I've been working on making some new spells / magic abilities for a mod I'm working on and I've run into some trouble...

#1. Is there a way to have the character sit and meditate for a concentration spell?

#2. How do I make spells that only effect the target on touch the way healing hands does?

Thanks!

Healing Hands isn't "on touch", you can heal people with it from a distance. You could add a GetDistance condition though.

I realize there is a bit of leeway for healng hands, so it's not exactly "on touch". It is however a very close range spell, which is what I'm looking for. How exactly would one add a GetDistence condition to a spell?

Anyone have any help for question #1?

1. Sit & Meditate ... there probably is an animation that is something like you want (kneel and pray is one I think I remember ... used with one of the altars, I believe). But it will probably look and feel quite clunky if you are implementing this for the player.

Player Control is clunky, it's OK when used sensibly (like the execution scene at helgen) but is usually irritating to the player if it happens in-normal-game (especially in combat). But, like I say, there are a couple of animations that come close to what you want ... but as far as I remember, nothing exact

2. A spell has a RANGE: http://www.creationkit.com/Spell (just set that to whatever you want)

Well, thanks for the response, however I'm not really getting the answers I need.....


Yeah... the meditation animations in the game already would be fine... my question though is how do I have those animations trigger when using a spell. Specifically a concentration spell.


Problem is my spell's range is already set to 0.0 and it's still hitting from very far away. Gotta be more to it than that.

0 == no maximum range I think. Try a value like 1 or 2.

1. http://www.creationkit.com/SendAnimationEvent_-_Debug -> it's rubbish, unless you plan to kill the NPC straight after using it on ... it -> It's in a section called debug for a reason. I've no idea what it might do to the PC if you use it on that

(are you planning this for the player, an NPC, or both?)

But if you plan on this being a realtime effect, I don't think you've got much other choice? (Disable Player Controls and wotnot first)


2. You would be better doing the animation as a scene ... Then you can use http://www.creationkit.com/Idle_Animations (if you are lucky and a suitable one is there to find)

The scene goes in a repeatable quest, with another parent quest ... that you use to switch it on and off (plenty of examples on here of how to do that).

OnEffectStart of your spell start the Quest ... Script: Disable Player Controls, force 3rd person cam, enable an idle marker at player's feet, start scene ... play animation ... stop quest -> then in your OnEventFinish revert to a more normal (standing) idle ... stop quest, return to 1st person, return control to player (with suitable shaders or wotnot to mask the transitions)

(a scene would also work if spell is for NPC only ... and be much easier )

That got it, thanks!
Funny because healing hands has a range of 0.0... but setting the range to 1 changes the spell to pretty much the on touch range I was looking for!

As for the animation issue.... I think I've figured out that I need to create a new type of "casting art" using one of the existing meditation animations. Working on it now.....

I'll look into your scene suggestion as well... thanks alot!