That is a very good question.

A better one is "Why didn't the art department design armor models for the female units that look right, or even fit them properly, like any RPG in the history of the genera?" Not only does it make having female units/characters pointless (because the look exactly like males except for a tiny part of the face, assuming they wear a helmet as well), but the models don't even fit the female body frame correctly - skin shows right through the legs (I'll take a screen shot if anyone wants). 

It is very hard to take Elemental seriously as an RPG (or at all) if it can't take the time/effort to get this right. I mean, Dungeon Siege took care of it many years ago, and it had many more types of armor/clothing than Elemental (by far). And every piece was available to both male and female characters, while still fitting the way it should. I know there are a million items on the list of game improvements we all want to see, but for me, addressing this one needs to be a priority.

Sorry for the rant, but that is my 2 cents (or maybe that was closer to 3 cents   )

Agreed with Pyruvate completely.  Heck, half of the time longer hair styles are completely unusable, because the head meshes aren't properly fitted for half of the hair in the game.  I love so many things about Elemental, that it makes it that much more frustrating than I can't do extremely fundamental things like give my sovereign the hair I want because I'm going to see a massive glob of tumor-esque flesh sticking out the back of their head.

If you want a fix, there's a mod that will achieve that.

Download ExpandedFactions 8.2, then locate the file expandedfactions_specialgear.xml. Place this file in its own folder in the mod directory, then delete ExpandedFactions (if you don't want to keep it, that is).

Yeah when I showed my girlfriend the game, she did not like the way female warriors looked either. I want sexy Amazons and mages! I make my ladies archers so they can keep their pretty colorful clothes!

Someone before said something to the effect that is was not realistic to have feminine armor. What about the monsters and dragons, how realistic are they then?

Keep up the great work and everyone else all your ideas, I love reading them all. Even the Ahole ones!!!

I think you read my statement wrong.  I think it's bullshit that equipment can't be used by everyone, all champion of all races and genders.  I think I was agreeing with you, so put on your big girl panties and wipe away the tears.

I thought that my comment might elicit one such as yours. I understand the combination of the RPG and strategy generas; in fact I like the concept very much. In parentheses with my statement I said "if at all", and I think that applies here. Attention to detail matters regardless of genera, and I think that is the core of the frustration we have expressed here - even though it is certtainly most frustrating from an RPG angle (where characters are especially important).

There is so much I (and we) love about Elemental that it is indeed sad to see it suffer from such fundamental issues.

In the real world, army uniforms look pretty much the same for male or female, and even rank, because In the battlefield, you do not want the enemy to be able to easily identify who is who. Police in riot gear certainly look identical regardless of sex as well. The point is, as far as realism and logic is concerned, there is no reason to have female style armor.

Having said that, i do have to concede that games where female/male equipment is done well, it certainly does add to the enjoyment of the game quite substantially!

*meekly points out that EWoM is not an RPG...then scurries quickly back under his rock & doubles the dose from that I.V drip*

 To explain, while there are elements that are RPish in function, that alone does not make for an RPG. And frankly it should be listed as a strategy game set in a fantasy world. Keep it accurate; or more die hard Role players will pick up there +1 vorpal swords to do battle. lol... time for BEER> later. (PS: I know that this is what SD has officialy posted on the EWoM home page... it's just that most of us Roleplay junkies (MTL community) think diferently; maybe thats because our brains are frozen half the year... or something. Last thing; I trully hope that the changes that are being planned trully do make it a RPG world. That would be awesome.)

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On topic: Agreed more costumization options for all heros would be welcomed; while at the same time adressing that lack of "female" approved gear availabilty.

Several points to touch on:

Firstly, I don't consider myself a hardcore "RPG person". My games are typically more along the lines of RTS and FPS, but I certainly appreciate some RPG elements - I don't expect SD to add a level 60 blood elf mage princess to the game, whatever that even is . I don't want to argue over what kind of game Elemental is, only to point out what I (and some others) consider to be a disappointing oversight.

Next, about modding. I have already done quite a bit of this - new improvements, spells, items, talents/abilities, etc. I would love to add new clothing/armor and weapons as well. So maybe if SD doesn't have enough resources to do this themselves, then they should give the Community the proper tools to let us do that for them and the way we all want. My skill set does not really include 3D modeling (the closest I have come is *attempting* to design ships for Freelancer), but I would be willing to learn if given the tools - and some more helpful tutorials from people who actually know what they are doing.

A uniform is a uniform, but biology is also biology. Mistikmind, if I showed you two U.S. Army soldiers in the same desert camo, one male and one female, are you saying you couldn't tell them apart? The clothing/equipment can be the same, but there are still sufficient differences, IMHO, to distinguish them - especially if we are talking about sheets of metal that need to fit a person properly to do their job of protecting the wearer. I bet you that the male french soldiers could all tell which one was Joan of Arc  

Tangentially, why do you have to buy a "bonus" (i.e. "Egalitarian") to be able to have female soldiers in the first place? I understand making it a characteristic that you can choose or not choose (since unfortunately not all societies/races are free from sexism - in fact I would posit that none is so), but a "bonus" ability, really? Combine this with little attention to clothing design, and maybe we have a sexist game...<end rant...thank you for your patience>

Finally, to Lord Xia: as a die-hard RTK fan, I approve of your profile picture . If SD gives us modeling tools, we should totally make a RTK full conversion mod. Haha!

I would definitely not be able to tell them apart if i was an enemy,,, since i would be dead if i got close enough! As far as the uniform itself is concerned, there is no difference and in full battle gear, you would be hard pressed to represent gender in any video game.

As for Joan of Arc, as it happens, one of the crimes for which she was executed was to dress like a man!

I don't know if this would be of interest to anyone here, but I have started on a small project to use the game's existing selection of clothing and mod it to create mage (and possibly warrior) clothes for female characters. It will not look like armor, which is appropriate for mages anyway, but it would be a way to provide equipment making females viable characters (i.e. give then defense, etc) without taking away their aesthetics.

For example, I have already made a Mage Staff, which in addition to providing reasonable personal defense (not against knights, but it's better than any existing "mage-like" weapons) allows the caster to use a custom combat spell I made. Sound cool? How about a Mage Cloak that boosts some stats as a usable item? I see many possibilities, but lack motivation at the moment due to being a little burned-out of Elemental and not having tons of winter break left to enjoy.

But if people are interested, I'd be willing to work on it more. Or we can at least have a constructive conversation about modding to get what we want rather than just bashing SD for its oversights

I would love to see more clothing and equipment. At some point it would be kind of nice if we got a way to differentiate who could wear what, even if it was just in the code, so we could play around with it.

So on a historical note, since it came up I'm pretty sure there were no gender differences for armor. There were probably too few female fighters to warrent anyone learning how to make armor specificaly for women, anyways.

So SD, any word on giving your modeling tools to the Elemental Community???

With all the work modders here will likely do for you, your budget will be glad you did