This seems like a terrible idea and definitely more than a nod to pay to win. If this game ever goes pay to win along these lines, me, my wife and our son will all be out of here as quickly as we can lapse our subs. I can name a dozen more players who'd be right behind us too.


All this does is create a way to funnel real money into game items through the indirect means of purchasing and exchanging 'PLEX' cards for some in-game compensation from another player. So someone with a lot of money available can buy tons of these 'PLEX' cards and exchange them for items or services from players in-game. Hence allowing players to buy progress with cash - albeit indirectly. That is straight up pay to win.

As for the idea that this somehow kills off RMT, it does nothing of the sort, all it does is alter the economics of gill farming/selling for RMTs. In fact as someone else pointed out, it also provides a way for RMTs to keep their accounts alive without the use of cash.

In a way, (because of their botting capability) this system would make RMT a self sustaining proposition which requires little initial outlay. The RMT could fund their subscription time using 'PLEX' cards bought with their 'bot farmed gil. But, because they are 'botting the living crap out of the game, they still have plenty of gil left over to sell for real hard cash to other players as well.

The most that this system would do to RMT is lower the price point they could sell gil at, but then it also reduces their costs of operating, so their return on investment is actually maintained thanks to the 'PLEX' system being advocated.