skyrim meshes lost

[Evergreenmind]

sooo... i can't find my skyrim meshes.
Normally they would be in
steamlibary/steamapps/common/skyrim/Data/Meshes/actors/character/character assets
but now theres only four .nif files (normally all the files shoud be .bsa files).

I've been trying to import the meshes to nifskope for a few days with no luck and i think i f*ed something up.
I've used BSAopt and FO3 archive utility to extract them. I think it's the FO3au that replaced all the .bsa meshes with the 4 .nif files but im not sure.

I re-installed skyrim again, but it didn't work. I dont' know hat to do, but i really need the meshes back! character creation seems bug because of this, sometimes it work, but otherwise it just crashes the whole game (though i have several mods, so maybe it was one of those)

[Nazenn]

Sorry if im misunderstanding but heres where I think your problem lies.

.bsa files are archives, and will only be found in the base data folder of your skyrim installation. This is because your .bsa files have internally the rest of the folder structure for the data they hold, such as the textures/landscapes folder, or the meshes/actors folder etc etc.
If you want to use the files that are included in the bethesda archives they you need to extract the .bsa files into their actual directories, which is where you get the meshes (.nif files) and the textures (.dds files) and the other relevent files that skyrim uses.
If youre looking for meshes, then then .nif files are the ones you want

You should never unpack the offical skyrim .bsa files into loose files for use with your game. and as far as your mods you will need to list what mods you have installed for help with that.

[Evergreenmind]

thanks for answering :)
but, so where is my .bsa files now? can i get them back if have accidentally deleted them?

i mainly need the male body mesh, which i one of the 4 .nif files i now find in character assests but when i try opening it in nifskope it just gives me errorotification.

I've been able to extract and open the mesh previously few days ago, but then i had problems with importing it into blender, so deleted everything i had made that day.

[Nazenn]

If you extracted all of the .bsa files that come with the skyrim installation (I believe they are listed as Skyrim - Meshes.bsa, Skyrim - Sound.bsa etc etc) and then deleted them at this stage its really just safer to do a complete reinstallation of skyrim. While having meshes etc as loose files isnt particularly bad, having scripts as loose files certainly is in some cases and certain things just work better from inside a .bsa archive.
Extracting the bethesda archives into your data file can also cause conflicts with mods that install into the data folder as well.

If you didnt extract the offical archives and delete their original files in the data folder, then it might be that the four files that you are looking at are modded files if you have any.

Either way the easiest thing you can do to find whatever meshes you need are actually to download a mod that replaces the male body mesh which will give you a good indication of which meshes they have altered. Id give you file names but I'm on the wrong computer for that right now and don't have access to any of my mods on this one.
As far as nifscope, ive never used it myself so I can't help you there, but happy to help you navigate the skyrim data structure more if you need it.

[Evergreenmind]

i would love some help with the data structure to figure all this out.

i still have stuff like sound folder and texture folder intact. The biggest problem now is just to find the original .bsa files for gamemodels. i remember seeing them before i started to play with the programs i mentioned.

I could just download the bodymeshes somewhere, but the missing original ones seem to mess with my game: whenever i go into char. creation (or racemenu), the races that use the vanillabodies ( and not moded ones) tend to take ages to load up and usually the game just crashes after that

I already have a mod that replaces malebodies, i could try unistalling that if it brings them back, otherwise i'll just reinstall everything

[Nazenn]

The best way to make sure that your game is restored to its base state and that its all functional my itself is to follow this guide to return everything to its vanilla form just like when you wouldhave originally downloaded it. Unfortunetly without actually seeing and being able to browse through your data folder myself I cant manually troubleshoot the problematic files, especially if you have mods in the same folder.
http://wiki.step-project.com/Guide:Make_Skyrim_Vanilla_Again

After all that is done, make a copy of the bsa files that you would like to extract and put them somewhere else and the extract them to a location OTHER then your data folder.
If you want to see what meshes you might need then you should download a body mod manually as opposed to through the manager so you can manually look through the files to see what the folder structure is and what files it includes. Also means that you have a manual backup so it doesnt matter if you mess up the files outside of the data folder.

[Evergreenmind]

Ok i started un-messing up my skyrim with the link you provided and around midway the missing .bsa files came acorss in a folder they should NOT have been in. I have no idea how they get there...

Im still gonna make everything vanilla again and reinstal all my mods just in case, but i think i can handle it from now on. If this doesn't work i might still ask for advise if its ok with you.

Thank you SO much for helping with this <3

[Nazenn]

Feel free to keep posting in here if you want more help with this. Back on my old computer so I have access to my data folder now and can help with file identification as well.

But definitely make backup copies of any files that you edit, especially if messing with the offical .bsas as skyrim really doesnt like when they get changed XD

And youre most welcome, glad I could help.