Hello,

Once again i have run into a snag in the creation of my custom house/mansion. I am wanting to add a bard however the closest that i have come to being succesful is being able to ask the npc "what do you do around here?" There is never an option for "can i make a request".

Im just wondering if anyone knows how to/has done as i can find nothing on the internet and have now spent hours trying every possible combo of AI packages/factions/cutting and paste bards from other locations that i can think of.

Thanks for any help.
-Chris

I'd be curious about this as well. If anyone could help, I'd really appreciate it.

You can borrow Bethesda's pre-made "quests" just for this dialogue. I did it for a test NPC and it worked:

first, go into the quests list in the item window. There should be one quest called "BardSongs". Open it up. in the top area with the different tabs, go into "Player Dialogue". Here you'll find a ton of different dialogue branches with one topic each. You'll have to make a topic for your bard that links him to these whenever you talk to him. I don't know what quest or whatever you need to get the "Can I make a Request" topic, but you can make your own.

Just right-click somewhere in the item window while on the quests tab, and make a new one. Then, go to player dialogue and create a new branch. In the branch, create a topic, you can make it say whatever you want.

Then in info, give him a single response, click OK, or done or whatever, then double-click his response.

First, go to conditions, and make a condition called GetisID . Then, on the right, there will be an area that says "Link To:"

Right click that area, and press add topic or something of that nature. Then, untick the "Only show current quest" box and find the first 4 topics under the quest BardSong (there are 2 others; one makes you pay him cash, and the other tells him to "rest his voice"). Select all 4 and press OK. Then press OK in the response window. Now, once you go into the game, you should be able to have him sing some of these songs after going through whatever intro dialogue you gave him.

There are a few things you should know, however: Each of those 4 topics has it's own set of conditions, so you'll have to alter your NPC to meet them. First off, put your NPC's in the Bard faction; all of them have that as a condition. The other part is tricky; the voice types. Most of the songs are only compatable with certain voice types, so you'd have to go through the conditions to see which voice type offers the songs that you like. I've made a list:

Ragnar the Red: Requires either FemaleEvenToned or MaleNord voice types

The Dragonborn Comes: Requires MaleNord, FemaleEvenToned, or FemaleYoungEager

Age of Oppression: Requires FemaleYoungEager

Tale of Tongues: Works with any voice type, as long as you're finished the main quest

Now, there's a ton more of them out there that I couldn't find and the list above may not be entirely accurate; the guy I used sang "Age of Aggression" even though he was a malenord type, but the above is just what it says in all the conditions.

There are also a bunch of purely instrumental ones out there which would require more complicated work since you can't request them, but this should give you a small reportoire to choose from for now and give you an understanding on dialogue linking so you can use those other songs should you find them.

Thanks for the help i will try that right away!

Just wanted to say that this works 100%. Thank you SO much!

I just remembered one thing about the solution provided.
Although it does work, when he said to make a new quest i found that i had to just duplicate one (the bard quest) otherwise the "player dialouge" tab would not show up.

that does happen; you need to press OK and make the quest then open it up again to access the player dialogue tab.

Ok this is how I got a bard to work.

1) You need the actor with the BardSingerFaction and JobBardFaction (I just copied Lisette of the Winking Skeever)
2) Next Place an XMarkerHeading where you want them to play, and then Double-click the Bard in the render window and in the linkedref tab add the XMarkerHeading with the keyword BardPlaySpot. (I also just copied some markers from the winking skeever like BardSongNeutralLocationMarker and DrinkingSongMarker not sure if they are needed)
3) Next create a new location for your cell (like MyPlayerHouseLocation) under WorldData/Location edit the fields as normal but make sure you have LocTypeInn as a keyword. (this is used by the BardSongsScript), then edit your cell's location field to your new location.

This should get your bard to take request and play randomly. But if I missed something feel to correct me.

Is there any way to make NPCs sing songs while at idle markers. For example I want an NPC to sing while sweeping.

Is there a video tutorial known of to make a custom bard. I've tried reading this thread, can't make it work (tried the 2 options) there's something I do not understand it seems, and it is getting more and more frustrating... thanks in advance

Wait, where do I type in LocTypeInn?


I'm so confused Would love a video tutorial

The locTypeInn is in the Object Window/World Data/Location. You create a new one (location) for your cell, and you edit it. The LocTypeInn is in the Keywords section of that window.

(Hopefully, this will work better for you, good luck!)

Ohh I see, thanks. To be honest though I have no idea what to do with it. I create it but uh, then I dunno :/