Quote Originally Posted by Duelle View Post
Because of how progression in WoW worked, you could not buy success with gold. Which then equates to a weaker market for RMT due to a decreased demand. The fact the game was designed in such a way that there wasn't much they could truly exploit really helped.
I understand what you're trying to say about how an MMO's design can contribute to or discourage RMTs. It's hardly fair to criticize FFXI for having support reps on hand to identify RMTs, though, since WoW most definitely has the same kind of people. So does EVE Online, Lineage II, and basically any MMO where the developers actually care at all.

If the game has a way of trading currency for something of value, then it will have an RMT problem. If WoW's gold was really worthless, there wouldn't be an auction house.

Really, what developers can do well to help themselves is make it easy for players to report RMTs including a trustworthy chat log, and to record market and trade activity. Really, the more time they spend on tools to help players participate in policing and to help their reps investigate reports, the more success they're going to have fighting RMTs. I suspect WoW has very good tools these days, so RMTs get shut down quickly, making it more lucrative for them to go exploit other games.