Thread: Previous VIP Bonuses?

Well basically I am a Premium Player right now, but I am considering buying the 12 months VIP offer and then dropping back to Premium. I have heard that doing so will, although most of the things will become locked again, grant me a couple of bonuses. Has anyone done this and knows exactly what will stay unlocked even after I quit premium?

I think that one of the things is Swift Travel. Is that correct and is there other things (like Inventory Bags, Character Slots, etc.) that will stay unlocked?

Thanks in advance!

For each character that you log in while VIP you will keep:

Swift Travel
All 5 bags
All Traits (even if you haven't reached the level to open them yet)
Currency cap removal

You will lose 2 character slots but you will be given a choice to pick which 2 get locked. You can then buy slots in the store (up to 10 slots only) and unlock those characters and they will retain all the above bonuses as long as they were logged in at least once during VIP.

Special note: The items you have in the free 20 slot wardrobe will remain usable and you can continue to add dyes to them but you cannot add more items or switch them out if you don't buy the slots in the store.

If you fill the 20 slots then after you downgrade you buy 10 slots, you will still not be able to use any new slots until you are below the number of slots you actually purchased. For example in this case you would have to remove 11 items (leaving 9 filled slots) in order to have 1 slot to be able to add something. You could also remove everything and have all 10 purchased slots available or just buy 20 slots and continue as normal

any character which physically enters the world while ViP will retain all bags, gold cap removal, swift travel trait slots

once you downgrde to premium you will have 3 character slots, if you have more than 3 characters you will be asked to choose which you want to play unless you purchase extra character slots
any new characters created will have premium restrictions, they will have a gold cap of 5gold etc see this thread for full details of what youll get
Answers to Your Questions

My toon that i created whilst being on vip and then it went back to premium has a currency cap on it

It isnt enough to create character, you need log into game with it to have VIP bonueses applied.

Thank you for all the answers! If any of you have done this, would you recommend it or is it smarter to just purchase from the Lotro Store?

Originally Posted by Hechtschreck

Thank you for all the answers! If any of you have done this, would you recommend it or is it smarter to just purchase from the Lotro Store?

Depending on how many characters you have it should be better to go VIP.

A couple other things to consider,

Riding skill can be obtained through a quest at level 20 if you are VIP (if you can wait that long) and Crafting guilds are unlocked, but only while you are VIP so if you manage to get to the highest rep with the guild you can avoid buying the unlock..........at least until they add a tier in September.

Originally Posted by Hechtschreck

Thank you for all the answers! If any of you have done this, would you recommend it or is it smarter to just purchase from the Lotro Store?

I subscribed for two months and then dropped back to premium, and I would absolutely recommend a temporary VIP over buying the items from the store. You unlock 13 trait slots that otherwise would have to be unlocked individually - totalling 1435 TPs (per character!). You unlock swift travel, which can't be done through the store, except by buying temporary writs of travel. You also get the gold cap removed and the fourth and fifth bags, both big conveniences if you don't have them already. It would cost a lot of points to get all those things piecemeal.

If you only have one or two characters, or only at a low level, you can go without such conveniences for a while. But eventually you are going to want the class and legendary trait slots unlocked on your characters for sure, and it's so much simpler to do it all at once by subscribing.

The more characters you have during the VIP time, the more benefit you'll get from it. I'm an altaholic, so for me the benefits were overwhelming. If you only have one character, it won't be as much - but still useful, definitely. It does pay to plan ahead a little before you subscribe: stack up some crafting guild rep items to turn in all at once if you do crafting. Get ready to pick up quests and deeds in areas you don't own quest packs for. Get as far as you can before subscribing, so you don't waste any of the VIP time you have.

When you subscribe, remember to create and log in the two extra characters you get while VIP: it only takes a couple minutes, and even if you end up dropping back to premium and having to lock them back up, they'll be there ready if you ever decide to buy extra character slots. Try out the skirmishes and instances you don't own, to see if you'd be interested enough to pay for them once you lose VIP privileges.

Also don't forget that you get 500 TPs per month while subscribed, on top of your normal gameplay earnings. Think through if there's any big purchase you'd like to save for, because TPs can slip away oh-so-quickly if you buy the first thing on sale without planning ahead first. But! be aware that you can't buy things like quest packs when you're VIP, so you won't be able to take advantage of any big sales that come up - like this one that should be coming in the first week of July.

Of course, it's possible you might subscribe and decide you like it enough to stick with VIP for a while. That's cool too, if you can afford it, and takes away some of the urgency.

Woah, just noticed this was a monster post, very sorry about that.

Swift travel abilities only stay if you earned the port in the first place by either deeding it or actually traveling to the stable itself.

The biggest downfall of going premium is the loss of cosmetic slots and essentially freezing what you have in your wardrobe until you buy up more slots to counter what was lost by going free. Also its irritating only having 5 auction house slots. But other than that (i have all the expansion areas already and I dont care about the skirmishes) I cant regret the choice.

you dont have to buy a year sub to get it, one month will do as well.

Originally Posted by Laweh

Swift travel abilities only stay if you earned the port in the first place by either deeding it or actually traveling to the stable itself.

WRONG

All you have to do is login to the character while VIP.

Then you must meet the requirements to use the route at the time of travel (have enough COIN, have done the quests required, discovered the destination, etc.)

That's it.

Not 'i must obtain access to the route while VIP.'

Just 'I must login to the character while VIP' and the route will function as if I were VIP. If I meet the regular requirements I can use coin. If i dont meet the regular requirements I can use TP. Just like if you were VIP.

what about that was wrong? i said if you meet the requirements or traveled to the location ie. stable perhaps the word stay was what threw you.

Originally Posted by Laweh

what about that was wrong? i said if you meet the requirements or traveled to the location ie. stable perhaps the word stay was what threw you.

What Crell is saying is that you don't NEED to meet the requirements or travel to the location to keep swift travel access. Once you log in as a VIP character then swift travel access is unlocked permanently for that character even if you're on a level 1 alt who hasn't even left the tutorial zone. You still can't actually take the swift travel routes until you meet the requirements but the system itself is unlocked for you. The swift travel option for those routes will open up for that character once you meet the requirements even though you're now a Premium account.

Originally Posted by KualaBangoDango

What Crell is saying is that you don't NEED to meet the requirements or travel to the location to keep swift travel access. Once you log in as a VIP character then swift travel access is unlocked permanently for that character even if you're on a level 1 alt who hasn't even left the tutorial zone. You still can't actually take the swift travel routes until you meet the requirements but the system itself is unlocked for you. The swift travel option for those routes will open up for that character once you meet the requirements even though you're now a Premium account.

This.
The fact that you have to level the character and visit places is a very common misconception, so.. I'm pretty vocal about it. It's the most valuable of the char downgrade unlocks