Suggestion: Power Animation Packs For Sale!

Much like costume packs that are sold currently, I think Power Animation Packs would be a great idea for something to sell! Imagine if you will a themed set of animations for most powers in the game.

For example:
Spectral Animation Pack - Adds ghostly/translucent power animation options to most powers in the game. Your Fire Blaster's fire now looks like something ghostly rather than the stock fire animations! It includes Spectral Weaponry for weapons sets! (think less techy versions of the vanguard weapons)

What's good about this idea? Well it is something EVERYONE can use. Unlike a new power set it doesn't require making a new character. It can use existing stance/activation animations and only needs the projection or weapon model to be made. As a themed set there can be alot of re-use of these animations for different powers that happen to have similar activation times across a multitude of powersets

What's not so good about this idea? Just a guess on my part, but it might be more expensive than a typical costume pack due to more time invested to make the power effects. Some concepts might not translate well for weapon sets (but I think it can be acceptable that not EVERY power will get options with each pack just like not every character gets something from every costume pack). It's all cosmetic! No balance issues to really deal with!

All in all I think this idea has merit and is something that can really sell depending on the ideas brought forth. My the scope at which I envision it is too broad but on the whole I believe it is something that can be done to some degree and will sell if done right.

Possible Themes include: Souls (ghost widow style), Optics (ranged blast sets all have new animations and effects with the eyes as their emanation point), Chromatic (a new set of animations with it's default coloring similar to the rainbow path aura), Spectral (ghostly translucent effects and weaponry), Kheldian (kheldian style animations for non kheldians!)

I'm always up for more cosmetic stuff, and if I have to buy it, I will. New animations and effects, especially for older sets, have been a long time coming, and it would be nice to see what the art team can do.

I should point out that the last time new animations were added (for Blast sets), these were met with negativity because it seemed like there wasn't much there, it seemed like powers at random didn't get new ones and because a lot of the new ones were just slight deviations on the old ones. Doing this not for "all Blast sets indiscriminitely, but NOT for duplicate powers in non-Blast sets" is a bad idea. At the same time, doing this for ONE set, so that each power could get something new and that something new can be individual to the set, is a much better approach.

That said, we need to differentiate between "animations" and "effects." What Blasters got was new animations using the same old effects, sometimes without accounting for different body part positions (hello, Power Burst!). This is cool, but it's only one half of the equation. I believe powers also need new effects, as well. As you said - from basic fire to ghostly fire to fire that looks like an ink drop dissolving in water and more are legitimate additions to a fire-based powerset without needing new animations. In a lot of cases, effects would do considerably more than effects, such as with Archery, for instance.

I'd suggest going for packs that are either all animation or all effect, just because new animations AND new effects in the same pack might make it too costly to produce.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

/signed. Samuel_Tow makes a good point.

I'd like my Dark Controller's Umbra Beast a lot more if, instead of a solid-looking animal, it were made of nothing but particles like the Dark Servant, only still keeping the four-legged skeleton. Add on a set of disembodied fangs and you have the general effect of something like this, which would be SO MUCH COOLER. Hellhound made of animate shadow? I would pay for that in a heartbeat.


Fire imps made of particles with no physical body underneath would also be freakin sweet.

Personally, I'd also like to change the look of the "Pool Powers" as well. For example, my brute uses Dark Melee, then suddenly, when I use the Speed power Flurry, these bright yellow flashes appear, while all his other attacks are black and smokey. It makes the more generic powers stand out and seem out of place.

I'm all for it. They'd have to be preview-able. But I'd certainly buy animation sets that I liked for a reasonable price.

All of this I like. If these were "previewable" in the character creator/tailor and thus purchasable as a per item/effect baisis then it would make it oh so much more enticing. Might even lower the cost of the packs slightly too.

Make it so!

Along the same lines, what about:

Choosing to have our fire control/sonic assault/ice melee/demon summoning (etc.) powers come out of an object such as a gun, wand, mace/sword, or magical whip, rather than the spellcast/shout/punch/summon animations they already get? There are alternate animations for a handful of powers, but they don't seem to be very focused in what they could enable.

It'd be interesting to see a villain who builds guns that do stuff like control fire or plants, as well as a guy with a sonic ray gun or a mace that does the fiery melee stuff rather than fisticuffs, and summoning the demons USING the whip just makes it look like my powers come FROM the whip, which is also amazing. Especially since the whip is such a strong symbol of slavery, which just makes the character more visually striking. (the fact that demon summoners actually USE their melee attacks helps them with this already)

/Signed

I would buy a undead pet wedding pack. Who doesn't want a zombie bride and groom.