customization Armoury expansions: Piecemeal armour; cosmetic weapon variants/ armour trim

[Sakya]

Hello!

The idea is basically, to provide alternate versions of weapons and armours. Mostly cosmetic.

 

Piecemeal armour:
>For each torso, split it in 5 parts that you can combine - Base, shoulders (left/right), arms (left/right)
>For each legs, split it in 3 parts that you can combine - Hips, legs (left/right)
Being able to mix and match would achieve lot of different armour patterns already. It would also make adding new versions easier (such as armoured kilt).
Some pieces could be purely decorative (such as pauldrons for shoulders). This would also allow for "barbarian armour" by adding non-protective straps in torso, then protective pauldron and single chain/scale arm piece.

Armour trim: 
For each piece (or for finished armour part) apply 1-3 trim patterns. They are purely cosmetic and can be made out of any metal or dye ingame. Maybe require blueprints found in ruins? Or bought from traders?

Weapon variants:
For each weapon head, add variants that are available to smith if looted blueprint is placed next to anvil. Alternatively, have it be used in crafting weapon itself if you don't want to add extra Falx heads etc. Point is, as reward for exploration you unlock new variants of same weapon.

Hilts:
Scavenged or crafted, hilts could be used for further weapon and tool customization, used in place of stick. When tool breaks, get hilt back.

All of these could be used to customize mid to lategame experience. Two factions could have full steelplate armour but entirely different colours for it. It would be especially great when it comes to making new ruins and such, since you could add hints of individual cultures within them, differentiated by different hilts, trims, armour piece combinations found inside.

[LadyWYT]

2 hours ago, Sakya said:

Hilts:
Scavenged or crafted, hilts could be used for further weapon and tool customization, used in place of stick. When tool breaks, get hilt back.

I wouldn't mind having some different materials to make handles from, but if the tool/weapon has been used enough to break, so should the handle.

 

2 hours ago, Sakya said:

Armour trim: 
For each piece (or for finished armour part) apply 1-3 trim patterns. They are purely cosmetic and can be made out of any metal or dye ingame. Maybe require blueprints found in ruins? Or bought from traders?

I like the idea but not the implementation, as it feels too much like Minecraft. A better option, I think, is having colorful cloaks, sashes, or animal pelts as cosmetics that can be worn over armor, or otherwise creating some sort of painting system the player can use to paint patterns on shields, similar to chiseling. I think options like those are both much more realistic, as well as offer much more options in general. 

 

2 hours ago, Sakya said:

Piecemeal armour:
>For each torso, split it in 5 parts that you can combine - Base, shoulders (left/right), arms (left/right)
>For each legs, split it in 3 parts that you can combine - Hips, legs (left/right)
Being able to mix and match would achieve lot of different armour patterns already. It would also make adding new versions easier (such as armoured kilt).
Some pieces could be purely decorative (such as pauldrons for shoulders). This would also allow for "barbarian armour" by adding non-protective straps in torso, then protective pauldron and single chain/scale arm piece.

I was thinking about this the other day, in that a Morrowind-style system would be interesting. By that I mean splitting armor into a few more pieces, and then letting players mix and match those pieces as desired to get the look/practical benefits they want. Don't have a lot of metal? Might want to invest in gambeson for legs/torso and use some plate for a helmet/boots. If you're wanting to focus primarily on ranged, maybe you invest in a plate cuirass but leave off the pauldrons to make firing bows/spears easier.

I think it might be a bit much though. According to a recent interview, there's potentially some armor changes coming, but no information about what that could really be.

[Sakya]

While I understand your point on trims, I just wish we could add gold, molybchalcos etc patterns on armour. Decorating was a thing done in past and it'd be nice

Extra decor like fur etc on top of armor would also be nice. But trimming would be great.

 

[I Suck At Coding]

I've had the idea for trim on chain mail and other armor for some time, i think i might add it to my mod, i already got some scope creep, why not more?

For armor i would remove the trim from the vanilla texture; create separate trim textures for every material type, and create recipes for them.

Same thing for chain, but perhaps also have separate belts for every trim texture.

For plate armor i would make; blackened, gilded, perhaps silver plated idk, something like that.

The only problem with this method is that you would need to make an insane amount of textures for instance,

let's say you make 4 belt textures and 5 trim textures for mail, That would be 180 textures!

Because all mail types like; iron, steel, bronze, black bronze, etc. Need all 4 belt and 5 trim textures.

Hmm on second thought i might not add this feature, or at least not on every material type, since i would need to make every texture manually. (To my knowledge at least) 

In all this would be a simple feature to implement, if you can add overlays on textures, which i bet you can, but i don't know how. (And i ain't using ai, soo if anyone knows tell me)   

Edited April 8 by I Suck At Coding

[runnybabbit]

On 3/25/2026 at 1:46 AM, LadyWYT said:

A better option, I think, is having colorful cloaks, sashes, or animal pelts as cosmetics that can be worn over armor, or otherwise creating some sort of painting system the player can use to paint patterns on shields, similar to chiseling

Surcoats would be amazing too!