Wizard robes and armor

[Mike1072]

If something we are doing has mixed opinions, we usually offer a way to install something different or not install it. For this particular issue, we are well aware that some of our item icons, colours, and paperdolls may not look as good as the ones in 1PPv4/EE, because our stuff is all based on the old 1PPv3 stuff. We want to update our items to use the 1PPv4 stuff and make them look as good as 1PP, but with colours matching the IR lore instead of vanilla lore! Simply reverting our colour assignments doesn't make our items any better.

 

It would be extremely helpful if someone could provide screenshot comparisons of items, showing them as they appear with 1PPv3, with 1PPv4/EE, and with IR. The two important images are the paperdoll and the inventory icon. (These two things often did not look the same in vanilla BG, but 1PP tries to make them match.) Ideally we would want screenshots for every item IR touches that has an animation (armors, robes, weapons, shields, and helmets), but I don't know if we could find a volunteer willing to do this (including ourselves). If I was going to do it, I'd probably code up a tool that could read from the paperdoll files and then generate paperdolls with colours assigned based on the item, the way the game does, and automate output of the paperdoll/inventory icon for each item on the various platforms. That's also a lot of work, but maybe less than doing it manually.

 

If someone wanted to provide screenshots for just the robes, we could probably update the v4 beta with decent colourings that would make the 'IR-Colorable Robes' mod obsolete.

[JediMindTrix]

Armors are great! I don't think you really need to do anything about that. There's a huge variety of them available.

If someone wanted to provide screenshots for just the robes, we could probably update the v4 beta with decent colourings that would make the 'IR-Colorable Robes' mod obsolete.

 

Eventually, people will want another one. It's not because the colors look bad, or are not true to lore, it's because there will always be people who A) get weary of static colors that never change through their numerous playthroughs (I fall into this category and this was my primary motivation for creating it in the first place) or B) they just want to be able to customize the look of their character.

 

This doesn't mean you shouldn't take the time to color the robes, it means that there will always be people who'd prefer to set them to their own preferences.

 

To use an pair of examples from NWN: A server I played on had a decent-sized player economy, and customized armors and weapons were traded all the time. Players would all spend a significant amount of time on customizing the appearances of these armors and weapons to be aesthetically pleasing, despite knowing that 50% of people who would purchase them would in turn re-customize the item their own liking. In another example, I spend a significant amount of time customizing the appearance of armor and weapons in a Single Player module I work on occasionally for fun, despite the fact I also have a system in place to let players change these pieces on their, free of charge, anytime and anywhere. We do it because it speaks to the quality of the content and makes it more attractive, even if the end-user is going to change it anyway, it is not time wasted.

Mike1072

If something we are doing has mixed opinions, we usually offer a way to install something different or not install it.

 

This is what my mod does, offer a different way of using the Item Revisions Robes that caters to specific tastes. Instead of trying to make it obsolete (which it likely never will be entirely for the reasons in my first paragraph), why not incorporate it into IR and additionally seek to give the robes, and other armors if you feel so inclined (which I personally feel isn't necessary), more appealing colors? Better yet, include the original colors as an option as well. I think this is a solution that would satisfy all sides.

[Mike1072]

Eventually, people will want another one. It's not because the colors look bad, or are not true to lore, it's because there will always be people who A) get weary of static colors that never change through their numerous playthroughs (I fall into this category and this was my primary motivation for creating it in the first place) or B) they just want to be able to customize the look of their character.

 

This doesn't mean you shouldn't take the time to color the robes, it means that there will always be people who'd prefer to set them to their own preferences.

Okay, I understand a lot better what your mod is doing now. I thought everyone was just complaining about the colours we selected.

 

Major and minor colours can be chosen in-game to customize your character, but we chose permanent colours for these areas, which means you can't alter your character's colours while wearing these robes. I think the reason we did this was because otherwise there isn't very much we could change in order to differentiate robes that share the same appearance, unlike armours that have big metal and leather areas to colour. We could consider offering a power user option to prevent setting the major/minor colours if this is a serious concern for some people.

 

Then everyone, including yourselves, will be satisfied.

You can never satisfy everyone. Just ask Salk.

[janoha]

(..) We could consider offering a power user option to prevent setting the major/minor colours if this is a serious concern for some people.

 

Well it is not a serious concern, but it would be a nice option to have in the ini. I think the colours are well chosen, but I too get tired of seeing the same colours all the time and would like to be able to customize my char more easily.

 

This is not a critiicism of the work done in IR, which is exemplary, but a personal preference for more control.