Paying for Pleasure
stargrace 
Over the years I’ve spent more than my share of ‘extra’ money on various MMORPG features. One of these features includes server transfers, or in the case of World of Warcraft, faction transfers. Now, I understand that I don’t NEED to pay for these extras because technically I could just swap servers, or create a new character in the faction of my choosing – but that’s not always the ‘best’ decision and it’s not always a decision that makes me happy.
I just finished grinding 10 characters to level 100 in preparation for Legion. I have a set of alliance and a set of horde – but to be honest I prefer my horde classes to alliance. I decided to play my horde characters first when Legion came out, too. Not a huge deal except that a good portion of my bnet friends are playing alliance, and I want to be able to group with them and do dungeons. The decisions I was left with included creating a brand new alliance character in a class that I actually felt drawn to playing, toughing it out with horde but not grouping as much with my bnet friends, playing a class I was lackluster about but being alliance, or paying $30 for a faction change on a current horde character, and swapping them over to alliance so that I could 1. play with friends and 2. play a class immediately that I was interested in playing.
I decided to go with the payment option.
I didn’t want to level up (yet another) alliance character. I didn’t want to boost someone (even more costly) and my horde character had no real ties to that faction aside from the fact that every other character I have on the server is horde. It was a quick process (not even 5 minutes) and my troll hunter became a human hunter. Bada bing, bada boom. Once I completed the transfer I breathed a sigh of relief. For me, such extra costs are completely worth it. It’s not a cost I would want to indulge in on a regular basis, but I had set aside some money for my hobbies and lets face it, gaming is a hobby of mine. I have no doubt it will bring about more than a few hours of enjoyment for a character that I was completely lackluster to play before I faction transferred.
Have you paid to transfer servers before? What about faction changes? If you have, what was your reasoning behind paying the extra cash – and was it worth it? Let me know in comments, and as always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!
(P.S. If you happen to know of an alliance guild on Area 52, please give me a nudge, I’m Arysh, looking for a home!)