I copied several characters to Test last night to see what kind of effect the autogrant would have. My main character has over 4k AAs already but still received 1800 in fluff. (Had 5843, went to 7644.) Actual stats (HP, mana, endurance, armor class, attack) were virtually unchanged. I have 3 more characters in the 3-4k range. Same thing. They received 1500-2200 in fluff AAs and the core stats ended up hardly changing. One character (84 shaman with 175 AA) saw an increase of 1800 hp/mana and the AA count went to 3939. Not exactly game-breaking. The autogrant will give you a ton of activated Class AAs for utility, so that's the best thing about it unless you're running around without any combat agility/stability for some reason. After the post 4k auto-grant, RoF/CoTF collection tasks should get you to 7k or higher. It's on you to learn how to use them. If you've gained the first 4k AAs through XPing, then there shouldn't be any concern of knowing "how to play your class". It's better to think of the auto-grant as back-fill more than a headstart. Else you end up blowing your 4k curve on things like Innate Charisma. Conclusion: If you're going to opt-in to the AA grant, for efficiency it's much better to spend the first 4k AA points yourself (on HoT AAs and up if you can because the AAs cost so much at later levels) and then accept the auto-grant.
I'm just curious, did you do this with the /restaa thing I saw someone else mention? When I logged on the character I have on test, clicked the auto-grant AA check box and zoned....I was awarded all those fluffy AAs (my character had over 8k to start) but the AA counts on the right hand side of the box did not change. I was thinking that this might have been their way around the 4k bonus issue/how many AAs did you earn....I'm just wondering since my AA count didn't appear to change. I've copied another character on a second account over to test and I'll try it again with her later.
Is there any place where I can read up on this? I have not gotten to where I get AA, and I am unsure if I am comfortable with getting a whole bunch put into ones I may not want. Is there a way to get the AA but not have them placed, or is it 'get or don't get'?
It's a get or don't get, honestly getting them isn't really going to hurt you, it just allows you to get to max / top faster. The side AA will be solid boosts to your toon with it on as you unlock each level block of AA that will allow you to kill faster, die less, etc.
One of the reasons that they're not just dumping a few thousand AA on you to spend is because you're going to be capped at 30 unspent points until higher levels. They don't want to remove this cap because it would allow people to bank thousands of extra AAs and then spend them all the day that a new expansion (and its new AAs) goes live.
Right. It definitely doesn't hurt you. It will make a new character with no AAs pretty viable. The only downside is that a lot of the more powerful AAs come with a very high cost. That's why trying to get them done before your 4k curve is finished is imho worth considering.
But the Shaman also got all the level-appropriate healing/nuking/dotting/canni/etc AAs, right?That's a significant increase in power.
Yes, he did. And yes, it is. My shaman is a buff bot and I have no intention of actually playing him in groups. The autogrant is great for him. To get an alt up to a level where he can contribute, it should be worth considering to accept it right away. For a main character, I think it's better to wait.
Nope. There are a few reasons why they wouldn't want to do that. I don't see it in the upcoming patch notes: https://forums.station.sony.com/eq/index.php?threads/test-update-2-14-2014.208175/
Getting logged into the Test server was the only part that took any time. Should see this go live on Wednesday unless there's some kind of holdup.
At this point there are no HoT+ aas I can buy. Everything Im allowed to buy is something I will get free when the update arrives. This is on a L85 wizard with 800aa.
I don't know that there's any real benefit to that. You have to level up pretty high to get into the HoT+ AAs, and most are just extra ranks of earlier AAs. Probably end up wasting most of your bonus on buying AAs you'd get for free, and/or trying to gain those AA while not buying core abilities. I tried a mage at 86, and after the grant (which was like 4700 AA) there were only about 900 points worth of AAs that I could buy. A fair chunk being SCS and the TS masteries, and almost everything else being just additional ranks of existing AAs. If someone already has a bunch of AAs spent to unlock those higher ranks (or close), it's probably worth finishing off what you can while still under bonus, but for a newbie, taking the grant seems the way to go. Or at least, get SCS and the TSs if you want them, bank 30, then take it.
Look at your aas and see how many are useless and how much they add up to. I think that the fear that it will add many useless aas is exaggerated. AFAICT almost all useless aas are in the general page and they are so cheap that you will only have a small number of wasted. Innate stats/resists + the planar powers you dont need only add up to about 280 points. Check it yourself. You can see what each aa costs at every level at this website: http://eqaasearch.org/aainfo_search.asp If you end up gaining 300 useless aa points and 3200 useful points I think its worth it.
AAs are so fast at 100, its best to opt in from the very get-go, then do like 10 or 20% into AA until 100. People who think that no AA bonus is tough haven't been level 100 apparently, doing HAs they come by the hundreds per night.
