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Armor and Appearance TAB - Playing Dressup
There was a brief discussion earlier today on discord (@Fwuppers and others) about Armor Appearance and I wanted to try and put some of the ideas I had in writing for others to see and discuss. With such a great community I am sure ideas will flow and hopefully some useful feedback will make it to the DEVs.
Some years ago (2009) I played a game called Fallen Earth, one of the features I loved about the game was the Appearance Tab. This TAB duplicated the Armor TAB and any item you placed in a slot would visually replace the item on your character. There was also an ability to hide any items with an "Invisible Armor" item for each slot. Now Fallen Earth had over 20 Armor Slots and I don't expect to see that many in AoC but what I would like to see is Armor Slots and then additional Appearance Slots for items that are for appearance only. I have made a crude drawing below to hopefully make sense of my rambling.
Also to continue a discussion that came up this morning was about Durability Appearance, basically the idea is that some Armor pieces (Helm, Chest, Legs, Boots, Weapons, etc.) could show wear and tear based on the durability.. 100% - 75% - 50% - 25%. This would of course be a player optional feature and have a check box on the Appearance TAB as well as a Global bypass for those who don't wish to see it at all.
Cheers
Maddstone
Comments
I'd fully endorse this @Maddstone because if we can all wear different types of armor (heavy/medium/small) our actual gear potentially look quite bad. Have an appearance tab will allow us to customize our looks to the nth degree and would allow for true creativity in the world. LOTRO and SWTOR are MMOs who have dabbled successfully with this imo but it could be developed further for sure.
I'd also endorse being able to use weapon cosmetics providing the weapon type was the same.
Lets hope IS implement this from the start and not introduce the feature as part of an update or dlc a year into launch.
PS - that's one big head on the guy in the diagram!
Borrowed it from the Interwebs
Maddstone
Sorry...my inner 12 year old could not resist.
I hope IS will reach out to the community at some point on this topic. What we really need is to know what is possible slot wise that will not tax the engine. After that there would be the issue of having all the items created by the Artist, but as most of us know the more slots we have to play with the more items they can sell in the cash shop. And my vision is that some items would be actual Armor / Stat items and others purely cosmetic slots that could be crafted, found or purchased from a cash shop.
Where I would like to see AoC go is something along this line..
ARMOR TAB
Armor (with Stats) - Head / Shoulder / Chest / Hands / Waist / Legs / Feet / Back
Jewelry (with Stats) - Ears / Neck / Wrist
APPEARANCE TAB
The above would have slots on the Appearance TAB with the addition of the following...
Appearance (cosmetic only) - Face (mask, eye patch, etc.) / Chest (trinket, medals, broche, etc.) / Waist (pouches, purse, etc.) / Torso (tabard) / Back (pack, etc.)
Appearance - Invisible Armor, this would be a Slot specific item that would allow you to hide the appearance of an item instead of replacing it with a cosmetic.
This is the Paper Doll from Fallen Earth... not suggesting they take it this far just wanted to show an example. The way most of the armor worked was say you apply a set of gloves, this would take up both slots. But on the Appearance TAB you had several options... apply a set of gloves as a cosmetic replacement.. apply an "Invisible Glove" to either the Left, Right or Both hands to "hide" the items.. or a cosmetic on the Left Hand and Invisible on the Right hand giving the appearance of only wearing a single glove. This may be above and beyond what would be needed in AoC but just wanted to put the idea out there.
- Shirt
- Pants
- Torso
- Legs
- Head
- Eyes
- Ears
- Mouth
- Left Glove
- Right Glove
- Belt
- Shoes
- Left Shoulder
- Right Shoulder
- Left Upper Arm
- Right Upper Arm
- Left Lower Arm
- Right Lower Arm
- Left Upper Leg
- Right Upper Leg
MaddstoneAs to the idea, I like the general idea of customizable appearance, but I think I may be alone in disliking a system that would replace default appearances.
In a game like this, where there will be a lot of overlap of equipment between classes, and where PVP could happen anywhere at anytime, I think obscuring what a player is wearing takes away some very relevant information from players.
Every game out there that has multiple roles or classes, even non MMO titles, go to great length to build avatars that convey game information. Even in relatively classless games like FPS, you can see the weapon an opponent is wielding, and as such make game-play decisions around that.
If I'm off solo mining in a boarder node, and a couple of reds come over the hill, I want to know if they are geared to kill me, or in crap gear.
It isn't clear yet, but there may be some potential for archetypes to fill multiple roles, definitely potential for archetypes to implement their roles in different ways, and a strong possibility that some archetypes may share assets. As such, I think a player should have full visual information about another player.
That being said, I like the idea of customization, so long as players know exactly what someone else is wearing. An example of this would be re-painting armor, or adding a guild or node insignia. I would also support cosmetics that do not obscure equipment, such as a cape slot that did not add stats, or adding cosmetic additions, like feathers to a helm, or other such visual augmentation that does not obfuscate the item its self.
While I think it will be too much of a tech hurdle to add dynamic durability appearance to the mechanics already existing for racial appearance plus dyes... (great if the devs can pull it off, though)
I would love to see clothing and armor that is threadbare, rusted, or "damaged"...
Especially for those of us roleplaying followers of @nagash, the Lich King.
I wonder how it would work with tier gear though *ponders*
You don't need to change the base materials or meshes, so there is only a relatively small marginal effort to create fairly realistic damage.
lexmax thanks for the info... that actually opens up the Durability options in my eyes.. adding dirt and grime to armor.. having the shine fade on metal armor and weapons. What was new fades and show wear over time until you have it repaired and cleaned.
Maddstone
Johndoe... I am afraid you may be in for some disappointment then. The Cash Shop is a thing, they have already mentioned it several times for selling mount skins, freehold skins, armor skins, etc.
They have also already confirmed an appearance change system, they just have not told us to what extreme. But one example would be the Angle and Demon skins, they completely change your appearance. And I know on a couple of occasions they have mentioned wanting the players to be able to look they want and not have to sacrifice stats.. meaning you stat gear is one thing and your appearance gear in another.
Now that said that doesn't mean there may not be some type of mechanics that allow you to quickly view a players gear stats or maybe even an option of only see others in their equipped gear instead of their cosmetic gears. This will be something to explore and give feedback on during Alpha and Beta.
Thanks for the feedback.
Maddstone
Hmm.. could actually be a cool game mechanic to help with economy.. some armor and weapons drop with "cursed" durability and stats, requires repair by an Artisan skilled in that craft (Armor/Weapon) and specific materials to repair and cleanse.
Great idea Nagash!
Maddstone
I would hope to see armor and weapons available in worn condition as well. Thinking of items that were left behind from the original exodus and being discovered and dug up by the new arrivals. Not all armor should be pretty and shiny.
And with the demo lexmax provided on UE4, it may even be possible that they could offer skins that "degrade" the appearance of existing armors and weapons. The player could apply the skin and it would retain the overlook of the item but apply some grit and grime and knock the shine of items.. that way you can express yourself as someone who cares about the quality of their gear but so no concerned with how shiny and clean it is...
"my axe may be crusted with the blood, sweat and tears of my enemies, but she is still sharp enough to split you in half"
Maddstone
https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Engine/Rendering/Materials/MaterialInstances/index.html#materialinstancedynamic
Steven has said that, which leads me to believe that they already have plans for appearance slots on say your belt and other locations for accessories.
Hopefully in the near future they will give us more information on this and how than currently plan on implementing the system so we can chime in.
Maddstone