The character models would not necessarily have to have the same origin to use the same scale, though they may if it was easier to extend them than start from scratch.
I would think Larian has already adjusted the scale of the avatar for higher resolutions, unless zooming all the way out is meant to get a wide overview of the land. In the Evil Islands demo, zooming out is good for traveling, but doesn't show much detail for fights.
I'm all for higher quality avatars (I plan to use Riftrunner to justify upgrading my video card, even if that is not actually a necessity <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/winkwink.gif" alt="" /> ), but the latest pictures are fairly detailed. The game is still a few months away from release, so I would think/hope the 3D engine will be further optimized to improve quality (Larian doesn't want poor quality avatars any more than we do). 3D will not be as good quality as hand optimized 2D renderings, but the animations will be more fluid and have much greater variety. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/up.gif" alt="" />
