I was happy to find that FC had added hats to the game. A sunhat or crusher is just the thing I need to keep my frail opifex body from wilting under the merciless Rubi Ka sun while I'm hanging out in Old Athens. THEN I found out that the hats cost about 450k each <boggle> and give a ton of stats.
So what I want to know is, what about the little people, where are our hats?? It doesn't have to be anything fancy or give stats but it does have to be reasonably priced and keep the sun off our heads. In fact I would prefer a very simple hat to compliment my designer Miiir social clothing, kind of like wearing a Martin the Martian necktie with an Armani suit. It says, "sure I'm beautiful and have impeccable taste and can introduce you to all the right people and get you into clubs you didn't know existed, but I have a lighter side too".
Now, if the problem is more hats is going to require a ton of new textures which is going to increase lag a million percent and crash the servers and result in everyone leaving AO then don't do it, I mean I'm willing to make that sacrifice for the greater good. But if the only reason the rest of us don't have hats is because the developers get out of bed every morning and ask "what can I do for the game's glitterati today?" with nary a thought to the little people then we have a problem.
If you want to preserve some aura of exclusiveness to dull, ordinary hats then insert a simple quest into the game instead of just adding them to shop inventories. The quest should be accessible to low level characters and allow you to choose from several different styles of hat as a reward. That way wearing a hat is a priviledge players will have to do a little work to earn - and many to most of the players won't bother.