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{{trope}}
{{quote|'''Tycho''': So , at the end of [[Dragon Age]], I pissed off {{spoiler|Alistair}} somehow and he left. In my '''Warden Commander''' armor from the DLC.
'''Gabe''': Wasn't that like, seven dollars?
'''Tycho''': I know! He fucking robbed me! As I watched him walk away, all I could think was "Please, {{spoiler|Alistair}}. Leave the armor."
|[[Penny Arcade (Webcomic)|Penny Arcade]], [http://penny-arcade.com/comic/2009/12/02 December 2, 2009]}}
In [[Video Games]], this is the annoying effect of having potentially great equipment stolen from you because the character wearing them is rendered inaccessible for some part of the game. If and when they come back, their equipment may already have fallen victim to the [[Sorting Algorithm of Weapon Effectiveness]]. Or they may have found new, better equipment and ditched what they had before, in which case you better hope they didn't have anything unique on them that you might need later. Kinder games will dump this swag back into your inventory.
Especially a risk with [[Guest Star Party Member
Some Meta-Humor is often used here; if you the player know the character is leaving, you'll unequip everything from them. Since "you" the character couldn't
{{Unmarked Spoilers}}
{{examples}}
* A rare
== [[Tabletop
* This can happen in most role playing games. Whether you're buying the NPC decker some new gear to help you in [[Shadowrun]], giving a magical sword to a companion in [[Dungeons
* ''[[Beyond Good and Evil (Video Game)|Beyond Good and Evil]]'' has PA-1's, [[Heart Container|heart containers]] you can swap between yourself and your partners. {{spoiler|When Pey'j is kidnapped}}, he takes all of his PA-1's with him, though he has a chance of dropping one... and only one. The rest vanish into the ether, leaving you vulnerable and short in the [[Life Meter]] department. You'll get it back only near the end of the game, and might as well hoard them for yourself since they won't be around for too long.▼
▲* ''[[Beyond Good
▲== Adventure Game ==
=== Adventure Game ===
* This happens a lot in ''[[Maniac Mansion]]''. If a character dies with something important in their pocket, you may not be able to get the item again (this happened in the NES version). If they die with something super important, like the old rusty key, and nobody else can access it, someone is going to sit in the dungeon forever.
** On the other hand, some versions place a package on the kid's grave that contains all the items they were hauling around. Considering the lengths you have to go to in order to get the kids killed, it's not nearly as much a problem as it sounds even in versions without packages.
=== First
* ''[[
** In ''[[Deus Ex: Human Revolution
▲* ''[[Deus Ex (Video Game)|Deus Ex]]'' gently pulls this stunt a couple times; twice, JC will be asked in dialogue to hand the best sidearm he's holding to an [[Non-Player Character|NPC]] in order to trigger marginally improved plot outcomes. These [[Non-Player Character|NPCs]] will have no interest in returning said weapons when they're done with them; this is made worse by the fact that most players will have used rare upgrades on these guns. Fortunately, this can be averted while achieving these plotlines' "good" endings by dropping the "good" weapons on the ground and grabbing an unmodified gun for the [[Non-Player Character|NPCs]] from the level.
▲** In ''[[Deus Ex Human Revolution (Video Game)|Deus Ex Human Revolution]]'', you have the option to hand {{spoiler|van Bruggen}} one of your weapons to allow him to escape a Belltower ambush unscathed (he'll die if you don't). It doesn't have to be your ''best'' weapon, just any in your inventory, but if the only weapons you have are customised and upgraded...
*** ...then be ready to hear about your failure to save him repeatedly over half of the remaining game. It doesn't matter if you devote your every action to protecting him; it doesn't even matter if you clear out the area while he safely hides in this little alcove so that there's no one left to kill him; [[Gameplay and Story Segregation|if a gun is not physically in his hand]], you're a heartless bastard.
* Both ''[[Left 4 Dead]]'' games have this if a player in an online game leaves. Survivor AI cannot use defibrillators or any bomb type items, but if a player who has the said items leaves the game, their bot will carry the items but cannot use them. Since the game does not allow dropping items or giving items to other players outside of pills/shots, you won't be able to take a bot's stuck items unless they get killed, where the items will then fall loose for anyone to pick up.
=== Hack
* In ''[[Dynasty Warriors]] 6: Empires'', you can spend a big chunk of in-game money and resources upgrading one of your officer's weapons, only to have them defect during a battle. Lu Bu is particularly prone to this (although the real Lu Bu did have [[Chronic Backstabbing Disorder]], so it has to be expected).
===
* Can happen in ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' or any other MMORPG which uses guild vaults. Griefers will get themselves invited to a guild, convince their new guildmates to allow them to grab some gear out of the vault, and then leave the guild with their newfound stuff. Fortunately this activity is usually against the game's EULA and [[
* The above kind of behavior is NOT against the rules in [[
=== Real-Time Strategy ===
* Averted in ''[[Warcraft III]]'', where the various hero characters could carry and use items, and would keep them between missions. If, at any point, a hero left, all their items would be on the ground at the start of the next mission. The only exceptions were at the end of each campaign (obviously): if the items weren't there, that character was coming back.
** The only exception is if the Hero you can't use anymore was on a separate journey than the main hero of the campaign. For example, Grom Hellscream during his two missions in the Orc Campaign, Illidan during his own single mission in the Night Elf Campaign and any of Sylvanas' missions during the Frozen Throne Undead campaign. Anything they or any other heroes they met had is [[Lost Forever]]. There is a minor exception though, since {{spoiler|Illidan}} is a usable hero for both the Night Elf and Alliance campaigns in Frozen Throne, he retains any gear he had between campaigns.
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** Potentially inverted in ''Chaos Rising'', when {{spoiler|the traitor in your ranks (assuming he wasn't Martellus) politely drops all the armor, weapons, and gear of yours that he was carrying.}} Unfortunately, though you may get all the items back, instead you lose {{spoiler|the only character who could have used the items with any kind of proficiency (e.g. Avitus' heavy weapons, Cyrus' bombs)}}.
=== Role
* In ''[[
** At various points in the game, Cloud, Tifa, and Yuffie are all temporarily [[Put
▲* In ''[[Final Fantasy VII (Video Game)|Final Fantasy VII]]'' (the former [[Trope Namer]]) Aerith's [[It Was His Sled|sudden death]] makes you lose all her equipment. Thank God the creators weren't cruel enough to take away all her materia, too... The fact that her equipment is not returned is especially irritating because there is a unique piece of armour (the Edincoat) in the dungeon just before you lose her that you will quite likely equip on her, since she is a [[White Magician Girl]] who is, for that dungeon, a [[Required Party Member]]. Luckily the weapon situation is no problem at all because Aerith is the only one that can equip Staffs in the first place.
▲** At various points in the game, Cloud, Tifa, and Yuffie are all temporarily [[Put On a Bus]] and you lose their equipment as well, but you get their stuff back when they rejoin the group.
** Luckily this is avoided completely by the important stuff: the Materia. Whenever a party member leaves, they hand over their Materia beforehand. Except for Yuffie's sidequest, where they're ''all taken away''.
*** And if you find hidden materia during said sidequest, Yuffie literally appears just to STEAL THAT TOO. And when it's done she randomly puts all the materia back in random slots on your characters instead of replacing it as you had it before. There's a reason more than a few people consider her a [[The Scrappy|Scrappy.]]
* Kain from ''[[
** The sequel, ''<nowiki>
** On the other hand, when Kain comes back, he brings a brand-new set of very good equipment with him. Oh, and it's all free.
*** ''Final Fantasy IV'' loved this trope so much, it even used a variation of it with ''the main character''. When Cecil goes through his [[Class Change]], any Dark Knight gear equipped on him is lost. So much for selling it off to buy his expensive new Paladin equipment. Fortunately, the game doesn't go into autoplay until after you step off the boss-fight square, giving a player who knows what's coming the time to strip.
* The "Junction" system in ''[[
** The English version actually added several points to the game where you would be given the opportunity to switch your junctions around, so this wasn't usually a problem because you could anticipate that if the game wanted you to change your Junctions, you were going to have a split party coming up and could spread them out accordingly.
** It's also possible to set up ''six'' sets of abilities/GFs that still had all five major Junctions. The one caveat is that you can't do this before you visit Esthar, as it's the only place in the game where you can get Amnesia Greens.
** Oh, and don't forget to take back all the magic you gave to [[Guest Star Party Member|Edea]] unless you never want to see it again after Esthar.
* Inverted early on in ''[[
** And even then, he comes with another set when he rejoins anyway for some reason.
** Better not give Shadow any rare equipment or Magicite until he joins for real in the World of Ruin.
*** This trope can be averted, very oddly, by speaking to the equipment guy on the airship who will somehow unequip all of Shadow's stuff and give it to you even after he's gone.
** Due to a (minor to the point of being nearly unnoticeable, but entirely unavoidable) bug, inverted with just about the last character you'd expect: the boomerang and shield equipped by Kamog/Cosmog, one of the generic moogles at the beginning of the game, are "returned" to you at the end of the {{spoiler|World of Balance}}. Note that you can't even alter Cosmog's equipment in the first place! (The reason for this is because this moogle shares his party member ID with Gogo, who hasn't been introduced yet, and the "unequip everyone" script accidentally counted Gogo among "everyone".)
* In ''[[
** Though it made the last boss battle in the main storyline kind of a hassle, it was worth it to send the Blood Sword to the bonus section and kill off the Ultima Weapon to gain its [[Disc One Nuke|reward spell at a ridiculously low-level]].
* ''[[
** The [[Guest Star Party Member
*** The Mythril Sword loss is only a problem if the player doesn't think to visit Esto Gaza before going to the Desert Palace.
** However, you can give Beatrix one of the summoning items and cause it to be [[Lost Forever]].
* The ''[[Final Fantasy]] Legend'' games (actually ''[[SaGa]]'' games renamed for America) all featured temporary party members, but it was impossible to unequip them once equipped. Naturally, they would all take their equipment with them when they left.
* ''[[Final Fantasy:
** Although the trope can be inverted by taking equipment from the guests to use or sell.
* ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics]]'' zigzags this in one notable example. When {{spoiler|Gafgarion betrays your party}}, after the battle his gear is dumped back into your inventory, thus being a straight inversion in this case. However, you can make the fight against him ''laughably easy'' if you remove all his gear just before said battle, since without it he is ''hilariously useless''. Bonus points if you removed all of his abilities barring his default {{spoiler|Dark Sword}} skill set, which ''he can't use without the sword you just took from him'', thus reducing him to only using punches which, as everyone knows, are pathetically weak for any class besides a Monk. Sadly, he gets even better gear in his subsequent encounters, which obviously make them [[That One Boss|a lot harder]].
** It's also possible to invert this with the 'invite' skill. You can recruit nearly '''anyone''' into your group, steal their gear, and dump them.
* ''[[
* ''[[
** {{spoiler|[[Badass Longcoat|King Mickey]] [[Roaring Rampage of Revenge|seemed to think]] they'd be crazy enough to do so.}}
* ''[[Star Wars]]: [[Knights of the Old Republic]]'' is rife with this.
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** Ditto for {{spoiler|Kreia}} in ''KotOR 2'', who leaves no matter what and takes your stuff with her.
** To a lesser extent, there's the fact that both games will occasionally throw you on a mandatory run with only one character, often not your main, and at the worst possible time. Good luck winning when all your good weapons are being used by active party members. The second game was ''much'' worse about this, particularly Nar Shaddaa, which had a good hour's worth of playtime spent doing nothing but forcing you to switch between numerous characters without so much as a chance to regroup.
* Happens with several [[NPC
** Party members who are [[Killed Off for Real]] either drop their gear to the ground, or to another members inventory to prevent this.
** If you try to avoid this in the final scene, [[The Dragon]] will notice (triggered when a defecting character is wearing less than 10000 GP's worth of gear), and he will call it clever but futile. [[The Dev Team Thinks of Everything|He also wonders if you knew they were going to betray you]].
* When {{spoiler|Kratos}} leaves the party in ''[[
** Amusingly, even if you see it coming and do so, the character is still equipped with a set of the best equipment legally accessible at that point regardless of whether or not you had actually bought and equipped those items beforehand.
** Ironically, the game ''tries'' to avert this a few times, when a character temporarily leaves the party and their equipment is added to your inventory. But the only times this happens, the character is away for such a short time it's mostly annoying having to put the equipment back on them afterwards.
*** Actually, there is one instance where this happens and is genuinely useful: {{spoiler|if you choose the storyline path where Zelos dies, you still get to keep his equipment. And that happens near the end of the game, so the stuff he was wearing is pretty nice.}}
* Averted in scenario 1 of ''[[Shining Force III]]''. Julian leaves the party part way through the game (in order to join the party going through scenario 2) and his equipment is actually ''cloned''. He takes one set with him, and the other set reappears in the item storage. However, when he leaves the scn 2 party to lead the one going through scn 3, he plays this trope pretty straight.
* ''[[
** When the party washes up on Tanetane, all of their items are washed away with the tide. If you defeat the Barrier Trio before getting your lost items back from Ocho, they are lost ''permanently''.
* When {{spoiler|Kalas}} leave the party in ''[[Baten Kaitos]]: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean'' he takes his entire deck with him. Annoying enough already, but given the game's [[In
* ''[[
** There is a true problem with this later in the game. Party members that leave temporarily keep all their gear ''and the items they are holding''. This is usually not a problem because you will gain the character and those items back, however the game has a [[Gotta Catch Em All]] [[MacGuffin]] system to advance the game and in the rare chance {{spoiler|Maribel}} holds onto a [[MacGuffin|shard]], well this is one of the few Game-Breaking Bugs that becomes an [[Unwinnable By Mistake]].
* Also averted by ''[[
* ''[[
** At least it's explained in-game: Maya gambled it all away, Alena hired some mercenaries, Ragnar spent it wandering the world, and Torneko paid for the construction of a ship.
** Also any temporary NPCs who join your party have their own personal equipment that cannot be removed and will refuse to accept any item you put into their inventory.
* Averted in ''[[Persona 3]]'' with the full-moon incident on October
* Averted in [[Legend of Dragoon]] when both characters who leave ({{spoiler|Lavitz}} suffers a [[Plotline Death]] and {{spoiler|Shana}} gets [[Put
* The ''[[Valkyrie Profile]]'' series is an odd turn in that it actually puts this under your control. You choose (with a couple exceptions in the second game) when to get rid of your guest party members, and thus have full control over what equipment they have at the time. The twist here is you get items in exchange for the characters, and you get better items for a well-equipped and high-level character than one you've stripped bare.
* ''[[Betrayal
** On the other hand, since the party {{spoiler|permanently splits into two at one point, you can end up with your good items on the party that doesn't need them.}}
* Some ''Ultima'' games avert this by having the character spontaneously drop everything, including clothes. Humorously, in ''Serpent Isle'' you pick up Selena, who is very transparently working for the bad guys and tries to lead you into a very ineffective and badly planned deathtrap. When the mercs she hired show up, she makes a remark about going back to the inn (she's not going to be there, though) and then literally teleports out of her clothes. One wonders what she thought she'd accomplish.
* ''[[Arcanum]]'': When Virgil runs off to deal with his subplot, he takes his inventory with him. According to this [http://lparchive.org/LetsPlay/Arcanum/chapter54.html Let's Play], this can create plot difficulties when his equipment is too good!
** In addition, if you fail to reveal the villains' true plan to {{spoiler|Gideon when you meet him in Tsen'Ang, Vollinger, if he's with you}} will challenge you to a duel and leave the party. When you show up at his place, your opponent will have standard equipment rather than what you gave him before the betrayal; that stuff is, of course, [[Lost Forever]].
* Present in ''[[
* Averted in the obscure Super Nintendo game ''Arcana''. Every time someone joins or rejoins the party, they have no equipment at all, and you have to buy new gear for them. On the other hand, every time they leave their equipment is automatically removed and left in your inventory, which you can then keep or sell as needed.
* In ''[[Lufia]] 2'', when {{spoiler|Tia, Dekar and Lexis}} leave your party, never to return, whatever they had on them is lost. Particularly annoying since, if you've never played the game before, the point at which they leave and never come back can be difficult to anticipate.
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*** Which is morbid when you think about it, as {{spoiler|Tia and Lexis}} leave of their own accord, but {{spoiler|Dekar}} is ''killed''. {{spoiler|[[Unexplained Recovery|It doesn't stick, though]].}}
* In ''[[Fallout 3]]'', there are numerous temporary companions you can have on your journey. On occasion, they can be equipped with weapons, and a few can be treated outright like party members and equipped with both weapons and armor. For example, Red from Big Town, who you have to rescue from Super Mutants. The second these people have reach their destination, THE DIALOG OPTION TO TRADE ITEMS VANISHES. Then they'll just be walking around with the gear you gave them, totally unwilling to give it back. You can't even steal it without giving them better gear. The only solution is murder, which tarnishes your karma. Fortunately, it also works in reverse on occasion: Fawkes carries one of the most powerful melee weapons in the game in his inventory when you first meet him, and most players will take it (he'll equip a replacement).
* In ''[[
** If you keep [[Emo Teen|Aerie]] and [[Jerkass|Korgan]] in the party together for too long Aerie will eventually get fed up with the dwarf, storm off and vanish from the game with all your stuff.
** It's also possible to drive off Jaheira, though you have to mock her husband's death so you really have only yourself to blame.
* Both played straight and averted in ''[[Mass Effect]]''. {{spoiler|Killing Wrex}} will give you all his equipment as if it just dropped. However, any items equipped on {{spoiler|Ashley or Kaidan}} are [[Lost Forever]]. Which is kinda [[Justified Trope]], what with {{spoiler|the nuclear bomb}} and all. The weird thing is, though, that the cutscene which depicts {{spoiler|their deaths}} puts them in their starting armor, but you still lose the one you had actually equipped them with, even though they apparently weren't wearing it.
** You do get {{spoiler|Ashley/Kaidan's}} weapons and armor back on a [[New Game+]].
* ''[[
* In ''[[Suikoden III]]'' when you return to Karaya, {{spoiler|Lulu is accidentally killed by Lady Chris}}, and you lose every piece of equipment that he had on him.
** {{spoiler|Losing some low-powered items was worth it to get rid of Lulu.}}
* Used {{spoiler|and then inverted at the end}} in ''[[
* Rather realistically inverted in the ''[[Siege of Avalon]]'' anthology, where most party members have at least some equipment that cannot be unequipped, but can be taken from them if they die. (Naturally, you don't want the new kid taking the armor that's served you well for months of siege, even if he is the war hero's younger brother.) Unfortunately, it's mostly just standard mid-level armor with a distinct coloration (rare, but not unique) or even non-unique, non-enchanted, basic clothing, and it also means that you can't upgrade their armor at any point. And you'll want to. However, all but one of them will only die (permanently; every death [[Killed Off for Real|is real]]) if you're badly outnumbered and you don't or can't heal them in time to save them, or get a magician in your party and set him to do it for you.
* Played obnoxiously straight in the ''[[Gold Box]]'' series of ''[[Dungeons
* Rather strangely done in ''[[Live a Live]]'' due to the fact that the Final Chapter only uses the main characters from each chapter. Not stripping Taro of his item-gained specials before completing Akira's chapter means you lose some equipment for Cube later on.
* When someone dies in Interplay's ''Lord of the Rings'', you are instantly given the task of transferring inventory to another party member. If your inventory is already full, that stuff is gone. If the One Ring is gone, you're screwed, and the game ends.
* Averted in ''[[Eien no Filena]]''; when a character leaves your party, their equipment is dumped into your inventory. Curiously, this happens even when they leave involuntarily, such as when a party member ''falls off a bridge''.
* Happens a couple times in ''[[
** A very noticeable one happens in the second game, where Piers temporarily leaves your party to go to the cemetery. While he's gone, you don't fight any enemies, but there's one point where you need a special item to make a tightrope up to the top of a building. If Piers has the item, the man in the building lowers the rope, which is the ''only'' time in the game where the sprite for lowering a rope is used.
** ''[[Golden Sun
*** Not that there's any reason to give her much. She comes equipped with the best vendors have to offer at that point, and she can't use anyone else's weapons. Her stats are good enough that it might actually be in your best interest to take ''her'' stuff and give it to weaker party members before she leaves.
* Happens ''constantly'' in ''[[Phantasy Star IV]]'', because only the four main characters stay in the party the whole game; all the others join temporarily, and then return for the final battle when you have to pick one, except Alys {{spoiler|who dies}}. Hahn, Alys, Rune, and Raja can be un-equipped before they leave the party, and you can sell their stuff to help pay for better armor and weapons later on, but if you want to do that with Gryz, Demi, or Kyra, you have to be gutsy enough to go through a boss battle with them naked because they leave in the cutscenes following the victory.
* ''[[
* ''[[Dragon Age]]'' is pretty obvious with which party members will stay with you and which won't (hint: look for an approval bar), so it's easy to tell when you should strip your [[Guest Star Party Member|buddies]] in the pre-initiation mission. It's just [[Vendor Trash]], but hey. As a bonus, the usually dramatic initiation cutscene gets an [[Naked People Are Funny|added dose of hilarity]]. However, even the "permanent" party members will leave if you cross their personal [[Moral Event Horizon]]
** It's averted with the guys in the pre-initiation mission. Their stuff automatically goes into your inventory after the inevitable occurs. It is played annoyingly straight with the random guys you get in the Tower of Ishal.
*** [https://web.archive.org/web/20140124080209/http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/comics/stolen-pixels/6831-Stolen-Pixels-147-Naked-Greed This "Stolen Pixels" strip] illustrates the reaction of [[Genre Savvy]] players.
*** On the bright side, regarding the Tower of Ishal guys, if you just leave them in default gear you don't actually ''lose'' anything, and if you strip them you can get some bonus vendor trash as well as one of the only robes that'll be available for a while- normally trash too, but potentially useful if you're playing as a mage ''and'' plan to use Morrigan in your party early.
* ''
** Unless you use a tavern card. This item can be used at any point of the game and lets you rehire any mercenary. And the chick you bought equipment for will be with it and join you for free (when all other mercenaries cost the exact same amount of money they did the first time).
* ''[[Albion]]'' is nice enough to give you a chance to take equipment from the one character who leaves for plotline reasons. However, this is played straight if you neglect to take equipment off character who you fire to make more room in your party.
* ''[[Suikoden I]]'', of course, has this a few times, with characters that leave your team (either temporarily or for good) and take everything they were carrying with them. There's also an unusual instance of the trope where this is caused by the main character; when he obtains the [[Blessed
** However, when {{spoiler|your [[Battle Butler]]}} dies, the death is conveniently in such a way, that ALL THE EQUIPMENT IS THERE! Right up there with [[Hyperspace Arsenal|"throwing equipment through a portal"]] on convenience. Still a [[Player Punch]], though.
* Toyed with in ''[[Arc Rise Fantasia]]''.
** You can't equip or unequip [[Guest Star Party Member|guest characters]], and characters who leave for an extended period leave their equipment and orbs behind.
** However, they keep their stuff if they're only gone for a little bit, and the game isn't very nice about warning you. One character, for example, gets booted in the cutscene preceding a boss
** Finally, when playing as the alternate party, you ''can'' unequip them if you'd like, but they don't share the same item pool as your party... so there's no point.
* Krobelus in ''[[Summoner]] 2''. Luckily he's not allowed any armour in the first place, but he has other equipment. Make sure you have a wooden staff in the inventory that you can replace his rod with, because you aren't allowed to just take his weapon.
* Can be done in ''[[Pokémon]]'' games, although it generally has to be on purpose; by releasing a Pokémon holding an item. However, accidents are possible if, say, you actually raised that Shuckle in GSC and gave it a held item before returning it. Or traded that Spearow you were raising in FRLG for Farfetch'd on an impulse trade. Still not very likely, as useful items like the Master Ball or one-of-a-kind TMs have no reason to be given to your Pokémon in the first place, unless you're abusing the Pokémon/item duplication [[Good Bad Bugs|glitch]], in which case this is a moot point. Alternately, though, people do sometimes trade items like Master Balls to friends by giving them to mons to hold during trade, and you can be screwed if you forget to remove said item before trading the mon yourself or trade it by mistake.
* Can rarely occur in ''[[
* ''[[Grandia]]'':
** In ''[[
** The same thing happens in the first ''[[Grandia (
* Happens due to a programming oversight in ''[[Inazuma Eleven]] 3''. In previous games, story characters only leave for brief periods and come back with everything intact. (In fact, you can still view their equipment and stats in the menu while they're absent - they're merely locked in inactive slots.) And if you dismiss an optional party member, their equipment is returned to your [[Bag of Sharing]], but their EXP, stats, and hissatsu techniques are reset (if you recruit them back later), and any techs you taught them are gone. But in the third game, when {{spoiler|Midorikawa, Fubuki, and later Kurimatsu}} get [[Put
* Subverted and averted in [[Arcana]]. When they first join you, your party members have ''no equipment at all'' and you'll need to buy their weapons and armor. This can be a hassle if the character joins in the middle of a dungeon, which means you'll need to go back to town. On the other hand, when your party members leave, all their equipment is automatically removed and left in your inventory, so you can sell or use it as desired.
* Played completely straight with one character in ''[[
* This looks like it will be used as a gameplay mechanic in [[Mass Effect 3]]. Max out a character in multiplayer and Shepard will recruit them to fight against the Reapers. They'll be added as war assets and will somehow help in achieving the best ending.
* At the end of [[Beyond Divinity]], the Death Knight who has been your unwilling companion through the whole game turns out to be Damien himself and fights you. If he's got all of your good stuff, he can be nearly impossible to beat. If you remove all of his stuff just before the final boss fight right before the big reveal and manage to keep him alive, he's incredibly easy to beat.
=== Simulation Game ===
* Toyed with and reversed somewhat in ''X2: The Threat''. During one early mission you are loaned a personnel transport ship armed with some decent
=== Stealth-Based Game ===
▲* Toyed with and reversed somewhat in ''X2: The Threat''. During one early mission you are loaned a personnel transport ship armed with some decent equipment -- including some expensive shields. After the mission is finished you are given an old cargo transport, but its hull integrity will be greatly reduced if you decided to sell off the shields in the other ship for personnel gain.
* Happens about two
===
* ''[[The Thing (
** [[Fridge Brilliance]] here: ''Anyone'' could be The Thing, and if it turns out to be 'the guy who gave them their guns', the giving of the guns could be some sort of elaborate setup. ''The Player'' knows this isn't true, but the [[Guest Star Party Member
▲* Happens about two thirds of the way through ''[[Metal Gear Solid]] 3'', wherein Snake recovers all of his equipment after a [[No-Gear Level]] sequence, except for all of his previously captured animals and collected food (including the pricelessly valuable Tsuchinoko, if you were lucky enough to find it - fortunately you can catch it again just after getting your gear back). Humorously, you can call EVA about this, and she will confess that she rifled through your pack for instant noodles, but the rest of Snake's pack was emptied by Ocelot because "[[Ho Yay|he wanted to eat the same things Snake did]]".
▲* ''[[The Thing (Video Game)|The Thing]]'' does this practically every level. This game isn't an RPG but is filled with [[Guest Star Party Member|Guest Star Party Members]]. It's a [[Survival Horror]] game, so ammunition and weaponry are limited. Your party members seem to desert you after each load screen for a new level and take the weapons with them. They apparently think that they have a better chance without the guy who gave them their guns.
▲** [[Fridge Brilliance]] here: ''Anyone'' could be The Thing, and if it turns out to be 'the guy who gave them their guns', the giving of the guns could be some sort of elaborate setup. ''The Player'' knows this isn't true, but the [[Guest Star Party Member|Guest Star Party Members]] don't and would therefore feel that they'd be safer away from him... and by extension away from each other as well. Paranoia does weird things to people.
* ''[[Resident Evil Outbreak]]'' would give you AI partners if you were playing alone, who were notorious for occasionally taking extremely valuable items or ammo and running off to die. You could take the items off the bodies, but generally the same monsters which killed them would kill you.
** This could happen online as well, if someone took an important item and then went AFK for a long time, thus never able to respond to any requests for that item. If this happens in a safe area, one of the other players would have to get killed elsewhere and come back as a zombie to kill the idle player, but that wouldn't work for a two-player run or an area completely devoid of remaining enemies and hazards. By the time the idler's virus gauge is maxed out naturally, everyone else is likely also dead or close to it.
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*** Players may be severely hampered later on if they equipped Claire with the more powerful weapons like the grenade launcher for the battle with Nosferatu. Which you're [[Sniping Mission|supposed to use the sniper rifle for]].
=== Turn
* ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics]]'' subverts this; [[Guest Star Party Member
* Subverted in ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics
▲* ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics]]'' subverts this; [[Guest Star Party Member|Guest Star Party Members]] leave their equipment. Due to a [[Good Bad Bug]], you can even take advantage of this fact when {{spoiler|Gafgarion}} pulls a [[Face Heel Turn]]; steal {{spoiler|his}} equipment, and you'll get the stolen copy PLUS the copy he leaves behind for leaving your team! Too bad if a character meets [[Final Death]], though...
▲* Subverted in ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics a 2]]''. {{spoiler|When Adelle leaves the clan, she doesn't take with her any of the items you had equipped to her. Eventually she re-joins the clan, so it doesn't matter anyway.}}
* ''[[Fire Emblem]]'' has an odd example of this. Certain chapters have NPC allies, who are hated by players as occasionally they will kill an enemy that can drop a valuable or useful item, and if an NPC does this then that item is lost to you.
** In ''Radiant Dawn'', you play chapters where some characters might not be with you, causing some items to be temporarily lost as you switch between one party to another. In addition, you'll sometimes fight characters you used to control (and will again in the future), and the CPU loves to break your rare weapons during these periods.
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*** The above is averted as of the DS remakes of [[Fire Emblem Akaneia|Marth's games]] - if someone dies, all their stuff is magically transferred back to the supply convoy. Presumably they're looted by your own army, which in a roundabout way makes letting them die even more heartbreaking than usual.
** Can happen in ''Sacred Stones'' with {{spoiler|Orson's}} [[Face Heel Turn]], but easily can be averted, and once you know that it's coming, he becomes a useful meat shield since he's a {{spoiler|one-chapter only}} [[Crutch Character]] anyway.
* Cecille from ''[[Luminous Arc]]'' manages to pull this without leaving the party. She has a particularly unusual class change, which ends up changing all of her equipment except accessories, removing whatever she had equipped before from the game. If, as is quite likely, you had her equipped with the
* Semi-averted and played straight at the same time with ''[[Disgaea]]''.
** When you start a [[New Game+]], all of the equipment you had on the characters you had acquired through the story are lost until you get them back in their respective storylines, [[Justified Trope]] in that you technically haven't met them yet.
** Then there's the part in one of the later chapters where {{spoiler|Jennifer}} leaves the team {{spoiler|(and gets subsequently [[Brainwashed and Crazy]] by Kurtis)}}
** Additionally, {{spoiler|[[Magikarp Power|Flonne]] }}is taken out of commission for the final boss fight via {{spoiler|getting turned into a flower}}. She'll come back with her stuff on a [[New Game+]], of course, but the stuff on her, which is likely to be good stuff, since she's one of the best story characters in the game, is locked away from you until then.
** After beating the aforementioned final boss, if you choose to start in [[Another Side, Another Story|Etna Mode]] instead of a traditional [[New Game+]], {{spoiler|Laharl will die in the opening cutscene}}, leaving you without ''his'' equipment, as well. Etna Mode is significantly more difficult than the normal story, and you probably ''needed'' him fully equipped to handle the final boss without access to {{spoiler|Flonne}}, making it nothing short of annoying.
* Every single team member in ''[[Odium]]'', since they all leave without warning. Especially ridiculous when one of your teammates departs through {{spoiler|dying an unavoidable death on the street. You'd think you could just collect the stuff off the teammate's corpse, but no dice}}.
* Averted quite nicely in the ''[[Jagged Alliance]]'' series: mercs whose contract is up will leave behind their equipment. In fact, one of the strategies in ''Jagged Alliance 2'' involves creating an IMP merc (widely considered to be your chance to make an [[Author Avatar]], and will stay on the party permanently), hiring one of the super-expensive mercs for one day with their equipment, taking the first two towns, and
* The [[Warhammer
* The ''[[Super Robot Wars]]'' series tends to do this, especially with storyline deaths. A very early one occurs in ''[[Super Robot Wars 3]]'' where [[Zeta Gundam|Reccoa]] disappears to go spy on the bad guys and takes the Mobile Suit you put her in with you. Here's hoping you shoved her into a mook unit before hand and not one of your special Gundams.
** A stupid one happens in ''[[Super Robot Wars Alpha]] 3'' - if you chose to start with Touya's route, you get to play out the beginning of the second half of ''[[
▲* Can happen in ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' or any other MMORPG which uses guild vaults. Griefers will get themselves invited to a guild, convince their new guildmates to allow them to grab some gear out of the vault, and then leave the guild with their newfound stuff. Fortunately this activity is usually against the game's EULA and [[G Ms]] can often help you recover your goods.
▲* The above kind of behavior is NOT against the rules in [[Eve Online]], and is a particularly infamous and widespread profession, making vetting new members and restricting access a lot more of a big deal. If your corporation gets swindled out of your items, tough luck, you should have been more careful about placing your trust in people. Your only option is to swear revenge.
▲== Anime and Manga ==
▲* A rare '''non''' video game example, this is [[Lampshaded]] in a side omake by Natsuki Takaya in a ''[[Fruits Basket]]'' volume.
▲== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
▲* This can happen in most role playing games. Whether you're buying the NPC decker some new gear to help you in [[Shadowrun]], giving a magical sword to a companion in [[Dungeons and Dragons]], or working your money and black market ties to get your trusty ghoul bodyguard an SMG and some shooting classes in [[Vampire: The Masquerade (Tabletop Game)|Vampire: The Masquerade]], there's a chance that character will leave the game. They may die with the gear beyond salvage, be bought out or turned by your enemies, become a [[Distressed Damsel]], have been [[The Mole]] all along, or just decide they've had it with you being a [[Jerkass]] (as so many players are.) When that NPC was entrusted with essential equipment, this can become a great complication for a fun night of gaming (either saving the NPC, winning them back, or at least getting back the goods) or a reason to grumble at the player who angered the party's allies until they just stormed off.
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