Melee weapon upgrades

[Jokuc]

Can simply make the weapons slightly brighter/reflective to make it look like a newer/sharper sword. As you said in the OP I think it would be cool to have weapon upgrades for elves shine a little bit blue, but other than that I do not want to see Gondor Soldiers and Dwarves running around with lightsabers and cerainly not Uruks looking like sith lords.

I must add that I think it is a horrible idea to not have any visual change whatsoever as players must be able to judge whether to engage in a battle or not. Shouldn't have to press all of your opponents units to see if they have upgrades, that's just frustrating.

[Solethria]

Can simply make the weapons slightly brighter/reflective to make it look like a newer/sharper sword. As you said in the OP I think it would be cool to have weapon upgrades for elves shine a little bit blue, but other than that I do not want to see Gondor Soldiers and Dwarves running around with lightsabers and cerainly not Uruks looking like sith lords.

I must add that I think it is a horrible idea to not have any visual change whatsoever as players must be able to judge whether to engage in a battle or not. Shouldn't have to press all of your opponents units to see if they have upgrades, that's just frustrating.

This is the most recent statement on how the upgrade approach will be:

We are aiming at preserving the special elegant style of LOTR and that's why we want to avoid making cartoonish, stylized glowing blades of common Gondor soldiers and orcs, the only exception being the elven enchanted weapons. To fill in the void, we are preparing different and interesting upgrades.
- https://bfmereforged.org/

Also this statement when it comes to the properties of armor and how they are affected by lighting:

Thanks to new shaders, objects in game acquire physically correct lighting and shadowing: elven armor and blades get shiny under a bright sun, orc inferior and dirty weaponry and armor are dim under same circumstances.
- https://bfmereforged.org/

[TohoBuWaha]

I like the idea of making it look more realistic.

On the other hand especially for competitive play it is important to be easily able to tell if a unit is upgraded or not - so I think it's very important to somehow implement a clear distinction for every faction.
I also feel like the glowing swords somehow belong to bfme for me...a horde of Uruks running at your base with glowing swords always meant trouble xD

But as long as it is possible to see upgrades easily I think whatever option you go for will be fine

[Tntnoto]

These ideas got me to realize, why not choose in between? Don't pick the intense BFME2 glow but pick a shiny shimmering (like the sun bouncing of the weapon) and maybe change of color for the weapon. That would be awesome indeed!

Me personally I don't like just an interface indication. We didn't step up to this cool looking engine for no reason ^^

I definitely agree that an interface simply won't do this game any justice. A change of weapon or weapon color is, in my opinion, the best way to go as it's even clear in the movies that some weapons are better based on Smith's and materials.

[Erikzorz3]

I feel like Solethria is on the right track. An improvement on the old system would be best, and an interface might be a bit boring. It doesn't have to be the flashiest mechanic, but it should be somewhat easy to tell between the upgraded and non upgraded swords. I didn't mind the bright glowing, but it brought out an important game mechanic; focus firing or avoiding the upgraded units.