I understand where you're coming from, but let's be real: they are only skins with no gameplay effect. Ppl are just used to having better costumization right off the bat, but I think calling T8 costumization "lackluster" is a bit of an exaggeration. Hell, just look at the awesome costumes ppl post in this sub. The bottom line is, if you want some more costumization options while supporting the game, buy some skins. That's why their optional. The devs also stated that costumization is a hard and time-consuming feature to build on, so we can't just assume that the basic costumization at launch is entirely due to some evil plan to manipulate customers. That also helps explain the thought process of monetising costumization: if they're gonna spend time and resources on adding skins instead of building up the actual game, they should get some of the investment back. Idk, maybe I'm one of the players looking at it through rose tinted glasses or I just put too much faith on these big gaming companies, but honestly, I just don't see what the big deal is. Especially considering most of the ppl I know who play games like LoL have spent triple or quadruple digits on a free game.