I know that the Founder's edition gets some cool skins - and I am NOT trying to get around buying that.



I was wondering what if I want red, blue or green Drakken hero or say brown Ice Wrags to help sell Desert Wrags (pretend minor faction mod), can we add our own skins? Is that possible - I assume so since Founder's editions does. I tried searching but did not see anything on to to do so myself.

Adding skins, even if it would be the easiest part to change (because it won't require new model or animation), is not possible through moddding at the moment.

This is something that we still need to look at in terms of feasibility.

Main issue is that we would have to share our own assets (skins).

I think that would be a no brainer. Games like these last much longer the more Moddable they are. Look at Civ4 for the perfect example. I understand there might be legalities to address before you can release your own assets. I just hope it is something you guys are working towards.

It would be really interesting, skins for units and maybe buildings as well. Adding some life to those black Vaulters towers would be really neat



Is it feasible on steam for other games to have a model like TF2 or Dota2? The users create skins that are submitted to the workshop, where the community votes on which ones should be introduced in the game; when that happens, they're offered as purchasable cosmetic items. Plenty of people would end up collecting skin packs just for sheer visual variety, myself included. Plus, added revenue.



Oh well, maybe one day I'm still getting used to this g2g model, maybe the users skin thing just doesn't fit.

I don't think a user created skin should be sold. Modders, usually do what they do to make the game they want to play, if they start charging for every little model and skin and whatever else, progress on those types of things would slow to a grind. Sure vote and have them put in a library, but sold? Only company stuffs should be sold. IMHO.

I would be nice that if the had a custom faction there was the option to use a custom or an alternate skin for those units.

Pikou wrote:
Adding skins, even if it would be the easiest part to change (because it won't require new model or animation), is not possible through moddding at the moment.

This is something that we still need to look at in terms of feasibility.

Main issue is that we would have to share our own assets (skins).

Something like this I have to agree with another commenter is a big no-brainer on. The more moddable a game is, the more life it has and more fun it is to mess with. I just bought this game today and I have to say I enjoyed it much more than Civilization. I was excited to learn one can mod the game, but was quickly disappointed to learn that custom 3D models and assets can't be added. I would have loved to add my own race and if this game was properly set up to make use of Steam Workshop it would have been pretty awesome to work with that. Take a look at games like Skyrim and Torchlight II and tons of others. They don't seem to have a problem releasing the tools necessary to modify existing models and create packages for mods with new data, up to and including total conversion mods. It seems as if the game was made with Unity though, and I know it's very feasible to load external assets in a Unity-compiled game. There's plenty of resources out there on how to do this. Obviously multiplayer wouldn't work as well unless both players have the same mods, but that's more of a programming logistics problem than anything else and for the time being can be easily restricted to single player until that's figured out.

What about adding new models and animations? This is what I do, and I would really love to be able to make the new units people add, visually distinct.

Also I think an easy way around sharing your assets, (As a fellow game designer I totally get the fear there.) You could simply share your uv shells, and also perhaps a set of dummy textures. you could just outline where the shells correspond with the in game mesh. Or just leave it up to your user's trial and error, the people who really want to make these mods will find a way.



I do agree with the above to an extent, protecting your assets is extremely important, but giving the fans the ability to enhance and expand your creation in their own time, with their own copies. Well, have you seen Skyrim's fanbase and modding community lately? That game came out 4 years ago. The modding community is STILL going strong, people replay and replay and mix and match it all. And basically all of those fans are going to get the next copy of their series as soon as it releases, with the assumption that their mod support will continue. (excluding the ridiculous step into the mmo arena lol) Just some things to think on.

these are excellent points. I continue to play Skyrim too. Mostly, right now, it would be great to be able to rename my heroes... C'mon guys Pecs Kerre, Pecs Kerre I, Pecs Kerre II, Pecs Kerre III, etc, etc, etc... Seriously??

kwbudburt wrote:
these are excellent points. I continue to play Skyrim too. Mostly, right now, it would be great to be able to rename my heroes... C'mon guys Pecs Kerre, Pecs Kerre I, Pecs Kerre II, Pecs Kerre III, etc, etc, etc... Seriously??

Ye I remember we talked about it during the early access... It seems they forgot to rename them ^^