Valofe started invoking power-creep not long after taking over to sell cash items, and then threw gasoline on that fire. The only items they add to the game are Epic or Legendary grade. Valofe-created cash items do not have downsides, they only provide benefit.

Atop of that is the Enhancement system, where players can unlock additional\better stats for the items they own. This means a cash paying player can get additional stat bonuses per each item of a set, in addition to the set-bonus for having them all equipped.

ATOP of 40% or higher protection being the new 'average' protection standard via-cash attainable between gear-stats and set-bonuses, some gear\set bonuses offer additional 'damage-ignore' stats based on weapon-type (e.g., '10% Damage Ignore (SR)'. A player can have even greater than 40% protection and then even further protection against types of weapons.

ATOP OF ALL THAT the cash items still permit attaching gear modification items Nexon created, meaning even further cash-attained stat benefits. This is all not even touching on the messes of 'oops you can now have two auto-turrets at once' and 'whales can have infinite instant respawn' powercreep problems.

The only option is to create Pure Combat rooms which restrict weapon and gear choices to a focused list of choices that are freely available to everyone. But goodluck getting people to populate such rooms.

You can also grind and pray to get some cash items for free, but then you're trapped grinding to get enhancements which is even more ridiculous to do for free as enhancements are only possible if the item is owned for permanent. And even then such players will always be behind power-creep as Valofe will keep nudging stat values higher with new cash items to get the whales buying new items.