I do miss all the armor slots we had in Morrowind. Mixing and matching in that game made for some interesting looks. Plus, while the Enchantments may not have had much magnitude on the smaller pieces, a nice combo could be achieved to meet the role's requirements.

And let me wear a robe over my armor again.

Actually, I don't see how having another slot for pants is a problem with performance. Tons of unused slot masks are available in the engine.

I think they simply don't want to deal with clippings around the waist. Honestly, aesthetically speaking it's kind of a good idea. Custom armor modders in Oblivion (such as zotman12) used to just ditch pants entirely and provide the armor as a one-piece, so the number of equipments used is the same as in Skyrim.

This! I really miss the customization I got from the Morrowind armor system...made layering enchantments so much better.

Would you care if it was fallout-style? Or fallout style, where helmet is connected as well?

Also, they stated the reason behind not having pants in the whole game world was the scottish influence. Seriously though: It was only partly because of performance boost and much more of the art-style they were going for. They think a skirt leather armor looks nice, and didn't bother adding pants to them at all. So instead of allowing some armors to have pants and others not, they took them out completely.

I recall them saying that as well. Apparently most of the armors would have coveredup the legs, so they just took them out.

I think that Bigbossbalrog was talking about there being more Skyrim gamers on console than on PC. (6.33 million + 4.15 million) > (2.46 million + 5.01 million)

Yes.

I miss the Morrowind system as well. That said, having played the game, my guess is that while there might be some performance gain, the main reason was probably clipping. Morrowind's system allowed great customization, but also tended to clip horribly. I don't think you could get away with that amount of clipping without people complaining in a modern mainstream game. My guess is that the amount of clipping from having 8-9 armor slots and 12+ armor sets quickly becomes a problem when you have to try to make sure that all the pieces are compatible and that they don't clip. There are still some clipping issues, but probably fewer than Oblvioin and Morrowind. It could probably be done, but would limit the artistic style.

Doesn't honestly bother me.

No it wasn't a good idea, that garbage about having more NPC's on screen was minimal at best and only had to do with their coding. Oblivions inability to run more than 15 NPC's wasn't because of the clothes they wore.

I am fine with idea. Armors look better as a set.

I'd rather the programming time and detail etc be put into other stuff.

It's not an issue with TES but I'm also not so keen when armor pieces of a certain set are spread throughout so you have to travel to the ends to find them. I like unique pieces or rare complete sets to be searched out but not individual pieces. I want to be able to purchase a complete set at a given time.

Except there are more NPC's on screen and the armors have more detail now. Thank you Todd.

I'm sure the current system has it's advantages. It undoubtedly takes fewer system resources, is easier to avoid clipping issues that you would have with separate pieces, and allows for armor designs that wouldn't be possible if tops and bottoms had to be self-contained.

However, RPGs are largely about the characters we play and while the jumpsuit armor may have increased the dev's flexibility, it came at the cost of ours. Personally, I don't think it was a tradeoff I would have made.

read next time. You never cease to be entertaining by that logic Oblivion would have equivalent amount of NPC's if the armors were merged as well

X2

Ups

And here was me thinking I was in a relatively mature forum free from idiots like you..

But I agree with the others that if it means more NPC's its a price worth paying

Thanks, at least someone gets it.

Ok, maybe you didn't understand what I was saying so I'll reiterate.

More NPC's on screen oh of which the only time you'd notice in vanilla Skyrim is during the Civ war and "modded" are all the epic Battle vids on Youtube with next to no lag is because of the Optimized Coding -Bethesda- did for Skyrim. it has nothing to do with merging TWO armor pieces. mk? is it clearer now? if you actually examined rather than hanging on a statement NOT repeated since before Skyrims release Q1 2011, then maybe. just maybe

That's only the half of it. It allowed for better armor detail as well.

Yes their optimized coding allowed for more armor detail in a 2011 game that can sport 30-40+ NPC's without lagging in the least atleast depending on the system, we're in agreement.

This is what they said, and I believe it. Part of the reason vanilla Skyrim is so superior to vanilla Oblivion graphically is because they made this decision. Skyrim has less pop-up, a much greater draw distance, and the graphical details are simply finer overall. I'd rather have all these things than have seperate tops and bottoms. If I want to "mix 'n' match", I can always play TES: IV.

Just wait until TES VI gives us armor as one piece that covers all previous slots, chest, head, feet, and arms.

While you aren't 100% wrong, you are more wrong than you're right. The most important reason bethesda removed pants from the game was a few armor's design not having pants at all. While some clipping issues might've been fixed because of the limited amount of customization, it didn't add much to the performance of the game. Besides, the only time you'll see enough NPCs on the screen for it to matter is the civil war quest. Oblivion probably had almost as many NPCs on screen during the great gate quest.

I'd prefer more NPCs in the game world, but it feels like Skyrim has just as few as Oblivion, meaning, the removal of pants wasn't a deal I would've made.

Like in Fallout 3 and new vegas, but just the helmet also slammed into the mix.

If it was the helmet, then I might be a bit upset. Because most of the time, I just do not like to have helmets. But this is not about that though, it's about the torso and legs!