Newest expansion NOT all in one?Follow

So I was ready to buy the newest expansion as I decided to play eq2 again as f2P. I have a 57 berserker (60 armorcraft). I am missing velious and aod. So just wondering can velious be skipped all together? There are quite a few utility things Id like to have from AOD such as mercs and create a dungeon. I am not a big fan of paying $40 for AOD and then another $20 for velious.

Also I guess f2p is stuck at 50% going to AA on the exp bar?

I thought DM was before the AOD expansion? Research Assistants are the big draw for most people (the ones who weren't creaming themselves over beasts that is)

The easiest question to answer here is that yes, as a bronze/silver account your AA bar will be fixed. It only moves at level 10, and level 90(in other words, before you can get AAs its at 0 and once you can no longer level its at 100 - itll be 50 the entire time inbetween).

Velious is indeed skippable. Just picking up AoD will get you mercs, a tradeskill apprentice, the dungeon maker, beastlords... and i think 20 extra AAs. Its possible that Dyadem was confused on the dungeon maker part because you can play IN someone elses dungeon without the expack, but you can only design your own if you picked it up.

What you give up in the DoV pack is a lot of the best high level(85+) adventuring content, the only current tradeskill heritage quest... and maybe flight and the new raised level cap? I dont think they let you go to 92 without DoV(you definately wont get the new standard trade recipes, as those only come from quests in a DoV zone), and im not sure if you can get a flying mount without the pack(you definately can not do the quest for one, im not so sure if you bought one off the marketplace without the expack if itd let you fly... but no one can fly before they get either adventure or crafting to level 85, so this is a question for later).

One thing you could consider is waiting til the next time they go on sale(or a double+ SC weekend) and getting the pack for a discount. A $15 walmart card applied during a triple SC weekend(admittedly, these are much more rare then double credit weekends) would get you enough SC to tag yourself for both expansions. You know, if you wanna wait that long. Otherwise, just play what you wanna play, its all good.

I play a necromancer I had built up myself so the mercenaries are not a really big thing for me... Personally everything above he said is the main reason I would definitely go with DoV. I do not have DoV yet and I cannot get groups for anything except maybe a very rare chance. Everyone on my friends is already level 92 and I'm stuck at 90 with maxed AAs and I cannot join in the new content which I heard was very spectacular. I like doing dungeons and have made one on a friends account. I personally would rather just do them by myself. I have over 40,000 dungeon markers that I cannot spend. Only thing I would have spent them on is the research timer reduction potions. Since they have taken those out the only thing i see fit for buying is the Pegasus for 500 dungeon markers, but after that nothing else really. Before they did the patch on 7/17/12 I was doing dungeons with no problem. I was helping out old guild mates with runs for about 90k xp/8mins which is really high and they would get up in no time. Would take me only a couple of weeks to get them from 20-90. Sorry but I need to get back to the point... If you do not want to buy them just ~~save up platinum~~. People on my server sell an buy them all the time. They go for ranging from 120plat-420plat on my server. That is a big difference but it saves you with real life money troubles.