why can't we dye back items?

[ErikTheTyrant.4527]

I realize that not all back items should be dye-able, but some of them should be. For example the largos wings, you can dye the wings of it but not the back part, which makes it look odd af when the go from the standard blue and black to white and gold or something like that.

[Just a flesh wound.3589]

There are two threads on the front page with the answers to your question. This [one](https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/56677/dye-weapons-backpacks#latest) has a response from the Devs also.

 

Here’s what Anet has said on the subject

 

>**Tidgepot.3285**

>If you need citation, then look no further. I'm the dev who concepted this glider! Granted, I'm an artist so I couldn't give you the full technical rundown like Josh Petrie, but I do handle our engine daily.

 

>Whether or not the equipment takes damage or not has no bearing on how the engine separates items. The engine sees armor as what is called a composite, it sees things attached to your characters like weapons and backpieces as items, and it sees gliders as a sort of middleground item/effect. Our file structure separates gliders as items, but because of how they pop into view, layer, and more easily allow for dyes it makes sense to basically treat them as effects. Now I'm not positive on this, but I'm going to hazard a guess that if we decided to make gliders as items, we'd have to retroactively alter the system in a way that would allow for weapons/backpieces to be dyed.

 

>On its face doing this sounds like a great idea, since this is what fans want. As a fellow player I'd like this as well, but unfortunately our systems were not designed with this in mind. Not only would we have to go back and code each item so it can have dye channels/sufficient UI and prepare for the veritable bugfest that would ensue from altering a system that has years of work built on top of it, but we'd also have to retexture these items. Why? Our dye system is balanced around a red base color which has an impact on how every other color will appear when a channel shifts to it. Anyone who has played with dodging/burning in photoshop will know that red has some strange properties when it comes to shifts in values. Many dyes would have blown out/dull/oddly saturated textures as a result.

 

>That's just the tip of the iceberg. There's SO much more to the process that I don't have a firm grasp on.

 

>The devs here are gamers and we love what we do. We want fans to get excited about what we make because we're fans, too. However, we have players clamoring for every fix/feature under the sun so we have to do a ton of prioritizing. Game development is never plain and simple.

 

.

 

>**Ashe Lewis.9815**

 

>I rarely post on the forums so I just had my account upgraded to a developer one. So Tidgepot is indeed a dev because I'm Tidgepot! My posts earlier in this thread still stand. I'm sorry about the confusion :P

 

>Like I said before, I’m just an artist so I’ll elaborate on what I understand as best as I can, but I’m no engineer.

 

>This sounds like a it could be good idea, but it doesn’t sidestep the issue of categorization and what certain types of assets can do. The older assets would still be affected. We’d still encounter a ton of programing challenges and bugs from altering a core mechanic of the game and the years of code built on top of it. Every player and many npcs use items, so the wrong bug slipping through can have a major impact on everyone in the game. Not to mention finding that bug could be like searching for a needle in a haystack because of how fundamental this part of our system is. We’d still probably end up having to re-author and retexture all old items (which would take a ton of resources) and even if we did do that, more players may end up upset by the minor texture changes to their current gear than those who can’t dye backpacks.

 

>Maybe(?) a workaround could be a new asset type, but our engine is old and finicky— it would certainly take a lot resources to teach it to parse through something so fundamental.

 

tldr: it would take a lot of work and changing code at the base of the game would create a large number of bugs, some of which could be gamebreaking and many would be very difficult to find and fix.

[Dibbiest.8259]

> @"Just a flesh wound.3589" said:

> There are two threads on the front page with the answers to your question. This [one](https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/56677/dye-weapons-backpacks#latest) has a response from the Devs also.

>

> Here’s what Anet has said on the subject

>

> >**Tidgepot.3285**

> >If you need citation, then look no further. I'm the dev who concepted this glider! Granted, I'm an artist so I couldn't give you the full technical rundown like Josh Petrie, but I do handle our engine daily.

>

> >Whether or not the equipment takes damage or not has no bearing on how the engine separates items. The engine sees armor as what is called a composite, it sees things attached to your characters like weapons and backpieces as items, and it sees gliders as a sort of middleground item/effect. Our file structure separates gliders as items, but because of how they pop into view, layer, and more easily allow for dyes it makes sense to basically treat them as effects. Now I'm not positive on this, but I'm going to hazard a guess that if we decided to make gliders as items, we'd have to retroactively alter the system in a way that would allow for weapons/backpieces to be dyed.

>

> >On its face doing this sounds like a great idea, since this is what fans want. As a fellow player I'd like this as well, but unfortunately our systems were not designed with this in mind. Not only would we have to go back and code each item so it can have dye channels/sufficient UI and prepare for the veritable bugfest that would ensue from altering a system that has years of work built on top of it, but we'd also have to retexture these items. Why? Our dye system is balanced around a red base color which has an impact on how every other color will appear when a channel shifts to it. Anyone who has played with dodging/burning in photoshop will know that red has some strange properties when it comes to shifts in values. Many dyes would have blown out/dull/oddly saturated textures as a result.

>

> >That's just the tip of the iceberg. There's SO much more to the process that I don't have a firm grasp on.

>

> >The devs here are gamers and we love what we do. We want fans to get excited about what we make because we're fans, too. However, we have players clamoring for every fix/feature under the sun so we have to do a ton of prioritizing. Game development is never plain and simple.

>

> .

>

> >**Ashe Lewis.9815**

>

> >I rarely post on the forums so I just had my account upgraded to a developer one. So Tidgepot is indeed a dev because I'm Tidgepot! My posts earlier in this thread still stand. I'm sorry about the confusion :P

>

> >Like I said before, I’m just an artist so I’ll elaborate on what I understand as best as I can, but I’m no engineer.

>

> >This sounds like a it could be good idea, but it doesn’t sidestep the issue of categorization and what certain types of assets can do. The older assets would still be affected. We’d still encounter a ton of programing challenges and bugs from altering a core mechanic of the game and the years of code built on top of it. Every player and many npcs use items, so the wrong bug slipping through can have a major impact on everyone in the game. Not to mention finding that bug could be like searching for a needle in a haystack because of how fundamental this part of our system is. We’d still probably end up having to re-author and retexture all old items (which would take a ton of resources) and even if we did do that, more players may end up upset by the minor texture changes to their current gear than those who can’t dye backpacks.

>

> >Maybe(?) a workaround could be a new asset type, but our engine is old and finicky— it would certainly take a lot resources to teach it to parse through something so fundamental.

>

> tldr: it would take a lot of work and changing code at the base of the game would create a large number of bugs, some of which could be gamebreaking and many would be very difficult to find and fix.

 

This is a great response, however a way around this would be to create multiple back items associated with the main back item.

 

For example, you buy a set of wings that has the permanent back item in your wardrobe, when purchasing this item from the gem shop, you are given a physical item. There could be additional copies of this item added to your inventory/or sent to your mail, with different color variations on the items. This would simply adapt current systems to have some degree of customization by simply packaging additional items with colors along with them. Rather than getting 1 item of that single design, we could simply receive 5 or 6 items of different colors. Like a red variant, yellow variant, green variant, blue variant, black variant, white variant, etc. etc.

 

No need for dyes!

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

Would kind of mess up the Wings backpacks, no?

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

> @"Dibbiest.8259" said:

> This is a great response, however a way around this would be to create multiple back items associated with the main back item.

>

> For example, you buy a set of wings that has the permanent back item in your wardrobe, when purchasing this item from the gem shop, you are given a physical item. There could be additional copies of this item added to your inventory/or sent to your mail, with different color variations on the items. This would simply adapt current systems to have some degree of customization by simply packaging additional items with colors along with them. Rather than getting 1 item of that single design, we could simply receive 5 or 6 items of different colors. Like a red variant, yellow variant, green variant, blue variant, black variant, white variant, etc. etc.

>

> No need for dyes!

 

Actually, that's a ton of work for the devs, because they would have to individually color each element. The dye process we use for armor is simplistic compared to what the artists do with weapons. And as a dev put it (about weapons, and backpacks work the same)...

> We have never done simple color shifts. The team that works on weapons has a rule against it.

 

If you look at all the different wings sold, you'll see that there are plenty of similarities and some differences; it's not just a monochrome white or black or gold or whatever.

 

****

Or put another way: the choice for ANet is probably something like:

* We can deliver 5 color variations of a single skin (charging for each individually) _or_

* Deliver 2-4 unique skins. (Usually on the lower side, depending on the complexity.)

 

Given those options, which would you prefer? Which do you think most other players would prefer? Which do you think will generate the most money for gem shop items?