PC Game/Quest Breaking Dragon Riding Glitch (spoilers maybe)

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ShenziSixaxis

Article Writer
You know that one part of Dragonborn that was a really big point? Guess what decided to break on me with this DLC.

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The feature has never functioned correctly so I don't even know what exactly is supposed to happen, but obviously whoever mounts the dragon is supposed to fly off with it, not just sit there...

I'm PRETTY sure that this isn't an issue from a mod, enough so that I'd bet money it wasn't from a mod.

I've tried reloading countless times and even deleted and reinstalled Dragonborn. I couldn't find ANYTHING on google with this issue so I'm very much lost as to what to do about this.

Besides being pissed I spent all day enjoying Solsthiem just for this to happen so that I can't confront Miraak, I also can't believe I'm at the end of the main quest of the DLC. That's terrible.
 

DidymusEi

New Member
Hi Shenzi, I've come across this issue as well and I found a solution. It IS a mod issue. Basically your character is connected to the dragon via the dragons skeleton. Some dragon mods have custom skeletons included. Since the game uses skeletons held within the 'meshes' folder before the ones kept within the .bsm, it's using the outdated custom skeleton instead of the new dragon-riding ready skeleton.

So to solve the issue go to your >Data>Meshes>Actors>Dragons> folder and delete the skeleton.nif.

Problem solved.
 

ShenziSixaxis

Article Writer
... except installing the unofficial DB patch from the Nexus fixed this for me without modifying any meshes. One "fix" I saw on the Nexus mentioned something about this, though all the comments noted that it wasn't anything to look at.

Whatever the cause of the bug is, the unofficial DB patch fixes it.

Also...
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\Skyrim\Data\meshes\actors\dragon\character assets

There's no skeleton.nif all the way into that folder, nor anywhere on any of my hard drives. Nice try?
 

DidymusEi

New Member
Then in your case the skeleton.nif was held within a mods .bsa. It's a skeleton issue, that's the only thing it could be as it's how riding creatures works in this game and the exact same thing happens when you incorrectly create a new type of mount.

When I had this issue I too had the Unofficial DB patch, it did nothing. Deleting the dragons skeleton.nif fixed my problem, I didn't do anything else. Do you use BOSS? If not it's likely UDB holds the new skeleton.nif, is at the end of your load order, and "overtook" the bad skeleton.nif that's causing your issue.
 

ShenziSixaxis

Article Writer
... except it doesn't seem to and nor do I have any mods that modify the skeleton, and the UDB patch is at the bottom of my load order.

Whatever the issue is, it's fixed on my end and the UDB is noted to usually fix it when installed.
 

DidymusEi

New Member
Ah I see now. The issue was caused by what I'm explaining for me personally (A skeleton.nif in /meshes overrides .bsa, even with UDP), hence why I didn't think UDP solved it. But even before that "Dragonborn.esm wiped out the body part changes in Update.esm that shipped with official patch 1.8 that made dragon riding possible. These have been restored. (Bug #11916)". Which is what you and others are experiencing.

Ah well. Still worth noting if anyone is still having this issue with Unofficial Dragonborn Patch installed: Check for skeleton.nif in /meshes/actor/dragon
 

akatanaka

New Member
Hey everyone! I've just newly joined your ranks of Skyrim lovers and have been watching this thread with interest because I have the same issue. It is quite hilarious to mount the Dragon and then have it takeoff without me, leaving me sitting there, stranded in midair! Unfortunately as you all know, this is game breaking because you can't complete the main quest or ride any dragons.
I've tried the two main suggestions listed here: installing the unofficial Dragonborn patch, and looking for the skeleton.nif in the game files. The patch didn't solve the problem, and I can't find the skeleton.nif file anywhere. Do any of you have any other suggestions…?
 

ShenziSixaxis

Article Writer
Hmm, this thread has a few suggestions:
Dragonborn - Stuck in air when riding dragon (possible spoiler) - Page 2 - Skyrim Mod Troubleshooting - The Nexus Forums
I found that deleting Default male/female files in these folders
Data/Meshes/actors/character/characters/
Data/Meshes/actors/character/characters female/
and disabling player headtracking mod fixed this for me

Maybe that'll work for you.

Also, if you have the Realistic Ragdolls mod, make you sure you update it to 1.9 or disable it as version 1.8 interferes with the DLC.
 

DidymusEi

New Member
If you have any mods that alter player or dragon skeletons, uninstall them one by one and see if that fixes it. Once you find the problem mod either see if it's been updated or leave it off for the time being.
 

Adele

New Member
Signed up just to back up what ShenziSixaxis said in his/her latest post-- I updated nothing except the Realistic Ragdolls and Force mod, and this problem was solved for me.

I had no skeleton.nif for dragons in my meshes dir, and I had the head-tracking mod and the unofficial Dragonborn patch enabled, but the glitch was still present until I updated the ragdoll physics mod.

Hopefully this helps someone.
 

akatanaka

New Member
Thanks for the further suggestions! Your ideas got me thinking about whether I had any mods active that changed the dragons in any way besides the Update and yes, I had the Resilient Dragons mod active which loaded after the Unofficial Dragonborn Patch. So I made the Patch load after this dragon mod in the Mod Manager, and it seemed to fix the problem! So the skeleton.nif must've been embedded in the Resilient Dragon mod, and making the Patch load after it corrected the script?
 

ShenziSixaxis

Article Writer
Thanks for the further suggestions! Your ideas got me thinking about whether I had any mods active that changed the dragons in any way besides the Update and yes, I had the Resilient Dragons mod active which loaded after the Unofficial Dragonborn Patch. So I made the Patch load after this dragon mod in the Mod Manager, and it seemed to fix the problem! So the skeleton.nif must've been embedded in the Resilient Dragon mod, and making the Patch load after it corrected the script?

That's how it should work! Interesting that there'd be a skeleton.nif in that mod. I can't imagine why there would be.
 

akatanaka

New Member
This is all very confusing to me…! What we PCers have to go through just to play Skyrim the way we want to…! The price we pay for making the game our own. Thanks again for your help. Great forum!
 

Keki

New Member
I did all the above, even looked for a skeleton.nif in the search box, and I absolutely CANNOT fix whatever is wrong. I've even unsubbed and deleted a few "dragon" mods that even had to do with dragons at all, which I had only one. I have every mod up to date, (as I've started recently modding) and made sure the DB patch was first. Still nothing.

Any more ideas?
 

Keki

New Member
Ah, figured out my problem. I deleted the dragon's curse mod, but it somehow snaked it's way back into my mods.

Figuring this out, I suggest highly that you double and triple check mods are deleted as you wanted.
 

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