State of Character Creation in 2025

[Halivel]

1. The reason why unique NPCs aren't "bound" by same constraints is because they have separate textures and separate models. Or, in simpler words, they exist outside of existing character creator system.

2. The reason Auri cannot change their horns separate from their face comes from an older limitation that was in place when they were created (and might be still in place in upcoming 8.0, but we don't know yet). Basically, current character creator has a limited amount of categories it can provide, and that's why Auri have their horns tied to their face, plus also why Auri/Viera/Miqo'te cannot adjust muscle level - it's replaced with tail/ears instead.

Both points you raised are something players have been talking about for a long time, and are something SE will only be able to remove if they will do a complete overhaul of current character creator. Which we don't really know if they're working on, although they did make some off-handed mentions of that in the past.

Also, you can bypass word limitation by editing your post after posting.

[Underscore]

1.
Basically, current character creator has a limited amount of categories it can provide, and that's why Auri have their horns tied to their face, plus also why Auri/Viera/Miqo'te cannot adjust muscle level - it's replaced with tail/ears instead.

It actually would be possible to separate them despite the stated category limit, by adding every combination of face+horns as a separate "face". They could make the UI display the faces and horns as separate features on the character creation screen for ease of use, but still have them be lumped together as "faces" on the backend.

This type of workaround could also be used to add things like hairstyle variants, alternate highlight patterns and gear toggles.

[Halivel]

It actually would be possible to separate them despite the stated category limit, by adding every combination of face+horns as a separate "face". They could make the UI display the faces and horns as separate features on the character creation screen for ease of use, but still have them be lumped together as "faces" on the backend.

This type of workaround could also be used to add things like hairstyle variants, alternate highlight patterns and gear toggles.

It should be possible to do it that way, yes. They probably just didn't want to do it for memory related reasons. I do remember they also said that creator as a whole also had a limited amount of slots available for things - which is why we didn't really get any new face paints, for example, because haircuts got a higher priority.

I'm pretty sure they mentioned drastically increasing that slots limit during preparation for 7.0, so it shouldn't be as much of an issue right now as it was back then, and perhaps they'll look into expanding those options now.

[Underscore]

I'm pretty sure they mentioned drastically increasing that slots limit during preparation for 7.0, so it shouldn't be as much of an issue right now as it was back then, and perhaps they'll look into expanding those options now.

They did increase the current number by 7 with the second dye channels and facewear slots, so I hope so.