Horse Idle Animations

[Tamira]

I think everyone knows the small herd of wild horses in cell 10,6 south of Sardavar Leed, the only wild horses in the game. When you watch them using invisibility or TFC you can see that they have several special idle animations that the other horses in the game don’t show.

Now I wanted to add some untamed horses on a paddock near by my Ravenhorst Manor, not for riding, only for the atmosphere. Of course they should not flee when approached, so I altered the aggression of CreatureHorse from 100 to 5 and saved under a new ID.

Well, my new untamed horses walk around – but they do not show the loiter idles of the wild horses. Why?

Can anyone tell me what I have to do to make my horses show these idles too? And why the other horses in the game don’t show these idles as well? Do I have to give my new horses these idles manually? ( I know how to make NPC play special idles but never did it with a creature)

Here are some pictures that show these idle animations of the wild horses:

Graze:

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/HWrIBWtk8wrQ-B4n4y0e2ycwT2Mrji2-vJDHwRsJKvY?feat=directlink

Paw:

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/wVCcToJwYso22MbWxdJA7CcwT2Mrji2-vJDHwRsJKvY?feat=directlink

Scratch:

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Hqx7glFR_q88swyDMwxVxycwT2Mrji2-vJDHwRsJKvY?feat=directlink

Rest:

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/06N93RPl6-kBLtJ95WJwiycwT2Mrji2-vJDHwRsJKvY?feat=directlink

Swat (not to be seen ingame, only in the CS):

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/V6qSGBNrMmLd81JgwZfAXicwT2Mrji2-vJDHwRsJKvY?feat=directlink

[DarkRider]

All vanilla horses play those idles by default as the animations are setup for the horse skeleton, even swat but that's far less common an occurrence, The idles are conditioned to run on a random percentage interval, so they aren't running idles every frame unrealistically. The reason swat plays rarely is because it has no percentage called, so it's not selected as often. Have you tried watching your horses under the same conditions as the wild horses using invisibility? Detection can make them abort idles.

[Hanaisse]

Here's a tip I just read on the CS Wiki; actors with low energy will play idle anims more often.

[Tamira]

@DR: From the point of logic of course all horses should show the same animations.

Well for testing I mixed LL0Horses with my free roaming horses and put two riding horses among them. Then watched them all for a long time from a distance using TFC.

Only the LL Horses show the animations but not my herd. And the riding horses certainly won’t. (I never watched riding horses with idle animations).

I don’t understand this.

@Hana: My horses should have the same energy level as the LL ones, as I only changed their aggression. But I will have a look at this, thank you.

Edit: Lowering health and fatigue did not change anything....

Well, maybe they only show the idles only once per day and this wasn't the time - lol -

Edited July 14, 2011 by Tamira

[lonewolf_kai]

IS and I sort of touched on this not long ago when I was trying to figure out why the Akatosh Mounts, which are set as mount types, would not play their idle anims when told to "Stay." The script is supposed to force the animal into an idle state where it should play the anims. We never could get them to do it. The only way I could get it to work was to switch the dragon to a creature rather than mount type and then it played the anims.

I'll have to try that tip though and see if it changes though Hana.

[donnato]

This is interesting...I didn`t know horses could use invisibility...

[DarkRider]

@DR: From the point of logic of course all horses should show the same animations.

More than a point of logic I'm afraid, it is what it is. All vanilla horses use the same skeleton, same animations, same conditions to dictate idle plays. There are minor differences, such as energy level, and aggression, but nothing in the vanilla design will stop all animations from playing at all, that would take some modding to interrupt; it's not a difference of tame vs wild being vastly different. To demonstrate, I captured some screens of vanilla captive horses playing animations,

Look:

Rest

Graze

Now that said, in testing for these shots I did find out more about how horses pick their idles and I think it may explain the behavior you are seeing. It seems like horses only run the percentage on their idles immediately after selecting an AI package. Which would be why a horse with higher energy and more aggression would appear to do more idle animations. They are likely evaluating AI more frequently. To get your horses moving more, what I would try is giving them 3 different Wander AI packs with varying radius widths to wander and set to run at 3 different times, energy set at 75. This way your horses will evaluate and change packages more frequently and so will re evaluate and play their idles as a result. Try it and see.

[Tamira]

Thank you for taking your precious time to make screenshots and for your suggestion.

More than a point of logic I'm afraid, it is what it is. All vanilla horses use the same skeleton, same animations, same conditions to dictate idle plays. There are minor differences, such as energy level, and aggression, but nothing in the vanilla design will stop all animations from playing at all, that would take some modding to interrupt; it's not a difference of tame vs wild being vastly different.

Maybe I did not find the right words in my first post, I never doubted that all horses have these idles. My question was "what must I do to make other horses show them?".

Well, I'm going to make a testing series this weekend starting with your suggestion and then have a look at other creatures too. Then I'll report here.

Thanks again and a cookie goes to you

[Tamira]

You are right, Rider. The wild horses pick up their idles usually when I load the scene via savegame or fast travel, but only seldom when I approach them slowly from a distance. The same can be forced by entering my manor and then step out again. And my custom horses do so sometimes but very seldom.

I tested my custom horses again with different values for the energy level, for health, and several more, but I did not see any difference.

I tried several different packages as you suggested but the only effect was, that the horses at shift-change went to their editor points and started to gaze at the landscape again. They even usually do not walk around. They are LAZY

As for the low energy Hana mentioned: I installed TIE some day ago (of course deactivated it for my tests), where the wolves do not attack you until you or they die as in vanilla but flee when their life energy is low. When they come to a stop after that they instantly pick up the „I am a cute little doggie“ idle (which looks odd because one would expect them to lie down and lick their wounds). Maybe this is what CS Wiki is talking about.

Test result: My horses randomly pick their idles but by far not as often as the wild horses. I have to be content with this and take it „as is“.

Thank you all for your comments.

Edited July 17, 2011 by Tamira