Blizzard cutting corners with armor designs?

[Deleted]

Many attempts have been made to persuade players that actual armor cannot be placed on player characters but instead we get armor that's stuck to our character like paper. I remember their being explanations that the engine can't handle it and what-not. Yet blizzard has proven that they can in fact make actual armor.

Yet despite this, we've seen countless NPC's get super cool looking uniquely designed armor, and yet blizzard has yet to make any leaps to create unique armor for players. Why do NPC's look like they actually wear something while I look like I was made in 2005?

For example, just look at the new sets in Legion, the paladin set looks like paper glued to the body and with some weird longskirt that somebody could only walk in. Yet if we look at a new NPC model in Legion, we can clearly see them trying out new ideas on NPC's. Why not share these unique armor styles with the players too? Why do we only get retextures?

So why do NPC's get special treatment with their models but players do not? I'm fine with NPC's having "Unique" armor of their own, but I'm not okay with them having more realistic/sensible armor than my character because it makes player characters outdated in comparison.

So is blizzard cutting corners for money/time so they can shoehorn more armor instead of trying out new concepts which they have shown they can do with the new NPC models?

Examples provided below:


Player Models with armor:

While it is visually pleasing imo, it lacks the aesthetic of what armor actually looks like and looks flat.




NPC Models with armor:

Meanwhile in this new updated model, their is a unique concept of the skirt and armor, it's seperate from the model and looks like something you could wear.


Here is Sylvanas with a unique style of cape with hair coming out from inside the hood.


Khadgar showing that robes can be done in different ways than a longskirt.

[Justpassing]

Beacuse you don't have to fit the armor design you've created on all the different races.

Don't get me wrong, I would love more intrinistic armor designs but don't compare them to prebuilt npcs.

[Darsithis]

Well, one thing to remember is that this armor is usually tailored to the specific model, like Sylvannas' armor. It's a lot harder to generate an armor like hers that works properly on a combination of 24 different races and genders.

[jackofwind]

Lore characters get unique armor because it's the only armor they're seen in an needs to look special and set them apart.

NPC armor has always been assimilated slowly into obtainable gear via raid drops over the course of time. I wouldn't worry about it.

Also, those "cloth" gloves look stupid as hell and I'd never want to have to wear them.

[TiaMaster]

You will get updated armor polys with Legion. Chest, hands, and feet if I remember correctly. They are high-end sets that have these extra polygons. Its not much, but its there.

[Thimagryn]

Because every PC armor set and piece has to fit all races. The more unique silhouettes, the more work and tweaks to fit each race perfectly (and you can see here, it's never perfect).

Recolors and textures swaps are a thousand times more efficient in this case. One texture swap saves days of work compared to one model change that requires to be fitted onto Pandarens, Gnomes and Tauren equally while still looking good. And then there's gender differences on top of all this...

NPCs don't have that problem because they have one frame, one skeleton set. You make it look good for that one race/gender combo and you don't have to worry about skirts being too long on gnomes, crashing into tauren tails or clipping into pandaren's jiggly bellies.

[enragedgorilla]

Designs on armors change from artist to artist, NPC's armor is more or less the same as anything we can get in game, Lore NPC need to have a unique armor, personally I would like more "reality" based armors ...more than the "artistic show" pieces we get now.

[Nynax]

NPC's "armour" is part of a full custom model set that never changes and is part of the model itself, hence they can have more detail.

Player Armour has to be interchangeable and no single piece can be directly connected to another piece that you may or may not have equipped, while they have to create separate "molds" to fit across all races and each races animations for 11 different classes. And then every extra extrusion is a potential performance issue for each additional player in an area that has it equipped.

[Deleted]

Beacuse you don't have to fit the armor design you've created on all the different races.

Don't get me wrong, I would love more intrinistic armor designs but don't compare them to prebuilt npcs.

But aren't some NPC's similar to that of the normal player models anyway? Why not just resize armors for every race? Is that too much to ask? Guild wars 2 did it just fine.

Well, one thing to remember is that this armor is usually tailored to the specific model, like Sylvannas' armor. It's a lot harder to generate an armor like hers that works properly on a combination of 24 different races and genders.

True, but asking for more work other than retexturing/making slight changes to the shoulders and head sounds reasonable.

- - - Updated - - -

Designs on armors change from artist to artist, NPC's armor is more or less the same as anything we can get in game, Lore NPC need to have a unique armor, personally I would like more "reality" based armors ...more than the "artistic show" pieces we get now.

The armor NPC's have actually makes sense from a visual perspective though. Meanwhile player armor looks outdated in their graphical form.

[Sylvaeres]

With how amazing some of the sets are, I can't complain about them

[Aeluron Lightsong]

It's as simple as what Darsithis said. How they design armor for players and non custom NPCs is different.

[SirBeef]

You will get updated armor polys with Legion. Chest, hands, and feet if I remember correctly. They are high-end sets that have these extra polygons. Its not much, but its there.

All the unique NPC armor is not armor. It it part of the model. That plus the 24 models for race/gender would make it nearly impossible for unique armor like you see on many of the NPCs and bosses.

[Nnyco]

i wish we just had some nicer robes, theres just either the long one or pants, nothin in between

[Deleted]

Player Armour has to be interchangeable and no single piece can be directly connected to another piece that you may or may not have equipped,

I don't understand what you are trying to say here.
Most items right now only look good if you have the other items of the same "set" equipped.

And people saying that it would be "impossible" to do that for each race/gender should look at other games, seriously.

[Deleted]

have you been living under a rock?
blizzard have been cutting corners with armour designs since t6.

[SunspotAnims]

Modelling armor on a custom NPC is not the same as making independent armor models that can fit properly on all player models. With that said, Blizzard has been making more strides toward custom models on armor, with Legion tier sets featuring unique models applied not just to the belt (as has been the case since MoP), but also to the boots, chestplate, gloves, pants, etc. For example, your representation of the Paladin tier is outdated and inaccurate, here is what it looks like now, note the 3D models on the legs. An even more noticeable example of this can be seen in one of the demon hunter armor sets, where there are 3D models on the pants, boots, and gloves.

[Deleted]

It's as simple as what Darsithis said. How they design armor for players and non custom NPCs is different.

So you're saying it's simple and they can't interchange it? Seems like there is many ways they could work around this. Considering Guild Wars 2 did it just fine. As do many other less succesful MMO's.

All the unique NPC armor is not armor. It it part of the model. That plus the 24 models for race/gender would make it nearly impossible for unique armor like you see on many of the NPCs and bosses.

Then why not just make the armor as a seperate entity and attach it to the player once it's resized? As I said, Guild Wars 2 and other MMO's that weren't as successful managed to pull it off.

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I don't understand what you are trying to say here.
Most items right now only look good if you have the other items of the same "set" equipped.

And people saying that it would be "impossible" to do that for each race/gender should look at other games, seriously.

That was my point as well. Why is it so impossible to do what other games have managed to do?

Modelling armor on a custom NPC is not the same as making independent armor models that can fit properly on all player models. With that said, Blizzard has been making more strides toward custom models on armor, with Legion tier sets featuring unique models applied not just to the belt (as has been the case since MoP), but also to the boots, chestplate, gloves, pants, etc. For example, your representation of the Paladin tier is outdated and inaccurate, here is what it looks like now, note the 3D models on the legs. An even more noticeable example of this can be seen in one of the demon hunter armor sets, where there are 3D models on the pants, boots, and gloves.

Agreed. I have noticed these changes, espieicially in the belts in MoP and the Demon hunter armor. But as for your first point, why not just make a workaround or develope a new way to integrate armor?

[Saracens]

This is not news. Whitewash and recolours have always been. It's not always a bad thing either.

[FelPlague]

omfg i love it when people pick certin things and ignore others just to fit what they want to try and make... you COULDENT BE MORE WRONG



for example oh look the legs are 3d

and as people said, its much eaiser to make armor for NPCs as it only needs to fit 1 model, where our armor needs to fit every race, every gender

also good job using the broken version of the rogue teir, and claiming its the full teir :P

let me show you the finished teir you compley ignored...





even the paladin teir has some 3d added on, just need to find it

also i dont think you know but our teir sets now have up to 6 items... still only a 2 and 4 set, but you can now also equip a cape, that matches perfectly with your teir... so i wouldent call that cutting corners...

[Rivin]

So you're saying it's simple and they can't interchange it? Seems like there is many ways they could work around this. Considering Guild Wars 2 did it just fine. As do many other less succesful MMO's.

GW2 (and probably every other MMO that uses fully 3D armor) is much newer than WoW is and was built using more modern design techniques. WoW's armor models were originally designed around geosets built into the player models. While Blizzard has slowly phased most of those out, and most armor pieces are now mostly or fully 3D (I think cloak, chest, and robe/kilt are the only ones still using only geosets, and chests are getting some 3D pieces in Legion), they are probably unwilling to completely replace the geosets of the chest and legs because that's the core of the model and would require the most work.

Now, why they didn't do that during the model update is a good question, but I would guess that they just didn't think they had enough time to completely redesign the way the models were built before WoD launched.