SKYRIMLE True Circlet Gems (Madcat221)

[Noobsayer]

Compares in OP.

 

As you can see - Moonstone is not touched by any of the 2 tested mods. Some of the meshes are not affected by BCG, and some are.

 

 

 

Wait, are you sure about Moonstone? I swear I tested one that altered moonstone. NJfC has a moonstone pic for sure, I thought that was the one that altered it for obvious reasons, but maybe I'm thinking of a different one.

[EssArrBee]

I like everything except the Sapphire. They are just way to blue and where is the transparency on them?

 

Good compares roots.

[rootsrat]

Compares in OP.

 

As you can see - Moonstone is not touched by any of the 2 tested mods. Some of the meshes are not affected by BCG, and some are.

 

 

 

Wait, are you sure about Moonstone? I swear I tested one that altered moonstone. NJfC has a moonstone pic for sure, I thought that was the one that altered it for obvious reasons, but maybe I'm thinking of a different one.

 

Apologies, Moonstone is contained in NJfC! I don't know what I was thinking :D

[Kelmych]

Thanks for all the work roots. I agree with you that Better Circlets + New Jewels for Circlets is best. For me it is followed by Better Circlets alone.

[Vrugdush]

It's difficult to capture the difference True Circlet Gems makes with just static screenshots - it really needs to be seen in motion, as the light shifts and hits the gems from different angles. Vanilla gems look quite dull in comparison, but the effect might be a bit too much in some cases. Either way, I suggest that you check it out in game before making your mind up.

Edited March 1, 2014 by Vrugdush

[Octopuss]

The screenshots are a little bit too small to make definitive conclusions, I'm afraid.

I am also pretty surprised how the gems look identical with and without TCG. That makes no sense - or maybe there's not enough lighting to make the new meshes show themselves.

[WilliamImm]

The screenshots are a little bit too small to make definitive conclusions, I'm afraid.

 

Actually, no. You can click on the screenshots to zoom them in and look at them closer.

[rootsrat]

And if that's not close enough, right click and "Open the image in a new tab" :)

[Octopuss]

Of course I did click on the thumbnails, lol. I could live with twice as big ones, but well... that's just me.

 

I am a bit confused by what I see. Am I looking wrong, or do the gems in Better Circlets have more surfaces than vanilla ones?

It's also weird how combining all 3 mods give almost identical results compared to just BC+TCG.

[rootsrat]

There are no vanilla screenshots.

 

Not all gems in 3 mods combination are the same. See Gold And Ruby circlet (2nd and 4th screenshot) - you will see small side gems changing texture accordingly, which prooves they are different mod combinations.

[Octopuss]

I know there aren't, it was a side question.

 

It's the main gems that confuse me. I think special version of the meshes would be "required" in order for Better Circlets to fully benefit from them.

[rootsrat]

I just realised something. These meshes apply to all the gems I believe! I recently tested Improved Gemstone Dragon Claws and they looked horrible, nothing like on screenshots! I've just realised it was True Circlet Gems that affected this!

 

I will need to confirm this, but I'm pretty sure that's the case.

[CJ2311]

How could it affect Dragon Claws if it's only changing circlet*.nif files though? That sounds weird.

[rootsrat]

As I said, I am not 100% sure, but the dragon claw gems looked suspiciously similar to the circlet gems...

[Octopuss]

I briefly talked to Madcat and here's what he replied to my question about the possibility of altering the meshes in any way for BC:

No.  I am done with altering 56 circlet meshes.  Furthermore, using those would undo the very purpose of my mod: to make the gems have more true-to-life glitter and flare.  What you see in  Better Circlets are "baked in", as in completely fake glitter and flare.  It's completely a texture effect, and is an attempt to compensate for the lack of such mesh-level effects in the gems on the vanilla meshes.

 

Basically, if you like the gems on that, then there is absolutely no purpose to having my mod installed.

 

TBH, I'm not fond of that retex because the modder just did a quick texture bake of the circlets, not bothering at all to factor in the fact that the existing vanilla normal maps were mesh-baked, and their new normals are actually displaying wrong.  No attempt was made to do normal map blending with the existing textures.  Heck, the texture baker they used even considered the fake flare in the gem texture to be "bumpy".  The normal maps were basically an afterthought.