"Pay to Win"

[Deleted]

No it is not, that gives POE extra credit, i think that being an action RPG makes it even more difficult to stay afloat without P2W.

PoE requires way less resources than an usual MMORPG game. PoE is brutal, one of the best games I have ever played. But the game is fairly small (small in terms of it requires not that much to make a very good and deep game for hundreds of hours of gaming), but presented very big. There are a lot of F2P games in different genres without any kind of P2W. But MMORPGS are a whole different story.

[Deleted]

show me a single example. theory =/= practise

Why? This is not a question of "practise" but of you mixing concepts.

[Deleted]

Why? This is not a question of "practise" but of you mixing concepts.

I have no idea what you want from me.

F2P-MMORPGS are not working without P2W in practise.
P2P-MMORPGS are not working with P2W in practise.

[Teri]

The advantage is having gold. You can buy boosts with it, or buy gear from AH, or any number of other things. All other things being equal, having lots of gold is a big advantage. And Blizzard sells you gold for cash. It's as straight up pay2win as you can get.

Blizzard does NOT sell gold directly from an endless vault, token value is based off player economy, if 10000 player suddenly bought a token, the price is dropping. Player boost prices and AH economy is directly related to that.

On the other hand you can convert the same gold back to €13 or $15 digital blizzard money.

Even if You had a billion gold, you cannot buy itemlevel 1000 items while everyone runs around in 925 maximum (which are mostly pvpers when it comes to pure-itemlevel right now)

[Deleted]

But MMORPGS are a whole different story.

Yeah but that is because it is insanely difficult to build a working MMORPG, wow itself is a miracle.
There is an excellent youtube series called MMO graveyard, and as you see the series you do realize it is madly complicated to have even a shadow of wow success in this genre.

[Deleted]

F2P-MMORPGS are not working without P2W in practise.
P2P-MMORPGS are not working with P2W in practise.

It is possible to have a F2P game that is not P2W.
It is possible to have a P2P game that is P2W.

F2P/P2P and P2W are different concepts.

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Blizzard does NOT sell gold directly from an endless vault, token value is based off player economy

That's irrelevant. You can get out your credit card, go to Blizzard store and get gold. The point of the token mechanism is just for Blizzard to be able to sell gold without causing inflation.

[Rotted]

Cant someone ban you again for stupid posts?

WoW doesnt have a single P2W element.

Pay to win is when game provides gear/damage/buffs with money that are relevant to the active progression of the game.

Rift and earring slots as example.

Buff scrolls in old MMOs back in 2003-2005.

Slightly disagree, there is one pay to win element and thats ingame token, theoretically speaking, you could buy a load, sell for the Gs then on a patch launch you could be at cap to buy heroic - mythic trash BoE drops to give you that extra push on the follow raid night.

But overall, no its not a pay to win,

[Deleted]

1) It is possible to have a F2P game that is not P2W.
2) It is possible to have a P2P game that is P2W.

3)F2P/P2P and P2W are different concepts.

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1) but never happend yet
2) but never happend yet (except the levelboost option)
3) I still dont get it what you want to try to explain. I know what F2P, P2P and P2W means and I know in which context they are working with each other.

[Yriel]

Doesnt matter what some fangirl low iq player will say.

P2W has a definition, when the definition is met, you lose the argument.

Those MMOs have it.

When Blizzard starts selling as example as the game is now 925 item level gear in the cash shop, we can argue P2W.

If they start selling a flask in the cash shop that stacks with the other flasks and provides 10% extra stats, we can cry P2W.

That is interesting because in this thread alone i have read like 100 definitions for "Pay to Win", why is yours the only correct one?

[Elim Garak]

There is no single entity called "games industry" that makes authoritative decisions about definitions.

Duh, there is. It's called "industry proven best practices". Practical and always correct.

I've published two iOS games that made money, so technically I'm part of the "games industry" and I say you are wrong.

How about no.

Which shows that it is a pointless definition, and the definition I use -- "Ability to gain an in game advantage by paying money." -- is better.

It's not pointless, it's very precise and very effective. Yours is so vague that any game in which a player can buy something that others might deem advantageous is p2w. This is rubbish, completely useless definition which accomplishes nothing but letting someone scream "P2W" about anything. You are wrong and you don't know what you are talking about.

It isn't, "advantage" is very easy to define -- anything that impacts game mechanics in your favor. And it translates into "winning" by definition. If you have an advantage, all other things equal, you have a higher probability of "winning".

So anything is P2W. Rubbish and Wrong.

That doesn't work because "meaningful" is vague and cannot be strictly defined, unlike "advantage", which can be strictly defined. And "competitive" is vacuous since you can compete about anything in game.

Meaningful is not vague. it's quite specific if you remember that the context is a game, it must be an advantage that is unavailable to non-paying peers. It is the only way for an advantage to be meaningful. It must be better than non-paying option and it must be your peers.

Buying raid gear with cash won't give you an advantage in raid environment and outside of raid environment it's of little use to somebody who would buy it. Because there's no win outside the raid.

Now buying raid gear PLUS that is better than free raid gear - that is meaningful advantage and that's p2w.

Read what I said multiple times until you memorize it and can recite it by heart. Because that's the only correct definition of p2w.

[Deleted]

Duh, there is. It's called "industry proven best practices". Practical and always correct.

Ok sure, and what is the email address of this Department of Industry Proven Best Practices and Always Correct Definitions? I'd like to double check with them about the definition.

It's not pointless, it's very precise and very effective. Yours is so vague that any game in which a player can buy something that others might deem advantageous is p2w.

No. Your definition is useless because just by adding an infinitesimally small chance to get the same thing in game (even if in practice nobody will ever get it) the game is suddenly no longer P2W. There is no value in that kind of definition. The definition I use, on the other hand, is not only precisely defined, but also has actual practical value when used.

So anything is P2W.

No. Cosmetic stuff is not P2W, for example, because they do not impact game mechanics.

Meaningful is not vague.

It is completely vague. What you call "meaningful" I can call "meaningless". It's a subjective concept, so it makes no sense to use it in a definition.

Buying raid gear with cash won't give you an advantage

Of course it does. All else being equal, a player with raid gear has multiple advantages over one that doesn't.

Read what I said multiple times until you memorize it and can recite it by heart. Because that's the only correct definition of p2w.

As I pointed out, your definition is completely pointless.

[Deleted]

That is interesting because in this thread alone i have read like 100 definitions for "Pay to Win", why is yours the only correct one?

The people dont get that P2W is not an standardized term. As long as you have an directly adventage against other player for real money investment its P2W. This gives a lot room for interpretation. But we can still compare with other MMORPGS on the market.

Level Boost
Pay money -> klick a button -> win.

Gold
Take a look on the sellruns current prices -> pay money for 21 wow tokens -> sell 21 wow tokens in the AH -> hope for a good exchange rate -> the exchange rate has dropped, two additional tokens are necessary -> pay money for 2 additional wow tokens -> sell 2 additional wow tokens in the AH -> hope for a sustaining exchange rate -> start to look for an mythic raid boost incl mount -> following options:

1: the next mythic progress phase starts on next tuesday/wednesday, there is no guild aroun which delivers mythic raid runs for the dozens of weeks
2: you have to trans to an another server to get the service for additional real money
3: all gold brokers worldwide are banned so all the big guilds dont make any sellruns anymore because they are not able to change gold in real money anymore.
4: the price is increased an additional time
5: there is only room for 1 buyer per week and you are on spot 115 on the list.
6: or a combination of all that stuff
7: maybe win.

[Elim Garak]

Ok sure, and what is the email address of this Department of Industry Proven Best Practices and Always Correct Definitions? I'd like to double check with them about the definition.

Gotta be in the industry.

No. Your definition is useless because just by adding an infinitesimally small chance to get the same thing in game (even if in practice nobody will ever get it) the game is suddenly no longer P2W. There is no value in that kind of definition. The definition I use, on the other hand, is not only precisely defined, but also has actual practical value when used.

Rubbish for the sake of not admitting being wrong is still rubbish

No. Cosmetic stuff is not P2W, for example, because they do not impact game mechanics.

Oooh, can't wait for your comments on the upcoming Transmog competition in WoW.

It is completely vague. What you call "meaningful" I can call "meaningless". It's a subjective concept, so it makes no sense to use it in a definition.

Rubbish for the sake of not admitting being wrong is still rubbish

Of course it does. All else being equal, a player with raid gear has multiple advantages over one that doesn't.

If all else is being equal there's no player without raid gear. Becasue all players are raiders and all raiders have raid gear. Gear is defining factor of peers. If you buy mythic gear your peers are automatically mythic raiders. Go compete with them bro. Stop fooling around the scrubs - there's no win in that.

As I pointed out, your definition is completely pointless.

If it's pointless then how did you manage to point it out? You are pointless.

[Reachie10]

Jaylock is what's wrong with our world.

Trolling.

[Deleted]

Rubbish for the sake of not admitting being wrong is still rubbish

If you have no argument to make, why do you insist on posting? Take a deep breath, realize that it's just a game, and calm down.

[Schizoide]

This is a silly argument. There are quite a few F2P games that don't have egregious P2W. Star Wars: Galaxies and Wildstar come to mind. There are also quite a few B2P (buy to play, where you buy the game and can play for free forever) games that don't have egregious P2W, like Guild Wars 2 and Elder Scrolls Online.

And then there are B2P games that do have egregious P2W, like Black Desert Online and Archeage.

I can't think of any subscription games that have egregious P2W, because players wouldn't stand for it. But tons allow players to buy in-game money like WoW, because players largely accepted that. Many of us grudgingly, but we haven't quit over it.

[Minttunator]

These threads are always fun since there will never be a universally accepted definition of P2W and discussions on whether or not a given game is P2W always devolve into arguing about what P2W actually means to each individual poster.

Personally I think we should probably stop using the term "P2W" altogether since it's so loaded (i.e. it always generates bickering - which is also why the OP created this thread, I suppose) and yet so ambiguous.

Currently there seem to be 3 broad groups:

1) People approaching the term literally with questions like "what is it that you're winning exactly?" - i.e. in their mind the game should have a clear win condition and players should be able to spend money to directly fulfil that condition. AFAIK there is no game like this, yet these posts always come up for some reason (mostly by defenders of the game trying to argue that "their game" is not P2W).

2) Being able to purchase, with real money, exclusive items that grant an advantage over non-paying players - mostly this means being able to buy powerful gear/upgrades that cannot be obtained through other means (i.e. by just playing the game without paying real money). This exists in a number of Korean grinders and I'd guess most people probably consider this P2W as well.

3) Simply being able to gain an in-game advantage through paying real money. Mostly this boils down to "pay 2 save time" if these advantages are also obtainable through playing the game normally - i.e. person A might pay real money to get some powerful item while person B might have to run 20 dungeons to achieve the same result. Something like this is present in most current MMOs (WoW included) and the arguments revolve around how egregious it is in any particular game.

Is it P2W if I buy an item with 10 dollars but another player can get it in-game within 5 minutes? Not really? What about if he had to grind for 3 days to get it? What about 5 months - where do you draw the line?

This doesn't get into other shady stuff that gaming companies do to get our money (gambling boxes instantly spring to mind) or the possibility of buying boosts/carries - which can be considered P2W in and of itself, I suppose.

As far as WoW goes, it's clear that players can currently obtain tangible advantages through real money - you just have to buy gold and then buy gear with said gold. Hell, you can even buy legendaries now! Some years ago I would've never accepted this but I've since come to terms with the fact that most MMOs have some P2W elements nowadays and the possibility of buying gold in WoW doesn't bother me too much, partly because I've found it relatively easy to make gold in-game as well so I've never been tempted to sell tokens (on the contrary - I've actually bought a bunch!).

[potis]

That is interesting because in this thread alone i have read like 100 definitions for "Pay to Win", why is yours the only correct one?

Cause out of the 100 definititions most say the same thing, and its 2 of them in the end.

[Schizoide]

Great post, Minttunator. Well summarized.

[Banard]

Cant someone ban you again for stupid posts?

WoW doesnt have a single P2W element.

Pay to win is when game provides gear/damage/buffs with money that are relevant to the active progression of the game.

Rift and earring slots as example.

Buff scrolls in old MMOs back in 2003-2005.

ummmmm...

use $$$ buy wow gold from blizzard...pay Super Mythic Raid Guild to carry and feed you gear. <---how is that not pay to win?