Throne of HeroesFollow

I've been playing my Paladin for almost seven years now, and to be entirely honest, this is absolute crap. This is by far the absolute worst Veteran AA to date, because it poses absolutely no use beyond what a 7AA Cost ability already does. Oh dear, I get to go to the lobby instead of my home city, oh man, that's a whole extra three minutes of run time! It's the end of the world!

Origin has failed to even replace my gate potions. They offer me too easy enough target spots to hit. My bind stays in Guild Lobby, except for Time raids, which means after the Time raid, I go back to the lobby, like always, talk to the soulbinder and problem solved. Soooo hard, all that extra work saved really equates the value of this year long commitment of money.

These are the veteran rewards previously:
Lesson of the Devoted: Double Exp for 30 minutes (20hour refresh)
Infusion of the Faithful: Max Stats/Resists for 15 Minutes (20 hour refresh)
Chaotic Jester: Kind of pointless, but the CH/Complete Mana Heals are a nice perk
Steadfast Servant: Very helpful soloing, even helps out nicely on raids with heavy AEs, or groups where multiples are tanking by offering up HoTs and some buffs.
Expedient Recovery: Calls your corpse to you, rezzes you for 100% exp, gives you full health and mana after the rez.
Staunch Recovery: Full Health and Mana, great for those tight spots where a bit extra boost will pull you through. Completely invaluable to casters.
Intensity of the Resolute: Increase rates and damage from melee and spell crits. Very solid DPS increase, and sets a Vet apart from someone newer.

And then they give us a gate. Big... frigging... whoop. Nice to see they have already stopped caring about puting out QUALITY with the veteran rewards and unique abilities that are NOT EASILY REPLICATED IN THE GAME ALREADY. Every single veteran reward is unique, there are not spells, or items that offer the same effect (double exp potions being the only notable exception, however 10 charges, one time, no drop and no way to get them after the scavenger hunt went away pretty much makes them no where near easily replicatable.)

I hear lots of complaints about the new AA. As a player of 7 years I like it. My main is a war and when I get this AA I will use it a lot. It gives me 2 bind points. Unlike origin, I can go somewhere usefull and central to the game. I don't use origin much because it takes too long to make my way back to Pok and the GL. Granted it does not a take long time to origin to home city but it is nice to just gate to where you want to be in the first place. Also I will be able to bind at the camp and then gate right back to where buffs or rez is at then gate to camp. This AA may not be the best thing they could think of but I think it is good AA that I will use.

Of all the things that SOE could have done for 8 year veterans, this was the best they could do? Traveling in this game is no longer an issue. Especially if you've been playing this game for 8 years. I remember when traveling from Halas to Freeport required running through 14 zones. (And of course, you slowed down when you zoned into EC since all trading was done in the tunnel there.) You usually don't have to run through more than 3 or 4 zones anymore. Even dying is no longer a big deal. I've been playing for 7 years and find this latest AA an insult to my loyalty. Even that annoying jester is a better reward. At the very least, you would think that they would have the option to get a refund for the AAs we spent on Origin. Maybe when you use the Heroes Throne AA, you land in GL already raid buffed? Naaahhhh. No such luck.

Edited, Jun 21st 2006 at 2:41pm EDT by Cocidius

Seems to me they could make a new charm with some damn nice stats - better than a fully loaded time access one - or a charm aug better than slipgear or whatever the one would be with all LDONs completed (who is doing those nowadays anyway) and attach a self only port to throne room right clicky on it - but the real benfit may be a charm with something like +150 mana HP +15 all stats and resists - something that really rewards 8 years of playtime


Nrgyzr
Enchanter on the Nameless

Very handy for my 66 warrior. Used it for the first time a couple nights ago. Since I'm a non raider, I've never made the push to 70, so I don't have the gate aa. It can't compare to the 7 year, intensity of the resolute, but I wouldn't call it worthless. It saves me the trouble of having to buy the aa and also from having to buy more gate potions.

And best of it, its FREE! SOE has given me much to gripe about over the years, but this is not one of them. Thanks for the freebie!

they are loving it on the *test* server sure....

because they dont' have 8 years of equiping & playing, and it's seems great to play with something they prolly will never get.

On the other hand, if their test server character actually had 8 years of playing & hunting & such, they could care less.

They prolly loved the jester on the test server, just like many did on the live servers for all of a week, until the novelty wore off and the ludicrousness was fully apparent.

Sslar once said:


According to PATCH NOTES 13Jun06

PS

There have been some posts here complaining about it using untruths as proof.

The Binden Concerrentia is the final PoP gate neck reward. It is only attainable if you flag into or flag share into Tier 3 PoP zones such as TowSolRo, and PoTactics. It is unlimited use but it still requires a reagent that costs roughly 130 plat. That is what they cost to make for a shaman. If you find them cheaper it is a moron. Probably someone that has no idea what they cost to make or even what they sell to at a vendor. FFS you can sell them back to a vendor for 100 plat so why would anyone of any reasonable intelligence sell one for 25 plat. Granted that isn't all that much but it also means you have to carry a stack around with you. Furthermore unless you manage to get the drops for the third version, you are stuck with an item that has either 5 charges, or 10 charges respectivly. To do this quest you have to be 46+ and get at least a group's worth of flagged friends together to get you the pieces and then it still costs you 130 plat per port.

There is the mage summoned gate item that also has the knowledge port ability. Of course it is also no rent and uses the same Quintessence Of Knowledge (130 plat) reagent.

There is the OT hammer which requires tedious faction grinding and is useable at 50.

There are gate potions... either the instant cast variety for in excess of 1k or the cheaper, shaman made, port potions to various zones next to the starting cities of the various races that can make shamans. Much cheaper but still requires quite a run to get to PoK.

There is the Origin ability which requires the expansion, the charachter to be Level 67 or higher, and 7 AAs. This ports you to your home city, to the guild hall for your class. All require quite a bit of running to get to PoK.

There are the Spiritstones for the priest classes that port them to thier starting cities... also quite a bit of running to get to PoK. In addition you have to be Level 51 or higher to use the effect and the cast time is 30 seconds.

There is of course the gate spell. This is available to pure casters and priests but require you to bind where you want to go in advance and there are limitations on where you can bind.

There are ports... which require you to either pay a stranger, beg a port of a stranger, inconvience a friend, or have a bot... to port you to PoK.

There are the books which are placed at various locations.... which is usually out of your way.

There is magus travel that for some reason still is unable to port you to the guild lobby.

There are a few other ways..... dropped items.... quested items... etc.

However this item is useable by any level, short cast time, very close to PoK, allows you to bind elsewhere for ease of travel or raids etc, is reagent free, and has a recast time of an hour and 10 minutes ffs. I notice that most of the people trashing this ability don't have it. It doesn't take up inventory slots carrying stacks of potions or reagents. I for one am very pleased with it.

PPS
The jester food and drink items, when they aren't poisen, add +5 mana and +5 endurance regen (wine) or add +10 HP per tick (bread). As the buff on the wine is one of the only buffs that increase the endurance regeneration of a pure melee these are invaluable. The mana/end regen buffs also happen to stack with everything..... and I've yet to meet a caster that will turn down an extra 5 mana per tick that stacks with everything and isn't level restricted (can be used by Level 1 and up). Ironically there are people that both trash the jester as worthless and at the same time say that the 8th year should be something that increases your mana regeneration. They of course must be to stupid to realize that such a thing already exists in the jester and is the reward for year 3 and as such available to many more people.


Edited, Jun 23rd 2006 at 5:19am EDT by DangerousMonk

Its a great thing for any non-gater. Would have been nice to know about it 2 weeks ago before I spent 8 frickin AAs on Origin

14 - 8 = 6.

Those veterans who started playing at 6 years old and younger, I want to hear their opinions.

Hope 9th year is a Vet aa that opens a portal to CShome, would love to raid there sometime.

It has just taken the place of the absolutely worst Vet AA there is. Yup, the stupid jester has been supplanted. At least the jester CAN do you a favor or two. Once it healed me completely, when I was low on health, and once it gave a group member full mana. So it is not completely useless. Next to it, but not completely useless. But this. Let me see now. There are gate potions, there is that gate item quest that almost any melee with 8+ years experience will have. There are casters who can gate. There is the Origin AA. There is, oh, let me see. Why do we have yet another gate device?

Let us all say it for Sony. STUPID!!!