Seems more like " pay for a slight advantage". Unless it makes it almost impossible to knock someone off, I'm not seeing it as a huge deal. While I'm not one who ever likes to see anything that gives you advantage sold, this seems to be so far down the list that even I wouldn't care.
Also on the crafting system from SWG ever being implemented, I'm not sure we will ever see anything that complicated in an MMO again. One of the things they loved to blame for SWG's failure was how overly complicated it felt to new players. It was also done because crafting was considered a class, something I also don't think you will see for a long time.
Just feels like everything has to be made for the lowestt common denominator anymore.