Guild Wars 2

GW2’s end game is built around cosmetics. Dungeon gear and Racial armour provide no better stats than level 80 epics. Arenanet gave us the tools, in the form of transmutation stones, to let us customize the appearance of our characters just the way we like it. As a roleplayer, I absolutely love this idea. The trouble is, the game doesn’t currently let us do that. Because you are still limited to light, medium, or heavy armour depending on your class. Take my Elementalist for example. She’s a corsair, and I’d love for her to look like a pirate. Unfortunately, virtually my only options are to make her look like [Edit] an Asian female.

I can think of no conceivable reason why this is. Obviously, it would throw off balance to let anyone have the higher stats from heavy armour. But what’s wrong with letting them just have the appearance of heavy armour? The current implementation of transmutation stones even seems to support this; if, for example, I tried to use the stats from the heavy armour on my light armour character, the item would show up as non-equippable!

You could make the argument that it makes classes less recognizable, but this doesn’t hold water either. For starters, if I see a medium armour class coming towards me in WvW, that could be one of any three classes. How do I tell which one it is? Well, either by looking at their class icon, or more typically, observing their abilities. The guy throwing grenades at me? Probably an engineer. The guy with two clones of himself who just teleported an entire army behind the walls of my keep? Probably a Mesmer. The unguilded human female with a Juvenile Brown Bear pet and a somewhat nonsensical name? Probably a bot. The fact is that when encountering other players, you recognize their class from their abilities, not their appearance. You might be able to argue that it would hurt SPvP, except you can’t use transmute stones there anyway, making it a moot point.

It would even be beneficial for Arenanet. More options for armour means more players wanting transmutation stones, which means more sales for Arenanet on the gem shop. It means more players running dungeons, because previously undesirable dungeons suddenly become desirable if you could choose any of the armour.

It’s win on all fronts. So why on Tyria can’t we do it?

but it’s not a win on all fronts, i dont want Guardians n Warriors running around in cloth whilst Necromancers run around in full armour declaring themselves a DeathKnight.

You kidding me? All dungeon sets are exotic and there is no such a thing like epic tier, I guess you never had any dungeon equipment before.

Elementalist with heavy armor? no thank you. That would ruin everything.

the only games that has “allowed” this that i remember from the top of my head has been the dnd Neverwinter Nights and most likely Neverwinter Nights 2, where all classes could wear most armors with a few rule exceptions, but usually it would come at a cost.

you are an caster wearing heavy armor? you get a chance for your spells to fail, the more heavy armor pieces you had, the more likely your spell would fail
in another game, i dont remember wich, that had mana, if you wore heavy armor (ah i remember now, lineage 2) as a caster, you spells would cost twice as much to cast and your mana regeneration would be severely hampered.

now, what price will the casters in heavy armor pay here? mobility?casting failure? i can imagine the outcry of people if such things where in there, “why i must be punished?” “why cant i play how i want?”
what advantage would have soldier classes wearing leather or cloth armor? faster endurance to dodge more often? magic resistance?
and what would be the adventurers advantage to wear cloth? and the penalty to wear heavy armor?

as far as im aware, Anet doesnt have “intrinsecally punishing” gear aside of it making relatively little sense, most casters train their minds to be able to cast spells, thus they sacrifice their physical stats, thus they cant really wear heavy armor or not have any casting penalty.

lore/fluff aside

i imagine its easier to balance the gear and the professions when each has their own gear, as i have to admit i was surprised that the soldier professions cant wear medium and light armor, but tbh, it doesnt rob me any sleep

I’m just wondering whether people actually read what’s posted before replying. I very clearly said that I was talking about using transmutation stones to transfer the appearance of different armour classes, not transferring the stats. Look at the box that pops up with you use a transmutation stone currently. If I tried to transfer heavy armour stats onto a piece of armour with light armour appearance, the resulting piece would still only be wearable by a warrior or guardian.

This would change literally nothing except the appearance of someone’s armour. No stats would remotely change.

I think you people are missing the point here, the maker of this thread is not suggesting that a cloth user can wear heavy gear. He/She is suggesting that you can transmute your cloth armor to look like heavy gear. It would still have the same stats as it had as cloth gear, it would still be cloth gear, it just looks like heavy gear.

Quite frankly as a female human elementalist, I would love to see this option to. I can’t for the life of me find any gear that doesn’t make my mage look like a harlot or something that came straight from an anime cosplay event.

clearly signed. nothing speaks against me using every available skin, thats why we have the transmutation for after all imo. The system needs to be opened up!

If this was to happen I think it would require a system that showed your true armour class in PvP, you say you can rcognise it from skills but you shouldnt have to wait for you opponant to have played out several skills at you before having any idea what they are, and if there are 5 of them? which on is which? How can you concentrate fire on one class when they all look the same (you know this would be abused). Lotro had a cosmetic armour system which let you do this but it would only show your true armour in PvP which was better.

Though I would like to make my rifle warrior to look like a samurai or a pirate, you can’t beat a pirate, especially with my pirate runes making me shout ‘yarr’ and summon parrots…

It would be a bit weird seeing a mesmer/ ele run around in heavy armor but the way the OP suggests it would work fine. (In DragonAge Origins I played a mage class that could wear heavy armor-I rocked the Warden Commander set on my little elf )
Sure, the more the merrier
A combination of different sets would be even better- imagine a male caster in a mix of heavy/med and light armor mmmmm

I’m not really a fan of mixing armor types for cosmetic appearance, but I do hope they add more sets.

I know how you feel about the light armor. Some of it is… Redonk.

Galen.9042:

GW2’s end game is built around cosmetics. Dungeon gear and Racial armour provide no better stats than level 80 epics. Arenanet gave us the tools, in the form of transmutation stones, to let us customize the appearance of our characters just the way we like it. As a roleplayer, I absolutely love this idea. The trouble is, the game doesn’t currently let us do that. Because you are still limited to light, medium, or heavy armour depending on your class. Take my Elementalist for example. She’s a corsair, and I’d love for her to look like a pirate. Unfortunately, virtually my only options are to make her look like a high price Korean call-girl.

I can think of no conceivable reason why this is. Obviously, it would throw off balance to let anyone have the higher stats from heavy armour. But what’s wrong with letting them just have the appearance of heavy armour? The current implementation of transmutation stones even seems to support this; if, for example, I tried to use the stats from the heavy armour on my light armour character, the item would show up as non-equippable!

You could make the argument that it makes classes less recognizable, but this doesn’t hold water either. For starters, if I see a medium armour class coming towards me in WvW, that could be one of any three classes. How do I tell which one it is? Well, either by looking at their class icon, or more typically, observing their abilities. The guy throwing grenades at me? Probably an engineer. The guy with two clones of himself who just teleported an entire army behind the walls of my keep? Probably a Mesmer. The unguilded human female with a Juvenile Brown Bear pet and a somewhat nonsensical name? Probably a bot. The fact is that when encountering other players, you recognize their class from their abilities, not their appearance. You might be able to argue that it would hurt SPvP, except you can’t use transmute stones there anyway, making it a moot point.

It would even be beneficial for Arenanet. More options for armour means more players wanting transmutation stones, which means more sales for Arenanet on the gem shop. It means more players running dungeons, because previously undesirable dungeons suddenly become desirable if you could choose any of the armour.

It’s win on all fronts. So why on Tyria can’t we do it?

This….^^^^^ totaly this…

I have been looking for the right words for about a week now to make the same point that the OP has just totaly nailed in that post above.
The game is meant to be all about what YOU want to do but for some confusing reason they still restrict us in this way.
I mean they make a great play on ‘’doing away with the holey trinity’’ which i congratulate them for it was a great move, so now no one HAS to be a healer no one HAS to be a tank, no one HAS to be a dps only.
SO… why do you still make us all dress like a healer.. a tank… a mage…. a dps.??
Heavy armour for tank, light armour dps… cloth mage/healer. if your going to be bold and inovate then go all the way. ;p

No thank you.

Every class has his armor tier related to him (aka heavy, medium, cloth)

It would be totally absurd to see necro, mesmers, etc running in heavy armor it would be total mess. I dont care what arguments you give, transmutation stones are there for purpose to transmute heavy to another heavy etc, and your suggestion is just crazy.
Guardians and warriors are popular because they are only heavy armor classes, thats why they are played and thats how it should stay

You already have pelnty of armor choices, from dungeon to cultural armor sets. Some other mmorpgs have just one high end game gear and not even way to transmute gear.

I am against this suggestion.

-It’s not about limiting customization.

-It’s not about preventing classes from wearing incorrect, absurd or mismatched armor.

-It’s about art. It would limit the artist to have to make sure all heavy armor could fit with all cloth armor with limited clipping.
I’m willing to be the artists wish we didn’t have as much customization as we already do because it means it makes it really challenging to create really unique designs.

In depth:
Heavy armor tends to have bulky segmented pieces while cloth and medium armor tend to have longer flowy armor. Most heavy armor boots would flip through medium or light armor leggings.

totally agree with this because i want to mix some heavy armor looks with medium looks. all of my best and favorite toons are medium armor, and looking at the end game armors i feel heavy armor has a heavy lead in what looks best, then light. If i could mix them it’d be amazing and since it wouldn’t affect stats who cares….i think the only people against this are heavy armor wearers because they already have the best possible looks haha

I disagree with this, it’s already more difficult to determine the class of an enemy than it should be. Mesmer and Ele both wear light armor, but the strategies to win against them are drastically different. It would be significantly worse to be fighting a warrior that looks like a necro, or a thief that looks like a guardian.

When you click on an enemy, there’s a very clearly marked “class” designation. I would hardly say class identification would be a problem for any serious PvPer. Plus, I can easily hide helm and shoulders on my Guardian, and use a heavy armor set that absolutely looks “clothish” if I really wanted to, or if I thought this would give me any advantage in WvW.

The only part of the game where this might be an advantage would be sPvP, but you’re locked into very specific gear there anyway, so I don’t see why you couldn’t keep it this way, and let open-world armor sets be mix and match.

And on Anet’s part, it could be another source of revenue. Make “Exalted Transmuation Stones” they can sell in the cash shop for twice the cost of fine transmutation stones that’ll transmute across armor types. With the right cost attached, you can still keep it limited in scope, while still giving people the option to transmute pieces.

A bit off topic but the best armor look system I have ever seen is in DC Universe Online. Whatever armor you have ever had on is “remembered” by your char and you can use all those styles whenever you want simply by chosing every single piece from a very long list (on high level). People in DCUO are collecting any possible armors just to have as many looks as possible. I would love so much for this system to be implemented in GW2.

Probably won’t ever happen though.

Now on topic. I agree with the OP. I wish I could use some medium armors on my sylvari mesmer, especially the cultural one. Male cloth sylvari cultural armors look so terrible that I will never consider buying any of them (the only decent sylvari male light armor is the Nightmare one). On the other hand medium cultural sylvari male armors looks amazing and I would give a lot to be able to use them.

If they make transmutation work across armor types, they might as well rename the game to Pirate Wars!

I like that my Guardian is encased in gleaming mithril and isn’t lost among the plated necros and elementalists. That’s my only (selfish) concern. Death Knights… shudder

My preferred option would be that ANet introduces some more armor models that mix styles a bit. So light armor with some metal parts here and there, heavy armor with flowing sleeves/robes and medium armor… well anything that’s not a trenchcoat.
It’d be a lot more work than allowing transmutes to work across the board though, so I’m afraid we won’t see it for a long time if ever.

Another option might be to allow light and medium to mix and medium and heavy.

Cyrus.8261:

I like that my Guardian is encased in gleaming mithril and isn’t lost among the plated necros and elementalists. That’s my only (selfish) concern. Death Knights… shudder

Instead, you’re lost among the other plate classes that look almost exactly the same as you.

By mixing armor styles, you open up a huge door for character customization, and really allow players to get creative with how they express their character’s appearance.

More options means less chances for your character to “get lost” amongst the other players.

And again, it’s purely for looks. There’s no advantage given to a necro putting on a plate-armor look, so why does everyone assume that ever cloth class is going to instantly switch to all heavy armor, and vice versa?

No no no, please keep it the way it is. I would really not like people transmuting looks of heavy armor to light and vice versa.

If you can’t make your light armor char look like a pirate, the solution is that Arenanet creates a (proper) light pirate armor set, not a change in the transmutation mechanics.

Oh that’s really annoying. I just made a really long post and it disappeared/got infracted. If it was the latter, I’d be rly peed because there was nothing offensive in my post besides the obnoxious use of CAPS because it gets ppl’s attention and my calling people sexy.

ANYWAY…

Here’s the watered down version:

1. THE OP HAS NOT SAID HE WANTS STATS TO BE TRANSMUTED. HE JUST WANTS THE APPEARANCE OF THE ARMOUR TO BE TRANSMUTED ACROSS ARMOUR TYPES.

2. No disrespect to you guise, but the people who are against this idea have no real legitimate or valid reasons besides personal preference. That argument doesn’t really hold water. I don’t know those of us who want open customisation should be restricted because you “just don’t want to see warriors in cloth.” That by the way is an exaggeration cause it’s not like all warriors are going to suddenly transmute to wearing cloth. Silly.

3. If I’m PvPing, I don’t have the time to check out my opponent. Usually just clicking and seeing what skill icons there are is enough to tell me who I’m up against. If this is rly such a big deal, then I’m sure they can introduce GIANT profession icons. Idk. Honestly. That’s a very weak argument as well.

4. Restricting people to specific armour types based on their profession is backwards, redundant, unnecessary and a tired concept that I’d expect to see from an MMO in 2004 or something. If I were in a mesmer irl (lol!), why should I not be allowed to wear armour or trenchcoats just because some magical rule says I can’t because I’m a scholar?

5. I really think, like, 70% of the human male light armour is ugly. Sorry, but I just don’t like it. I think it’s hideous. I’ve stopped wearing my shoes (in-game, not irl lol!) because they’re so ugly. This is a tangent but it’s kinda relevant.

6. PLEASE GIVE US OPEN CUSTOMISATION, ANET. PLEASE DON’T BE OLD FASHIONED AND DRACONIAN. It doesn’t even make sense. Not all magic professions want to wear cloth but for some strange reason that isn’t explained by lore, we’re all bound to the cloth!

7. I don’t know how this might be implemented in game. You wouldn’t necessarily have to allow us to transmute across existing armour types. Perhaps consider creating new sets that look like heavy armour but which retain their light/medium stats, for instance.

Metalripper.5406:

I disagree with this, it’s already more difficult to determine the class of an enemy than it should be. Mesmer and Ele both wear light armor, but the strategies to win against them are drastically different. It would be significantly worse to be fighting a warrior that looks like a necro, or a thief that looks like a guardian.

Nothing would change in spvp. You’d still be limited to your type of armor and you can’t transmute there anyways. WvWvW is the only thing that would be effected and anet has stated MANY times that it’s unfair pvp. They aren’t going to balance it. So why does it matter if you can’t tell if it’s a mesmer or not at first glance? The whole idea of WvWvW is zerging anyways. One player doesn’t matter.

Alexander.4827:

—It’s about art. It would limit the artist to have to make sure all heavy armor could fit with all cloth armor with limited clipping.

The artists aren’t that concerned with making sure all heavy armor can fit with other heavy armor as it is now. Heck, some of the crafted medium armor clips incorrectly with itself. Please don’t pretend this is an actual concern.

Besides, people who don’t like the clipping won’t mix-and-match conflicting armor to begin with. The problem fixes itself.

I would pay 10-20 dollars for 6-8 special transmute stones which allowed me to use ANY armor from any class once in each slot.

My Engineer would wear a cloth looking top while the rest of her outfit would be standard leather pants, boots, gloves, and mask (actual pirate look).

My Warrior would wear heavy arms, legs, boots, gloves, and shoulders, with a cloth shirt looking top and no helm.

My Mesmer would wear the Duelist set because it honestly fits the class as a magical based illusionist (after all what is a ninja but a person that uses illusions to their advantage).

As for confusing people and breaking peoples “immersion” of the game… lol. Really, we have everything from ghosts trying to kill us to giant rats stealing eggs 3 times their size and you are worried about a Warrior appearing in cloth gear?

Do I think this will ever happen? No, because there are too many mesh issues with combining a lot of the armor types. It would take a lot of work and I doubt the ANet team has the time.

Dogblaster.6713:

You already have pelnty of armor choices, from dungeon to cultural armor sets.

While there are many sets, diversity is lacking. I have seen only one light armor legs that on a female is not a long skirt. I have seen two medium armor tops for females that are not a trench coat (on a female, though one is on a male — go figure). I don’t care if the options come by broadening the ability to transmute or by adding more options to the game.

And while other games may only have one set of top-of-the-line armor, that set is wanted for its stats, not necessarily its appearance. Since GW2 max stats can be had on many appearances, GW2’s primary enticement with regard to armor is appearance.

LOTRO allows any class to put any armour into their cosmetic wardrobe, and it works just fine. I’m not really sure why it should be an issue if it’s purely cosmetic.

That being said, I mostly used cosmetic pieces within my armour range while playing LOTRO. Just every so often I would mix heavy armour with medium, or medium with light.

@the OP, I tend to concur, a lot of the light armour pieces look trashy (not to mention highly impractical for a girl fighting out in the field). You might want to try looking for a set of Shadow Garb armour, it’s not pirate wear, but it is quite nice and doesn’t make you look as though you charge by the hour.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Shadow_armor

I asked for this a long time ago and people said no, generally for clipping reasons (armor is already clipping anyway), or for PvP reasons (people check skill icons, not appearance). I’m still hoping for changes to the fine transmutation stones or have new “rare transmutation stones” in the gem market. I don’t care if they would cost more, the option to mix and match armor appearances would be great. Medium armor characters would love it the most, I wager, haha.

What I’d like is if we could take regular items and use them for town clothes.

I’d also like if we could take the cute pirate town clothes from the gem store and put them as skins on regular armor, at least medium wearers.

I think wvw and pvp need the silhouettes to be consistent. Of course there’s no transmutation in pvp anyway. But wvw…

mulch.2586:

What I’d like is if we could take regular items and use them for town clothes.

I’d also like if we could take the cute pirate town clothes from the gem store and put them as skins on regular armor, at least medium wearers.

I think wvw and pvp need the silhouettes to be consistent. Of course there’s no transmutation in pvp anyway. But wvw…

in WvW it’s all zerg vs zerg. Class icons (if they do not already show up) should show up next to the person you target anyway.

The only issue I see with this is clipping issues (which people have already mentioned). Try wearing a light cloth skirt with a medium leather jacket. They will clip tremendously through each other. There would be a bunch of complaints about clipping if this happened, and artists would have to rework pretty much all armors to make this a viable option so we don’t have tons of clipping and ugliness.

Otherwise, with clipping aside, I don’t really see the issue. Rift does this now. You can wear any armor, regardless of level or type, in your wardrobe over your armor. It would add more customization and that isn’t a bad thing.

Mostly I get annoyed when I see someone wearing awesome armour and then it turns out they’re a poor person who can’t afford gems. I would like it better if I could tell whether they were a real person or a poor person by their armour. Maybe if all drops were rags and tunics and then the good armour was only available from the Black Lion? I think this would improve my experience and be more realistic.

Its limiting the way it works now, sure, but some amount of limitation, some degree of structure, is good IMO. If you just let everyone go free-for-all on any sort of armor they want, then it’ll just be a cluster of random gear everywhere with no rhyme or reason to it. Mages wearing full plate armor while armored Warriors run around in flimsy cloth shirts just wouldn’t gel. The armor types are part of the identity of the classes IMO (not just talking stats, I’m talking appearence too), and I’d prefer it to remain that way.

Besides, weapons are set, you want a sword moveset you use a sword. Why should armor be treated any different just let you use whatever at will?

That said, I would certainly support a larger variety of armors, including some armors that might look a bit more like other armor classes. Add a set of Light armor that, while still looking light and manuverable, has some metal pieces and a bit more structure to it. Add some heavy armor that, while still looking like actual armor, maybe has some cloth pieces over the top of the plate mail or something. And definately some medium armor that actually looks like armor and not clothes.

I mostly just want all Order armour to be opened up instead of just the one you are in. That is the bigger concern.

I don’t see why people shouldn’t be allowed to mix and match. I hope they implement this.

Alexander.4827:

-It’s not about limiting customization.

-It’s not about preventing classes from wearing incorrect, absurd or mismatched armor.

-It’s about art. It would limit the artist to have to make sure all heavy armor could fit with all cloth armor with limited clipping.
I’m willing to be the artists wish we didn’t have as much customization as we already do because it means it makes it really challenging to create really unique designs.

---

In depth:
Heavy armor tends to have bulky segmented pieces while cloth and medium armor tend to have longer flowy armor. Most heavy armor boots would flip through medium or light armor leggings.

You clearly have never tried mixing and matching sets or you’d notice how ill fitted a great deal of it is to itself within the same armor type…

Anyway as for what the OP is talking about I’m all for it. I actually use metallic short gauntlet looking armor on my Ranger that thankfully is classed medium because I like the look a great deal.

More chances to create unique looks like that would be appreciated.

Alexander.4827:

-It’s not about limiting customization.

-It’s not about preventing classes from wearing incorrect, absurd or mismatched armor.

-It’s about art. It would limit the artist to have to make sure all heavy armor could fit with all cloth armor with limited clipping.
I’m willing to be the artists wish we didn’t have as much customization as we already do because it means it makes it really challenging to create really unique designs.

---

In depth:
Heavy armor tends to have bulky segmented pieces while cloth and medium armor tend to have longer flowy armor. Most heavy armor boots would flip through medium or light armor leggings.

because there’s no clipping right now right?
and most light armour leggings are dresses/skirts, which no boots clip there period. if they’re not bell shaped then they’re skin tight or super short.

+1 for allowing classes to transmute skins of any armour to something you can wear.

I’ll have to agree with the OP on this one. All races can be all classes therefore the models are already in game. I’m thinking the transmutation stones are bugged and broke!

I second the OP’s idea, I like to mix and match armors from different classes on the preview screen, and sometimes the results can be astounding when mixing medium and heavy.

- “The art will clip” :
They already do when you mix and match some armors from the same category.
– “My pvp is going to die” :
sPvP has its own set of armors and you can’t transmute anyways.
WvW is unfair and you can’t really tell apart warrior from a guardian, a mesmer from a necro or a ranger from a thief unless you select the character, see him use a skill or see him with pets/weapons/minions. Also, there are no icons on enemies.

It’s like the costumes of GW1, it doesn’t alter your character in any ways, but you look like Grenth’s reaper and you can’t use them in pvp.

Galen.9042
Usagi.4835
Artemis Noir.3804

Yes to all of it.
This subject is so common in every MMO you would think creators would catch on quicker but surprisingly its the popular companies that have the most difficult time with it. Took World of Warcraft 7 years to accept that allowing their players free reign to customize the appearance of their characters improves their experience in said game. (thank you Snarky and “The Appearance Tab” thread plus all other supporters for making it possible after so many years of diligence)

“The plate wearing mage” argument…its classic. Always there are players that believe this will be the norm (or pirates, or naked players or whatever absurd idea pops in their head) and it is not. As stated above Lord of the Rings lets light armor classes wear heavy armor pieces cosmetically and thankfully the world has not imploded. Instead there is an entire sub community of bloggers that create outfits and show them off.

And let us not victimize the artists of GW2. Their work is under no threat what so ever. They will continue to release designs for plate, leather and cloth armor. That is a ridiculous argument that is repeated so much just like the plate wearing mage.

Yes please allow armor of all kinds (heavy, medium, light) to be used by all professions cosmetically.

The arguments against this assume that armor value is significant between types. News flash: It’s not.

I personally don’t mind this, and actually would appreciate it when playing my scholar professions.

However, if this were to be implemented, the names of the WvW Invaders should change to be more identifiable, like “Jade Quarry Elementalist” or “Stormbluff Isle Warrior” or something like that. Either that, or have the armor temporarily change back the untransmuted version so that enemy invaders are easier to point out. I really don’t want to think “Guardian!” when I find out I’m already dead because they just happen to be a Thief in heavy armor.

Usagi.4835:

No disrespect to you guise, but the people who are against this idea have no real legitimate or valid reasons besides personal preference.

neither do you in favor of it.

paelen.3821:

I’ll have to agree with the OP on this one. All races can be all classes therefore the models are already in game. I’m thinking the transmutation stones are bugged and broke!

Of course the models are already in the game – Equipment Preview option proves that beyond doubt.

I’d love this! I’d even pay REAL MONEY….

Theik.9340:

Quite frankly as a female human elementalist, I would love to see this option to. I can’t for the life of me find any gear that doesn’t make my mage look like a harlot or something that came straight from an anime cosplay event.

I find that hard to credit actually – granted, my female mesmer pretty much intentionally dresses in the sort of outfit you’ve expressed a distaste for, but there’s a pretty decent selection of more modest (or from my perspective, boring) outfits out there. I actually had the opposite problem when my character first started out – all the dropped and crafted armor past the very first tier was sensible and concealing and not at all scandalous (oh noes!), I had to look for the silly stuff (of course at higher levels… that ceased to be a problem, ha ha).

But since you posted here complaining about the impractical and “stripperesque” stuff, I might as well take the time to point out the sets that I think are entirely too sensible to bother with.

Human T1 cultural light armor
Human T2 cultural light armor
(Human T3 cultural light armor is of course exactly what you’re complaining about)
Crafted Devout armor
Crafted Student armor
Crafted Acolyte armor
Crafted Exalted armor
Country armor from karma rewards or drops

On the topic itself
My understanding of WvWvW was that nobody on the other servers actually sees your character model as you have it equipped now anyways, they see a stand-in version of you wearing standard gear instead of what you’re really using, so if this was implemented I don’t think the impact in PvP would really register much (apart from confusing your allies, who do see you as is). Personally I don’t see the need for unlocking transmutation across armor types, but I understand why some people are clamoring for it.

i think we should use all armor time at cosmetic , i like the idea as guardian to combine heavy armor and use light hood (could look super epic)

also the idea to combine all type of armor is pretty awesome at end game , cuz basicly at lvl 80 every is look the same !!
all guardina / warrior look same with the spike karma armor , or with the draconic set
allow us to use diffrent armor look will change every thing , everyone will diffrent as they want and that make it pretty unique

If we can transmute different type of armor, it becomes an issue in pvp.

Imagine 5 different professions all wearing heavy armor. there’ll be no way to tell what type of professions they are just by looking at them. this creates unnecessary confusion in pvp since predicting the enemies’ move is part of the strategy involved, but if everyone can choose transmute whatever type of armor, it becomes virtually impossible to guess what the enemy will do next until he actually attacks.

ok , u know what maybe in pvp not alowd cuz its a small groups fight with each other,

but in wvw and pve i dont see a reason why not ,
pve , not one realy care how u look ,
wvw there is demn to many people there that u just want to see numbers then how enemy looks like !

I really don’t like this idea. If you make a warrior or elementalist you gotta look like one. It’s not about PvP (although I understand the point) it’s about common sense. The gear we have is carefully crafted (no pun intended) to fit within the themes of the professions that can use them. Medium armors have shadowy leather gear and masks for thiefs and the long trenchcoats of engineers and rangers, but it totally wouldn’t fit a warrior. Heavy armor have a mix of barbaric and knightly armors which fits both warriors and guardians but how would it make sense for your thief to wear knight gear? It wouldn’t.

I agree one hundred percent that there is not enough variety in the armor styles, however the solution is not to do a free-for-all where warriors wear level 1 mesmer skirts and elementalists wear full dark armor, it’s to design new sets of armor with the styles people want but that still look like they belong to their proper armor class.

Also, on a more technical point of view, armor pieces have to fit together even if they’re not from a same set. The fact that you’re limited to one class of armor puts less restrictions on the artists and allows them to make equipment without having to worry about it clipping with pieces from the other 2 armor classes. For example the trenchcoats of the medium armor sets clip horribly with almost every heavy and light leg pieces. (You can see for yourself in the preview screen.) It doesn’t matter because the leg pieces of medium armor are all tight and cannot clip with any trenchcoat, but if you remove the restriction you suddenly have to make every combination works, which will probably end up with more bland-looking gear due to the restrictions this would create to avoid clipping.

Customization is great,I have spent hours customizing my characters and must have rerolled my main something like 15 times until I got the right look, however it must not come at the cost of the game’s artistic integrity.

I played another game where you can transmute whatever gear and weapon to the skin you like. In that game warrior was the worst class out of all but in highest level area, you can find the place is flooded with WARRIORS… until you see their spells and they are actually MAGES…

So no, don’t like this idea, if a cha looks like a warrior, they should be a warrior.