It’s like back in vanilla where you had to save money to buy your first normal speed mount. And when you had enough cash to buy it, it felt special and great. If it would have been possible to buy the mount in the cash store back then, a lot of people would have missed that “good feeling”. A game shouldn’t allow you to spend money to skip such things.

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And we should respect people who like cosmetic items and not just expect to get everying for free and them to pay for our content. That won’t work out.

If You’re Not Paying for It; You’re the Product

Then your point itself is incorrect.

Let’s be clear here. Most people who say that paying for a cute texture is fine, but paying for better gear/stats is bad, aren’t playing competitively. My earlier post was dealing with those who are, for them there’s a real difference between cute gear and stat gear. But, even if the larger case of people who aren’t really playing PvE competitively, I still don’t agree that claiming “paying for cute texture” is fine but “paying for a higher number” is bad are “incorrect”. They are making a subjective judgment which differs from yours, that is true, but that is not the same as being incorrect.

Your earlier post: “Actually, you’re argument boils down to “Paying for things I don’t need makes perfect sense, but paying for things I want is just wrong.””

No, his argument boils down to :”you paying for things I don’t want is ok, but me paying for things I want is just wrong. ” That is selfish and highly subjective, but not “incorrect”.

He isn’t assuming everyone is just like him, he just doesn’t care about people who aren’t just like him. Why does that upset you?

“T13 would probably increase your characters power but that’s neglectable. It’s rather unlikely to be hold back by your gear in todays WoW, most of the time you’re hold back by your or someone elses “capabilities”.”

This isn’t really a matter of probability. I can join a hardcore guild and be more limited by gear, or I can join a casual guild and be more limited by bads. No randomness there. (Most people aren’t good enough to get into a progressed guild, I am, so again, no future randomness there. Past randomness maybe, but not really, in any meaningful sense, for any individual person.)

““Paying for cosmetic things makes perfect sense” is the same as “paying for things I don’t intend to acquire makes perfect sense”.”

Yes, that is exactly what he was trying to say. Why does that bother you? Why do you expect people who don’t enjoy or respect your style of play to advocate for your style of play? Are you spending your days and nights advocating for theirs?

Regardless of the amount of money you have available to spend, you still want to be treated as a valued customer. If the game abuses your trust, I think it is more likely people will leave rather than pay.
But they may also implement other mechanics other than the grind to keep you there and endure the grind just for those other parts.

You might get excited about higher numbers on your character sheet, someone else might get excited about a special texture on his mount/pet/gear. It’s not like you absolutely need that gear for todays content.

Would it be so different if Blizzard would sell T13 in an item shop compared to a mount? I think not, not at all.

T13 would probably feel less special because everyone can buy it but the same is true for a cash shop mount.

T13 would feel less special because you didn’t “work hard” to aquire it but the same is true for a cash shop mount. A cash shop mount can never be as special as a winterspring tiger or a baron mount or mimirons head.

T13 would probably increase your characters power but that’s neglectable. It’s rather unlikely to be hold back by your gear in todays WoW, most of the time you’re hold back by your or someone elses “capabilities”.

“Paying for cosmetic things makes perfect sense” is the same as “paying for things I don’t intend to acquire makes perfect sense”.

Winning = competition. So, I guess in some game where the leaderboard is comprised of whomever acquired the most cute pets, then buying cosmetic items with real cash is paying 2 win. Does neopets work like that? There might be other games that work like that, I suppose.

I don’t think anyone who originally was involved in coining or using the term paying2win really cares about neopets, however. Might be easier to coin your own jargon Kring, since those 2 genres are generally so disconnected. The goal of language is to communicate, not create confusion.

I agree but I think there is a difference between “just-good-enough content at a slow pace” and “not good enough but abusing the sunk cost fallacy” to keep you paying. And I think stuff like 4.2 daily hub, without having experienced it, is on the “sunk cost fallacy” side.

> Bear in mind that not all sub games are the same

Of course not. The same is true for F2P.

But a lot of people are scared by the F2P model (rightfully so). And at the same time they are not scared by the subscription model while Blizzard shows us how you can abuse the subscription model and use it to the players disadvantage.