Has there been any talk about adding a Paperdoll system at all? A graphical one?
I’m not sure what a paper doll system is? can you elaborate?
Basically its a graphical representation of the character, or proxy in this case, that updates based on how they appear. Some use clothes, others show body changes… I think I’ve seen one that did more than one if I recall correctly… Ultima Online had a paperdoll that was pretty interactive. The game “trap quest”(the drawn version) has one that is a good example of body changes. It would require somebody with a little artistic talent but could be neat flavor.
I’m guessing it’d require a good reworking of the game code to include support for one, as you’d have to essentially draw a new window - drawing another image in the event window doesn’t work all that well. You could call an image into the event window to display such a paperdoll for certain events (activating proxy, looking at self, etc.), but there’s no good way to do it permanently without screwing other things up.
Currently there’re a couple templates for such a system, both designed for looking at specific characters, and both handling the problem in slightly different ways. The game itself has a system for drawing Merril based on her current status, and if you look at /templates/char/merril_display.tpl, you can see how it works: it’s not separate images being layered on top of a base; rather, every possibility has been compiled into an image, and that specific image is called based on current variables. This is fine when there’re only a couple variables in play, but with everything from hair/eye color to race to height/weight and body part sizes, this wouldn’t work nearly as well for proxies.
Dohavocom’s done something similar for his mod, albeit slightly differently: rather than each possibility done in a single template, each image has its own template, and the specific template that matches the requisite condition is called, with the matching image called as the background image (as opposed to an image called and drawn dynamically in the Merril template, on top of the background). I personally find this method a bit unwieldy, but there are specific cases where it works better.
I have no idea how the game handles multiple templates each calling their own image, but it might be possible to have a series templates that each calls a transparent image, and hope the game overlays them all; this way you could handle each body part with its own template, but that’s all assuming it works properly, and wouldn’t allow much adjustment for proxy height. It also doesn’t solve the problem of calling the image into the event window, so the original caveat applies.
EDIT: I am a bad person and was digging through an old install for the above post. For self-observation images, Dohavocom’s mod uses templates closer to those used for Merril, and it looks like he’s able to call multiple images at once. It still uses a series of individual templates rather than a single one with loads of if conditions, but the point is that it seems possible that you could use layered images, allowing you to dynamically call specific images for body parts, to an extent. You’d have to be careful with the geometry in your image editor to make sure everything lines up to the right place, though.
Like jimbobvii said, my mod has a simple character representation (used in the measurements event). My mod currently only does 2 variables breasts size and belly size. I do it by utilizing 2 images layers (the background and character layers) currently the engine only supports those 2 layers. I’m hopping H.Coder adds support for more layers n the future, but i know shit is tough for him right now.
I could have used a single template to do the same thing, and it might even be easier, but it’s just not the way i originally did it so that’s how it’s staying for now, haha.