Thanks Sitiana. I just want to clarify a few things:
(1) Does the Master Skinned Mesh Component need to have all possible bones configurations, even when unused, or does the Master Pose Component add bones from the modular skeletal meshes to the master skeletal mesh? For instance, a skirt will have additional bones and animations for each pose.
(2) Can I add a skirt as a legs option with the SetMasterPoseComponent, or will this require me to use the CopyPose component, since these are not ‘separate’ animations, but additions to the same pose?
(3) I have been researching Texture Vertex Animation without bones for things like hair, and possibly cloths. But am unsure of how shader animation works within unreal; an attack pose will require different vertex animation to an idle pose, can I access this within the Animation Blueprint? Is CopyPose the correct node for this?
(4) Can I combine separate animations from things like hair and skirts into one animation to be used by the single mesh generated by Skeletal Mesh Merge? And do the limitations of a merged skeletal mesh make it less ideal for animation, such as facial animation (“you can only run one animation on the merged mesh and transferring Morph Targets to the merged mesh is not supported”, “If however, …once you have your Skeletal Mesh you can create your Morph Targets by calculating the FMorphTargetDelta between your base mesh and any morphs.”). If not, then for performance reasons, is it advisable to use both the MasterPose/CopyPose method, and generate a separate merged skeletal mesh to be used for LODs?