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Anaraxes · 12-30-2010, 10:20 PM

Leaving sheer fashion and consumption for pleasure out -- as they're both perfectly possible in a roleplaying game -- the main reason people buy more cloths is maintenance and wear. Unless you want to do laundry every day, you have more than one set of clothes. Even people that wear uniforms usually have more than one copy, so it's not for variety. The clothes wear out (or stop fitting) over time, so you replace them. Most people don't want to track this sort of detail in a game. In GURPS terms, it's subsumed in the generic "cost of living". Feel free to assume that PCs have a normal amount of variety of clothing according to their status and CoL. If they want to buy more beyond the norm, encourage them.

It makes no difference mechanically whether clothes provide a penalty if you don't have them, or a bonus when you do. You just shift the zero point. Certainly it's not a matter of "realism" one way or the other, as reality doesn't come with a fixed zero point for a skill roll determined by a GM.

12-30-2010, 10:20 PM	#6
Anaraxes Join Date: Sep 2007	Re: Social benifits of gear Leaving sheer fashion and consumption for pleasure out -- as they're both perfectly possible in a roleplaying game -- the main reason people buy more cloths is maintenance and wear. Unless you want to do laundry every day, you have more than one set of clothes. Even people that wear uniforms usually have more than one copy, so it's not for variety. The clothes wear out (or stop fitting) over time, so you replace them. Most people don't want to track this sort of detail in a game. In GURPS terms, it's subsumed in the generic "cost of living". Feel free to assume that PCs have a normal amount of variety of clothing according to their status and CoL. If they want to buy more beyond the norm, encourage them. It makes no difference mechanically whether clothes provide a penalty if you don't have them, or a bonus when you do. You just shift the zero point. Certainly it's not a matter of "realism" one way or the other, as reality doesn't come with a fixed zero point for a skill roll determined by a GM.