Am I the only one afraid of this?

[Constraint]

It isn't P2W. It's pay to skip. Paying money for less content. Levels have never had anything to do with winning in wow, out side of pvping while leveling or open world pvp. Winning in wow is about gear and skill. Blizzard isn't selling either of those.

I enjoy newbies making up new definitions for P2W left, right and center. Basically, it means whatever you personally think it means, right?

By your amazing "not winning anything" logic, we could have paid profession leveling and it wouldn't be P2W, paid achievement points and it wouldn't be P2W, paid last-tier gear and it wouldn't be P2W, paid arena ratings and it wouldn't be P2W, basically everything except full best-in-slot gear and "skill".

Utter and complete hogswash, as usual. It's actually getting a little old. Pay to win does, has always, and will always mean nothing more or less than "paying real $$ for in-game advantages". Now, you'll turn around and whine, "But Constraint you big meanie, you're not winning anything by paying for a level 90 since the game starts at 100!" And I'll turn around and say, "Incorrect, noob".

Say you and I start leveling at the same time. We pick our races, our classes, and jump eagerly into the world! How exciting!

Since you enjoy paying to win, you jump onto the store and magically level your character to 90 in one fell swoop. Since I'm opposed to cheating, I don't. I spend day after day leveling from scratch, while you're already gearing up your magical character in LFR, Flex, Normals etc. You're already fully geared by the time I'm even at 90. You can instantly purchase epic flying and zoom around (after 5.1 at least) and mine/herb/skin to your heart's content, while I'm stuck walking around hoping a herb/mine spawns near me. You can earn gold a lot faster, you can gear up a lot faster, you can PvP a lot faster.

Now, this isn't an in-game advantage, how pray tell? Why would anyone NOT pay for their 90, unless they were strapped for cash, which isn't exactly fair - "Sorry bro. You're too poor. Do it the slow way, spending extra days leveling while people who can afford it can have more fun in-game".

The very essence of pay-to-win.

Now, I know that my writing this up is utterly fruitless, since the same inane responses pop up time and again - "That's not pay to win! That's pay for convenience! Leveling's pointless anyway!"

If leveling's so pointless, remove it. Or allow free 90s to all if your old content is that irrelevant and revolting that no-one wants to experience it. End of.

TL;DR - stop fucking making up new definitions of P2W to suit your arguments. You're not fooling anyone, simply further cluttering up these boards.

[Kathranis]

I enjoy newbies making up new definitions for P2W left, right and center. Basically, it means whatever you personally think it means, right?

By your amazing "not winning anything" logic, we could have paid profession leveling and it wouldn't be P2W, paid achievement points and it wouldn't be P2W, paid last-tier gear and it wouldn't be P2W, paid arena ratings and it wouldn't be P2W, basically everything except full best-in-slot gear and "skill".

Utter and complete hogswash, as usual. It's actually getting a little old. Pay to win does, has always, and will always mean nothing more or less than "paying real $$ for in-game advantages". Now, you'll turn around and whine, "But Constraint you big meanie, you're not winning anything by paying for a level 90 since the game starts at 100!" And I'll turn around and say, "Incorrect, noob".

Say you and I start leveling at the same time. We pick our races, our classes, and jump eagerly into the world! How exciting!

Since you enjoy paying to win, you jump onto the store and magically level your character to 90 in one fell swoop. Since I'm opposed to cheating, I don't. I spend day after day leveling from scratch, while you're already gearing up your magical character in LFR, Flex, Normals etc. You're already fully geared by the time I'm even at 90. You can instantly purchase epic flying and zoom around (after 5.1 at least) and mine/herb/skin to your heart's content, while I'm stuck walking around hoping a herb/mine spawns near me. You can earn gold a lot faster, you can gear up a lot faster, you can PvP a lot faster.

Now, this isn't an in-game advantage, how pray tell? Why would anyone NOT pay for their 90, unless they were strapped for cash, which isn't exactly fair - "Sorry bro. You're too poor. Do it the slow way, spending extra days leveling while people who can afford it can have more fun in-game".

The very essence of pay-to-win.

Now, I know that my writing this up is utterly fruitless, since the same inane responses pop up time and again - "That's not pay to win! That's pay for convenience! Leveling's pointless anyway!"

If leveling's so pointless, remove it. Or allow free 90s to all if your old content is that irrelevant and revolting that no-one wants to experience it. End of.

TL;DR - stop fucking making up new definitions of P2W to suit your arguments. You're not fooling anyone, simply further cluttering up these boards.

I don't think the average player would consider what you're talking about to be "competitive," though you're trying to make it sound like such. Yes, if you challenge another player to a leveling competition and they "cheat" by boosting to 90, you could consider that P2W.

That's a really, really specific scenario, though, and there are already plenty of things that unbalance it, like recruit-a-friend perks, heirlooms, and death knights.

And it doesn't take that long to level to 90 anyway... A player did it last year in 12 days /played... without killing anything.

Even in the oddly specific argument of "if we both created our characters at the same time and we try to get to max level and start gearing up," the boost only offers the most marginal of advantages, assuming you actually take the "competition" seriously. Depending on how lucky you are with drops, and how dedicated you are to playing (assuming 'very' since you consider this scenario 'competitive'), you could very well gear up before they did, even if they boosted to 90.


Besides, by your definition, basically every MMORPG out there is pay-to-win, from EverQuest to Guild Wars 2. Pretty much every MMORPG offers some sort of paid leveling enhancers, ranging from EXP potions or gear packs to explicit level boosts or the ability to purchase "heroic" characters that start at higher levels.

[Demona3]

Who cares? Let the idiots spend their money on a new 90. Guaranteed that more than HALF of them won't have a damn clue how to play the class they buy. Let them try to get a raid spot...lol.

[Constraint]

I don't think the average player would consider what you're talking about to be "competitive," though you're trying to make it sound like such. Yes, if you challenge another player to a leveling competition and they "cheat" by boosting to 90, you could consider that P2W.

That's a really, really specific scenario, though, and there are already plenty of things that unbalance it, like recruit-a-friend perks, heirlooms, and death knights.

And it doesn't take that long to level to 90 anyway... A player did it last year in 12 days /played... without killing anything.

Even in the oddly specific argument of "if we both created our characters at the same time and we try to get to max level and start gearing up," the boost only offers the most marginal of advantages, assuming you actually take the "competition" seriously. Depending on how lucky you are with drops, and how dedicated you are to playing (assuming 'very' since you consider this scenario 'competitive'), you could very well gear up before they did, even if they boosted to 90.


Besides, by your definition, basically every MMORPG out there is pay-to-win, from EverQuest to Guild Wars 2. Pretty much every MMORPG offers some sort of paid leveling enhancers, ranging from EXP potions or gear packs to explicit level boosts or the ability to purchase "heroic" characters that start at higher levels.

You still haven't stated how it's not an in-game advantage, you've just endeavoured to undermine exactly how much of an advantage it is - fair enough, but the fact remains, it's an outside currency ($$) for an in-game advantage (time/effort). You can argue the semantics 'til the cows come home - I don't care - it's not as if the dictionary's rewritten solely for your point of view.

[Last Starfighter]

Leveling is going the way of the dinosaur. If Blizz could, they'd actually remove all leveling in WoW and we'd just start at 100.

They could do that in WoD easily if they wanted. But they're not going to. Why? Because it's a massive chunk of content. And they know that. Leveling is not the way of the dinosaur. If that's the case then gear is also "the way of the dinosaur". People love to use "outdated" "Clunky" and "Dinosaur" for things they personally don't like.

- - - Updated - - -

It isn't P2W. It's pay to skip. Paying money for less content. Levels have never had anything to do with winning in wow, out side of pvping while leveling or open world pvp. Winning in wow is about gear and skill. Blizzard isn't selling either of those.

It's pay 2 win. You're paying for character progress. And going from 1-90 instantly is massive character progress.

[rda]

Constraint, you are right, of course.

And the key phrase in your post is this:

Now, I know that my writing this up is utterly fruitless, since the same inane responses pop up time and again - "That's not pay to win! That's pay for convenience! Leveling's pointless anyway!"

I give it 10 posts max after mine before someone posts another "It's not p2w" one liner just to appear smart and cool.

[Kaleredar]

It's pay 2 win. You're paying for character progress. And going from 1-90 instantly is massive character progress.

You haven't progressed in end-game raids, stats, or PvP one iota by skipping ahead to 90. That's all that "paying to win" will EVER encapsulate; people need to stop pretending otherwise.

[rda]

You haven't progressed in raids, stats, or PvP one iota by skipping ahead to 90. That's all that "paying to win" will EVER encapsulate; people need to stop pretending otherwise.

Where you get that from, I am curious. I mean, you must have read some wikipedia page or forum thread or... something. Right?

On the one side we have this point of view: pay to win is when you can gain an in-game advantage for money. Clear and concise.

On the other side we have this: pay to win is when you can gain an in-game advantage for money, AS LONG AS that advantage is in this list of mine: <here goes the list>. Lists and criteria for making them differ from one guy to the next. Unclear, artificial, messy.

So, where does this second thing come from?

[Kaleredar]

Where you get that from, I am curious. I mean, you must have read some wikipedia page or forum thread or... something. Right?

On the one side we have this point of view: pay to win is when you can gain an in-game advantage for money. Clear and concise.

On the other side we have this: pay to win is when you can gain an in-game advantage for money, AS LONG AS that advantage is in this list of mine: <here goes the list>. Lists and criteria for making them differ from one guy to the next. Unclear, artificial, messy.

So, where does this second thing come from?

You're still drawing lines, unless you're willing to admit that absolutely nothing is worth complaining over. Are appearances pay to win? If not, why not? If they are, the Blizzard has been "selling pay to win" ever since they released TCG mounts back in Burning Crusade, back when everything was supposedly splendiferous and perfect.

Are EXPANSIONS pay to win? I mean, they use your resources to develop them. You pay and you get a whole set of new levels to go through. Up until recently, you had to pay to get new classes and races, even.

And what about RAF? Is that pay to win? If so, that's been going on for quite a while, and is quite similar to what's happening right now.

Are those things advantages? Are they not advantages? Why are they or are they not advantages?

Of course, you've already upheld that any one person's opinion on the matter is useless, so I guess I've no reason to ask you, as your thoughts on the matter would merely be your opinion.

[KOMO1211]

Wellp, with the new level 90 boost thingy in WoD we got ourselves quite a problem folks. Since a lot of people are gonna use them to skip major content of the game, things like LFD/LFBG won't work anymore. even now queuetimes as a dps can be pretty long and with no more people playing they will be insane.

On top of that it's P2W, but thats a whole other story

i dont know about all that, i just lvled a mage 1-70 in the past month or so, had no longer then maybe 10min queue anytime i queued up for a dungeon run, so what you have to wait 15-20min now. oh the horror. who cares anyway they are all zerg fests. as for p2w, no, no its not.

[Bathory]

It's not P2W. It really, really isn't. You're also assuming that everyone will be rolling DPS classes to up your queue time. There are tanks/heals out there.

[Raldazzar]

I've not made ANY posts on the whole paid 90's thing yet. so I'll keep this short and sweet.

I have one last character that isn't 90, my monk, who just dinged 86 yesterday.. so I'd think, in my opinion I would be one of those people who should be 'angry' as I've spent hours an hours levelling to get my toons all up..

I honestly couldn't give a flying toss, why would I care who/how others play. the only issue I have really is the skill. the avg skill in LFR is already fairly low.

I feel that when they DO bring in the 90's they should be FORCED to complete say Proving grounds silver at least before being able to jump into LFR/LFD etc. so they have a base level of skill and aren't like. learning the class in the dungeons

[Trubo]

you lost all credence of an acceptable debate when you stated the above,
Paying to get an instant level 90 is Not Pay to win under any imaginable concept.
You do not gain an advantage over someone who takes the free route.
You do not get any gear that is of higher quality than in the dungeons / raids already
You get toon at level 90 straight away. if anything its Pay to loose. as you loose the leveling time learning the class.

as to your original concern about queue times, I have found that they are fine. if your leveling and wanting to do a dungeon then take the time to go questing whilst you wait. Ofc if your only going to level through dungeons then it will take longer, but then the game is not designed to specifically level through dungeons alone. You will also find for every person that buys an instant 90, there will be 100's if not thousands of others leveling normally.

While I agree that this isn't pay to win you are wrong with that statement: you get to do beginner level 90 stuff immediately upon logging in rather than investing a week or more (depending on how long it takes you to level); plus you get access to the highest profession skills before those level 1/55 characters would though you still need to level them up as normal. Then again if there wasn't the paid (not the one time only WoD expansion 90) option I doubt that character would even be made.

Now if anyone is curious what I consider pay to win it would be anything where real currency can purchase an advantage over other players that can not be obtained by normal means. Do some games take this to extremes? Certainly but I can't say that Blizzard has done this yet.

[plaits]

Its not P2W, you dont get max weapons, max gear, max skills, max anything.... you are boosted to the LAST EXPANSIONS MAX LEVEL. Why are so many of you completely ignorant, and quite frankly clueless when it comes to P2W and how it actually works? Get a clue before complaining on these forums about the same shit day after day when you are completely wrong about it all. FFS

Because complaining is the new black.
Actually nothing much new about it for the WoW community, I remember the complaining when they allowed PVE to PVP server transfers and faction change too. People are afraid of change, and usually choose not to try and fully understand it before unleashing the whine. They just hear FREE 90 and fail to get that very soon 100 will be max level, so being boosted to 10 levels under max level really is NOTHING like p2w.

Even now, ages after the first guilds finished Hc SoO, having a 90 doesn't mean you've 'won' the game either. But whatevs. We all know all the people who reckon it will be the end of the game will be doing it as well.

As for the OP it's not the end of levelling. People will still level, because they like it, and to save money too.

[Rocket Surgeon]

A paid 90 boost is like paying for bus fare to travel almost all the way to work or school instead of walking the same distance. I really don't understand why so many people are flipping out over it.

[rda]

You're still drawing lines, unless you're willing to admit that absolutely nothing is worth complaining over. Are appearances pay to win? If not, why not? If they are, the Blizzard has been "selling pay to win" ever since they released TCG mounts back in Burning Crusade, back when everything was supposedly splendiferous and perfect.

Are EXPANSIONS pay to win? I mean, they use your resources to develop them. You pay and you get a whole set of new levels to go through. Up until recently, you had to pay to get new classes and races, even.

And what about RAF? Is that pay to win? If so, that's been going on for quite a while, and is quite similar to what's happening right now.

Are those things advantages? Are they not advantages? Why are they or are they not advantages?

Of course, you've already upheld that any one person's opinion on the matter is useless, so I guess I've no reason to ask you, as your thoughts on the matter would merely be your opinion.

Yes, RAFing yourself is pay to win. Yes, expansions are pay to win, we are fine with them only because they bring lots and lots of content (if WoD was only allowing you to get to level 100 by grinding the same mobs in Pandaria, and contained nothing else, would you not see it as pay to win???? it would be pretty apparent that this is pay to win in this case - you pay money, you can get 10 more levels, you don't pay money, you can't get 10 more levels). Etc. All these things have been discussed already in other threads.

Your problem is that you see pay to win as a binary thing - either the game is pay to win (and then it's bad) or it is not. In reality there are shades of pay to win. Some pay to win services touch one half of the player base, others touch the other half, the scale of every effect is different, etc. Yes, WoW had several pay to win things even in TBC, they were touching a small part of the game and the effect was relatively small. Since that time, the range of pay to win features expanded, they are now touching more of the game and the effects are larger. Paid character boost is pumping it up more, we are now talking about things like increased FotMs in arenas, for example, which is pretty significant. This is it. It's all about shades, and it's getting darker.

[Kraineth]

I can't wait until all of this blows over in the middle of WoD, people said the same stuff about pets/mounts in the store.

The only time that things like this should be worried about is when it actually provides a real bonus that is not obtainable in the game otherwise, say they allow you to pay money to build your garrison faster, or pay money to fly earlier than everyone else, then you can freak out about it and I will be right there with you.

[noobstar]

I guess its considered P2W if you use your new 90 to destroy lowbie's while they are leveling ROFLROFL.... but that's about the only advantage you get for having a fresh 90 so in the eyes of a lowbie I could see it being unfair

[Deleted]

What's with the "Am I the only one..." all the time? Where did this come from? Is is the new attention grabber or are people too thick to realize there are 6 billion people in this world and that being the only one thinking about something is impossible?

[Woceip]

Really wish people would stop saying that. It isn't P2W. P2W would be boosting to 90/100 with a full set of Current-teir Heroic and current season Elite Conquest items, with maxed professions and everything else you can possibly buy for a single character.

What you're getting is a level 90 with potentially 600/600 professions if you boost a 60+ (From what I interpret it as) rather than a level 1.

Yep, definitely P2W. Better find a new game.

Nah, pay to win would be having gear that's above what's available in-game (mounts and such don't count, go away) and/or abilities that are better than what's available. Off the cuff example: Execute that starts at 50% health remaining and hits for the same as usual. PVP gear that grants 15% more damage done/less damage taken on top of the same stats as the best available.

Until you get a sniff of this stuff, pay to win will be far far away from wow. I also doubt you ever will see it.