Armor and Weapon Upgrade Graphics.

[BlueHeaven]

Graphics and Armor Art are a very big part of GW and the GW community. I believe any type of advancements in that area will be welcomed. (Hopefully as there seems to be a lot of fuss over game play additives suggested).

Visible upgrades to the armor and weapons would be a very nice touch.
Meaning:
Adding Sword Hilts and Pommels currently in GW, nothing currently changes visually.
Adding Runes or Insignia’s to Amor in GW, nothing currently changes visually.

Adding a Rune to your armor should actually add a Rune to your armor.
This would add a whole new element of customization in which you not only have Fancy armor that you can purchase (but function like any other armor set), you would also have fancy runes that would either be bought or collected (drops or acquired through elite quests/missions).

Weapon Upgrades could have the same functionality. Putting a new handle on a sword would make it your own while affecting the base stats (not all +30 Pommels would look the same). And I think we would all like to see elemental upgrades actually affect the looks of a weapon (a fiery bow string should have a fiery bow string, no?).

A lot of this depends on what they are capable of doing with what they are using (game engine and such). I'm sure they would have loved to add a bowstring to a bow if it could be done with out being problematic.

So what say you, yay, nah, or pointless.
(and hopefully not already discussed here in another thread :embarassed:)

[Vidar Anahdi]

This is kinda a cool idea, but I'm not sure how feasible it would be.

First, for weapons and such, it's already hard to see the sword hilt and pommel with your character's hand wrapped around it, and swinging it about and such. It might be hard to show it off to other people while you're holding it if you're covering what you're trying to show off.

The ideas for runes and insignia, though, would be kinda cool for armor. It'd definitely be more visible, and would add a bit of uniqueness to the armor. People would also be able to tell what runes and insignia you're using on your armor by zooming in a little and looking. (Though I'm not sure that would be good or bad, given that some might complain that you don't have enough health runes to be in their group, etc.) :rolleyes:

I think the biggest drawback to this would be from the development standpoint. It adds a whole lot of new variables. The art department would have to design, and implement new geometry and textures for every new item, and make sure to make it compatible with whatever you wanted to put it on. It would introduce a whole set of problems with certain mods not working on certain weapons very well, and certain runes not working on certain armor combinations, and so forth. Notice now how there are still issues with clipping with some armors and things like Chaos Gloves, etc. Also, if the GW:EN armor is any indication, there seem to be issues with the textures on some of those armors that could stand for a little upgrading. Much of the geometry is reused from other existing armor from other campaigns, and they just applied a new, sometimes slightly shoddy, texture. I don't know what this says about whether they were trying to push GW:EN out the door, or if the artists were already busy with working on GW2 items and armor, though. Just something I've noticed.