Tailor Archive

Tailors, Q, Holo, Devs:

Yesterday when I saw the patch notes, and realized the implications, I was pretty mad (and justifiably so, I believe) Then I went through points where I was disappointed, resigned to changing careers, thinking of quitting, etc. Now, however, I am going to try to have a little bit of optimism. A lot of good ideas have been floated around since yesterday, and I think I’ve come up with a cohesive approach that solves most, if not all problems, adds some new dimension, and poses little problems coding, since my plan uses existing coding conventions. (I’m NOT a dev though, so I may be mistaken here)

I start with one basic belief. Decay in one form or another is VITAL to the viability of the tailoring profession. The question then becomes what sort of decay is viable, implementable, desirable & consistent with existing conventions.

Usage decay (clothing items delay when equipped) seems to be the best solution to this question. Much like a pistol decays when used (aka fired), or armor decays when used (aka absorbing damage), clothing should decay when used (aka being worn). Attached to the notion of usage decay are three items, color decay, experimentation & quality.

I’ll start with color decay. Suppose the color of an item, let’s say a red/black shirt, is tied to the quality level. If the shirt is of the highest quality (for sake of argument say 1000/1000), the colors available to be used by the tailor are the brightest red possible & the darkest black. But as the shirt is worn, & decay sets in, the colors fade. When the quality of the shirt is reduced to 900/1000, the red becomes duller, and the depth of the black fades. Ultimately, if the shirt becomes quality 0/1000, the colors will fade completely, becoming grey/grey. Since many players desire brightly colored clothing, it would provide great incentive to keep your clothes new.

Next is experimentation. Give us a reason to find & use high quality elements for our schematics. We have a crafting station for clothing; give us a reason for it. Reinstate experimentation. Allow the experimentation to set the clothing quality from say 500 to 1000, and affect durability in a similar manner as well. This will allow for master tailors who experiment to have clothing that is of a higher quality level, and will last longer before decaying.

Lastly is quality, which is tied in with the items above. Obviously, the higher quality an item is, the better it should look (aka perform) and the longer it should last. As decay occurs & the quality drops, the item looks worse (fades to gray), and performs worse. If an item hits 0/1000, it becomes unwearable, but does NOT “poof”. You could put up an onscreen message – “Your jacket has become unwearable – the snap closures are broken”. The player could then go to a tailor & get the clothing repaired, much like players do with weapons. The item would then be based on, say 900/900. It will never be as good as new. Eventually, the item will indeed become unrepairable & would need to be thrown away.

I know this is a long post, folks, and if you’ve gotten this far in reading it, thanks for your time. I’m TRYING to retain a sense of optimism – even in these trying times.

I think those are wonderfull ideas... I hadn't eave though about color fade... That would be realitivly easy to simulate by adjusting th Saturation factor in the HSI system. At the very least the need to reinstate experimentation for components because of their impact on armorsmithing... If they do implement any form of decay system we need back all of our experimentation.

But as an addendum to your suggestion: I would make quality and durability both matter in this way. A high quality item holds its color longer in real life, as such to simulate the decay in game, high quality items will loose their color at lower condition values than poor quality ones.

Example:

Base Item:

Quality: 9%
Condition: 1000/1000
Color Intensity at (50% condition, 25%, 12% 5%): 50%, 25%, 12%, 5%

You experiment JUST on decay:

Quality: 9%
Condition: 10000/10000
Color Intensity at (50% condition, 25%, 12% 5%): 50%, 25%, 12%, 5%

You experiment JUST on quality:

Quality: 70%
Condition: 1000/1000
Color Intensity at (50% condition, 25%, 12% 5%): 90%, 70%, 40%, 10%

You \experiment on both:

Quality: 40%
Condition: 5000/5000
Color Intensity at (50% condition, 25%, 12% 5%): 70%, 45%, 22%, 7%

Basically, on high durability items, the fade takes a long time, but it looks kinda faded for most of its life. On high quality items, they only really fade at the end of their lives, but thier life is short. On hybrid experimentation, you get a medium lifespan item that is really only faded in the last quater of it's existance. Nice, bright, long lasting color.

Just a suggestion

colour is too important to sales to make them begin faded based on outcome. Less-than-master tailors would be shoved right out of the market after ''Im sorry, ive tried 6 times, it just won't come out really red.'' I like the idea of color fade with time / decay but new clothing needs to be crisp and new.