Alright, I'll get right to the short and sweet of it. I'm a newbie when it comes to OBSE, but I've been modding since Morrowind released, and I know that in Oblivion there is no way to do what I want to do (but I know for a fact they added the one function I need in Fallout :banghead: )

So, I'm looking into OBSE as I know many things are possible with it that aren't possible elsewhere.

I'm making a mod where a player can dynamically customize an army under his control, everything from race to how their armor looks, everything. I'm getting a little hung up on the race part. See, in certain sections of my mod, I want to allow the player to explore, say, an area under occupation by his troops. Now, being that there could be any number of different races stationed there, to make it seem like the player truly is affecting the world, I'd need 10 copies of every single NPC I had there. This method I'll henceforth refer to as the "brute force method", which I don't want to do because it makes the file huge (I've estimated I'd require well over 1800 NPCs to adequately perform this method).

Now, I know OBSE has a way with arrays, so I'd like to know if there's any way I can circumvent this. Say, add 10-30 templates (for adequate non-clone-trooper syndrome), for the various races. For every NPC I have stationed there, I create a template with their schedule. Now, to dynamically simulate the races stationed there, I'd need to spawn in a new NPC using something like clone or PlaceAtMe (ack, savegame overflow, I know) from one of the appearance templates, and then copy over the package files from one of the other templates.

Option three is simply downsize- drastically. Force the player to use a certain race for his army, or a certain group of races. Claim that when he occupies, it creates "militia" troops from the native population. I don't like this solution much at all, as it kind of forces the player away from my original vision.

Which of these three options are the best, or is there a fourth, unknown, blessed option that would make my entire life complete from here to summer's end?

Modding the race directly does not seem doable, unlike the MatchRace command in Fallout 3.
I just went through the OBSE manual looking for something comparable to it for Oblivion.

The only things which come to mind involve clones using CreateFullActorCopy, but you need to store the ref variables for these somewhere, in case you wish to reference, alter, or delete them later.
A word of Warning: Removing the mod will not delete such clones. A rigging should be added to delete them all, using the stored references, before removing the mod if this approach is used.

Like the Bruma Statue Ref i stored in MartinNPC's Script.
I am not sure how stable these are. I've not experimented with them.

I wish you luck in solving this one.