To avoid any confusion about how boss & weak music isn't working...
The DCS - Combat.esp provides but does NOT distribute keywords that are used to define boss targets, keyword distribution is handled by a lot of separate plugins that way it's kept completely optional
Additionally if you are using one of the keyword distribution plugins and are getting silent combat music...
be sure you have some CombatBoss & CombatWeak music files because that's what the distribution plugins are for which is to enable keywords that allows and filters targets for those, a basic Bandit or Bandit Outlaw (not Bandit Thug) or Wolf will use CombatWeak while a Bandit Chief if encountered as the first target enemy will use CombatBoss for example, if you can get music for only some targets such as named town npcs it's most likely the case you don't have at least 1 of each of these song types.
EDIT 2/21/2021
I started trying to use npc replacers like Men of Winter, Pandorable, Northbourne, Retouched Bandits, and such and some of these will conflict with DCS Combat IDs by removing the keywords so if you use one of those might want to check those with SSE Edit against the DCS Combat ID - Skyrim and then simply drag the keyword(s) added by DCS over to the npc replacer which you do want to load the replacer after otherwise you get the keyword but not the changes, in fact you might get a black face since the Combat ID loaded after would be restoring the original face data.
If you don't use a bash patch or some other kind of automated patch like me you'll want to compare your entire load order to any replacer you install because you never know what change gets left out whether it be a door key added by JK, a faction added by Mysticism, an item from Cutting Room Floor, AI data, the new stats from Skyrim Revamped, you just never know unless you check, and yes everything I just listed was just some of the things I had to correct in my own load order.
If you're not familiar with changing things with SSE Edit or just not the npc data part the things you DON'T want to change for the replacer to stay as intended are the Head Parts, Tint Layers (unsure about Texture Lighting but to be on the safe side probably don't), Weight (changing this can cause black faces if I remember right so don't do it unless you plan to re-export the facegen files with the Creation Kit), and Race which for example the unofficial patch changes Aringoth to a Wood Elf as was as the head parts, the replacer I have for him reverts back to High Elf which is tempting to drag that change over but I'm almost sure it will break the facegen and cause a blackface until re-exported.
Hmm I don't have the option to sticky this, maybe because it's in a comment chain perhaps would be my guess so I had to copy & paste this post by Halifax92 which may make things a little easier for some.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So the program is called Mp3tag, don't know if I'm allowed to link to it or not from here(it's legit, you can get it right from the developer's website), but it's easy enough to find on Google. It's free to use, normally it's meant to edit the artist/album misc track info of music files. It supports xwm, so you can edit files already converted by MultiXWM or whatever you use. You can only process one folder of files at a time, but it still helps some.
1. I start by putting all the files from one type, such as Tundra Day CombatNormal, into a blank empty folder. I just made a new folder on my desktop. 2. In Mp3tag, there is a yellow folder icon with a green check that says 'change directory' in the toolbar, click that and navigate to the folder with the music you want to rename. The tracks should show up in the program. 3. Click Tools, then 'Auto-Numbering Wizard'. Make sure Tracknumber and 'Leading Zeros' are checked, and 'Begin at Tracknumber' is set to 1. Press Ok. 4. Click Convert in the top toolbar, and select 'Tag - Filename'. You can also find a shortcut in the center of the toolbar, it looks like a red dot with a curved yellow arrow pointing to a white paper. In the field, enter Trackname%track%, so for example CombatNormal%track%, or Explore%Track%. A preview will appear below the entry field, it should show CombatNormal01. Select Ok. (For finale tracks, use CombatBoss%track%End) 5. All the files in the folder will now be numbered with the naming scheme you want. I just cut and paste the music to the desired folder and then repeat with the next set of files. It still requires some manual work, but it beats having to manually rename tracks individually. *As a bonus, Mp3tag remembers your previous settings, so you save some time by doing all the explore tracks in a row, then all the dungeon tracks, etc.
IF YOU WANT TO MAKE A KEYWORD DISTRIBUTION to get another mod to use DCS's Weak & Boss music...
9/3/2021 EDIT Ver 2.9 has had the keywords changed to injected records into Update.esm so as I understand it you can I think just make a new keyword record in your esp and change it to have the same name & FormID as DCS does and it should work without DCS - Combat.esp needing to be a master, however Update.esm will be needed as a master.
0 - Download & install the Creation Kit from Bethesda's Bethesda.Net Launcher 1 - Download & install SSE CreationKit Fixes by Nuukem here https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/20061 2 - Open the Creation Kit 3 - Click FILE in the upper left corner and then Data... 4 - Find DCS - Combat.esp and double click it so it's box is ticked to indicate it will be loaded 5 - Find the esp of the mod you want to edit and do the same 6 - Press Ok and continue when it warns of no active esp because you're making a new one 7 - If the mod has new races adding a keyword to them is a faster way of giving it to a group of npcs as well as a little less likely to be a conflict later, to add a keyword to a race double click it and then on the far right side in the Keywords column right-click and choose ADD and then if it's a weak enemy add 00DCSCombatWeak, if it's something you want to use location generic boss music then add 00DCSCombatBossGeneric, and if you want to use one of the special boss music folders you'll instead want to add 00DCSCombatBossSpecial00NormalLockout & then one of the other 00DCSCombatBossSpecial keywords which will tell it which folder to use, for most mods you're probably going to want to use the 00DCSCombatBossSpecialOtherMods keyword
8 - Now go through the Actors tab and search for individual npcs that are not yet covered, when you find one double click it to open it and then go to the Keywords tab and then follow the same instructions for adding a keyword as above in step 7
9 - If the mod has fully new tiers of enemies such as with Bruma (CYREncGoblin01, CYREncGoblin02, CYRGoblin03 and so on), then you probably will want to add the 00DCSCombatWeak keyword to the first 2 tiers (all of the CYREncGoblin01s & CYRGoblin02s in this case) which will be consistent with how DCS - Combat ID - Skyrim is set up.....NOTE that just because it's an 01 tier doesn't mean it may deserve the Weak keyword, check the Stats tab to see the level and use your best judgment, if it doesn't seem like a weak enemy leave it alone and it will be counted as a normal enemy.
10 - Ensure the next tier isn't inheriting the 00DCSCombatWeak keyword, for example open CYRGoblin03 npcs and see if they are using a lower tier template AND using the Use Keywords flag, if this is true then all you need to do is remove the Use Keywords flag
11 - For any generic bosses (for example CYREncGoblin02BossMelee) add the 00DCSCombatBossGeneric keyword but don't add or if it's been inherited remove the 00DCSCombatWeak keyword
12 - Ensure any leveled npcs that use those new tiers are actually keeping the keywords, for example if we look at CYRLvlGoblinBossMagic we see it's not set for Use Keywords, so to fix that all we need to do is click the Use Keywords flag OR we can just add the keyword directly
13 - If the npc is using a vanilla leveled list for it's template (for example LCharBanditMeleeAny) all you need to do is set it to Use Keywords
14 - For any unique major boss npcs we'll want to add 2 keywords, first is the 00DCSCombatBossSpecialNormalLockout which will prevent normal music from being used, and then the keyword that tells the game which folder to use which you will probably want 00DCSCombatBossSpecialOtherMods which will tell it to use the BOSS - OTHER or BOSS - OTHER DRAGON folder
15 - Once you think you've gotten all of the keyword edits done click on FILE again and press Save which will then pop up with a box for you to name the esp & save it
16 - Click FILE once more and Exit
17 - Use something to flag your new esp as an ESL so it doesn't take up an esp slot, if using Wrye all you need to do is right-click the on the esp and choose ADD ESL FLAG
SSE Edit
Spoiler:
Show
1 - First off I don't know how to MAKE an esp with SSE Edit so I'd recommend grabbing the DCS - Combat ID - Skyrim.esp & rename it to what you want it as.
2 - Load the renamed esp in SSE Edit and delete everything inside of it 3 - Close SSE Edit and it will ask if you want to save it, say yes 4 - Load the now blank esp in SSE Edit along with the mod you want to add keywords for 5 - If the mod has new races go there first 6 - For a race you want to add a keyword for right-click on it and choose Copy as Override Into... and then select the blank esp you prepared
7 - After doing step 6 the race should now have 2 columns with each esp name in the View tab, on the column below your blank esp name find KWDA - Keywords (sorted) and right-click and choose ADD, then change the new NULL entry to one of the DCS keywords, if this is a weak enemy then change it to 00DCSCombatWeak, if it's a boss enemy change it to 00DCSCombatBossGeneric, if it's a unique major boss (or if you just want to use a special BOSS folder), then you want to add 2 keywords, the first being 00DCSCombatBossSpecialNormalLockout which will prevent normal music from being used, and then one of the other 00DCSCombatBossSpecial keywords to define which folder will be used, giving it the 00DCSCombatBossSpecialOtherMods will use the BOSS - OTHER & BOSS - OTHER DRAGON folders.
8 - After going through the races go through the Non-Player Character (Actor) category 9 - When you find one you want to edit it's pretty much the same as what you did with the race edit
10 - For working with new tiers of enemies you'll probably want to add the 00DCSCombatWeak keyword to the first 2 tiers (see the above Creation Kit instructions for what I mean by that)
11 - After adding a keyword it might be good to check the Referenced By tab to make sure the keyword isn't being inherited by those you don't want it to
12 - For those you don't want it to be inherited by you'll want to REMOVE the Use Keywords flag, to do that look for Template Flags in the View tab of that npc and right-click and uncheck the Use Keywords flag
13 - Once you think you're done go ahead and exit SSE Edit & save the esp
I went to finally go test Beyond Reach with the DCS High Rock option and got mixed results, the exterior worldspace seemed to use it but the interiors almost clearly seemed like they were using the DCS Cyrodiil group, I can't find any cause for this and can only assume the 1.6 AE update adding new esms sabotaged my test run by causing the load order to shift on my save game, just sharing this experience for anyone else to consider that changes to your load order on a save game may cause this kind of behavior.
For those that don't like to read in short, don't install new esms/esps on a save game in progress unless you can place the esp at the very end of the load order which I think is safe.
Just in case somebody asks or even notices boss music doesn't always get used for single combat with a target True HUD shows as having a boss bar, DCS uses keywords on the actor bases instead of the boss reference type, which I initially tried to use the reference type even back pre-DCS but I found it unreliable, for some reason HasRefrenceType on CombatTarget can't be detected by the game as quickly as the CombatTargetHasKeyword function, I literally had to be in 1h melee range for it work that way it seemed during testing which isn't really viable because by then it will have already started a regular combat track normally and ignored the undetected reference type.
Furthermore of why boss music doesn't play when True HUD's boss bar is displayed is that several npcs in the game have the boss reference when they really aren't a boss spawn, the archer on the bridge in Embershard is considered the boss there, the draugr in the coffin at Hamvir's Rest is a garden variety draugr although probably higher tier so it can seem like a boss, and if I recall there's even a mudcrab or 2 out there that are as well for a few examples, and then you also have other npcs with that reference type such as just about if not every store owner such as Belethor, Arcadia, Keerava and so on.
I wanted to update to V7, but the Exterior Dungeon Music has Creation Club content as required master files, no matter what I do and what I select in the installer. I don't have CC Content, so if it is possible, I would appreciate it if those files were not required.
In the meantime, if anyone wants to fix this themselves while not having the CC files: Open Wrye Bash in MO2 (If you use MO2; If you don't, just open it how you would other programs like LOOT), right click on the Exterior Dungeon Music.esp, select the Option "Create Dummy Masters". This will create empty dummy plugins that have the same name as the CC plugins.
You can then load the Exterior Dungeon Music.esp in SSEEdit. Once it has loaded, right click and select "Clean Masters (= Remove all unused Masters)". This will remove the dependency on those Creation Club Files.
It's a real headache to keep swapping the unofficial patch out for an old version just to remove those, I don't think I'm going to do it anymore and instead will just sticky and recommend this post for those who are still refusing to update.
Thank you for this! I have gone all in with my music, making custom tracks, and boss intros for each boss, and making atmospheric music for each region, and it's been amazing to experience, I play on PCVR so everything is "larger than life" so having something like this to add to my 2800+ mod list is the icing on the cake, the final piece that brings it all together. It's tedious yea but worth it imo. I'm using custom music organizer from the LE page to batch rename all of the tracks to save time but thanks for this. This mod is a MUST
Don't blindly trust those programs to do things completely for you, they might get some of it right but double check things, I recall combat finales(ends) being an issue that had to be manually fixed.
Oh true, I used a different renaming app to batch rename them and it worked beautifully. It's called advanced renamer on google. Take one name of the tracks, and you can set it to number and rename everything all at once. 1000% recommend for tedious stuff like this
hi, lovely mod and am really loving how modular and flexible it is, however i can't seem to get combat music to work. any tips as to what am i looking for here?
basically everything seems to work (exploration, castle, dungeon etc) except combat music, which seems to revert back to vanilla. i've put plenty of CombatBoss, CombatNormal and CombatWeak (numbered of course) in 00DCS/ALL/ANY and ANY PROVINCE, but no luck. i've also copypasted the same files to some other folders i thought might do the trick, but no dice so far
any idea what should i look into to fix this? DCS-Combat.esp is activated, of course, and i'm loading it as late as it can, as far as i can tell it should win all music-related conflicts, and DCS - Rules Type - Simple.esp is loading after it
I'm not really sure, that sounds like it should be right, what location are in you at in-game because the only thing I can think of would be a mod added location that has it's own setup and if not that then something doing things by script which would get priority.
Using the simple rules should negate the need for the dungeon combat tracks as well, I don't use that version myself so it's possible I made a mistake somewhere with it, if you disable the rules type and let it go back to default rules what happens when starting a fight with some wolves in the tundra or something?
disabling the rule esp unfortunately didn't change anything, combat tracks are still vanilla
location-wise it's the same anywhere, vanilla combat plays wherever the player is, but the exploration tracks work correctly, correct tracks play on correct locations
update: my bad, it was a plugin called "BSHeartland - Arnima Patch.esp", i don't have a clue why it would revert the combat music back to vanilla, especially being rather low in the load order, but oh well. it's all fixed now!
I just finished up my load order and done a custom patch for this mod to make it work with lux and a bunch others. Quite a hassle but hopefully everything works and itll be worth it. xD I just have one question though, its said in the instruction file that the ANY and ANY PROVINCE folder works with the default rule type only when outside of dungeon range, but what about Dragon combat soundtracks? It appears that the folder that contains dragon soundtracks is ANY PROVINCE, so if i dont use any optional rule type, and i put dragon combat soundtracks into All folder, would it be be taken priority over by any other folder?
Believe me patching with Lux is most definitely a hassle, seems like every Lux update (which feels frequent) the cell data is different and needing to be repatched, which is why I'm not doing those patches, it's hard enough keeping them up just for myself.
Dragon combat is a special case, it should work anywhere but you still need to be the first to start the battle directly, if the dragon targets a follower it will probably use the locational music, this is a vanilla issue and I've been trying to find a way to improve it for a long time but I don't think it's possible without some kind of skse mod just like engine fixes had to solve the stacking music issue.
I guess I should have clarified that info is for normal combat, I'll have to try and do that next update.
Ooooooh, so thats why even when i was still using Personalized Music dragon soundtracks refused to play sometimes, and instead played soundtracks for puny enemies instead. This explains a lot. I guess its something i gotta live with, but so far ive been allowed to set up so many good and epic soundtracks for many fights thanks to this mod, i feel spoiled honestly haha. Fighting with dragons or some draugr bosses at the end of the dungeon have never felt this epic before, and im able to give many good tracks to unique or named bosses as well, thank you!
Yeah it's a vanilla issue, I've seen it happen with the guards being the first target during the battle with Mimulnir at the Western Watchtower as well, my way around that is I set his boss music to be distance based as well as the only thing allowed to be used if you're within a certain range of him, the bad news is he doesn't have to be spawned yet and you can have his boss music while fighting the bandits on the way to Bleak Falls at the small tower area, not perfect but it at least works well enough now.
I noticed while trying to improve this it looks like Bethesda actually has the nearby wildlife spawns as disabled during this quest possibly for the same work around although also probably more the fact that dragons seem to want to go after the weakest things first.
In addition to the above I've done something similar with dragon lairs, before the point in the main quest dragons would be enabled regular combat music is used in those places, once dragons are enabled and you would find one there it uses a filtered no specific target type conditioned set of dragon combat tracks, in short once you've finished Dragon Rising any battles within a dragon lair location radius will use the dragon combat, this was mainly my workaround for mods that add extra enemies to those like the Draman from Immersive Creatures but it also makes it work better with followers present too.
Oh gosh so that would mean there might be a chance ill be having dragon music while fighting mudcrab or skeleton or sum around dragon lair? I guess its a workaround so it might have downsides but honestly cant really expect much from the way bethesda set up the music system in skyrim.
Speaking of Mirmulnir, i dont know how it happened, but when i was fighting him, the music bug kept happening and so the weak combat music kept playing while i was playing him, so i decided to try and turn off the standard rule type, then fill every single folder in BOSS category folder to about 6 same songs, after that his soundtrack keeps playing everytime i fought him again and again. However, since the standard rule type esp is off now, somehow i cant get songs in bandit hideouts to play anymore, but given everytime im in one before when the rule type was still on, it always play songs from ANY or ANY PROVINCE folder instead of the soundtracks from their actual faction folder, which is pretty weird. Not sure if this extends to other dungeons or other enemies aside from bandits or not, im guessing it has something to do with new mod added enemies not having the right keyword? But that would be weird since bandit hideout is more of a locational condition.
EDIT : nevermind, im a huge silly donut, i forgot to put music into Bandit Camp category folder but thought i did. xD Imma test some more and mess with the load order of the 3 main esp and see if theyll be working correctly.
If the area was not vanilla then likely more to do with the location data not having the expected keywords, I've made a pseudo keyword system to get around this, add the DCS faction type keywords to the area's location data so DCS recognizes it as a certain type without interfering with the radiant quest system, some places in vanilla don't have the keywords either for this very reason that a radiant quest won't choose a quest specific dungeon such as Dustman or Snow Veil.
Also mod added places are kind of bad about not even having location data at all so you may have to learn how to create that sadly although it's not difficult.
Yeah i can manage to make custome patches for any modded locations for this mod, but believe it or not i minimized adding npcs and creatures and also mods that add new places into my game as much as possible specifically just so this mod can run fine, thats how much i value having the right music for this game. xD Because if i had to make patches for new mods im gonna add in i probably will never be able to play the game.
I have one question, during the execution scene at the start of the game where Alduin attack Helgen, there seem to be no music at all until i escape into the fort, do you happen to know which folder i need to put music into for the Alduin attack to have music?
That's all the DUNGEON - HELGEN folder, CombatDragon from that specific folder should be used while Alduin is attacking, it's a special case one like those inside the BOSS folder.
Although made with my previous music mod it should function pretty much the same as this video shows and improved where I could
Oh yeah youre right! Somehow i was so blind i didnt see there are samples of CombatDragon in Helgen folder, so i only put CombatNormal ones into it only. Welp i guess im done setting up everything, and have managed to put tons of songs into the game in a total span of 3 days. xD Can finally play the game now. Hopefully nothing goes wrong. This mod is so awesome honestly. Thank you.
Oh, i also have one small suggestion if you ever update this mod more, maybe add "special" category folder so people can change their main menu song too. I did it for my game and just put it into your mod folder for ease of access, but figured maybe you'd wanna add it for others too, since its simple and doesnt need anything to do with scripts or plugins, yet might be useful for people that havent known about it already.
There is no special music type nor anything to do with the main menu music in the creation kit so I'm unable to do anything with it, it might be possible to make it if I knew what the original was though, I'm guessing that one is in the exe directly instead of the esms.
Its actually nothing fancy nor complicate, you just drop a folder called "special" into your mod, same place you put your 00DCS folder and let people know (with a readme or such) its for main menu music. The structure is data/music/special and then drop an xmw file into there called "mus_maintheme", no need for plugins or anything, thats how i change my main menu music. Im suggesting because i think it might be a nice addition to your mod given its just that simple but many might not know about it so might be useful.
That's only replacing an existing file, the point of DCS is to expand on the original limits so I'd specifically want the ability to add random and up to 20 or 50 tracks for that purpose.
I see i see, well it was more of a suggestion to let people know how to change it if they want to, but if thats not the purpose of your mod, its totally fine. This is still a super awesome mod though, thank you for making it and let us experience our game in a different way.
So, ive been having an issue. For some reason most, if not all the time, aside from boss fights, combat music only plays after a while into the fight or when enemies have already been killed. Do you know any way to fix that?
Probably lacking weak target combat music, that's usually the case to this very very commonly reported issue, either add some for that type or 't use the boss only keyword distribution option, the other option could be you need to edit your music files used to remove any silence at the start of them.
It seems you are right, i was lacking quite a bit in many category folders that i didnt even realize have combat soundtracks. Thank you, hopefully the problem is fixed now since ive added the missing soundtracks.
I wanna ask, how are the soundtracks selected? What i mean is, from the description, the limit for each folder is 100, which is reduced to 20 with the Demo plugins, but are those limits only so that we can add that many songs, or is it for looping and such? Lets say i use the demo plugins with the limit of 20, anbd for each keyword in each folder, i only add 1 song, so would the game play only that song, or it will have to scroll through all the 19 empty song slots until it can reach the only song there? And if its the second case, do you think it would take long to cycle through the empty slots with the demo plugins?
Music is chosen based on the area's location keyword data usually, then with combat several keywords on the target themself are checked for, if out in the wilderness then the region data is what is checked.
Hard to say what the delay would be, I believe it's different based on your computer's capabilities, it might be quick but there will still be a noticeable break as it changes to one of the other tracks so you have much less chance of a perfect loop happening.
No, you would need to fill all 20 of that one folder with the same song if you want a proper loop as well as not using the optional rules type that changes how that part behaves, in addition that's specific to dungeons and major bosses only, in order to keep compatibility with new lands mods there has to be a blanket ALL folder to handle exploration categories since those would be new regions, ANY PROVINCE is the one that handles that the most, the regular ANY is for vanilla regions, I know it's a little tough to grasp but I did the best I could with things.
Hello, its me again. xD Im so sorry for bothering you so much, but i just wanna make things work as intended. So im trying to patch this mod with certain mods myself, mainly by giving them keywords ( attempting to at least ), so what i wanna ask is, if i wanna give an enemy a BOSS keyword of either for ALL music type or a faction, what keyword should i give them? Is DCSCombatBossGeneric for the ALL category perhaps? Im a little confused because i was under the assumption that for enemies to be seen as boss by this mod they need to have certain keywords but when i look at the Keyword distribution plugin Boss only through xEdit i saw that many of the enemies dont actually have any keywords. And lets just say if i want a boss to have Boss music playing from Other folder from the Major Boss folder, would giving them "CombatSpecialBossOther" keyword work? Thank you.
Edit : if you dont mind, i wanna ask, what about dungeon/faction based boss? How would i go make an enemy use boss tracks thats specifically for dungeon/factions?
That's entirely location data based on where you currently are in-game at that time dependent and using just the boss generic keyword, in short just give them the keyword and the rest should handle itself unless it's a mod added location that is missing the location data then it might end up coming from the ALL ANY PROVINCE folder or something, some vanilla locations are missing some of that info as well but I've tried to create workaround solutions for those so those should take care of themselves as well.
Ah i see, yeah i suspect as much that i only need to give them the Generic Boss keyword, but at the same time i was worried that it means that it would give them the ANY boss sound track instead. Would the Generic Boss keyword alone works, or should i also give them the Normal Combat Lockout keyword by the way?
Also, thank you for taking so much time replying to me and helping me through this whole time, i know ive asked a lot of stuff, been building my modlist around this mod for a whole month now. :D Its not everyday that you get to put your own ambience into the game so this kinda just puts me on excitement. But i wanna let you know i really appreciate your effort.
If you want regular non special boss then I believe that one keyword is sufficient, don't remember how I did it so take a look at the keyword distribution esps to double check that.
Yep no problem, best wishes you manage to achieve what you set out to do, I know it's not perfect but I've done the best I can with it so hopefully it will be enough.
Also a PSA, something with Nexus is broken for me, it shows the last comment made here was March 6th when that's clearly wrong, I'm trying to remember to manually check these pages now but if I miss doing that and don't answer send me a PM.
Great mod so far. It covers the things that Personalized Music didn't, like the character creator scene and even the skills/perk tree menu heheh.
I seem to be suffering one issue right now tho, which is when I open my skills menu while indoors in Whiterun (tested in Arcadia's shop; I haven't checked all buildings and cities yet), for some reason it causes the music to break. Like, the skills menu music I set doesn't play either and it'll cause the town music to stop playing too until I exit that building.
DCS mods are all at the bottom of my load order after even the Bashed Patch, and I do have that Perk Tree fix thing itself at the very bottom.
Sorry for a slow reply, the skills menu music is done by using the None music type which is what is actually used for that menu, any cells interior or exterior that are set to the None music type will have this happen, I haven't seen that in too many vanilla interiors myself, mostly just the college if DCS changes get overwrote by another mod causing those cells to get reset to None.
Additionally I've done my best to change every None music type using cell I could find, this is one of the easier conflicting issues with other mods, harmless and just annoying to deal with.
It sounds like you might have another mod changing cells to be None because I've definitely not seen that anywhere in Whiterun with the exception of the hall of the dead and the guard barracks I think, I'd suggest checking your entire load order with xEdit to see any cell conflicts, the fix plugin is for places that were None in vanilla, Aracadia's wasn't one of those to my memory so only another mod could be doing that.
Yes with the exception of the palette tracks which are too complicated to replace I think, in order to have the vanilla tracks you'll want to extract them from the bsa files or extract them from the high quality audio mod bsa files, the reason for this is so you can use them how you want and they will follow dcs rules.
They're very short tracks that are setup in groups and then the sections are played randomly to create various mixtures, at least that's how I think they work, with the amount of tracks DCS allows they don't pop up too often, at least for me.
This should be them although given they randomize their sections in-game probably not identical
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyqGaMJvVXc
I managed to dig up an actual description looks like it came from UESP
Palette Track a multi-layer track type. Individual Music Tracks plugged into each layer will be played back at random, simultaneously with other layers. Duration defines the length of the Palette track. Its individual tracks across all layers will continue to play for this duration.
Both a personal design choice to allow longer death music and it stops a crash I've seen happen with both mine and others, you can undo it if you want it's fDeathReloadTime or something similar to that under GameSettings in the plugin.
hey bud just a quick question, im looking at making half of all tracks ambient ones, is there any issues using long tracks for non combat folders?
for example, a track thats 13 minutes long thats basically crickets, owl hooting etc would be placed in a night time folder, possibly a village on or just explore
Only if it fails to convert to xwm, super long 15-20 min tracks seem to do that the most often which will crash in-game when it tries to play them, logs that show these kind of crashes happening are usually pointing out bsxaudio dll or something similar, they can be difficult to figure out which one is crashing so pay attention to the converter's log to see if it mentions any of them failed despite it still made a file.
Failing that precaution check the file sizes, when I ran into this myself I found the file size was I believe 0 kb making it easier to figure out.
Beyond that though combat tracks are the only ones that have to be within a specific time frame due to how ending/finale tracks are setup, in order to avoid a double ending the finale tracks are disallowed past a certain point in the vanilla songs and there is no way to change this that I'm aware of, only extend the duration.
532 comments
The DCS - Combat.esp provides but does NOT distribute keywords that are used to define boss targets, keyword distribution is handled by a lot of separate plugins that way it's kept completely optional
Additionally if you are using one of the keyword distribution plugins and are getting silent combat music...
be sure you have some CombatBoss & CombatWeak music files because that's what the distribution plugins are for which is to enable keywords that allows and filters targets for those, a basic Bandit or Bandit Outlaw (not Bandit Thug) or Wolf will use CombatWeak while a Bandit Chief if encountered as the first target enemy will use CombatBoss for example, if you can get music for only some targets such as named town npcs it's most likely the case you don't have at least 1 of each of these song types.
EDIT 2/21/2021
I started trying to use npc replacers like Men of Winter, Pandorable, Northbourne, Retouched Bandits, and such and some of these will conflict with DCS Combat IDs by removing the keywords so if you use one of those might want to check those with SSE Edit against the DCS Combat ID - Skyrim and then simply drag the keyword(s) added by DCS over to the npc replacer which you do want to load the replacer after otherwise you get the keyword but not the changes, in fact you might get a black face since the Combat ID loaded after would be restoring the original face data.
If you don't use a bash patch or some other kind of automated patch like me you'll want to compare your entire load order to any replacer you install because you never know what change gets left out whether it be a door key added by JK, a faction added by Mysticism, an item from Cutting Room Floor, AI data, the new stats from Skyrim Revamped, you just never know unless you check, and yes everything I just listed was just some of the things I had to correct in my own load order.
If you're not familiar with changing things with SSE Edit or just not the npc data part the things you DON'T want to change for the replacer to stay as intended are the Head Parts, Tint Layers (unsure about Texture Lighting but to be on the safe side probably don't), Weight (changing this can cause black faces if I remember right so don't do it unless you plan to re-export the facegen files with the Creation Kit), and Race which for example the unofficial patch changes Aringoth to a Wood Elf as was as the head parts, the replacer I have for him reverts back to High Elf which is tempting to drag that change over but I'm almost sure it will break the facegen and cause a blackface until re-exported.
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So the program is called Mp3tag, don't know if I'm allowed to link to it or not from here(it's legit, you can get it right from the developer's website), but it's easy enough to find on Google. It's free to use, normally it's meant to edit the artist/album misc track info of music files. It supports xwm, so you can edit files already converted by MultiXWM or whatever you use. You can only process one folder of files at a time, but it still helps some.
1. I start by putting all the files from one type, such as Tundra Day CombatNormal, into a blank empty folder. I just made a new folder on my desktop.
2. In Mp3tag, there is a yellow folder icon with a green check that says 'change directory' in the toolbar, click that and navigate to the folder with the music you want to rename. The tracks should show up in the program.
3. Click Tools, then 'Auto-Numbering Wizard'. Make sure Tracknumber and 'Leading Zeros' are checked, and 'Begin at Tracknumber' is set to 1. Press Ok.
4. Click Convert in the top toolbar, and select 'Tag - Filename'. You can also find a shortcut in the center of the toolbar, it looks like a red dot with a curved yellow arrow pointing to a white paper. In the field, enter Trackname%track%, so for example CombatNormal%track%, or Explore%Track%. A preview will appear below the entry field, it should show CombatNormal01. Select Ok. (For finale tracks, use CombatBoss%track%End)
5. All the files in the folder will now be numbered with the naming scheme you want. I just cut and paste the music to the desired folder and then repeat with the next set of files. It still requires some manual work, but it beats having to manually rename tracks individually.
*As a bonus, Mp3tag remembers your previous settings, so you save some time by doing all the explore tracks in a row, then all the dungeon tracks, etc.
9/3/2021 EDIT
Ver 2.9 has had the keywords changed to injected records into Update.esm so as I understand it you can I think just make a new keyword record in your esp and change it to have the same name & FormID as DCS does and it should work without DCS - Combat.esp needing to be a master, however Update.esm will be needed as a master.
Here are the available keywords & their FormID
017C3C00 - 00DCSCombatBossGeneric
017C3C01 - 00DCSCombatWeak
017C3C02 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecial00NormalLockout
017C3C03 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialAlduin
017C3C04 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialAncano
017C3C05 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialArchCurateVyrthur
017C3C06 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialCicero
017C3C07 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialDurnevhiir
017C3C08 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialEbonyWarrior
017C3C09 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialForgemaster
017C3C10 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialGaulderson
017C3C11 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialGauldersonSigdis
017C3C12 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialMercer
017C3C13 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialMirmulnir
017C3C14 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialOrchendor
017C3C15 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialOtherMods
017C3C16 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialPaarthurnax
017C3C17 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialRedEagle
017C3C18 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialSoulCairnReaper
017C3C19 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialTsun
017C3C20 - 00DCSCombatBossSpecialDeathbrand
Creation Kit
0 - Download & install the Creation Kit from Bethesda's Bethesda.Net Launcher
1 - Download & install SSE CreationKit Fixes by Nuukem here https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/20061
2 - Open the Creation Kit
3 - Click FILE in the upper left corner and then Data...
4 - Find DCS - Combat.esp and double click it so it's box is ticked to indicate it will be loaded
5 - Find the esp of the mod you want to edit and do the same
6 - Press Ok and continue when it warns of no active esp because you're making a new one
7 - If the mod has new races adding a keyword to them is a faster way of giving it to a group of npcs as well as a little less likely to be a conflict later, to add a keyword to a race double click it and then on the far right side in the Keywords column right-click and choose ADD and then if it's a weak enemy add 00DCSCombatWeak, if it's something you want to use location generic boss music then add 00DCSCombatBossGeneric, and if you want to use one of the special boss music folders you'll instead want to add 00DCSCombatBossSpecial00NormalLockout & then one of the other 00DCSCombatBossSpecial keywords which will tell it which folder to use, for most mods you're probably going to want to use the 00DCSCombatBossSpecialOtherMods keyword
8 - Now go through the Actors tab and search for individual npcs that are not yet covered, when you find one double click it to open it and then go to the Keywords tab and then follow the same instructions for adding a keyword as above in step 7
9 - If the mod has fully new tiers of enemies such as with Bruma (CYREncGoblin01, CYREncGoblin02, CYRGoblin03 and so on), then you probably will want to add the 00DCSCombatWeak keyword to the first 2 tiers (all of the CYREncGoblin01s & CYRGoblin02s in this case) which will be consistent with how DCS - Combat ID - Skyrim is set up.....NOTE that just because it's an 01 tier doesn't mean it may deserve the Weak keyword, check the Stats tab to see the level and use your best judgment, if it doesn't seem like a weak enemy leave it alone and it will be counted as a normal enemy.
10 - Ensure the next tier isn't inheriting the 00DCSCombatWeak keyword, for example open CYRGoblin03 npcs and see if they are using a lower tier template AND using the Use Keywords flag, if this is true then all you need to do is remove the Use Keywords flag
11 - For any generic bosses (for example CYREncGoblin02BossMelee) add the 00DCSCombatBossGeneric keyword but don't add or if it's been inherited remove the 00DCSCombatWeak keyword
12 - Ensure any leveled npcs that use those new tiers are actually keeping the keywords, for example if we look at CYRLvlGoblinBossMagic we see it's not set for Use Keywords, so to fix that all we need to do is click the Use Keywords flag OR we can just add the keyword directly
13 - If the npc is using a vanilla leveled list for it's template (for example LCharBanditMeleeAny) all you need to do is set it to Use Keywords
14 - For any unique major boss npcs we'll want to add 2 keywords, first is the 00DCSCombatBossSpecialNormalLockout which will prevent normal music from being used, and then the keyword that tells the game which folder to use which you will probably want 00DCSCombatBossSpecialOtherMods which will tell it to use the BOSS - OTHER or BOSS - OTHER DRAGON folder
15 - Once you think you've gotten all of the keyword edits done click on FILE again and press Save which will then pop up with a box for you to name the esp & save it
16 - Click FILE once more and Exit
17 - Use something to flag your new esp as an ESL so it doesn't take up an esp slot, if using Wrye all you need to do is right-click the on the esp and choose ADD ESL FLAG
SSE Edit
1 - First off I don't know how to MAKE an esp with SSE Edit so I'd recommend grabbing the DCS - Combat ID - Skyrim.esp & rename it to what you want it as.
2 - Load the renamed esp in SSE Edit and delete everything inside of it
3 - Close SSE Edit and it will ask if you want to save it, say yes
4 - Load the now blank esp in SSE Edit along with the mod you want to add keywords for
5 - If the mod has new races go there first
6 - For a race you want to add a keyword for right-click on it and choose Copy as Override Into... and then select the blank esp you prepared
7 - After doing step 6 the race should now have 2 columns with each esp name in the View tab, on the column below your blank esp name find KWDA - Keywords (sorted) and right-click and choose ADD, then change the new NULL entry to one of the DCS keywords, if this is a weak enemy then change it to 00DCSCombatWeak, if it's a boss enemy change it to 00DCSCombatBossGeneric, if it's a unique major boss (or if you just want to use a special BOSS folder), then you want to add 2 keywords, the first being 00DCSCombatBossSpecialNormalLockout which will prevent normal music from being used, and then one of the other 00DCSCombatBossSpecial keywords to define which folder will be used, giving it the 00DCSCombatBossSpecialOtherMods will use the BOSS - OTHER & BOSS - OTHER DRAGON folders.
8 - After going through the races go through the Non-Player Character (Actor) category
9 - When you find one you want to edit it's pretty much the same as what you did with the race edit
10 - For working with new tiers of enemies you'll probably want to add the 00DCSCombatWeak keyword to the first 2 tiers (see the above Creation Kit instructions for what I mean by that)
11 - After adding a keyword it might be good to check the Referenced By tab to make sure the keyword isn't being inherited by those you don't want it to
12 - For those you don't want it to be inherited by you'll want to REMOVE the Use Keywords flag, to do that look for Template Flags in the View tab of that npc and right-click and uncheck the Use Keywords flag
13 - Once you think you're done go ahead and exit SSE Edit & save the esp
For those that don't like to read in short, don't install new esms/esps on a save game in progress unless you can place the esp at the very end of the load order which I think is safe.
Furthermore of why boss music doesn't play when True HUD's boss bar is displayed is that several npcs in the game have the boss reference when they really aren't a boss spawn, the archer on the bridge in Embershard is considered the boss there, the draugr in the coffin at Hamvir's Rest is a garden variety draugr although probably higher tier so it can seem like a boss, and if I recall there's even a mudcrab or 2 out there that are as well for a few examples, and then you also have other npcs with that reference type such as just about if not every store owner such as Belethor, Arcadia, Keerava and so on.
In the meantime, if anyone wants to fix this themselves while not having the CC files: Open Wrye Bash in MO2 (If you use MO2; If you don't, just open it how you would other programs like LOOT), right click on the Exterior Dungeon Music.esp, select the Option "Create Dummy Masters". This will create empty dummy plugins that have the same name as the CC plugins.
You can then load the Exterior Dungeon Music.esp in SSEEdit. Once it has loaded, right click and select "Clean Masters (= Remove all unused Masters)". This will remove the dependency on those Creation Club Files.
basically everything seems to work (exploration, castle, dungeon etc) except combat music, which seems to revert back to vanilla. i've put plenty of CombatBoss, CombatNormal and CombatWeak (numbered of course) in 00DCS/ALL/ANY and ANY PROVINCE, but no luck. i've also copypasted the same files to some other folders i thought might do the trick, but no dice so far
any idea what should i look into to fix this? DCS-Combat.esp is activated, of course, and i'm loading it as late as it can, as far as i can tell it should win all music-related conflicts, and DCS - Rules Type - Simple.esp is loading after it
Using the simple rules should negate the need for the dungeon combat tracks as well, I don't use that version myself so it's possible I made a mistake somewhere with it, if you disable the rules type and let it go back to default rules what happens when starting a fight with some wolves in the tundra or something?
location-wise it's the same anywhere, vanilla combat plays wherever the player is, but the exploration tracks work correctly, correct tracks play on correct locations
Dragon combat is a special case, it should work anywhere but you still need to be the first to start the battle directly, if the dragon targets a follower it will probably use the locational music, this is a vanilla issue and I've been trying to find a way to improve it for a long time but I don't think it's possible without some kind of skse mod just like engine fixes had to solve the stacking music issue.
I guess I should have clarified that info is for normal combat, I'll have to try and do that next update.
I noticed while trying to improve this it looks like Bethesda actually has the nearby wildlife spawns as disabled during this quest possibly for the same work around although also probably more the fact that dragons seem to want to go after the weakest things first.
In addition to the above I've done something similar with dragon lairs, before the point in the main quest dragons would be enabled regular combat music is used in those places, once dragons are enabled and you would find one there it uses a filtered no specific target type conditioned set of dragon combat tracks, in short once you've finished Dragon Rising any battles within a dragon lair location radius will use the dragon combat, this was mainly my workaround for mods that add extra enemies to those like the Draman from Immersive Creatures but it also makes it work better with followers present too.
Speaking of Mirmulnir, i dont know how it happened, but when i was fighting him, the music bug kept happening and so the weak combat music kept playing while i was playing him, so i decided to try and turn off the standard rule type, then fill every single folder in BOSS category folder to about 6 same songs, after that his soundtrack keeps playing everytime i fought him again and again. However, since the standard rule type esp is off now, somehow i cant get songs in bandit hideouts to play anymore, but given everytime im in one before when the rule type was still on, it always play songs from ANY or ANY PROVINCE folder instead of the soundtracks from their actual faction folder, which is pretty weird. Not sure if this extends to other dungeons or other enemies aside from bandits or not, im guessing it has something to do with new mod added enemies not having the right keyword? But that would be weird since bandit hideout is more of a locational condition.
EDIT : nevermind, im a huge silly donut, i forgot to put music into Bandit Camp category folder but thought i did. xD Imma test some more and mess with the load order of the 3 main esp and see if theyll be working correctly.
Also mod added places are kind of bad about not even having location data at all so you may have to learn how to create that sadly although it's not difficult.
I have one question, during the execution scene at the start of the game where Alduin attack Helgen, there seem to be no music at all until i escape into the fort, do you happen to know which folder i need to put music into for the Alduin attack to have music?
Although made with my previous music mod it should function pretty much the same as this video shows and improved where I could
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHGvSHhqC7c&list=PLdgvqAKY5f8_4gg3DDSIGh8mVjW_j9IGv&index=1&t=599s
Oh, i also have one small suggestion if you ever update this mod more, maybe add "special" category folder so people can change their main menu song too. I did it for my game and just put it into your mod folder for ease of access, but figured maybe you'd wanna add it for others too, since its simple and doesnt need anything to do with scripts or plugins, yet might be useful for people that havent known about it already.
example : https://ibb.co/Fgv4hDh
I wanna ask, how are the soundtracks selected? What i mean is, from the description, the limit for each folder is 100, which is reduced to 20 with the Demo plugins, but are those limits only so that we can add that many songs, or is it for looping and such? Lets say i use the demo plugins with the limit of 20, anbd for each keyword in each folder, i only add 1 song, so would the game play only that song, or it will have to scroll through all the 19 empty song slots until it can reach the only song there? And if its the second case, do you think it would take long to cycle through the empty slots with the demo plugins?
Hard to say what the delay would be, I believe it's different based on your computer's capabilities, it might be quick but there will still be a noticeable break as it changes to one of the other tracks so you have much less chance of a perfect loop happening.
No, you would need to fill all 20 of that one folder with the same song if you want a proper loop as well as not using the optional rules type that changes how that part behaves, in addition that's specific to dungeons and major bosses only, in order to keep compatibility with new lands mods there has to be a blanket ALL folder to handle exploration categories since those would be new regions, ANY PROVINCE is the one that handles that the most, the regular ANY is for vanilla regions, I know it's a little tough to grasp but I did the best I could with things.
Edit : if you dont mind, i wanna ask, what about dungeon/faction based boss? How would i go make an enemy use boss tracks thats specifically for dungeon/factions?
Also, thank you for taking so much time replying to me and helping me through this whole time, i know ive asked a lot of stuff, been building my modlist around this mod for a whole month now. :D Its not everyday that you get to put your own ambience into the game so this kinda just puts me on excitement. But i wanna let you know i really appreciate your effort.
Also a PSA, something with Nexus is broken for me, it shows the last comment made here was March 6th when that's clearly wrong, I'm trying to remember to manually check these pages now but if I miss doing that and don't answer send me a PM.
I seem to be suffering one issue right now tho, which is when I open my skills menu while indoors in Whiterun (tested in Arcadia's shop; I haven't checked all buildings and cities yet), for some reason it causes the music to break. Like, the skills menu music I set doesn't play either and it'll cause the town music to stop playing too until I exit that building.
DCS mods are all at the bottom of my load order after even the Bashed Patch, and I do have that Perk Tree fix thing itself at the very bottom.
Additionally I've done my best to change every None music type using cell I could find, this is one of the easier conflicting issues with other mods, harmless and just annoying to deal with.
It sounds like you might have another mod changing cells to be None because I've definitely not seen that anywhere in Whiterun with the exception of the hall of the dead and the guard barracks I think, I'd suggest checking your entire load order with xEdit to see any cell conflicts, the fix plugin is for places that were None in vanilla, Aracadia's wasn't one of those to my memory so only another mod could be doing that.
This should be them although given they randomize their sections in-game probably not identical
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyqGaMJvVXc
I managed to dig up an actual description looks like it came from UESP
Palette Track a multi-layer track type. Individual Music Tracks plugged into each layer will be played back at
random, simultaneously with other layers. Duration defines the length of the Palette track. Its individual tracks across all layers will continue to play for this duration.
for example, a track thats 13 minutes long thats basically crickets, owl hooting etc would be placed in a night time folder, possibly a village on or just explore
Failing that precaution check the file sizes, when I ran into this myself I found the file size was I believe 0 kb making it easier to figure out.
Beyond that though combat tracks are the only ones that have to be within a specific time frame due to how ending/finale tracks are setup, in order to avoid a double ending the finale tracks are disallowed past a certain point in the vanilla songs and there is no way to change this that I'm aware of, only extend the duration.