NPCs At War Tutorial

Introduction

For me, the NPCs in Oblivion are rather dull. They seem to stand around a lot and stare into space. In this tutorial, I will show how to create two NPCS that will fight each other on sight.

Start a new mod

When you start the construction set, click the open button, then double-click the Oblivion.esm option then press okay. After you wait a few moments, lets save the mod as NPCSATWAR.

Create two new factions and make them "at war"

To beginning the viscous bloodshed, you must first press the character button on the top of the screen. Then press the Faction... button File:NPCsatWarbutton.jpg

After you have open the screen, you should see a long list of factions on the left. Right click that list, press new, and name the editor ID as NPCatWARfaction1. Repeat the same function except name the editor ID as NPCatWARfaction2.

While on NPCatWARfaction2, check the boxes on the top to Evil and Hidden to PC (Note: you do not need to add a name, make the factions evil, or make the faction hidden for Pc if you want to. The name is only useful if the box is not checked on hidden for pc and the pc joins it. Hidden from PC makes the faction hidden from the faction menu if the player is a member. Evil, makes the factions evil, so if you killed them, they would not count as murders. Also, as being evil, they have no protection for guards. If you are in a city, and one of the factions are good, a whole barrel of guards join in. Sometimes the guards hit each other and then they start attacking themselves, kind of funny to watch in my opinion.). Also, right click the interfaction relations list and press new. On the opposing/affiliated box, bring up NPCatWARfaction1 and change the disposition modifier to -100. Do the same steps to NPCatWARfaction1 except for the opposing/affiliated box, change the faction to NPCatWARfaction2. Basically, you just made every person from NPCatWARfaction1 have 100 less disposition than normal to a person from NPCatWARfaction2, and vice versa.

NPCatWARfaction1 can look something like this. File:NPCsatWarfaction.jpg

Wait, don't close that box yet, we will need it for editing our NPCs.

Selecting NPCs to edit

Right clicking on the lists of NPC and pressing new to create a new , functioning, NPC is too hard. Instead, you want to edit an already functioning NPC, preferably one that does not play a big role in Oblivion, because of time-saving as well as if you mess up, not all would go bad. Let's edit the NPCs Tadrose Helas (I'll call her NPC 1) and Tanasa Arano(I'll call her NPC 2), of which you can find both underneath the NPC, Dark Elf, Female List. Let’s start with NPC1.double click her name on the list and it should open a box. like the one below (the red circles show the functions you will be using): File:NPCsatWarNPC.jpg

Editing our NPCs

Before you do anything, change the ID of the NPC, if you forget and you change the actor's AI/script then the character might be messed up! Continuing, under the factions tab, clear all previous factions and pull from the faction box NPCatWARfaction1. Next, go to the AI page, change the aggression to 20, and uncheck the Buy/Sell boxes as well as auto-calc other too. In addition, delete previous packages. NPCsatWar.jpg Do the same steps, as above to NPC2.

Place your NPCs

Now lets place our NPCs on the great green Nirn. Let’s say I want our combatants to be in Bravil. In Cell View, under the World Space tab, click on BravilWrold. In the list of editor IDs, double click on BravilEntranceNorth. Wait for a few moments then a popup will show, just click yes. You may need to navigate using arrow keys or scroll down a bit. Click on the red X (Note: The red X should not be messed with, it is involved in several guard packages) and press T. Scroll up a bit, then place the two NPCs in close proximity. Press F to make them fall to the ground and shift-z added with your mouse moving up or down to make them go to desired elevation.

Load the mod

• Start Oblivion
• Under Data Files, choose NPCsatWar.esp, click OK, click Play
• Load your game and fast travel to the Bravil gate (or where you placed the NPCs).