Blade & Soul - Dreamcatcher (Gon Outfit) Mod

In this week's post, we will be looking at an outfit which is neither old nor new. It was released late 2018 after the main storyline patch in September, together with the introduction of the Dreamsong Theatre dungeon. The outfit can be obtained from the dungeon itself or bought from NPC in Mushin Tower using Dungeon Challenge tokens.

The Dreamsong Theatre dungeon's setting is much like a theatre where Chinese Opera are performed. It is actually a setup by cultist to bewitch and kidnap citizens. The bosses and their minions wore costumes similar to Chinese Opera actors, as such the outfit design is mostly based on the costumes worn by Chinese Opera actors too.

Just for some fun facts, Chinese Opera is much like Western Opera in which historical or fictional stories are performed on stage by live actors. Except that in the former, the actors wore costumes that mimics the cloths worn by Chinese ancestors but in an exaggerated way. Some of the performance by the actors are also deliberately exaggerated, such as moving actions that suddenly come to a stop. Another feature of Chinese Opera is the fully painted face which represents the character type of the performed character. 😲

Although it is rich in heritage, the Chinese Opera is fast loosing traction as it looses the ability to attract performers and audiences from the new generation. 😟

Coming back to the outfit, we can see that the base design is a Cheongsam, decorated with multiple butterfly knots. The difference between the outfit and a Cheongsam can be seen from the bare shoulder and single-sided sleeve. There is also a red cape that rests on the shoulder and flows down to the waist level.

Front View - Original Outfit

The Cheongsam dress can be seen above with embroidered patterns of lotus petals.

Front Close-up View - Original Outfit

The chest portion is actually a separate structure from the rest of the main dress. The entire area wrapping around the chest is actually formed by multiple vertical 'card' structures.

Rear View - Original Outfit

We can see more embroidered lotus petals and a decorative butterfly knot at the back of the dress.

Rear Close-up View - Original Outfit

Left Side View - Original Outfit

The sides of the dress is like a Cheongsam, with inverted 'V' slits that shows off the legs.

Right Side View - Original Outfit

In the mod, I trimmed the length of the dress and removed those white pieces of cloth at the bottom. But after trimming, the dress is left with just a plain color, and so, I shifted the golden lotus petals patterns upwards, for both the front and back of the dress.

Next, I tried to adjust or re-arrange the red cloak but in the end, I took out majority of it, leaving just the collar portion.

Thereafter, I tried to see what can be done for the chest portion. Unfortunately, there is nothing that can be mod. As explained earlier, the turquoise-white portion that wraps around the chest is actually made up of several vertical 'card' structures and these structures share the same piece of texture. As such, any mod on that texture would affect the entire area. And removing the texture means that the entire area will be gone, leaving holes. Trimming it for a certain part would reveal hole at another area. In the end, I had to leave the chest portion untouched. 😥

Check out the modified outfit in the images below.

Front View - Modified Outfit

We can see the trimmed dress in the image above and below.

The lower portion of the decoration at the center of the dress had to be removed because it shared the same texture with the decoration at the back, which had to be removed because it is attached to the back portion of the dress to be cut off.

Front Close-up View - Modified Outfit

Rear View - Modified Outfit

The petals patterns can be seen shifted upwards to the remaining part of the dress.

Rear Close-up View - Modified Outfit

The red cloak has been removed, except the collar portion.

Left Side View - Modified Outfit

Right Side View - Modified Outfit

Right Side Close-up View - Modified Outfit

After the dress has been trimmed, the panties strap on the right hip becomes visible. Although I tried to turn the strap into skin, it seems that the mesh alignment is not perfect and will leave artifacts revealing the edges of the meshes where they meet. Even though I tried to mend it in the normal (N) texture, it did not seem to work either. Therefore, I had to leave the panties strap as it is. 😰

Eagle-eyed viewers might also noticed that the skin surface lacks details. That is because the entire skin area is represented by approximately only 110x130 pixels area and that size just is not sufficient to contain the required details. 😰

We have reached the end of this post. Watch the video for more details of the mod. However, since I do not have the outfit, it can only be captured with the in-game Tailorshop. Hopefully it is enough to show all the details. 😅

[Updated] A patron noticed that the skin color is darker and it seems to be the mask (M) file skin layer being given an incorrect alpha value. I have fixed it as shown in the image below.

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Blade & Soul - Commitment (Gon Outfit) Mod

This week, we will be looking at the Gon Commitment outfit, which is a request from almost a month ago after I posted the Yun Commitment mod. The details about the outfit can be found in the Yun post so I will skip them.

As mentioned before in the Yun post, Commitment looks exactly similar for all three races. The outfit has a modern design sporting a sleeveless shirt with open front and back, a pair of white trumpet trousers and finally a very thick belt on the waist.

Although, I dislike the trumpet trousers (because they looks very 70s 😐 ), I cannot do much about it because removing or trimming them would reveal a disconnected pair of feet. 😓

The most that I can do, is for the shirt as shown in the Yun mod, where I transformed the shirt into a laced layer. That is also what I plan to do for the Gon mod.

But before that, let's take a look at the original outfit below, as proof that the three versions for the Yun, Gon and Jin has the exact same design. 😅

Front View - Original Outfit

Front Close-up View - Original Outfit

The base design can be seen to be an exact copy of the Yun, right down to the tattoos on the body. However, their positions can be seen slightly shifted due to the inherent difference between the Yun and Gon body mesh.

Rear View - Original Outfit

Rear Close-up View - Original Outfit

The demon face decoration on the belt looks the same too.

Side View - Original Outfit

Side Close-up View - Original Outfit

As mentioned earlier in the post, I did the same Yun mod on the Gon's version.

Although the mod seems pretty easy like just making holes in the shirt, in actual fact, it takes a little more effort than that. I skipped mentioning that in the Yun post since that part of the mod cannot be seen or compared between the original and modified versions. But I thought I would explain it here as a supplement.

The not so obvious part of the mod has something to do with the skin color which is hidden below cloth. I guess now you can understand why it cannot be verified by comparing the original and modified versions. 😆

If we are to look closely at all outfits, we will notice that the skin color darkens between an area exposed to surrounding light and an area hidden under cloth. This boundary creates a shadow-like effect much like our real world. As such, the entire skin surface under the Commitment's cloth has a darker shade to it.

Now that I intend to make the originally fully concealed area semi-visible from outside, I need to take care of that, by recoloring those areas to normal skin color while also preserving the tattoos.

So, as you can see now, it is not just simply 'poking' holes in the shirt alone. 😅

Let us take a look at the modified Gon Commitment below.

Front View - Modified Outfit

Front Close-up View - Modified Outfit

As seen in the images above, the originally fully opaque cloth now has lace pattern on it, giving a semi see through effect.

Rear View - Modified Outfit

Rear Close-up View - Modified Outfit

The back of the shirt has also been modified to lace.

Side View - Modified Outfit

Side Close-up View - Modified Outfit

Unfortunately, I do not have the outfit on my Gon so I cannot get any closer look at the mod to check if the important points have been carefully concealed. So don't scream if you notice anything unusual. 😰

Oh, by the way, if you think that this outfit can be made topless, I suggest you to forget about it. 😆  Although the entire torso does exist under the shirt, the mesh structure of the breasts looks weird since they have been altered to fit into the shirt. The sides look like they are permanently compressed towards the center. It does not stand out that much under a semi see-through setting but it looks really weird if nothing is over the area. 😑

Since I do not have the outfit, I can only make the video using the in-game Tailorshop. Thus, I cannot do any close up views due to the limitations but I hope it is enough to show the mod.

Download Link

Blade & Soul - Unchallenged (Yun Outfit) Mod

Just end of March, a patron shared the news that the Unchallenged outfit has been added to the list of outfits sold by the Zaiwei Achievement vendor. This is good news indeed since we no longer need to pray to the RNG goddess (for it to drop) and hope additionally that no one else in the party would bid against you for the outfit. 😅

Now, players just need to defeat Yoong, the final boss in Irontech Forge, under five minutes and they can purchase it from the vendor for three high quality fabrics. These fabrics can be easily obtained by salvaging certain outfits or just bought off the in-game marketplace. And with the recent level sixty cap, the achievement is not out of reach for most players.

With the ease of getting this outfit now, I decided to buy it for my Yun character and test out the same Jin mod on the Yun's for this next mod.

All the details about this outfit has been mentioned in my previous Jin Unchallenged post, so I will go straight to the Yun outfit, which looks exactly the same like the Jin's and Gon's.

Front View - Original Outfit

Front Close-up View - Original Outfit

As seen above, the Yun outfit is made up of the same full black leather parts, such as the full length coat and leg guards. The armor is also littered with spikes and maybe that is why the outfit is called Unchallenged. Would you challenge a hedge hog to a fight? 😆

Rear View - Original Outfit

Rear Close-up View - Original Outfit

The same power pack, huge metal glove and the power cable can be seen above.

Right Side View - Original Outfit

Left Side View - Original Outfit

Left Side Close-up View - Original Outfit

As with the Jin mod, I similarly removed the power cable and most of the spiky armor pieces. The bra area was also trimmed a little and the mid vertical portion at the back of the coat was removed.

I also tried to trim the metal glove to remove the protrusion but that will leave a hole, so the idea is aborted.

The end result looks very similar to the Jin mod. Let's have a look below.

Front View - Modified Outfit

Front Close-up View - Modified Outfit

The armor pieces on the mid torso have been removed as seen in the images above.

We can see just a little more of the underboobs after the bra area is trimmed. 😅

Rear View - Modified Outfit

Rear Close-up View - Modified Outfit

Similarly, the power cable and mid portion of the coat is no more.

Right Side View - Modified Outfit

Left Side View - Modified Outfit

Left Side Close-up View - Modified Outfit

With the mod, you might face more challengers, now that most of the menacing spikes are gone. 😆

This will wrap up the Yun Unchallenged outfit mod. Check out the video which was taken in the newly introduced region - Moon Refuge in the Solak map.

Download Link 

Blade & Soul - Oblivion (Jin Outfit) Mod

Stretching across three years of this blog, we have at long last reached the final version of Oblivion, which is for the Jin race. Starting off with the Yun Oblivion in the last quarter of 2017, followed by the request for the Gon Oblivion in September 2018, I guess it is time to wrap up the mod for this outfit.

There isn't a request for this outfit mod and I think it might be because it is still very much only obtainable by chance. Even though the dungeon - Desolate Tomb has been nerfed and players updated to be much more powerful (than the final boss), the RNG goddess is ever more powerful, as she still has the last say to whether we can finally own this outfit. 😧

Several dungeon outfits have been made available to players outside of dungeon, such as the Unchallenged outfit from Irontech Forge, as highlighted by a patron just after the March 2019 NA patch. However, Oblivion remains out of reach of players outside of the dungeon, or rather, remains in the hand of our beloved RNG goddess. 😅

Moreover, the dungeon has become obsolete due to game updates and the fact that it is not part of the main story line causes many players to shun it. As such farming for this outfit have become a difficult task for new players. However, looking at how NCSoft has been rejuvenating old contents to make them relevant, by improving rewards and increasing the difficulty as in the case of Midnight Skypetal Plains/Cold Storage/Heaven Mandate, we may one day see the Lord of Flames bashing up players again. 😆

As seen in the original images below, the Jin Oblivion looks almost the same as that of the Gon and Yun, other than the cross-straps on the Yun's bra area. But one thing is clear, the crystal hanging on the Gon's torso is humongous for some reason. 😅

Front View - Original Outfit

Front Close-up View - Original Outfit

The outfit has the same dark blue/purple leather armor over a slightly translucent tight-fitting layer.

Rear View - Original Outfit

We can also see the same elbow guard and tail emitting electrical sparks.

Rear Close-up View - Original Outfit

Side View - Original Outfit

Side Close-up View - Original Outfit

Although the outfits for Gon, Yun and Jin have the same appearance, the underlining mesh structures can be quite different.

If you remember from my Yun Oblivion post, you will know that I have to draw two panties straps on the sides of the waist to hide a layer discontinuity. For the Gon's and Jin's mod, there is no need for this.

I also managed to 'open' a hole on the Yun's leg guards so those thighs will not look so thick, but I cannot do the same for the Gon's mod. However, in the Jin's mod, the thigh portion of the leg guards can be totally removed to reveal the thighs.

You can see the Jin mod in the images below for a comparison.

Front View - Modified Outfit

The tight-fitting layer has been repainted to skin just as in the Gon's and Yun's mod.

Front Close-up View - Modified Outfit

As seen above, the portions of the leg guards at the thighs have been removed and the thighs are clearly visible.

Rear View - Modified Outfit

However, a lower portion of the leg guards have to be retained because there is no skin layer underneath them.

Rear Close-up View - Modified Outfit

The outer layer at the butt which connects to the leg guards can also be removed as seen in the image above.

Side View - Modified Outfit

Side Close-up View - Modified Outfit

At last, I can wrap up the Oblivion mod.

Now that you have seen all three versions of the mod, which one do you like most?

You can take a closer look at the mod in the short video on YouTube.

Download Link