I noticed in the construction set that you can change body meshes for different races. I don't remember if you could do this in Fallout 3, but it was something that I wished they had in Oblivion.

I remember the first time I saw Roberts male bodies, and the choices you had I had visions of seeing different people with body types that matched their lifestyle. It wasn't possible back then, but it looks like it is now.

If it is as simple as I think, it would be a matter of making duplicates of the existing races - one for each body type - changing only the body mesh used. this would give the player to choose what body type they'd like their character to have.
Changing the bodies of NPC's seems like it would be easy too, just a lot more time consuming as you would have to go through each individual NPC and change his race.

I haven't tried to do this yet, mostly because I'd need to contact Robert to get permission to use his meshes but also because it's something I'd just thought of, so it's mostly theoretical at the moment. but if it is possible, I am seriously considering doing it as even though it would take me a long time, I feel that it would be a massive improvement to the Fallout atmosphere.

My question, and the only issue I think I may have is the clothing/armour meshes. These are a single mesh for all races, meaning that even if I all the races body shapes, they would all look the same with any clothing equiped. I'm curious to know if it would be possible to make an armour choose a mesh based on race using a script, possibly using the script extender or something similar. Basically I'm wondering if there would be any possible way to get around this, as I feel it would ruin the whole feel of what I'm going for.

Does anybody have any ideas/input? Any at all would be appreciated.

I would take a look at these two FO3 mods: http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=10053 and http://fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=10235.

What they do (or claim to do, I never got around to using them) is basically what you're talking about, except (if I recall), they just choose the body randomly--and they do it completely dynamically with scripting instead of having the mod get its dirty fingerprints all over every NPC in the game. Further, I haven't given them a good look but NPCs do actually have classes in FONV, so what you could probably do then is have the mod give NPCs a body based on their class. This would both be a lot less work and a lot more compatible with other mods. You might still have to tweak the classes of NPCs that aren't giving you the desired effect, but I imagine that's still loads better than modifying their race.

I remember some talk regarding mesh path changing with OBSE or an OBSE plugin. Don't take my word on that though.

FO3 allowed for different bodies aswell.

Compatibility is something I'd thought about, but I hadn't really thought of any solutions. I've never really done much scripting, so I don't really know what kinds of things can/can't be done. But if I was to set the mesh based on class instead of race (which would could less conflicts, and take a lot less time to do) it would have to be done via script. If it can be done this way, it would be great. I didn't even consider this, so I'll have to look into it.

I'd never seen those to mods you linked either, but it shows that the mod is possible. My only issue with it is the whole randomisation of meshes, I feel that this could come up with some very unusual results.

Thanks for your input, it's given me some things to think about.


Oh nice! That's good news.