Will there be an option to be left handed or right handed?

Greetings AoC community.

I can’t seem to find anything on this or maybe I’m just not looking in the right place. Will there be an option to be left handed or right handed? Anyone know?

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RocketFarmer

The creative director is talking about having a character take a bath in some random house asset and we have people blathering about how having left handed characters is a waste of time. Classic.

Conrad

I dont think either of you realise how much work left handedness actually is compared to your shitty examples. Seriously, if you never rigged and animated anything in your life don't talk like this shit is easy. You're behaving like a bunch of kids.

Left handedness is a waste of resources pre release. It requires animations made for left handed versions because mirroring almost never properly works. Mirror the rig? Sure, animations not so much. Not only that, it literally doubles all the character animations in the game. An emote or skin tone are nothing compared to the amount of work needed for different dominant hands.

Try to argue as much as you want, but the amount of work needed for left handedness vs its actual use is pretty disproportionate. So yes, my point stands, it's a waste of valuable dev time.

Dygz

It's only a waste of resources if it's not already part of the design.
Asking for stuff is always fine - as long as you keep in mind that there might not be enough time in the schedule for the devs to do it.
If there is enough time, great. If there's not enough time, the devs have the idea in the backs of their minds for the games they work on in the future.

Conrad

Dygz wrote: »

It's only a waste of resources if it's not already part of the design.
Asking for stuff is always fine - as long as you keep in mind that there might not be enough time in the schedule for the devs to do it.
If there is enough time, great. If there's not enough time, the devs have the idea in the backs of their minds for the games they work on in the future.

If they are already working on left handedness I'm fine with it, but players requesting it I'm totally against it

Dreoh

Conrad wrote: »

I dont think either of you realise how much work left handedness actually is compared to your shitty examples. Seriously, if you never rigged and animated anything in your life don't talk like this shit is easy. You're behaving like a bunch of kids.

Left handedness is a waste of resources pre release. It requires animations made for left handed versions because mirroring almost never properly works. Mirror the rig? Sure, animations not so much. Not only that, it literally doubles all the character animations in the game. An emote or skin tone are nothing compared to the amount of work needed for different dominant hands.

Try to argue as much as you want, but the amount of work needed for left handedness vs its actual use is pretty disproportionate. So yes, my point stands, it's a waste of valuable dev time.

Yep, just as I explained in my follow up comment

Dygz

Again, players can request whatever they want. That's what the forums are for.
The devs will figure out whether they have room in the schedule to accommodate the request (or whether it fits with their design philosophy).
Some requests may already be part of the design but not yet implemented.

Noaani

Dygz wrote: »

Again, players can request whatever they want. That's what the forums are for.

And other players can agree or disagree, and even provide their reasoning for agreeing or disagreeing. That's also what the forums are for.

RocketFarmer

No excuse for bigotry. They will either do it or not. I don’t expect they will because after all this game isn’t for everyone. It would, however make for an interesting PVP dynamic most games don’t address. It’s more than just aesthetics.

Left handed people deal with hard every day, so arguments that it’s too hard can talk to the hand. Don’t expect any hand holding either. Sorry for the puns.

But that’s OK because left handed people make 15% more money, are better problem solvers, spend less time in lines, are more likely to excel at creative and visual arts, are better at multitasking, and are better fighters.

So I can understand why some would want to keep everything right handed only. Game balance. They would have to otherwise nerf the left handed characters. Besides, left handed flipping dwarves would be just too much for the world to take.

Conrad

RocketFarmer wrote: »

No excuse for bigotry. They will either do it or not. I don’t expect they will because after all this game isn’t for everyone. It would, however make for an interesting PVP dynamic most games don’t address. It’s more than just aesthetics.

Left handed people deal with hard every day, so arguments that it’s too hard can talk to the hand. Don’t expect any hand holding either. Sorry for the puns.

But that’s OK because left handed people make 15% more money, are better problem solvers, spend less time in lines, are more likely to excel at creative and visual arts, are better at multitasking, and are better fighters.

So I can understand why some would want to keep everything right handed only. Game balance. They would have to otherwise nerf the left handed characters. Besides, left handed flipping dwarves would be just too much for the world to take.

I have no idea why you're suddenly mentioning left handers being better and shit like that and how they would need a nerf in game. That makes no sense. Left handed characters would have no advantage or disadvantage in games, never heard more stupid thing in existence lol

RocketFarmer

Guess you don’t know what you don’t know.

Voidwalkers

Wait, is this thread about ...

A. PLAYER's LH/RH options (which affects controls & mouse/key bindings), or
B. CHARACTER's LH/RH options?? (e.g. shield in MH, sword in OH for higher defense/block but lower damage/hit chance)

Wandering Mist

Dreoh wrote: »

It could be deceptively complicated to code depending on how they've structured their systems so far.

If they've created a sufficiently flexible infrastructure it wouldn't be too difficult, but if they've hard-tied things to off-model positions like "spawn particles from 3 units to the right, 3 forward, and 6 up to simulate coming out of the right side of the player or similar hard-coded things. Though I doubt that experienced professionals like they have on the team would do any hard-coding

If they've left the systems flexible enough it could be as easy as adding a simple toggle that flips everything along the x-axis
That unfortunately would also mean any visuals with a specific perspective in mind would be ruined, like a shield with a sigil on it would have it's sigil flipped which could look strange

I wouldn't say it's hard to code, but having the ability to put weapons in either hand would require an entirely new set of animations. Essentially, each weapon swing would need double the animations (1 set for right handed users, and 1 set for left handed users). That is a huge amount of work and I honestly don't think it's worth doing.

Dreoh

Wandering Mist wrote: »

Dreoh wrote: »

It could be deceptively complicated to code depending on how they've structured their systems so far.

If they've created a sufficiently flexible infrastructure it wouldn't be too difficult, but if they've hard-tied things to off-model positions like "spawn particles from 3 units to the right, 3 forward, and 6 up to simulate coming out of the right side of the player or similar hard-coded things. Though I doubt that experienced professionals like they have on the team would do any hard-coding

If they've left the systems flexible enough it could be as easy as adding a simple toggle that flips everything along the x-axis
That unfortunately would also mean any visuals with a specific perspective in mind would be ruined, like a shield with a sigil on it would have it's sigil flipped which could look strange

I wouldn't say it's hard to code, but having the ability to put weapons in either hand would require an entirely new set of animations. Essentially, each weapon swing would need double the animations (1 set for right handed users, and 1 set for left handed users). That is a huge amount of work and I honestly don't think it's worth doing.

I think you misinterpreted/misread my comment?

The complex coding was in reference to spell/particle effects and other things that might have been manually hard-coded like I had explained.

As for the extra animations, mirror-flipping models/rigs adds minimal extra work but comes with many downsides and is not ideal in any way.

It's obvious to anyone that adding left handed stuff without mirror flipping would require much more work.

szelesbt

Voidwalkers wrote: »

Wait, is this thread about ...

A. PLAYER's LH/RH options (which affects controls & mouse/key bindings), or
B. CHARACTER's LH/RH options?? (e.g. shield in MH, sword in OH for higher defense/block but lower damage/hit chance)

Kalv1441

Conrad wrote: »

I have no idea why you're suddenly mentioning left handers being better and shit like that and how they would need a nerf in game. That makes no sense. Left handed characters would have no advantage or disadvantage in games, never heard more stupid thing in existence lol

It seemed as if they were just being facetious.

maouw

Simple example where mirroring the rig doesn't work:
open a door.

Now imagine how many non-symmetrical animations in the game need to be reworked...

Dygz

Do we open doors in Ashes?
And do we typically actually use the doorknobs in MMORPGs?

maouw

Dygz wrote: »

Do we open doors in Ashes?
And do we typically actually use the doorknobs in MMORPGs?

This question is really asking: How much fidelity are we going to have in player animations?
If we're happy with no interaction animations (or generic ones), then it's even less meaningful to implement LH/RH

For example, if we want to "get into a bathtub", this too can't be mirrored because the bathtubs we've seen are not symmetrical along both x and y axes. But if we just press "E" and we're in the bathtub, then it's not a concern.

RocketFarmer

If physical traits such as size and handedness are irrelevant then characters are nothing more than hit boxes with animations. If that’s just the way it is, then that’s the way it is.

Position of weapon and shield are critical components to combat as well as reach. Being able to change hands would add a layer of complexity to combat. If the modeling tools don’t accommodate that easily then the tools suck frankly. For two-handed weapons, not having handedness takes away up to half of the positions and tactics as every right hand side guard or attack has a corresponding left hand (or sinister) guard or attack. Of course if all you are doing is swinging a sword then you are already taking away the usefulness of the weapon. Similar situation for shields used as blocking mechanisms rather that the way shields were actually used. And that’s not even related to the whole action combat vs tab targeting argument. Both systems including the proposed hybrid could apply these concepts.

For bows, handedness is irrelevant as the side you shoot from is based on eye dominance.

Noticed the dragons fighting with both front claws, although badly but it is alpha. Would also expect the wings and tail being swung around to hit characters and do damage as well as knock back. Based on the attacks, however, the system does not appear to take this into account and is instead handling damage via threat indicators rather than physics and spatial awareness. Yeah, it’s alpha. Or in other words, damage out of thin air. That forces the player’s attention away from the opponent and more towards the ground, and based on camera angle you can immediately lose the immersion of the combat. And since the position and movement has next to nothing to do with the attack, the corresponding defense or reaction becomes less than interesting. I for one think the whole on-the-nose telegraphing of the attack via threat indicators rather than say an animated tell takes away from the combat. It also takes away from the initial experience of fighting a monster for the first time.

The number one rule of medieval combat is not to get hit. That means position, cover and transitions are not trivial. Starting position sets up the line of attack and the line to cover. Opponent’s position also plays into that as well as the corresponding transition position and guard. Combat flows from that. Launching oneself into a bad attack angle or uncovered position is something to avoid and should be heavily penalized (e.g. auto crit). Except for maybe a shield wall or phalanx where you are fighting more as a unit rather than an individual, you are an idiot if you are just standing there exchanging blows like a turn-based RPG game.

If your combat isn’t considering this and instead it’s nothing more than a glorified hit box with animations then it would be even easier to implement left handed characters and character animations. If the system does take these factors into account, then WTF. Why do it halfway?

If you are simply going to say we will implement combat just like game X, then stop pretending at some sort of innovation. Also, just go with tab targeting. Besides, no one can see anything in a fight with all of the effects and chaos anyway.

Dygz

I'm really asking if we open doors with doorknobs in MMORPGs - because I don't recall doings so.
The feature request is for the option for some characters to do things with the left hand that other characters do with the right hand. If characters aren't depicted as opening doors with hands at all, mirroring is not an issue in that instance.
(I think we did open doors in APOC, we just didn't use doorknobs.)

And, yes, whether mirroring entering a bathtub is a significant issue depends on the animation details for entering a bathtub. The more likely issue, I think, might climbing up on your mount.

I think this is a feature that should always be asked for in the early stages of game development.
Representation is important.
Could be that it's too late to implement for Ashes, if it's not already in the game design.
It's great to list the obstacles that might prevent the devs from implementing this feature if it's not already in the game design.
And...if it is too late...hopefully the devs will remember to add it as a feature in the next games the work on.

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