'm thinking that they aren't going to be directly portable. But I'm a noob so...

It's a new version of the .nif file. We're going to need to wait for a new version of nifskope.

Ah, well that stinks. Thanks for you help though. I learned quite a bit.

In the meantime you can recolor the soulgem meshes we have to look more like Morrowind's style, except there's only 2 textures used for all 5 soulgems.

I'll probably just wait until the tools get updated.
It'll be great when we get them.

soulgemholder01 and soulgemholderstand01 might refer to those ornamental metal 'cups' and pillars that sometimes have a soulgem stuffed in them.

Not sure that the soulgempiece0# are though, could be something they don't use or quest-related; who knows.

As to NifSkope not loading the meshes. I guess the best approach would be to contact the author of that program and see if he can help out


Greetz,

Milt