Hairstyle Concerns for The New Races

[reivaxe]

After mulling over the different customization options, I've come to the conclusion that I prefer being able to change the pattern and colors of fur to being able to change hair styles and colors. The former offers a lot more variety. Ideally we should be able to do both independent of the selected face but it's very likely going to be one or the other because of memory limitations. It's amazing how much you can do with fur options and I hope we can have them available at the aesthetician since they replace hair customization for Hrothgar.

I had some fun with my current favorite character trying out how many styles I can wear by changing only the fur, tattoos and face paint.

Here's the original panther design:


Tiger, snow leopard, black lion and cheetah styles seem nice.


Less realistic styles can look pretty amazing as well. The right one is "snowflake obsidian" by MelodyCrystel. Really beautiful! I'll probably wear the blood runes on the left when leveling DRK for that extra edge.

From a game design perspective, and from perspective on the existing characters and their current state of customizations, it indeed makes zero sense and could possibly be a killer for Hrothgar when a player is given so much more customizability concerning the other races. I want to say the benchmark is what we get, on the other hand this sort of logic of perpetually spending $10 is illogical and of ill design.

Oh, it should be known that the Hrothgar have an amazing amount of customization as is.
The most impressive in the game IMO. Kinda scuff at anyone that floats the notion that Hrothgar will suffer from same-face and all look alike because of this. As a Femroe player I know that of the few of use there are like most use the same face ... but the very nature of the race encourages creative use of skin color and hair color and glams. So no matter how many I saw on my old server ( the one where they weren't just soul less ERP bots >_>) we always looked uniquely different because of the colors and glams we picked. Viera on the other hand I see as being like Kitty girls. Sure, they have the option to go for the extremes ... but most people are gonna make a generic pretty white girl, pick one of the 8 hair styles and get lost in a sea of sameness because they don't pick options that let them stand out cause the race allows the "normal" appearance of a human. There is no "reg/ arvg/ normal" for giant furry people.

The reason I don't think this is all there is for Hrothgar is because ... it legit makes zero sense to leave things like this. This isn't like Scale Bois, they get a racial "extra bit" that comes with their face that they can't swap between ... but they can still wear horns they buy in the game, earn in the game/ in rl or buy on the mog station. It doesn't gate them from content. Even if the Hrothgar can't wear the default reg shared hairs I feel like both them and the Viera will get some version of what you've unlocked in the game or gotten on the Mogstation. Cause again, it makes no sense the way it is now. No other race needs you to pay money just to change hair styles so either face changing is gonna be a part going to the style guy or there's more to this. If not then I can deal with what we have now, but logically gating out people who pick a certain race makes no business sense.

Also I think people are setting themselves up for disappointment if they really think that SE would release both these races and say "lets give Viera all the hair annnnd give Hrothgar absolutely nothing". Either both are screwed or both are getting something more than this IMO. But w/e, I'll let the train run it's course.

[Penthea]

The reason I don't think this is all there is for Hrothgar is because ... it legit makes zero sense to leave things like this. This isn't like Scale Bois, they get a racial "extra bit" that comes with their face that they can't swap between ... but they can still wear horns they buy in the game, earn in the game/ in rl or buy on the mog station. It doesn't gate them from content. Even if the Hrothgar can't wear the default reg shared hairs I feel like both them and the Viera will get some version of what you've unlocked in the game or gotten on the Mogstation. Cause again, it makes no sense the way it is now.

Pardon my cynicism but SE, while I have intense respect for their work on the game, have a history of doing things that make no sense.

The housing situation has been deplorable for several years and despite the tremendous amount of feedback, there has been very little improvement. There are a multitude of ways housing can be vastly improved without an overhaul, but SE seem disinterested in little other than token tweaks that often just swap one problem for another. If you're unaware about any of this, just take a peek at the housing forums and you will see the vast majority of posts are complaints from players who meet the prerequisites to get a house, but are unable to to get one.

For a few weeks SE decided to take away need rolls from alliance raids and this decision was made based on the looting habits of the japanese community. Not only did they not obviously not look at how the western audience handles loot, they also misjudged how the japanese felt because they ended up hating it as well. After huge community backlash from all regions need rolls were brought back.

While the next two are not from the game devs themselves, it's still SE.

The Mog Station got a shopping cart only very recently. Before you had to buy everything individually. Not only was this very awkward, it also caused problems for players who bought duplicates of items. For some players their banks flagged these duplicate purchases as suspicious activity and locked the account, which meant SE didn't get paid. And SE's reaction to this? Ban the account of the player even if they explained that the charge-back their bank did was an automated response they had no control over. For whatever weird reason SE also didn't take the items back even at the request of the player, which would make sense if they considered them not paid for. Why SE would rather lose sub money by blindly banning accounts instead of retain it by helping players is beyond my understanding.

There is a thread on the front page right now from a player who was reported for offensive language but the GM does not explain exactly what the offence was, leaving the player to guess what they did wrong. This is far from the first time I have seen something like this. I have been seeing this particular issue pop up every so often since I started playing.

So yea while I would love to assume everything is going to be okay for hrothgar and viera hairstyle customisation, I simply cannot. As I said before for the viera it could simply be an unfinished product because how hair is chosen is an identical process to the current races. I am not too worried about them. However hrothgar are a different story, which brings up questions about what happens at the aesthetician, and if bought hairstyles from sources such as the mog station will be unable to be used due to the fact that there is literally no customisation option labelled as "hairstyle".

I would like to believe SE will go about this logically. I completely agree that forcing players to fantasia to change hair and preventing them from using hairstyles they bought would be ridiculous. But SE have already done ridiculous things : /

Also I think people are setting themselves up for disappointment if they really think that SE would release both these races and say "lets give Viera all the hair annnnd give Hrothgar absolutely nothing".

Actually people who assume everything about the hair situation is going to be okay would be setting themselves up for disappointment if it turns out not to be okay. Whereas for me if things remain unchanged I'm already used to the concept and have already processed the disappointment, and if they do change to be just as good as the current races then I will plainly just be happy.

[reivaxe]

Pardon my cynicism but SE, while I have intense respect for their work on the game, have a history of doing things that make no sense.

We'll see soon enough so there's really no use in this.

Like I said, I tend to take things at face value. As someone who plans to flip flop between both races I can't help but be just as concerned about Viera. To me it's clear their unique head issues are being handled together so if Hrothgar get screwed outta hair I fully expect Viera to be limited to their 8 styles as well. I accept that this is diffidently a possible outcome and I'll still roll with both regardless ... but from even the most basic common sense they should know that leaving things this way will turn many off from these races. It also directly hurts players who do change into them if this is all there is.

So when ShB releases we will see. If things stay this way then people will understandable throw a fit. Hopefully this gets addressed in some way before we have to find out on our own.

So yeah, don't take me spit balling solutions as blind optimism. As far as I'm concerned this is all we get and they do some stuff to help Hrothgar out like unlocking the hairs or allowing freedom to change heads potion free at least. But when I apply logic I think there's more to this as it doesn't even make cartoon sense to leave it this way ... so we'll see.

Actually people who assume everything about the hair situation is going to be okay would be setting themselves up for disappointment if it turns out not to be okay. Whereas for me if things remain unchanged I'm already used to the concept and have already processed the disappointment, and if they do change to be just as good as the current races then I will plainly just be happy.

That's pretty much what I said lol