It'd be great if other Premium members can reply though
Fuck it, let me give you my own personal response then, going off the different things you get. Looking at it primarily from a HL2RP standpoint because its what I have most experience with:
- Zombie Whitelist: Never used it but I heard some people saying they have enjoyed RPing as a headcrab or necrotic. Be prepared to die a lot and very quickly if you happen to run into any geared up resistance members. I believe you still have to apply for it though via
@Chicken.
- PET flags: Physics gun, Toolgun and Prop spawning access. This tends to be the thing I use the most from premium to add a couple of decorations here and there for my market stall, spawn in a mug to ICly make someone a cup of coffee as a Secretary or even decorate my clinic a little when doing medical RP. Just make sure you don't go overboard without staff permission - otherwise you could end up losing access to PET.
- Citizen body-groups: Purely a vanity thing, you can change up your BG to include glasses and whatnot so that you can be cool and different from everyone else. Mainly used this for editing my resistance bodygroup to get a medical shirt instead of standard blues for my character.
- Premium container: Arguably the best and most important benefit from a mechanics standpoint, this benefit gives you an extra 30kgs (I think) of storage space in certain locations around the map. Use this to store your extra gear or before you head off into the city.
The forum banner is a nice touch that makes your profile look a little bit nicer I guess and the premium-only discussion board is...alright. I would say its more for a quick read and the odd interesting topic rather than something you will want to check all the time.
Dealing with
@alex and the system in general. Not going to lie when I say Alex was really quick when I paid for premium but received none of the benefits (this was using the old system) as he managed to correct the situation within the hour. Obviously that's going to vary at times because man needs to sleep but he clearly isn't trying to rip anyone off.
I've actually spoken with him a few times, bit of a nerd (love you really) but otherwise he is really down to earth and is a pretty decent dude. I wouldn't say we were close on a personal level or even knew each-other too well. I am not staff and have zero reasons to lie in order to 'trick' people into getting premium.
Most importantly just think about your experiences on the servers - ignore the rest of the fancy crap that goes along with it like the rewards and think about how you enjoy everything. If you like it and enjoy RPing then chuck the community 5 quid every month. If you don't then don't bother - a zambie whitelist isn't going to make everything better magically.
There. Response administered.