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Fiddler's Green42661 Posts
Problems with Implementation of Skins in LotV
Given the enormous success of skins in other games like LoL, Dota2 and CS:GO and their integral role in increasing popularity for thier games (http://www.pcgamer.com/how-400-virtual-knives-saved-counter-strike/), many people have advoated for the implementation of skins into SC2.
There are currently three problems:
1 - Technology.
In CS:GO there are at most 30 models that can be skinned (10 guns, 10 pistols, 10 knives). In LoL, 10 heroes. In dota 2, each ero can be modded with different sets and couriers. The problem with SC2 is that in a general game, it can be anywhere from 200-500 or models to alter. And then you double or quadruple that in team games. Presumably this causes a strain and creates performance issues for the game.
2 - Identity
The second problem is the inherent difference of identity between SC2 and CS:GO/LoL/Dota2. In those games you control a “hero” unit that represents who you are in the game. In SC2 you are a commander of an army and there is less personal investment as you send your soldiers to get slaughtered by the hundreds. Of course this is probably the smallest problem of the three.
3 - Market/incentives
Part of the popularity of skins in games like Dota2/CS:GO is that there is an entire economy built around buying, selling and trading skins. It isn’t enough to just buy/sell skins, but you’d need to also have an infrastructure to allow it, which requires resources and time.
Solutions:
Limit the amount of skins a player can put on into a game. For instance, let there be a loadout screen where they can equip 10 units to have their bought skin. This avoids the performance issue as there won’t be as much slow down and it makes those units “special” creating an identity for the player. Another option is to tie it to unit rank. After a certain amount of kills, the unit is “promoted” in both rank and appearance (Though I can’t speak on the feasibility of this one.)
Achievements:
Random aside, but I’d like there to be esports related achievement/portraits. for instance, if I ragequit 4 games in a row without typing GG, I want a portrait of Idra.
 
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For the performance issues (and those who say playing against skins is annoying), I always kind of wondered: Why not an option to just.. turn it off?
Is it really bad to give the players options like that? Or is the technology for that more complex than I'd think?
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On October 01 2015 07:25 Rehio wrote:
For the performance issues (and those who say playing against skins is annoying), I always kind of wondered: Why not an option to just.. turn it off?
Is it really bad to give the players options like that? Or is the technology for that more complex than I'd think?
If your opponent can't see your skins people won't buy them. If you couldn't show of your cool skins in CSGO the value of every skin would sink tremendously.
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How bout an option to buy something that can turn everyone else into a skin/model of your own choosing?
Should just be like Quake 3 where you can turn everyone into Keel because he was the loudest and biggest/easiest target to hit.
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does that point no.1 really work that way?
as long as the skins aren't changing the base model (not sure the right turn, basically the physical model), shouldn't the performance be similar?
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On October 01 2015 08:34 riotjune wrote:
How bout an option to buy something that can turn everyone else into a skin/model of your own choosing?
Should just be like Quake 3 where you can turn everyone into Keel because he was the loudest and biggest/easiest target to hit.
cl_minmodels 1 was pretty much a given in my CS days. I like portraits and skins but not at the cost of peformance. My pc is struggling as it is.
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Germany3367 Posts
On October 01 2015 14:38 ETisME wrote:
does that point no.1 really work that way?
as long as the skins aren't changing the base model (not sure the right turn, basically the physical model), shouldn't the performance be similar?
In my own experience the zergling skin most of all (with speed upgrade) is really slowing down the performance of the game for me. It's also annoying as hell, because I can't estimate the number of lings coming my way with these stupidly large wings.
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Team logo portraits is something that would be awesome to have.
LoL does this and I think Riot splits the money on team icons with the teams (dunno how exactly) so something like this could be good for teams as well.
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On October 01 2015 07:25 Rehio wrote:
For the performance issues (and those who say playing against skins is annoying), I always kind of wondered: Why not an option to just.. turn it off?
Is it really bad to give the players options like that? Or is the technology for that more complex than I'd think?
Non you are right. Quake III had an option to turn off skins. In 1999.
On October 01 2015 08:34 riotjune wrote:
How bout an option to buy something that can turn everyone else into a skin/model of your own choosing?
Should just be like Quake 3 where you can turn everyone into Keel because he was the loudest and biggest/easiest target to hit.
It was into Sarge 
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i wanna choose my own color
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On October 01 2015 20:54 boxerfred wrote:
i wanna choose my own color
you're not the only one that's grown tired of blue vs red! and I do think this would provide some options.
The other thing I do think could have some marketability is portraits and decals. Unfortunately there's already a lot of them in the game, but I do think there could be room for growth there (even if just a little).
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Katowice25012 Posts
While I think people really overvalue what skins would do in SC2, as its considerably harder to monetize than something like Dota or CSGO, I also think the reasons for having none are kind of bs.
Technology for example, even outside the proposed solution you outlined, SC2 is a five year old game. Can people REALLY have that many performance issues? Who is out there playing SC2 on a laptop that's from 2009? That population seems like it would be tiny.
On October 01 2015 07:22 stuchiu wrote:
Random aside, but I’d like there to be esports related achievement/portraits. for instance, if I ragequit 4 games in a row without typing GG, I want a portrait of Idra.
I'd love this.
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On October 01 2015 17:38 TheOneAboveU wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2015 14:38 ETisME wrote:
does that point no.1 really work that way?
as long as the skins aren't changing the base model (not sure the right turn, basically the physical model), shouldn't the performance be similar? In my own experience the zergling skin most of all (with speed upgrade) is really slowing down the performance of the game for me. It's also annoying as hell, because I can't estimate the number of lings coming my way with these stupidly large wings.
Isn't that because the zergling skin added extra physics because of the longer wings?
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On October 01 2015 18:43 FFW_Rude wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2015 07:25 Rehio wrote:
For the performance issues (and those who say playing against skins is annoying), I always kind of wondered: Why not an option to just.. turn it off?
Is it really bad to give the players options like that? Or is the technology for that more complex than I'd think? Non you are right. Quake III had an option to turn off skins. In 1999. Show nested quote +On October 01 2015 08:34 riotjune wrote:
How bout an option to buy something that can turn everyone else into a skin/model of your own choosing?
Should just be like Quake 3 where you can turn everyone into Keel because he was the loudest and biggest/easiest target to hit. It was into Sarge
Yea Sarge was a good choice too, you could always tell where he was from a mile away because he jumped lol. I liked Keel because of his robotic clunk clunk footsteps, and I think his model represented the hitbox better over the other big model, Tank.
I think force model resulted in 1v1 players walking more and jumping less between battles/item spawn times in order to get the jump on the other guy heh
Though after a while one might get sick of playing against the same model over and over, one always had the option to turn off force model (during casual matches  )
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How about skins for select buildings instead of units, like food so far, maybe bases too? It seems Blizzard is considering more skins:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/1PEnNMt.png)
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I think for units skins in sc2, it could be a skin package and it redesigns every unit. So you can only have one unit skin active at a time.
For example my whole army will have the JAGW logos and uniforms if I had bought the JAGW skin.
Pretty sure that would help a lot with performance issues.
Buildings could have different skins I guess?
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Idk about unit skins, I don't want to have to keep track of all the different looks random units can have. I know there are a few already. I like the building skin idea more. Custom colors are cool too. And I say this as somebody who really does buy a lot of custom looks in games.
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however I just watched Polt do a LotV PvT and he played Marauders only because of Adepts. Hell, that was boring af. Skins wouldn't help.
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I think one "modified" skin per race is enough. best solution would be thor, ultra and collossus. No-Go on buildings and units that isn't 6supply. skins for zerglings is/was a very poor idea, incredibly hard to see how much they are.
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The thing you are underestimating with csgo is how much better the game is right now than it was in the hiddenpath days. The game when it came out was a louzy piece of steaming crap and the fact the csgo became more and more popular also comes down to the fact that valve did a great job at fixing the core mechanics and making it good. Of course, the skins helped a ton, hell, a lot, but if you want to retain those players, you have to have a good game. And I think a lot of people are just done with sc2, me included.
As you have mentionned, there is also the problem that it is significantly harder to make skins "a thing" in sc2. In that aspect, csgo is the perfect game for skins : you have your weapons in front of you all of the time cycling through them, people can pick them up, people watch you play with them during the game etc...
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EPT
