Hey guys! I just got back from character creation and was going over a few details. My wookie engineer - mechanic/scientist has decided to give himself a utility belt, load bearing gear, and a backpack. I can imagine utility belt could go with either...but part of me feels you could not use load bearing gear and a backpack together. Thoughts?

You can use em together. I did in the Army.

Sometimes they are designed to be used together, so yeah it's definitely possible. However, I try to remind my players how it looks. Some won't care, and are just in for the crunch... But others don't like the idea of sitting in a cantina with all their gear.

Got at least one fella with a pack, maybe 2. I'd imagine port side it's fairly common on rim worlds or even the core with people just gettin off ship. Everyone has luggage of one kind or another. LBE's is just military mumbo jumbo for a glorified bandoleer essentially, again, pretty common

I would allow the load bearing gear with the backpack, but not with the utility belt. In my opinion the load bearing gear includes a utility belt. It's a utility belt plus more.

Below is the Load Bearing Equipment (aka Load Carrying Equipment aka ALICE gear) once worn by some of this us on this forum. It includes a waist belt. And yes we wore it with a backpack.

That's certainly true of webbing and you may want to enforce no utility belt with load bearing gear, but you could potentially have all three if the load bearing gear was more a tactical vest / chest rig style.

Especially for personnel who may need to remove their tacvest/chest rig to lower their profile (ie to engage with locals in COIN) it is increasingly common to have a vest + belt system independent of each other, so you can take one off but keep the other. For example:

Chest: Rifle mags, grenades, radio, bayonet, canteen, tactical commander's kit, etc

Belt: sidearm, sidearm mags, medical kit

Maybe bump the Rarity and/or Price of Load Bearing Gear you'd let your players combine with a utility belt to represent them having to hunt down higher end tactical gear, vice hand me down planetary defense force stock.

If you took off the chest rig you would be left with just a Utility Belt in my opinion. I have no problem with house ruling you can reduce your Load Bearing Gear to a Utility Belt with 2 Maneuvers. In fact, that was done sometimes when I was in the Army for special or light duties. You wore only the belt (not the suspenders) and it was actually called a "utility belt".

To me the old-fashioned LBE/LCE/ALICE/Web gear I posted above is the same thing as a more modern looking MOLLE vest. They are both Load Bearing Equipment, just of different styles. I suppose if you wanted to differentiate them, perhaps the web-style has the benefit of able to be reduced only to a Utility Belt when needed while the full vest gains an extra Encumbrance, but can only be taken off, not reduced.

To me the old-fashioned LBE/LCE/ALICE/Web gear I posted above is the same thing as a more modern looking MOLLE vest. They are both Load Bearing Equipment, just of different styles. I suppose if you wanted to differentiate them, perhaps the web-style has the benefit of able to be reduced only to a Utility Belt when needed while the full vest gains an extra Encumbrance, but can only be taken off, not reduced.

But isn’t there already a Utility Vest?

What is the comparison/contrast between that and what you described above?

Had to go back to the books to compare them. Utility Belt gives +1 Encumbrance. Load Bearing Gear gives +3 Encumbrance and describes it as a "tactical vest". The Utility Vest gives +2 Encumbrance. The LBG and the UV are described similarly, but have different encumbrance bonuses? For game purposes (without house ruling) I would say the UV is just a vest with nothing on the waist, so you can add the UB for a total of +3. The LBG includes a belt so you can't add the UB. But, you could strip down the LBG into just a UB if you have the time.

Speak with your GM. GM has the final say on rules matters

I am the GM

When I say "My wookie engineer - mechanic/scientist" I am referring to my players. It's why I even asked about it as an issue, I doubt he see's any problem with what he proposes but I saw a potential problem and wanted to throw the question out there since there is no RAW and I don't know if it makes sense or not.

I guess you need to find out his intended use for all these packs too, the LBG and UB are designed for carrying lots of small things in easy to access places. A backpack is more about big essentials for traveling, not so much all day everyday use. You don't see Tradies working on site with all their tools in a backpack, but tool belts and load straps are everywhere.

If the PC wants something else that works similarly to the backpack but makes more practical sense then the Spacer Bag is an option too, much easier to drop in an emergency. more suited to carrying in hand or on shoulder too.