Issue 22 Preview is up!

Diabolique's new look makes me think of Hela (Avengers: EMH version) sans the cape.

This whole undress thing is just a phase, as soon as the game works through it we'll start making all of the plot characters dark and brooding, and ummm...what happens next vanilla with a side of camp before we start all over again? I might have missed a stage in there.

The new Banished Pantheon Soceresses and Tsoo Sorceresses and Ink women also wear more than their male colleagues - and the new Knives of vengeance group are also pretty covered up, so focusing on just one new AV outfit is kinda missing out on the clothing diversity of all the new female models in I22.

New issue looks great. Now let's hope to God the content is properly balanced without excessive rewards given the ease of non-trial content.

And I quite love Diabolique's new look. The hat is awesome and bustier + loincloth is a pretty classic low fantasy sorceress look (which we desperately need to be able to get on player characters).

Beast Mastery definitely needs a bear as the Tier 3 pet. Especially if it's going to be a pay-for powerset. I know that it wasn't intended to be "turned on" in this beta and it's super early and unfinished, but on the bright side, that means there might actually be time for our feedback to be taken into account! Usually by the time we set a set, it's far too late to make any major changes to it.

Also:

IMHO I can see what they're going for with Diabolique.

1. Bigger is better: the easiest way to say "I'm a god" is to be bigger than is biologically possible in a kind of "I can't squeeze this much awesome any smaller" way
2. "I Am So Powerful My Hair Is Fire Instead Of Hair" Happens all over the place
3. Gods wear impractical clothing because they are too powerful for it to matter
4. I agree with Sam with the Matriarch Benezia vibe, that face says to me "Evil has aged me, I am saturated with the weight of evil"

I'd actually like to see Praetorian Diabolique retconned with a version of this mesh, stick the old head on and some tucked-in-at-the-boots trousers but keep the sharp accessories (not the god-fire-hat though) it wouldn't be that obvious due to the constant stealth-effect she has running

The Tyranids^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Mot-Daemons... they seem really... off, much too biological, too sci-fi-alien, too brightly coloured, I'd prefer to see something designed to look like a nightmare not an alien predator....

Like... something with tendrils gathered to look like a skirt, a painful-looking huge obsidian stone chained around a the neck and torso with stone chain links, torso covered in gashes each with actual metal razor teeth, the face is is pitted cast iron maybe suggesting a form fitting mask or just a solid lump of metal for a head (Echoing the masks of the BP), recesses for eyes and the jawline distended as if screaming, long spindly arms who's bones spiral around as if broken.

Think Silent Hill without the sex or babies rather than Avatar with WH40K spikey-bits

Hamidon costumes would be better than what's being proposed, actually, which looks a lot like "completely unisex costume pieces for every one at all times, from now on please. This includes both players and NPCs" - not explicitly stated, but a definite undertone.

I find the idea of people emailing the art department complaining about Diabolique's costume and begging for it to made gender-neutral [or whatever the cause du jour is] annoying to a very high degree. There are PLENTY of NPC costumes I absolutely hate; I'm hardly lobbying the art dept. to change the game to meet my specific criteria of good and bad.

The costume is beautiful, don't touch it.

[QUOTE=Samuel_Tow;4067652]This is more or less the issue we addressed with David Nakayama during the fallout from the "Gunslinger" set. It seems the art team really was mired in the "men are strong, women are sexy" mindset that, while it can produce interesting material, also serves to limit what the team is able to create. I think that after the stink we raised, we may have been able to bring at least some moderation to the situation, but as with everything else in this game, it'll probably take a year before we see the fruits of our labour. For what it's worth, I look forward to having more women in this game intended to be admired, as opposed to ogled.QUOTE]

I'm aware of that, and I'm intensely interested in the results of this effort.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MisterMagpie Actually, I think they mean it's offensive to people who don't like trivializing nazis into a game.

From the people I knew personally at the time, the trivilizing you mention was just a part of their feelings. More of their offense came from all the people in the first two years who kept making 5th Column knockoffs as heroes. For them, that was the hardest part to accept, and I was present for a very loud, heated argument when another friend of mine was caught with a Nacht <something> hero.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MisterMagpie Naw, no one wants that. This gender neutral dystopia you fear is not in the cards! EDIT: not that gender neutral pieces aren't attractive. I gave a little OH GOD YES at the new Pocket D shirt with loose tie for women.

I wasn't going to grace his comments with a response, but I think I'll put in my 2inf that what I, and I think all or most of the others I'm in agreement with on this subject, want is LESS 'hoochy', not NO 'hoochy'. I agree with you here, it's a balance issue, not a complete retcon of all sexiness. But far be it from me to stand in someone's way if they wish to sound foolish

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eva Destruction The Elemental Order costume set in i22 has a unisex jacket, unfortunately you have to gamble for it.

I know there are many not happy with the random factor but I personally am absolutely unable to be bothered by it. YMMV, of course, but I hope for the sake of those who hate it that they either: A - try it with an open mind, after which I'll respectfully accept whatever they think of it, OR B - they get an option to get the whole outfit set in the future somehow.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eva Destruction Only since Going Rogue. Up until then, we had Swan on one end of the scale and Valkyrie on the other, with most of our female NPCs falling somewhere in between. Now we have Desdemona on one end and Mother Mayhem on the other. So I wouldn't use older NPC designs as examples of women who wear pants, it was a different time when the art lead wasn't a guy notorious for drawing Sister Psyche in a bubble bath. The only signature character who's revamp didn't involve stripping has been Battle Maiden, Nightstar being 1) not technically female and 2) naked. Again: Valkyrie, Mynx, Numina, Ghost Widow, the Vanguard Sisters, and in the "show some skin but not all of it" middle ground we had Ms. Liberty, Lady Grey, Ice Mistral, Countess Crey, then on the other extreme there was Sister Psyche, Swan, Silver Mantis, and as an added bonus we had "scary half-dressed" NPCs like Clamor, Arakhn, and Barracuda. A nice variety, don't you think?

Well, you kinda /sorta miss my point though, even if only by a little. While you've added to my list of women showing only hands and or face, you've also pointed out many more of thsoe who have more skin showing than hands / face. I don't have any real problem with women showing whatever they want...

But...

There was a reason I specifically stated the overwhelming majority - to the point of being almost nauseating - show skin other than hands and or face, because it's become sadly REMARKABLE when I see someone like TwinShot added to the game who's not, shall we say, 'heroine-hoochy'. While Ms Lib' and a few others do seem tasteful in this, there are a LOT of others who just aren't.

I'm not calling for an outfit retcon, tbh. It's just something I have to ignore in comic-books LESS than I do here on CoHF, and sometimes that gets on my nerves. Particularly after the Barbarian, Gunslinger, and Magic outfits were made to the end of the scale I'd rather see LESS of. We have plenty of ways for women to show skin so it would be nice if future sets erred more towards taste than not. And after the Gunslinger 'incident' there was enough outcry to have the outfits down the road do just that, for which, as I already said here, I am ecstaticly waiting.

In closing on this, I'll repeat I'm not asking for all, or even any, NPS costumes to change. I'd just like the contingent of women who can be sexy without showing skin beyond hands and face to get better representaion. Don't believe it can be done? Bah. Rogue from 90's X-men, Catwoman from the comics and Batman Returns / Dark Knight Rises, and Black Widow from Iron Man 2 come to mind...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eva Destruction I'm not aware of NPC costuming being addressed in that thread, only the discrepancy between the male and female costume parts players get. If you can point me to the post where Nakayama even acknowledges that his women tend to all look like pin-up girls, let alone proposes to do something to change that, I'd like to see it.

I'm pretty sure he did not. Then again, it's an art style I perform myself though, so I'm not one to criticize it, and I certainly wouldn't apologize for it either.

In yer Dark Astoriaz, killin yer Zerg Rushes,
~Raven

...and once we get new costume pieces to not show any skin, then it will be "Well yeah, they're not showing any SKIN. But those costumes are still skin-TIGHT and they're still sexy. I object to the objectification and sexification of women, this skin-tight stuff has got to go!"

Once a goal is met, the next goal is inevitably moved on to, which is a rung higher on the ladder. Or lower, depending on your PoV. I could cite some really infuriating real-life issues with women that are headed this direction even as I speak, but that is too flammatory. As Devo so eloquently said, freedom of choice, is what you got. Freedom FROM choice, is what you want.

Ugh.

you're onto me! Curses! Now how will I unload all these gunny sacks!?