Civilian character models as prismatick æther costumes?

[Azari]

I want to be a slightly overweight man with a beer belly and poor posture wearing office attire. Etc. All the civilian models should be available using prismatick æther particles. 
 

The Everlasting RP/Pocket D/Base RP crowd would be all over this. These types of costumes would be perfect for a bartender type character, dancer, or various other non-combatants. Or for funny “average looking person with amazing abilities” toons.

Edited February 23 by Azari

[Azari]

Better yet, just make it so we can be a civilian. City of Civilians.

[Player2]

City of Civilians

 

Missions:

• Get from one location to another while avoiding muggers
• You've been kidnapped; a hero sets you free but you must either escape on your own or follow the hero to the exit
• Pay your taxes... just a run of the mill trip to City Hall, where you must wait in queue while heroes register their supergroups and such
• Go shopping, because you have to feed yourself and possibly a pet
  • Pets are basic dog (German shepherd model) and cannot protect you in combat
• Combat... run away.  You can't even brawl, so run run run!!

[Rudra]

I'm not sure if this thread is jest or serious. So, treating it as serious for this response.

 

3 hours ago, Azari said:

Better yet, just make it so we can be a civilian.

You can. Step 1: Make a civilian look for your character. Step 2: Don't use powers other than Walk (or do missions). Step 3 (Optional): Only use Walk to get around until you encounter a hostile, then use "/em afraid" for a little bit, then turn off Walk, turn around, and run away.

 

Edited February 23 by Rudra
Edited to add "other than Walk".

[biostem]

23 minutes ago, Rudra said:

You can

While you can certainly make someone in plain clothes, the civilian models differ from that of player characters and have some outfits that we simply do not have access to.  Maybe they just want access to one of those?

Edited February 23 by biostem

[Rudra]

14 minutes ago, biostem said:

While you can certainly make someone in plain clothes, the civilian models differ from that of player characters and have some outfits that we simply do not have access to.  Maybe they just want access to one of those?

Then should probably ask for some of the NPC civilian outfits to be made available to players and add a fat slider to the three body types as was asked on another thread. All I am doing is giving an explanation of how to currently play as a civilian in the game, which is what the author's second post asked to be able to do.

 

(Edit: The sheer variety of civilians in the game would mean either we would need a ridiculous number of prismatic costumes added to Benevelo Labs, or they would have to be random which would upset some players, or they would be a very limited sample of the civilians available which would also upset the players, or we can just make them ourselves.)

Edited February 23 by Rudra

[biostem]

7 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Then should probably ask for some of the NPC civilian outfits to be made available to players and add a fat slider to the three body types as was asked on another thread. All I am doing is giving an explanation of how to currently play as a civilian in the game, which is what the author's second post asked to be able to do.

The civilians use different geometries;  I don't think you could just port them over to player characters.

[Rudra]

2 minutes ago, biostem said:

The civilians use different geometries;  I don't think you could just port them over to player characters.

Asking to have civilian outfit geometries modified to work with player character models is no worse than asking for male, female, or huge only costume options to have alternate geometry options so they can be used on the other player character model options. And doing so would place civilian design in the player's hands so they can have a civilian appearance they want instead of hoping to randomly get one using the Benevolabs costume option, sorting through all the possible civilian appearances after they have been added to Benevolabs, or having to settle for the wrong civilian look if only a sampling was added to Benevolabs.

[biostem]

1 minute ago, Rudra said:

Asking to have civilian outfit geometries modified to work with player character models is no worse than asking for male, female, or huge only costume options to have alternate geometry options so they can be used on the other player character model options. And doing so would place civilian design in the player's hands so they can have a civilian appearance they want instead of hoping to randomly get one using the Benevolabs costume option, sorting through all the possible civilian appearances after they have been added to Benevolabs, or having to settle for the wrong civilian look if only a sampling was added to Benevolabs.

I have to disagree;  We already have NPC enemies as options for players, and they also use different geometries than players, so that precedent already exists...

[Pleonast]

Don’t forget a Civilian’s one power, Immawalkinghere: Auto, Self, while Walking, Heroes get pushed out of your way. 
 

But seriously, I’d love for a lot of the civilian clothes be available for costumes. 

[Rudra]

15 minutes ago, biostem said:

I have to disagree;  We already have NPC enemies as options for players, and they also use different geometries than players, so that precedent already exists...

Agreed, however, there are far less varieties of those factions than there are of civilian models. Multiple of those costumes are of singular entities that form the ranks of said faction. Cabal Sorceress is the same model used regardless of what type of non-unique lieutenant/boss Cabal witch you encounter. Arachnoids all use 1 model for minion and lieutenant, and bosses use 1 model. Civilians? There are short ones, there are fat ones, there are business attire ones and casual attire ones, there is a wide variety even with the limited options they seem to have. As far as I can tell, more than any faction other than 5th Column and Council. And we only get a small sample of the larger factions.

 

And even beyond that, civilians have specific color combinations, which keeps the civilian models the game draws from to a small army instead of overwhelming the game's memory/storage. So what if you get the correct outfit NPC civilian, but the colors for hair, skin, and/or outfit aren't what you want? (Edit: Or what if the hairstyle and outfit combination you want doesn't already exist as a civilian NPC choice?) Should the player now request a new color combination be made and added to the game? Wouldn't it be better if it was left to player agency to make what the player wants?

 

Edited February 23 by Rudra
Edited to correct "amde" to "made".

[biostem]

2 minutes ago, Rudra said:

So what if you get the correct outfit NPC civilian, but the colors for hair, skin, and/or outfit aren't what you want?

Just means they'd make for an easy addition to the holo-outfits that could be released further down the line.

[Rudra]

4 minutes ago, biostem said:

Just means they'd make for an easy addition to the holo-outfits that could be released further down the line.

And given the wide variety of things we both know players go for as individuals for their specific characters, how much should we place on the devs to make and store on the servers to make sure we get the correct combination we want? Just how big should the game's server side data files get before it becomes too much? When instead it can be offloaded to us players to make what we want in whatever combination we want since that doesn't require as much server space since our character files only refer to the model files and aren't stored as complete characters with their own models on the servers?

 

Edit: For that matter, how big a menu do you want players paging through of NPC civilians to get what they actually want before they scream in frustration?

Edited February 23 by Rudra

[biostem]

11 minutes ago, Rudra said:

And given the wide variety of things we both know players go for as individuals for their specific characters, how much should we place on the devs to make and store on the servers to make sure we get the correct combination we want? Just how big should the game's server side data files get before it becomes too much?

Those NPC models are already there.  You wouldn't need to create anything new.  All you'd need to do is repoint the representation of the player's model to the NPC one that corresponds with the holo-device they had equipped.

[Rudra]

Just now, biostem said:

13 minutes ago, Rudra said:

And given the wide variety of things we both know players go for as individuals for their specific characters, how much should we place on the devs to make and store on the servers to make sure we get the correct combination we want? Just how big should the game's server side data files get before it becomes too much?

Those NPC models are already there.  You wouldn't need to create anything new.  All you'd need to do is repoint the representation of the player's model to the NPC one that corresponds with the holo-device they had equipped.

 

20 minutes ago, Rudra said:

And even beyond that, civilians have specific color combinations, which keeps the civilian models the game draws from to a small army instead of overwhelming the game's memory/storage. So what if you get the correct outfit NPC civilian, but the colors for hair, skin, and/or outfit aren't what you want? (Edit: Or what if the hairstyle and outfit combination you want doesn't already exist as a civilian NPC choice?)

 

[biostem]

17 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Or what if the hairstyle and outfit combination you want doesn't already exist as a civilian NPC choice?

The Benevolabs holo-devices draw from EXISTING NPC models.  So if they don't already exist, you are SOL.

[Rudra]

18 minutes ago, biostem said:

36 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Or what if the hairstyle and outfit combination you want doesn't already exist as a civilian NPC choice?

The Benevolabs holo-devices draw from EXISTING NPC models.  So if they don't already exist, you are SOL.

So you are fine with a massive expansion of the Benevolabs menu just for NPC civilians and against players being able to make their own civilians using civilian outfit options modified to work on our character models?

[biostem]

1 minute ago, Rudra said:

So you are fine with a massive expansion of the Benevolabs menu just for NPC civilians and against players being able to make their own civilians using civilian outfit options modified to work on our character models?

In order to make them player pieces, you'd have to re-code all those pieces to be compatible with said player models.  The more pragmatic option is to simply add them, in whatever release schedule the devs deem appropriate, as holo-devices.  It's not a matter of what *I* am fine with or not.  I didn't ask for these, I'm just suggesting a way to get said models/pieces added in as timely and less labor-intensively as I think would be possible...

[Rudra]

6 minutes ago, biostem said:

In order to make them player pieces, you'd have to re-code all those pieces to be compatible with said player models.  The more pragmatic option is to simply add them, in whatever release schedule the devs deem appropriate, as holo-devices.  It's not a matter of what *I* am fine with or not.  I didn't ask for these, I'm just suggesting a way to get said models/pieces added in as timely and less labor-intensively as I think would be possible...

And I'm trying to find a solution where players can have their characters have a civilian appearance that fits their character. Yes, they will have to wait longer, and yes it will take more work, but player's having control of what their characters look like seems the much better option to me. Especially since it will avoid adding an I have no idea how large a number but much larger than most enemy factions as costume slots that may not even see much use but will make the Benevolabs menu massively cumbersome to sort through.

 

Edit: And until then, we players have probably as much variety in options to make civilian appearances for our characters right now using the costume creator as we would get from adding all the civilian models to Benevolabs. Maybe even more variety in options.

Edited February 23 by Rudra

[biostem]

2 minutes ago, Rudra said:

And I'm trying to find a solution where players can have their characters have a civilian appearance that fits their character. Yes, they will have to wait longer, and yes it will take more work, but player's having control of what their characters look like seems the much better option to me. Especially since it will avoid adding an I have no idea how large a number but much larger than most enemy factions as costume slots that may not even see much use but will make the Benevolabs menu massively cumbersome to sort through.

Except the OP specifically mentioned the PAPs, not normal costume options.  Advocate for whatever "pie in the sky" implementation you want, I'm all for new costume pieces.  That being said, the outfits found on civilians have different geometries than player models, and could not be ported over - they'd have to be re-created.

[Rudra]

3 minutes ago, biostem said:

Except the OP specifically mentioned the PAPs, not normal costume options.  Advocate for whatever "pie in the sky" implementation you want, I'm all for new costume pieces.  That being said, the outfits found on civilians have different geometries than player models, and could not be ported over - they'd have to be re-created.

Their geometries would have to be modified, not necessarily recreated. Just like the male only and female only costume options players are asking for.

 

Edit: And an OP can ask for anything while still allowing us to try to provide what we feel are better options.

 

Edit again: We're arguing in circles and today of all days is a day I want to not get embroiled in an argument or debate. So I'm tapping out.

Edited February 23 by Rudra

[PeregrineFalcon]

I want a terrified civilian as a cape/back option for one of my villains.

 

What?!?   Villain!

[Player2]

1 hour ago, Rudra said:

Their geometries would have to be modified, not necessarily recreated. Just like the male only and female only costume options players are asking for.

 

 

 

No geometries have to be modified.  The way the holo thing works is that the player's model is replaced by whatever holo option the player chooses with their Prismatic Aethers.  This is why you will occasionally see Nemesis warhulks and snowmen running around despite them looking nothing like standard player models.