Update: Made a beta version of a possible Bearded NPCs mod that uses different races for the beards.

http://tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=30140

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I'm not good at introducing a topic, so I'll just get to the point:

I guess many people here know "Nords with Beards" and "Equippable Beards". These mods are cool, but they have certain flaws: Firstly, they only work for the player, not for NPCs, and secondly, one of them is only for Nords and the other one only has equippable beards, which means that they don't move with the mouth.

Now, I don't understand this. Because adding beards to NPCs isn't actually that hard. You make a new race for every beard mesh & color you have, and then you change the races of certain NPCs accordingly.
"There are some problems with that", you might say. But so far the only one that comes to my mind is that the new races don't get the dialogue that has an NPC's race as a condition. And those are mostly the chit-chat between NPCs, so it's not even a big problem. On top of this, I've heard that there is even an OBSE function with which you can tell the game to act as if the new race was actually one of the vanilla races, so that way we could get rid of this problem completely.

So today I tinkered around a bit, and I discovered something else: Changing the race of an NPC doesn't even seem to affect mods like TNR (Tamriel NPCs Revamped). To be more precise: I made a plugin that is dependent on RBP (Race Balancing Project) and made a Breton race with a beard, which also had all the RBP hair and eyes. I changed Alberic Litte to that race, and put the plugin at the end of my load order (and added RBP to its master files). Before it, I had one of the NPC Diversity plugins from RBP; one that included TNR and that also changed Alberic Litte's haircut to one of throttlekitty's.
http://img69.imageshack.us/img69/7690/albericlette.jpg
As you can see, he still has throttlekitty's haircut and TNR's face - even though (or because?) I let my race-changing plugin load after the Bashed Patch.
His dialogue seemed fine as well, and he even had a conversation with somebody else shortly after I made that screenshot (though I can't say if it was a race-specific conversation).

So this all leaves me with the question: Why hasn't anybody done this by now?
Right now I really want to make this a new little project - but I'd like to know first if there are still any issues that could come up.


And now, off to a slightly different topic:

If it was actually possible to make bearded NPCs this way without major drawbacks, then we would still have the problem that there are almost no beard resources out there. The only ones I know of are the beards "Nords with Beards" uses and Hel Borne's two beards (a Fu Manchu beard and a French goatee/mustache).
While Hel Borne's beards are simply outstanding, the ones Nords with Beards uses have clipping issues (some of them seem a couple of sizes too big for Oblivion's heads).

So I thought, maybe some modelers would feel encouraged by this thread.
Like I said, I have high hopes that this could actually work, which would mean a completely new Oblivion experience. And we only need a small number of different styles, as they all look different when worn by different races (though the Nords should probably have very unique beards no other race would have). It would be highly appreciated... since I'm playing FO3 more often, I realize how having no beards at all in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is the greatest game in the history of the universe. big time.* It takes away so much of the atmosphere this game could have. And the current selection is simply too limited.

*) Wow, that's the most grammar-defying censorship I've ever seen! I just wanted to say that having no beards svcks! Oblivion is an "alright" game!

1. Yes, OBSE function 'SetRaceAlias' can make any custom race can be recognized as any vanilla race.
2. However, you'll have to make new races for every beard(like Nords with Beards), it will make racial selection quite cluttered.
3. When you change any vanilla NPC's race to custom one, Bash tag 'NPCFaces' may not work. If any other mod changes said NPC's behavior or something(like some official DLCs), and if 'NPCFaces' does not work, you'll have to make separate compatibility patch. (NPC beautification mod 'XEO' already has this problem, so I had to make my own patches for the mods I use)

Short note: I made fully 'conformulated' beard resources for human/mer and orc heads and had very few downloads. No one seemed interested.

Hm. Beards would be nice.

hmm, and were might this mod resource be located?

LFact:
1. Yep, pretty cool!
2. Only a problem if you make them playable. :grad: But even then it'd be only a one-time annoyance I could easily live with (ever scanned through RBP's arsenal of haircuts? Now THAT's annoying!). Anyway, one could have them not be playable, and instead the user can just make the bearded race he might want to use for his character playable himself.
3. Hm, I thought my little "Alberic Litte experiment" showed that this was not the case?

Hel Borne - Well, I am interested now. And I've been using your resources for ages, one time I even tinkered in RBP so that all orcs had your Fu Manchu beard. I've been in the "beard business" for quite some time, only I never dared to change the races of NPCs because I thought bad things would happen. Which I can imagine as a reason for many modders not to try this. And since there's not other way to get your resources into the game, that would probably explain low download numbers.
(However, I think your resources have found their way to quite a couple of smaller download sites, so download numbers might be misleading. On Ei der Zeit, all your mods have pretty decent download numbers - the beards have around 400 downloads all in all.)
So... if this project turns out to be possible, then it would be great if you gave it another shot. I already said how much I like your beard resources, especially the Fu Manchu... too bad there are no Asian-type races in the game, but it fits the orcs perfectly, and I guess Altmer or Redguard wizards wouldn't look too bad with it either.

Prime Monky: It is available on http://www.ei-der-zeit.com/portal/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=942:hel-bornes-haarschnitte-und-baerte&catid=37:ressourcen-und-replacer&Itemid=54. Be sure to download both versions; the 2.5 version is only for orcs, the 2.0 version has the French style and a Fu Manchu for human races.

Also, the SetRaceAlias command would work fine... So long as you input it once per session. Per race.
It's great for small scale once off effects(like forcing a mod that doesn't work unless you're one of the vanilla races to think you are one), but on a larger scale, it's kind of sketchy in my eyes.
Of course, it'd be great if it stuck in the game until disabled somehow, but it'd also be a nuisance with mods that do included your race and other ones as part of one race check(such as Integration).
Then again, if there is a way to check if the game has just been loaded, then one could run the script like that, saving headaches and framerate.

I'm using my own cosmetic mod, but I know. Now I cannot count how many hairs/eyes I have! XD

Thanks Fearabbit!

http://cs.elderscrolls.com/constwiki/index.php/GetGameRestarted / http://cs.elderscrolls.com/constwiki/index.php/GetGameLoaded

I hope we can beards integrated well. It would be a welcome addition.

I originally made the first beard mod resource, which is what most beard mods today are derived from. Nords with beards just popularized my hard work in creating the meshes and textures in the first place by adding it to some races, etc. The reason there is clipping is because it was before conformulator was made. Now IMO, the correct way to make a beard mod would be to merge the beard with each hair style, then conformulate the whole thing, hair and beard as one mesh. Then, add it to the VANILLA races as an optional hair style. Then you could have any race with a beard and no ill side effects at all, no bash, no scripts no nonsense.

This is just one approach you could do it a number of ways like take the conformulated beard resource and just use a script on game load block with a do once to add beards using tail slot to selected NPC's in the world and you wouldn't need to modify ANYTHING... it would be compatbile with any other race mod, etc.

Holy... I just tried the approach with the hairstyle. That actually worked!
I can't merge the beards with the hairstyles myself, so I just conformulated it on its own, creating a bald hairstyle with a beard attached to it. No matter how much I squeezed the head in FaceGen, it would stay attached to the skin... so I guess it would also move with the mouth when the NPC talks.

I'm amazed. And even more confused why nobody in all these years cared about making this come true.

Edit: Ah, how disappointing. When I set it up this way, it doesn't seem to move with the mouth.

So the beard is stuck with the hairstyle?

Problem with adding to hair mesh is the beard disappears when you equip a helm. Best solution was to merge with teeth or tongue mesh (IMO). Tail/amulet slots are used by a lot of mods. I'm a big fan of your work BTW.

You could use my http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=10674, freeing up 2 face slots to insert any extra bit of conformulated face furniture you'd like.

Ooh, I'm dreaming. Would be great to have real men in Oblivion :drool: . Though I can't help, I would be one happy camper.

Because there are still some issues to solve, see my comments below.


Ooops your right, I didn't think of that, so you are correct that using a spare teeth slot would be the way to go.

Glad you like my work! I can't remember exactly what mods of yours I've used, but I know for sure I've downloaded and used a few before


Definitely the way to go.

I imagine that the beards should work to some degree after conformulated. However if they are not tessellated enough there might be some weird distortion around the mouth when they talk, but it should move some. I don't know that much about the conformulator but if it worked in facegen then it should work in Oblivion.

And we owe the Conformulator and other tools to you so I'd like to express my gratitude. :bowdown:

Conformulating your existing meshes wouldn't be that hard. I'd suggest closing up the gaps and meshsmoothing a bit cause they'll need to bend. I had planned on doing all sorts of styles (muttonchops, goatees, sideburns, etc.) but again the response to the 1st sets were a little lukewarm. I gave the Orcs bushy eyebrows. Not sure anyone noticed.

http://nixbased.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/beardtypes1.jpg

Waalx has also made many bearded NPC and some with http://i285.photobucket.com/albums/ll54/pero_lozhach/WAC/Picture25.jpg. http://s285.photobucket.com/albums/ll54/pero_lozhach/WAC/ http://waalx.com/RealSwordsForum/index.php?sid=487912a4479be280db41db3cc218931c

They may look weird on my pics because WAC overhauls their appearance and I use RBP, so it's conflicting. But originally, it looks very cool.

Edit:
http://waalx.com/Downloads/druids.jpg
http://waalx.com/Downloads/notWaldo.jpg
http://waalx.com/Downloads/marauders.jpgs

Oh, man! If anybody takes this idea and runs it with, I will download it in a New York minute. Beards, fat people (also now possible, just waiting for someone to run with it)... All I need now is a peg-leg model, and I can have NPCs that look just like me! (Just kidding. I don't have a beard. )

By the way, Hellbishop, those Orc fu manchus are awesome!

gothemasticator

I for one did.
Those are the best beard models out there.
I'd love to even see a fraction of that list come true.

WAC gives a whole range of races beards and adds them to the world, which really enhances diversity and beauty.

Oh my god yes! I'm printing that out, and sticking it on my wall!

And I would definitely like to see facial hair in oblivion. It might persuade me to start a new, male character!

Strange, one of the most famous facial hair types - the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toothbrush_moustache - is missing.