Alright, let’s dig out the old faithful again:
WoW has 4 design pillars:
- Great combat
- Sense of world
- Community
- Constant stream of content
It takes 4 different kinds of skill - to correspond to each of these 4 pillars:
- Be good at fighting the enemies directly
- Be well prepared - use the resources of the world to overcome challenges and progress
- Find the right people in your community
- Be ready to adapt as things change
If you managed to find someone who were willing to carry you all the way to a mount for free because they just like you so much, do you know what you did? You succeeded at the 3rd type of skill to such an overwhelming degree that it was enough in and of itself. It was not cheating.
And quite frankly, paying for it is just the 2nd kind of skill combined with the 3rd - you came with everything needed to convince a group of people to do something for you.
The moment it becomes cheating is the moment you short-circuit the 2nd type of skill requirement by swiping your credit card.