This game is ridiculously pay to win.

"
Xavathos wrote:

No, it's not about money. Even if everything goes up in smoke tomorrow, I don't regret supporting GGG and their game. I was also one of the first people who openly spoke with concerns regarding the future of the game when Tencent's "investment" was announced. It's not all fun and games and if something isn't right, I'll gladly admit it.

This, however, is not one such case. You need to do some serious mental gymnastics to land at the conclusion that Path of Exile is P2W. I've played games that were P2W... this is not it.

The only thing as far as this goes that I will grant you is that premium stash tabs are required to put your items up for sale and those are only available from the store. Quality of life or not, that is a feature that should come with the core game as it is a massive advantage to be able to do. BUT:

1. They can't do that or bots will take over even more than they already have. (Now they have to buy tabs, which puts off many, and again when they get banned, which puts off more)
2. It's $1,50 for a Premium upgrade, $1 during sale. One dollar, and you can sell your entire stash forever, no matter how big it is.

To keep it fair, yes, that is a paywall, a $1 paywall. But considering point 1 above, I completely understand why GGG hasn't made it a baseline feature.

Even considering alternatives, like a $5 minimum spending requirement to trade. Yes, that would stop bots just as much and you could then make public stash tabs a baseline feature and leave premium tabs for the recolouring and renaming of them. But real players would be down $5 instead of $1 then.


I agree that having a tiny paywall helps with those issues. Moreover I wouldn't have a problem with PoE being pay2play at all.
But what about those players who can not transfer money to GGG and thus feel like second class citizens? I had one of them on my friends list, from Venezuela (although I don't know if that turned out well by now).
And yeah, we may have to include all those 15 year olds with too strict parents...

Tencent is a different topic.
But seriously: if you lost all non-default tabs and only kept your cosmetic MTX, i.e. if you weren't allowed to pay for them (due to lack of money, payment methods, whatever), wouldn't you feel seriously disadvantaged compared to the other players? Wouldn't you feel like they were winning compared to you?
I would (that you have to take as my opinion) and a great many others would too (that I hope you agree with by observing the community).

And I claim that you owe me to show where exactly my basic assumptions are fraudulent, or the conclusions illogical, such that you would accuse me of lying :)
Last edited by foosis on Jun 15, 2018, 9:10:22 AM
This game is about time and efficiency. Premium tabs are usefull to save you time and time means sextra loot. So yes, premium tabs are a p2w mechanic, but nothing to worry too much about.
"
foosis wrote:
I agree that having a tiny paywall helps with those issues. Moreover I wouldn't have a problem with PoE being pay2play at all.
But what about those players who can not transfer money to GGG and thus feel like second class citizens? I had one of them on my friends list, from Venezuela (although I don't know if that turned out well by now).
And yeah, we may have to include all those 15 year olds with too strict parents...

Tencent is a different topic.
But seriously: if you lost all non-default tabs and only kept your cosmetic MTX, i.e. if you weren't allowed to pay for them (due to lack of money, payment methods, whatever), wouldn't you feel seriously disadvantaged compared to the other players? Wouldn't you feel like they were winning compared to you?
I would (that you have to take as my opinion) and a great many others would too (that I hope you agree with by observing the community).

And I claim that you owe me to show where exactly my basic assumptions are fraudulent, or the conclusions illogical, such that you would accuse me of lying :)


As much as you owe it to me to fix those quotes. ;)

The lie is in the way you claimed there was an MXT that increased experience gain by 3%. I get where you're coming from, as most would, but your statement simply isn't true. One could interpret it as such in regards to stash tabs, but you're throwing numbers into the mix and stats that do not exist on any mxt. Unless the definition of lie has been changed, my conclusion remains unchanged.

As for your question:
My feeling of disadvantage would be irrelevant to me. I may or may not feel that way, I don't know as I've never been in that situation. I like to think I live a humble life, despite my spendings on PoE. You wouldn't catch me driving an expensive car or living in a big house, because I spend my money. I'd spend it on my family, my pets, my hobbies, my friends, charity, strangers even sometimes. People that matter to me. I feel more inclined to say that I support GGG, rather than PoE, for that reason. I don't care much for material things, but people and ideas I can get behind.

I've helped quite a few players I met during my play time that are like you described, those who cannot pay for things for whatever reason, by gifting them things they've always wanted, no strings attached. Sometimes it's just better to buy the first armour set for a guy that owns none, than it is for me to buy my 40th.

It is also for that reason I don't participate in events such as the fashion one last year. Like many others, I'd be able to mix and match just about anything the game has to offer, so I'd have a good shot at winning. But what if I do win? I'd be taking the prize away from someone else who may have had a use for those things. Most of it I already owned at the time, so I decided not to participate at all.

I'll never have a lot of money this way, but I'll also never consider myself poor. :)

The reason I tell you this is to perhaps make my personality a little more clear to you, so you could understand why the answer to your question is "probably not". :)
Carry on my waypoint son, there'll be peace when maps are done.
Lay your portal gem to rest, don't you die no more.

'Cause it's a bitter sweet symphony this league.
Try to make maps meet, you're a slave to the meta, then you leave.
"
Xavathos wrote:

As much as you owe it to me to fix those quotes. ;)

The lie is in the way you claimed there was an MXT that increased experience gain by 3%. I get where you're coming from, as most would, but your statement simply isn't true. One could interpret it as such in regards to stash tabs, but you're throwing numbers into the mix and stats that do not exist on any mxt. Unless the definition of lie has been changed, my conclusion remains unchanged.

As for your question:
My feeling of disadvantage would be irrelevant to me. I may or may not feel that way, I don't know as I've never been in that situation. I like to think I live a humble life, despite my spendings on PoE. You wouldn't catch me driving an expensive car or living in a big house, because I spend my money. I'd spend it on my family, my pets, my hobbies, my friends, charity, strangers even sometimes. People that matter to me. I feel more inclined to say that I support GGG, rather than PoE, for that reason. I don't care much for material things, but people and ideas I can get behind.

I've helped quite a few players I met during my play time that are like you described, those who cannot pay for things for whatever reason, by gifting them things they've always wanted, no strings attached. Sometimes it's just better to buy the first armour set for a guy that owns none, than it is for me to buy my 40th.

It is also for that reason I don't participate in events such as the fashion one last year. Like many others, I'd be able to mix and match just about anything the game has to offer, so I'd have a good shot at winning. But what if I do win? I'd be taking the prize away from someone else who may have had a use for those things. Most of it I already owned at the time, so I decided not to participate at all.

I'll never have a lot of money this way, but I'll also never consider myself poor. :)

The reason I tell you this is to perhaps make my personality a little more clear to you, so you could understand why the answer to your question is "probably not". :)


Ah, it will complete the tags if you forget and leave one open quote. Mea culpa, fixed.

I will give you the 3%: it should have been, as with the "100 rares 5c" example, qualified with "the exact parameters are unknown". I do suspect that it's significantly more than 3% for one of those twitch powergrinders... just watch them for a couple of minutes. But maybe less for leisurely gamers.
[edit: the quantitative assessment may be sloppy, but the qualitative point still stands]
As it stands, yes, one can pick the interpretation where I make a hard incorrect claim. Noted for next time, because these threads will reoccur ;)


For many (most? majority? large minority?) players, not paying will make you have less of what is desirable in this game, what people are playing it for, what is considered winning...
We're talking about the average psychology of players here. This is not entitlement (advancement without money effort): the game advertises that you can get rewards without money, only time investment.
Yet the rate in time at which you get these rewards equates to success in those players minds, even if it seems not in yours. And that rate is dependent on whether you pay or not.

Which means: the portion of players with the described mindset will legitimately view PoE as a pay2win game. I do. Life is pay2win. And I don't mind any of that.
[edit: in particular because PoE is "pay just a little 2 win" and most PoE players in the world can afford it. Not all, unfortunately.]

Sub point: one could argue that flashy skins are desirable, and thus inherently a pay2win feature.
This is in contrast that a vast majority of players enjoys rewards such as good items and high lvl chars, but (anectodal data here) only a small fraction cares about pimping out their appearance. If GGG were to regularly hand out automated rewards (items or XP) to those who have stylish characters/hideouts, then yeah, cosmetic MTX would be pay2win as well.

[edit: my dear... the forum is barely usable today]
Last edited by foosis on Jun 15, 2018, 10:07:46 AM
"
foosis wrote:

Ah, it will complete the tags if you forget and leave one open quote. Mea culpa, fixed.

I will give you the 3%: it should have been, as with the "100 rares 5c" example, qualified with "the exact parameters are unknown". I do suspect that it's significantly more than 3% for one of those twitch powergrinders... just watch them for a couple of minutes. But maybe less for leisurely gamers.
As it stands, yes, one can pick the interpretation where I make a hard incorrect claim. Noted for next time, because these threads will reoccur ;)


For many (most? majority? large minority?) players, not paying will make you have less of what is desirable in this game, what people are playing it for, what is considered winning...
We're talking about the average psychology of players here. This is not entitlement (advancement without money): the game advertises that you can get rewards without money, only time investment.
Yet the rate in time at which you get these rewards equates to success in those players minds, even if it seems not in yours. And that rate is dependent on whether you pay or not.

Which means: the portion of players with the described mindset will legitimately view PoE as a pay2win game. I do. Life is pay2win. And I don't mind any of that.

Sub point: one could argue that flashy skins are desirable, and thus inherently a pay2win feature.
This is in contrast that a vast majority of players enjoys rewards such as good items and high lvl chars, but (anectodal data here) only a small fraction cares about pimping out their appearance. If GGG were to regularly hand out automated rewards (items or XP) to those who have stylish characters/hideouts, then yeah, cosmetic MTX would be pay2win as well.


Hmm, but that's still considering what the game looks like to a number of players. You're still talking opinions here, interpretations. My point is that by definition (fact) it's not P2W.

I'm not arguing at all that it may seem that way to some, or even many. I'm sure it does. It doesn't take much at all for some people to be jealous or envious. As you said yourself, life is P2W and in certain aspects, it really is. But by definition it's not. Because YOU and YOU ALONE set the boundaries to what you view as P2W, what you view as "necessary".

For example: If you decide a Demon King armour set is absolutely required to play the game, you would view it as P2W, correct? You can't get that in-game, you have to pay for it in cash.

But then if you don't hold value to any of those things, or indeed time spent/efficiency from stash tabs, what about anything is really P2W anymore? Nothing right?

We walk a fine line here between one extreme and the other, and either is inheritly wrong, they are just different views.

But with that said, nothing that you can buy in the game is required or directly advances achieving the main goal of completing the game: Doing all the maps, killing all the bosses and getting level 100. Therefor it is by definition not P2W.

To many, this is not their goal though, and that's where you point comes in. Because if you want to look like a muscular shellfish while you leap around like a frog on a beach, there's only one way to do it. $$. But your goals are your own to set and it's doesn't change the F2P core essence of the game in the slightest.

One more example:
If I set a goal for myself to own a 550 Maranello, life is P2W.
If I'm content walking everywhere though, suddenly it's F2P.

So who's to blame then? Is it the fault of Ferrari that I have to walk if I can't afford a 550? Maybe. Or maybe I could settle for less. Much less. Nothing in fact. I'd still be able to do everything life has to offer, takes a little longer getting to places, that's all. But I'm up $150000 on someone that went with the car. :)
Carry on my waypoint son, there'll be peace when maps are done.
Lay your portal gem to rest, don't you die no more.

'Cause it's a bitter sweet symphony this league.
Try to make maps meet, you're a slave to the meta, then you leave.
"
Xavathos wrote:

Hmm, but that's still considering what the game looks like to a number of players. You're still talking opinions here, interpretations. My point is that by definition (fact) it's not P2W.

I'm not arguing at all that it may seem that way to some, or even many. I'm sure it does. It doesn't take much at all for some people to be jealous or envious. As you said yourself, life is P2W and in certain aspects, it really is. But by definition it's not. Because YOU and YOU ALONE set the boundaries to what you view as P2W, what you view as "necessary".

For example: If you decide a Demon King armour set is absolutely required to play the game, you would view it as P2W, correct? You can't get that in-game, you have to pay for it in cash.

But then if you don't hold value to any of those things, or indeed time spent/efficiency from stash tabs, what about anything is really P2W anymore? Nothing right?

We walk a fine line here between one extreme and the other, and either is inheritly wrong, they are just different views.

But with that said, nothing that you can buy in the game is required or directly advances achieving the main goal of completing the game: Doing all the maps, killing all the bosses and getting level 100. Therefor it is by definition not P2W.

To many, this is not their goal though, and that's where you point comes in. Because if you want to look like a muscular shellfish while you leap around like a frog on a beach, there's only one way to do it. $$. But your goals are your own to set and it's doesn't change the F2P core essence of the game in the slightest.

One more example:
If I set a goal for myself to own a 550 Maranello, life is P2W.
If I'm content walking everywhere though, suddenly it's F2P.

So who's to blame then? Is it the fault of Ferrari that I have to walk if I can't afford a 550? Maybe. Or maybe I could settle for less. Much less. Nothing in fact. I'd still be able to do everything life has to offer, takes a little longer getting to places, that's all. But I'm up $150000 on someone that went with the car. :)



That's pretty much the point.

Point me to any pay2win game with free signup. I will enter, sit there in the starting area/situation, and declare that I'm happy and winning. Voila, no pay2win games exist. Or... who decides if it's pay2win?

Consider this:
One PoE player buys every last available in-game cosmetic and makes himself a super lvl 1 act 1 town doll.
Another one grinds out the world record lvl 100 char and owns (as one of just few) a bunch of uber-mirror-bis items.
Both will do better in their endeavour if they pay (due efficiency in paid tabs, and cosmetics... well they cost points) but which one is winning? You may say both, especially if each declares to be happy with the situation... but the community will probably only consider the latter.

These are not laws of nature: "opinions" and "interpretations" of the opinion makers / influencers / majority is what our social rules are made of.
Humans are social animals, and society/community sets the standards for what is desirable (after biology, of course).
Owning an expensive car is not a must-have goal by many people's standards (including mine) because it's a hindrance if you live in the city, so we have the freedom to ignore that. Having a happy and well-adjusted family on the other hand...

I'm arguing, as in that list I made on page 1, that the PoE "society" sets xp/hour and items/hour as standards of success (goals D,E), in place of completing all areas and reaching lvl 100 (goals A,B,C). Every individual player may chose to deviate from that, as happens elsewhere in real life. That doesn't change the fact that generally, if you look anywhere PoE players interact (forums, reddit, YouTube/Twitch): powerful (fast-killing) builds and high ex stack counts seem to be exactly what is desirable.

Also, league challenges / achievements are easier to do if you have better gear and higher lvl chars.
"
foosis wrote:

That's pretty much the point.

Point me to any pay2win game with free signup. I will enter, sit there in the starting area/situation, and declare that I'm happy and winning. Voila, no pay2win games exist. Or... who decides if it's pay2win?


The definition of P2W does. The universally accepted definition is that P2W means straight up buying power or progression through real life currency. Games where you can reach the end with your wallet, as well as games where you can go beyond with only your wallet. The games you're talking about in the above example clearly offer you that.

Yeah, I could still play those games and be happy with nothing and say it doesn't feel like P2W to me, but that doesn't mean it's not. It just doesn't affect me the same way as the accepted definition of the word(s).

In the same respect, you could feel that PoE is P2W, but that doesn't mean it is. There's nothing offering you straight up power or progression, even the stash tabs don't do that. They are just empty "Excel sheets" which you can fill up as fast and efficiency as the next free to player.
Carry on my waypoint son, there'll be peace when maps are done.
Lay your portal gem to rest, don't you die no more.

'Cause it's a bitter sweet symphony this league.
Try to make maps meet, you're a slave to the meta, then you leave.
Last edited by Xavathos on Jun 15, 2018, 11:03:06 AM
"
Xavathos wrote:
"
foosis wrote:

That's pretty much the point.

Point me to any pay2win game with free signup. I will enter, sit there in the starting area/situation, and declare that I'm happy and winning. Voila, no pay2win games exist. Or... who decides if it's pay2win?


The definition of P2W does. The universally accepted definition is that P2W means straight up buying power or progression through real life currency. The games you're talking about in the above example clearly offer you that.

Yeah, I could still play those games and be happy with nothing and say it doesn't feel like P2W to me, but that doesn't mean it's not. It just doesn't affect me the same way as the accepted definition of the word(s).

In the same respect, you could feel that PoE is P2W, but that doesn't mean it is. There's nothing offering you straight up power or progression, even the stash tabs don't do that. They are just empty "Excel sheets" which you can fill up as fast and efficiency as the next free to player.


"being able to buy item x within y days" for specific x,y will be enabled by better trading through premium stash tabs, but not by unpaid alternatives.
"being able to keep up 50mil xp/hour on lvl 95+ without omitting to pick up chaos orbs", or rather that displayed xp/hour count at the bottom will be higher with specialised tabs.

You can say that these are not power or progression, but you can't say that unaffected by whether you pay or not. The community appears to say that they are power and progression.

And if beating all bosses and reaching lvl100 is sufficient for you, then you play PoE for a couple of months, reach the goals, and quit. If you plan on repeating this over and over... welcome to the grinding mindset, and xp/hour + items/hour considerations.

You assume that goals A,B,C are implicitly correct, but this is nowhere stated by GGG. They point us to achievements and challenges, which is why I mentioned those in my previous comment.
And goals D,E are intuitive as well, plus they seem to be favoured by "society", which GGG is certainly well aware of (they were, as I was, D2 junkies).
Perhaps we are bickering about how much "straight up paying for advantages" is straight up enough.


Thought experiment on the side:
If a developer creates some in-game goals that require payment to achieve, and even declares "I made a pay2win game", but all players just enjoy the non-paid parts and maybe compete on who can "stand around better in the starting area" (e.g. some free part of the game is deemed much more relevant than the dev's goals, which get all but forgotten), we have lots of winning yet no paying. Does then the developers opinion on whether his game is pay2win actually matter?
This game is ridiculously pay to win.

In every league you can get any 6link in few days. And you call it "pay to win"..

It used to take at least two weeks to get a 6link for an average player in a league.

Everything is easy now and its still pay to win lol..
Poe 2.0 new trailers when?
I've spent hundreds of dollars on this game and I've never won anything darn it!

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