Guild Chat - Episode 86

The following is an unofficial, player-written transcript of the episode. The accuracy of this transcription has not been verified by ArenaNet.
The 86th episode of Guild Chat aired on May 24, 2019. It went behind-the-scenes on in the development of the Skyscale mount.
Summary[edit]

Today's Guild Chat, hosted by Rubi, was everything to do with the skyscale. Guests and highlights are as follows.
Rubi Bayer (Host)
Hotfix coming soon to reduce time-gates on Skyscale collections
Mox Gauntlet for Charity updates
- Arena.Net raised $1,240 for the charity
- Steven Stadnicki reached Top 15 individual fundraiser
Joel Heimlich (Gameplay Programmer)
While the base max range of the skyscale's flight limited (one keg brawl field, from my tests), the Wall Launch mastery is the intended means for the skyscale to traverse long distances.
They're working on tweaking the interaction of max canopy height with things like Jump Mushrooms, ley lines, etc.
"The original design was for [the skyscale] to move along walls"
Wall Launching horizontally gets you more "flight juice" back
Regarding "Why can't the skyscale just have free flight?" "The game's mounts are built around [the mounts] interacting with terrain... [the skyscale was designed to hover, but also interact with walls]"
Steven Stadnicki (Content Programmer)
The collection quests were designed to make the skyscale feel as much as a living creature as much as possible.
"All the raising is for the players to build this bond with the skyscale."
Collections unlocked after the end of the story so as to not distract players from the story, and give players more to do after the story
Joe Clark (Senior Sound Designer)
Compilation of callback cues for Skyscale of Courage collection
Footstep sound effects involved using crushed eggshells on different surfaces
Skyscale guttural was synthesized using the following audio layers:
- a leopard,
- MAPP Gas Torch,
- upright bass (for multiple layers; pitch and distortion alterations included),
- yogurt in bellows,
- jello in bellows,
- rubber band on djembe, and
- a balloon.
Skyscale guttural while idling was a result of the following mix:
- balloon on doumbek,
- upright bass,
- Greek yogurt in bellows,
- cherry jello in bellows,
- voice with glass chimney,
- MAPP gas torch, and
- a rubber trash can dragged on carpet.
Kate Peeilschieeter (Creature Art Lead)
Brian Walter (Creature animator)
Designer of the fish-feeding fidget
Peter Egbers (Creature artist)
The scales were handcrafted, rather than stamped, to get the best look
Transcription[edit]

Note: The text below hasn't yet been converted from raw subtitle text into pretty print. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIgCYPOiNuE
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hi teria happy Friday and welcome to
guild chat thank you for spending some
time with us today
I'm your host Ruby and we are gonna be
talking about the sky scale today I have
I have a small friend that one of our
dev guests brought me so we can thank
him here in a little bit so we're going
to talk about the sky scale we mentioned
a few weeks ago that we were going to do
a little bit deeper dive into the design
and implementation of all parts of the
sky scale so we are going to talk about
that with six of our dev guests today a
couple things that I want to mention
first if you have somehow missed the
forum post about updates on the
acquisition about updates on the
collection a couple notes the mastery
track was not supposed to be blocking
spirit chart acquisition so we hop fixed
that and that changes and now it does
not do that anymore and I know there's
been a lot of talk about the collections
and the time gating on that so in case
you missed it again there's a hotfix
coming in on May 28th we're going to
reduce the time between collection tiers
from 24 hours to 2 hours that's the
difference between one real-world day
and one Tyrian day and you can also feed
your sky scale four times a day instead
of three so that maxim of that time off
in case you missed that if you want to
read a little bit more about that or
talk about it with the rest of your
community you can check that out on the
forums so with that said those updates
are incoming and now we're going to have
a chat with our first round of dev
guests starting with Steven I do want to
talk to you first
until you congratulations for the
gauntlet last weekend well thank you so
much it was absolutely amazing
yeah you guys you guys did fantastic
work you our community really did a
great job supporting us ArenaNet ended
up raising one thousand two hundred and
forty dollars for charity Steven was in
the top 15 individual fundraisers out of
the entire gauntlet so that was amazing
thank you so much and
you seriously like people I don't know
we're donating to me because of the
screams so thank you for for getting the
chance very happy to do you want to talk
a little bit about the event we have a
couple pictures in the event check you
guys out yeah do you want to talk a
little bit about what that day was like
it it was a rush we got there a little
bit early sat around tried to get in a
couple of quick games of parade because
that was one that we hadn't had a chance
to try out beforehand and it worked out
pretty well I think for everybody else
on the team
for my own part parade was not my strong
suit I think I scored like 35 and 40 in
the two games which would be great
except it's a low score wins game and
the other teammates were like at 10 and
12 so not quite so great but I had much
better luck in the trivia round and then
the last round they had this wonderful
combination of carnival games and puzzle
solving and I am an inveterate puzzle
solver so I got to fiddle with pencil
and paper whilst people were throwing
balls at milk cans so you were like
cracking your knuckles going get out of
the way my time has come
pretty much that exact waiting awesome
well congratulations thank you for all
of the work that you did preparing for
this event
and thank you tyria for supporting us
and helping us to support el centro de
centro de la raza
this was a super successful super fun
year for our first year participating it
was absolutely amazing thank you so much
everyone yeah definitely
alright so let's talk sky scale I'm
gonna have each of you go down the line
introduce yourselves what you do here at
ArenaNet
and talk about what you worked on for
the sky scale I am Steve instead Nicky I
work as a Content programmer which is
kind of a straddled role between
programming and technical design and
I've just recently come to this role and
so as part of my spin up on the design
aspects of it I worked with the primary
content designer for the sky scale
aleena to implement some of the
collections
see thank goodness that's my name
I'm Joel Helmick I'm gameplay programmer
worked on mostly movement stuff
general mechanics I sort of inherited it
a couple months into the design process
as a Elena was working on it it was like
oh by the way there's a lot of work to
do and we're calling in bringing out of
retirement one last job it's not true
but I I do a lot of things I have my
fingers in many pies and when you put
your fingers in pies nobody else wants
them so you end up owning them how that
saying goes but yeah but moving
mechanics that kind of stuff Joe Joe
Clark I'm a senior sounds owner
I worked on the audio for this guy's
girl I think work on everything that
goes on here goodbye Heather or human or
three teammates designing and
implementing what it sounds like in
correct forms yep gotta roles the
movement the abilities yeah I'm excited
about this because we have some videos
of that to show later on and where we're
going to get into the breakdown of what
makes these sounds exactly let's start
off though and talk a little bit about
movement the motion of the thing
iterating the design figuring out what
problem this is trying to solve where
did you even start yeah okay so so when
I was handed this thing start with when
I said please please work on this more
and and keep it ring on it
I had already had the sort of flight off
a little envelope concept where it's
like it can operate within this sort of
shell and then do things but they can't
like go outside of it and so my first
job was making that a little more
reliable because it wasn't had some
problems but beyond that is like okay
well done that sounds it's functional
but not like exciting like it needs it
needs some some thing that people can
buttons people can push into stuff which
is where the - came from for example
like dashes are cool people enjoy planes
and more than that the the wall jump is
something sort of I think that's sort of
the defining aspect of this
or anything else and they actually came
out of came out of frustrations with
just missing ledges like he was just
short oh if only I could if I was
talking over some people oh yeah right I
imagine you've been that situation like
a Griffin or something yeah sure yeah I
usually I'll like bash into the side of
the cliff and just try to just get it by
yourself I get spaced really hard and
and so having some kind of like some
wool volt it originally wasn't like a
cling or anything I thought it was just
a you could time it just right like an
like platforming games a lot of times
we'll have like you can stick to all
four second don't let you get space burn
you jumped up onto the thing so that was
the original idea was like hey we hit it
and then you've got like a second or so
and they can kind of jump up high and
then at some point in if well until you
could just stick to the wall forever it
doesn't really make any difference and
some people thought that was cool so it
ended up just just happen that clinging
opposed and you can just kind of chill
and stare at people and watch them
silently yeah well I'm out no no I can
talk for as long as you'd like
no please so you started with sticking
to the walls and then once you get that
mastery yeah so so the way the way it
works currently is is you can you can
stick to the wall by holding forward you
can but the third mastery is what
actually is what you actually want and
that's that's alone that lets you push
spacebar that you burn some energy you
jump and you get some altitude back and
they ended up being nice to go where I
want to go with this conversation they
end up being sort of like the real
innovation part of it I guess I believe
this is the sort of a new thing that
brings to the table its whether I think
it's kind of hard to notice this when
you're playing it but it's that is the
tool that you use for moving long
distances with this thing where you're
usually when whenever you use the wall
jump if you have moved substantially
like if you're like way over like near
your altitude cap or whatever or you've
gone past your elbow to captain and clip
to a wall that you push jump it'll push
that ceiling back up again
closer to where it was originally yes
the idea is you can move along a cliff
pretty far and you keep using wall jumps
and go to another cliff wall jump now is
sort of the envision design behind this
thing it's like okay well this is how
well this is how it'll do sort of
creative long-distance motion as you
create a jump between cliffs okay so if
you haven't made use of that yet you
should try that yes but that that that's
sort of like that resetting of the
flight ceiling isn't necessarily obvious
unless you've done played it for a while
which of course I have cuz sites but
people who have just gotten their sky
skills might not notice that might not
think to try it like oh I could use this
to move really far they might just be
thinking of it as a means of moving
vertically straight up and not off and
you can absolutely use it to go long
distances you did just remind me that we
are we did pull a lot of questions off
the forum and we're going to answer some
of those at the end of the segment yeah
what were some of your favorite things
about working on this it's a dragon
there's not a downside it's bragging
rights
they're cool I know I you'll have my
layer of brand the animator for it he's
he just want to work with ya this one
have a back and forth just just working
with other people on the project it's
not really they've got quite the what
you wanted to ask but that works I just
take it it's just fun to work like the
people involve is fun yeah that's well
let's I want to talk about the
collections a little bit with you
Stephen what we're well okay so we've
talked some about the different parts of
the collections and what's required and
what's needed and the time and the time
gate I'm trying so hard to say timescale
which is a very different thing that we
don't want to mess with how did you
decide how do you all decide some of
what went into the collections and
requirements with the caveat that a lot
of it was not my own personal choices
yeah this was a team effort
the core intention was to make it feel
like
an actual living creature as much as
possible and that extended to the
collection aspect so all the raising is
to get the players to build this bond
with their sky scale I think more so
than you get a chance to with a lot of
the other mouths and really have that
sense that this is something that I've
taken from the world and invested my
time in and now is giving back to me
through this well through this bouncing
through the world aspect yeah what were
some of your favorite things about
implementing this I think my favorite
was getting to drive through a few
regions that I hadn't really dug into
before I've poked at the Dwarven delves
under Highlands a little bit but over
the process of implementing collections
I put several pieces into the delves and
so that got a chance that gave me a
chance to kind of go through it a lot in
a much calmer manner when not everything
is trying to kill me and gave me a much
better appreciation for some of the
places yeah mm-hmm all right and we also
have some questions for you later on
something that you mentioned to me that
I wanted to make sure we called out that
you really enjoy was the player
cooperation aspect of different parts of
the collection even in some of its
weirder iterations
oh it is it is amazing one of the
reasons that I can tell that I'm not
that I'm still new to design is for one
of the achievements you have to read a
certain number of characters and the way
that players have chosen to do this is
by gathering together in places like
Divinity's reach at the edge of cliffs
and doing their best lemming impressions
jumping over to be raised by the people
below and every other designer I've
spoken to about this was like oh of
course they're going to do that wait
what oh no it's it's a good it's a good
example of player cooperation and they
will find it death finds a way that's by
the way
so how did you just like stumble across
this on live and pretty much exactly
that like I I was not expecting it until
I saw it and then suddenly it made
perfect sense you're like this clicking
noise that's what's gonna happen you
also mentioned that you didn't get to
come into the office to do some of this
that's right when we were doing the
initial collection implementation it was
if I remember correctly late February
and for anybody who's not in this area
late February was snowpocalypse for
basically all of Seattle yeah we're in
the span of a week and a half we got
something like a foot and a half of snow
thrown on top of us and where you live
was really bad it is I don't live
anywhere near the office I'm about 20
miles to the north and our house is at
the end of a cul-de-sac and this shot
right here so this was the view out my
front window for the first week and a
half after I got the got the tasks on my
plate and thankfully we had just gotten
the implementation of or I had just
gotten set up proper VPN so I could work
from home and so this was the first time
that I was able to actually start doing
real like coding and design work from
the office from home as opposed to you
know doing documentation whatnot so I
was able to do a lot of the driving
around teria and duo work which is our
content editor from from my house where
it was warm and I didn't have to try and
drive down 405 with all the other
maniacs I did the plows ever get to your
neighborhood I meant to ask him curious
they never actually did there was this
zone of about a quarter mile between our
house and the first turn off from our
cul-de-sac where they just waited for it
to melt which meant that even after the
snow ended we had about three more days
of Oh nothing's happening and all of the
actual streets are clear but there's
this quarter mile of hockey rink between
me and anywhere that I feel like I could
drive yeah so thank you for being
persistent and getting in getting that
done it
absolutely it was it was a legitimately
fun I got to ski to the store a couple
of times for food did you really I did
we have cross-country skis and so I was
able to trek to the local Albertsons I
might have seen you do yeah new mount
concept new cross-country skis
cross-country ski how to cross-country
ski mount actually stickers okay okay
you might have just seen the birth of a
design idea
alright so Joe how about you do you want
to talk a little bit about designing and
implementing these guys sound and where
you even started yeah I think again like
working on a dragon is exciting so uh
okay I actually haven't worked on
dragons prior to this that was pretty
awesome
wait you didn't I had not actually done
dragon before now so this is kind of
like in the past sound designer
extraordinaire and former audio director
drew Katie kind of covered that so he
said a high bar for me to kind of match
and uh
of the nice kind of approach so I had a
little bit of reference of what dragons
and serious sound like and I just kind
of get my own approach and yeah so a lot
went into the dragon one thing to call
out is I mean I did all the audio the
most part and then also another senior
sounds on your Chris Burges helped out
with the footsteps designed the
footsteps for that and that was an
interesting one because we want to make
the footstep sounds different from other
mounts so we kind of want to get the
weight of the dragon it may be it's not
literal but just kind of like figurative
like the dragon yeah what that would
sound like give me a little more oomph
and Chris also had a great idea too in a
previous Chris's also our go-to
cinematics audio support so in the
previous cinematic he had a I think was
Keith's branding with Orion oh yeah he
really wanted to focus on the kind of a
claws and nails of Orion so he added
some kind of crushed eggshells to that
kind of get that clickety sound and a
little bit with debris like rock and
stuff so
he suggested that be a nice layer for
the dragon to make it they like a little
different so we added that and kind of
come up the idea maybe really accentuate
that on the hard surfaces so if you're
walking around with your dragons flying
you're walking around you'll really hear
those unlike metals and woods and stuff
like that so that was kind of fun and
then I definitely wanted to get the wing
flaps right I put it like a nice a nice
leather layers in there sighs you're
gliding you'll kind of get some nice
leathery sounds I also didn't want to be
too heavy so I kind of soften that out
so as you're flying it's not - yeah yeah
well do you want to show off the
breakdown of some of these yes extremely
fun to me designing some gutturals for
most creatures a similar approach and
it's not just really like all right so
Matt's dragon needs a sound and it's not
just roar you know someone singled know
I sound comes out you want to kind of
get the whole motion of the sounds if
you think like some kind of animal or
there's a little bit of like the pre
like breathe in like there and then the
sounds like the actual illusion and then
you kind of want to have a nice towel a
little bit of like the spikes that maybe
the spasm of the throw and just kind of
like the body just like big exertion and
then kind of you know come back to rest
so I feel like we need your lamp chimney
for this a little bit of that right now
actually yeah so yeah design sound is
interesting you'll have caught some of
our earlier audio segments - sound
design you know trying to recreate or
create a new sound and it's kind of like
pulling in with other assets you have
the sound in your mind and you know it
sounds like cooking it sounds like and
all these all these ingredients I want
so for the sky scale you know I got like
a reptile I kind of referenced obviously
pre-existing driving concepts and
like a krokodil or something like those
one of the coolest and sign animals it's
very uh girthy and like a lot of uh yeah
so yeah we could take a look at so my
yeah so do we have first
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you
Wow
yeah so I didn't want to go too deep in
there by like one of the things that
brought attention to it was like you
know there's a lot of processing in
there but pitch reverb distortion little
Distortion
some problem I think was it was the yeah
anyway yeah just kind of like separating
like why don't you give a little taste
of this is the sound I pulled from and
then just adding a little bit of like
pitching it down and and some distortion
skips a little more energy and separates
a map gasps some of the layers you know
I want like friction so friction is
great friction is your friend for sound
design and for us having a nice Foley
room really helps so we can get those
gestures and get that the sound we want
so like a rubber band on a djembe which
is a drum like just kind of like shaking
your hand vibrating your hand as you're
pulling down which kind of adds to the
character of the sound and the map gas
which is like a you know welding torch
kind of gave us that I went to that
sound for like a little bit the grit a
little bit like the rasp of the of the
sound so I do we have some more
you
you
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you
you
moved his garbage can on the rug
carpet and it was like these alligators
just always listen anything like yeah I
remember Drew had this story a while
back about how he was a visiting family
and there was a squeaky door oh yeah at
the end of a hallway or something and
that's everybody else was just like oh
and knowing squeaky door he waited to
everybody else was asleep so it would be
quiet and went and recorded I did the
same thing with the San Juan Island with
my fiance justification we have this
random house Cinda open the doors a clip
screen door it was like this sounds
amazing
so wait for it to fall asleep my creeped
out there and played it around that door
and I don't know yeah that's how you get
this stuff to answer the incredibly
important questions that were just
passed wasn't test from chat it was
Greek yogurt and cherry jello yeah so
it's good that we have a priority you
get a completely different sound off of
traditional yogurt and never mix the
cherries in correct I want to know if
this is true I need like a be testing on
this Stephen has caused this and I
wanted to clarify that you did clean the
bellows out because it's concerning me a
lot because I go in there sometimes very
yes think I might still be red but you
have the jello is interesting so with
the believe of the yogurt had the nice
little gala P sounds I kind of added
that to like the towel the cow saying of
the sky scales got a roll so you can't
get that as me throat I just think
that's a nice way to design and then
with the G yellow was a very light kind
of bellow movement so it was kind of
giving this airiness to it so I think
what's interesting about like kind of
like breaking these out for people I
think I'm a bio sauna but I you can see
here's all these sounds in isolation and
you're just like you put them all
together and like you don't maybe you
can pull pick some out you know now that
you've heard them in isolation but just
like in as I design it you know it's
just very interesting just legitimately
I had no idea there were that many
layers in it it's there's a good amount
yeah there's a lot going on there
yes um speak did we have another one or
was there two more we have two more okay
look yeah let's do another one
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you
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you
you
you
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you have a lot of weird stuff in that
room I just I just want to say anything
goes just it goes to making such cool
stuff next one real quick
you
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I didn't mention in the stove door I
remember we got that stone - we're still
in our room I did a little pitch
envelope so I just kind of draw in a
quick envelope for the pitch so it's not
just the screen so kinda like screeching
it's kind of like I want to get that
gesture yeah there's a lot going on
there Wow
yeah I had no idea the crow I thought
the girls funny fauna it's actually I
good me it's across aisle but I push it
down a bunch and just kinda Foreman
sound like you the funny thing is I can
still recognize the crow just because we
hear them so constantly here absolutely
think so there are how many layers were
into that last one did I count eight oh
I lost count the car actually the car
engine Rev was funny a kind of a guy
knows I'm designing I'm like I'm pulling
people and I'm getting a lot of
reference from my team and crosses the
playing area you know and another senior
technical sound designer Keenan C came
in and like a car engine are you talking
so I threw that in there like perfect
this is great yeah so did you already
have that or do you have to go out to
the parking garage she already has car
okay I didn't have it I would have yet
but yeah that's fair
you know what while we're on the topic
of audio something that you had called
out about part of the collection was the
musical callback mmm
to various battles my one little design
suggestion for the collection was I did
the implementation on the talk to your
egg aspects of the collection where you
bring it to heart of thorns I'm
completely blanking on the name of the
the McGoohan struggle you bring it to
the jungle and tell it how you defeated
mordremoth's you tell us how you
defeated Balthazar and Keenan was able
to put together some little callback
cues for that that
just absolutely amazing do we have those
we do have those okay so let's listen to
those
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that was such a good musical cue I like
I like that you guys work together on
that just reminiscent of each battle it
was just an amazing job
kudos to Keenan for that and yeah I was
really as I was putting yeah as I was
putting together we knew that we
couldn't have voice for these so it'd be
great I thought it would be great if
like we could at least have some
explanation almost of what you were
doing right there and the audio was the
perfect thing for that okay so I went to
hit up questions here shortly but you
had commented about the name of that
we've been saying dragon this whole time
and but there was like some work that
went into that particular thing there
was I've been every time somebody says
dragon I have this little flinch
internally because I got like multiple
weeks of training almost on sky scale
remember it's the sky scale and there
was like there were actual passes over
all the content that went in both for
the collection and I think for the map
itself that we're like did we call it a
dragon anywhere make sure we didn't call
it a dragon anywhere it's a sky scale
I'm sorry I know this isn't how it works
but I'm just picturing a giant fine to
replace for much of its lifetime in
development it didn't have the name it
was the dragon I had to actually that
was one thing while I was placing all
the content for my collections I had to
keep this list up in a window of the
real names of the maps the flavor facing
games maps and the internal names of the
maps internally it was like a devil idea
every time somebody uses one I'm just
like no I need you to translate that for
me because I've only remembered about
half of them mm-hmm so and then we keep
having new maps and I don't know those
names either like I don't know point to
it all right so do you guys want to talk
about some of what our players in the
forum's had questions about all right
all of these are exhibit list I'm sorry
I put them in order so you guys could
read them easily Joel you're up well I
will I'll take four
and then I guess see when you can take
the last one yeah from there how do you
balance mountains yes pretty broad
question um there's there's no I hurt or
fast rule on how I do it I'm not the
only one but I I usually I look at like
the first the first thing I like it like
let's say that the basic design of the
mountain is like an we know that it's
trying to solve this problem
approximately and then it's like okay
well I like for example you look at like
like a raptor Griffin or something and
it's like how good is it at solvent like
getting across a canyon and like okay
well like just or jumping in the air and
you start tracing out the path of Italy
okay well what's what's the arc look
like how far can it go how high up on
something can I get and then you just
start finding different places in the
world it's like should I be able to get
on this can I get on that or I could get
on that should I be able to get on that
kind of stuff it's it's a lot of sort of
fuel and eventually gets into hard
numbers but for a lot of the initial
work it's just kind of a just try it
just play around with a lot I can also
actually speak to this one a little bit
because I did use some of the mount
movement for path fire itself and Joel
and I were kind of like the devil and
angel sides of Mount Mullen where Joel
is a big proponent of making it better
where better is like more exciting and
more fun and I am that quiet voice
always saying do you realize how much
this will break and then especially
after I took on some of the skimmer
movement stuff I've always kind of had
this little glare now again like you're
not going to make it worse now are you
people aren't going to stop using this
and so there's there's that a little bit
of like I think part of the balance is
making sure that every mount does have
its place that it is especially like
going forward you always have to look
back at the existing Pantheon the mounts
like look at well I do have we outclass
have have we outclassed something to the
point where no one's going to bother
with it anymore
because if so that's that's that's a
problem and like every single like this
the sky scale let's say I'm gonna use
the right
it's very good at going up to the point
where there was a concern that it would
completely displace Springer and so one
of the compromises okay well what if we
just made this burgers Hertz faster so
it's better if you guys guys might be a
while so some sometimes the correct
answer is to go back and look at the the
mounts that are getting stepped on a
logo we can do we can bring this up a
little it's actually safe to do so
maybe we're a little too conservative or
initially it's like that's actually okay
to to make this a little better and then
sometimes the answer is okay the new one
there's like it's completely blowing
this out we got that mm-hmm there's no
singular rule why also I actually sorry
I'm writing it suddenly from puff-puff
development I really appreciate I don't
think players ever saw much of this but
the sky scales engage skill is actually
a callback to some of the early engaged
skills that were being kicked around Oh
or some of the tests that were being
done for mounts and like mounted combat
skills almost and I just remember you
flaming everything in Queens Dale with
uh with burns coming in and breathing
fire apparently yeah that's Gabe yeah
that that was that was like early mounts
development before we even had a strong
concept of what we wanted to do yes like
well I would what's the thing you're
gonna want to fly it's gonna be a dragon
so when found the Weaver and it's the
closest I could get and every legendary
wyvern you weren't screwing around I
mean if you're gonna burn stuff and yes
still every time I see sky skill engaged
that's the thing that I call back to my
head so I always kind of laugh at that
one video because he you know you bring
in that legendary tail - he's emulating
everything and there's one bandit going
a little help dude it is far too late
done here the kid who's like I'm gonna
get you you chicken you don't know what
a chicken no that's not how any of this
works that was super fun so how about
that second one
actually Stephen would you like to take
guys because these are all gonna be me
except for the last last question I'll
jump in on last one then I'm sure so
there are a couple of reasons why the
collection begins at the end of the
reason at the end of the I can read the
question sorry for those who haven't
seen this the question is why did you
decide within the quest then begin the
collection after the end of the episode
instead of when you first meet the sky
scales and primarily there are story
reasons for that we need gorrik to help
you through the entire collection gorks
very busy during the storyline of Dragon
fall the sky skills don't get sick until
the events of Dragon fall I'm not going
to spoil those events but for story
reasons it made the most sense to place
the collections beginning after the
episode itself has completed and it also
gave us the opportunity to give players
something to do after the episode
it's nice when players can actually play
through the entire story and there's
just some concern that if you start a
collection in the middle of this story
the players some players will go off and
divert themselves with the collection
and never come around finishing the
episode so we just really wanted to make
this an epilogue and something that you
could do to further explore the story of
these creatures
once you've finished exploring the story
of the map itself that makes sense so
there's more to do after you finish the
story exactly okay I will answer third
one there okay so there's a the question
is will there be adjustments to the
overall mechanics of the mount I mean
it's pretty broad question
no with exceptions so it's so that the
the main concern I've seen raised in in
various discussion forums is it's
actually pretty it's a pretty specific
thing but a lot of people want to work
which is when you mount this thing in
the air after you use an updraft I have
to use a jump mushroom you break out of
it that cetera we had made we being me
had made a change to Griffon where when
you mount the Griffon in midair
it sets it's effectively sets its
altitude ceiling to where you mount up
so so
back up that much stuff so the way
Griffin has this concept of a soft
ceiling where when you are pitching up
there's no like hard cap but the gravity
starts to crank up after you get a
certain amount over where you started
for the clean the idea being you have to
at least get up onto a cliff in order to
be able to get to that height anymore so
you can't just like go super high yeah
and so the mechanics it's fairly
generous when you're trying to recover
your ltitude when you pitch up again you
can often get up higher than where you
started but there is this this soft
ceiling that will keep you from going
too high and so what happened as people
take a jump mushroom and they'd Milan
the Griffon and then dive and try to
pitch up and the ground point be way
down here so they could and they
couldn't actually counted so the
solution to I was fine we'll just set
the ground position wherever you mounted
no problem this guy so doesn't have that
which is partially an oversight I
thought I'd I thought I'd fix this but
it just kind of slipped down to the
Ritter but now I was thinking about this
yesterday is a how to actually solve it
it's actually complicated so right now
this guy scales a flight canopies based
on its last ground position and if we
were to reset that to its current
position when it mounts up suddenly your
L stood would bump up a lot and so what
people would do is they would fly to max
height ejector seat mount back up again
and now you're Ella stood cap bumped up
but the full flight cap and then they
just keep doing that forever so the
ejector seat is that's a person my fault
every time Joel says it's complicated I
get this little twinges yeah and I'm
just like this is gonna get good yeah
they're details sorry
they're details yeah the ejector seat
was uh that was III signed off on that
one that's how--that's am i doing
and I checked your seat is the next gym
store chair right yeah also possible boy
was it's what's the actual in-game name
I don't again this is this is the
in-game names versus internal names
it's callate yeah on the faith
undershirt that's what it's called okay
and so so that alone isn't a solution so
like okay well what if what if you say
fine you can take your current position
and then shift it down by your max
altitude
tight with their bouts and so when you
mount up in midair you'll just be
sitting at max altitude but you can you
can still like flap down you're not
super far on the red that's fine except
that then you can go okay well you can
still jump pretty far up a wall you can
like wall top wall hop on the bigger
wall top wall hot then you're way above
your intended functional ceiling then
you eject your seat and rebound and
you're still way above what you're
supposed to be even if that you inside
adjustment place so suffice to say it's
complicated working on it well we'll see
it is it is known you don't need to keep
telling me I know
otherwise it's it's supposed to do I
think I think a lot of troubles people
running into is they just haven't flown
for very long because for very long and
there there's some like there's some
hidden features on this thing that
people don't know about like um I'd
mentioned earlier that it's designed a
lot of what it's built to do is to move
along walls or between walls that's sort
of its whole schtick and it's actually
it it that makes it fairly different
from other like Griffin or beetle which
are very averse to running into all this
things like no I want I want the walls
that's sort of the terrain that I
interact with but there when Alena and I
were talking over this before we were in
order to keep it from we wanted to be
able to do to do this sort of like wall
traversal but not also be able to just
assign the vertically like we used to go
the durmand Priory and just can you go
all the way to the top if the answer was
yes it's probably broken and so the
solution that we came to was all right
if you move away from the point that you
last wall jumped you will gain energy
faster your jump energy will come back
faster so you're encouraged to move
horizontally rather than vertically you
can go vertically but you're you you get
more out of it if you move that way so
just something to keep in mind when
you're trying to play plot out okay can
I get through this is if you keep moving
you'll get your your jump dues back
pretty fast little details anyway
so sky skill hints alright what else my
questions are up here yeah I can talk
about the collection requirements a
little bit so to the best of my
knowledge actually the sky scales
movement and its collection were
designed largely independently but given
that they were both designed by Alena
they're independently by the same person
independently by the same does things at
different times real quick the question
was when you were developing the sky
skill did you have the collection
requirements in mind or did that develop
over time thank you karyam sorry that
said the collection got an entire design
of its own and honestly when I started
implementing it I was amazed by kind of
the depth of storyline frankly that
aleem II was able to put into the
collection and the way that she was able
to really make it feel like an activity
in its own right and not just kind of
not not only a scavenger hunt yeah I can
see that okay let's see a whole lot I do
questions in here sorry yeah so I guess
like it's like those top two there and
they're basically the same concept so
the probably the question is so what is
the reasoning behind this the the way
the flight mechanic works like why is
this canopy in place and the first Lego
what what breaks if this thing can just
arbitrarily fly anywhere and it's it's
kind of a deep philosophical question if
you really want to get into it we do the
D which I guess we do these comes back
to the angel in devil to some expression
right so some of it is the I guess the
the most reduced form of the answer is
our game is built around interacting
with terrain like it's like super broad
philosophical we interact with trying
like beetle rolls down hills you spring
her jumps up things wrap your jumps
across things even Griffin which is very
good at flying you still have to get up
on to something and then dive off so you
still have this initial interaction with
with earth rain if if you have a mount
that can just start from any point and
then go
up and then you never need to touch
ground again you're no longer
interacting with the world that we've
built you're just kind of floating out
free and so given that like we want you
to do that to some extent it would it
would work on where they go and also
completely displace all the other around
so you could just you could get anywhere
you could just I don't need I could
ignore all of these train problems and
just just start at any arbitrary point
up over and down yeah and like there's a
there is a phrase that gets kicked
around the studio a lot joy of movement
and frankly flying some people do get
some joy in like the raw flight but it
does get very monotonous after a while
and having that variety of movement
really is at least for me more enjoyable
overall than always having the one thing
that's the best at doing this stuff and
you can make the candidly the
hypothetical account agree more like no
Griffin can fly if everyone it's a
Griffin you have to work out a little
it's not like super hard but you still
again you still have to start somewhere
and then you still have to every once in
a while refresh your altitude like
refresh your velocity and so you're
still you're still interacting with
something whereas sky scale was built to
be a hovers wherever you put it that's
kind of its thing there's a lot of skill
and flying Griffin well too I see those
videos of people doing like the
collections through Divinity's reach and
just my job well and and what's fun
watching those is there they do that
it's always close to the ground those
are the fun ones to watch when you're
really really low really high risk of
hitting something same with beetles
going through tight turns and stuff like
that is like there's there's always this
sort of risk factor and sky scale was
built to be to not have that sort of
risk of like if you hit something it's
okay it's it it's fine with hitting
walls it wants to take walls and so to
give it to have that on top of being
able to just kind of just fly wherever
would make it ultimately kind of not
interesting so that's that's how it
ended up how it is that's that's just
that's that's a good answer there works
see I kind of like that first one I feel
like kind of everybody can picture that
so the question is how do you test maps
to make sure that the mounts don't break
them before we had Mountain game do
testers have some sort of mount like
exploration mode the short version of
that is that we had mounts for a long
time before players had mounts and there
was a very extensive QA pass on existing
Maps to make sure that mounts did not
blow out too much and there's also been
a lot of post facto retrofitting of the
inevitable bits and pieces that we
missed over time where mounts proved to
be just a little bit too good at some
things and a couple of no mount zones
had to get tucked in here and there yeah
I was when I read that question one of
the things I was thinking about I think
about how long we've been working on
this and I remember it like way back in
the early days of testing mounts it was
just like this Raptor one of the things
that we've talked about a lot in our
game is how the mounts they have weight
and they feel like the animal they are
and they have there's there's thought
that goes into their movement and I
remember the very very early days like
the Raptor was just this thing that
didn't have animation it wasn't moving
and it was just like skidding around the
map and it felt like a styrofoam statue
because it was so light and that's
that's how long we've been testing those
and working on them behind the scenes
for ages good idea the styrofoam statue
no you just use permafrost on the whole
thing and you've got it yes it's I don't
know if you guys have seen any of these
like characters or mounts that are all
yeah yes it looks like there's something
wrong with the game yeah that's basic
answer though lots of time as is answer
with many things you spend lots of time
yeah that's how you check for breaking
the mouse I do like the permafrost
roller Beautiful's I'll say just like
giant snowballs rolling around the night
ah that's right you know we have a tonic
if you want a giant snowball talk to me
after yes we can do that too but yes I
like the permafrost roller beetle you're
not gonna miss it I mean like you're
gonna see it coming holy crap
okay what else why did you decide to
remove cork and the sky scales from the
stables after the collection it's after
the collection is complete cork has
things to do in place
that he wants to be and gorg has his own
life left to live and I cannot hang
around we are stable forever yeah if we
trapped him there forever that that kind
of pulls him out of being able to do
anything else
as for the sky scale that is a very good
question and one that doesn't have a
good answer right now except that hmm
maybe they shouldn't look into that all
right that's fair
let's see what else I think that one's
for you Stephen and the next one the
middle one any chance that the
activities you did with your young sky
scale could return do you think you
would ever consider adding some type of
minigames and Suns refuge like the ones
in the collection without making any
promises here I know that I asked Alena
about this and she would love to see
possibly some adventurers made out of
these so I can say that we are also
thinking along these lines and
personally I would like to play catch
with my sky scale pretty much as much as
any player out there I think so yeah if
time and resources were infinite if time
the reef or resources were infinite it
would absolutely happen yeah all right
any more I do not know the Lord yeah
there's a lore question as to where the
sky skills came from and my
understanding is it was Crocs magic but
please don't hold me of that I don't
know the details like Tom's out there
somewhere we could go get him don't go
get him
he's probably worried about falling from
the magic of coming from the mist in
materia and crashing all those different
all right and those are for later so all
right do you guys have anything that you
want to add I will think of it about
five minutes after I walk isn't that
what happens you can bus back in the
room don't do that probably won't do
that all right well I'll tell you what
you guys stick around with us for just a
couple of minutes while we get our next
round of deaf guests up here and I will
let you all get back to work thank you
so much for sharing this with us that
was that was really fun thank you it
it's always a pleasure thank you all
right thank you guys just a car
be right this
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hi guys welcome back thanks for sticking
around and waiting we are going to jump
into the next segment where we have
artists and animators and we're going to
talk about the look of the sky scale and
the design so why don't you three go
through introduce yourselves tell us who
you are what you do here to reading it
and what you worked on for the sky scale
okay hi I'm Kate file shifter I'm the
creature art lead on Guild Wars 2 and I
was mainly responsible for doing art
direction and concept review for the sky
skill
I'm Brian Walter I do animation and I
did animation on the sky scale I'm Pete
egg berries as the creature artist on
the sky scale so I took it from the
concept to the production that's it
alright so let's just kind of walk
through the design a little bit we
started with the Griffin rig on this
right yes yes okay and this was I think
it was Pete mentioned that the concept
sculpt came we you were given the
concept sculpt and then started working
with that yeah how did that go lovely
okay yes so um it went really well the
concept skull was awesome normal
procedures just to make sure that
everything that was done in the concept
actually fits the Griffin rig since it's
based on the Griffin Drake's you make
sure the joints are in the right place
and you know the jaw functions properly
which is you know a bigger deal and it
sounds like really yeah things like that
so what is it like if it's not fitted
properly well just I know it's sucking
like just fall off yeah I mean it's like
a huge deal but like and the concept
sculpt down and see it was closed but I
want to say in our default one it's open
a little bit so you just want to make
sure all that stuff's right because
it's not it'll break animations down the
line that are expecting it to be a
certain position from the get-go
yeah like the skeletons are in what we
call a zero pose okay so that's like all
the joints are zeroed out and the game
uses that for the rotation on the joints
as the base so basically what happened
is since it's based off the rake of the
Griffin the Griffin zero pose had the
mouth open but the dragon had it closed
so then when those animations get put on
it the mouth is an offset from where it
was so the mouth starts doing weird we
have to do a couple back and forth like
okay what wait okay we needed to be open
so that these animations of them
chomping the fish actually worked great
oh yeah because that's a super-fun
fidget that's a really fun idle one it
sounds relatively simple but it's like a
very minut detail that you have to make
sure it's skinned just right otherwise
like things will get off very quickly
like the mouth will overshoot the skull
or the mouth will just always hang open
and you want to make sure it fits just
right yeah the eyeballs are in the wrong
place in the orbit around the joint the
joint for the eyeball
you know the aisles a flyout of the
headers yeah feels like a big deal yes
yes little details I'm sorry I'm
horrified wait we need those such as
eyeballs staying in your skull very
important something that you mentioned
and this was just this entertained me
and I feel like it's not a he as huge of
a deal as your eyeballs flying guys your
skull okay I'm not moving past that
anytime soon
but we actually got his it's teeth
weren't showing well am I telling this
right yeah more or less
so the concept scope just didn't really
have obvious teeth like it had like a
gum line here and so yeah I think we
have an image we have images it's what
you're looking at is over here okay oh
okay so we had grandpa
well I think there's yet on the left
there yep yeah grandpa dragon yeah so we
we didn't give them dentures so much I
guess we gave him actual teeth we want
to make sure you could see the teeth
even when his mouth was closed I mean
there could have been teeth inside of
his mouth like a normal animal but we
wanted to you know make it a little bit
more aggressive and you know dragon like
he looked he definitely looks fine as he
is but just to kind of get so that
coolness factor across you just wanted
to make them be more like a crocodilian
about same thing yeah just for the fun
of it yeah I had noticed there were some
other changes on there too
do you want to talk a little bit about
some of the iteration of the appearance
because I know you went through some
different things that you considered oh
sure yeah well if you go back to that
image for example the one on the right
was an earlier one the whole concept
with fur with this guy was to try and
have something that felt heroic felt
strong powerful badass and made you feel
heroic strong powerful and badass
without being villainous without
necessarily being ugly so the one on the
right is like a little bit more
villainous looking partially due to his
kind of almost like vampire jaw still
really awesome but uh went and did the
one on the left instead with the
addition of some crocodile style teeth
of course I'm okay with the crocodile
teeth so what else let's see we had we
had some conversation about finding the
proper wing size and that was like a
whole odyssey wasn't it yeah yeah I
think Brian can speak a lot yeah so
mounts take a long time to make so yes
no you just left them together and it's
easy so utilizing the Griffin we wanted
to save time because he already had a
bunch of animations yeah and so however
the Griffins we also wanted the dragon
well sky scale to stand out you know and
not look exactly like the crest sure so
there's a lot of posing changes we can
do there's some adjustments to the
animations we do but also just the
silhouette of the character we wanted to
make feel more like a sky scale like a
dragon so we played around with the
scale of the wings to kind of emphasize
that shape if I hadn't click it to the
next one and we can take a peek at what
that was like
I didn't you should be good mark can you
kick it forward for us okay so well I
well I have my argument with this
besides the wings what else were you
what else did you work on to give it
that slightly different look so there's
the base idol pose for one the Griffon
stands very differently than the sky
scale stands so I was just figuring out
that base idol pose was the biggest
silhouette change and then the Gryphon
runs very light you know it's very
bird-like so his run animation is very
light so using that run on the sky scale
we had to kind of mess with the curves
and make him a little heavier tone down
some of the motions so he felt bigger
and more dragon II okay that's fair so
he just feels more solid and that's like
what we were talking about in the last
segment in that they all have they've
got different weights and they've got
that feel of what they are and not just
this very light bird-like thing yeah
much much heavier set of a guy like
riffin partially also to differentiate
out there flying in playstyles the
Griffon is smaller wings lighter much
faster and more so used for diving and
crossing areas pretty quickly a dragon
is or like your hover vehicle for
navigating more precisely okay - and I
actually I managed to get this working
so let's take a look at some of the
other concepts that you guys work
and I'll just let you I think that was
you Kaitlyn okay I'm still thinking
really hard about this so sorry okay I
apologize for my first no that's a first
for me I'm kind of proud of myself I'm
realizing I've managed to never do that
before I'm very sorry but I will let you
talk about the concepts on the different
appearances the head on the sky scale oh
sure
yeah for this we're trying to just find
out some different takes to go on this
guy all kinds of crazy things from Jim
Van Bogart that was the concept artist
that we had on this we ended up focusing
on horns and they were focusing they
were oriented more forward just to get
that kind of like attack battle-ready
sense to the guy but also as a technical
constraint we knew we wanted him to have
a very prominent like very iconic kind
of s-curve to the next kind of classical
classical Western European dragon pose
to his idle pose and that puts his head
relatively close to where the player is
going to be sitting so it could be a
problem on say char or Noren type
characters if his horns are very large
and are facing backwards and swept-back
and just stabbing you getting stabbed in
the neck by his horns but um we toned it
down from some of these just to have
more of a try to have a balance between
like a classic horn look and something
it also frames the face satisfies those
technical constraints and looks cool and
badass but also not looking like to too
evil or like too unconventional yeah
like you've got this terrifying creature
that could turn on you any instant yeah
is not the look we want yeah one of the
top left ones up there kind of makes me
think he has a spider on his head no I
can't didn't see it oh gosh still cool
just a different approach yes there is
okay yeah that's the spider head now in
my head I'm terrified
what else what's the next one oh this is
another earlier take where you can see a
little bit more of the I think in a
previous guild chat I mentioned that
there are some aspects of the neck that
were kind of based off of snakes and
cobras you could see that a little bit
more on this guy he's a little too thin
and I think that's the reason we went
with the other approach he's again still
cool but a little less classical dragon
not quite as beefy and buff as we wanted
to go for the one on the left you can
really really see that snake-like
influence yeah and then this also this
guy also looks a little bit more
nefarious than the final version we went
for we want your sky scale to feel like
he's definitely a badass but he's also
still your friend and your partner and
you could probably pet him without him
biting your hand off yeah just give it
fish give us some treats so the next one
is one that I'm really interested in
talking about just one design direction
that we were thinking about so I'll let
you move it forward and talk about that
one yeah so this is from when I guess I
can say spoilers now when we were trying
to figure out how to justify these
dragons existence how they're going to
be generated from croco toric crashing
into the ocean and that impact creates
this whole new land an area that you
explore it also creates these dragons
so you're thinking maybe they would be
more geologic slightly and some of the
aspects of their features maybe they
would have rocks on them or crystals or
like this but um it ended up making them
feel a little too evil too close to
branded and not got event Oh got further
away from also that kind of classic
western european style dragon that we
wanted to go for for the for like the
the default the base dragon we really
wanted something that you could that
wouldn't that would mesh with as many
different kind of personal player styles
as possible right like your personal
aesthetics for your character and could
work in as wide a variety of those and
then like maybe with the skins later
we'd offer some more
pick things to style it directly towards
whatever style you're going for with
your character yeah I can see as the
branded look is really fun excuse me
the branded look is really fun it's
interesting I love the look of it
personally but it also looks like
something that we've been trained to see
as an enemy yeah years and years now
yeah that was that was primarily well
one of the reasons why we shied away
from doing that yeah and I don't feel
entirely comfortable being that close to
that particular thing yeah maybe if your
character is styled like a necromancer
or evilly dude then maybe you'd like
that but again it's trying to make it
work for like the widest variety of
players to start with right and then
also again to feel like he's your
partner he's her friend he's not like
some offspring of Crockett or ik this
guy that you just yeah no hard feelings
about that Crockett or yeah killed your
dad don't worry about it it's fine he
was bad let's trust us we're your new
dad oh I can see how this would be a
risky proposition like how long are we
gonna be able to keep this up before
everything that was terrible yeah just
raise them that's a baby and never tell
them the truth they'll be ok I'm sure I
see no way that could go wrong so we do
have the wing size up next I'm gonna
have you sure if Pete yeah you can use
the magic rope yeah so all right so
here's our dragon sky scale at his
shipped state his wings are scaled up to
1.5 times what the Griffin is that was
just we're having fun yeah and so we
wanted to see how far we could go right
Hey so I was like okay I'll just double
it
and I mean it looks cool it animates
it's fine but then they get a little too
big and start clipping into stuff and
hitting things they probably shouldn't
iteration for how he looks on the ground
right when he's running and yes huge
things like air awesome on the ground
like wait why have these huge things
this bird and of course
shrink I'm super small because we just
wanted to see what it could do and this
one just speaks to me being animated so
he's trying so hard I feel like at that
point there's like a limit to how big of
a player character you could put like
you get ignored up there he's like no
please stop I feel like it needs to be
going hyper fast like a bumble bee or a
hummingbird yes can we can we get on
that I would love to see just that
particular animation like hummingbird
like just because he's trying so hard to
stay on point
oh yes so the way we scaled the wings is
through the animation like the joints of
the wings I just can scale them in the
program up and down
so this way we inherit the animation
that exists from Griffin and then oh now
we just scale them up and they're bigger
right and so you get those glides and
then well obviously we had to add the
new like hovering and all that stuff
yeah I'm sorry I keep looking back
because I love the tiny little wings
just working I just wanted to be going
super fast struggles it looks like they
need to right yeah okay so we got
through the wings the look of the tail
and scales that kind of thing kind of
ping-ponging off what Kate was saying
where did you where did you start as far
as what those were gonna look like hmm
that's a good question um well I I mean
I took what would James had given us
which was pretty cool um I kind of had
like a gecko a vibe to it to begin with
so I kind of just sort of went with that
because I thought that would cool made
sure the spikes were pronounced and
everything because it's a dragon yeah
and then as far as the scales went he
had put in a lot of like kind of you
know archetype scales too that were kind
of larger and kind of just you know give
a lot of character and then I tried to
complement it with some smaller ones
along the belly just to give it you know
a little bit of contrast put some bigger
ones in the front just to kind of also
make contrast from the small ones that
are also in the front but yeah mostly I
just trying to complement the concept
with that those kind of decisions that
is something that I've noticed I have
spent probably more time enough time to
make it weird just looking at what the
different parts of it look like
especially after I talk to the three of
you looking at the different sky scale
patterns and they're grading up and down
looks really good you can tell you put
the time into it like um so it looks
fantastic and it's one of those it's one
of those little details to just kind of
take some time and look at and not just
kind of pass over it and take it for
granted because the work you guys put in
shows thanks yeah scales are very
important fun dragon thing that takes
the longest really yeah it's just like
you putting the amount of detail into
them and you don't want to just use like
stamped information it never looks quite
as good as something that is more home
to the actual specific to the actual
underlying anatomy and then the actual
like block out so everything kind of
needs like to be personally touched up
bone okay that makes sense all right
well um so I have a last question for
you guys what was your favorite thing
about working on this make it a dragon
dragon I don't know we're not supposed
to call it that I'm sorry Steven yeah
you got to make a dragon yeah I uh
that's my favorite thing that I do here
at the studio would do it all day every
day if I could world of dragons yep I
think my favorite thing was doing the
fidgets we throw the fish oh that is
really funny how did you decide okay
this is what it needs to be uh well a
lot because fit
sir where you can really sell the
personality of your mouth and people
have really liked the interactions of
fidgets we've done in the past so trying
to grab your shaking you yeah yeah
so getting that moment with your mouth
really ties it together I think I was
talking to Kate one day just like hey do
you have any ideas for fidgets like
she's super into animals and behavior
stuff so just getting some ideas and
stuff and I think we had mentioned oh
yeah feeding it and so originally we
were talking about oh maybe it's like a
fruit or something but then our fix
artist Nick he he rigged up a fish and
had some bone constraints so it's all
floppy
and he attached that to the point so it
looks like this cool fluffy fish guys
made it way much way cooler so okay
that's super fun yeah Australians gotta
be carnivorous he can't be feeding it
yeah what's another point you have a
leaf this is how you get eaten
yeah this is a friendly dragon yeah so
let's keep it that way
yeah I like that and just see the little
idol blowing flames just because you
know I don't know cuz I can he's got it
right you gotta put you gotta put all
the dragon into all the animations it's
very true how about you Pete um I mean
I'm not gonna lie I was gonna say making
a dragon as well it's valid right um but
also just working with Brian was really
fun because we set like right next to
each other and like when you're trying
to figure out the wing scale and all
that stuff it was pretty hilarious
because we just changed right on the
screen now make it tiny cool all right
do you guys want to talk about those
sure to questions from the forums yeah
it looks like the first one we may have
already addressed talking about the
horns what considerations went into the
kind of horns for this guy's Galen
yeah stabbing the player yeah mix of
like technical animation concerns with
various races that could be sitting on
them and the size that those various
races could appear at and then also
something that fits the kind of
character that we're trying to go with
that
unique butts the classical cool-looking
but not necessarily you were looking and
then the second question there are the
similarities between the appearance of
the sky scale and the griffon
intentional or a byproduct of them
sharing the same rig so yes no a bit
both there are some things that we
probably would have done no matter what
such as like Nessus such as say the
scale of the dragon trying to keep that
in line with the other mounts the other
mounts are more or less the size they're
at to fit various players but also also
to try and like split somewhat of a gate
on how much clipping with the
environment we want to allow yeah yeah
and we probably would have made it a
hexapod that's like a six-limbed dragon
rather than a wyvern which is like a
four-limbed dragon pretty much probably
no matter what because we wanted that
kind of classical Western dragon body
type which lends it of course to you
looking somewhat like the Gryphon when
it's running around on the ground
and where we really tried to
differentiate those two is their play
styles and how they animate and fly
around when they're in the air okay how
about you guys already Caitlyn cake
cover it I mean this is something we
kind of do all the time yeah this is
something this is a very common practice
in video games is fitting something else
on to something else
because you know you don't have all the
time in the world to make every single
thing you want to make so there's plenty
of games and our game as well where
you're you have a slight constraint of
fitting a thing on to a skeleton but we
get away with such crazy things on
skeletons that you wouldn't even be able
to notice if it weren't for like super
iconic animations like you see so well
it is on the Griffon wig I think we did
a great job of making it still feel you
oh I completely agree and that's
something that we've talked about on the
show before as far as using existing
rigs for things you could like
painstakingly handcraft every tiny thing
from scratch just for the sake of
painstakingly handcrafting every tiny
thing from scratch but I feel like
nothing would ever get done yeah I'd I'd
spend like I'd have my custom if if I
could wave a magic wand and like hire a
bunch more people we'd have like custom
rigs and custom animations for
absolutely everything but we probably
would never ship any content we even
have a really good time yeah not awesome
well thank you guys so much for spending
the time with us I appreciate it do you
have anything else that you wanted to
add about the Griffin look or the sky
scale you could also add about the sky
scale I've already talked about the
Raptor if you want to I think between
this and the last guild chat covered
although yeah mixer agent I have at the
top of my head all right well thank you
all and Kate got to learn Tony's and
what was this Anna Toma Toma Toma tone
look it's it's the brand name oh okay
yeah it's actually a thing so alright
thank you all for spending some time
with us thank you all for spending some
time with us and asking your questions
about the sky scale and letting us speak
to it a little bit all right we'll see
you all in the next Gil chat yeah thanks
guys
bye guys thank you
[Music]
[Music]
you
Guild Chat - Episode 86

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