Notes for skin editing (material properties mesh settings texturing)

Most of what's written here was discovered by trial & error, and the info is in no way 100% correct or final. Please feel free to correct it or contribute!

Small how-to's related to skin editing:

How to change texture paths of the head mesh:

If you ever tried to give a npc some other texture set by changing texture paths in an xml or in a w2mesh, you could've noticed that it didn't always make it actually use the new texture set in game. This is caused by some npcs having NormalBlend's material (node responsible for presence of dynamic wrinkles when character's mimicking or talking) overwriting mesh's own material.

So, check your head's entity for NormalBlend node:

CEntityTemplate->CEntity->CMimicComponent->CHardAttachement->CNormalBlendComponent

and edit texture paths in it's MaterialInstance.

For example, Triss' main vanilla head mesh:

characters\models\main_npc\triss\h_01_wa__triss\h_01_wa__triss.w2mesh

Is linked to this head entity:

characters\models\main_npc\triss\h_01_wa__triss.w2ent

And is set up to use this texture set:

characters\models\main_npc\triss\model\a_01_wa__triss_a01.xbm

characters\models\main_npc\triss\model\a_01_wa__triss_b01.xbm

characters\models\main_npc\triss\model\a_01_wa__triss_d01.xbm

characters\models\main_npc\triss\model\a_01_wa__triss_n01.xbm

And it can be adjusted in her h_01_wa__triss.w2ent in NormalBlend's MaterialInstance here:

If npc's head.w2ent has no NormalBlend enabled, you should be able to change it's material by editing head's xml or cooked mesh material, as you do with any other mesh.

How to fix weird lighting/shadows on your custom head mesh (made from scratch or imported from some other game):

Make sure it's Vertex Color is similar to other w3's head meshes:

The most convenient way of copying it would be to use Data Transfer modifier in Blender on some vanilla head mesh a source mesh.

What defines NormalBlend's (dynamic mimicking wrinkles) areas:

They are set in two places:

1) character's head's w2ent's NormalBlend node:

characters\models\main_npc\triss\h_01_wa__triss.w2ent

2) character's head's w3fac file:

characters\models\main_npc\triss\h_01_wa__triss\h_01_wa__triss.w3fac

They seem to be set in 2d space and related to UV coordinates. You can copy them to any npc for any other npc to alt