Good afternoon,

so im working on my first mod, its a splinter version of "domaine alucard" which I'm making more of a comprehensive player home/stronghold i guess. Ive replaced the necropolis (which, for me did not serve much of a purpose) with a faction barracks and armory. Ive pretty much finished the cell except for all the AI schedules i want to implement. Ive watched a bunch of tutorials and can figure out how to set up basic AI packages, patrols, etc. those i grasped relatively quickly once i saw them done. however, i am stuck on a couple items that i want to get implemented in the barracks.

first item: Armory guard posts.

i have six guards that rotate(pairs) in 3 guard shifts for the door to the armory. i created a new package using the "Guard Post" template. the actual guard procedure i did not need because this is basically and extended player home, so i just removed it from the new package. i set the travel procedure to send my guard to an isolated patrol marker by the armory door for 8 hours, and used the "wait location" value. i set him to idle with his arms crossed with 0 in the idle timer setting. boom that's done, and works great most of the time.

i did run into an issue with sandbox as i had a default sandbox package set at the bottom of the package list which would consistently make the actor ignore the idle setting and not cross his arms until i walk up and talk to him.(got rid of that. these guards probably wont have time to sandbox) the main issue with my package is that the actor does not seem to go back to something else (like sandbox) after his 8 hour shift is over he just stands there until i wait with my character, then hes off doing whatever actors do with their sandbox time.

the other thing i wanted to do with the door guard AI Package is after each guards shift is over, they lock the armory door. i tried adding a "LockDoors" procedure to the package but i don't think i am doing it correctly. i set the "LockDoors" procedure to "location" value then selected the door as a "near reference" in the "selected package data" options. i also ticked the box for "success completes package" in the door lock procedure. i set the owner of the door to be the npc faction i made, but its not working. the npc starts telling me i shouldn't be there when his shift starts. i can only guess that this is because i am actually telling him to lock the door to the cell and not the door that separates the armory from the hallway?


second item: dummy training package

i can not figure out how to get actors to do combat animations on dummies. i need a melee package and a ranged weapon package, so i can get them to train on dummies i have constructed, at certain times of the day. i am completely in the dark with this one and don't even know where to start/ if its possible.


to cap all of this off i am not very proficient with scripting. i can look at a script and understand things like if statements, Boolean, and or statements but my education is limited in that area, so i don't know if i could accomplish much with papyrus.

any input would be appreciated if you are more experienced with the CK!

Thank You

I noticed two things:

1. A time of 0 seems to be a bad idea ... others have reported ... set it to 1 (it seems 0 sometimes/all the time, means the action is not performed)
2. Depending how you set all of this up, removing the sandboxing item from the Package Stack completely may give you issues - You could use ALIASES in a GuardDoor Quest that picks a guards to fill each alias and that alias has packages to do the guarding. On change of guard you stop the quest, clear the aliases then start the quest again and fill with a different set of random guards. If you did it that way, you would have a default sandbox on every actual NPC guard, with the Alias packages taking over only when the Guard Quest was running.

(though, to be honest, it should just work with straight packages)

SO: Are you REEVALUATING the NPC Package Stack straight after you changed their role?? http://www.creationkit.com/EvaluatePackage_-_Actor

i did some thinking on this. after i couldent figure out the door locking..... its really not that important i have some other ideas i would rather attempt first. i dont really think the player will care if the door locks itself or not. the only practical use i can think of for it now is mabe keeping sandboxing npc's out of the armory. i think i am onto something with the use weapon template so i can get my guards attacking targets. after that ill prety much have all of my custom ai packages done. right now, however i am trying to figure out how to import weapons and armor from other mods, so i can make an outfit for my npc's. i was reading an article that said to merge two mods i would need to use wirebash and "trick" the CK into thinking one of the mods is a master file or something.

i was able to figure out how to import armor from other mods! and its really simple. go to the skyrim nexus website and look for the "linking an armor mod to another mod without esp or esm master tip for " topic. it works if you follow instructions. now back to ai packages!