By this logic paying a sub is RMT. Or buying a new expansion. It matters who’s getting the money and if the money is going to Blizzard then it’s just a legitimate transaction for an ingame good/service (in this case gold)
Not true. Both of those are required to experience the game.
It offers no expedition of experience or rewards. The boosts are also borderline RMT though.
You can’t even fast track gear accumulation with a token.
Sure, if you purchase a carry and the purchase states that any gear that your class can use goes to you, then that, theoretically, can speed up your gearing. But that gear has to drop first. Let’s look at two cases. Joe Booster, who purchased a token and paid for a carry with the gold, and Bob Normie who hasn’t purchased a token and is running the raid normally with his friends.
Joe Booster completes his carry, but RNG wasn’t on his side, so all he got was some gold, artifact power items and a domination shard that he can’t use as none of his gear has domination sockets.
Bob Normie completes his raid, and he gets two pieces of gear because RNG favours him.
This goes on for several weeks, with Joe Booster paying for carries, and Bob Normie raiding with his friends. After those weeks have passed, Joe Booster has 4 pieces of gear, while Bob has 7 pieces from the raid.
Who got gear faster? Who ‘won’? Bob did, obviously, and he didn’t spend a single gold coin on a carry. Where as Joe Booster spent hundreds of thousands of gold and only got 4 items for his efforts.
That’s the reality of carries in WoW. You are not guaranteed anything from a boss just because you paid a team to take you along for an easy kill. You may get lucky and walk away with an item or two, or you may walk away with absolutely nothing. Doesn’t seem like Joe is ‘winning’ to me.
When you reduce the example to these two, you can make a hint of an argument.
But these two aren’t exactly equal examples. The person buying a carry, I assume, isn’t a raider so that’s why they’re buying carries.
You’d have to compare this person to the person that maybe can’t afford the real money to buy the boost, and who is able to put in equal the time and effort of that person being carried. All things being equal, except financial status IRL, that person buying the boost has just either gained a gear advantage or an in-game experience the other person without the ability to buy a Token has.
And gold isn’t required to experience the game? What WoW tokens are is a microtransaction. In game currency for actual money instead of time spent farming it. Services are services. You’ll need to explain to me how it’s a RMT at all if the vendor (the ones selling a carry) get no actual real money in the transaction. I believe it’s a service and it is very annoying to have to see it at all but not inherently wrong (By which I mean it is very annoying to have to see people advertising it everywhere. Allegedly there’s an addon that filters it all out). Or would you call selling a mage portal an RMT? Mage Portals are not required to experience the game; Flight points exist. Would you call buying legendary raws a RMT? You need these to experience the game but also can grind and craft your own so why buy the raws or use the service of someone with the profession. Selling rating and selling raid boss kills or achievements is similarly a service sold by those capable of carrying it out. Does it go against the spirit of playing a game to begin with? Absolutely. Why are you even playing a game if you are spending gold or money on wow tokens for gold to get something you should play to get if you want to play the game. Is it RMT though? No. The vendor is not getting any real money thus it is not RMT. It could be classified as a microtransaction though as I said
Since you have to pay to access the servers isn’t the game pay to win by default?
2 Likes
The examples don’t change the reality.
Even if you have two people buying carries, one with gold earned in-game and one earned by token sales, or one person who can afford a token while another player can’t and has to put in the effort, you can’t expedite the gearing process because RNG is a limitation. Even if your carry group stacks the raid with as many classes that wear your armor type as possible, there’s always a chance you’ll get duplicate items, which, at least in WoD, Legion and BFA could warforge/titanforge so you at least had a chance at getting a useful upgrade, but in Shadowlands, nope, any duplicates are vendor-trash unless they’re BoEs.
You’re desperately scrabbling to hold onto this idea that tokens are P2W, but they’re not.
1 Like
This topic got me on a binge watch about MMO whales on youtube tho. So I’m entertained for the day.
This game has had paid carries and cash-for-gold since 2005. The fact that Blizz opened up the shop is simply their way of profiting off of what was already happening. Might as well, right?
It’s like a certain leaf that some people enjoy. The government tried its hardest to create campaigns against it, and now, realizing it’s not going away, they’ve realized they might as well legalize it to earn some tax revenue.
Which is why I also listed the experience. Gear isn’t the only advantage. You’re just picking that part of it because it helps you form an argument.
I guess it’s up to you what kind of value that experience has. I’m sure a player that can’t afford those things would appreciate it. I always liked the experience of raiding more than the gear. Not to mention the doors that open with the achievement you can buy and how progress falls into place once you get the AOTC (I’d like to facetiously say that I doubt pugs even form anymore since everyone just buys carries, but I’m sure your penchant for pomposity would have you arguing with that).
But none of it is gear that you can’t get without paying for a boost.
1 Like
That’s literally the P2W argument in its entirety. You pay for a carry, you get gear, you ‘win’.
Only there is no winning, because there is no gear guarantee. You can’t even get experience from a carry, because in most cases when you get a carry, in order to make sure you don’t mess up the pull and wipe the group, the raiders will have you die in a corner early on (during WotLK carries for the Lich King would have you leap off the edge of the platform the moment the fight started) and you get zero experience. You aren’t learning the fight, you aren’t dodging the mechanics or learning how to deal with them, because you’re dead, they don’t affect you.
And thanks to tools that I honestly despise, such as Raider IO, there’s no way to ‘fool’ experienced raiders with a simple achievement link, because they’ll look at your IO score and know full well that you paid for a carry.
1 Like
Hello, I see you are posting in the pay to win thread. I agree, paying to boost most certainly isn’t pay to win. There is not a single instance in the game for a player to purchase gear with gold, nor should there be! The World of Warcraft Token is a fantastic system that allows players with lesser skill have access to content that might otherwise be inaccessible to them! I’m with you, the RNG definitely removes the ability for people to directly purchase gear upgrades as well. Did you know there are PvP vendors in the wonderful game of World of Warcraft? What a great system, if I do say so myself!
Thanks for your post and hope you have a fantastic day!
2 Likes
lol okay you turned me around on you
Do me a favour and stop following me from thread to thread.
I’ve already put you on ignore, because frankly, I grew tired of the way you were posting about 6 hours ago. Go bother someone else.
He thinks he’s being funny. It’s cute
Hello, I see you replied to my post. I’m sorry you are upset, I’m an extremely new player and only looking to help my fellow adventurers in the hope that they also will help me. If you have any tips or suggestions, I would love to hear them!
Thanks for your reply and I hope you have a wonderful day!
1 Like
I honestly blocked him because he deliberately linked my character profile in a thread so folks could armory bash, which is why I have it hidden in the first place, so it’s harder for folks to do that. I was hoping Blizzard would have banned him already. Oh well, ignore will have to do.
1 Like
Hello, I see you are posting in the pay to win thread. Did you know that the basic computer keyboard has a key called an ‘enter’ key. This key allows you to space out your posts in a much more concise, easier to read format. Personally, I think it’s a little overrated but I will admit, it’s very useful! Hopefully this tip will help in your next, fantastic post on the World of Warcraft General Discussion Forums!
Thanks for the great post and have a fantastic rest of the day!
2 Likes
haha. good one