Racial weapons and armor

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Armor racial appearances in early Alpha-1.[1]

Violet light and myself are wearing exactly the same armor set right: Same stats, same everything, but it drops for her it looks one way, it drops for me it looks another way; and... a small part of that is gender, but then the other part of it is race. So because I was a Vaelune in that playthrough my armor was in the Vaelune style; and when she picked it up it was in the elven style because she was an elf. So that gives you an example of sort of the breadth of looks that we're going for and how we try to capture like who you are as as a character and allow you to build your look that way.[2]Jeffrey Bard

Dünir and Empyrean racially styled armor concept art by Keith Kovach.[3]

We have essentially sets that exist across all races; and each race that dons those armor sets is going to have their own racial influence on the presentation of those particular sets. So that's something that's unique in how each of the races get diversified.[4]Steven Sharif

Weapons and armor are not race locked, but armor will take on a racial appearance.[4][5][6]

The customization of equipment per race is really focused on Armor sets not Weapon props. Weapon props will, from a model standpoint, will translate pretty one-to-one across the races.[7]Steven Sharif
Let's say for example you have the Eagle set or something, right: The Eagle set has in art, it has a thematic design that's going to include certain attachments to the armor. It's going to include color palette and theme. It's going to have some aspects to it that define it as the Eagle set, right. When a Elf wears the Eagle set or when an Orc wears the Eagle set, you obviously have two different cultures there; and you don't want to stomp out that culture by assigning a de facto 'This is the Eagle set and this is how it looks on everybody.' What we want to have is cultural influences play a role in showing how that set looks.[7]Steven Sharif
When you say, what if I'm an Orc but want to look like an Elf and I want my Eagle set to be the Elf representation? Well the issue becomes there that Orcs have a different organic model. You know, their body is different than that of the Elf. So, from a scope-creep standpoint, it's one thing to add different influences that represent the cultures that are donning the armor; it's another thing to adapt each influence as a matrix that can be worn pretty much by everything. From a scope perspective, that's a very difficult task for the character artists to tackle. So instead what we've done is, in order to facilitate a variety of cultural representation between the races but allow for the sharing of assets like different armor sets, we give different representations of those armor sets to each race.[9]Steven Sharif
Q: Since a single armor set will look different on each race, how will we have large varieties of in-game achievable gear for each race if we have to make nine different looks for each set?
A: The approach for that is to create a modular piece set for armor creation; and the way we achieve that is by two steps: So, on the modeling side, each race has these geo sets basically where you're creating pieces of the armor for heavy plate armor, for medium, for robes; and you get to grab those modular pieces and mix and match as design makes a request for a particular set to the art teams. So, design comes along and they say, "hey we have a theme for a set that we want to create", so let's use Carphin in that example; and that theme from design's standpoint is going to include color, it's going to include materials, it's going to have an etymology for the set to give a background so that they can incorporate certain types of attachments- whatever they want to include on the art side. Then, the character team says, "okay let's take our base sets of geo and let's mix and match those pieces to create the Carphin set and then we're going to do a materials pass on it, and then we're going to do a color pass on it"; and that way we have a lot of essentially pieces of the puzzle to create these many different unique sets. Now we can also deform pieces across from race to race. So, even if we create unique geo on a per-race basis, we can grab the pauldron from the Human set and put it onto the Vek representation; and the end game there is that we have a particular set, for example Carphin, and that Carphin is communicating the theme; and when you don the armor for the Carphin set- you've acquired the Carphin set and you put it on- it is going to look Vek if you're a Vek. It is going to look Kaelar if you're a Kaelar, but it is still going to have the identity and the theme of the Carphin set.[10]Steven Sharif

Racial gear appearance

Alpha-1 female plate armor 3D render.[11]

We want to be realistic with the application of particular types of armor, such as plate armor. In this regard for the different sexes there's a fine line that has to be drawn between accentuating the form of the sex as well as making it somewhat realistic and actually applicable to the environment.[11]Steven Sharif

  • Armor will not be overly sexual in appearance.[11][13]
    I'm more of the mind that it wouldn't really serve a purpose to have bikini plate armor, just in like reality, if you're going to have armor, it should be protective. I think from a fashion statement is enjoyable for some people, but it's a an immersive issue.[12]Steven Sharif
    • Some armor and costumes will be more revealing than others, but there will not be nudity in the game.[15]
    There might be sliders, but there are not gonna be naked sliders.[15]Steven Sharif
Each race is getting its custom geo pieces, which then will share thematic components such as color palette, attachments, design filigree. Those types of things will get shared across the geo but generally you're going to see unique races with unique geo.[16]Steven Sharif
  • Cosmetics can be used by all races but there may be slight variations to make them work with the body builds of each race.[21]
  • Hair will likely be masked if helmet display is toggled on.[26]

Appearance slots/Transmogs

Gear will have appearance slots (Transmutation/Transmog/cosmetic slots) that are used to copy the appearance of an item (in some cases).[30][31]

  • There are rules when applying cosmetics to specific items, unlike costumes, which don't have level restrictions.[32]
  • Cosmetic slots can be toggled on or off on their character by the player.[33]
  • A "default player appearance" may be automatically applied during sieges or other large scale battles to improve client-side performance.[34][35]
Cosmetics, whether purchased from the shop or earned in game, are an important component of MMORPGS I personally enjoy; and there's a lot of collectors out there who spend a great deal of time either in-game achieving these things or spend money purchasing them from the cosmetic only marketplace; and we don't want to demean or reduce that achievement or that expenditure. So it's going to be situational where the default appearance will be applied and can be activated.[34]Steven Sharif

Racial skins

Racial skins enable a player to change their character's racial appearance.[36][37]

  • Racial skins transform the race of the character to that skin. The original racial appearance of the character is entirely replaced.[38]
  • Racial skins can be toggled on and off.[37]

You're changing your race over to that, which means that you won't look uniquely different if you were a Vek angel or a Human angel.[38]Steven Sharif

Racial skins are not costumes. This means that armor and character customization is possible on these.[39]

  • Skin color customization.[40]
  • Racial skins appear along with any costume appearances.[41]

There are plans to create other racial skins.[42]

  • Some potential future ideas include undead and werewolf (lycan) skins.[43]

See also

References

  1. Video, September 30, 2020 (2:44).
  2. Livestream, September 30, 2020 (47:47).
  3. Livestream, July 26, 2019 (54:06).
  4. 4.0 4.1 Livestream, March 31, 2022 (4:57).
  5. Livestream, May 26, 2017 (44:11).
  6. Livestream, May 26, 2017 (20:46).
  7. 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 Podcast, August 4, 2018 (53:43).
  8. 8.0 8.1 Livestream, October 28, 2022 (1:41:06).
  9. 9.0 9.1 Podcast, August 4, 2018 (55:17).
  10. 10.0 10.1 Livestream, February 29, 2024 (1:15:51).
  11. 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 Livestream, May 29, 2020 (50:20).
  12. 12.0 12.1 Livestream, May 26, 2017 (19:51).
  13. 13.0 13.1 Reddit Q&A, 2019-01-8.
  14. oversized.jpg
  15. 15.0 15.1 Livestream, December 23, 2021 (1:34:07).
  16. Livestream, September 24, 2021 (1:25:27).
  17. Livestream, November 30, 2023 (1:40:11).
  18. Sparkly.jpg
  19. Livestream, November 30, 2020 (1:05:22).
  20. Livestream, May 24, 2017 (24:19).
  21. margaret-gear-appearance.png
  22. cosmetics obtaining.png
  23. Livestream, July 18, 2017 (54:56).
  24. Livestream, July 28, 2017 (9:47).
  25. helmet.jpg
  26. Livestream, October 30, 2020 (1:13:22).
  27. weaponslots.png
  28. Livestream, September 3, 2017 (48:56).
  29. Livestream, May 31, 2023 (58:37).
  30. Interview, August 24, 2018 (5:28).
  31. Livestream, November 17, 2017 (22:33).
  32. Livestream, November 30, 2020 (57:50).
  33. Livestream, February 9, 2018 (50:29).
  34. 34.0 34.1 Livestream, July 25, 2020 (54:10).
  35. Livestream, November 22, 2019 (1:08:05).
  36. Livestream, May 12, 2017 (1:04:04).
  37. 37.0 37.1 cosmetic skins.jpg
  38. 38.0 38.1 Livestream, May 29, 2020 (1:42:43).
  39. Kickstarter 12k+ backers.
  40. character colors.jpg
  41. costumes and skins.jpg
  42. February 8, 2019 - Questions and Answers.
  43. Livestream, 2018-04-8 (AM) (4:47).