Why should I waste time to get the SP for a proto weapon if one exists at a much lower SP cost at a cost of real money? Sure the Aurum version might not benefit from as much skills, but the skill difference is minimal. Two people with equal skills, however, and the Aurum item will have the edge over the non-Aurum item; henceforth, you pay to have an edge.

Every prototype weapon has an Aurum version which only requires level three in the correct skill. Yes Aurum items are supposed to be sneak peeks for weapons but this is just silly.

For example, the 'Grimlock' Guristas Assault Forge Gun requires only forge gun operation 3 but is much better than the DAU/2A Assault forge gun (trying to recall it's name from memory) which actually requires level 4.

Pay-to-win is the ability to pay for items with better/equal attributes than items with equal/higher skill requirements. And these are just that.

I understand that Aurum items are one of the ways for CCP to make money in a free to play game, but they need to think of other ways. If you ask me, Aurum items should only be of equal value to standard items and require no skills (a true preview of a weapon). Why should I waste time to get the SP for a proto weapon if one exists at a much lower SP cost at a cost of real money? Sure the Aurum version might not benefit from as much skills, but the skill difference is minimal. Two people with equal skills, however, and the Aurum item will have the edge over the non-Aurum item; henceforth, you pay to have an edge.

I just hate being killed by these kinds of items because the other person might not even have the skills while I will have to work my butt off if I want the same proto weapon.

Every prototype weapon has an Aurum version which only requires level three in the correct skill. Yes Aurum items are supposed to be sneak peeks for weapons but this is just silly.

For example, the 'Grimlock' Guristas Assault Forge Gun requires only forge gun operation 3 but is much better than the DAU/2A Assault forge gun (trying to recall it's name from memory) which actually requires level 4.

Pay-to-win is the ability to pay for items with better/equal attributes than items with equal/higher skill requirements. And these are just that.

I could start an alt, give it passive status, walk away for a year, come back and in 1 month be death.

Price: 0$

Every prototype weapon has an Aurum version which only requires level three in the correct skill. Yes Aurum items are supposed to be sneak peeks for weapons but this is just silly.

For example, the 'Grimlock' Guristas Assault Forge Gun requires only forge gun operation 3 but is much better than the DAU/2A Assault forge gun (trying to recall it's name from memory) which actually requires level 4.

Pay-to-win is the ability to pay for items with better/equal attributes than items with equal/higher skill requirements. And these are just that.

I understand that Aurum items are one of the ways for CCP to make money in a free to play game, but they need to think of other ways. If you ask me, Aurum items should only be of equal value to standard items and require no skills (a true preview of a weapon). Why should I waste time to get the SP for a proto weapon if one exists at a much lower SP cost at a cost of real money? Sure the Aurum version might not benefit from as much skills, but the skill difference is minimal. Two people with equal skills, however, and the Aurum item will have the edge over the non-Aurum item; henceforth, you pay to have an edge.

I just hate being killed by these kinds of items because the other person might not even have the skills while I will have to work my butt off if I want the same proto weapon.

Militia items are the preview.

There are previously a few threads which delve deep the issue, see those.
Short recap on the results:


A very common defination on Pay-to-Win is roughly:
"Pay real world money to gain edge on other players you couldn't otherwise get"

It's quite clear your defination is different.

In the very strict example you were using (1vs1 equal SP and equal SP allocation) scenario AUR does indeed have the advantage - but in wider inspectation the non-aurum user has the option of playing more.
(To counter the extreme case argument that the game's very top two players, if having equal SP, the AUR user of those has the advantage:
As in reality those top2 players can NOT have played the maximum amount, 23/7 since January 6th 2013, counter argument is that one could still grind more)


Therefore, the AUR in Dust could be described as P2AG or 'Pay to Avoid Grind'.

I agree with you but if you think about it the Aurum versions will never be as good as the ISK proto version because they will lack the skill bonus. If someone wants to pay money instead of grind and still not get the best variant than so be it. "Low on skill? Try Aurum today!"

Problem is, the weapon skills don't necessarily help.

For instance, if you have an Assault Scrambler Rifle, the "reduce charge time" passive for scramblers does literally nothing for you. So if you use Aurum to buy the PRO version, you haven't missed out on any skill bonus at all.

It's debatable how useful two rank of most skills are to begin with, but with the Assault Scrambler you will always get literally nothing out of the Rifle passive.

Problem is, the weapon skills don't necessarily help.

For instance, if you have an Assault Scrambler Rifle, the "reduce charge time" passive for scramblers does literally nothing for you. So if you use Aurum to buy the PRO version, you haven't missed out on any skill bonus at all.

It's debatable how useful two rank of most skills are to begin with, but with the Assault Scrambler you will always get literally nothing out of the Rifle passive.