Help me get started making NPC's

[colbruce]

Hello.  Long time player, been using mods for a year.  Always have made my own portraits and soundsets.  Finally decided to try making an NPC for others to install.  Unless this sounds too tricky, I'd like to start with a pair of NPC's who go together (a monk and a shaman/shapeshifer/or druid type guy).

I've read the NPC Tutorial on this forum (thank you).  I am just wondering any additional hints, tutorials, sites to look at, or just advice for a beginner.  Are other ppl new at making NPC's hanging out on this forum?

I have a few specific questions but just wanted to ask for general tutorials etc. first so I can read up before asking questions.

[jcompton]

Hello.  Long time player, been using mods for a year.  Always have made my own portraits and soundsets.  Finally decided to try making an NPC for others to install.  Unless this sounds too tricky, I'd like to start with a pair of NPC's who go together (a monk and a shaman/shapeshifer/or druid type guy).

It adds a layer of complexity. I'd suggest you work on getting one NPC into the game, then add his/her friend.

I've read the NPC Tutorial on this forum (thank you).  I am just wondering any additional hints, tutorials, sites to look at, or just advice for a beginner.

Don't underestimate the power of code examples. Unfortunately there's really no one perfect NPC to download and look at, since things never quite work out the way we want them to in the real world.

That said, Ghareth is a good technical example for the basics of what an NPC CRE should look like, what the basics of a NPC TP2 file should look like, how banter works, and so forth.

Some of the more advanced concepts, such as quest interjections and things like the Tree Of Life gut-check, are better demonstrated in mods like Valen or Kelsey--although when you read Kelsey code it's very very very important to read the disclaimers about what is and is not "good form." Because there's some atrocious legacy code in there.

[Nebukad]

I've read the NPC Tutorial on this forum (thank you).  I am just wondering any additional hints, tutorials, sites to look at, or just advice for a beginner.  Are other ppl new at making NPC's hanging out on this forum?

I have a few specific questions but just wanted to ask for general tutorials etc. first so I can read up before asking questions.

Well, I'm pretty much of a beginner in this field, but what I did first, after getting the tutorials done and learning the basics, was a very simple NPC that wasn't party joinable. However, I did it without using any tutorials by digging stuff with Near Infinity (and trying to maintain enough self-control not to copy-paste things from tutorials or mods) and it propably got me more comfortable with many aspects of modding. The most important part of learning for me was propably reading throught the code of whatever mods I happened to have on my computer at the time, though.