Greetings, I'm pretty new, and though I've read many resources, I'm still unsure about a lot of things. I apologize in advance if my questions are easily answered by some tutorial or portion of the manual that I didn't read thoroughly enough. ^^'
This is the rought draft of a preset I'm working on based on an OC of mine. Some of the questions pertain to it. Click to go to larger image.


1. I know one's presets don't show up unless the viewer has downloaded and paced their preset in the correct folder, but what does the character look like if they haven't done that? Can "custom" rather than "preset" colors/markings be made to show up to the viewer if they dont have the file?
Edit: I've been seeing a lot of characters who appear flat white, with or without black manes, and I wasn't sure whether that was a result of not having their preset, some other glitch in my install, or what they were supposed to look like.
2. Is it allowed to use the shading included in the game on presets, and is it ok to make modifications to it, or must all presets be user generated in full?
3. Is it ok to us these "Xaph Horns"? I'm unsure where the pack originally came from, and will remove them from the character if it not allowed.
4. Related to above, I think I read that items don't show up properly unless both viewer and user have the same "item pack" installed? Does that mean their "items.cfg" file's contents and it's order is identical, or something else? (I removed many entries from my items file because it was too large to easily browse, since couldn't find a way to move one enty at a time in the character creation menu, and my mouse jumped to quickly through the list. This would mean no one would see those horns, right?)
5. In order to match the character, I think I'll need to make some modifications to the tufts, mane, and/or items. I'd like to color the mane on the underside different from the top, cheek tufts as well and elbow and rump tufts, a larger tail plume, and possibly nubby fangs. With my limited understanding, it's possible, but I'd need to construct several new meshes?
6. Related to above, are there resources I may read on how to create meshes, and/or edit items for feralheart? I have access to an old version of Maya, I have modeling experience, some texturing experience, but no background with .mesh, conversion, ect
7. Random thought, is it possible to code the material so that a glowing marking only shows up in low light, such as the eyeshine in the character sheet- black/green in normal lighting, bright in dark?
edit: I used a tutorial to make my characters markings glow, and it's pretty awesome, but it wouldn't allow the pupil to show black, as far as I can tell?I...thinks that what I wanted to ask, thank you to all who made the resources I've already utilized and to any who can help answer my questions!