Trouble Rigging An Armor Mesh...

[The Vyper]

What I'm trying to do is make a Skeleton wear some armor. I'm using a (slightly) re-textured version of the Ayleid Skeletons found in JGreybear's Ayleidoon Karan set. The current Skeleton mesh looks like this. The only problem is that when the Skeleton crumbles, this happens:

Aaahh!.<--- That seems to be a result of the armor being attached to the arms. Is there a way to modify the mesh so that the arms don't come off?

[daemondarque]

I've seen this happen on Bonelords from Warcry... Unfortunately, skeletons were never meant to wear armor; they were meant to fly apart, and the mesh has no choice but to follow. The only way I know to fix it is to remove the sleeves.

[The Vyper]

I've seen this happen on Bonelords from Warcry... Unfortunately, skeletons were never meant to wear armor; they were meant to fly apart, and the mesh has no choice but to follow. The only way I know to fix it is to remove the sleeves.

Yeah, I tried to remove the sleeves but that resulted in this. I then tried to remove the rigging too, but got a CTD as soon as I entered the room in that screenshot. The CS also crashed when I tried to "preview" that skeleton. I know this can be done because of the Dark Guardians in the DB Sanctuary. So how do I go about removing the sleeves and the rigging without causing a CTD?

[DsoS]

I don't think this would help, as I have the slightest clue to rigging and modeling, etc

But could you use the DB skeleton for what you need... and possibly use that armor your trying to use... maybe if you look at the model or nif from the DB skeleton it may help out a bit?

just my

[nateneurotic]

There could be a few reasons that the mesh is deforming so strangely actually. First off, what might be your skinning method for the armor to the skeleton.nif?

I know that if you use "bone weight heat" to skin, it doesn't take into account that none of the armor mesh should be rigged to bones such as the bip01nonaccum, bip01, magic bone, or other helper bones like that. So, if parts of your mesh actually do get rigged with any of those bones, funny things can happen. If this is the way that you're rigging, you have to first delete ALL the bones that shouldn't deform the armor mesh before applying this type of rigging.

Also, if you use the bone weight copy script from the skellie.nif file, the skeleton actually has some pretty wonky rigging since it's made up of pieces that aren't meant to deform with the bones, but keep their shape. This method could also lead to some weird rigging.

Anyway, from what I can see in your screen shots, it really doesn't look like the problem is coming from the arms but from verticies in the torso or helmet that are rigged to bones that aren't actually part of the body (like the magic node bone for example.) But, I really can't say for sure. Also, skeletons actually don't actually fly apart. When the skeleton dies, only the skull becomes lose, but the rest of the skeleton stays attached, so that wouldn't, or at least shouldn't cause the strange rigging problems. I hope some of this helps.

[The Vyper]

I don't think this would help, as I have the slightest clue to rigging and modeling, etc

But could you use the DB skeleton for what you need... and possibly use that armor your trying to use... maybe if you look at the model or nif from the DB skeleton it may help out a bit?

just my

That was a good idea. I tried looking at the DB skeleton. It uses the same "body" as the normal skeletons, but it has a unique cuirass designed to work with it. I've looked at it, but can't figure out how to rig an existing armor the same way. It's like looking at 10 pieces of a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle and trying to figure out what the picture is.

There could be a few reasons that the mesh is deforming so strangely actually. First off, what might be your skinning method for the armor to the skeleton.nif?

No clue. I'm using the skeleton from Jgreybear's Ayleidoon Karan mod. In fact, the skeleton in the first screenshot is from that mod.

I know that if you use "bone weight heat" to skin, it doesn't take into account that none of the armor mesh should be rigged to bones such as the bip01nonaccum, bip01, magic bone, or other helper bones like that. So, if parts of your mesh actually do get rigged with any of those bones, funny things can happen. If this is the way that you're rigging, you have to first delete ALL the bones that shouldn't deform the armor mesh before applying this type of rigging.

Umm...I don't know enough about NifSkope to make sense of that. I would be more than happy to rig separate pieces of armor for the skeleton to use (like the DB Skeletons) if I knew how. I'd want to use Boots, Greaves, Cuirass and Helmet.

Also, if you use the bone weight copy script from the skellie.nif file, the skeleton actually has some pretty wonky rigging since it's made up of pieces that aren't meant to deform with the bones, but keep their shape. This method could also lead to some weird rigging.

That appears to be what happened.

Anyway, from what I can see in your screen shots, it really doesn't look like the problem is coming from the arms but from verticies in the torso or helmet that are rigged to bones that aren't actually part of the body (like the magic node bone for example.) But, I really can't say for sure.

Hmm.How might I go about fixing that, or rigging individual pieces of armor so they can be selected in the "Model List" in the CS (and actually show up in the correct place)?

Also, skeletons actually don't actually fly apart. When the skeleton dies, only the skull becomes lose, but the rest of the skeleton stays attached, so that wouldn't, or at least shouldn't cause the strange rigging problems. I hope some of this helps.

Wait, so the arms are still "attached" even though they're half a mile away? No wonder the armor stretches.

[nateneurotic]

So, I downloaded the mod, and took a look at the skeleton's mesh in game and in nifskope. Unfortunately, in game, the Ayleid skeletons do the same thing when they die... a few of the vertices on the body portion of the armor are still rigged up to the arm bones and like to stretch along with them when the arms detach from the body when the skeleton dies. I think a relatively simple solution would be to tweak your skeleton's skeleton.nif so that the arms DO NOT detach at death. That way, you won't have to worry about reskinning any of the armor or removing more pieces. In fact, you may be able to add the arms and gloves back if you like.

What you would have to do is open up your skeleton's skeleton.nif, located the Bip 01 L UpperArm and Bip 01 R UpperArm and add some constraints to them. The easiest way to do this would be to copy the bhkRagdollContraints for the Bip 01 Thigh bones and link the copies up to the bhkRigidBody blocks of the Upper Arm bones. When you've added the constraints, the arms should no longer fall off and your skeleton should look good dead or undead.

I can't promise anything though, as I haven't tested this all out yet.

[nateneurotic]

Ok, I uploaded a version of the skeleton.nif file that has constraints where the shoulder joints should be on the skeleton, as well as on the head just for testing purposes. Just use this skeleton.nif file for your skeletons and you should no longer have weird rigging mishaps since the arms should stay attached.

You can download the .nif file HERE.

[The Vyper]

Ok, I uploaded a version of the skeleton.nif file that has constraints where the shoulder joints should be on the skeleton, as well as on the head just for testing purposes. Just use this skeleton.nif file for your skeletons and you should no longer have weird rigging mishaps since the arms should stay attached.

You can download the .nif file HERE.

Works like a charm. Thank you so much! XD

[DsoS]

Glad you found someone who could help you on that. for Nate