Character customization?

Depends on how strict you are about the definition of historical but I'm not sure I appreciate what you're implying. There's books and there's experience. None of the armor in your pictures came from a museum did they? No, they're not. Real people wear that stuff for ren faires, shows or whatever else and there's more types of armor than what is listed in a book. Besides.. "up to" 80 lbs is very flexible and does not mean "always 80 lbs" or even imply that you're wrong.. just that sometimes.. depending on what it is.. can get up to.

As it is.. since we're apparently making a big deal out of it.. does the weights of those armors take into account the size of the person wearing them? Oh hey look at that.. armor for the joust.. 90+ lbs. Did I mention these guys also joust?

Your own book is showing armor in excess of 90 lbs.. so why can't a 6+ foot tall guy in full plate get near 80? There's another nearly 72 lbs listed there. Heck my chain shirt alone weights more than 20.. galvanized steel btw.. in case you're working.

And no I didn't bother to ask them what gauge their armor is.. except it's not stainless.. they often complain about having to clean their armor all the time to keep it from rusting.. or about the rust when haven't cleaned it. In any case.. I don't see what the big deal is. The weight's going to vary not just from the gauge of steel used or the pieces worn but also taller people are going to end up in heavier armor (if they want it to fit properly).

You might trust your books but I've no reason not to trust people with years of practical real life experience. Why does it need to be an issue?

 

Sorry to get tough on you bud.

 

um.. ok np..

On a side note.. and it really doesn't apply to the game.. and this is just my understanding.. but technology and production can also factor into weight differences. Steel plate back in the day would be thinner in the sides and back would it not? Where as the steel used in armor today has a uniform thickness because of how it was produced.. so some modern made pieces might be a little heavier for that reason. This however does not stop someone from running, doing forward rolls or cartwheels.. which I have personally witnessed.

But I suppose what I really should be pointing out is that I'm all in favor of more realistic armors in the game. But I've also never seen a lot of 'fantasy' armor in any of the Ultimas.. they've all lent themselves more to the practical so I don't think we've anything to worry about.

 

May not be quite on topic here, but I love the LOTRO Outfit system, or parts of it, at least. I'm not ssaying mages should wear heavy armour, but this system allows them to wear it cosmetically.

I'd put up some images but I seem to fail at internet, or something. My album on photobucket, is open to view, however. PICS (look in the LOTRO Cosmetics Album. Oldest first, if it asks.)

Basically you have your armour, which is all statted up and most likely as ugly as Turbine can make it. It has all your stats, Defense, +Might, +Will, etc, so on and so forth. (Should be the first image with a paperdoll.)

After that, you have cosmetic slots... I have 7, for example.

Each slot is a "look." There's no stats related to these slots, it's merely cosmetic. Your armour and it's stats are unseen, but there.(You can show the armour if you want.)

If I want to show Cosmetic Slot One, I simply select it and POOF, I've got that look. Etc and so on for the rest of the slots.

Each slot has item slots, Chest, Legs, Boots, Head, Shoulders, etc... and each one of these can be turned off and on.(If you look at the album, you'll note that next to each "piece" is a small eye. That's the toggle.

Each slot is also dyeable, but Turbine took it a step further.

The last 2 images there, are taken in thetown vault, in it is a Wardrobe. This stores "copies" of the items you put in it, and allows you to dye it many colors. There are drop down menu's allowing you to decided which color that you want to wear... so.. as an example, I take a nice looking pair of boots and stick them in the Wardrobe, then I take a black, blue, grey, green, orange dye and dye the "copy" of the item and I'm allowed to select from those colors which on to place on a paperdoll. (I say copy because the item, once it's in the wardrobe can be discarded. Only an "image" of it remains in the vault for me to put on my character.) If I select an item, at the bottom center there's another drop down that will allow me to select which color of the item I want to place on a paperdoll.

Essentially this allows for tons of customization without being stuck wearing something you might think is hideous. It also allows, in lotro at least, for anyone to wear virtually anything in the game. A mage in plate, a guardian(tank) wearing a robe... etc.

 

That's not really off topic. Armor appearance still falls under character customizing.

I could almost make an argument for a system like that.. but it would require a bit of suspension of disbelief. It sounds interesting but not really my style.. hmm but then again I could probably get used to it. heh.. I think I prefer something a little more classic though. Call it a personal preference if you will.

 

I'm not looking at the armour, per se, but the system is nice.

Believable?(Not sure how you mean it?) As far as changing? Most of us RP'ers don't just poof, and change in front of the crowds. Most will find a private room or secluded spot and change.

(Or do you mean armour type?) I would agree with mage types not wearing plate armour, if that's what you mean, but the system still works. A few patches back, in fact, you had to be able to equip the item before you could place it in the wardrobe. (Had to be able to wear heavy to stash it, or had to have the proper level, etc.) Not arguing, just not unsure what you meant.

ADDED: Or do you mean the paperdoll part of it? If that's the case you could simply require an item, maybe a pack on your mule, or a room at an inn, or your own wardrobe in your home.

I just like the flexiblility of it in that even if two people are wearing identicle gear, they can still look unique due to colors or mixing and matching other parts, boots, or shoulders are/aren't shown, or are different. I *can* say that the female player-base there, LOVES it.

Some of the perks that come with it are nice, too. For example, ever found a really sweet looking chest piece in a game, but hated the stats? Here you could wear the look, while not worrying about it's stats. Also, once you store it, you're free to get rid of the actual item, thus freeing up valuable vault space. Then there's dyes, it stores all the colors you've placed on the item. So, you have a chest dyed black and red, if you want to wear it red on Monday, and Tuesday you're feeling like wearing black you just run to the wardrobe and swap it out. It'll always keep the red one, in case you want to wear that again on Wednesday. I happen to be a clothing whore, to me it's great cause I can have alot of nice looking things for different situations. Beno in his nice gear and his hood, singing in Bree looks like a Bard, where when I just to slot one and head out to fight I look proper for that occasion, too. Both of these let me avoid the dreaded, "OMG, Who designed this hideous thing..." that some games can force you to wear to keep your stats. Also it's great for Kinships that might have a uniform you may not always want to wear.

*tosses two coppers in the hat and wanders off in search of a pub*

 

heh so it was basically a playability vs realism decision. I guess I can understand that approach. Players get freedom to wear what they like without worrying about their stats.. of course it's going to be popular for a majority..

Ha.. I bet they do.

 

Hey guys,

Thanks for all the interest in the game and the customizable system.
To answer the plethora of questions, I am going to give you some perspective; (to middle of page 3)

- We are in the very early stage and we have a very small team here to make your wishes come true! We will do our best to prioritize and give you the best systems we can. Don't forget though this is a living game and as long as I am here (or till they tear my dead hands from the keyboard ) we will endeavor to make it better and better for you.

That said, I think most of the games you showed for custom character creation are freaking awesome! But they were most likely in development for years, with large teams and cost 10s of millions of dollars. This is what you get with large publishers. For example I like the Second Life system (and its already sparked dreams in my head) but it is a separate system that was created as an add on to the original game. That kind of robustness and power is something we can shoot for down the road. Don't get me wrong, we are shooting for the best we can do for this round, but at this point i can tell you it wont be that robust. Not yet

I have been championing the character customization system from when I got hired on. I have experience with several systems and if my history is anything I believe we do something amazing for the time we have. Again this is the first very polished draft! What we as a community should do is have FireLotus make us some kind of voting poll where you all decide what is the most important in the customization tool. Then I can, as we work on it focus and post on the top of the list.
Right now we are looking at an outside tool that will help us do the work of creating the base system. This tool is much more powerful than what we have planned and it will also help with the planning of content creation. The biggest problem we face is that we need a system that will take the least amount of time away from the engineers. There is so much they have to do for the rest of the game. Honestly this is a typical dev issue, we always have to weigh engineer time for each system. That is why games are so iterative, they get up graded every year.

Also we can look at what is realistic production for the first release. You guys may decide that customizable lips like in the Second Life creator, is the top of the list! At that point I will go back to the engineers and figure out if, how, and if we have the time. We may need to give up customizable shoes for lips for example, and honestly we may not be able to do it at all. But doing it this way will give you all an inside track that I can at least keep you informed on.
I have taken up this banner, and have allot to offer the system. We will move forward and fight till the last person. WE ARE SPARTA!... oh wait no, I guess we aren't, but we should make a banner! Maybe a segmented pie with different types per piece!!

One last thing this is a big undertaking. For example ; Even if we do get the system up and running, my real job is to populate it!. So as well as getting a system working, we need to build you all a library!

Qball
more to come

 

So I am trying to compile all the great ideas that are posted here and put together some kind of coherent document, mainly for studio use to track the things we talk about here.

After that is done I will put something together for here too. Like I said in the previous post, I want to get something together for polls on customizable options like; armor types, realistic or stylized, med-evil or renaissance, magic and steam-punk, or all of them, and such. We need to put this out to the main forum as well to be fare.

But anyway I get alerts for all your post on here, but if I don't respond its cause I am working on the docs (Well except for the character work like the current Avatar, the bartender, etc. I have to do. )

Keep this going Peeps.

Qball

 

Found this:



Not sure I agree with the top list, but I did like some elements of these. Like being able to pick a hair style or beard and adjust the length. Also there is some neat use of "stamps" where you can select an image or pattern and paint it on. This could bankrupt me quick if you meshed this with the microtransactions to upload images that we could stamp on our armor, items or body.

Keeping it simple I think most of sliders tend to be useless as all you do is end of making some disfigured mugs if you aren't careful. However providing a few templates of things that can be overlaid could provide a lot of variety.

NWN (Bioware) allowed you to change out all parts of the paperdoll for armor and clothing. With community additions this got to a ridiculous level: head, torso, pelvis, shoulder, upper/lower arm, hands, upper/lower leg and feet. In addition upper/lower robe parts could be overlaid on top of this. So mismatching armor parts meant you were pretty much unique. Something like this could be expanded over time. The problem with NWN was the interface was not built for it, especially with the tons of stuff added by the community pack, so you basically had to hit next like 500 times to get to what you wanted.

 

I do really love Aion's system. It's probably even improved since launch. I spent hours modeling the characters. I swear they could sell that thing as a stand alone app or something to make dolls out of.

You could also watch how it unfolded as they changed the game for US audiences. More ethnic diversity in hairstyles, etc. Also the male models got much less waify.

 

Liked Umbrae's post and really think you guys need to pay attention to character customization. ESPECIALLY WITH ONLY HUMANS TO PLAY!

 

@Qball
Thx for the feedback and nice infos. I have to agree. Second Life a plattform a friend tugged me in was the first plattform i saw an advanced slider style character customization and was surprised how well it worked. Ok, there was actually aswell the way to use an animation overrider, take some parts together to even run around as pony, but i don't think you mean something like this. To see that the team want such a high customization aswell is something really nice. Aswell that the ideas are welcome. Intresting aswell, that steampunk was mentioned. With the tesla aswell i think we can look forward to some technology in SOTA. Looking forward for it. Was always a huge fan of fantasy games with steampunk.

PS: I know, that a dev is reading here. One of the reason i let out one bikini picture with a bit to less coverage.

 

here are some Gorget you have movement in them . They are very nice.

 

Ah now I can see some movement in that chain one. I've worn one like this leather one before.. I thought even that was a little restricting.. and by that I do mean a little.. as in.. not a lot. They restrict your head movement more than anything else. Turning is no big deal but tilting is another matter. I'm trying to remember what it felt like on the shoulders.. if I recall I could raise my arms but not to a point of bring my elbows higher than the shoulder.. otherwise it raises the gorget.. then again the one I had was wider.. and probably stiffer than this one.

Never worn a metal one. Saddly my budget has never allowed any plate pieces. It makes me sad. Have tried on a few helms though.. I do not envy folks who have to wear those.. they're bleedin' hot and it's hard to breath unless it's open face.. and more than half your vision is blocked.

 

I know you guys are probably tired of hearing about it but now but I think that the character customization system in Phantasy Star Online 2 is probably one of the best ones that I used in a game so definitely look at that one if you haven't seen it. it lets you change pretty much everything on the character including the size and weight any thing far skinny tall short with sliders not just preset also the facial features and everything else.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 4 Beta

 

The metal one with sections lets you move your neck left ,right , back ,and forward. I have 2 metal ones and 2 leather.