Paying Cheating?
Don't get me wrong. Niantic has every right to make money from the game. I remember having to put a coin in a slot before you could play video games.
Now I'm older, with plenty of coin, I feel it will ruin the game to buy my way to the top.
It's frustrating walking 400km to evolve four Charizard's before getting a good moveset but I like the challenge, and value that good one more.
To amass an army of top shelf mons by paying for it seems like a form of cheating to me. A hollow victory.
Answers
I'm totally with you on this. It seems like it would be similar to paying a hooker (I think... never done it myself); you get gratification of sorts, but it really doesn't have the same feeling of earning the accomplishment.
I totally think Niantic should be able to turn a buck on this since they are a business after all, but if I can just go buy a carton full of dragonites off the shelf, there's not much of a feeling of accomplishment there...
I know a LVL39 (probably 40 now) Valor trainer from Jersey who has hatched nearly 10,000 eggs since he started playing. He's a doctor, and hatched eggs 24/7, and drove. His collection is probably untouchable, people been making trade arrangements w him for months now on mons. ?
Me, not so much, I don't spend that much coin, here & there.
I would't pay anything, not only I'm a scrooge but also it would make the game easier than it already is. Also as a Linux user who is used to get high quality software for free it would feel weird paying for PG, I recently talked with an iOS developer about this and we both agreed that from a purely technical point of view Pokemon Go is the worst piece of shit we've ever seen, a nice proof-of-concept but far from being a marketable product.
To amass an army of top shelf mons by paying for it seems like a form of cheating to me. A hollow victory.
I play table tennis. I have buyed a good racket to get an advantage over players with a bad racket. Is this cheeting?
It is pretty the same with all games and sports, hard to imagine anything where you cannot invest for better performance.
Lets regard Pokemon go. Is it cheeting if you buy(sic!) a battery pack to be able to walk longer? Is it cheeting if you buy(sic!) a walkboard to breed faster? Is it cheeting if you buy a new telephone to get smoother game performance? Is it cheeting if you change to the best mobile network to get better access to some gyms?
Why should it be cheeting to buy 1000 Incubators instead?
I'm the other way around. I think paying players should get something shinny on their avatar so we can recognize them, and maybe even thank them somehow (let say give them an item that we got for free in a pokestop so they can get more shinny items). After all, they are allowing us to play great games for free. In the old time, everybody had to pay big bucks for PC games, to only find out a few hours later that they didn't liked it that much. Today, you can play most games, for free, for hours, and if you find out you really like it, only then, invest money in the games, so programmers can get paid and make more games. Because of that, we are saving money if we don't like a game we could not have played long enough, thanks to guys who pay for them.
I understand the OP. He is saying that to him as more a purist he prefers to grind out his things by spending time. That is understandable and how he finds he gets the most satisfaction from the game.
But playing the game as intended by buying things while funding the free to play players experience is cheating? That is the dumbest thing that I have read all day.
Time is money. In fact many people with money consider their time valuable. To use that value as rate to which you compare time spent playing to achieve a goal is something that is particular to each person. If the OP chooses to walk and extra 5kM (at least an hour worth of time) for the cost equivalent of one incubator then he values his time as worth less than $1.50/hr. But the OP considers that a more pure way to play and I understand that. Folks that see it differently are not cheaters though. If some stranger walked up to me and said "Here, walk with my phone for an hour and I'll give you $1.50" I would tell him to pound sand. For me that applies to doing it for myself too in certain cases.
Would those that have better access to pokestops than you also be cheaters? Would folks that have to drive to get to good areas to hunt also be cheaters?
TLDR: I understand what the OP is getting at in regards to his game play and the idea that buying would cheapen his experience but to apply the term "cheaters" to those who value their gameplay and the value of their time differently is incorrect.
I know. Nothing is free.
If he feels the game is more pure when he doesn't pay that is how he wants to play while others value their time or enjoy the experience enough to pay some money to improve or enhance it. They certainly aren't cheaters and are even needed for the game to be sustained. The cheater tag is silly.
How is paying cheating? We gotta keep Niantic in business!
I wish I didn't have to pay, but as a rural player I sometimes even run out of poke balls (hate to buy some, but should I ignore that wild dragonite that just spawned?) And I try to incubate 3-4 eggs at a time and just don't get enough gym coins.
Yes, some people buy even more incubators, good for them. But if they walk to hatch those eggs, how are they cheaters?
