If you havn't done the "lost to the ages" quest and don't want to be spoiled, don't read.

What items should I choose?
The crown thing would be the most obvius choise right, but it wasn't. I had the havey perks where I had more armour if I weared all my armour types at the same time. And I have almost 100 on every skill so I didn't really needed that one, right?

I have 100 on shield so the obvius choise should be shield. So I choosed shield, but the problem is. I have auriels shield. A bit bugged yes but also a nice shield. So now I have 2 awsome shields and don't know if it was nessesary.

So what was left was the staff, but I can already summon better stuffs (I think) like the deadra lord. So thats why I didn't pick that.

So was my choise good or bad? Then I create my next character I will know better what I will have.

Save, pick one, reload pick the other. See what you like better. Another reason why this game is brilliant.

#masterpiece

I got the shield no regret.

Maybe you should pick something based on its display value rather than its practical value. Personally, I like the way the crown looks. It would go well with ancient Falmer Armor. As for armor rating, you could always use the Lord Stone as one of your stones, or smith your armor up really high with enchanting and alchemy buffs. The shield is next best looking. The staff looks pretty Meh.

I just went for the one that looked the best, which I decided was the Crown but they're all pretty useless enchantment wise.

I went with the crown. It's most useful for my necro-knight.

I got the crown, but I'll never use it. Just got if for looks since (like you) none of the items would really help me.

The crown, because you can basically switch what it does by taking on new standing stone powers. So, its the most flexible, the most valuable, and probably the most powerful.

I always pick "shield." It's just so deliciously overpowered.

see here:
http://www.rarityguide.com/articles/articles/2944/1/Skyrim-Dawnguard-Aetherium-Forge-Items/Page1.html

Crown. The wand/staff is pretty useless, and Auriel shield is better.

The Crown. I like having more than one stone power at a time.

I saved and chose the crown. Unfortunatly it conflicted with the PC hair mod I use and looked very funky with tufs of hair sticking out of it front and back. I'd have no use for the staff so I chose the shield. Cause it looks cool and glows in the dark on the wall in breezehome.

I doubt I'll use the shield... I don't bash things with a shield to make them impossible to kill. I bash them to kill them haha.

Yeah, I don't like any of them and can't decide which one I would ever be even remotely likely to use. I don't like the crown because my character already has headgear. I don't like the staff because the ability to spawn spheres is cool for about 2-3 minutes, then it gets boring (i tried). And the shield enchantment sounds like a cool mechanic, but not really anything I would want since my character is a sneak who doesn't have a sword+board follower. So really, I don't have any use for any of the items, so I choose based on which I think has the coolest power, and that is the crown. I wish Beth would add a few more options to the forge, for a wider variety of players to benefit from all the hard work of discovering the forge.

So choose the one with the greatest collectible/sale value - the crown - you can either sell it or keep it as a relic of sorts.

Also, for me (obviously), I hate the summon a dwarven automaton (Blech! So bored...), and a shield that makes your enemies un-attackable? Who the hell wants that? I wanna sever my enemies' heads from their necks, not make them "ethereal"...

I went with the crown, because for cool looking dwarven stuff you can already get the spellbreaker, which blocks spells and damage, which seems a bit more useful than making things ethereal, and the staff just makes robo spiders or spheres, meh. I have the steed stone on and the other one that gives you faster regeneration, forget what its called.

but the shield looks good over a fire place. just sayin lol

Went with the crown since it seemed more useful for my character. If my character used the Block skill, I would have picked the shield. The staff I don't see to be quite useful. As there is always the chance of it summoning scrap parts instead of an automaton, and the automatons aren't all that great in a fight.

I'd say shield, if you use blocking. If not, the crown.

Maybe i put the crown on a follower.... just for the look.

The shield can be a lifesaver if you find an opponent getting the better of you. Or if you're swarmed by enemies, mildly disoriented, and wish to just get everyone off you until you can regain your bearings. I use it in those instances. Emergencies. I don't use it for the purpose of avoiding combat wherever possible. It's also an amusing time-killer if you just feel like picking a fight with city guards, especially coupled with the Shield Charge perk.

The crown I can only see myself selecting if I were playing a non-warrior character, and then only for the look of it. I would hardly agree with you that the crown is "probably most powerful" item in the game. It allows you to stack two Standing Stones abilities. That might actually be impressive if the Standing Stones abilities didn't svck for the most part. Three of them are "learn faster" abilities which will eventually outlive their usefulness. Four of them are "once per day" abilities which makes them only marginally useful and one of those (The Tower) is the lamentable "Save yourself some lockpicks once per day!" ability. Yes, save yourself on some lockpicks. Because we all know how rare and expensive these curious little items are. I honestly don't think I could conceive of a more crap ability on my own without putting some serious effort into it.

That leaves only a handful of Standing Stones abilities that are actually worth having for the duration of the game, but personally I think the average player is better off just double-enchanting their own headgear (if you're leaning towards the crown, then chances are you're a mage anyway, in which case you're likely to have (or planning to get) the "Extra Effect" enchanting perk).

I always choose the Crown.

I'll use your Warrior as an example...

The Warrior stone makes Warrior-centric skills go up 20% faster, which is helpful because an A-typical Warrior only really uses those Skills anyway. So this Stone is pretty useful.

The Steed Stone makes your armor weigh nothing, armor won't affect your movement speed, and you get an extra 100 to your carry weight... very, very useful.

The Lady Stone, perfect for a Warrior as you regain Health and Stamina 25% faster. Perfect for recovering from a grueling fight.

By mixing and matching these three Stones, your Warrior can have some very serious buffs before going out on his/her next excursion. This is the incalculable value of the Crown. The fact that most Stones don't help a Warrior a bit isn't the issue as the same applies for both Rogue-ish and Mage character builds. But it's the reality that instead of having to try to predict which Stone will help you more when you don't know what's facing you (when without the Crown) is mitigated by the fact that you can go into the unknown with the effect of two Stones just waiting to help you slaughter whatever is next.

I definitely go with the Crown for all of my characters.

"Some may call it junk, me i call them treasure."

Same count for the countless builds and playstyles of TES games.
Me, i call it junk. (for my "main" charakter build)
100 enchant + all perks and the enchanted item is something with armor rating + i can use perks like Well Fitted. So allmost all standing Stones are outclassed. (Steed stone?..... i use Conditioning).

But if you take a build without using enchanting then you may call it treasure. There is (allmost) no wrong or right in TES games.

On the contrary, this would weaken my warrior. My warrior already has the Steed Stone effect applied to him. The Warrior Stone would do him no good as his related skills are already at max.

The Lady Stone? Sure, the crown could allow me to attach that to my warrior as well, but it means having to wear the crown. Which means not wearing a helmet. Which means I lose the effects of the "Well Fitted", "Matching Set" and "Tower of Strength" perks. The three combined are hardly worth trading for the Lady Stone's 25% Health/Stamina regeneration bonus (which by the way, is almost entirely useless since, during combat health and stamina regeneration gets reduced to a glacial-paced crawl).


That's vastly overstating. It's not incalculable. It's very calculable. I just calculated it. Without using a calculator.

In your opinion.

Let's not forget, the whole point of this thread is that everyone was asked, by the nature of the OP, to provide their opinion. in my opinion, the value of the Crown is in fact incalculable.

But I can very well see where it would be a hindrance to you. When I made my post, there was no mention of what anyone's Stats were at.

For my Assassins and Mages, I love having the Crown. I don't play straight Warriors as I see them as boring. But most likely the Aetherial Shield would work better for your Warrior since you already have all the skills for Warrior at maximum.

I don't believe so. What are we talking about here? The ability to wear a Standing Stone on your head. I mean, that's all the crown is. It's your character wearing a Standing Stone as a hat. Come to think of it, that's what the crown should have looked like. An enormous hat in the shape of a Standing Stone. Then you could battle injustices throughout Skyrim as a giant phallic symbol.

Bandit: "Pardon me.. is that a Standing Stone on your head?"

Player: "No, I'm just glad to see you!" *kills bandit*

I appreciate that you find the crown to be invaluable to you for your preferred build-styles, but in order for an item to live up to "incalculable value" or "probably the game's most powerful item" (as said by someone else) then such an item should probably be of great benefit to all three of the game's main archetypical builds and not just two out of three. So yes I can objectively say you were overstating. It's not a matter of opinion. I can prove it with graphs.


I didn't forget that. Did you forget that the OP indicated that his is a shield-wielding character with heavy armor perks and nearly 100 in every skill? Standing Stone abilities aren't going to be of great value to him at this point. He chose the shield and now he's asking if he made a good choice. Given his build description, I'd say yes.