(18May99)
I assume that the graphic are handled by a graphic library
such as Allegro (or XwinAllegro).

Construction of player's grafic tile.

   Every base tile (f.ex. for every race & sex combination)
 is associated to 4 coordinates of where to put over the
 graphics for headgear, left and right hands wielded items
 and Footwear. (Armours and cloaks can be set too, but by now
 i dont want too complex items, after finished this i will add 
 them)
   
   The aditional tiles are stacked over (assuming the use
 of masked bitmaps) the base tile (well, better use a larger 
 bitmap with that graphic centered) and the final union is 
 clipped to  32x32  pixels (or the size of your tiles) and
 stored for later use.
 
 (This is an ugly ASCII example, not well scaled)
 
 (The graphic for the boots must be clipped)
  
    +-------------------+ <- Base character graph. (Think
    |                   |    in a brave warrior or a  
    |         1         |    mighty mage here)
    |                   | 1 The coords for head (the graphic
    |                   |   for helm will be centered here.
    |    2              | 
    |              3    | 2 Right hand (mostly weapon)
    |                   |
    |    +---------+    | 3 Left hand 
    |    |         |    |
    |    |         |    | 4 Boots
    |    |    4    |    |
    +----+---------+----+
         |         |
	 +---------+

   The tile must be redrawn (recalculate?) in the memory buffer
 every time the character change armor or wielded items or when is 
 wounded (blood stains can be added) or somehow change of status
 (Polymorph anyone?), but the loos of speed is infimous, given 
 the times that you change the status of the player is only
 every not soo few turns.
    
   Also, weapon graphics can be added an aditional parameter
 to handle the orientation of how the picture of the character
 hold the weapon, and then rotate the weapon graphic before
 make its merge (To advoid the feel that all characters are 
 in "vogue"(?) ) This will make some "graphical" damage to
 our weapon tiles but ... (This idea is not tested yet by me)
 
   NPC graphics can be handled using a similar method, but an 
 easier (and faster) one will be better. My dessing only uses weapons
 graphs and only for humanoid NPC.
   
   NEXT .... Palette and colour changes