[EDIT]: Since posting this article, BioWare announced that they will be removing the armor weight restrictions from the Outfit Designer and that it will available in the next PTS build.
If you’re one of those people who like to keep up with the latest fashions and needs to dress for every occasion, then cue up Augie’s Great Municipal Band, and get ready to dance in the streets, because the Outfit Designer is here. A word of warning though, it’s very good, but it’s far from perfect.
So what is the Outfit Designer? It’s a new system that allows you to change the armor your character is wearing without having to swap out all of the components and augments. A moment of silence for those making a living selling augment kits.
Now, before you get too excited thinking about all the credits you’ll be saving, the system is not free. It does make changing your appearance incredibly convenient though.
Here’s how it works, you get one equipment slot for free, and then you can purchase up to 15 more. That’s right, you can have a total of 16 different outfits for your character. This seems like plenty if you ask me, but I’m sure there are some of you who probably want twice that many.
The costs to unlock the slots are incremental. On the PTS, the cost to unlock a second slot is only 20K. Once you get around to unlocking a tenth slot the price maxes out at 500K. If you want to unlock all 16 slots it will cost you a cool 4.4 million credits. It does look like there will be an option to unlock slots using Cartel Coins.
The sucking of credits from your wallet doesn’t end here though. It will cost credits to build each outfit to the tune of 14K per armor piece. Each outfit can have seven pieces for a total cost of 98K for a full outfit. It doesn’t cost any credits to remove an item from an outfit, but it will cost you to replace it.
You can still dye your armor and there are a couple of ways that you can do that. You can put the dye in the armor and then put it in the outfit tab, or you can apply the dye module to an item after you create the outfit. Putting the module in the actual armor piece allows you to use that item in multiple outfits while utilizing the dye. Perfect if you have an expensive black/black dye in a piece. Applying a dye module to an item once it’s in the outfit tab will apply the coloring to only that outfit. And yes, dye modules are still consumable.
As I mentioned before the system is very good, but it also disappoints in some areas. One great feature is that armor is not limited to moddable gear. You can use white, common, and prototype items to create your outfits. I’ll pause here while I give you a moment to lament all of the wonderful items that you sold to a vendor that you now wish you had back.
There are restrictions based on the armor type your class wears. The system also does not apply to weapons, nor does it work with companions. It’s also not an equipment manager that lets you switch between PvE/PvP or tanking/healing gear.
The weapons and companions are the two biggest disappointments for me. Especially the companions. With the incredible gear that you can get for them there’s little incentive to try and create a comparable set of gear just so you can give your favorite companion that perfect look. While these issues won’t be addressed in 3.2, there is some hope that they may find their way into a future patch.
 Tait Watson |
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Hey everyone, We think having the Outfit Designer ignore armor weight restrictions is a great idea! We are actively exploring changing this now, and I’ll let you know as soon as I know anything else. I’ve also seen the mention of weapons and Companions being included in the Outfit Designer. Even though it may not seem like it, adding an Outfit Designer tab for Companions would effectively be creating a new system. Due to this we won’t be implementing one for 3.2, but will look into the option for a future release. Similarly, adding the ability to stamp weapons would require a lot of changes to the backend of the system that is currently in place, so it is unfortunately not feasible for a Game Update 3.2 release. -Tait |
I imagine that any future enhancements to this system are a long way off, so we’ll have to be patient. For now I’ll enjoy the system for what it is and rejoice in the fact that I can now run around Hoth wearing cold weather gear.
