6.2 Hrothgar Update

[Midareyukki]

So I will go ahead and say it - modders aren’t the answer. They can only do a few things:

1) They can replace a model with something else (and others cannot see it)
2) They can make the model more complex, see problems above.
3) They can take the time to do race-specific work which Square used to do in HW, but I believe will not because it’s in a design document somewhere. This involves a change to how the game makes some decisions, and I’d rather Square fixed it right than have a modder change my client.

I wonder if they'll address this when they get around to updating the graphical system for Hrothgar and Vieras. If they touch the system at all, that is, and not just upscale some textures.

Because as it stands, a lot of the way the Hrothgar race is designed is limiting its potential. We've seen this with them removing the ears outright.

Obviously we have to think of lower-end computers... but I do wonder if that's as big a problem as it sounds, given how we've increased our minimal requirements and did away with PS3 compatibility. Surely a few more bones on playable races would be feasible?

Though I wonder why, of all things, we have whisker bones... odd design choice, but okay? It's just slightly unnecessary given how people are paying more attention to ear physics than whiskers dangling in the wind...

Otherwise, yes. Modders are not a solution, if anything because they're against the ToS and PS4\PS5 players can't access mods. Not just because they don't work with SE's standards, but even those who do are just doing it completely beside the product itself. No one should seek out third party tools to fix their race. This should come from somewhere. And, as much as it may be a dismay to many people, we have no one else to ask this of but from Square Enix themselves. If not the dev team, then their leaders. If not their leaders, then someone above who can give them the resources and approval required to do this.

[Kelev]

I wonder if they'll address this when they get around to updating the graphical system for Hrothgar and Vieras. If they touch the system at all, that is, and not just upscale some textures.

Most likely not. Reason's the same -textures and shaders are all client changes. They do not change how the servers work, nor how big my data footprint is, nor require any testing for clients they do not modify. If they change the skeleton, they now have more assets to keep in synch OR performance testing OR introduces slower network time. The impact isn't small. In fact, even the impact analysis isn't small.

Because as it stands, a lot of the way the Hrothgar race is designed is limiting its potential. We've seen this with them removing the ears outright.

Just because the ears don't have their own bones doesn't mean that there aren't tricks they can pull - take a look at "hood" items or the new haircuts. The facemasks have the ears bolted on, so the way this is being done, the ears are just invisible. Modders didn't "add the ears back" - they just flipped the flag, which Square opted not to do because you'd only see the tips, or the way they moved it would be odd. Square could have done this as well, and it would have been about as difficult as closing a drawer.

The reason Hrothgar are so janky to work with is we're unfinished. Square will have to do *SOMETHING* it does not want to do:

1) Race-specific work they no longer do and is probably in a design document not to.
2) Just admit there's going to be some clipping, clipping's been going on anyway, let me decide what looks like crap on my character.



That look like clipping to anyone else here?
3) Design extra skulls with the hairstyles glued on, thereby increasing the number of assets.
4) Overhaul the race so we're not in beta any more.

And there are ways of doing this that don't break the bank - for example the tail slider that I mentioned earlier. Have you ever adjusted it from max length to min? It's like adjusting the angle of tilt on an airplane seat - I don't even really notice. Why on earth does that have 100 possible values?

If the Hrothgar were treated as an "embedded system" where the 100+ values (2^7-ish possibilities) were interpreted as seven flags as to whether to shorten my mane in the back because I'm tired of my collar clipping, or straighten my posture to walk like a roe - those animations already exist. I don't think Kelly wouldn't be Kelly any more if he walked upright. Nor anyone who'd complain about having an option they could turn off like the Ronso horn.

This should come from somewhere

If mods, like the UI ones that have been getting people banned is feedback your players want more options, why aren't visual ones the same message?

-Kelly

[Kelev]

To be fair I don't put the hat modding in such a high pedestal either. Their solution to most hats is hiding the ears.

I hate it when people start sentences with 'to be fair.' Generally they're going to say something that's technically correct, but not helpful.

Who is "they?" Modders? We're not talking about modders. Square's solution to most hats is hiding the hat.

And I'm sorry but even with a race of anthropomorphic large cats not being real anyone who knows anything about real animals at all would tell wearing accessories muffling or flattening your ears like that would range from awkward to extremely uncomfortable.

I hate it when people start replies to forum threads with 'And I'm sorry, but...' Generally they're going to say something that's not particularly supportive to the OP.

Generally, while I'm not a mean person, I reply to such things very directly and frankly. I don't like doing that. I'd rather make dad jokes.

As much as I love a misspelled Hildibrand weighing in on how my character should look, or the options I should have, not every hat is created equally. The thesis of this thread was "XiRon would really like it if Square would try" - "Trying" here would be designing things like seasonal rewards that all your players could use. Or allowing us to use things like the top hat where the neck isn't involved and the ears would be covered up anyway. Or examining each hat individually to see if there's an impact.

And I'm not sure that I want someone who wants so desperately to look like someone else they would "design" a character that not only looks identical to an NPC, but had to spell it "Hildbrand" because someone else beat 'em to it or the game designers didn't want you naming someone the exact name of an NPC. I'm not going to say where there's smoke there's fire, but I'm getting the idea originality may not be your forte.

And I'm sorry but even with a race of anthropomorphic large cats not being real anyone who knows anything about real animals at all would tell wearing accessories muffling or flattening your ears like that would range from awkward to extremely uncomfortable.

Did you know that I have an option in my client to hide or display headgear if I so choose? Little tickbox in my character profile. So if I think something looks awkward or uncomfortable, I can flag it invisible. Or take it off. But I get to make that choice. Not you. I took the liberty of looking you up on Lodestone, because I wanted to double-check that I got your name right, and even if this is just an avatar that you use and you're secretly a Hrothgar 99.44% of the time - which would be weird given the amount of money you've spent on the mogstation for character-specific glamours - you still don't get to dress my character. I still want more options, even if I select not to use them.

-Kelly

[XiRon]

To be fair I don't put the hat modding in such a high pedestal either. Their solution to most hats is hiding the ears. And I'm sorry but even with a race of anthropomorphic large cats not being real anyone who knows anything about real animals at all would tell wearing accessories muffling or flattening your ears like that would range from awkward to extremely uncomfortable. It's even more so than the ridiculous new hair. Majority of them don't look like a species with ears like Viera, Miqo'te or Hrothgar would want to wear at all unless they were forced and wanted to have trouble hearing while in action.

Hrothgar can wear glasses and circlets by the magic of telepathy I don't think "fictional ear discomfort" should matter. I see miqote wearing the calfskin rider cap all the damn time theres no reason hrothgar would be less comfortable in a hat when their ears are smaller, especially not in some of the bigger hat like the flat cap or the lv.60 ast witch hat.

[XiRon]

Hello there!


Hrothgar are descended from Roes. We re-use a lot of structures from them for different things. For example the muscle slider for them actually controls the length of our tails. We have a bestial jaw and “whisker” bones as well as 5 bones in our tails. All of this stuff’s gotta come from somewhere, and we can’t just “have more” or we’d become difficult for lower-end video cards and PS4s to render. There are some “kludges” that are done here and there to make us possible. One of which is that our ears are part of our ‘masks’ - this is part of why we can’t have hats, and part of why we don’t have ear wiggles like Miqos, and 100% of why ears are not a selectable item on character creation. Viera do not have this problem, you can see that partially because they have have selectable ears.

Adding more bones and details would also make characters more difficult to transport which is already hard. You can see this in that we get chocobo saddlebags rather than additional inventory slots.

So I will go ahead and say it - modders aren’t the answer. They can only do a few things:

1) They can replace a model with something else (and others cannot see it)
2) They can make the model more complex, see problems above.
3) They can take the time to do race-specific work which Square used to do in HW, but I believe will not because it’s in a design document somewhere. This involves a change to how the game makes some decisions, and I’d rather Square fixed it right than have a modder change my client.

I encourage you to take a look at the “Bad Haircut” thread where I go into this in more detail, or contact me at the Discord above or on my Twitter @kelevvidui - happy to discuss more.

Okay can you explain...better? the use of the word "can't" in can't have hats? Why? We get dinkyass visors and ocular impairment goggles but not something that sits on TOP of our heads? (Which would be more logical like why can hrothgar viera and miqo use glasses when their ears are on top of their heads????). It should really just be a metadata flag or even just resizing gear for hroth headshapes. We have a hat toggle for gods sake and I have no idea WHY hrothgar or viera have that button to begin with. It really cannot be that much of a tax on anyone, even lowgrade ps4s (like mine) to process hat on head technology.
I remember seeing someone claim our trash hair options HAD to remove our ears because our ears would cause the systems to break but how? Our ears are smaller than miqo or viera so just letting ears slip outta the Snow beanie (like haha viera or miqote ears do, yknow, gods golden races) cannot put that much strain on the game engine when god knows there are not nearly enough hroth players per world to cause such issues, not anymore than viera running around with their ears still attached with rainmaker hair.

[XiRon]

Most likely not. Reason's the same -textures and shaders are all client changes. They do not change how the servers work, nor how big my data footprint is, nor require any testing for clients they do not modify. If they change the skeleton, they now have more assets to keep in synch OR performance testing OR introduces slower network time. The impact isn't small. In fact, even the impact analysis isn't small.



Just because the ears don't have their own bones doesn't mean that there aren't tricks they can pull - take a look at "hood" items or the new haircuts. The facemasks have the ears bolted on, so the way this is being done, the ears are just invisible. Modders didn't "add the ears back" - they just flipped the flag, which Square opted not to do because you'd only see the tips, or the way they moved it would be odd. Square could have done this as well, and it would have been about as difficult as closing a drawer.

The reason Hrothgar are so janky to work with is we're unfinished. Square will have to do *SOMETHING* it does not want to do:

1) Race-specific work they no longer do and is probably in a design document not to.
2) Just admit there's going to be some clipping, clipping's been going on anyway, let me decide what looks like crap on my character.



That look like clipping to anyone else here?
3) Design extra skulls with the hairstyles glued on, thereby increasing the number of assets.
4) Overhaul the race so we're not in beta any more.

And there are ways of doing this that don't break the bank - for example the tail slider that I mentioned earlier. Have you ever adjusted it from max length to min? It's like adjusting the angle of tilt on an airplane seat - I don't even really notice. Why on earth does that have 100 possible values?

If the Hrothgar were treated as an "embedded system" where the 100+ values (2^7-ish possibilities) were interpreted as seven flags as to whether to shorten my mane in the back because I'm tired of my collar clipping, or straighten my posture to walk like a roe - those animations already exist. I don't think Kelly wouldn't be Kelly any more if he walked upright. Nor anyone who'd complain about having an option they could turn off like the Ronso horn.



If mods, like the UI ones that have been getting people banned is feedback your players want more options, why aren't visual ones the same message?

-Kelly

See they COULD have just given us our damn ears by release of 6.1 and now we're breathing down 6.2 and they can't even take 5 seconds to turn on an ear flag? God almighty the devs just despise hrothgar.

[Kelev]

Okay can you explain...better? ... can't have hats?

Remember that "go easy, I wear out fast, I'm on your side" thing?

Go easy on me, I wear out fast, I'm on your side. There's a longer explanation in the "Hrothgar Haircuts are Really Bad" thread. It's a read, but if you'd like to educate yourself, I recommend starting there. But if you don't, I don't mind answering questions, just the implication I explained it poorly is unappreciated.

'Can't' is a reference to 'cannot as Hrothgar are currently with their refusal to allow certain kinds of clipping.' We're at an impasse that only Square can break and only by doing things they do not want.

It should really just be a metadata flag

I mentioned this. In order to do that, you have to engage in race-specific development or treat Hrothgar as an embedded system where those flags are kept on one's character.

or even just resizing gear for hroth headshapes.

There are four skulls with different shapes and a neck/posture that also can clip. If you do a one-size-fits-all method, we end up with the 2-B Peanut skull we got with our new hairstyles. If you do it per skull/posture, you add in 4 more assets instead of an object that stretches and fits based on the character's head. Square used to do this kind of work with hairstyles in HW. They apparently will not do it any more.

It really cannot be that much of a tax on anyone, even lowgrade ps4s (like mine) to process hat on head technology.

Any time you add in another asset, that requires testing. One of the things I mentioned in the HHaRB thread was that in patch 5.55 there was a hotfix for the Early to Rise hairstyle on Au Ra, wearing some gearsets. To put that into perspective, that's a fix for one race, with only some gear, for a hairstyle that is literal bedhead. Believe you me, I'm angry. Square would have to go back and test older assets one by one to actually determine "Hey this hat doesn't cause any conflicts at all."

our ears would cause the systems to break but how?

This is not true. Nothing would break. You'd have ear tips sticking out of unattractive hair would move through the static ears. You wouldn't be able to see much "ear" at all, and it would move funny.

Our ears are smaller than miqo or viera

Both of which have ear bones which can be adjusted to move into a hat/hair -compatible position.

so just letting ears slip outta the Snow beanie cannot put that much strain on the game engine

They would also look drastically different on each Hrothgar skull because there's no way to move the ears. Removing the ears makes the hair look consistent on all skulls.

Things clip all the time. Look at the back of your neck in just about any shirt you have. The world won't end.

It just doesn't fix our problem, that they ran out of bones.

-Kelly

[Kelev]

they can't even take 5 seconds to turn on an ear flag?

I'm going to sound angry here, because I am, which my cardiologist has said is mildly dangerous for me. What's important here is you understand that I am not mad at you. You are not foolish for asking these questions, and even if you were I'd still be mad at Square for not educating the player base properly.

That said?

So I can have a crappy haircut with ears on it?

They don't hate Hrothgar. Some things you should know about me:

1) No one is more angry about this than I am. No one. I am LIVID that they had the GALL to say "Thanks for your patience. Here's your nightmare fuel."

2) I am spending this amount of time replying to your posts not to argue with you, but to explain the issue. If, at the end of this, you are better at focusing your rage at their poor project management, lousy customer service, transparency problems, and the fact that you had to get me to explain it to you rather than someone who is paid by SquareEnix, that will make me happy. I am actually happy with the friends I've made talking about this. I genuinely like Midareyukki, especially the "We Deserve It" Signature, and Vahlnir makes me giggle every time they post.

3) While I think "Guys, this is hard, and if we're going to fix it, the hairstyles are going to come out more slowly," is excuse, YoshiP is correct about the hard part. This is something that the current implementation of Hrothgar just isn't designed to do. So it is, in fact, hard. And it will require work. Just because a problem is difficult isn't an excuse not to do it, nor is it to procrastinate on it and create more technical debt instead of fixing it right.

4) I think "Guys this is hard please be patient" is something most us are tire ofd. If you don't believe me, go to Limsa and type: "/shout HEY GUYS, THEY'RE WORKING ON HOUSING, AND I KNOW WE HAVEN'T HEARD ANYTHING, WE JUST GOTTA BE PATIENT." and watch what happens (I'd make sure you had Sprint off cooldown, though.)

If something is hard, explain why. Give resources where people can read further, or contacts. If you screw up, apologize, but follow it with "and this is what we're going to do."

I refuse to accept these haircuts. That's not a "taste" thing. Thats a "you tell me with a straight face your company handled this competently" thing. They bounce light off your scalp, don't stick to your head, clip features, look like bad wigs, distend badly because of the one-size-fits-all nature, and even the documentation's wrong. Ears don't fix that.

They knew it was wrong and released it anyway. Fix it.

-Kelly

[Midareyukki]

They don't hate Hrothgar.

I feel like this is important to reiterate. I don't think anyone genuinely thinks they hate us. At best they're indifferent, as they would be to any other race.

It's clear they have other priorities. It's just that said priorities have led them down an unfortunate path. Not just in making the game, but also in how they dealt with the community.

It's clear that their design and system are either outdated, or simply in need of an upgrade. And the lack of an upgrade has finally caught up to them.

Which is what people in general want them to consider and plan better for. Because we've reached a point where their content for us Hrothgar players hasn't been on the same level of quality as the other races, for whichever reason. And it has to be met somehow.

We're in for a racial update soon. But they decided to do so on the Legacy Races first. Which isn't fair when, at their base level, these races (whom you need to pay an expansion for) aren't up to par with those other ones. Meaning if anything is going to get fixed eventually, it will only come much later.

So really. If anyone thinks they hate Hrothgar: they don't.
But just because they don't hate us, it doesn't absolve them from having handled the race in unfortunate ways. And that needs to be addressed and acknowledged.

Because as Kelev said,

They knew it was wrong and released it anyway. Fix it.

They were the ones who wanted Hrothgar in the game, Yoshida said so himself. It wouldn't make sense for them to just randomly hate it. They agreed and approved of this, it didn't come from fan outcry.

They did know what they ended up doing was wrong. They knew it wasn't up to par, and know that it hasn't been for years. They know they'll have to fix it eventually, but haven't done anything toward that. The release of 6.1's hairstyles shows something. It can either show they're not planning on doing it anytime soon, or it shows that they are but not now. Or it can show something else entirely, but it's still the same message: it's not the proper step to take. Because it doesn't show that they acknowledge that the race is wanting. That the fans have been supporting it and asking for quality for years now.

I've said this on the Feedback Thread before, and I'll say it again. You do have people wanting changes and fixes as immediately as possible, and you have some people who are willing to wait as long as that work is actually going to be done. And not "Wait for 6.1 for updates to get something meme-worthy and horrid". But they can't keep making this game with fans aware of what's going on without anything changing. It's unfair for us, and it will only grow even more unfair for those in the making of this game that have no say in what sort of quality they can produce. Because they'll be wanting to do better, but "doing better" would imply changing so much they'd need approval of something at that scale.

[PrincessLily]

Hrothgar Need find toilet first you guys are constipated.