Stuff, Stuff, Everywhere

There are limits, even in WoW, to how many outfits and how much cool RP stuff you can accumulate without running out of storage space. Even if you dedicate all your bank slots to your hat collections, broken bottles and offhand frills, the day will come when there is more that you want than you can fit in your bags and still have space for your raid gear and the stuff that actually helps you win fights.

What is a fashionable toon to do?

If this were real life, you might be compelled, as I am, to have a tag sale (the equivalent of a trip to the vendors). If you are super organized, and I am not, you might decree that for every new item that you acquire, an old one must go. Or you might just rent a dumpster - that old standby DELETE.

Here are a few tips I have learned about maximizing the potential of every item in your collection and the space you have to keep it.

1. Use your Bank All for anything not Soulbound. This will be mildly inconvenient when you need to log off to mail yourself a stack of fish, but most of your fashionable gear will be bound to you and can only go in your own bank or bags.

2. Use the most versitile items of apparel in many costumes. Imelda Marcos had closet space for 2,000 pairs of shoes. You don't. Do what the Real Life fashion mavens do and find a belt or two that goes with everything. Unless it is a matched set, you do not need a one-off pair of gloves or shoes. Even the same pair of pants can be used for many different looks. I get a lot of mileage out of Azure Silk Pants, Willow Belt, Studded Belt and Calico Shoes.

3. Don't equip that perfect hat until you have acquired the full outfit. As long as you leave it BoE, your Bank Alt can store it for you.

4. Covet not the Bosses Gear. If it is not available to players, it doesn't matter how hot you think you would look in Queen Alexstrasza's Uber Babe armor. You can't have a Pirate Admiral's Coat, either. Get over it.

5. Avoid trying to fill non essential fashion slots. Especially for male toons, there are very few times when you will want to equip shoulders, capes or bracers to complete a specific costume look. How many pirates do you know who went running around looking like linebackers? Unless you want to be a high fashion wizard, these are of limited costume value. Stick with Hats, Chests, Legs, Waists and Feet in that order.

6. Be distinctive! After you have been browsing the AH for a month or so, you will have exhausted its fashion potential. The distinctive gear comes from quests. Seek out that stylin' red hat and consider dumping the threadbare one. You can always get another from the AH if you miss it later.

7. Take a screenshot and save that, not the garb. Especially with one-off costumes where it was a fun look to acquire but you are unlikely to use it again, record the moment in all its glory and then send that headress and loincloth off the to the vendors.

8. Keep it Fresh! Find new opportunities to use the cool fashion attire you have assembled. I like to joust in mine, which for a DPS warrior has the added advantage of letting me dual wield the lance with my offhand item. Stuff like this goes in you bags, not your bank.

9. Let an alt have the fun. Not every toon needs the First Mate Hat....well, maybe they do need that, but there are other looks that you can let your alts have without burdening your main. And frankly, some fashion looks better on certain races and genders than others. Male dwarves and dresses are not a pretty combination.

10. Remember to play the game. You still ought to be out there questin' and hackin' and slashin' and castin' and whatnot. And acquiring mounts and vanity pets. They don't take up bag space. And you will still look marvelous!