Poll: Metagame or Aesthetic?

[Daystar Clarion]

Ok, scenario time ladies and gentlemen.

You're playing you're favourite single player RPG, whether that be an Elder Scrolls game, Fallout, etc.

You've just finished clearing out a dungeon/building/zeppelin/the moon, and you come across two sets of armour.

Set one has the best stats of any armour you've ever found (but not so much to be game breaking), but the the armour itself is also the worst looking piece of crap you've ever seen.


Set two has no exceptional stats, but it is some of the best looking armour you've ever seen.


You can only have one of these sets, so which one do you pick?

The metgamer inside you is screaming,
'Just look at those stats! OMFG 3p1c LOOTz!'

While your aesthetic side states,
'Whoaaaa, so shiiiiiiiny!'

Me? I'd pick the second set. I always have done in those types of games.

Stats are fine, but nothing screams awesome like a great looking set of armour, I'm the kind of guy who downloaded a mod for Oblivion so that my female elf could wear Ezio's armour from Assassin's Creed 2.

 

[Fayathon]

I take whichever is worth more money, the armor I wear in those games is always stuff I've gotten custom to fit my play style better, crap I pick up never works as well.

 

[the spud]

Set 1, that little number cruncher inside always gets the best of me.

Although if better armor was to come along later I might have gone with set 2.

 

[ChupathingyX]

I would take the aesthetic one and display it in my suite in the Lucky 38.

As long as I have Benny's suit, Joshua Graham's armour, 1st Recon beret and sunglasses I'm happy.

 

[AlternatePFG]

If it's like the newer Fallouts, where you still can get through the game easily without amazing armor, then yeah definitely set 2.

 

[Asti]

Awww, I can only take one? I usually put the better looking stuff in my storage and forget about it. XD But If I can take only one, I'd take the shiny one.

I like the shiny.

 

[OmniscientOstrich]

I'd probably go for set 2, my in game avatar's mentality is pretty vain.

 

[Sonicron]

Definitely the first option. Sure, I cringed at the look of my party in KotOR pretty much throughout the entire game, but god damn, did I kick ass!

 

[DeadlyYellow]

Super metagame: I'd find a mod for it. No reason you can't have good protection and nice looking armor.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

Super metagame: I'd find a mod for it. No reason you can't have good protection and nice looking armor.

That is breaking ze rules! Und those who break ze rules vill be dealt with most severely...

 

[Jordi]

I don't understand how taking set 1 would be metagaming. Suppose you are really in that world, struggling to survive, being attacked all the time. Would you care more about how you look, or how well you're protected? To be honest, I consider taking the second set to me more meta than the first, because only behind a monitor/tv in the safety of your own home would you care about how your outfit looks.

A similar distinction is often made between roleplaying and powergaming, as if the two are mutually exclusive. Can't I roleplay a smart character who actually cares about how practical his equipment is?

Anyway, sorry for the rant. I case you couldn't tell, I'm taking set 1.

 

[Extraintrovert]

While I selected set 1 in the poll, something is telling me that if I were actually presented with that situation, I would choose set 2. My emotions override my reason more often than not, and given the option between something that mostly the game will see and something that I will see, the latter is more immediately appealing and thus the more likely outcome for me.

I don't understand how taking set 1 would be metagaming. Suppose you are really in that world, struggling to survive, being attacked all the time. Would you care more about how you look, or how well you're protected? To be honest, I consider taking the second set to me more meta than the first, because only behind a monitor/tv in the safety of your own home would you care about how your outfit looks.

A similar distinction is often made between roleplaying and powergaming, as if the two are mutually exclusive. Can't I roleplay a smart character who actually cares about how practical his equipment is?

I love you.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

I don't understand how taking set 1 would be metagaming. Suppose you are really in that world, struggling to survive, being attacked all the time. Would you care more about how you look, or how well you're protected? To be honest, I consider taking the second set to me more meta than the first, because only behind a monitor/tv in the safety of your own home would you care about how your outfit looks.

A similar distinction is often made between roleplaying and powergaming, as if the two are mutually exclusive. Can't I roleplay a smart character who actually cares about how practical his equipment is?

Anyway, sorry for the rant. I case you couldn't tell, I'm taking set 1.

Lets say, set 1 is a loin cloth. It offers no 'real' protection whatsoever, yet its stats are what make it a ridiculously powrful. It's not magic, so that's no excuse.


Picking that set because it has a bunch of high numbers is metagaming, because there's no conceivable way you can explain how that armour is as powerful as it is.

If it was some really bland platemail, then yes, practicality would be a perfectly reasonable excuse, for choosing it.

 

[Zhukov]

Set 2.

Fuck stats.

Of course, the best solution would be for the game to have a LOTRO-style system where you can pick a different set of armour for your appearance without affecting stats. Best of both worlds.

 

[The Elcor Batman]

Metagame. Aesthitic appeal only gets you so far. Its all about getting the best numbers in the land, dadio!!

 

[DrOswald]

The good looking armor, those games are usually too easy anyway and another better or equal piece of armor is going to drop eventually anyway. I like my vanity sets.

 

[thejackyl]

Number one.

The only time I would choose Aesthetic over stats, would be if the stats are similar, or even the same.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

Set 2.

Fuck stats.

Of course, the best solution would be for the game to have a LOTRO-style system where you can pick a different set of armour for your appearance without affecting stats. Best of both worlds.

That's actually a really cool system.

I'd like to see that implemented in other games.

 

[Jordi]

I don't understand how taking set 1 would be metagaming. Suppose you are really in that world, struggling to survive, being attacked all the time. Would you care more about how you look, or how well you're protected? To be honest, I consider taking the second set to me more meta than the first, because only behind a monitor/tv in the safety of your own home would you care about how your outfit looks.

A similar distinction is often made between roleplaying and powergaming, as if the two are mutually exclusive. Can't I roleplay a smart character who actually cares about how practical his equipment is?

Anyway, sorry for the rant. I case you couldn't tell, I'm taking set 1.

Lets say, set 1 is a loin cloth. It offers no 'real' protection whatsoever, yet its stats are what make it a ridiculously powrful. It's not magic, so that's no excuse.


Picking that set because it has a bunch of high numbers is metagaming, because there's no conceivable way you can explain how that armour is as powerful as it is.

If it was some really bland platemail, then yes, practicality would be a perfectly reasonable excuse, for choosing it.

I think it all comes down to whether you think the in-game character knows about the "stats" (or has a feeling about the power) of an item.

What you're basically saying is that for the character it would make no sense to pick the loin cloth, because it doesn't really look very powerful (which is by the way different from not being aesthetically pleasing).
But I have a problem with that, because the character lives in his world and he should be able to observe the effects of items. Even if the loin cloth doesn't look like it would protect him, he would be able to notice that in fact it does as soon as it is tested. Of course, it's possible that the character would discard the item without noticing how powerful it is. Now I can see that happening in our world (especially with the loin cloth), but if you live in a world where (apparently) loin cloths can offer better protection than armor, that would be kind of stupid.
Note that in all of this I didn't once consider how aesthetically pleasing the armor is, and I would solely consider how powerful something looks.

You say that it is metagaming because the power of the loin cloth cannot be explained, but I don't really agree. It can be explained, simply because it is there. But the difference between us is that you use an out of game explanation ("because the developers wanted it"), whereas I'm looking for an explanation in-game, which I think is less meta. I'm thinking that because these kinds of items apparently exist in the game world, game characters would either have different laws of nature (so that the protection could be "real") or they would consider it to be something they can't explain AKA magic (maybe not the same type of Magic™ that the game might otherwise reference, but magic still).
Or maybe our difference of opinion can be explained by the fact that I consider that item (and items like it) to be fully a part of, and integrated in the game world, whereas maybe you consider the game world and the item(s) to be separate somehow.

What do you think?

 

[J.McMillen]

#2. In Fallout 3 I stuck with the Ranger battle armor because I liked the way it looked, even though power armor had a higher DR value.