For level 1-3, you’re really just looking for anything that can raise your temperature to survivable levels plus a backpack/travelpack. At that point in the game, combat shouldn’t be in your best interest anyways, so taking any early “armored” clothing that wasn’t scavenged is pretty useless. Things to look at here include the cotton hat, the bandana, foot and hand wraps, arm and leg warmers, and light gloves.
For level 5, the previously mentioned nomad gear is the way to go. At this point, having a spear plus nomad gear is enough to deal with small groups of zed and possibly even a mi-go (although I personally wouldn’t risk it). Most of the craftable helmets here are still pretty bad, so just go find an army helmet.
Past level 5, everything comes down to the survivor gear. The light/heavy/survivor gear covers the full range of high armor, high encumbrance to low armor, low encumbrance. If the regular armor isn’t enough, you can also use fabrication, not tailoring to craft bio/chitin armor for comparable armor to survivor gear, although it has a bit lower than 100% coverage. You can also use fab to make metal armor too, which can be pretty impressive.