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I think anything where players have to pay money to have their skills advance at a reasonable rate, have their characters suck if they refuse to pay money, AND where the owner makes six-digit profits, completely at the expense of the players is definitely a pay-to-play mud.
I think saying it is free to play is some of the sleaziest advertising I have seen. My main problem with Achea is not that it rips off it's players and sucks up their money, but that it claims to be completely free and doesn't say anything about payment until you've been playing for a while or actually bother to read carefully through their webpage(which sadly, few players seem to do anymore before playing a mud).
It's like "We're free to play!" Joe Shmoe goes "Yay, I'll play this mud." Then Joe Shmoe realizes that Achea is really a pay-to-play mud and Achea is like "Ah ha, we tricked you, you stupid n00b! Guess what? You have to pay us money or your character is going to be easilly beaten by every newbie or experienced player with a rich person sitting behind their computer!"
There isn't really anything wrong with Achea's buisness model. Many companies make money at the expense of their consumers. It's capitalism. The thing about Achea is that it tries to hide this and pretend to be a free-to-play mud.
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