12.13.2011, 07:41 AM

This is the 26th iteration of the Unofficial Appearance Customization thread, 25.000+ posts preceded this discussion on the old forums.
Appearance customization has been a major concern of players during the wait for SWTOR's release. Given that The Old Republic's fourth pillar is story and the MMORPG of the game was emphasized, many players wanted more options to customize the appearance of their characters, so as to heighten the immersion into the game.
Appearance customization at character creation is a bit limited compared to many other MMO's. Post-character creation, no system has so far been introduced to change the appearance of your character, although many hope that the legacy system will provide solutions on that topic.
The majority of discussion in past versions of this thread, though, has been about gear appearance customization. During many of its iterations, the preferred solution was an appearance tab. The appearance tab is a system which allows players to equip a second item on the character doll for gear appearance, while retaining the statistics of their primary item.
BioWare chose to go with another system. Their implemented method of gear appearance customization is 'orange' gear. This means these sets of equipment have no base statistics, just modding slots. Mods can be acquired via questing, vendors and group content, throughout all of the game.
When those mods are slotted into the empty mod slots, the orange quality equipment will be granted combined statistic equivalent to normal, unmodded gear at the same item level, including armor rating.
The ( for the moment ) final system was presented by a developer post from Emanuel Lusinchi and its reception was decidedly mixed. The major concerns from gear appearance customization proponents are the difficulty of maintaining up-to-date gear, the comparison to endgame gear with set bonuses and the viability of the orange quality mod equipment in PvP.
It is up to us to see how the system holds up in actual gameplay and bring concerns and constructive feedback to the developers.
In closing, some arguments why gear appearance customization is good for the game.
Good reasons players would want gear appearance customization:
- Avoiding the clone effect at endgame.
- Putting together your own unique look for your character.
- Roleplaying outfits: Festivities, enviromental adaptation ( flimsy uniforms on Hoth just don't cut it ), relaxation time clothes.
- Using all possible outfits for a long time, and as such honoring all the designers work, not just the endgame gear.
- Enhanced immersion into the Star Wars universe.
Good reasons why developers would want gear appearance customization:
- Timesinks: Collecting that one piece of gear for the perfect looking outfit gets players to do content they otherwise wouldn't.
- Player retention: Appearance customization creates attachment and immersion. And thus loyalty to ones character and the community. People stay subbed for this reason.
- Added comfort: Modern MMO's try to give their costumers options. More options make players more satisfied and thus help with costumer retention.
- Less need to top the latest endgame set with a more outrageous looking one for the next tier of endgame content.