Hey Guys,

I've been busy this last few days pretty much constantly, reading , practicing and learning the GECK, BLENDER, NIF Scope etc and now am looking at starting my first original mod. Basically Im thinking about building a new building in the wasteland but my chosen spot isn't very flat and I would like to flatten the ground mesh in a specific area of the wasteland. Does anyone know how to alter the ground mesh ?

As nobody has replayed yet Ill add a couple of more questions I'm wondering about. Basically I've got a problem where there is a Car wreck in a location that is not convenient so I simply Moved it to another spot not far away and saved. However when I reload Fallout 3 the Car is still in the original position prior to me moving it in the GECK ? Can anyone cast some light on why this is the case ?

Also I have some Grass growing thought the soil in a location I would like to clear . I've deleted all the shrubs and bushes but cant seem to do the same for grass. I cant even see the crass In the GECK ! Is there anyway for me to ensure a small area is clear of grass altogether ?

World -> Landscape Editing or tap "H" while in a worldspace. To flatten, tick "Flatten Vertices" with Texture set to NONE. If you have a texture set, it will paint. The grass is painted on. I think "I" brings up the textures used in that quad window.

I've never edited the wasteland landscape, only a small custom worldspace. So I don't know how that will play out.

If you change the land a lot, or move/remove trees or buildings, you would then have to regenerate the LOD as well. Or things will look odd when they suddenly change when you get close to your modded area. The Ghost LOD trees and buildings could also still be in their original places.

As for grass, its part of the texture that is in that area. You would have to draw a 'grassless' texture over the 'grass' texture.

and DO NOT DELETE OBJECTS IN YOUR WAY. Simply make it initially disabled so it wont load ingame. This will save you ALOT of trouble.

Err too late gunmaster. I've already deleted a lot of clutter around the area. Just things like tyres,skulls,sandbags, etc stuff you cant pick up! However concerning the LOD I should be OK as im not flattening mountains or anything just levelling a small area where a shack once stood, and no trees were cut down or destroyed in the making of this mod. Grrr bad lumber jacks. I'm only looking to level the foundation of the building as it is very uneven at the moment.

While you may gat away with it, Gunmaster's advice about not deleting vanilla objects is right on. Don't be surprised if you start getting CTDs or other weird behavior when going to that area in-game. In general deleting vanilla objects is one of the big No-Nos.

Damn. How would I initially disable objects from loading ? Would moving them be OK . I just want to clear a small space of rubbish clutter from the game. Im hoping this wont be too involved but Im a noob and only know enough to ,id swear at this point normally, to cause the game to 'swear' up !!! Hell I don't even know what a CTD is !!! Also , bar from starting my mod over how would I 'fix' this ?

Also can someone explain in a little more detail how I would remove the clumps of grass. ? They look like there above the ground texture however and not part of it !!! However they not selectable like some 'Bushes' are so it fits that there not actual objects ? But I don't know :/

Double click an object and check the box at the bottom that says 'initially disabled' Moving them underground is alright too, but making them initially disabled is better. The grass is part of hte ground texture. to get rid of it apply a new texture to the ground.

Thanks Gunmaster Having a Little difficulty in that part of the area wont 'Paint' over wih the new texture. I see a sharp clean edge between where the new texture has been applied and the older texture. This area that wont let the new texture 'adhere' to it is square and has a car placed on it which can be exploded :/ Could this cause a problem ?

I'm going to try linking you all to an image of the 'glitch' hope this is allowed :/


http://yfrog.com/2oscreenshot3pyj

FYI - CTD = Crash To Desktop

As I said in my post way up there, you have to paint a new texture that is a 'grassless' texture over the existing 'grass' texture.

If you cannot paint anymore, its because you exceeded the number of allowable textures in a quad. There are 4 of them in each cell.

Press 'B' to see the cell boundries.

[EDIT] Press 'H' to go into landscape mode, then...
Press 'I' to see the currently used textures in a cell. Delete the least used ones, but never delete the first one on any list.

AND MAKE SURE you save your mod before trying any of this because you cannot undo a lot of the world editing.

I understand how to paint on a new texture to hide the grass. Its basically replacing the existing tecture with another that dosent have the grass effect. Ive done this and tested it in the game and there is no longer any grass. GREAT. I know how to do this now.

BUT I have a problem!

I can see that One edge of the area that wont take the texture is part of the boundary you mentioned that is now visible after pressing 'B' ( Its a Black and Yellow Line) However when I press the 'I' key I dont understand the information that is displayed! I fail to understand what im looking at ? OK I get this is the number ? and names of textures but there seems to be many more cells than just 4 Quads ? Also what use s this information too me ? I'm confused. Can you explain the jargon for me .

So.. Far

I've opened the wasteland in world space then in cell view I've selected a cell ? from the cell view then within this I've boundary's which divide the cell up into squares ! Is this called quads ? If so I have a large number displayed and the foundation of my building happens to be on the border between 2 of these 'squares'.

Sorry for being dense but im very new to this :/

OK I'm beginning to see. I've tried selecting a texture that was already listed in the Quad that would not use the new texture and it works fine. What is the limit of textures per quad 7 ? That seems all that I can use. The first quad only had 6 textures so using another did not seem to pose a problem. So im going to have to create a concrete foundation object possibly to get the effect I want in the game. Should be a good starting point for creating my first Fallout 3 Object in blender .

OK SO If each 'Square' within the Black and Yellow Boarder (B) Key is a 'Cell' How can I tell which quad is which ? I'm assuming that they have some Mapping orientation for use in the GECK ? Is there anyway to display the boundary's between the Quads ? Like the Border key ?

Typically, the cell should be looked at with north at the top.

So, the top left quad would be the North-West part of the cell.
The top right quad would be the North-East part of the cell.
etc..

Once the list becomes 'full' then you cannot add any more textures to that quad of the cell.

If the texture is on a cell boundry, you have to change to the other cell that is not letting you add a new texture and check the number of textures in those cell quads. The list in 'that' cell is probably full.