Greetings! You are right, summons are great from AI point of view, they follow, attack your enemies, do not attack your friends automatically, so there is no headache like when you make a companion animal and you have to say to him what to do all the time, stay, follow, attack and so on. And more then that if he gets lost or something you can summon him again. This mod: http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=26723 is using a companion system and it seems there are problems with it too. So even with scripts there are problems. From my point of view as I will not install SI, I'm very content with the solution I've found for my summons, just like you did. Anyway if you find some way to do things better let me know, I'm interested.
I prefer summoning wolves and bears too! I never liked summoning daedra, or most of the SI creatures. I always liked the Dark Seducers though, so I do not mind summoning them.
I thought about the idea of using scripts. But I do not think it would work fully. You could use a script to create an animal next to you, but it would just be another forest creature. It would not be your summons, and would not follow you around. So I believe it would just wander around as a regular animal would. It might fight your enemies, but probably only if the normal animals would fight them. I might be wrong though. It is worth testing sometime.
Hello again! I do not have Shivering Isles installed and when I did my mod I haven't realised that those extra summon spells will be used for Shivering Isles. I guess Bethesda put those there from the beginning to be used with Shivering Isles. But since I like to play as a Ranger, I prefer wolfs and bears instead of hungers, dark seducers, golden saints and stuff like that. Anyway it's good that I found out what's going on with these spells. So I guess the only way to make new summon animal spells without affecting anything would be to use scripts.
Hi Caesar, thank you for dropping a line. I see your ideas were similar to mine, but go off in different directions.
I think you misunderstood me though. I did not replace any of the old conjuration spells. I replaced the magic effects. Which is exactly the same thing you did. You took most of the magic effects from Shivering Isles and used them for your animal summoning effects instead.
But without the original magic effects, those original spells to summon things like Hungers, Dark Seducers, Golden Saints, etc... are not going to work anymore. The spell is still there, but the magic effect it uses has changed. For example, you used the effect for summoning Dark Seducers for your summon Cougar. So if someone tries to summon a Dark Seducer while using Caesar Ranger they will actually get a Cougar instead. The same sort of thing will happen in Witchcraft.
It was an excellent idea you had to add your new animal faction and then make that friendly to the player. I might do something like that. Or you could just add the Player Faction to the animals. I might want to try something like that for the next version of Witchcraft. I kind of like using an item to trigger it though, as that way it becomes something you can easily toggle on and off, simply by wearing or removing the item.
Hello SubRosa_Florens, if you like to summon animals try this mod http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=32308 It is using a new magic effect for animals and it does not replace the old conjuration spells. The way you aquire the spells is level dependent so it does not imbalance the game. Plus the idea of not to be attacked by animals is implemented without having to wear an amulet or anything.
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This is a wonderful mod
I was attacked by a wolf is that normal ?
You are right, summons are great from AI point of view, they follow, attack your enemies, do not attack your friends automatically, so there is no headache like when you make a companion animal and you have to say to him what to do all the time, stay, follow, attack and so on. And more then that if he gets lost or something you can summon him again.
This mod:
http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=26723
is using a companion system and it seems there are problems with it too. So even with scripts there are problems.
From my point of view as I will not install SI, I'm very content with the solution I've found for my summons, just like you did.
Anyway if you find some way to do things better let me know, I'm interested.
Take care!
And Blessed be!
Caesar
I prefer summoning wolves and bears too! I never liked summoning daedra, or most of the SI creatures. I always liked the Dark Seducers though, so I do not mind summoning them.
I thought about the idea of using scripts. But I do not think it would work fully. You could use a script to create an animal next to you, but it would just be another forest creature. It would not be your summons, and would not follow you around. So I believe it would just wander around as a regular animal would. It might fight your enemies, but probably only if the normal animals would fight them. I might be wrong though. It is worth testing sometime.
Anyway it's good that I found out what's going on with these spells.
So I guess the only way to make new summon animal spells without affecting anything would be to use scripts.
Blessed be!
Caesar
I think you misunderstood me though. I did not replace any of the old conjuration spells. I replaced the magic effects. Which is exactly the same thing you did. You took most of the magic effects from Shivering Isles and used them for your animal summoning effects instead.
But without the original magic effects, those original spells to summon things like Hungers, Dark Seducers, Golden Saints, etc... are not going to work anymore. The spell is still there, but the magic effect it uses has changed. For example, you used the effect for summoning Dark Seducers for your summon Cougar. So if someone tries to summon a Dark Seducer while using Caesar Ranger they will actually get a Cougar instead. The same sort of thing will happen in Witchcraft.
It was an excellent idea you had to add your new animal faction and then make that friendly to the player. I might do something like that. Or you could just add the Player Faction to the animals. I might want to try something like that for the next version of Witchcraft. I kind of like using an item to trigger it though, as that way it becomes something you can easily toggle on and off, simply by wearing or removing the item.
http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=32308
It is using a new magic effect for animals and it does not replace the old conjuration spells.
The way you aquire the spells is level dependent so it does not imbalance the game.
Plus the idea of not to be attacked by animals is implemented without having to wear an amulet or anything.
Bless and blessed be!
Caesar
P.S.
You also get a kudos!