Won't likely happen in scope of 1.0.

But who knows if I'll provide it as an update after 1.0? I wouldn't mind having such a feature in the engine that would allow picking from parts to make up the complete outfit, whether it would be random based, controlled with XMLs or an in-game UI.

I strongly disagree. The entire purpose of making the soldiers have different skins depending on weapon, is (arguably) to make it easier for the player(s) to tell at a glance who is what. Therefore it's not only acceptable, but actively vital that the soldier changes appearance when he picks up a new weapon. It would pretty much defeat the entire point, otherwise.

If you're worried that it might look "too weird" - have you played Battlefield 3? The game has this function where if you pick up the weapon of a dead soldier, you'll in actuality pick up the entire class-kit. This means that whenever a soldier picks up a weapon from the ground that belongs to a different class than his own, he will visibly change his entire appearance on the spot. And you know what? No-one cares. At all. It's a videogame, and as players, we have come to expect and not really care about these things.

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Still, if you're absolutely determined not to have this function, would you at least consider making a few different skins that would be selected randomly as a soldier spawns? Just to mix things up a little. It does look a bit bland and generic at present, and while I suppose that might be considered intentional, I honestly think this option could greatly enhance the aesthetic value of the game without an amazing amount of effort on your part. We're not talking massive changes, here - just little things that would subtly add up to making the overall visual experience seem that much more vibrant. The odd beret or felt hat in stead of a helmet, differently coloured pants, maybe some bulky body-armour or a backpack... make them look more like little individuals and less like clones with placeholder-textures.



What do you mean by that? Will the "Greens" and "Greys" have uniforms that differ in other ways than just their colour? Because that would be awesome.

Like I said, it might come, I do understand the point of having them around. I just don't instantly get a good feeling about the change-your-whole-look-in-a-split-second -feature, and it's not first and foremost the players' reaction to it I'm worried about, it's just my feeling about it. I'm perhaps still living too much in the mindset that the game might become to have all sorts of equipment, meaningful or not, which you could mix&match to your liking to set your appearance, no restrictions implied by the weapon you just happened to carry around. Having said that, I'm pretty sure it's not ever going to go that far, as that basically means either the customization menu or a lot of pickable items on the field and inventory.

This
basically means the exact same thing as

It's also briefly put as "variety of soldier models" on the About page of the things coming in the short run.

On a uniquely personal level, I feel that perhaps slightly over-complicating things in this manner would go somewhat against the overall "feel" of Running With Rifles. But that's just me. It's obviously not my place to dictate your vision of the game.



Good stuff.

This reply might be a bit late but, how about rank-specific models?

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[0.90] Running with Bolters v5



[0.92] Worldwar v2