Okay, I need help with my Tech character - I'm a Gimp...

Storage space is a factor and so is the price, but I'm mostly talking about the awareness of dependency. I myself simply don't fancy having the need of using short-lived buffs and knowing that I'll have to constantly be visiting shops to keep me well stocked with them. I find it tiresome and the whole situation makes me feel like a junky of sorts. I'd rather depend on my hard stats.

Doesn't that kill the challenge and joy of earning money? One thing I don't like when playing a mage is the fact, that quite quickly I have enough money to buy anything I will ever need and that fact, while exciting at first, get's boring pretty soon. When playing a tech, however - and a gunslinger at that - money finally became an issue. I'd call that a thing that adds to the whole experience of the game.

Nope. The Machined Platemail provides pretty much the same Damage Resistance while giving greater Fire Resistance and significantly better Armor Class, and it increases your Strength too. The only aspect is which the Machined Plate is inferior to Electro-Armor is Electrical Resistance. Indeed, Electro-Armor has very high ER but seriously, how often does one encounter Electrical Damage dealing foes anyway?

NPCs shouldn't be trusted when it comes to choosing equipment. Seriously, they don't know what's good for them. Virgil using a revolver while having no points in Firearms is just a quick example, and so is a follower equipping a hexed item or Loghaire preferring a Railroad Spike to his trusted Harrow. As for armor, they usually equip the ones which has the greatest "total defence" number. However, one resistance isn't as good as another, and in the Electro-Armor's case the "total defence" number was very high because of it's extraordinary Electrical Resistance which hardly every comes in handy.

If they intended players to become gods and masters in all disciplines, they wouldn't have put in the 50 lvl cap in the first place. Creating a specialised and powerful character with the combination of a wisely chosen background and limited Character Points is what makes character creation in Arcanum as entertaining as it is.