Racial armor and lore

(searched and haven't seen similar discussions, although I guess there probably has been something)

Is the bonus being on the armor instead of the character itself a design choice for game balance only, or is it supposed to be taken as lore?
For example, can I imagine that hylotls actually breathe underwater and florans can absorb sunlight, say for the purpose of immersion or writing fanfic (meanwhile in game the ability is on the armor, so that players can obtain other abilities without getting two at the same time or something), or the races indeed do have technology for that and are largely similar in biology and physical abilities without the gear?

 

Well, I think I can safely say that the decision to put the racial bonuses on armor was made before virtually any official lore existed. So I'd say the primary reason at least was balance. However, there's nothing saying that this design choice couldn't be incorporated into lore. Demanrasu is probably the best dude to answer that for you.

 

Btw you will be able to craft every race armour there is later in the game.
That's what I've seen on one of those streams.

 

Hypothesis: I believe it would have been primarily a balance/design choice. Giving races actual abilities and advantages over others would limit creativity in possible roles and potentially limit enjoyment. After all, who would play as a lowly human when they could breathe underwater like the Hylotl, potentially glide like the Avians or operate in zero-vacuum environments like the Glitch and Novakid?

Conclusion: by placing racial characteristics on racial armor, the developers allow more creativity to flourish. By ultimately giving all races access to all racial armor, the problem is eliminated entirely. Lore can easily be retconned to suit the needs of the gameplay mechanics, but the opposite isn't always true and is much harder to accomplish.

 

Very informative, and a likely hypothesis.
However, I find your lack of an alien-communicative-socialization-unit to be.. adorable! :catface2:
It doesn't give much in the way of hiding your presence amongst them as an interloper(such as myself), but adorable nonetheless!

 

Very well thought out and a good hypothesis on the reasoning behind putting racial stats into the armor as opposed to the species.

 

Here's some pictures if you want to see what some of the race's armour looks like

http://community.playstarbound.com/index.php?threads/race-armor-and-more.25866/

 

Hey our titles are only one letter different!

 

word*

 

yeah indeed... actually two. close enough.

 

I can't answer this question because I don't actually know, lol