May Special bundle and other feedback

[berg]

First off, I want to say thanks for the epic generator – It’s fantastic, I love it!

Some feedback and suggestions. I’ll start with the newest (the may bundle):

The ork base is very good, right in the top bases! I like it that there are a few bases that can be used as a muscular human to create something like this barbarian http://www.comicartfans.com/gallerypiece.asp?piece=352661

That’s something I’d like to see across all of the character bases: Always have a few base options without pointed ears and fangs – just plain human features. Humans are likely the most used character and it would allow the creation of slightly different humen like muscular barbarians (Ork base), very slender humen (elf bases), burly and big bellied humen (dwarf base).

About the orks clothing. It’s top notch as ever but I’d like to see the option to use very primitive and savage clothing. Orks are usually savage, dum, primitive and aggressive: They wear filthy, ragged, torn clothing with dark bloodstains. They wear animal furs and ornaments made from animal bones. Having more options in that direction would bring them more to their “natural” environment and looks.

The human base could need a few middle-age + older base chars with some wrinkles. Getting back to the above idea about having human across the all humanoid races: The elf base could be used to create a very frail and old character as they are pretty slim.

I like the new smaller weapons that have come in the may bundle. That’s something I have been missing for the human and elf bases: They have a lot of big weapons but they are lacking small knifes and daggers.

There were some new items in the “wings-section” which was great. It’s still missing a shield which can be worn on the back like the Vikings used to do: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_1luLRXKoJM8/SNX-wu5bY6I/AAAAAAAAIMA/VTKmCGLrZpY/s400/boromir+shield.jpg

It was a great idea to use the ‘wing-section’ for magic effects like the light-vortexes in the may bundle. Thats something I’d definately like to see explored further: Light, smoke, fire and ice etc.. to make it appear as if the character is appearing from a portal of light, fire or smoke.

Lastly feedback about the size of the images: Would it be possible to have an option to use a wider image size (968×968?) so that the effects do not get clipped. I’m planning to use chars with transparent background and there are quite a lot of items that get cut when saving the image: weapons, companions, wingtips, smoke-foreground effect, magic flare etc. I can only use images that appear whole 🙁

Thanks again for the fantastic work you are doing with epic generator. Its epic!

[sade]

hello, thank you for your feedback!!

im happy you like it, and i try answer best as i can! however my english is faaar away from perfect, please forgive me for it

i plan to make different body type humans, and other races, it’s only question of time 🙂
now im working on modern male (the modern female -human) more or less is ready.

Pointy ears/fang. The fang option can be turned off (just don’t choose fang, first icon), but you will notice his face will be strange. It have some type of hair where the ears is not visible.

(The program still have some limitation because of this realistic style, and i want keep maximal the mix and matching, but i’m restless to find new ways, new options. And of course our clients-like you can help alot! I never do beards, if i dont asked example :))

Ork: you have right! i will add as free update some more savage wardrobe! (i’m playing earthdawn, there the orks not stupud, ugly creatures, i wanted to catch more that as tolkien type or, but the war paint, the tribal outfits, savage stuff is great, i wrote up!!!

human: you have right again, i’ll add. the age-play popped in my mind when i made the dwarf female. Sadly i had a hdd crash, and i lost all data from the human (and dwarf), so i plan to make a 2.0 from him and her, maybe different body type (some more muscular perhaps :))

small weapons: noted! this is what i throught at cats first. (they need knife :))

wider images: i will talk about it with the coder.

Aaand lastly: if i have a little time (i try allways spare time for you :)), im gladly make some gfx stuffs, for points 🙂 just write your wish in note :))

this is note for me
————————

– tribal, dirty, savage stuff for ork
– small weapons for every race
– age play for every race
– shield at back for every race

[berg]

> tribal, dirty, savage stuff for ork

That would be great! I just noticed that the Ork doesn’t havy any short pants (besides the default “boxer shorts” when wearing nothing 🙂 The first two might be meant as knee-lenght shorts but I’m seeing the lower legs filled with a single color. Is that a bug?

Maybe in the same update have a pair of “shorts”. The Ork does have muscular and hairy legs so why not show them 🙂

– age play for every race

I think this is most important for humans. The dwarf always have large beards so it’s hard to tell their age and the elf are usually described to have “ageless faces”. Ork and cat ages is a mystery for me 🙂

– shield at back for every race

Do you think you could add sword (a single) or swords (forming an X) to the wing-section too? Maybe shield + sword both? Swords are usually carried on a belt or strapped to the back if they are not used. That would free the hands for other purposes – magic spells or other items. Something like this http://www.eeldrytcharmouree.com/ScansMisc/Backstrap2.jpg

[berg]

> wider images: i will talk about it with the coder.

I know there is likely a problem with the backgrounds – but if backgrounds are not used (transparent) then I think it could be possible to just use a wider image. Another possibility would be to just try to fit as many future items into the picture so that they do not get clipped. That would make them usable even with transparent background.

[sade]

thanks for the ideas

first two: no, its long pants with that design, but i can make it as short pants

note for me
—————
shorts for ork
swords at back–i can make the belt and sword/shield separately..like for quiver. the wuiver/wings/etc is behind the chaeracter, the chest belt is misc2 type, over the character.. cant do automatically..but i can make as options (and some of tops contains chest belt)
—–

wider images: i have to recreate resize etc from the psd from zero. also have to… nah, it have more technical problem, im wait what the programmer says (the original images are 2-3000px

[LBandy]

Hi berg,

Thanks for your feedback and suggestions. Regarding the wide images, it is reasonable and possible, but would produce a great amount of overhead in the development as the program is not designed to function that way. We will try to create items that fits into the screen without being cropped on the first place, and will see if we can spare same time to develop a feature like that in the future.

[berg]

[quote=”LBandy” post=282]
Thanks for your feedback and suggestions. Regarding the wide images, it is reasonable and possible, but would produce a great amount of overhead in the development as the program is not designed to function that way. We will try to create items that fits into the screen without being cropped on the first place, and will see if we can spare same time to develop a feature like that in the future.[/quote]

I thought that might be the case. I also realized that people who are using frames probably do not want everything to be crammed inside the frames but instead want to have big wings (and other parts) span “outside” of the frames.

I think there is one solution to consider though: Just like clicking the companions (front and back) allow you to move them you could allow the character to be moved when clicking the base char: That way people could create two images (one on the left, the other on the right) and combine them into one image (in an image editor) that has full wings (and other cropped parts) . It would also make it possible to position some items and companions for a better view of them.

This is not really a big issue so don’t spend too much energy on it:) It’s just a bit frustrating seeing some really nice companions, effects, weapons and wings that get cropped and are therefore not very usable with transparent backgrounds.

[sade]

quick solution, and good play (probably not too hard). Save same character with and without desired things. The photoshop will put automatically on different layers. you just simply deleted the unwanted part, and voila 🙂

🙂 i wrote some tutorial about postwork, and im gladly write a tutorial, if you want, in any theme:)

[Coleatus]

Dear Epic Character Generator team,

first of all I`d like to thank you for your work, ideas and (of course) your nice program, which is really good! I do also have some suggestions for you:

I come from Germany and I am a typical pen&paper-roleplayer. Here in Germany we do have several different roleplaying-systems (of course). It`s also possible to buy Dungeons and Dragons here, but the real dominating rpg-system is “Das schwarze Auge” (short DSA), translated “The Black Eye”. Most of all roleplayers start with DSA their roleplaying ‘career’. It`s a pretty cool system, and thousands of players are playing it regularly. It is a matter of fact that these german DSA-players would be a very good market for your portraying program. DOn`t forget: Germany has 80 Million inhabitants and is the biggest market in Europe and one of the biggest on the world. So, the perspective of getting many many many happy roleplayers and making a little money with your program could be an idea worth considering.

But there is a little problem for DSA-players by using your program. You offer many different possibilities creating an individual character, but most of these possibilities are (for german DSA players) a little too much. By now you are focusing on high-fantasy characters. Most of the random created characters look like they come out of a world, where every second creature has a pair of wings and every stone and every forest is very magical and has some funny fairies in it. You have (human male) for example many many wings, but a simple wooden bow is missing. Most weapons look like very very special magical unique items, but just simple standard weapons, which were historically really used by the most warriors and soldiers, are missing.

And that`s a little problem for the most german rpg-players. It`s the same in the wardrobe: Only super-heavy-special-armors, but the good old used leather armor is missing. And that`s a pity.

I`m sure, that if you would also offer just simple, historically inspired wardrobe and weapons, you could reach a lot of more roleplayers, especially in Germany. And not only in Germany, you could reach all players who play a solid low-fantasy rpg.

If you are interested in some examples, I could send you some images, which could tell much better than all my words here. Just tell me.

Another suggestion is the possible age of the created characters. For creating portraits of npc, it would be very helpful to vary the age of the models. At the moment they are all focused on young heros, but not at older people. Some more models could easily remove this problem.

That`s my feedback. I hope, you understand it in the right positive way, it was meant, because I like your program very much and use it with fun. Go on with your work, it is worth it, and thank you very much for all your woderfull work for now.

Best regards

Coleatus

[sade]

at first, thank you for your feedback.

We working on new version of the program, i m trying to write every new feature, but my part mostly the gfx. But a minor change: We will have only 3 character (at start), and you can buy mix and matchable wardrobes for these characters. the system is not automatic, if you can use more than one wardrobe, you have to “check it” in.
it will solve your unwanted wing problems, and the thematic problem too.
Example now for the male character have three pack:
– adventurer (fantasy) (non specialized fantasy wardrobe set)
– modern leasure (modern young, sporty wardrobe)
– superhero (as the title say, modern, and some can be use in fantasy settings too)
– scifi, futuristic (modern, as the title say)
it will have military (modern), elf-archer-ranger thematic pack, and fantasy warrior, etc pack, etc. you will able to mix and match them.

This was necessary, because the reason what you want: i was not able to put everything in one pack.

If you have any special wishes about packs, i make a forum thread for every pack, what im working on, and if you write your wishes, im making it.
The feedbacks on the drow packs, and scifi, and others its very very important for me, because im very rhapsodical creature, and the feedbacks help me focus. (Example: while somebody did not wrote to the forum the facial hairs is missing, the male characters was lack of it).

🙂
The age problem and the face’s similarity is also solved at the new characters.

sorry for my english, i hope you understood more or less 🙂
(and if you look around example in scifi pack, you will find an older, and different type males too :))

[Kelemelan]

If I remember correctly my DSA years and in a few words : Coleatus is asking for low fantasy characters and designs. 🙂

My guess is the work done for the barbarian packs and such will already answer a good part of this issue but yes, it’s just a guess. 🙂

For the record, the english translation is The Dark Eye (“The Black Eye” would have had an unwelcome double meaning 😉 😛 ). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dark_Eye

[sade]

thank you
im in big work, if i finish:

Ready:
female sorcerer (catfolk race as bonus), female dark sorcerer (drow race as bonus), female pirate minipack
male leasure, male scifi, male superhero, male supernatural
male muscular barbarian

the next is would be nice a warrior pack for male or female, or modern female, or anything else?

[Kelemelan]

If you ask me, I’ll always go for modern female, especially since the modern to scifi packs are quite lacking at the moment. 😉 😛

Now, I’m going to be the devil’s advocate and since Coleatus is begging for DSA packs I must say that warrior packs would certainly be more appropriate to that end…

Well, you know where my heart lies. 😛

[Author]

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