The trade-offs were often negligible, and you couldn't craft the weapons at all. (Loot box or nothing.) It was absolutely 100% pay-to-win.
Same with the exclusive guns in Black Ops 3, to my understanding.
Hell, hasn't Call of Duty been selling actual DLC guns for at least a couple iterations? I'm pretty sure they had that in Advanced Warfare. This is something EA has been doing in Battlefield (and Battlefront) for quite a few years now too, Naughty Dog has done it for at least a couple games, etc. The definition of pay-to-win.
Again, not defending any of this, I think it's gross, but I suspect elements of GAF are trying to push an anti-IW narrative that this is the new nadir and that's legitimately silly. I mean come on, you have people in this thread celebrating Battlefield 1 and
that's already selling 20 (!) DLC-only guns. Pay-to-win is business as usual for shooters, that's why there isn't any real outrage from the media or whatever. Infinite Warfare is just part of the extremely popular and successful crowd.