Tallstrider Mounts and Tallstrider Changes

[Slapperfish]

Or you could just, y'know, go with a simple canary yellow hue adjustment...



...And recolor the eye to make it stand out a bit more.

[cowmuflage]

Man stop that! Your makeing me want to draw more Tallstrider babies >.>

[peanutbuttercup]

I went and tested on the PTR as well. It's thankfully not quite as bad as I feared, but IMO it's definitely less graceful now than when it ran with its head held high. I don't think the old stance looked "derpy", the new one definitely is more "derpy" to me because it looks like it'll fall over, it's leaning down that much. And its even more bizarre on the pet because it goes from standing position to full sprint with no transition. I tried making it walk and it would walk a few paces with the hed up and then go into the full head down sprint position. Also from behind, on the pet (and I was riding a hawkstrider for comparison) the neck and head swings from side to side in a wobbly manner as it runs. Because hawkstriders have bigger wings (and your toon in the way as you ride) you don't see that, but with nothing but their naked little necks in full view, it's just swaying.

If I had to sum it up I'd say it looks like the head is being pulled by an invisible rope and the strider is running forward in a desperate attempt to keep up so it doesn't crash to the ground.

[Miacoda]

I went and tested on the PTR as well. It's thankfully not quite as bad as I feared, but IMO it's definitely less graceful now than when it ran with its head held high. I don't think the old stance looked "derpy", the new one definitely is more "derpy" to me because it looks like it'll fall over, it's leaning down that much. And its even more bizarre on the pet because it goes from standing position to full sprint with no transition. I tried making it walk and it would walk a few paces with the hed up and then go into the full head down sprint position. Also from behind, on the pet (and I was riding a hawkstrider for comparison) the neck and head swings from side to side in a wobbly manner as it runs. Because hawkstriders have bigger wings (and your toon in the way as you ride) you don't see that, but with nothing but their naked little necks in full view, it's just swaying.

If I had to sum it up I'd say it looks like the head is being pulled by an invisible rope and the strider is running forward in a desperate attempt to keep up so it doesn't crash to the ground.

This exactly. You stole my thoughts on it.

[Wassa]

Well I logged onto the PTR and I really don't mind the new run. It looks really silly at normal run speed, but at mount/dash speeds it looks great. The fast head down run makes me think Hahadori is a ferocious predatory Terrorbird.

I got her to walk normally putting my character on walk. Just wish the walk and run animations where the same, but when using dash it would go into a head down sprinting run.

[Wain]

The chocobo comparison is pretty accurate. Other than not having the wings that they can 'floof' out while doing so.
Hmmmm. Now we just need to get Wain to make a yellow one...

Sorry if this is straying from the topic! I never played any FF games, so I had to look up what a chocobo looks like. The impression I got was that they were more like hawkstriders than tallstriders.

This one is a little rough, but I removed the harness, armour and such and replaced them with appropriate patches of skin/feathers. Unfortunately you can't remove the saddle without removing the ankles as well (yes, those parts of the model are linked for some weird reason), so the saddle has to stay. I made it a very tasteful gold

[Kurasu]

OH my God I want one, Wain. That's *perfect*. As a mount, mind you, not a pet, but I *want*!

[Andine]

Oh my, Wain, that is awesome. Now I want that "chocobo" hawkstrider in the game!

[Quiv]

Of course the Mulgore hatchling got the animation to. The poster who made the observation of it looking like theyre being pulled by their neck with a rope was spot on.

IMHO, the animation fits a full on run animation, the speed in which a mount would run, for example, but not the casual running speed. There is a different run animation for characters when they get those high run speeds, such as from rocket boots.

To me, that is where the this breaks down. I was OK with it while mounted and the strider running beside me swiftly. However, when I just started running on foot, the pace did not match the animation.

For lulz:

[Ikutai]

The chocobo comparison is pretty accurate. Other than not having the wings that they can 'floof' out while doing so.
Hmmmm. Now we just need to get Wain to make a yellow one...

Sorry if this is straying from the topic! I never played any FF games, so I had to look up what a chocobo looks like. The impression I got was that they were more like hawkstriders than tallstriders.

This one is a little rough, but I removed the harness, armour and such and replaced them with appropriate patches of skin/feathers. Unfortunately you can't remove the saddle without removing the ankles as well (yes, those parts of the model are linked for some weird reason), so the saddle has to stay. I made it a very tasteful gold

Hell, I'd tame that in the wild. Saddle and all.

[Jadvya]

I played around with it on the PTR and I actually hope tallstriders keep the hawkstrider run! Makes them look more predatory and dangerous, imo.

[Andine]

IMHO, the animation fits a full on run animation, the speed in which a mount would run, for example, but not the casual running speed. There is a different run animation for characters when they get those high run speeds, such as from rocket boots.

The animation you're mentioning is actually "sprint" (meant for rogues, sprinting), but has been since used for different run speed buffs. All mounts while running use the run animation, and most don't have any sprint animations. So if they copied Hawkstrider animations to Tallstriders, this run will carry over. Let's hope they can revert just the run.

[Miacoda]

THAT CHOCOBO. DO WANT NAO. O.O

[Chimera]

i think it'd be cool if they did their bouncy run but then go hawkstrider run when they dashed or charged, it'd be much nicer

[Smyelmdar]

i think it'd be cool if they did their bouncy run but then go hawkstrider run when they dashed or charged, it'd be much nicer

If they have to give tallstriders new animations, I'd agree that this would be the best solution.
I still don't like how they run on the test realm.

[Slapperfish]

The way I see it, a Tallstrider's neck is too long in proportion to their body to properly run with their head aligned horizontally. It's nearly as long as their body, and too thick to allow that much weight to be in front of it the whole time.

If I were to redesign the Tallstrider run, I would keep the upright neck/head posture, but change the leg motion to be more on-par with a Hawkstrider's gait. That way, it looks more like an actual ostrich/ratite sort of run where one foot is always supported on the ground.

Same would go for a raptor, BTW. They need the Hawkstrider leg movement.

So if you're gonna implement a change to the Tallstrider, keep the neck, change the legs. Because it's the neck right now that makes it look like it's going headfirst into a wall.

[Rhyela]

Why must they keep trying to fix things that aren't broken? I haven't tried it myself, but from these pictures, I think the new run looks awful. It looks okay on hawkstriders because of all the floof, but on tallstriders, it just doesn't look right at all. Personal opinion, mind you.