What does eternal life look like?

[GothGirlDanielle]

This question is serious and has two parts. You don't have to be an expert at modding to voice an opinion.

The premise: Someone is "cursed" or "blessed" with eternal life. They are not an evil undead. Unwilling undead, wold be more like it. In other words, until the curse/blessing is lifted, they will not die. Once it is, they die immediately. They are not vampires. As long as they are in possession of a certain artifact, they will live. Losing the artifact, they die immediately. Or something like that. Also, they will be in a tomb and cannot leave, And they've lived in these tombs since the end of the First Era, Oblivion time.

Now, how does that look. Their bodies wouldn't rot; that would defeat the curse/blessing. It would be more of a loss of energy, a loss of life force. They wouldn't need to eat or anything else since that need would be contraction to the curse/blessing.

Frankly, I'm tied up in artistic/technical knots over this issue. That's Part I. Part II are the limitations of the TES Construction Set. While I'm not certain what says eternal life to me, I do know I want it to look realistic. You may be thinking: "Dani, what does it matter? Just make 'em look like normal NPCs. Didn't you ever read LotR?" Yes, but I want something surreal. Something that will give the player pause.

I made all possible/known solutions. Here's what I came up with:

1. I could may them talking skeletons. Blah.

2. I could use the "undead Akaviri" ghost solution. Sigh. Nothing new here.

3. I could just make them normal but evergreen NPCs, in a Sean-Connery-Highlander kind of way. Boring.

4. I could give them some kind of light "glow". Nice. The player enters an ancient, darkened dungeon and there's a walking light bulb.

5. I could remake textures to add rotting noses, long grey hair, ultra-wrinkly faces. Entertaining as that would be .... not working for me.

6. I'd like something .... wraith-like. Can you make NPCs fade ... like a Photoshop transparency adjustment? So the player would literally see them, but see through them, too. One solution might be to cast them in a tinted color - like a light spell only colored ... like an aura or a dispersion of energy.

Once I have a solution, I can set light and shadow in the tombs to create a surreal effect. I bet I've watched 50 YouTube videos, I've search IMDB, read a gazillion internet suggestions for eternal life, but I can't decide how these people should look.

If anyone has any suggestions at all, I'd love to hear them. I don't care how off the wall they are. Maybe I can make something with it.

~ Dani ~

Edit: Completely unrelated question: can you run multiple copies of the Construct Set for Oblivion like you could for Morrowind? Thanks.

~ D ~

Edited September 12, 2010 by GothGirlDanielle

[WillieSea]

You can use the 'SAA' command to set the transparency on the actors. 25% transparency would be good.

You could also apply something like the 'ghost' effect to the actors, but make your own, like perhaps a 'green' color instead. Or some other color.

A permanent light spell 'ability' would illuminate them.

There are many solutions to what you could do here.

[DarkRider]

You've got to stop getting your ideas out of the RST playbook.

I'm currently doing the same , not similar, curse thing with custom shaders on NPCs.

[EDIT] You can use multiple editors, you have to edit a setting in the CS .ini to allow multiple editors change the 0 to 1.

[EDIT EDIT] I AM just kidding about taking your ideas from RST, I know it's just an odd and inconvenient coincidence for both of us.

[GothGirlDanielle]

You can use the 'SAA' command to set the transparency on the actors. 25% transparency would be good.

You could also apply something like the 'ghost' effect to the actors, but make your own, like perhaps a 'green' color instead. Or some other color.

A permanent light spell 'ability' would illuminate them.

There are many solutions to what you could do here.

Fair enough. Perhaps I should have said limited by my knowledge of the Construction Set. I assume SAA is a script command?

Thanks.

Dani

You've got to stop getting your ideas out of the RST playbook.

I'm currently doing the same , not similar, curse thing with custom shaders on NPCs.

[EDIT] You can use multiple editors, you have to edit a setting in the CS .ini to allow multiple editors change the 0 to 1.

[EDIT EDIT] I AM just kidding about taking your ideas from RST, I know it's just an odd and inconvenient coincidence for both of us.

Right, I'm really just making your mod. By custom shaders you mean a recoloration of the ghost shaders?

On the multiple editors: ~ Duh!! ~ I knew that. It just got dropped somewhere in my mind.

~ Dani ~

Edited September 12, 2010 by GothGirlDanielle

[DarkRider]

Right, I'm really just making your mod.

I knew it! You fiend!!!! Have at you!

By custom shaders you mean a recoloration of the ghost shaders?

Not the ghost shader but yes an effect shader, wraith I think but I can't recall for sure.

[WillieSea]

SAA is short for SetActorAlpha. It is used to set transparencies of actors.

[DarkRider]

Yes it's a script code. You can make a new script and add it to the actor directly, Or add it to a spell so that you leave the actor script slots open for other stuff you may need. (Look at AbGhostNPC to see how this is done)

A very basic transparency script would look something like:

scn aaGGDSpiritEffectScript


begin ScriptEffectStart

    saa 0.25

end


begin ScriptEffectUpdate


end


begin ScriptEffectFinish


end

[/code]

[GothGirlDanielle]

SAA is short for SetActorAlpha. It is used to set transparencies of actors.

Thank you.

Yes it's a script code. You can make a new script and add it to the actor directly, Or add it to a spell so that you leave the actor script slots open for other stuff you may need. (Look at AbGhostNPC to see how this is done)

A very basic transparency script would look something like:

scn aaGGDSpiritEffectScript


begin ScriptEffectStart

    saa 0.25

end


begin ScriptEffectUpdate


end


begin ScriptEffectFinish


end

Thank you. I think I need to go read some basic ncp scripting tutorials, just to get oriented.

~ Dani ~

[Mishaxhi]

THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE