How much time do you spend on MMO character fashion?

Do you care how your character’s clothes and armor look in MMOs? Have you ever spent hours getting the perfect clothes to complete your outfit, or used transmog to make sure you stay looking slick no matter what loot you find? Or do you just wear whatever mismatched jumble of accessories gives you the biggest bonuses?

How much time do you spend on MMO character fashion?

Here are our answers, plus some from our forum.

Robin Valentine, Print Editor: When it comes to MMO armour, I actually kind of enjoy just being a victim of the loot tables. By just equipping whatever I find that has a higher number, no matter how incongruous it makes me look, I get to see my character constantly evolving visually in this organic way. Even in very different genres, whenever I have access to any kind of clothing system or anything like that, I like to find ways of gradually changing appearance over the course of the story in some slightly random way, just to see what weird looks come up and to feel like my character is going about their life rather than designing themselves the perfect hero costume.

Lauren Morton, Associate Editor: Mate, fashion is the only reason I’m here. I mean sure, I’ll prioritize the critical path quests or sometimes map completion (my other obsession), but my motivation for what to do next is always fashion rewards. 

I chose which dungeon in Guild Wars 2 to run daily (Citadel of Flame) because I wanted the complete armor set. I joined the Thieves Guild in The Elder Scrolls Online because, well, I always join the Thieves Guild in Scrolls games, but also I really wanted the leather armor. Even when I’m not actually sitting at a dye station choosing between two identical shades of black dye, I’m still technically spending time on my fashion.

Jody Macgregor, Weekend/AU Editor: I usually wore whatever gave the most pluses in Warhammer: Age of Reckoning, The Old Republic, Elder Scrolls Online, Lord of the Rings Online, and all the other MMOs I’ve flitted in and out of over the years. Only Lost Ark has made me start to think about putting together a lewk. And even there I haven’t got into dying outfits and all the other stuff real fashionistas do. 

Instead, I’ve just been collecting cosmetics and the ridiculous accessories given away in Lost Ark’s Twitch drops, which you earn by watching a streamer for four hours. And that’s why my sorceress basically looks like a pear and my artillerist is rocking a pair of 8-bit sunglasses.

Mollie Taylor, News Writer: Huehue, this is my time to shine. I’m a chronic Final Fantasy 14 player and as any Eorzea dweller knows, glamour is the true endgame. I’ve spent hundreds of hours grinding relic weapons, armour, and paying excessive amounts for the latest glamour item. The chest piece on my Paladin probably took the longest—Stormblood’s relic armour is a long and arduous journey, especially if you’re grinding it alone. Thankfully I wasn’t!

Final Fantasy 14 has a really nice mixture of both casual and immersive clothing items, and I tend to flip-flop between the two depending on my mood. Then I either have AFK in Limsa Lominsa to show off my sweet new getup or, of course, jump straight into /gpose and spend forever taking screenshots for the validation of my friends and guildmates. Fashion grinding is such a big part of Final Fantasy 14 that there’s even an entire lookbook website dedicated to it called Eorzea Collection (opens in new tab). It’s my go-to when I’m itching for a new outfit but stuck for inspiration.

Tyler Colp, Associate Editor: Final Fantasy 14 is the only MMO I’ve played that prompted me to care about what I wear. My bunny girl changes outfits depending on the situation and season. I hit the glamour dresser up whenever the main story takes me to a new location. I started playing FF14 after years of time in World of Warcraft where I wore whatever the newest raid sets were and never thought about it again. Now, I have a FF14 OC that I didn’t know I wanted and it’s all because of how stunning the fashion is in that game and how easy it is to get into it.

Zloth: Just whatever gives the best bonuses, which could be a mess:

City of Heroes/Villains was a breath of fresh air. You didn’t get armor, so you wore whatever you liked.

ZedClampet: The MMO I used to play let you transfer the stats of any equipment onto any other equipment, so you could be wearing the best armor in the game, but have it look like any other piece of clothes that you liked.

I did spend a decent amount of time doing that. I had friends and family playing the game, so I thought it was fun to create nice outfits. I would travel to venders in different worlds and buy what I needed or grind for crafting materials to make what I needed.

It wasn’t a main focus of mine, but when I got tired of grinding for money and breeding pets and farming bosses, I needed to have something to do.

Pifanjr: Stats above style every time.

Frindis: I like to use some time to make myself look fabulous. Here is a picture from Runescape where I am at the Deep Sea Fishing hub with my water lycan pup. I do like to have different bonuses on my character and I’ll override those items with better-looking clothes so I can still have the bonuses while looking good.

DXCHASE: If there is a transmog system…hours, if its just a generic build at the beginning… a couple of minutes.

Sarafan: The only MMO in which I spent a decent amount of time in the last years is The Elder Scrolls Online. The game has this characteristic that most outfits look quite aesthetic, so I don’t have a problem that characterized Cyberpunk 2077 (yeah, it’s not an MMO) where there was a challenge to find good-looking clothes. Of course there are better and worse looking armors in TESO, but I usually go for the statistics. It’s nice to have a good looking hero, but it’s even better to have a hero who has chances to survive encounters with enemies.