Market / Loyalty Rewards: What DON'T I get?

I've been playing CoX on and off since i3, and have amassed 18 tokens worth of the new loyalty program.

I have two options: I can either join the VIP program, or I can drop about $200 on this game's mickey money and earn the 16 tokens I need to permanently unlock IOs, which I think are necessary to enjoy the game. I've got probably 50 billion worth of IOs slotted into my toons, so without taking advantage of one of these options I doubt I'll play at all.

What I'm curious about here is what I don't get with each of these options. The FAQs are great at highlighting the benefits of VIP membership, but I could care less about customer support - and other aspects are unclear. Can I permanently unlock Praetoria? Incarnate system? Episodic content? I'm not sure what I'm missing out on with each of these options, and CoX isn't going to highlight the places where customers are getting nickle-and-dimed (or in this case, five-and-ten-dollared).

Can anyone either answer this question or point me to an existing resource that answers it? I don't want to drop $200 on a game just to be infuriated by the pieces I can't buy for love or money without a VIP account. On the other hand, I don't want to waste money on a VIP account that gives me short-term benefits if I could buy the whole shebang at once and play for free forever for $200 up front. I particularly don't want to pay the $15 for a VIP account and find out that there are still pieces of the game I can't access without paying more.

Any help is appreciated. Thanks in advance!

The only things you cannot get, ever, without a VIP membership is the ability to interact with the SG Registrar (make SGs/bases, pay rent - you can still edit bases however) and the incarnate system.

If you have a Going Rogue box code, you keep everything associated with that.

Most everything else you get "for free" as VIP (some powersets, First Ward, SSAs) can be bought. You can either check the wiki or check the market - anything in the market marked "VIP Content" is free for you while VIP and purchasable as a premium.

And at this point other than some costume pieces/sets and some powersets there is no content VIPs do not get with their sub.

Thanks, Rajani!

Looks like I'm best off grabbing a VIP month and trying it out, finding out whether I care about Incarnate content or not. If nothing else, I'll get one of my tokens out of the way.

Seems like Incarnate rewards are only applicable when raiding, and my characters are already vastly overpowered for anything non-raid. So.. I guess it's a matter of refamiliarizing myself with CoX and trying to join a few raids.

Are raids generally a guild-only activity the way they are in games like EQ and WoW, or more open / pick up groups? I remember mothership raids and hamidon raids being popular, but more or less scheduled events that took all comers. I'd hate to find that I had to join a guild in order to access the new content; I own a massive VG base I've spent years building up.

Incarnate stuff works for anything level 45+, but yeah if you've already done everything the only 'new' thing are the trials.

Trials are generally open to everyone, there are scheduled events and pick up events, just kind of depends on your server and who does what.

You can just jump into the trials or do the solo/small team arc to unlock your Alpha slot, then decide whether you want to build your first alpha ability with Strike force rewards or dive into the trials and earn salvage and threads.

Starting out you'll want to stick to the initial 3 trials, Behavioral Adjustment Facility, Lamba Sector, and the Keyes Reactor trials til you can craft some Level shifts to join the harder trials, which are the Underground, The TPN news, and the Minds of Mayhem. Not absolutely required, but it helps a lot and people will be more prone to snatch you up.

Oh and keep in mind, there will be a new Incarnate Zone coming out in the next few months so the Incarnate system won't be purely high end task forces & trials.

Good point, I forgot that F2P can purchase those arcs too.