Player Character Expressions Broke?

SlayerSyrena · October 2014

My friend and I were roleplaying on the PTS when we noticed that after using a variety of emotes (/angry, /cry, /no, etc ...) our character's expressions returned to a blank stare afterward, instead of reflecting the emotion of the emote we just used.

I logged into a different character, one that gets very intense expressions on his face after using /angry to check again and sure enough, he looks completely blank/impassive after using that emote. On the live server, he would continue to look extremely angry after the emote was used, at least until I used another emote to change his expression.

Anyways, I'm really hoping this doesn't carry over to live since the ability to change our character's expressions using emotes has been amazing since it was implemented awhile back.

Lady_Swillmart · October 2014

I noticed the exact same thing and commented on it both here and in the game with the /feedback function (as I'm not sure if it was a bug).

If it is a bug, I hope it doesn't get overlooked! But yeah, it was very jarring to me. I feel a little silly about noticing something like that, but I guess I'm more of a roleplayer.

I feel a little better that someone else noticed this, though; I was beginning to think it was just me!

Zed · October 2014

As a non-role player, I'd rather expressions reset to default rather than have to run around with a goofy smile or an angry expression on my face. I understand not resetting has uses in RP but I like the reset. Even (especially?) when it results in something like the above gif.

SlayerSyrena · October 2014

@Zed,

I know you can't please everyone. Still, there's many of us who enjoy the more human aspect of having changeable expressions for our characters that stick, instead of always having to revert to the blank, lifeless stare of a porcelain doll.

Lady_Swillmart · October 2014

I had once made the suggestion to have facial moods/emotions as a separate emote-like function, that one can set at will. That way, people who do want their character to have a certain emotion on their face can have that (and change it whenever they want), and the folks who prefer a neutral look can opt out of all that entirely. If I could mod all that in as an add-on, I would do it, but I don't believe it's possible with our current breadth of knowledge with the API and add-ons (I only know so much Lua, myself). Now personally, I really liked that the face would change appropriately after doing emotes, but that's just me...

Anyway, one thing to note here is that the character no longer seems to be displaying any expression change at all, not even while they're doing the actual emote. While it's true that facial expressions used to return to the default after doing emotes, they at least had some personality during the actual animation, even in the betas.

My point is, if this is a bug of some kind, it should probably be fixed, if possible.