Hello ....

Apart from the Official Tools like Photoshop Zbrush and other external tools not related to Skyrim that you are probably using in making your nice mods ... what tools from the community that do the work that the CK should be able to do and is not ......

are you using ?

Here my list

• TEsannwyn
  
• Oscape
  
• BsaOpt
  
• Gecko
  
• LodfileGenerator
  
• xWMAEncode
  
• Skyedit
  
• TesVsnip
  
• Niftools
  
• Nconversion
  
• Nif importerexporter

Isn't weird that without those modding would not be possible?
Yet Bethesda claims that Skyrim is easy to mod?

Would be nice to have all those tools merged into one ... a unbugged working CK perhaps ....

Modding is an heavy task which not concern only one person.

Making a mod alone is possible but the general approach if you want to produce a consequent mod is to work as team.

Each person has a specific task
- level designer
- animation modeler
- Quest Creator
- etc..

Each domain has its own tools ans i think it's normal.

I see the CK as an integration tool of the work of all the members of the team.

There are several processes which could be integrated or simplified like behavior management and animations and certainly others.

Merging all the tools is not a good idea for me.

For example, the job of an animation modeler is to produce a nif file that's all. The way it is integrated in the game is not is purpose in my own opinion.

It is the job of an animation integrator who masterize GameBryo engine animations rules and definitions (animationsetdata, hkx files etc ..)

0.

CK can do what I've been wanting to do, minus anything navmesh related >_>.

TES5Edit would be real nice to have though..

Just the CK.

Wait until you see what I'm making. It's a DLC sized new land, and I'm going at it alllll alone. >

Granted if I had more people it would go faster, but then I would do less and it wouldn't be as fun!

Tools I use to mod? Uhhh:

Creation Kit
Photoshop for retextures
Premiere for trailers
I used the CS for my heightmap back in February
TESAnwynn to import heightmap
Oscape for LOD

My friend might make me a few models so he'll use Maya and Nifskope.

That's about it? I mainly only use the CK and Oscape on a regular basis.

Hi,

I didn't say it was not posible to make a mod alone, it's harder and longer and everybody cannot do it.

The question was also if it would be a good idea to integrate all the tools ur using into a single one.

For me the answer is no. In teamwork every member has a job and the tools for.

Occasionally I use TESvSnip, when I want to delete, splice, or change the FormIDs of references. I use NifSkope for NIFs, Photoshop w/ the NVidia DDS plugin for textures, 3DSMax 2010 for modeling, Fraps for video, SoundForge for sounds, Notepad++ w/ Papyrus language plugin for scripts, and XNView for looking at textures & pics. I also use TESAnnwyn to create to-scale terrain (from satellite imagery heightmaps) with vertex coloring, but that's kind of a one-shot deal per mod.... I only tested to see if it would work and it does (I haven't gotten to my mod which would require its usage yet). I've also used xWMAencode for custom music; again, just to see if it could be done.. I plan to use it more in the future as well. And the app I use more than ANYTHING on my system (except Window$ itself): Total Commander... which is a substitute for Windows Explorer (it has double panes, tabs, custom toolbars, etc).

[EDIT: by the way... if you delete references with TESvSnip, but do NOT change the number of records in the header, the CK will change the header's version number to .85 (Skyrim should be .94, but it doesn't seem to matter). CK does this automatically after you click 'yes' to the question of fixing the record count.. even before the mod finishes loading, AND without having to actually re-save the mod once it IS loaded. If you change anything in the mod inside the CK, then save it, the file version will be automatically corrected to .94. I keep an eye on this and change it in TESvSnip if need be, even though it doesn't seem to cause problems in-game... I just try to eliminate all possibilities of conflict or error.]

Interesting...I had that happen and was wondering what effect it would have. I guess your saying that as long as you make an edit and save after allowing the CK to correct record counts it should be ok?

cooperles5: It does for me... no reason why it shouldn't for others. If it doesn't, simply open the ESP in TESvSnip and manually change the header version back to .94. Again, I don't think this really matters, but I do it just to cover everything (or as much as I CAN.. heheheh).

Besides the CK. I only use Wrye Bash (Smash?) to make ESMs and TESVSnip for merging and splitting. But I if TESVEdit is what everyone is thinking it will be, I would expect to use that as well, or instead of the others. But my mods are just house/locations. Maybe I'm wrong, but when I think about what is broken and/or just missing from the CK, Bethesda doesn't seem to be all that eager to see entire new worldspaces that might compete with the actual game and their own DLC. They have, however, made it pretty simple to add a forge to the basemant of Proudspire or to add some new clothes for the tavern wench. I'm not saying they really care as I don't know why they would unless they are thinking that fewer people will pay for DLC if they are getting content for free elsewhere. I think that is less likely to be an issue for them if the free content is limited. Under that scenario, I would think of the mods as something to keep people interested and active in the game until the first DLC package is available in a few months.

Not that I wouldn't like some CK fixes, but Skyrim is easy to mod. It is not easy to make completely new lands or a total conversion, but then you're talking about very advanced modding. I don't think it is fair to complain that we need to use additional tools (and my list is comparable to yours). If the LOD generation and Navmeshes were not broken I would only have praise for Bethesda.

I agree with most of what Maegfaer said... except the part about it being 'easy'. For some of us it IS (for the most part), but even for experienced modders, there are entirely too many new aspects of Skyrim and more intermeshing complexity throughout it, that even some of the more simpler tasks may create BIG drama, conflicts, or problems. (as opposed to Oblivion which could be running 20 of the worst mods in the world yet still function half-decent) It's simply the price we pay for getting more functionality, options, bells, and whistles.

But I try not to use 3rd party tools to minimize the possibilty that someone else's mistake(s) could ruin MY work; at least until the patches/updates stop coming and the software runs flawlessly (which I don't think ANY Skyrim app has achieved yet). That, and the CK pretty much does what I need it to (navMesh and LOD excluded of course)... as you said - I generally "only have praise for Bethesda". (my preCK impatience notwithstanding... heheheh )

Skyrim is not Easy at all , is probably the most moddable complicated game to mod ... they allow you to use a CK ( Bugged ) , but without External tools made by modders I doubt we woud see barely any mod past the first entisiasm weeks ...

Because new content wouln't be available then and bugs wouln't be able to be fixed , not talking of importer exporters and tools ...

but all this stuff needs side learning as well , and its a lot of complications to scan for all the tools to make something you want ...

Again, like it was said before, that's because we are trying new lands mods.

I could jump into Skyrim modding and make me a quick quest mod in like 3 days without any problems, and relative ease. The actual lower end stuff in the Creation Kit is a LOOOOT simpler than some other Devkits. While trying to make an entire new landmass is indeed more complicated.

LOL I am taking 3 days only to make a courier come to me and deliver a letter ... but apart that that at least seems to work , all the rest need tools and not only for landscapes , without importer exporter no new meshes , no new hacks of othergames armors , no manga , no boobs ... with no niftools no retextures no switching , no new mixing etc .....

GECKO??????? WHERE?

Forever alone...

Creation Kit
TESVSnip
Notepad++
NifSkope
Photoshop CS5.1
3ds Max

And whatever my brain comes up with when I need it, usually when I need automated processes to increase productivity when TESVSnip isn't enough. Extended Slider Colors spawned from an idea when I realized I wanted more colors for my races, but doing it manually would've taken me a life time, so what did I do? REVERSE ENGINEER DAT PLUGIN FORMAT now I've got a working C++ library that loads and saves plugins, inflate/deflate included.

I'm sure that "easy" is purely a relative term. There are things about modding Skyrim that are pretty easy, but there are also parts of the process that are incredibly complex. Very important parts. The game itself is so complex that creating substantial and meaningful mods is always going to be a complicated and time consuming process, even without dealing with mysterious bugs. For those of us that did not learn the basics on the earlier Bethesda games, the learning curve seems to be pretty steep.

Ehhh, relative to a point. Have you ever used the UDK or Hammer Editor? By comparison doing the same simple things is FAR harder. With the CK, you load up a cell, drag in some tile pieces and snap them together. Bam, you have made your layout. For the Hammer you need to use brushes to create sides and do other stuff, and the UDK is just a nightmare. The CK's 'easy' stuff is actually 'easy'.

No its not weird at all. You think Bethesda ONLY used the CK for the entire development of Skyrim? No. That would be silly. There are programs Bethesda uses that they cant release to us, so we have had to fill those gaps. Without their export scripts for 3DS Max, we need NifSkope as well as our own export scripts.

We as modders have to fill in where the devs could not provide. This is normal.

And yes, Skyrim is easy to mod. All Bethesda's games have been the easiest games ive ever modded.

They would be easier if they could give us those tools... Easiest games to mod are the ones that are open source, but that wouldn't bring in any profit (Although Minecraft did anyway). Would be awesome if there were some kind of law that states when an application reaches a certain age it should be open source LOL.

• Creation Kit (does, without issues, 90% of what I need to do)
  
• FO3Edit (bird's eye view of plugin(s), ONAM'ification)
  
• WryeSmash (ESP'ification)
  
• Sublime Text 2 (Scripting)
  
• Notepad++ (secondary text editor)
  
• NifSkope (in the rare event I mess with NIFs)
  
• Photoshop + DDS plugin (in the rare event I mess with textures)

As Skyrim is my first experience with modding a game, I would say it's very easy to mod. It's just really hard to make it work correctly!

For my ScenicCarriages mod, so far, I am using just the following tools:
CK
Notepad++ (w/ Papyrus plug-ins, this is great, almost as good as Visual Stuido, almost )
NifSkope



Edit: so much for the idea of making an ESM to avoid the navmesh bug... since I'm specifically and only editing the vanilla navmeshes, it's not going to help in my case.

- CK
- NifSkope (simply used to see an instant change with retexting in GIMP)
- Gimp
- Audacity
- xwmaencode