So, you posit that not everyone has the same amount of free time, but also that everyone have the same monetary resources to pour into a frivolity?
As the most appropriate example for P2W in this forum, Immortal, you can’t grind to keep up, it’s plain impossible.
No. Read above - two types of LBs.
That should not be the case of course.
Why not have two leader boards then for chars with loads of play time and chars with little playtime?
P2W should not exist.
You can. You’d need more LBs and more resources to do this.
Yeah, if you have one board, it’s not really resource intensive to copy it a few times and change the time values.
The real problem is how you implement and track properly these “time values”. It’s doable, but will cost you more resources. I like both options - P2W and time tracking - and I don’t think any of the options will do any bad, on the contrary.
D3 manages to keep track of playtime per season, playtime by class and playtime by char, despite it not being used for anything. I don’t really see that as a hurdle of note.
Not really. This is such an overused cliché.
Work is money. Money does not accumulate over time by doing nothing (yes, it does through capital, but then it still didn’t start at nothing).
A game is not really meant to be work, or an equivalent thereof.
Because they apparently dont want to play the game, and just cheat themselves to the end.
You are basically defending botting here.
If you want to get rid of the grind, I have a much better solution than paying to skip it… Remove the grind?
The P2W part is still just an unnecessary layer added on top, that accomplishes nothing positive for the players or the gameplay.
So they literally cant compete with the people who play more after all?
And the troll has returned from the future.
Everything you seem to ask for could be handled by having separate leaderboards based on time played. The 0-50 hour bracket, 51-100, 101-150, etc. hour brackets
It costs nearly nothing to add more leaderboards.
Games still haven’t solved the complex issue of measuring Time Played in the future? 
Darkest Timeline indeed.
The moment these start being used is the moment people will try to abuse them. If they can prevent it I am all for it.
They do compete with them on the P2W (global) LB. The non-P2W LB is only for non-P2W.
PoE tried to do it in Labyrinth and had numerous exploits over time. I am not saying it’s impossible to do it, it will cost more resources however.
You realize that still leaves a lot of people unable to compete right? People with little money and little time, of which there are plenty.
Seems to me you’re trying to fix something that’s not broke, but all it does it opens up the game to exploit players.
Best solution imo is to just not have any leaderboards at all in the game.
But so many ways to make leaderboards that would allow people to compete in all kinds of brackets and with different rules, that would both offer some fairness (you cant ever get perfect fairness for all people, like a blind person presumably will have a hard time competing on a free for all leaderboard) and not require a lot of time played.
You have a severe misunderstanding on how those works.
Most other places I read prefer D3 or no trading outside of a vocal minority.
I am a Diablo player. I do not fear p2w. I am smart enough to realize that most p2w games have unethical mechanics including artificially slowing progression to encourage spending money.
Right now in D:I, one can spend real money to buy legendary crests that a f2p player could not earn in 200 years if how they are earned and at what frequency stayed the same. Needless to say, people can not live 200 years.
I have sufficient real money to pay to avoid 200 years of grinding. but I have not and will not spend any money whatsoever on D:I unless the predatory p2w is changed. Also, I would never spend crazy amounts on any video game no matter how much I liked it.
No solution is perfect. Time based LBs also have their own flaws with required grinding to reach the competitive phase. For people with no money and time the best would be some mode like Challenge Rifts.
No LBs support would make the game too casual. The moment you are done with the campaign and some loot hunt will be the moment you’d stop playing. LBs make you strive for better gear and character improvement.
Yes, that’s a big problem. P2W isn’t done right in modern gaming and players fear it. P2W should never be forced on players.
Predatory p2w is not feared per se but simply recognized for what it is by many diablo players.
There are literally zero ways to do P2W right.
I think the point was fairly clear. They are not fair, allowing people to perform above their own level. Aka. cheating, and not an equal chance for competing.
Then do those and dont ruin the game with P2W.
Been playing D3 for 10 years now, never cared about the leader boards. As long as I can track my own progress I’m good. Couldn’t care less about the rest of the world.
The whole point of P2W is to make money. If it doesn’t give you an actual advantage no one pays, and if it does it becomes “forced”.
You see what I mean? When people like Shad hear P2W they freak out.
Yet you care about predatory P2W stopping you from progressing further.
The advantage consists in reducing the play time that’s needed. P2W is done great in games like Lost Ark and HS. It is not forced, but if you DO PAY, you’d save yourself a lot of time. At the same time after a certain point it’s all about skill in these games and not like in D3/DI - paragon/money.
I agree with you all that P2W somehow implies game design “adapted” to the P2W formula, but that doesn’t have to be the case in order P2W to exist and bring profits.
P2W can simply include “opt-out” features like (take for example D3):
Give me all that above and I’ll instantly return to push for a Season the P2W LB. You see what I mean? P2W can function pretty well if the environment/design is set for it without hurting the non-P2W players.
MicroRNA is right. We just recognize it for what it is. A blight upon the foundation of what a game is.
He is not the rest of the world. No contradiction.
Gear Honing sure is the best game mechanism seen since Diablo Immortal gems.