A question about sprites

Ive been brainstorming a game lately, a sprite based rpg game like diablo 2. In this game, equipping items would altar the appearance of the character but i just can't figure out how i could do it... I could make bazillions of variants of the sprite with all possible combinations but that would take me years to complete.

So my question is, how would i do this without spending to much time on making sprites?

 

You can try like it was done in Baldur's Gate, using another layer for the armor, you would animate only the armor and apply as a new layer to the player sprite that is drawn above it. Same for weapons. I don't think there are fast alternatives without going 3d.

 

So your saying i need to make a base character sprite then make helmets, armor, legs etc that can add to the base sprite? man this is gonna be a long task.

Hmmmm... i was thinking i could just make 5 empty sprites for the different parts of the player then just change that sprite to the one they have equipped. it could work but the animations mite be quite messed up. Only one way to find out.

 

Sadly no fast way to do this.

Draw normal sprite and each armor or weapon is drawn as a separate layer with its own frames then stuck above your 2D sprite.

or you can create a 3D model and export as 2D... You can even semi get it to look like pixel art but its never gonna be the same specially animations.

Yes. You'd make a sprite then draw a helmet over it in every direction and then redo that for every animation frame.

If your gonna do this for each peice of armor... Your gonna need a really simple sprite unless its side view... It will be alot alot of work.