Guild Wars 2

I often see people around here complaining about “buttskirts” and “trenchcoats”, so I’m gonna go against the flow here and defend the amazing clothing options we have in GW2.

First off, it’s a question of fashion in Tyria. Tyrians live in a world that is very different of ours and have tastes and behaviors of their own. There’s no reason for them to have the exact same sense of fashion as us. In their world, long clothing is the norm and it’s what’s fashionable, and this seems to be true for all races.

Secondly, it’s pretty good for gender equality. I’m no feminist, but this is something I would agree on with those who are. Too often in games, movies or comics, I see male characters wearing epic clothing that shows off who they are or what they do; clothing which defines their role or function, like wizards wearing huge robes, pirates wearing ragged shirts with tricorn hats or jedi wearing those monk garments (or whatever you’d call them). But then, whenever you have a female character, she wears clothing that is 90% about showing off her body and a mere 10% about her role. So basically they wear clothing that simply define them as women. It’s reminiscent of the Smurfette Principle (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smurfette_principle), where men are defined by what they do and women are defined by their gender. And GW2 does a pretty good job giving that idea the middle finger and giving us proper epic fantasy female clothing.

Thirdly, it’s also a nice change from previous games, and in my case (and probably many more around here) from modded games like Skyrim. Whenever I wanted to mod that game with extra clothing for my female character, I’d have to browse through pages and pages of skimpy, if not erotic content to finally find something that looked great. Like, come on guys, you’ve had the spotlight pretty much since the dawn of time, and now you think it’s too much to ask to have it differently in one single video game? There’s already so many video games or other forms of entertainment out there to satisfy your tastes, get over it.

Modern clothing belongs in modern world based games like GTA V. Not on GW2.

Hm ok. But why ugly trenchcoats?

Dawnbreaker.6215:

But then, whenever you have a female character, she wears clothing that is 90% about showing off her body and a mere 10% about her role. So basically they wear clothing that simply define them as women. It’s reminiscent of the Smurfette Principle (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smurfette_principle), where men are defined by what they do and women are defined by their gender. And GW2 does a pretty good job giving that idea the middle finger and giving us proper epic fantasy female clothing.

When I’m against trenchcoats and buttcapes, I’m just sick of my weapons and arms clipping through them!!! Look at the medium Glorious armor! FULLY COVERED BODY but it’s TIGHT and has no clipping issues! This is EXACTLY what I need for my female characters! I don’t want to be naked at all.

Mea.5491:

Dawnbreaker.6215:

But then, whenever you have a female character, she wears clothing that is 90% about showing off her body and a mere 10% about her role. So basically they wear clothing that simply define them as women. It’s reminiscent of the Smurfette Principle (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smurfette_principle), where men are defined by what they do and women are defined by their gender. And GW2 does a pretty good job giving that idea the middle finger and giving us proper epic fantasy female clothing.

When I’m against trenchcoats and buttcapes, I’m just sick of my weapons and arms clipping through them!!! Look at the medium Glorious armor! FULLY COVERED BODY but it’s TIGHT and has no clipping issues! This is EXACTLY what I need for my female characters! I don’t want to be naked at all.

The fashion and armors in Tyria are not tight. You are confusing our world with Tyria. Clipping is a minor problem, it can only be adressed by improving the game’s engine.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

The fashion and armors in Tyria are not tight. You are confusing our world with Tyria. Clipping is a minor problem, it can only be adressed by improving the game’s engine.

Funny, GW1 has lots of tight(er) armor options, just a few examples below. But suuure, armors in Tyria are not tight… Not anymore. Unfortunately.

Clipping might be a minor problem to you but it’s definitely a major turn off for me. Anet could avoid many clipping issues if they designed tighter armor.

I’m fairly certain the medium armour mesh has an inbuild longcoat anyway, hence all the “buttcapes”.

I don’t think people are asking for skimpy skin showing armor, they just want medium armor options that doesn’t go past the waist, or heavy armor that doesn’t have a kittened looking skirt or butt/groin flap

Lahmia.2193:

I’m fairly certain the medium armour mesh has an inbuild longcoat anyway, hence all the “buttcapes”.

I dont have a buttcape. I have what appear to be the cover of an access zipper, I think.

Dawnbreaker,

You said, “I see male characters wearing epic clothing that shows off who they are or what they do; clothing which defines their role or function, like wizards wearing huge robes, pirates wearing ragged shirts with tricorn hats or jedi wearing those monk garments (or whatever you’d call them). But then, whenever you have a female character, she wears clothing that is 90% about showing off her body and a mere 10% about her role. So basically they wear clothing that simply define them as women. It’s reminiscent of the Smurfette Principle (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smurfette_principle), where men are defined by what they do and women are defined by their gender. And GW2 does a pretty good job giving that idea the middle finger and giving us proper epic fantasy female clothing.”

Well said! Right on, sister! I love the fact that we can wear these awesome trenchcoats and heavy armor. Never understood why we could never get away with wearing awesome clothes in games in movies. Not all of us girls want to show skin, nor do we want to be made to. We are epic without having to look sexy.

Another thread by someone who has confused the dislike of buttcapes and trench coats with a desire for women to run around half naked.

it’s a wish for more diversity in design instead of armor after armor with buttcapes or coats. it’s a wish for pants for women instead of dress&pants or dress&leggings. Just plain simple pants.It’s a wish for some armors with clean silhouettes. Not armor with so much extra cloth hanging down In addition, it’s a wish that armor sets weren’t so different between the sexes so that women have exposed skin on the belly, legs, or chest but the same armor on men, all that’s showing is the face. It’s not the wish for more skin showing for women.

but we want less trenchcoats for males too! females do have more choices in armor, from fully covered, to tight fitting, to skimpy clothing, in mostly all armor weights. but that is NOT the case for male armor, specially medium male armor. the most we can show is our bare arms gasp.
clothing choices in tyria are unrelated since heavy and light armor, and female armor do have more choices than medium armor.
btw completely agree with you on harder to find a game where female armor can be more practical and less stripper-y

Bruno.3812:

Another thread by someone who has confused the dislike of buttcapes and trench coats with a desire for women to run around half naked.

it’s a wish for more diversity in design instead of armor after armor with buttcapes or coats. it’s a wish for pants for women instead of dress&pants or dress&leggings. Just plain simple pants.It’s a wish for some armors with clean silhouettes. Not armor with so much extra cloth hanging down In addition, it’s a wish that armor sets weren’t so different between the sexes so that women have exposed skin on the belly, legs, or chest but the same armor on men, all that’s showing is the face. It’s not the wish for more skin showing for women.

Exactly.

Bruno.3812:

Another thread by someone who has confused the dislike of buttcapes and trench coats with a desire for women to run around half naked.

it’s a wish for more diversity in design instead of armor after armor with buttcapes or coats. it’s a wish for pants for women instead of dress&pants or dress&leggings. Just plain simple pants.It’s a wish for some armors with clean silhouettes. Not armor with so much extra cloth hanging down In addition, it’s a wish that armor sets weren’t so different between the sexes so that women have exposed skin on the belly, legs, or chest but the same armor on men, all that’s showing is the face. It’s not the wish for more skin showing for women.

Do you not have a million games out there with butt tight silhouette armor? Why can GW2 not be an exception to the rule?

Trenchcoats are not the issue, the issue is that there are MOSTLY trenchcoats for mediums, 3 classes that cant be more different in fighting style and need of protection.
Thiefes\daredevils are almost ninja like, sneaky and agile. A “heavy” trenchcoat would just be a nuisance for them if you think about it. How about some form fitting leather suit with throwing knives instead? The ranger\druid, a master of nature magic and survival could use some trenchcoat to protect from the elements… sure.. but then again why not something made of hunting trophies or actually made from wood or bark… ya know.. nature stuff to go with the tree hippie fighting style, how about extra quivers on the legs or some nice cloak with hood. The engineer\scrapper uses metric tons of explosives, flamethrowers, elixirs, turrets and other guff to battle. How about something with utility belts and pockets or into armor pieces crafted machines rather then a leather trenchcoat or a helmet with in build utility goggles or just more stuff along the lines of the scrapper helmet. Id prefer stuff like this by far over the darn coats. Just look at the spec armor pieces… yea.. thats more like it, shame its just one piece…
Sure there ARE other pieces like that available but not nearly enough. But whatever… just wear an outfit or something, thats a-net´s answer to fashion wars afterall…

Trench coats arent a problem. Problem is trench coats in gw are poorly done and they end up looking horrible.

http://i64.tinypic.com/15d3s5k.jpg
http://i67.tinypic.com/23wr9di.jpg

Compare this set to.. everything gw has to offer.

to be honest I wouldn’t like those either. I want more variety, not more quality in trenchoats

Dawnbreaker.6215:

Bruno.3812:

Another thread by someone who has confused the dislike of buttcapes and trench coats with a desire for women to run around half naked.

it’s a wish for more diversity in design instead of armor after armor with buttcapes or coats. it’s a wish for pants for women instead of dress&pants or dress&leggings. Just plain simple pants.It’s a wish for some armors with clean silhouettes. Not armor with so much extra cloth hanging down In addition, it’s a wish that armor sets weren’t so different between the sexes so that women have exposed skin on the belly, legs, or chest but the same armor on men, all that’s showing is the face. It’s not the wish for more skin showing for women.

Do you not have a million games out there with butt tight silhouette armor? Why can GW2 not be an exception to the rule?

Why does gw2 need to be the exception if all being the exception gets you is less variety? No one is suggesting remove the ones that are there now. We are asking for more options. Is there something wrong with sleek armor? The way your phrasing your question makes it sound like there’s something wrong with asking for more options that’s doesn’t have a buttcape or trench coat.

agree, no one wants to remove options, we just want more variety, I don’t see why would that be a bad idea.

I dont think it’s a case of trench coat style armors being bad. I personally use Marauder, Whispers and sometimes Heritage chestpieces, but lack of variety. Vast majority of the medium armors look very similar because of it. Gwen’s outfit dyed a leathery brown though looks really nice. If they had more of that as armor skins there would be less issue.

Without buttcapes you can do a butt dance

ahaaha awesome

I don’t mind trenchcoats, but I do mind the total inequality in terms of form-fitting/sexy leather armors that males don’t have in this game compared to females.

What’s worse, as in the case of luminiscent armor, the males actually lose details and flairs and receive a more plain version. Where there was naked skin of females males are put in a burqa covering all flesh.

Somebody thought butterflies on shoulders wouldn’t fit for men (as if insects had anything to do with gender, guess mesmers didn’t get that memo).

OK, no butterflies for male shoulders. Why not replace them with dragonflies or hercules beetles instead? Why simply remove the detail and give males a completely stripped down version?

This game designs its armor primarily for female characters, and it’s really aggravating.

Trenchcoats make a lot of sense. They are practical garments that protect the wearer from weather exposure.

The only reason we don’t use trenchcoats today is because of modern synthetic materials and modern sewing equipment allowing for more form fitting outdoor attire.

The reason gw1 had form fitting, was because the gw1 engine couldn’t handle cloth simulation well.

they might make a lot of sense for some classes but for others they don’t. an agile evasive thief wouldn’t wear a trenchoat, it’s heavy and would get stuck in everything.
“No Capes!” as Edna Moda said.

Crinn.7864:

Trenchcoats make a lot of sense. They are practical garments that protect the wearer from weather exposure.

The only reason we don’t use trenchcoats today is because of modern synthetic materials and modern sewing equipment allowing for more form fitting outdoor attire.

The reason gw1 had form fitting, was because the gw1 engine couldn’t handle cloth simulation well.

Try moving quietly through the woods wearing an loose ankle length coat or a long flowing cape attached to your posterior parts. Let’s see if they don’t get hung up on every thorn and bush in your path. There’s a reason why soldiers and hunters don’t wear bulky outfits with long lengths of hanging cloth while moving across the landscape.

We don’t need anymore trenchies and buttcapes.

Also, trenchies and buttcapes are not practical/good for combat or stealth. Those long panels are easily caught between your legs when moving around and due to wind blowing.

but I like butt capes

good, no one is planning on removing the already available.

The problem isn’t that there are trench coats, or how they look.
The problem is that there are WAY TOO MANY, at least for medium armor. That is why so many people dislike them. Take a look at this gallery for example.

Almost every single armor in that gallery is a trench coat or skirt. What’s wrong with having some more pants like the Glorious Medium Armor? There needs to be more variety. We have enough medium armor Trench Coats.

Not to mention it doesn’t make sense for my stealthy and agile thief to wear a long and sluggish coat.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

The fashion and armors in Tyria are not tight. You are confusing our world with Tyria.

You’re the one who’s confused. Tyria doesn’t exist. It’s a product made for entertainment, by people in our world. Every aspect of it has been created by people who have access to our opinions on it. Are they required to act upon our desires for the product? Not completely, but at least to the extent that it remains a marketable product.

There is no “Tyria” to stay true to. There are no cultural leanings to slavishly hold on to. They can, at any time, create something that breaks the mold and say “Oh look, progress! New trends! Living world, yay!” They actually do that all the time. Just not with regard to armors, unfortunately. Trench coats have gone out of style in our world, it’s about time Tyria moves on as well.

Manasa Devi.7958:

There is no “Tyria” to stay true to. There are no cultural leanings to slavishly hold on to.

Exactly. We are talking about a fictional universe that takes place in a medieval setting, yet we have people running around with ghetto blasters, 8-bit glowing weapons and quaggan backpacks lol.

Fashion/cultural rules don’t mean a thing in this game.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

Bruno.3812:

Another thread by someone who has confused the dislike of buttcapes and trench coats with a desire for women to run around half naked.

it’s a wish for more diversity in design instead of armor after armor with buttcapes or coats. it’s a wish for pants for women instead of dress&pants or dress&leggings. Just plain simple pants.It’s a wish for some armors with clean silhouettes. Not armor with so much extra cloth hanging down In addition, it’s a wish that armor sets weren’t so different between the sexes so that women have exposed skin on the belly, legs, or chest but the same armor on men, all that’s showing is the face. It’s not the wish for more skin showing for women.

Do you not have a million games out there with butt tight silhouette armor? Why can GW2 not be an exception to the rule?

Looking at it after other games it is like fingernails on a blackboard. All those other games are doing at the fundamental level is hiding the skin directly under the clothing and using the skeleton. I know, I know, a bit more complex than that, but that is a simple way to explain how to solve the issue: a customized alpha layer between the clothes and the skin. Once you do that your options are wide open.

Bruno.3812:

Crinn.7864:

Trenchcoats make a lot of sense. They are practical garments that protect the wearer from weather exposure.

The only reason we don’t use trenchcoats today is because of modern synthetic materials and modern sewing equipment allowing for more form fitting outdoor attire.

The reason gw1 had form fitting, was because the gw1 engine couldn’t handle cloth simulation well.

Try moving quietly through the woods wearing an loose ankle length coat or a long flowing cape attached to your posterior parts. Let’s see if they don’t get hung up on every thorn and bush in your path. There’s a reason why soldiers and hunters don’t wear bulky outfits with long lengths of hanging cloth while moving across the landscape.

Pre cold war soldiers would wear trenches when traveling in foul/cold weather. (assuming they where properly equipped)

Also proper trenchcoats are heavy treated fabric, they should not get caught on shrubs.

sure for a COLD area they make sense. but unless we’re in the shiverpeaks it’s not really cold in Tyria.
but trenchcoats being viable or not is not the main issue in here, what people want is VARIETY. not to elminate already existing coats.
medium armor has very little variety, specially for males.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

Do you not have a million games out there with butt tight silhouette armor? Why can GW2 not be an exception to the rule?

I’m sure ANet appreciates you implying that other customers leave ANet’s game. The fact is that MMO’s thrive on larger, rather than smaller customer bases. Because people have different tastes, it is far better for the developer to offer different options.

Also, you seem to again be confusing a lack of long coattails with “modern.” This is not the case. There are many modern fashions that have coattails, and many less modern fashions that do not.

There is nothing wrong with asking for variety. There is something wrong, imo. with asking for a lack of variety when there are already a multitude of options that provide what you seem to want. That suggests you want not to see different styles that you dislike on other peoples’ characters. Your proclivities end where mine begin.

Your appeal is at least partly based on what you see as a coherent fashion trend. However, the people of Tyria once wore equipment that did not, for the most part, have long coattails. If there’s one thing that’s true about fashion, styles go in cycles. Finally, it seems odd to be concerned about the “ruination” of coherent Tyrian fashion when there are already such egregious departures as people wearing huge Cthuloid tentacular things, plush Quaggan, plush Charr, or 8-bit stuff.

I like trenchcoats. I even like some buttcapes.
What i don’t like is the lack of everything else.

Human male Thief coats are pretty horrendous, I much prefer Medium armor on Human female Thieves.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

I often see people around here complaining about “buttskirts” and “trenchcoats”, so I’m gonna go against the flow here and defend the amazing clothing options we have in GW2.

First off, it’s a question of fashion in Tyria. Tyrians live in a world that is very different of ours and have tastes and behaviors of their own. There’s no reason for them to have the exact same sense of fashion as us. In their world, long clothing is the norm and it’s what’s fashionable, and this seems to be true for all races.

I couldn’t care less if imaginary characters prefer it. They can’t make choices – if I didn’t dress them they would walk around in underwear.

I don’t ask my characters what they like before I choose their outfit, hair, color scheme etc. They wouldn’t answer me.

Therefore it is entirely my preference what my characters look like. I don’t hate trenchcoats but I prefer more choice.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

Do you not have a million games out there with butt tight silhouette armor? Why can GW2 not be an exception to the rule?

You are being purposefully obtuse on the problem. Literally no one here is saying “I want butt tight silhouette armor” People are asking for anything that isn’t a trenchcoat or buttcape. There are things that exist today that aren’t “butt tight silhouette armor”. They’re called pants and shirts. Most people wear them every day. For you to pretend like you forgot they exist is willful ignorance in an attempt to force your perspective on others.

You’re also pretending like you know what other people want. You’re sitting here labeling everyone who is asking for more options as some kind of pervert who wants Tera-esque armor options, when that’s not what people are asking for. Even after people carefully explain to you what they are saying you still sit there and go “yeah well, whatever, you guys just want to see butts!” Grow up.

Lahmia.2193:

I’m fairly certain the medium armour mesh has an inbuild longcoat anyway, hence all the “buttcapes”.

Plenty of buttcapes on heavy. Light tends more towards the weird half skirts.

Zenith.7301:

I don’t mind trenchcoats, but I do mind the total inequality in terms of form-fitting/sexy leather armors that males don’t have in this game compared to females.

What’s worse, as in the case of luminiscent armor, the males actually lose details and flairs and receive a more plain version. Where there was naked skin of females males are put in a burqa covering all flesh.

Somebody thought butterflies on shoulders wouldn’t fit for men (as if insects had anything to do with gender, guess mesmers didn’t get that memo).

OK, no butterflies for male shoulders. Why not replace them with dragonflies or hercules beetles instead? Why simply remove the detail and give males a completely stripped down version?

This game designs its armor primarily for female characters, and it’s really aggravating.

Completely agree. I only have male characters and it’s so annoying that I can’t put them in anything that shows skin unless it’s heavy armor (and let’s be honest those aren’t necessarily the best looking skins either)
I really do love Guild Wars but the armor skins and outfits are just…really not that great compared to other games of its genre.
Outfits in this game just look BAD on males TT

Dawnbreaker.6215:

Too often in games, movies or comics, I see male characters wearing epic clothing that shows off who they are or what they do; clothing which defines their role or function, like wizards wearing huge robes, pirates wearing ragged shirts with tricorn hats or jedi wearing those monk garments (or whatever you’d call them). But then, whenever you have a female character, she wears clothing that is 90% about showing off her body and a mere 10% about her role. So basically they wear clothing that simply define them as women. It’s reminiscent of the Smurfette Principle (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smurfette_principle), where men are defined by what they do and women are defined by their gender. And GW2 does a pretty good job giving that idea the middle finger and giving us proper epic fantasy female clothing.

In general, this is a two-fold issue at the fault of both men and women. Women seek individuality and trendiness thus they seek to wear a variety compared to men who wear clothing based on utility and practicality. How this ends up with women wearing tighter or piecewise clothing is attributed to women’s desires to accesorize. Now if women didn’t care about accessorizing and being trendy, their selection of clothing would be as limited as men’s (focusing mainly on comfortable underclothing, pants/slacks, shirts and accessorizing with mainly hats and ties) rather than incorporating wallets/purses, specialized shoes, scarves, etc. The other fold of the issue is that men value women for their appearance (because they are mostly viewed as opportunities for relationships and families) whereas women value men for their ability to provide resources (i.e. their job and what they do to provide for their family) so men value women who dress with feminine style.

So there you go, women value variety and accessorizing to their own fashion while men value women for their attractive appearance.

On the other side of the coin, no one cares how men dress, in the context of if they dress plain or trendy, so fewer men will bother thus the option to dress trendy or to emphasize male attractiveness is limited by available options.

Both these paradigms (men and women and their attire) seem to be reflected when developing custom gear in games, leaving men to wear practical gear while women are catered to by offering “femenine” things as well as refitted “masculine” things.

Personally, I think the actual problem is how feminist try to shame people for seeking attractiveness. Just because the female avatars have the option to be attractive doesn’t mean that is their only option (the majority of the time). And doing so, it stifles creativity and pretty much shoots the option of “sexy men attire” in the foot because the content creators are already walking on eggshells with feminist views.

Although I’m pretty sure the line “most players of video games are straight males and don’t want to see that” would pop up and then the paradox is in full view. Either offer more attractive men to pull in more of a female audience or just understand that there is a double standard (women aren’t drawn in by attractive males, women aren’t attracted mostly by appearance but by status, but men ARE thus partially why it exists).

tl;dr: sexy armor exists to appease both men and women and those that tend to complain about it don’t seem to understand that sex sells, it appeases the male audience and to cease is basically to the dissatisfaction of that male (and some female) audience. The only thing victimizing virtual women accomplishes is removing part of the target audience and thus making less money.

Khisanth.2948:

Lahmia.2193:

I’m fairly certain the medium armour mesh has an inbuild longcoat anyway, hence all the “buttcapes”.

Plenty of buttcapes on heavy. Light tends more towards the weird half skirts.

Half skirts with a poofy bottom. :/

I want my original monk’s outfit back! Thank Grenth for pirate and chef’s outfits.

Edit: Also khaki shorts, Ascelonian pants with normal skirt, town clothes, and many other old skins.

Mea.5491:

Dawnbreaker.6215:

The fashion and armors in Tyria are not tight. You are confusing our world with Tyria. Clipping is a minor problem, it can only be adressed by improving the game’s engine.

Funny, GW1 has lots of tight(er) armor options, just a few examples below. But suuure, armors in Tyria are not tight… Not anymore. Unfortunately.

Clipping might be a minor problem to you but it’s definitely a major turn off for me. Anet could avoid many clipping issues if they designed tighter armor.

GW1 Necro Scar Armor = Zero Clipping.
We need this armor. Problem solved

Anchoku.8142:

Khisanth.2948:

Lahmia.2193:

I’m fairly certain the medium armour mesh has an inbuild longcoat anyway, hence all the “buttcapes”.

Plenty of buttcapes on heavy. Light tends more towards the weird half skirts.

Half skirts with a poofy bottom. :/

I want my original monk’s outfit back! Thank Grenth for pirate and chef’s outfits.

Edit: Also khaki shorts, Ascelonian pants with normal skirt, town clothes, and many other old skins.

Like the light envoy legging … why does that stick out so much?

The ascalonian pants have the misfortune of that ugly top part.

Gryphon.2875:

GW1 Necro Scar Armor = Zero Clipping.
We need this armor. Problem solved

Haha, yup, that one too!