1. Can G8.1 clothing work for G8 without conversion?
2. Can anybody recommend some Star Wars "civilian" clothing or items that can be used as that? The average SciFi clothing is too ultra shiny modern!!
and finally...
3. I have some clothing in .obj/.fbx format that would probably work very well for the above but have no idea how to make it Daz compatible as I am as thick as week old custard!
For the first question yes. It's stupid and I'm not 100% sure to the particulars of how it works under the hood, but 8.1 clothes fit to G8 characters, you just have to change the their setting under scene identification from 8.1 to 8 and then fit to the character like normal.
1. Yes, it should.
2. You mean something like https://www.deviantart.com/shinteo/art/Jyn-Erso-for-G8F-and-G8-1F-890504975 ?
3. Ofcourse, you can import the obj in Daz from File > Import menu. Simple OBJ cloth can be useable in Daz with dforce depending on its geometry, you need to set-up the weight maps, however if you want conforming cloth which "fits" the character and moves with it, it would be much more difficult. I think it's theoretically possible but I don't know how to.