It is best Pay to Win Game...

[Willias]

Thing is there is bazillion different interpretations of "pay to win" and as we learned from this thread, different interpretations apply to different games based entirely on whether it's cool to hate that game. I agree with you, by the way, now could you please go to D3 forums (for example) and convince the haters that RMAH is not pay-2-win according to this definition?

While I agree that P2W is definitely paying real money for a distinct in-game advantage, I'd also argue that Diablo 3 feels like pay to win as well. The chances of you finding or acquiring upgrades on your own through in game drops feels so miniscule that you just learn to rely on the auction house. The difference at that point becomes "pay with in-game money" or "pay with real world cash".

I guess the difference for me is that everything I'd need to play GW2 well feels acquirable on my own. I can build up crafting skills to make top notch equipment, or grind up karma or coin to buy items in game. In Diablo 3, getting better equipment felt out of reach, and that I had to rely on purchasing things from other players to progress.

[Deleted]

Gimme a moment to Google this. I've played them before, most of them are Asian.

Edit: Many of the Pay 2 Win games are free to play games that offer large advantages when paying money. Eudemons Online essentially sells levels, Runescape used to be a rather annoying example of P2W before they introduced the member item restriction on free servers, FlyFF and Rappelz had very large convenience boosts in their cash shops, as did Maplestory (Though this was mostly cosmetic).

GW2 is FAR less extreme (+50% exp from kills, which make up what? 15% of a level? 20% maybe?) whereas Eudemons was essentially buy gems, sell them to players for experience orbs, use experience orb to obtain a level. In GW2 you have to spend absolutely thousands and thousands of dollars to get the same effect you do from spending 10 dollars in the games I've mentioned.

Sure it's pay to win for a millionaire, but then again, everything is.

so, since leveling in GW2 for money isnt considered pay2win, leveling for money in other games shouldnt be considered pay2win too! and mapplestory is mentioned as pay2win, when they only sell cosmetic gear, while you can buy in GW2 the BiS gear? Okay!


and just because Eudemus has reasonable prices and ANet is greedy as hell, doesnt make that pay2win method any kind of better ... its just paymore2win!

[DrakeWurrum]

While I agree that P2W is definitely paying real money for a distinct in-game advantage, I'd also argue that Diablo 3 feels like pay to win as well. The chances of you finding or acquiring upgrades on your own through in game drops feels so miniscule that you just learn to rely on the auction house. The difference at that point becomes "pay with in-game money" or "pay with real world cash".

I guess the difference for me is that everything I'd need to play GW2 well feels acquirable on my own. I can build up crafting skills to make top notch equipment, or grind up karma or coin to buy items in game. In Diablo 3, getting better equipment felt out of reach, and that I had to rely on purchasing things from other players to progress.

In Diablo 3, that gold is used to buy gear which can, indeed, make you more powerful than other people around you. In GW2, you haven't bought any power by doing this, and are just as powerful as anybody else.

[Eggoman]

So lets say I am rich in my real life. I buy lots of gems and make them gold legal.

Create character, after the tutorial I head into the city as level 2. Now
1)Buy materials from trading post and raise crafting professions to 400 and become 80 level.
2)Craft the very best armor available with my crafting Disciplines
3)Create a guild and buy 10000000 affection with my gold

I have a level 80 character
full all crafting Disciplines
The best gear available
150 Slots Guild bank
T3 Cultural Armor for cosmetic
And ALL of these http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Influence

What am I missing? I can do all this in a day without even step out of the city, without even kill a single mob, a critter...I have played other F2P games, Lotro and now Aion(I have played also before :P) and I can say that nothing is even near to what you can do in GW2 with real money. You are going to eat the carrot my friends in a day if you have the money, in months if you don't

This is not a discussion if the game is fun or not..It is fun and awesome game and I love it. But I remember lots of discussions before the game release that said the game is not pay to win, that Anet handled the original GW shop very good, blah blah..And I thought that Lotro was pay to win...

Do you think that the amount of things you can do with gold are way too much?Do you think that this will make people find efficient ways to farm golds by camping events instead of actually "play the game" for fun? Do you think this will bring lots of bots and gold sellers into the game? I have already got lot of in-game mails from gold sellers in the half price at least from the "legal" seller.

You got all the gear but you haven't made a difference in actually winning anything. You can't win WvW by dumping money into the game, sPvP is totally void of any gear that you could buy and you can't complete dungeons by yourself. You haven't achieved anything other that getting to 80 and getting good gear which isn't hard to do in the first place.

[Deleted]

You got all the gear but you haven't made a difference in actually winning anything. You can't win WvW by dumping money into the game, sPvP is totally void of any gear that you could buy and you can't complete dungeons by yourself. You haven't achieved anything other that getting to 80 and getting good gear which isn't hard to do in the first place.

again, that definition of pay2win makes EVERY SINGLE GAME ON THIS PLANET to be NOT pay2 win!

let it be flyff, mappelstory, flyff, archlord, 9dragons, 2moons, all games on this planet can be "done" without paying a single dollar ... so there cant be a single game which is pay2win!

[Zilong]

So lets say I am rich in my real life. I buy lots of gems and make them gold legal.

Create character, after the tutorial I head into the city as level 2. Now
1)Buy materials from trading post and raise crafting professions to 400 and become 80 level.
2)Craft the very best armor available with my crafting Disciplines
3)Create a guild and buy 10000000 affection with my gold

I have a level 80 character
full all crafting Disciplines
The best gear available
150 Slots Guild bank
T3 Cultural Armor for cosmetic
And ALL of these http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Influence

What am I missing? I can do all this in a day without even step out of the city, without even kill a single mob, a critter...I have played other F2P games, Lotro and now Aion(I have played also before :P) and I can say that nothing is even near to what you can do in GW2 with real money. You are going to eat the carrot my friends in a day if you have the money, in months if you don't

This is not a discussion if the game is fun or not..It is fun and awesome game and I love it. But I remember lots of discussions before the game release that said the game is not pay to win, that Anet handled the original GW shop very good, blah blah..And I thought that Lotro was pay to win...

Do you think that the amount of things you can do with gold are way too much?Do you think that this will make people find efficient ways to farm golds by camping events instead of actually "play the game" for fun? Do you think this will bring lots of bots and gold sellers into the game? I have already got lot of in-game mails from gold sellers in the half price at least from the "legal" seller.

I think what matters is.. are you rich?

Besides the point where you achieve nothing with that, you didn't play anything of the game and you will probably have to create a new character.

Who the hell would do that? I mean, even if you were rich Im pretty sure you wouldn't do that. Because in the end this isn't a pay to win game, no matter how much you put it out there. Buying everything you said just skipped the whole game, you won't be more powerful than the poor guy on your right.

If people want a Pay to Win game they won't be playing Gw2. There are far better games to do so (in a Pay 2 win game)

[Ghul]

That's a LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT of $$$ for gems.

Do it, I don't care.
You won't be affecting anyones gameplay.
There is no Arenas like in WoW, or PvE scoreboards.
So if that type of stuff doesn't exist, I don't give one damn if you can buy your way to the end game.

actually, he does! hes paying for the whole server-structure on wich the game is running on. 8>

[Crashdummy]

Leveling cant be bought, but basically any gear, achievement or mount could be in WoW via the Blizzard pet store (Guardian cubs) or TCG and mounts. Its not really easy but most things eventually are sold fairly early in each tier for gold and via those methods all legit. Expensive but possible and not breaking the rules.

You could do that legally in other games. I had already listed Star Wars: Galaxies as an example, and City of Heroes also allowed you to trade pretty much everything. "Bind on Pickup" was not universal before WoW became the dominant MMO.

You can not buy the best gear of the game with gold in WoW or Rift or most MMOs.

And i think its better if we stick to successfull games instead of citing SW:G as a point of comparison.

Again, this is the first MMO (or close to, whatever you want to call it) where the best items can be bougt legally with real money that i PLAY (maybe there have been others, but i havent played them).

Again, it doesnt impact much in this particular game because of its structure (stats dont matter that much in late gam because there isnt a gear rce like in other MMOs, there are no subscriptions, etc) but the OP does have a point.

[Edge-]

Things have gotten a bit too heated in here (partially due to the inflammatory title) so I'm going to close this down before things go any further South.