I haven't been to Plane of Hate or Fear since shortly after the original release of Kunark, so my information is out of date (not that Clerics were given any instructions other than "sit here, make sure I don't die" anyway). I've read about ways to get to poh with out a wizard, but it wasn't obvious what era that was introduced. I've also read about how the planar gear that drops was changed to items that you turn in, so Druids can get their gear from Hate, and Clerics from Fear. There's even one level guide for Live that suggests leveling from 50 to 58 with a 3 box + mercs (so a 6 man team?). Is there a resource to read up on how Hate and Fear are implemented on TAKP? Now as I approach 50 with my little WAR/CLR/DRU box, I want to start to explore these zones, and start picking up the planar gear from there. Is there any measure of success I might find in cracking into these zones with my little 3 box? I don't see a lot of global chatter around taking groups into these zones; is there enough casual interest in Hate and Fear that I could pull together an ad-hoc group?
I recommend skipping these. Velious offers group content that your 3-box can take on for better gear. Hate and Fear are raid zones--the latter especially is notorious for awful break-ins that are unforgiving with even 30 characters at level 50--tuned differently. Hate is more doable than Fear, but you're likely to find better risk-reward in Velious. Only way to PoHate here is via Wizard port. Googling around and looking at resources dated from 2001-2004 should be accurate. We might have armor "turn ins" which are a way to dump unneeded armor to a vendor for a little exp and maybe 100pp (someone else could chime in on this), but beyond that any trading mechanism is beyond our era.
A casual group of low 50s or even high 40s exping in hate and fear? You've been playing too much with Live mechanics. Try that here you'll just end up with a long expensive CR.
Right. I wondered. I haven't been playing at all (live or otherwise), but just perusing the internet looking for what's next. I'm not surprised to find Live is so much different, I just don't know how to sort through it all. Thanks for your patience. So when you talk about Velious, are you talking about the Class Armor stuff? Looking up the p99 wiki, I remember there being a big deal about killing Kael giants to get the dwarf armor set, but then killing dragon spawn in Skyshring for the Kael Giants armor set. Do I have that right? Does that mean there's a faction choice to make (and re-make)?
I did some Hate with enc/clr/mag in the high 50s. It's doable, just scary and kinda wipe-prone. I'd bring a friend, and either have a wizard ready to port you up for CRs, or camp a rezzer out at a safe spot. It's easy to accidentally pull huge trains. Fear is waaaaay harder than Hate. It's still a raid zone, two expansions later.
You're right that you can kill giants in Kael for dwarf armor drops! You could probably kill in the arena (avoid Protectors of Zek) with your trio in the low-to-mid 50s, but it'd be slow because the mobs have a fair chunk of HP. On the other hand, you'd get CoV faction at the same time. The dragon and giant armor quest armors you mention both drop in different parts of the Temple of Veeshan and are usually farmed by small raids, not 3-boxers. (With the occasional lunatic exception, of course!)
