Jealous of Shiva's curves

[TeraRamis]

I'll get straight to the point: I've been grinding Shiva Ex for the last hour or so trying to get the red mage arm to drop, and it suddenly occurred to me that she's got pretty much the best body in FFXIV.



She's actually got, like, real thighs and substantial (but not, you know, absurd) breasts. So... clearly someone at Squeenix doesn't mind a woman who isn't a perfect size zero (not that Shiva is super thicc - she's maybe like a 4). Which begs the question: why can't I have measurements like that on my characters?

[Enla]

Because according to the dev's adding any new feature to CC for the existing races is next to impossible. Realistically it's likely because they don't want to have resize the meshes for every item in the game to fit a new body. It's been a year and we still don't have even half the hats in the game for Viera or Hrothgar, and the ones that are in the game were done in the devs' free time of their own volition, so we already know it's not something they like to put their focus into.

[TeraRamis]

Because according to the dev's adding any new feature to CC for the existing races is next to impossible. Realistically it's likely because they don't want to have resize the meshes for every item in the game to fit a new body. It's been a year and we still don't have even half the hats in the game for Viera or Hrothgar, and the ones that are in the game were done in the devs' free time of their own volition, so we already know it's not something they like to put their focus into.

That's fair. But why do all new races have to be so slender, too? Arguably there they (SE) can do whatever they want. Couldn't some species added down the road have just a slightly more generous body? How about curvy kitsunes?



I'm not asking for plus size here. I'm not even asking, necessarily, for Marilyn Monroe at her thickest. Just something that isn't size zero.

[MariaArvana]

That's fair. But why do all new races have to be so slender, too?

Short answer: because of how the gear system works.

Long answer: Player characters in FF14 are akin to Lego - you don't have any body underneath your choice of clothing/armor/etc. Whenever you equip a new piece of armor/clothing/etc, it BECOMES your body. Any 3D model that shows skin is built into the piece itself (You can see this best in the 2B's pants giving your character a sudden rear upgrade, or Minfillia's outfit upgrading your bust to super size even if you're at 0 on the slider).

As a result, if they wanted to design a race that had different proportions to the rest of them, that race would need to have every piece of armor in the game specifically tailored to that race's proportions, which would be a titanic amount of work. So rather, they use the proportions of Female/Male Hyurs and then do slight height scaling on them to fit your character's height. The only exceptions to this are Lalafell & (Male)Roegadyn/Hrothgar, which have specialized pieces for them due to the nature of their bodies (The exception here being that they've been around since 1.0, so Hrothgar got a piggyback). Basically, the hope of them ever introducing a new race that would have different proportions/thiccness to one of the current ones is basically null due to the titanic amount of work it would require.

To put it in perspective, someone told me there's about 15,000+ piece of equipment in this game currently. For a new race to have different proportions than a current established race, ALL 15000+ would require re-meshing and editing to make it work. It's easy to see why they're not exactly in the biggest mood to use anything besides the female Hyur body type for future races.

[TeraRamis]

Short answer: because of how the gear system works.

Long answer: Player characters in FF14 are akin to Lego - you don't have any body underneath your choice of clothing/armor/etc. Whenever you equip a new piece of armor/clothing/etc, it BECOMES your body. Any 3D model that shows skin is built into the piece itself (You can see this best in the 2B's pants giving your character a sudden rear upgrade, or Minfillia's outfit upgrading your bust to super size even if you're at 0 on the slider).

As a result, if they wanted to design a race that had different proportions to the rest of them, that race would need to have every piece of armor in the game specifically tailored to that race's proportions, which would be a titanic amount of work. So rather, they use the proportions of Female/Male Hyurs and then do slight height scaling on them to fit your character's height. The only exceptions to this are Lalafell & (Male)Roegadyn/Hrothgar, which have specialized pieces for them due to the nature of their bodies (The exception here being that they've been around since 1.0, so Hrothgar got a piggyback). Basically, the hope of them ever introducing a new race that would have different proportions/thiccness to one of the current ones is basically null due to the titanic amount of work it would require.

To put it in perspective, someone told me there's about 15,000+ piece of equipment in this game currently. For a new race to have different proportions than a current established race, ALL 15000+ would require re-meshing and editing to make it work. It's easy to see why they're not exactly in the biggest mood to use anything besides the female Hyur body type for future races.

Uhm, but...

[MariaArvana]

Uhm, but...

So rather, they use the proportions of Female/Male Hyurs and then do slight height scaling on them to fit your character's height.

Internally in the engine's backend, all the bodies except Roe's (which hrothgar pigback off of)and Lalas are height scaled version's of the Male Midlanders. Like I said, creating a new race that uses different thick proportions compared to the stock Female/Male Hyur models requires a complete re-meshing & re-tooling of their entire gearset catalogue, hence why every race since ARR uses pre-existing body types.

[Canadane]

Yep, it was a shame as 1.0 each race had custom tailored pieces of gear as their bodies were all unique.
They mentioned they changed it so they could streamline the gear making process as they'd rather make more than make quality (less).

[AduroT]

I’d heard the default was actually the male Miqo’te.

[Iscah]

I’d heard the default was actually the male Miqo’te.

Miqo'te have very human proportions so there might not actually be a difference in terms of the default model they make before they start stretching it for other races.

Male Miqo'te have an oddly wide and asymmetrical stance though, so I don't know if that would factor into them being any easier or harder as the default model.

I guess if the two models are the same besides one having a tail attached, then it's going to be better to design for the tailed race first.

[SturmChurro]

Male miqo'te is just has a human body with scoliosis.