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At the PAX panel last night (which I enjoyed immensely! Thanks to all those that came, and pushed the room to capacity), I made some mentions about the pros and cons of the direction we took for follower armors and appearances in DAII, and strongly hinted that customization would be coming back. In the interests of transparency, I wanted to pop in here and lay out our current thinking in terms of how follower armors will work in the future.
To start, there was a thread a month back or so that was an excellent litmus test for us, as it asked what you folks would like to see in follower armors, and it was great to see that what was suggested by the majority of people was what we were thinking. I was careful not to comment much in that thread, so as not to influence the discussion, but a huge thanks to the folks who offered their opinions.
Second, I want to make it very clear that this is the direction we are thinking, not a contractual agreement. When and exactly how we make the changes is something we can't talk about at this point; remember that no official products have been announced, and, of course, circumstances can change, but I'm reasonably confident in this direction and thought it would be good to let you know early.
Now, to the meat of it. Our goals are:
- Followers will continue to have iconic appearances. Similar to DAII, their outfits will be more "full body" rather than parts-based (like Hawke or the DAO followers), and these armors will be unique to the followers. This decision allows us to give the followers appearances that "break the rules," such as isabela's boots coming over the knee, or Merril's gloves coming seamlessly up her arms. Ultimately, we believe that the strong visual identity given to characters by iconic appearances is an important part of their identity.
- Followers will have more than one appearance. Whether they be unlocked by advancing the core story, plot reward, some crazy ass crafting quest, romance or completing a personal plot, we would like the followers to have more than one appearance over the course of the game. To do show allows them to progress, grow and react to changing circumstances, all of which help us tell a visual story with the followers.
- The player should be given control over the follower's appearance once more than one appearance becomes available. Did you prefer Merril in green over white? Fair enough. We want to treat additional appearances more as unlocks, than as mandatory changes, so that you, as the player, maintain control over how your team looks, within each character's iconic style. Functionally, imagine going to the camp in Origins or your follower's base in DAII and clicking on a pack or wardrobe, and opening an interface that lets you pick which of their outfits you want them to wear.
- Followers will have their equipment slots restored and armor you equip in those slots will have the expected statistical impact on the follower, including enchantments, bonuses and base armor stats, along with requirements to wear the armor applying. As per above, adding armor pieces to these slots will not impact the follower's appearance directly, only their statistics.
- Followers who have no armor equipped by the player will be automatically equipped with a "basic" suit of armor that progresses automatically with them as they level, similar to the "basic" weapons that equip if you remove your real weapons in DAII. For those players uninterested in fiddling with their follower armors, these basic suits will be serviceable, and loosely equivalent to an run-of-the-mill suit of armor with no bonuses or enchantments for their current level. Hardly optimal, but serviceable enough for the lower difficulties.
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