Here's what I've learned..."Let's Talk about armor sexual dimorphism"...
...Let's not.
Less flippant; though I don't think the arguments for, or against practicality, hold water in a game that isn't trying to be a realistic simulation of medieval/renaissance warcraft, I think all the views on the representation of armor in games above are valid. Which makes the real problem that there aren't more than two skins for ever piece of armor, no character can personalize the way they want to be viewed, either NPCs by the world/PC (narratively) or the players by themselves (meta-narratively).
Something that happens pretty often to me in games, I'll decline to use the statistically superior equipment because I don't like the way it looks. A transmogrification system is a quick fix for this but it's pretty gamey (not that armor systems aren't) but as it is right now there isn't really enough diversity of styles (and yes, aesthetics) to really merit even this.
