The Global Agenda Forums have an update from Hi-Rez Studios about Tribes Ascend, their upcoming revival of the TRIBES series of first-person shooters (thanks reddit). They are looking to address concerns that the game's recently revealed free-to-play business model will include "pay-to-win" elements, which they say will not be the case:

No. Even as a 'free-to-play' game our general philosophy is to make all gameplay affecting items and loadouts earnable thru gameplay.

However we will allow players a path to earn loadouts and items more quickly by spending their money rather than their time. And we will offer a variety of cosmetic/prestige items for sale that do not affect game balance.

We will not be using the same exact system as Global Agenda, but you can see that general philosophy in place within Global Agenda. When speaking with IGN we described our intent to have load-outs earnable thru gameplay or purchasable, but to also maintain balance between all the load-outs. The writer found that analogous to League of Legends in that their champions are earn-able or purchasable but without any power discrepancy between the free ones, earned ones, or bought ones. And it is a model/game that has been embraced by the e-sports/competitive community. The writer's analogy is fitting but only goes so far since the Tribes: Ascend gameplay is so different.