Layering
Post One: Introduction
Post One: Introduction
Layering
• • • • Once upon a time, layering was simple. The dress up system was so basic, we could only wear one hat at a time. Most avatar outfits consisted of a hat, a shirt, gloves, pants and shoes. Heck, most people didn't even wear shoes.
The avatar dress up system has gotten much more complicated since then. Thank goodness. Most of the avatars on the site today would be impossible without all the new items and layers that allow a multitude of items to be equipped at once.
Long ago, it was easy to guess which layer an item would be on. A shirt was a shirt and would always be a shirt. Nowadays we have shirts that equip under other shirts and shirts that equip over other shirts. It's impossible to know for sure what layer a shirt equips on unless you preview it on your avatar.
Even though items equip on many, many layers nowadays, there are still underlying rules that items will follow. For example, most socks will layer under shoes. Makes sense, right? You wouldn't wear your socks on the outside of your shoes.
This is a very basic guide to the layering system. I once had ambitions of listing all the layers and the items that equipped on those layers. However, before I ever finished the guide, Gaia gave us new layers to work with. Now there are just too many layers and exceptions to list.
Why even make this guide? Users constantly create impossible "dream avatars" on tektek. Tektek doesn't use Gaia's layering system. What works on tektek, doesn't always work on Gaia. This often leads to tears. Just imagine, you've quested for months to save up enough gold to buy a jacket, only to find out that it doesn't equip with your shirt.
Always double check to see whether a tektek outfit will work on Gaia before you waste time buying all the items. Want to save even more time? Know how the items layer in the first place and you won't waste time creating impossible outfits. ;3
tldr;
This is a very basic guide to how Gaia items equip with each other. So basic that you most likely know all of this information if you've been around Gaia for awhile. However, it's worth taking a look at if you're new to Gaia and not sure of how Gaia's layering system works.
June 2015 Edit: This would've been ambitious when I attempted it... and it would be even more crazy now. Gaia didn't have a way to preview multiple items unless you owned those items. Or, unless you tried the item on in the marketplace and (through trial and error) found an item that it would knock off of your avatar. You'd then know that the item belonged to that category.
... Anyway, we now have the ability to preview multiple items at one time on Gaia. This is possible through both the search in Dress Up and through the Avatar Builder tool.
It's good to have a general idea of how items layer and what layers exist... but... there's no way I'm gonna try to name them all. There are tons now.
