Is Multiboxing A Form Of Pay To Win?

Thats a personal skill issue.

This game isnt that difficult.

What do you define as cheating? People who pay $1 for storage mules are paying to win then?

You specifically say "storage mule" so if it's just holding overflow items, it's convenience and goes in the 'additional services' bucket with wardrobes.


Leveling a mule to 99 so you can carry it through ambuscade for extra reward is pay to win. Progressing a mule through the missions to unlock Oseem for extra DM augs is pay to win. You get second helpings that you wouldn't get without paying for it.

When I hear pay to win, I think of stuff that lets you get ahead.

Creating a new character doesn't really do that, unless you're getting a premade character with everything on it.

As soon as you have a second account, regardless of where it's progression is, you have paid twice as much for twice as much reward (chance at reward)

You get double the sparks double the hallmarks double the plasm. You get twice as much reward as you should.

That's an advantage, that you paid for. How much effort you put into that second (or 10th) account is inconsequential.

It also means you don't need to shout for that support your second character plays. You got to skip a time sink.

That's an advantage, that you paid for. How much effort you put into that second (or 10th) account is inconsequential.

Paying for dollar mules and/or wardrobe is paying for more inventory. And more AH slots. And login points. And campaign bonuses.

That's an advantage, that you paid for. How much effort you put into that second (or 16th) account is inconsequential.

I see the virtue of your arugment, but I think you're just splitting hairs. What constitutes pay to win is not just the $1 for the mule, but the effort of leveling it to 99 too? So that means:

Paying $1 for the mule is not pay to win.
Paying $1 for the mule AND leveling it to 99 is pay to win?

What if I just use the $1 mule for an extra 7 auction-house slots to sell mats? How does that fit in?

Slippery slope...

Its still P2W since you're granting yourself extra things others dont have.

Even if you dont lvl it to 99:
You free up extra inventory so you can gear more jobs
You give yourself 7 extra AH slots to sell more things

Off the top of my head.

People are discussing a term without agreeing on the definition of the term.

I agree with this definition, that uses Clash of Clans as an example:



Having extra characters does not fall into this category. A character is not an item or an ability. You are not buying extra duration for your Warcry or Mighty Strikes.

Buying clears, buying gear, buying RP with money is pay to win. Making 5 other characters because you want to do content on your own does not shorten the wait time of going into Sortie, for example.

Login points when Empyrean Items are purchasable?

By this definition, having extra characters (on other accounts) is 100% in this category. Delve plasm -> gil; Ambu items -> gil; Vagary weeklies -> gil; Dynamis statue crusher -> gil. Even if you don't consider the fact that they are helping to accomplish the content, they directly give gil to you, and are purchased with RL money.

Mutli-boxing is absolutely paying money to gain an advantage and to gain items. I still don't know if I would call it P2W though, because most of the time when people say that they're talking about a direct microtransaction where you're skipping progress, or doing something which normally requires effort by swiping your credit card instead. This could qualify, but there are a lot of extra steps involved and it's not nearly as 1-to-1 as typical P2W cases.

It's all a grey area, everyone decides how much p2w they're willing to accept and what's ethical for them, you do you boo.

It doesn't. The definition is very clear.

Item or ability. A character is not an item or ability. You can call it something else, but it's not pay-to-win.

You can use the $120 you are spending on the characters, monthly, and flat-out buy gil, clears, items with it.

You pay for 5 mules. Those 5 mules complete Ambuscade and you get 10000 Alexandrite. You paid money, and now you have Alexandrite. If you hadn't given SE $120 you would not have that Alexandrite.

They're stuck in the mindset that "admitting" what they do is a negative.

P2W is not good or bad it is just a concept. You're not a bad person for paying to win. You'll be ok.

Same as RMT. It's not good or bad. It's merely a concept. If it's less time per dollar then you do it. That's not an emotionally charged choice, it's just logic.

You got people so deadset on never admitting they do it because of how they'll be perceived by basement virgins. Stop being silly.

The definition heavily implies direct purchase of items or abilities.

Multi-boxing is indirectly giving you those things, and not just due to the purchase. You still have to know generally how to control/ play the job

I'm using a definition. You can say you disagree with the definition, which is fine. But since a character is not an ability, or an in-game item, it's not pay-to-win, according to the definition I've provided.

You didn't extend your Mighty Strikers, or bought a Kraken Club with the money.

OK here's another thought experiment:
If a game allowed you to purchase resources in-game (say, clash of clans) but you have to complete a mini-game to unlock them, is that not p2w, because there's another step?

You can buy 10,000,000 gold in the cash shop, but you have to clear a board in the game to get your 10,000,000 gold. Is that P2W?

Again, I'd just stick to a definition.

If you used real money to shorten the downtime of Sortie, or segfarm. That's pay-to-win. If you used money to increase the potency of an ability, that's pay to win. If you used real money to get an oddy clear, you literally paid to win.

Having an additional character doesn't grant you any of that. A character is not an item or an ability, or an event that you are participating because you used real money to get in.

I won't speculate over your preference of the definition because you are totally allowed to have your own, just like I picked mine.

You’re the one doing mental gymnastics dude

Very profound of you. Would you like to provide some actual examples of your beliefs rather than just throwing out random insults? Would you care to answer my question?

Here's another one: If SE sold an item on SE Account Management site which allowed you to reset all Ambu rewards for $2, would that be pay-to-win, in your opinion?

What if they sold a monthly battle pass which allowed you to get 2x as many Ambuscade rewards each month for $13.95/month?

Your question is pedantic.

P2W is directly purchasing money or items in game to increase your power level in game.

Does multiboxing increase your power level in game. Sure. But it doesn’t do it directly with the purchase.

You could argue that buying a character that someone else geared up as p2w. But starting from scratch, no, it’s not by definition.

Exactly. People like to use the Ambuscade example as if you didn't have to do exactly what any other player would have to do to get to Ambuscade with their respective characters. Ah, but Oseem this, Ambuscade that... Yeah, just use the dollar to buy Dark Matter...

The definition stands. If you used real money to pay a merc to get you ambuscade gear, that's P2W. If you actually played the game yourself and got the items. It's not P2W.

I'd have to say that multiboxing is not pay to win, for the amount of effort involved. This includes a loss in performance by switching to between goals across so many characters.

There also is a delay in gratification when compared to a traditional pay-to-win cash shop.

The point of an mmo is to group up and the whole shitshow involved. You're paying to skip (part or all) of that process.

No different than paying 99 cents for your crops to grow faster in farmville.

You get hungup on the semantics of it cause you feel bad being accused of p2w.

All of you clamor to state that you bring twobox bards cause it's hard to get someone to bard. That's paying to win chief. You're skippin the shitty parts with cash.

It sounds like you all are saying that if any amount of gameplay is involved and between the purchase and the item, then it's not pay to win, which is fine, you can hold that belief. I don't personally agree, I think if handing over money to someone gets you an item in game, it's (at least some degree of) pay to win, even if that person is SE, and even if you have to do something in-game to earn that item.

As I said earlier, I think there are varying degrees of pay to win. If you buy an account with everything already done, very strong p2w. If you buy gil or items directly off a person/website, very strong p2w. If you set up another account and actively 2-box, middling p2w. If you buy a second character on your main account and leave it at level 1, very weak p2w. If you level that character to 99 and do Aman trove/DM augs, mid-low p2w. It's all p2w in my opinion though, you're giving money to gain an advantage that people without that service don't have.

I think if you seriously consider the examples I provided, especially a SE-sold reset (for your main character) allowing you to do more ambu and get more rewards, you'd see that this is clearly p2w, giving money directly for the privilege of earning items in game, and also extremely similar to (one of) the benefits of multi-boxing. If you think that isn't p2w because it requires you to do 2x as much ambu in order to get the extra items that's fine, but I disagree, I don't think a barrier of completing content takes away the paying, the winning, or the advantage

Yes of course paying for extra characters to receive extra rewards is pay to win. It gives a significant advantage.

I think it's a little tricky, because there are elements of direct pay to win (AMAN trove, login campaign, gobbiebox, garden distribution, constant handout campaigns). It's very hard to, by any stretch of the imagination, defend any of these as content where you earn your rewards.

Aside from that, it's a little more nuanced. If you're botting your mules(whether via a gearswap file or otherwise, for the weirdos who think gearswap bots aren't bots), then you're not really playing either. You're just paying for a permanent hyper-trust. That's pretty easily recognized as a paid advantage.

If you ignore the literal free handouts and actually play your alts by hand, I think you could make a decent case for it not being pay to win. Of course, I think that is an extremely small minority of people who multibox in 2023.

I think you are distorting 'pay-to-win' with any paid advantage. The term originally came about from games where you could buy such an obscene advantage that non-cash shop players could not compete, and simply throwing money would allow you to win every encounter. If you want to argue about paid advantage, then I'd agree with you, but the term is stronger than that.

Are roids considered p2w? Remember, you still have to put in the work for them to do anything.

If your answer is yes, then thats not any different then paying for extra chars.

Are you paying for a sub fee?
Did you win a fight?

Pay to win, baybeeeee