
Drop $60 on some cosmetics and look way cooler than you looked for your hundreds of hours of grinding mind numbing PvE content. Now a brand new player can hop into the game. But that was more of a time spent / dedication thing. Theres very few cosmetic rewards in game that look good, There used to be like 1 set that made you stand out from the rest of the player base.

Sea of Thieves on the other hand is a pvp based game with no player payer only skill level. So youre not paying to win but paying to quit essentially. Also the game is all about collecting gear so if you buy all the BiS then theres nothing to farm. Their idea was the more intense the RNG the more replay. The end game was just farming BiS gear which was impossible due to the drop system so it forced you into the auction house. Like in diablo3 there was no real pvp or leader boards back in the day. P2W only works in WoW when you change what the definition is and apply it to anything related to money or time.

Winning is expierence, unless you do it yourself you don't actually win anything If you stop to think about it, WoW is already p2w, since you can buy WoW Token and trade them for gold and buy rush. If these microtransactions are successful on PC we will get a much worst WoW store
