Replacing character Models

[Bahumot]

I have a simple editing question. I want to know how to replace one of the player models with an NPC model. Specificly one of the alien NPCs, Rodian, Rataka, Selkath, since I was disapointed you could not select a different species to play as. Plus I'm pretty sure these models will function since they are used in combat and use the same animations. I have used the Never Winter Knights explorer and Bif Unpacker to access the see which model files I'll need to use, but neither of these programs alow me to add or remove files in the bifs. Are there any programs that would let me access the files as efficiently as NWN Explorer and Bif Unpacker and let me add and remove from those files? (Other programs open the bifs but all we see inside are .raw files, or they just crash). Also, would it be possible to do the model replacing by creating identically named folders, like how Jedi Outcast and other editable games do? I've tried that once with a "player" folder in data files and it had no effect, so are there any other ways I could go about it? If anyone has any information on how to replace the models, myself and possibly many others will be very greatful. Seems to me if modding is going to be done for this game, it's going to have to start small, like replacing a few models.

[Darwithe]

Have you tried putting the files directly into the override directory?

I know for a fact that the override directory still works for .2da files, but either it dosn't work with scripts or scripts are initilized at new game and then stored in the save file. *shrug*

[Bahumot]

You were right, Darwithe, the override folder did it. (Why didn't I think of that in the first place?). It successfully replaced the files. Problem is, it crashed the game. I tried replacing player models, Thrask's model and Sithsoldier models with one of the alien models, but they all resulted in crashes before I could see the fruits of my labors. But now we know we can replace files through override. However, replacing the character models is going to be a bit more complicated. It bugs me, since it looked like most of the models in the game were handled with the same animations, seeing how they used the same combat animations. Hopefully someone comes up with an answer on how to successfully replace these models. It may up the replay value greatly and satisfy a number of our roleplaying wishes.

[Armisael]

Yes, muchly. I'd give my right eyeball for a halfway decent-looking male face...

[Darwithe]

Well, something is messing up or missing somewhere. I can bypass the crash-on-load problem by putting the appropriatly renamed .raw with it, IE: putting both of Mission's body .mdls and .raws renamed to pfb?s.mdl and both raws renamed the same, but the vertexes seem to be completely unbound for some reason. (It actually works in-game, it's just a large, sharply pointy, blob which dosn't seem to display armor, only weapons)

 

Note: Of the 3 bif programs I use, only BifUnpacker 0.5 by Zoligato extracts the raws without crashing on my system.

Also some combinations of files always crashed and others didn't.

IE: pfbas.mdl replacement worked by itself, but pfbbs.mdl crashed when it didn't have pfbas.mdl from the same source.

 

I really wish there was a 2da decrypter out so I could take a look at appearances.2da and find out how they bound things together.