Its not money sink as some say

[Antera]

New to a game but from what I have seen, everything on market is account wide. For example in BDO to create alt you need something like 150$ (for all the essentials). plus everything is character bound

[DocCovington]

There is character-bound equipment and items in GW2 as well, which is why not everything that exists in the game can be found on the Trading Post. Inventory expansion and additional skill & equipment loadouts are also character-bound.

But in general, yes, this game does not require you to spend a single additional dime in order to be able to compete with other players, the Gem Store is almost exclusively pure luxury (Quality of Life upgrades or mere cosmetics).

[CadiasHound]

Not really if you farm enough gold you can convert that to gems and karma to gold as well. Only things really worth buying when you start out are slots for mats,bank etc... and reusable tools for farming mats.

[tonypa]

The game is perfectly playable for free. I have bought some gems when I was actively playing it, but really, you only buy gems with real money. You can also buy same gems from other players using in-game money so with enough time invested you can get everything for free. If you value your own time over cash, you rather spend the cash to get an item, but if you have tons of free time and very little money you can spend your time on the game.

You need to buy Expansions obviously for newer content, new maps and skills and classes, but there is enough free content to keep you entertained for long time.

[goettel]

You got it OP. Grinding gold for gems is my main game loop, which means I can play any part of the game to earn me whatever store skin or QoL item I like.

[Hlowan]

I bought around 4k gems (50$) at launch then nothing but the expansions after that. I've spent 130k gems that I bought with gold on storage to horde or vanity bs I didn't need. There's also no stupid gamble to refine your gear mtx or anything like that.

It's nicknamed Fashion Wars for a reason.