Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Focused Feedback: Halflings

Thanks for the words of support ^.^ Hope everyone had a good unspecific celebratory festival day/Friday.

I'm almost to the end of the standard poses and animations now. Today it's dual wielding stances. Halflings have got unique stances for dual wielding, compared to human sized models, and they aren't too bad, however, there are some anomalies to look into.

On human-sized models, there are two dual-wielding ready stances - one for light weapons like daggers, and one for larger or heavier weapons, which is most other things. Halflings currently use the same stance for all dual wielding, regardless of weapons; No way currently to tell if this is intended or not, but here they are, plus the recovery poses for each.






So, for heavier weapons, male and female human-sized models have slightly different pose data - only slightly, but there are tweaks. It appears to have been designed for human males first, and then altered to soften the pose for females. Halflings use the same pose regardless of sex, and it's okay - it doesn't look bad, per se, but it is a little off balance. As is often the case, bringing the leading foot in slightly would make the pose look more stable; only slightly though, and it's okay as is in a pinch. It's quite acceptable for a ready pose. On both models, the back leg clips up into the torso section a little bit, and this pose also goes an unfortunate way to showing off just how disproportionate the female halfling chest is with the current models.

On human-sized models, we have a different stance for light dual wielding - here, male and female seem to use the same base pose data, I would like to make special note of the fact that the human female pose for light weapon dual wielding is currently Static and does not animate.

Halflings don't have an alternate pose for lighter dual wielding - however on both male and female halflings, their feet do not anchor, and they slide into the ground, distorting the rest of the pose. As the pose animates, you can see the feet slide around, and the model swivels on a floating anchor point that is closer to the hip area.

The recovery poses are unique on male human-sized models, being different for heavier and lighter weapon dual wielding - thought he males have an odd clipping issue where the left leg meets the hip. Female humans have their own recovery pose, but they use the same pose data for both heavy and light dual wielding. Again, I cant tell if this is intended, but it is inconsistent. The recovery pose itself is fine.

On halflings, the recovery pose itself is pretty decent, but Male and female halfings both use the exact same pose, for both heavy and light dual wielding, with no variation anywhere. The result is that for larger or longer weapons, we end up with bad weapon clipping. Though it uses the same pose data, this recovery pose looks better on female halflings than it does on males; if they are going to change one, they should give the males something different. The visual causes males to look back-heavy on their centre of gravity, and they don't have enough forward weight to maintain it, while on the female models, their centre of gravity looks much better, and the whole pose results in looking more balanced overall. This is exacerbated by the way the male halfing's foot placement end sup ahead of their knee, while for females it remains more vertical, creating a more solid forward anchor.

Not too bad here, compared to other things. Just a couple more to do, and if I'm quick, I'll have picked up the weapon type I'm missing by that point.