Blizzard have explicitly said that you cannot buy power.
They’ve also said you can’t p2w because there won’t be free trade on powerful items.
So far so good.
There is one weak link still that I feel allows Blizzard to sneak in a way to buy power.
Crafting materials can often lead to being able to make some of the most powerful items in the game. Amount of crafting materials needed may be huge, rarity of certain mats extremely rare or roll chances when crafting being extremely rare. All of this leading to an extreme desire to acquire these mats by any means possible, leading to RMT black market websites.
Blizzard have said that crafting mats will be freely tradeable. Does this mean that everything these materials can craft won’t be top tier gear?
This worries me. I think Blizzard still have a way to have some kind of p2w in the game because of what crafting materials may craft. I think we should be extremely wary of this and make sure Blizzard know we are aware of how powerful these items can be, and that if Blizzard want to stick to their word of being able to not buy power, then they may need to restrict the trading of certain crafting materials.
I don’t think Blizzard has said that?
In any case, yeah, crafting materials definitely should NOT be tradeable.
1 Like
That depends on if Blizzard sells them or not. As a general rule, when it comes to P2W the game isn’t called P2W because of a black market(otherwise most games with progression would be P2W and Diablo 4 would be as well more or less automatically).
If they actually directly sold crafting materials for real money, even if they didn’t make the best gear, that would be a horrible idea.
2 Likes
True.
It would not be P2W.
It would still cheapen the game progression if they could be traded though.
Yep, doesnt have to be the best gear for it to be P2W. If Blizzard sells power, of any kind, it is P2W.
P2W can also mean being able to buy things on black market websites like D2JSP. Free trade is considered P2W as you can pay real money to win by buying things from other players.
We’re arguing semantics here pointlessly when my description isn’t even incorrect as every post on this forum goes, where as the real problem at hand is the p2w that may be present if crafting mats can craft top tier tiems.
They won’t sell mats. You’d most probably be able to trade these for real money on black market, however.
Then Diablo 3 and 4 are also pay to win regardless of the ability to trade or not, as I could pay somebody to level my account or carry me.
You probably shouldn’t have used the term P2W to describe it.
Regardless, crafting materials shouldn’t even make top tier gear even if they can’t be traded.
The best gear should come from killing monsters, as that’s the core gameplay loop. Crafting should exist to augment that, not replace it.
1 Like
Agreed, in the context it doesn’t really matter if it is P2W or RMT (but the distinction is important otherwise). Both are bad.
Just dont allow trading of gold, crafting mats, gems, rare, legendary or unique items. And whatever other non-gear stuff that might be in the game.
Hopefully crafting is focused on enhancing gear, rather than creating gear.
Then describe D4 as p2w if you want but to most rational people you would be nitpicking as account buying is not being able to buy items for an account you are playing. But sure if you want to say there is a way to p2w this would be correct.
Diablo 2 has no cash shop only D2JSP etc but forever has been described as p2w as has any way of buying items in game whether it be a cash shop or black market. If you don’t think this you’re living in a reality that doesn’t exist.
Well I didn’t say account buying, but the point is that if a black market makes a game P2W then Diablo 3 and Diablo 4 are both P2W. Any game with progression will almost assuredly have a black market to let people fast track that progression in exchange for real money.
Maybe for different reasons than Diablo 2, but it’ll functionally result in the same thing.
In my experience the group of people who like to call trading P2W are mostly the D2 haters, and when you bring up being able to pay real money for power in Diablo 3 then they try to claim that it’s different so it doesn’t count.
I could see them doing consumables as well, though I’d kind of rather just purchase those at a vendor.
In a Diablo game I don’t really wanna spend 30 minutes farming potions so I can run dungeons. I Just wanna run the dungeons.
I think D2 gameplay is great but free trade is p2w.
The people trying to disguise this probably just want free trade in the game which is precisely what Blizzard are not putting in the game because, you guessed it, it’s considered p2w.
If high tier crafting mats are tradeable this would also be p2w. Exactly why I’m bringing it up.
We’ve come this far. We should make sure crafting mats don’t slip under the radar.
It would be exactly the same as the gem ruse in DI.
No, the people trying to “disguise” it are just making a distinction between what the term pay to win is generally used for and understood to mean, which is paying the developer money for extra power and the definition you are using which is being able to buy things from anyone that gives extra power, not developer sanctioned.
It’s like someone calling someone GOAT (ugh, hurts just to type that). Everyone knows they are most probably not calling them the real one and only best ever but it is used as one of the best, or the best, or just even really damn good.
So yes, in a literal sense that would be the developer creating a system that allows someone to pay another person to become stronger instead of doing it themselves. But people are just saying lets separate that from the awful practice and use terms in an agreed upon way.
Absolutely. Kanai cube gave us great QoL on obtaining crucial items. My self returned after its inception from afk. But its emphasis also turned gameplays to craftings oppose to farming. D4 should not make same mistake and turns game into incentives for bot.
There is officially sanctioned P2W (D:I) and P2W that breaks the rules (RMT in D2 as an example). The former is far worse than the latter in my opinion.
In the first scenario, the game is designed around P2W while for the other, there is a small number of players/ enterprises who sell items thereby breaking Blizzard’s EULA.
3 Likes
Please just shut up with the p2w merde. Blizzard has been more explicit about d4 in terms of monitization than any of the games p2w has slipped into or for any mtx model for that matter.
YOUR POST IS TOXIC
It does not help anyone and it only feeds your need to spread your own displeasure and sew the seeds of discord.
Leave the people that want to love d4 alone.
1 Like
I agree with the above two posts.
Time to let go of all this p2w ranting and seeing ghosts everywhere!
this is just rationalization.
free trade = p2w.
Is everything now considered p2w? The point is moot because no one wins anything in the delusional p2w narrative. When was the last time anyone received a big paycheck or award from Blizzard for being the best Diablo player? Pay to advance maybe, but no one “wins” anything. Look at all the money some of the 
spend on Immortal, but what did they win. Absolutely nothing. Unless being the #1 is now considered some type of achievement.
1 Like
LoL! The only big winner with p2w games is the Devs, the company and of course the stockholders of the game. They get the hard cash where the player gets worthless Bits and Bytes and a ton of bragging rights!
That was not what he said!
Unfortunately free trade opens the door to that ugliness!
1 Like