Boosting is P2W, simple

[Callieamaya-proudmoore]

Relax, guy. You need a rest.

[Wardrunâ-kelthuzad]

Anyways. I don’t think people should be banned for it but it does need to be addressed. I have no dog in the fight as I quit chasing that carrot in Cata. 70 twink bracket was fun enough for me until that was ruined.

[Sneakybreaky-illidan]

@Mslulz-bigglesworth

That isn’t boosting. That is playing with friends

So, with your logic, it’s okay to get boosted, and it only becomes a problem when people pay for it?

[Callieamaya-proudmoore]

And there are P2W games that offer items and services that can’t be obtained in game. Also, P2W has to be a guaranteed “win”. Buying a boost doesn’t guarantee anything.

[Mslulz-bigglesworth]

Sure they can. They could disable player to player trading. Make every transaction go through the AH. Change the AH to only show the cheapest prices for the number of requested items you are looking for on the AH as to avoid selling an item for an inflated price. Also investigate the possibility of putting price fluctuation caps on each commodity for the same reason.

[Pyri-shadowsong]

thanks for the 734th thread about this, you really added a lot to the discussion

[Abendroth-zuljin (Abendroth)]

Then that’s not enforceable as you’d have no way to know if it’s paid or free. If you wanna stop boosting with ingame methods, then you also stop friends carry.

That won’t fly well.

Edit : and are you a madman, stopping character to character trading. Do you wanna kill organised guild raiding?

[Annastasi-proudmoore]

@Varlth-mankrik

It’s ridiculous to think M+ is the golden child of content that allowed boosting to flourish rather than the thing that literally let’s you buy the currency that people want when they boost you.

I can’t quantify it, obviously, but there’s a reason those wow gold selling sites are so prevalent. many, many people were buying gold pre-token.

[Callieamaya-proudmoore]

What caused the influx of these threads in the last week or so? Did someone’s favorite streamer release an hour long video of them whining about tokens and boosting?

[Wardrunâ-kelthuzad]

There were a handful of legit sites but what scared a lot of people off were the amount of scam sites that took your money and ran. Plus the risk of ban.

When there were scams + risk of ban, of course it was happening less than when blizzard is officially selling gold. lol

[Annastasi-proudmoore]

@Callieamaya-proudmoore

What caused the influx of these threads in the last week or so? Did someone’s favorite streamer release an hour long video of them whining about tokens and boosting?

I’m sure streamers have had plenty of opportunity to run their mouths about it after the ToS change the other week.

you know that’s drama they wouldn’t be able to resist.

[Varlth-mankrik]

@Callieamaya-proudmoore

And there are P2W games that offer items and services that can’t be obtained in game.

Sure, but even when they do offer a straight cash option their main design is that the game has a premium currency like gems, rubies, diamonds, etc and you get them naturally by playing the game, but you can drop money to get ten thousand of them all at once; then you have to go to the shop to buy the items you want. This is intentional because then you have a harder time associating the cost of what you are buying.

The simple fact that you can just play the game does not, in any way shape or form, make a game not P2W. To think if it another way imagine if I had a game where a sword costs $100 and it’s the best sword in the game. But I also let you grind it in the game but the grind takes over 100 hours to get. Or 1000. Are you going to sit here and pretend the game isn’t P2W at this point?

@Callieamaya-proudmoore

Also, P2W has to be a guaranteed “win"

No. You’re just trying to parse down the words used in a term that defines a system. Some systems offer you sped up crafting, or unlimited lives so you don’t have to wait a few hours. Like look at Candy Crush. You can buy TONS of perks to start a level off but you don’t have a guaranteed win, you’re just much more likely to win.

As soon as you start offering in-game advantages for money you’ve created a P2W system, doesn’t inherently make it bad, but it does fundamentally make it P2W.

[Sneakybreaky-illidan]

@Varlth-mankrik

As soon as you start offering in-game advantages for money you’ve created a P2W system

Where has WoW done that?

[Xianwae-lightbringer]

@Callieamaya-proudmoore

And there are P2W games that offer items and services that can’t be obtained in game. Also, P2W has to be a guaranteed “win”. Buying a boost doesn’t guarantee anything.

I don’t even think it has to be buying things that are unobtainable, but rather that buying them is way quicker since doing it through gameplay is ridiculously time restrictive or random.

I always think of the crappy mobile games that hit you with rewards quick, but then taper them off to the point where you realize you would have to spend inordinate amounts of time losing the game to have played long enough to get the item to help you win. I always saw them more as psychological traps to get you hooked and then capitalize on it, with the gameplay designed around having those competitive features to get ahead.

That’s a long winded way of saying that the “win” portion is competitive a lot of the time. I feel weird thinking of people that play in a PvE fashion as “winners” in the same way. PvP maybe, but again, the mathematical advantage of better gear won’t necessarily get you wins if you intend to play at the highest level.

[Kaemane-area-52]

1. If the existence of boosting means WoW is P2W, then everything is P2W. If everything is P2W, nothing is. The term loses its meaning if you stretch it too broadly.

2. Gear doesn’t make you win. Everyone likes to poop on wows classes being too easy, but we’ve all seen the 252 mage doing 4K overall with 2.2k IO. It happens.

3. There’s really no winning, except in pvp. Killing a boss just means you can kill it again 0.1% faster next time.

[Varlth-mankrik]

@Sneakybreaky-illidan

Where has WoW done that?

I’m sorry, do you not consider having more gold advantageous?

If so please send me yours.

[Abendroth-zuljin (Abendroth)]

@Varlth-mankrik

and you get them naturally by playing the game, but you can drop money to get ten thousand of them all at once;

@Varlth-mankrik

The simple fact that you can just play the game does not, in any way shape or form, make a game not P2W.

It does, when you literally need someone else that already did it multiple times in order to be able to sell the boosts. In the gems case, you can absolutely gain stuff before someone else that don’t pay up can.

[Callieamaya-proudmoore]

Everyone seems to have their own definition of P2W. None of this is objectively the truth.

[Wigglytüff-stormrage]

@Xianwae-lightbringer

It never seemed to me that it was an activity with competitive advantage in mind, but rather more a personal/completionist kind of thing.

Whenever I was doing boosts, I’d occasionally come across the odd person who was obviously a capable player (sometimes even keeping up with the two DPS boosters in the group) but just wanted to get a key done and felt that the ~100k was easier than hunting for a group in LFG that would actually finish.

But if I had to guess, most people just want a shot at better gear for their character (and maybe eventually to getting KSM for the mount or w/e). I doubt the “I’m going to cheat my way to a high IO so I can fool everyone!” crap that the OP suggested is high up on many people’s priorities…

[Varlth-mankrik]

@Abendroth-zuljin

It does, when you literally need someone else that already did it multiple times in order to be able to sell the boosts.

The playerbase props up the boosting aspect of P2W with the token, but the mere fact you can buy gold is a P2W system in and if itself.

On a scale of 1-10 WoW is probably like a 1 or a 2 on the P2W scale. It’s not overly aggressive or roadblocks you and skill factors into how far you can go. But the WoW token system is fundamentally a P2W system because out of game wealth can influence the in-game wod.