You won't need to pledge in order to play.

Hello Gregory and welcome to the community. :)

Chronicles of Elyria will not be Free2Play or Buy2Play and is still in early develpment, there isn't a game yet to play. First their will be the defferent alpha and beta stages, beginning soon(tm), which you will only be able to join, if you pledged for a package containing access to those stages.

After that there will be the so called exposition. This is a 3 month periode prior to the official release:

Exposition is an early access period of 3 months before the launch, such access is guaranteed for anyone who has purchased a pledge package at the Bloodline tier package or higher. source

After that the the official launch is going to happen. Which might be end of 2019 / beginning of 2020 at the earliest.

And while you don't need to pledge for the game right now, you have to buy it, to play it. The price might be a little bit higher than the standard Elyrian pack right now.

The souls and sparks is on top of that and is COEs version of a Pay2Play system, instead of the classisc subscription.

Chronicles of Elyria is not a typical subscription style game, outside the initial purchase of the game (which includes your first Spark of Life). If you wish to continue playing, every 8-14 months (depending on your play style) you will need to purchase a fresh Spark of Life, which is estimated at $20-$30 USD.

Source

CoE is a Buy to Play game with your Sparks acting like a variable subscription. As in do something dumb and die a lot you pay more than someone who plays it safe.

Just to caveat on the topic, and correct me if this has since changed since I am still new, there is an Earn to Play mechanic in the game where essentially, after the initial purchase of the game, you can continue playing for free by simply being active and earning story points.

In Chronicles of Elyria, the Story Points you earn while playing can be traded in between lifetimes in order to buy Sparks of Life. This is what we call the “Earn-to-play” model of funding Source

That is correct, however it'll take a few years to earn enough to play.