I updated the topic and added my opinion about this, as well as the difference between the game models that I'm going also to put in this reply:
<-- My opinion and differences between P2P and P2W -->
Well, as many of you perhaps imagined, I'd also quit the game, even if I love it so much, if it went to a Free to Play that, yes, 99% of the cases are Pay to Win, nobody is willing to develop a game and hold the whiny players and their critics about the game just for free, managing a mmorpg is one of the most annoying works of the world and noone, I daresay, noone is willing to do that for free or just for 'a few insignificant donations'.
To say, I was a victim of a P2W game, so I know very well how cruel they are, it's a genre that should disappear of this world for playing with people's mind. At the first you think "Bah, I don't need to pay for those things", "Bah, I can do it, just taking more time". Thing is, soon or late, most of those games promote PvP or competition between players, and when that happens, players start to buy and buy just for being better than others, those others, feeling bad because somebody is better than them just because paid will also start to pay and pay, and that's the endless cycle, be a second class citizen, a noob, or be a pro that is paying and paying, endlessly.
Now, straight to their main differences, maybe I'm just too much "Logic please" but... Just after reading something like what I'm going to state, how can people play there? I guess only kids plays those games, as cannon fodder.
<--- Free to play -> Pay to Win ---->
-> The community that plays this game is generally kids, because they can't afford to pay a subscription fee or they don't have pay options (No bank account for themselves is an example). It's obvious that (And yes, there are exceptions by age, I agree, I also had 16 and I didn't ever feel the necessity of insulting anyone for free) such a community is poor, so. One of the worse things in those games is the awful childish community.
-> Regarding community, because they are kids they usually have more time to play than you (Again, speaking in general terms), so, if you work or you have other things to do after all, you'll be in disadvantage with the 90% of the playerbase.
-> Are games more susceptible to be hacked, because community, and because developers don't care so much at all, because money players still win even hackers!... (Let's go again, kids, they have a lot of time, they are in a competitive environment, they'll search in google the magical words "hack + name game").
-> Brutal competitive environment. Competition among players is enhanced. Why? this is a psychological trick for making people pay, even those who entered there thinking they would not. YOU WILL. People that goes to a free to play game saying "I won't spend a cent on it" will often pay just after they start to enjoy the game, make some rivals, and start playing it seriously enough to enter competition.
-> It's a pay to win, the payment methods are planned so even those kids will be able to steal money from their parents and go buy some new gear, or some 50% + expeerience, etc... SMS, telephon call, whatsover works!
-> Skill, experience, knowledge....That's meaningless there. At the end what will matter is if you buy the latest gear, if you buy some enhanced articles for speedrunning your level... Or even worse, some games even have bonuses systems where to add bonuses to a gear costs money, and to change them money, and if some player also added bonuses against your race and you now want to battle him then you pay again for changing yours, but, oh, bonus are random and you didn't took what you wanted, let's buy more bonus change items!... (To put it in mind, imagine the materia system in final fantasy would cost you money to each materia you put, you can put 5 materia to each, EACH gear piece, even 120, and if you want to change those materia, pay more money). Some high level content is locked, so, even if you don't want to pay, what are you going to do? wander around low level areas?......
-> Unlimited sink of money. You can waste all you want, don't worry, there are always options for it... Spend 500 € per month? Let's go, you can do it, there's rarely a limit of what you can spend for improving your character, it's ironic how some people can waste more money in those 'free games' during just a month than what costs you a full game for a console that has been developed over years of sacrifice.... Because the unlimited sink of money, this model of gaming is extending like a cancer in the videogame world, now most of the games use this system, because it is 'free' people will always try, and if they like it, then they enter the spiral of money it means to play at the long time one of these. So they have a lot of second tier players being there for the first tier to PWN and enjoy game while keep paying.
-> ALL their additions, expansions, patches, etc are made only for gaining even more profit. Because it would be too bad if a player already payed so much that doesn't even know where to spend more. New zones that you have to pay to access, new gear or bonuses for being able to defeat those new zones...
With free games, the classic phrase "You don't have to pay if you don't want!" can't be applied seriously, except if you are just going to play it one month and switch to the next free game because you are a roulette-gamer. If you really like a free game, you'll end paying on it for 'enjoying it the maximum'.
<--- Pay to Play - Subscription model ---->
-> Generally the community of these kind of games is more mature than in a free to play, they have their ideas clear, and, even, some sector already suffered and were victims of P2W genre before. I can say that in almost one year of FFXIV ARR I have not seen yet anything similar to the lived in some previous P2W, I think I have never read an insult (It's too childish after all), and you rarely know despicable people you could lament later. We certainly have some little trollers around and in the forum, but that's an internet factor, anonymity + audience = trolling feed. We should enjoy that we can yet have our anonymity before the governments of the world decide to cut our freedom and destroy internet, transforming it into a tool for controlling us all as they would like.
-> Because this is a more mature community, the overall disponibility for gaming is not so high as it is in free games, (Again, speaking in general terms....) So you'll rarely feel like in disadvantage because time issues... [My own case, I obtained ninja nexus weapon just four days ago, are there a lot of people with it? Not really. Can I play 24h? No, I can just spare 4 hours a day, and fully play the weekends]. Then why did I obtain it so early if my time is limited? Guess it.
-> This kind of games are generally more serious and severe with hacking, and have better protections. Also, basically, they have less kiddies trying to search for hacks and stuff, and because that, less specialists trying to win extra munney by designing certain tools...The only they usually have are harmless third party tools that rarely provide an advantage to their users.
-> Cooperative environment, no open PvP areas, not so high presence of PvP, not level up rankins and stuff, nothing enhancing at all the competition but the cooperation. People needs to know more people and help each other for achieving their goals isntead of destroying the path and progress of others. Because we all pay for playing and we all are the same, developers don't need to make us compite against each other just for obtain more money.
-> Skill + knowledge + experience = win. There's not even the money word to put in the equation. We all pay for the same, for maintaining the servers and costs the game has, the development of it, etc, we don't have to pay for extra advantages or for unlocking gear or stuff, we obtain all the same so we are equal to the game and all what it has to give us, meaning that only difference between players and what they obtain is valued by their time gaming, their skill, and they things they know. Knowing the many ways to do something and choose a fast or efficient one, dealing good with that way, all of that, you don't need to spend a single euro for that, you already pay every month, you and everyone. There's no second tier, first tier of players!
-> Limited maximum money to pay. You can only pay your sub and, in some cases some vanity stuff... You'll rarely spend big quantities of money except if you want to make your character a special new race with the supreme ability of changing appeareance, name, and server every day. Minitransactions such as changing server, name, etc, are more than common in these model of games and it is required for protecting a certain order and don't leave the game be a chaos of people changing all the time stuff whenever they want.
-> Their additions are made from their work, work we pay every month with our subs, so they don't need to think of new things to make us waste more money, they take it like if they'd be some kind of worker being paid by a big business. In some cases, somee additions include more vanity items. The only trouble is when a P2P game falls too much in this, adding more and more vanity stuff, becoming more and more greedy until they change to the big next step, P2W.
The classic phrase for these games is... "Do I have to pay for playing? No way!" (Ironic, those people who say it normally end spending triple-cuadruple more of the money in 'free' games.)
