Improved Better Skulls v2.6
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a TES III: Morrowind mod by Pherim

This is an improved version of the mod "Better Skulls" by tronvillain & nONatee based on the latest version 1.4b.

"Better Skulls" is a great mod that greatly improves the look of the various skulls found in the game, and increases visual consistency by using the skull from the skeleton instead of the crude vanilla skulls. However, there were a few things about it that bothered me, so I tried to fix them. This is the result.

Changes include uv map fixes, removing unneeded vertex colors from the original skeleton mesh, combining parts with the same texture, a new smoothed and optimized version of furn_bone_rib_01.nif, and  a new bone texture. Completely new skull pile model, now without intersecting geometry! I also smoothed all skulls except for those in the skull pile and the Ancestor Ghost. Unless you have a VERY old graphics card, there should be no difference in performance. In fact, as I have combined parts with the same texture into single NiTriShapes, performance may even have improved in certain situations. For all changes see the changelog.

Install with NMM/Wrye Bash/Mod Organizer (2) or manually by extracting all files and folders in the "Data Files" folder OR the "Vanilla Textures" folder into the "Data Files" folder of your Morrowind Installation.

Everything else from the original mod's readme still applies!

Changelog from original Better Skulls mod v1.4b:
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- removed ugly triangles at the top of all skulls, improving the uv mapping as much as possible with the given textures (yes, they are there in the vanilla skeleton skulls, but the vanilla texture is practically white in this area so it doesn't show as much)
- Subdivided and smoothed all skulls (except those in the skull pile and some jaws in the "Vanilla" folder that aren't there in the main mod - I may add them later)
- removed unneeded vertex colors from all skulls, as they were completely white. This is coming from the original skeleton mesh as well
- combined objects with the same textures into single meshes (especially furn_burial20.nif and in_om_skullpile.nif)
- improved subdivided furn_bone_01.nif and added smoothed furn_bone_rib_01.nif (also merged separate parts with different texture with the main mesh, it is now a single object)
- New Bone texture (furn_bone_01.nif and furn_bone_rib_01.nif)
- removed superfluous duplicate geometry, fixed normals
- filled transparent pixels in textures with black color, added missing mipmaps
- removed unneeded AncestorGhost.nif (only the XAncestorGhost.nif is used by the game)
- renamed "Vanilla" folder to "Vanilla Textures", restructured for Wrye Mash/BAIN installation, added missing meshes from main mod, added missing furn_burial00.nif from Vanilla folder to main mod folder

v2.1: Added missing NCO to bones and skulls

v2.2: - Included TX_Skeleton_clavicle.dds from Connary's texture pack that was missing in the original mod, to have the whole skeleton covered for visual consistency
- minor improvements to some vanilla textures meshes, changed band texture in furn_burial20.nif and misc_skull10.nif to tx_metal_strip_01.dds (like R-Zero's Random Replacers - Servant's Skull (https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/44025) does for misc_skull10.nif)

v2.3: Added Skeleton creature and containers meshes with various fixes (uv map errors, unneeded Geometry, wrong normals...). These work both with the textures included in this mod and vanilla textures, as well as all other skeleton texture replacers!

v2.4: Added back sides to bands around skulls in furn_burial20.nif, also modeled new ropes where the stakes are crossed and improved uv mapping on the "gold metal parts", plus minor fixes and improvements

v2.5: Added emissive material to candle flame in light_spear_skull00.nif to make it compatible with Glowing Flames (https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/46124), rounded candle edges, smoothed jaw of vanilla textures version

v2.6: Added new, non-intersecting skull pile mesh.