Clothing Ideas

Game Talk The Drawing Board
1

I like how clothing works in this game but some of it is quite odd.

One of those weird things is storage space with stacking clothes. Wearing 4 pants (2 jeans and two cargo pants) give a lot of inventory space but it’s quite unrealistic. It would make sense to wear them like that for extra warmth and armor but only the outermost should offer inventory space, IMO. This could be done with a code flag so it doesn’t affect all items of the same type, only the ones with/without the code flag.

Another odd thing is armor protection. Most of the clothing protects the same against bash and cut. Maybe there should be code to directly affect those stats to make some clothing items be more effective against one type of damage than others.

You can only wear one helmet or pair of shoes/boots. But that depends on a number of things, like how cumbersome the item is and the like. The hood of a cloak counts as helmet but I think you should be able to wear a hat/helmet over it. Perhaps it should depend on another piece of coding?

Also, there are a lot of clothing but some of them have little differences. Having more body parts would allow clothing to offer a variety of coverage options:

Head
-Scalp
-Eyes
-Mouth
-Neck

Torso
-Chest
-Waist
-Hips

Arm
-Upper Arm
-Elbow
-Lower Arm
-Hand

Leg
-Thigh
-Knee
-Shin
-Foot

These new body parts will make clothes even more unique. Some examples:
-A T-shirt should cover all the Torso parts plus the Upper Arms.
-A Tank Top should only cover the Torso and nothing else.
-A Trenchcoat should cover all of the Arm parts but the Hands, all the Torso parts and the Thighs.
-A Ski Mask should cover all of the Head parts but the Eyes.
-Knee-high Boots should cover all of the Leg parts but the Thighs.

This last suggestion will definitely make things more complicated but not in a negative way, I hope?

2

For stacking, you really need to start tracking which items go where, because when you put on something that prevents access to your pockets, it doesn’t move the stuff around, just makes it inaccessible, and making that decision essentially randomly is no good. For that we need the nested container style inventory we’ve been wanting for forever.

What’s your proposal about the extended body parts, are you saying we should have more parts for purposes of encumbrance and taking damage, or would they just limit the amount of coverage you would derive from different clothing types?

3

I like it, got my support.
More in this case is better.

4

[quote=“Kevin Granade, post:2, topic:5695”]For stacking, you really need to start tracking which items go where, because when you put on something that prevents access to your pockets, it doesn’t move the stuff around, just makes it inaccessible, and making that decision essentially randomly is no good. For that we need the nested container style inventory we’ve been wanting for forever.

What’s your proposal about the extended body parts, are you saying we should have more parts for purposes of encumbrance and taking damage, or would they just limit the amount of coverage you would derive from different clothing types?[/quote]
I feel like stacking clothes should only be available for light clothing like T-shirts and leggings or clothing with some kind of stacking flag in the code. Wearing 2 chest rigs, utility vests and survivors harnesses at the same time and with so little encumbrance seems a little odd to me.

A nested container style? You mean like in Diablo? That would be awesome… I can imagine how much time it might take to implement something like that, though. It’s still an cool feature and it could be extended by making exclusive storage space for some items like holsters and quivers so they could have a real purpose other than just increase general inventory space.

About the extra body parts. I would say all of the things you mentioned will be affected. Clothing will have more advantages and disadvantages, something players will need to take into consideration when looking for the best combination to wear. In addition, having more body parts to protect will make things harder but a bit more challenging, IMO.

5

It should honestly be outright impossible to wear two pairs of jeans, or two survivor suits, or two pairs of gloves or whatever. As in more than just overencumbering your character, it should be physically impossible (as it typically is in real life) to put two pairs of tactical gloves or jeans on over one another.

6

As someone who was once a child, I can firmly state it is NOT impossible to wear multiple pairs of jeans at once … or shirts … or coats … or even shoes.

7

I think there should be like 2 more layers? There is skin layer and normal layer, I would like to see some layers like this:

Skin layer - already in
Normal layer - already in
Over layer - for things like chest rigs
Over over layer (sorry I am bad with names :p) - for rain coats, cloaks, trench coats and such
Bags - on top of that

You should not be able to wear clothing in wrong order, having rain coat under your shirt, for example.

8

As someone who was once a child, I can firmly state it is NOT impossible to wear multiple pairs of jeans at once … or shirts … or coats … or even shoes.[/quote]

Firstly, shoes? Nonsense.

Secondly, try wearing two pairs of jeans right now. If you get that far, which you probably won’t, see how far you can bend your knees. You can’t? Huh.

There’s a good reason most games have hard limits on the amount of clothing you can wear. Because it’s absurd to wear more than a single pair of trousers, or four t shirts, or etc.

9

and we have encumbrance when you do it, and we regularly get complaints about how HARSH the encumbrance is.
This does bring up one valid point though, you can’t wear two sets of clothing that “fit”, by definition they’re the same size, so you can’t reasonably wear one over the other. that having been said, wearing say a fitted jacket over a fitted shirt should work, though I think there may be an explicit “over” tag, that might help sort it out.

10

While we’re on the topic of clothing, how do you guys feel about enforcing layering in some way?

By stating that undershirts and t-shirts etc. always have to layer underneath jackets and blazers etc. we can solve the unrealistic (and silly) protection of backpacks from damage by wearing everything else over them.

ie.
1 -> Underwear and similar clothing.
2 -> Sweaters, blazers, trousers, shoes etc.
3 -> (Over/trench/lab/rain)-coats and other roomy clothing designed to wear over other clothes like rain parkas.
4 -> Toolbelts, rigs, backpacks.
5 and up -> Really large things like powered armor and things that will not fit underneath any clothing.

All items of clothing sorted first by layer number, then alpha.

Although i don’t know if giving articles of clothing a layer number and sorting them appropriately would be difficult or not.

Edit:Seems this argument was already made multiple time in this very thread. That’s what i get for only skimming a thread.

11

As someone who was once a child, I can firmly state it is NOT impossible to wear multiple pairs of jeans at once … or shirts … or coats … or even shoes.[/quote]

Firstly, shoes? Nonsense.

Secondly, try wearing two pairs of jeans right now. If you get that far, which you probably won’t, see how far you can bend your knees. You can’t? Huh.

There’s a good reason most games have hard limits on the amount of clothing you can wear. Because it’s absurd to wear more than a single pair of trousers, or four t shirts, or etc.[/quote]

Yup, I have pictures of my nephews wearing their own shoes (that fit) while wearing a pair of their father’s shoes over top of them as well (that obviously don’t fit). Trust me, they look encumbered as all hell, but it is physically possible for them to do.

I’ve worn two pairs of jeans as recently as … well, probably a half-dozen years ago now, but when its negative 20 degrees out (Celsius or Fahrenheit? “First one … then the other.”) and you’re woken up in the middle of the night and have to go outside and shovel/snowblow your car or it’ll get towed by the city you’ll layer just about anything you can get your hands on to do it. :wink: I wasn’t comfortable, and yeah I couldn’t run a marathon like that, but I was warm enough and mobile enough to get the job done.

I’m not arguing it is a good mechanic (I’ve got a screenshot of a character of mine min-maxed to look like a ridiculous mass of clothing that ‘works’ via game logic, giving me good carrying capacity without too-high encumbrance and armored-up invulnerability, despite it being illogical otherwise), I’m just poking at your comment of it being physically impossible to layer certain things. Edit: Here, see how stupid this is yet awesome it works:
… and more items get added all the time, so this isn’t anywhere close to what I could do now.

This dude here: http://www.rivervalleyleader.com/news/police_beat/article_1dfaf566-d79d-11e2-8199-001a4bcf6878.html

… that dude got caught shoplifting multiple pairs of jeans from a store. Happens a lot actually, but this guy here was able to actually flee from a cop, fight back, and got caught after a foot chase. lol

I think KG hits on it pretty well here … so maybe you’re just thinking along the lines of cramming into multiple pairs of clothing that would normally FIT well … yeah, I can’t wear two pairs of ‘nice’ jeans that fit me well and I’d wear out to the movies or whatever, but I sure as hell can fit one pair of fitted jeans under an old, loose baggy pair that I use when I do work around the house and maneuver perfectly well.

[quote=“Kevin Granade, post:9, topic:5695”]and we have encumbrance when you do it, and we regularly get complaints about how HARSH the encumbrance is.
This does bring up one valid point though, you can’t wear two sets of clothing that “fit”, by definition they’re the same size, so you can’t reasonably wear one over the other. that having been said, wearing say a fitted jacket over a fitted shirt should work, though I think there may be an explicit “over” tag, that might help sort it out.[/quote]

Yeah that makes sense. If one “fits” then two shouldn’t “fits” lol. “You can only wear one fitted item on this bodypart at a time!” type error message is due, or something, at least. I’d point back to our other discussion thread though if someone wants to step up to fixing the clothing/encumbrance system as it had a whole lot of chatter in there with some decent, workable ideas.

12

[quote=“Kevin Granade, post:9, topic:5695”]and we have encumbrance when you do it, and we regularly get complaints about how HARSH the encumbrance is.
This does bring up one valid point though, you can’t wear two sets of clothing that “fit”, by definition they’re the same size, so you can’t reasonably wear one over the other. that having been said, wearing say a fitted jacket over a fitted shirt should work, though I think there may be an explicit “over” tag, that might help sort it out.[/quote]
Wearing 2 cargo pants (fits) and 2 cargo shorts (fits) for 40 inventory space but 2 encumbrance is not harsh at all. xD
Wearing 1 fit garment and one loose one does make more sense, though.

A layers system like the ones that were suggested could also work.

Undergarment: Things like underwear, Stockings, T-shirts and other skintight clothes.
Lightwear: Things like shirts, skirts or even a loose piece of Undergarment.
Outergarment: The majority of clothes like Jackets, Sweaters, Jumpsuits and Cargo Pants.
Covering: Armor pieces, tactical gear like Chest Rigs and cold protection pieces like scarves and leg warmers.
Outerwear: Shoes or Boots, Trenchcoats, Lab Coats, Raincoats or even a loose piece of Outergarment.
Back: Special slot for either a cloak or a backpack.

Some clothing could cover more than one layer, like Survivor Armors or similar gear.

13

I think it’d make vastly more sense to just have a hard cap on the amount of clothing you can wear based on which layer each piece occupies.

You would theoretically have fewer complaints about encumbrance, as it would be impossible to encumber yourself by wearing three jackets one over the other.

14

As someone who was once a child, I can firmly state it is NOT impossible to wear multiple pairs of jeans at once … or shirts … or coats … or even shoes.[/quote]

Firstly, shoes? Nonsense.

Secondly, try wearing two pairs of jeans right now. If you get that far, which you probably won’t, see how far you can bend your knees. You can’t? Huh.

There’s a good reason most games have hard limits on the amount of clothing you can wear. Because it’s absurd to wear more than a single pair of trousers, or four t shirts, or etc.[/quote]

I have as a kid worn 3 layers of clothing on my legs… Boxers, Track pants, Bluejeans… Being the idea that if something got on my pants i could just rip em off and not look like a total maniac with my dilly flippin in the air
also i wore under armor below my t shirt which was under my hoodie which in very cold times(washington state) Id even wait a trail blazer ontop of that.
shoes… well i wore 2 pairs of socks and some heavy hiking boots
Gloves i too doubled up so i could remove a pair and still keep my fingerless on.
ummmm yeahhh id say it made movement harder but it wasnt impossible. hardly even uncomfortable. barely even noticeable unless you saw me take them off.

15

Okay. You’re absolutely right. Your anecdote completely justifies this ludicrous game mechanic. It makes perfect sense for people to clad their characters in multiple survivor suits and 15 assorted belts.

16

Erm… the player is no longer a kid. I still think a good way to make this mechanic less unrealistic would be that the only thing wearing all these clothes could do is to increase protection against damage and cold, as I mentioned before.

Since access to pockets or storage space in general under all these clothes is unlikely, all but the outermost garment should offer no inventory space. Of course, storage space in some clothes like coats can be accessed so maybe these could have a code flag to allow inventory space when stacking them.

17

I can look into adjusting the layering to account for the fact that you can’t wear two of an article of clothing occupying the same position that both fit. I’m thinking the layers would effectively be “default”, “under” and “over”, might end up needing more once I take a closer look at it. I think that would handle 90% or more of the remaining issue.
the idea is to incrementally improve the worst offenders, not to rewrite the system every time you identify a problem with it.

18

[quote=“Chiko, post:16, topic:5695”]Erm… the player is no longer a kid. I still think a good way to make this mechanic less unrealistic would be that the only thing wearing all these clothes could do is to increase protection against damage and cold, as I mentioned before.

Since access to pockets or storage space in general under all these clothes is unlikely, all but the outermost garment should offer no inventory space. Of course, storage space in some clothes like coats can be accessed so maybe these could have a code flag to allow inventory space when stacking them.[/quote]
ehh i really was not meaning in terms of storage space i was just was saying to Dominea that it is not IMPOSSIBLE to wear several layers of clothing… i still fully agree that storage on multiple layer of clothing should be changed but stating that wearing multiple sets of clothing is far from impossible, if you get a tight fitting set of cloths and a loose or slightly over sized set of cloths…

19

[quote=“Kevin Granade, post:17, topic:5695”]I can look into adjusting the layering to account for the fact that you can’t wear two of an article of clothing occupying the same position that both fit. I’m thinking the layers would effectively be “default”, “under” and “over”, might end up needing more once I take a closer look at it. I think that would handle 90% or more of the remaining issue.
the idea is to incrementally improve the worst offenders, not to rewrite the system every time you identify a problem with it.[/quote]
Makes sense. rewriting a mechanic at this point will take a lot of time. Speaking of which, what do you think about the extra body parts idea?

20

I just want to wear towels on my head or as pants, and bandanas as a hat…
More things in more places! Like allowing goggles to hang around your neck!