Characters and Clothes: your take?

[MarkVIIIMarc]

You know, I've always been very clear about my characters' clothing. My foppish, gender-bending sorcerer has a deep purple tunic and lovely brown leather boots, while my goliath warlock wears less than the appropriate amount of loincloth. My halfling ranger wore faded and torn clothes, but his boots were fine leather, much more expensive than anything else on his person.

I've always found it a good way to explore what people find important.

Darn right about having the nicest boots you can afford when you're doing a lot of walking.

In a campaign I run we have a naturally high charisma sorcerer who wears some flamboyant purple and pretends to be a vegetarian but secretly loves eating meet. I have no idea what the fellow is heading towards but it creates some interesting scenes. Maybe someone in his family or past is a secret smoker or something lol.

[Wryte]

I end up drawing all my characters sooner or later, so their clothing comes up then if I haven't already given specific thought to it prior.

I mean, good or bad, your clothes are basically free design space. Want to have a really cool hat? Go for it! Want to be a smelly peasant with a troll skull on one shoulder? Why not!

I'll never understand why people fail to use the tools available to them to make their character fun. I currently have a frenzy barbarian in one of my groups who goes into combat in a full dress.

I played a troll once in a campaign where the party came into possession of a wedding dress around the 3/4 mark of the game. She insisted on wearing it because it made her feel pretty, despite the fact that it was made for a woman roughly 3 feet shorter and 200lbs lighter. She managed to force it on, bursting about 90% of the seams in the process, and wore it under her half plate as it gradually became more and more tattered.

She didn't care. She was the prettiest troll in all of Ravenloft.

The Abbot had opinions about that.

Spoiler: Visual

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[DeadMech]

I quite like thinking about what my characters wear. Undercover noble paladin, yeah he should be deliberately wearing something that lets him blend in with commoners. Maybe he lets his clothes under his armor get a bit discolored from the oil maintaining the straps turning his shirt a bit off white in areas. A secret bundle of clothes in his pack with his signet ring. Maybe those are a military officers dress uniform. Eventually the cat has to get out of the bag, sometimes it's a snoopy party member, sometimes it's a rank pull moment, sometimes its just heading home and visiting family. It'll happen eventually.

I Tend to ask the DM if fashion is notably changing as we traverse the map as well. Picking up outfits in the local styles to either try to blend in while there or to stand out when we travel back elsewhere. I quite like to make sure my characters have a few sets of clothes spare. I know I personally don't enjoy wearing the same thing everyday. Especially traveling and for some reason when you play a painfully bashful dude it seems an invitation for the female npc's and party members to contrive reasons to end up naked as if this were some sorta harem anime.

Recently my characters have had color palettes. The vengeance paladin I choose to dress in red and black because I made up a church for him who's saint was secretly of less than capital G alignment origin. A monotone speaking unemotional wizard wore earth tones and greyscale.

Current wizard wears her school colors. Might have mis-described her outfit though since the artist of our group drew her in a literal schoolgirl uniform. Being the oldest character but the shortest and youngest looking I choose to roll with it. She's currently broke and in debt to the party paladin from buying a cloak of protection but once I pay that off and catch up on duplicating her newest spells she's going to try get that cloak's appearance modified. Change the color so it matches her outfit maybe have a unique design put on it. It would be super cool if at some point I could have a school logo made up. Maybe something like the metal circle the girls on little witch acadamia wear on their hats. Use something like that as the cloak clasp perhaps. She recently acquired a rod of alertness as well. Very powerful item and happy to have it but the way it's described... ick. Doesn't match it's use or my character's aesthetic. Looks more like something a knight should be using to cave someone's skull in than a powerful divination tool.

I'm Haley and this is my lime green boots of speed... Though to be fair this isn't new. Most of the magic swords I'm convinced contain more steel than my car. Allot of magic items are pretty hideous is some way or another. Next time I run a game I'm going to make anything with the attunement tag have a free non-illusion glamour effect so that over time magic items adapt to their owners. Possibly except for artifacts since those are unique and generally crafted by people beyond most parties comprehension. Fashion Souls shall ring out through the lands.

[Protato]

I tend to think of specific outfits (or at least a specific clothing article) for my character ahead of time so that if I get art, the artist knows what to draw. My Bard has a red hat with a feather in it (like a Red Mage in Final Fantasy), my Hexblade has a purple tailcoat, my Forge Cleric Dwarf has a white cloak with a blue collar worn above his heavy armor, and my Earth Genasi Barbarian has a motheaten green scarf and a blue shirt over some ragged pants and worn-out boots. I have other characters and ideas that haven't been put to paper, but in general I like to think about character appearance just for fun.

[Samayu]

I don't usually care about my characters' clothing very much except to specify that my wizards wear trousers, not robes.

My current character is a half-orc barbarian soldier with a thing for fancy clothing. She owns a dress uniform (for making impressions), a regular military uniform (for fighting), a fancy dress (for casual wear around town) and a plain dress (for casual fighting around town).

[Regitnui]

Playing a changeling with two different personas (shifter soldier and elf debutant), I had to be reminded that I need different clothes to not give away my disguise. Since I can't afford a set of clothes of many fashions, I have an Aundair soldier's uniform for the shifter, a set of fancy yet practical clothes for the elf, and a couple of sets of common clothes for either genders. Means I start with half my starting gold, but the fashion is worth it, especially when it'll get to my character being able to change freely in front of the others.

[Daithi]

I think everyone has a vision of what their character looks like, but from a game perspective --- Don't care.

[Pelle]

In Torchbearer, under Raiment on your character sheet you are supposed to fill in something special you wear. I find the description of it funny:

"How do you dress? In the life, we each wear something distinctive so as to add to our reputations. Otherwise, you’re just another filthy scarred face in the crowd."

[Pex]

In Torchbearer, under Raiment on your character sheet you are supposed to fill in something special you wear. I find the description of it funny:

"How do you dress? In the life, we each wear something distinctive so as to add to our reputations. Otherwise, you’re just another filthy scarred face in the crowd."

Can't speak for Torchbearer games, but in D&D many characters want to be just another filthy scarred face in the crowd.

[Pelle]

Can't speak for Torchbearer games, but in D&D many characters want to be just another filthy scarred face in the crowd.

Yeah, no disagreement. I just like the perspective. If you want to be recognized as the hero you are, wear something distinguishable.

[JakOfAllTirades]

Awesome clothes are the reason Noble is my favorite Background.

Also, why isn't there a Goth subclass?

[EvilAnagram]

Also, why isn't there a Goth subclass?

Shadow Sorcerer doesn't work for you? Or Necromancer? Or any Warlock?

[Dr. Cliché]

Awesome clothes are the reason Noble is my favorite Background.

Also, why isn't there a Goth subclass?

Don't Warlocks have proficiency in leather trench coats?

[strangebloke]

I end up drawing all my characters sooner or later, so their clothing comes up then if I haven't already given specific thought to it prior.



I played a troll once in a campaign where the party came into possession of a wedding dress around the 3/4 mark of the game. She insisted on wearing it because it made her feel pretty, despite the fact that it was made for a woman roughly 3 feet shorter and 200lbs lighter. She managed to force it on, bursting about 90% of the seams in the process, and wore it under her half plate as it gradually became more and more tattered.

She didn't care. She was the prettiest troll in all of Ravenloft.

The Abbot had opinions about that.

Nice! She's gorgeous! It's probably good to have that dress on, considering that the coverage of her half-plate is, uh, pretty minimal. Then again, Troll.

So long as we're showing off our art, though I haven't played in a long campaign in nearly five years, this is my latest one:

Spoiler

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The character is an incredibly arrogant paladin who is nonetheless horribly self-loathing. Something like "I'm the best around, I can kick ass, no-one is smarter than me, I'm the only adult in the room... but I'm a horrible person and insufferable to be around and I know it." The garb plays down the character's pretty looks and plays up the character's strength and no-nonsense capability. So kind of the reverse of your character. Looks like an angel, wants to be a be... not ugly, but pretty much as much of a faceless weapon as possible.

EDIT: fixed the link.

[Rogerdodger557]

The main character that I play is an Order of the Lycan Blood Hunter. Fortunately, the shifting doesn't explicitly destroy my clothing. I mainly see the shift ass affecting the head and arms, so the only piece of clothing my character cares about, his dad's naval jacket, doesn't get damaged.

[Joe the Rat]

Don't Warlocks have proficiency in leather trench coats?

Yes, yes they do.

Far Traveler can be pretty Goth: You have strange manners, music, and way of dress; can be aloof or irritated at the normie folk around you; have social outcast backstory options; somehow still get invited to all the cool kid parties; and are Proficient in the snarky observation skills.

[Monster Manuel]

Not a lot to add here, except that I read the thread title as "Characters take your clothes?" and I had questions...

[Brawndo]

My character is a Tiefling Warlock with at-will Disguise Self and at-will Mage Armor.

She just wears a common barmaid dress most of the time, which can look like anything she wants and Mage Armor has her AC taken care of.

[Beelzebubba]

We hand-wave away the mechanics and make it a player call as to how much they want to emphasize it in their RP.

I personally think about them a lot, but I draw and like to visualize. Some players in our group don't care at all.

[Afrodactyl]

I typically don't pay too much attention to what my characters are wearing unless it's part of the character. So my sorcerer for Out of the Abyss is constantly looking for newer finer clothes, because his other fine clothes keep getting dirty and damaged. And heaven forfend he succumb to living and looking like some sort of beast when he was raised in the lap of luxury.

[Glorthindel]

In my current campaign, while searching through an abandoned estate, our party stumbled into a massive wardrobe including theatrical costumes (no idea why the villain had these). My Bard immediately went full scavenger, filling his bags with all manner of costumes, uniforms, and clothing styles (including matching shoes and hats) to allow him to better blend in in a variety of environments and social situations. The rest of the party thought I had lost my mind