I've got a feeling that this post might get swept away in the "regular" posters chat, but here goes!
I've been following this thread for a good few months now. I've only actually just remembered to subscribe to it, as I normally see it pop-up from time to time on the recent forum posts section of the MMOC frontpage. Everytime is another amazing insight into not only the utter dross that people enjoy, but also how low some people can sink in order to earn/scam some money.
After taking a look over at the ToA forums and seeing that Gassy Goblin guy like every single post, is just...it made my mind go numb. It's sad to think that this guy (who has his own website mind, even makes some fairly okay computer art), is being used by the ToA "devs". Just someone that clearly wants to dream big, but is being shat on by a guy who clearly dosn't want to work, but wants 110% of the profit that someone else is making.
As for someone sharing that link to -TheBraxton looking for a "Make your own MMO Guide", surely that's either an elaborate troll or Brax himself? No-one else, going by that name, wanting to find that information is going to be on the internet; though it is a large enough place that it could be a coincidence. Some of the replys in that thread are genious though.
ON-TOPIC:
As for what ToA has in store for funding their game, my prediction is a subscription. Ellysa (spelling), their comunity manager is saying that they've got videos, art, concept ideas etc to share. None of this is going to be public knowledge though, I'll bet that you'll have to either join their patreon or subscribe to them. Monthly they'll give another "Our plans are slowly coming together..." video with a really shody hand-drawn picture of a dragon and it'll cost you £15. They'll add something into this subscription that it's only to fund more concept content, not actuall game content, thus yet again never actually needing to make a game but doing what they do best - talking about making a game.
Imagine that, people paying a subscription, for a game that dosn't exist!
This is probably how they're funding the two-best-buddys-from-college programmers. If/when they coble something together, they'll get a 20% cut of what-ever this subscription money is. Except that Brax and co. can just keep upping the feature creep, thus keeping the game constantly in development AND helping to put out more videos/concept art/forum posts.
Why/how those two guys ever signed up to help make this MMO is beyond me though. I suppose if one of them is into DnD and the other has made his own "Demo Island" in the past maybe it's enough interest to want to create a game of your own, but why would you ever team up with the ToA staff? They're total boobs, with no experience, no roadmap and no hope in hell of actually making a game that's fun for a single person, let alone an MMO!