I'm boosting....legitimately
Can't believe I reached level 50 just buy wheeling and dealing and it hasn't hardly cost a thing If you get your hands on some good items in certain games; you can flog them for quite a bit and use that as collateral to rank up although it is a bit pointless minus the few perks.
I do however find the concept a bit stupid. I actually complained to Steam about this a while back after seeing the FAQ and they didn't respond unsurprisingly A snippet from the leveling section of the FAQ:-
''The Steam Level is a quick way for users to see how much someone has invested in their Steam account. We have just a few different ways to get badges right now, but we hope to expand that to include all the different ways users contribute''
So basically what Valve are saying; crafting badges demonstrates more of an investment than actually BUYING GAMES! I spent £70.00 before the Xmas sale on 3 games and earned 3XP for my troubles but on the same day I spent £0.25 on 4 trading cards to complete the set and earned 100XP - basically this seems to mean that the 25p I spent on cards is more worthy in their eyes and on my profile than investing in 3 games at a far greater expense. Also this means that 1,000 games at a possible cost of £30,000 equates to the same standard of investment as someone that can spend £2.50 on trading cards and still have the same level of loyalty - that's a £29,997.50 difference but in Steam's eyes; both players are equal They seriously need to address this bullshit system.
My wallet funds are almost exhausted now so I'm done with ranking up and I don't have much in the kitty in terms of decent items left to flog into the community apart from some Black Ops 2 foils who's value has shrunk of late. I'll flog them in the next auction methinks!