15 replies to this topic

[Lex Peregrine]

Hello all,

sorry if something like this has already been discussed, I havent been active in the forums so far due to lack of time, but expect things to improve.

From what I understand, players can pledge to a house, go solo, or join a merc group created by another player. What about paint jobs? I suppose there are custom jobs that are purchased with real money, here's a few ideas:

There should be a few generic paint jobs, at least one for each faction, that are free to use of course. I think choosing House Steiner for instances the player should be restricted to Steiner specific paint jobs.

Here's my sugestion to payed content (paint jobs): each house has a number of known regiments or units, although I dont know how those are being handled, an ideia would be to allow the player to purchase for instances the 1st Royal Guards paint job, and thus be identified as belonging to that unit for as long as the player uses that paint job. Or another way of looking at it, if a player wants to join one of those well known house units, he pays for it and gets a new shiny paintjob as a bonus

As I dont want this idea to get too much heat from the players that are hoping to have access to such features without paying for them, an option might be to allow a player the rights to buy a command rank in one of these units (doesnt mean he'll be THE commander), and then that player can recruit others. The recruits will get access to the paintjob and listed as belonging to the unit and serving under the commander that recruited them, with the option to leave any time as each player can only have one commander.

This is a possibility to allow the house units that are already active in the forum to have a future in the game, as long as the respective commanders have the means to buy the rights described above, and their desired units exist at game start of course. And I believe this needs not be restricted to house units, but well known mercenary units as well.

[Roger de Flor]

I'd rather have a paint section at the mech lab where you can customize it or even paint it yourself. In the end, it's just a bitmap applied to a 3D surface and there's no such thing as an "unpainted" mech. A rudimentary set of painting tools should do it, and it would place the figure-painting ritual of TT Battletech right in the middle of the mechlab...

About the monetary issue, I'd rather it would be free or by the means of electronic credit system of choice...

[AlanEsh]

I'm pretty sure I don't want to have to wait for my client to download 23 custom bitmaps at the start of every match.

/edit:
But I'm most definitely cool with several layers of decals and paint that could be toggled on and off for a wide variety of different looks.

Edited by Angelicon, 13 March 2012 - 07:39 AM.

[Lex Peregrine]

Right.

I simply dont agree with the custom paintjob ability (paint your own), you risk adding stupid content, im sure some people would find fun hot droping in an Atlas with a hello kitty paint job... But the decal idea is cool, have 2 or 3 spots in each mech where custom decals could be added, custom insignias, mech nickname or personal message is cool ("This side forward")

As for my house units with specific paintjob idea, its something that would add to the role play element.

[AlanEsh]

Lex Peregrine, on 13 March 2012 - 08:21 AM, said:

... or personal message is cool ("This side forward")

[Karl Streiger]

Lex Peregrine, on 13 March 2012 - 08:21 AM, said:

I simply dont agree with the custom paintjob ability (paint your own), you risk adding stupid content, im sure some people would find fun hot droping in an Atlas with a hello kitty paint job...

Yeah because Hello Kitty is so evil...only three words for you: "Ace's Darwin's Whipits"

If some want to paint their mechs in all colors of the rainbow they could do it - when they are Mercs or Lone Wolfs. Maybe even for line regiments because of 2 reasons:
1 - there are worlds with the need for excotic paint shema maybe your tech has forgotten to give you a new grey ton
2 - even von Richthofen painted his Albatross red - with no concern for the regulation of his commanders

The only reason against custom colors is the performance of the server to handle 24 exotic and unique colors per battle

[Lex Peregrine]

LOL guys

Karl Streiger, on 13 March 2012 - 08:48 AM, said:

Yeah because Hello Kitty is so evil...only three words for you: "Ace's Darwin's Whipits"

If some want to paint their mechs in all colors of the rainbow they could do it - when they are Mercs or Lone Wolfs. Maybe even for line regiments because of 2 reasons:
1 - there are worlds with the need for excotic paint shema maybe your tech has forgotten to give you a new grey ton
2 - even von Richthofen painted his Albatross red - with no concern for the regulation of his commanders

The only reason against custom colors is the performance of the server to handle 24 exotic and unique colors per battle

Ok you have a point
personally I vote for no custom paintjobs for house or major merc units (besides ingame choices), but allow it for minor mercs and lone wolfs. Still, what Angelicon said, he has a point too, so lets leave that one up to the devs

A good compromise would be to have a good number of paint schemes, and allow players to choose their own colors, like a basic paint program with flood fill (paint bucket, whatever) and a color pallete, and then add some custom decals, and you get your own personalized mech.

Edited by Lex Peregrine, 13 March 2012 - 09:06 AM.

[Silent]

I'd like users to be able to create their own paintjobs from scratch. Give us Photoshop templates of the Mechs with the diffuse map laid out nicely.

Custom paintjobs should be client-side so no one has to download 23 .dds textures or whatever. If you and your group of friends have each others textures installed on your computers then you can see each others paintjobs, otherwise it just reverts to whatever default scheme you have set. Maybe have this as an option in the Mech Lab? Like you can set your custom paintjob that only people that have the textures will see, then you can set your normal paintjob that others see.

Mentioned it before, but allowing the community to do custom paintjobs gets them involved and also takes a bit of the work off of Piranha. They can eventually ask the community to vote on the best canon paintjobs that people have made, gather the winners up, and roll out free community paintjob packs every once in awhile. The artists get some official recognition for their work and it and it says to the community that they are helping develop the game in a small way.

[Dlardrageth]

Not sure if it would rank as a "custom" paintjob already, but I sincerely hope we'll get at least one house-/faction specific paintjob for our Mechs. Even if it is just the plain old "parade colors", which prolly would leave the FWL adherents among us with a purple one... For Merc units the equivalent might be some camo pattern that will be "Merc-specific".

In general a somewhat "different" paintjob to the default one would serve to enhance identfication of players with either faction and/or unit. Apart from this very basic feature, I'd expect any further customization to be a feature you'd have to pay for. And probably get it approved as well (Yes, I know, this will require likely some extra manpower to screen those on PGI's side.) Ruling out custom paintjobs on a broad scale would not be very smart, as it would directly rob PGI of a chance to make some extra money there IMO.

Edited by Dlardrageth, 13 March 2012 - 09:45 AM.

[AlanEsh]

Silent, on 13 March 2012 - 09:22 AM, said:

I'd like users to be able to create their own paintjobs from scratch. Give us Photoshop templates of the Mechs with the diffuse map laid out nicely.

Custom paintjobs should be client-side so no one has to download 23 .dds textures or whatever. If you and your group of friends have each others textures installed on your computers then you can see each others paintjobs, ...

yeah this is great and all, but how do you handle this scenario:
- My lance of Panther pilots is going to go with Hello Kitty Paint, so I paint up a beautiful Panther skin and distribute it to my friends.
- Game loads and... (choose one)
- a ) every Panther in the game has your custom skin.
- b ) only your Panther has a custom skin.

I don't see how you're going to set up your lance with custom skins without the client telling the server "Hey, this mech here is using this skin" -- and that means it has to upload the skin because your lance and BillyBob's lance over there might both have named your Panther skin "HelloThereKittyPanther!".

See what I'm saying? This is why it would be a ton easier to have several overlaid patterns, colors, decals, etc that your client can quickly communicate to the server (and thus to other clients) "hey my mech is using t1,z2,f34,g18 and h9" when the match is loading.

/edit:
and their cash shop can make plenty of money by making additional decals, patterns, and layers unlockable for $$.

Edited by Angelicon, 13 March 2012 - 10:44 AM.

[Silent]

I see what you're saying but what I am seeing is that you've either never played a game that has client-side customization, never used it in a game that has it, or have never made skins for a game that featured it and thus are a bit confused on how these things operate.

A) You wouldn't be overwriting the textures that came with the game, at least if it was implemented correctly. So there's really no way every Panther in the game could suddenly have a Hello Kitty repaint on your end. Usually games that feature custom textures designate a folder where you can drop custom files and as long as said files are exported correctly from the graphics program the textures would be listed as an option.

B) Your Panther would have the custom skin, and your friends would be able to see you as having that skin as long as they have that texture in their game files. If they rename the file or move it then they wouldn't see it. The same goes for you, if your friends use your texture then you'll see it as well. If anybody on the opposing team has your skin in their game files then they'll see it too. Anybody that doesn't just sees you as normal.

Yes there would need to be some kind of client/server interface there so your client knows what textures to look for, but it's better (in my opinion) and less costly than not finding the custom textures and having to force a download before the game starts. The server doesn't have to upload any skins though, because it's basically telling the client "Hey, this guys lance is using HelloThereKittyPanther.dds, do you have it? Yes? Then use that texture. No? Then use a default texture that should already be in the normal game files."

I think preset decals, camo patterns, and all that are swell and should be implemented. But you're never going to get the amount of personalization that a custom texture is going to get, and if you look at Hayden's Repainted Concept Art thread there's a lot of people that dig being able to really personalize their ride, and you can only do so much with decals and changing the camo color on a color wheel. If people are afraid of their immersion and seeing a bunch of Mechs with dongs drawn all over them then doing something similar to what I've suggested is a good middle ground where you can pick and choose what you want to see. Of course not everyone playing would see you in your custom skin, but I don't really care, and if the developers did something like community packs for popular and tasteful skins then you'd at least see a good portion of them.

[Lex Peregrine]

Angelicon, on 13 March 2012 - 10:38 AM, said:

See what I'm saying? This is why it would be a ton easier to have several overlaid patterns, colors, decals, etc that your client can quickly communicate to the server (and thus to other clients) "hey my mech is using t1,z2,f34,g18 and h9" when the match is loading.

/edit:
and their cash shop can make plenty of money by making additional decals, patterns, and layers unlockable for $$.

Im with Angelicon here
thats close to what I was saying, an in-game paint program that allows the player to choose a pattern and color it as they see fit, like a kid's coloring book
Besides, whats the point of taking the time and work of doing a full custom paintjob (skin) and go to a battle with random players that dont have it and wont see it? And even if the server were to transfer a custom skin to all players in the battle, after a while you would have your "Textures" folder filled with hundreds of MBs of junk skins.

In my opinion the best option is customizable patterns, with extra purchasable patterns and decals.

[AlanEsh]

Silent, on 13 March 2012 - 12:15 PM, said:

I see what you're saying but what I am seeing is that you've either never played a game that has client-side customization, never used it in a game that has it, or have never made skins for a game that featured it and thus are a bit confused on how these things operate.

I have played some, but I haven't bothered with using custom skins in anything but WoT and minecraft lately . But by your comments regarding "color wheels and decals", you apparently have never seen a super-flexible character creation system like City of Heroes, the majority of whose features would port to mechs just fine, and provide huge levels of customization cheaply (in terms of game resources).

While I agree with your desire for customization, this is where your argument falls apart for me:

Quote

B ) Your Panther would have the custom skin, and your friends would be able to see you as having that skin as long as they have that texture in their game files ... Anybody that doesn't [have the skin] just sees you as normal.

is followed by:

Quote

Of course not everyone playing would see you in your custom skin, but I don't really care, and if the developers did something like community packs for popular and tasteful skins then you'd at least see a good portion of them.

I want everyone to see the unique paint scheme my unit is using. You do this by either providing great customization options in a "mech designer" tool (ala City of Heroes reference), or everyone downloads the skins that are being used by everyone else in a match (which has too many pitfalls to be an option).

Community packs don't scratch the itch because a ) we still have the problem of everyone not having them, and b ) if everyone -does- have them, then there isn't much "unique" about them any more.

We just have too different goals for custom mech paint I guess.

[Silent]

I doubt we're going to see anything close to something as detailed as City of Heroes or All Points Bulletin when it comes to customization.

I would like to be wrong about that.

[Halfinax]

I wouldn't mind an amalgam of the two systems being proposed here. Granted I think full custom skins like Silent is proposing is one of those things that should a. go through some kind of basic 1.is it pornographic?, 2. is it too big?, and b. it falls under the type of thing that should be paid content. Hell I don't mind paying for the template its-self.

Honestly to download a custom skin like that even if all 24 players had one your talking on the high end (unless the devs do something horribly wrong) shouldn't take more than a minute or two. What's more is it could be a simple toggle. I.E. Would you like to download other players' custom skins? Regardless with todays bandwidths downloading a 1920 x 1080 .bmp doesn't take more than a blink of an eye.

I say let the basic MechLab Spray Booth be a free thing allowing 2 tone color and a few pattern choices.

[AlanEsh]

Silent, on 14 March 2012 - 06:30 AM, said:

I doubt we're going to see anything close to something as detailed as City of Heroes or All Points Bulletin when it comes to customization.

I would like to be wrong about that.

Agreed, they'd have to limit it to color, patterns, transparency, and decals. But imagine they come up with 20 simple patterns, or even 10, then allow you 3 layers of these patterns which you can color as you wish. This in itself would add a ton of customization options with some creative pattern and color choices.

Dream big!