It just bothers me a little that I'm being relegated to the masses after being one of the players that actually bought the originally released game. I mean, I don't plan on going back to the game as it feels rather dated now, but it still bothers me to an extent when a studio will turn its back on the people who gave them some measure of success in the first place.
But you're not really relegated to the masses, as a preferred member you have lots of things unlocked.
In my case for example, I have all the crafting unlocked for all characters, have rocket boots on all characters, have plenty of PVP and dungeon passes (to let me play without limit every week) You can buy all these things on the Auction House as well, since they all sell for just 200k (the F2P limit)