Upgraded crafting stations

[SXTC]

Right now we have crafting stations that give us a temp boost to crafting which is nice but it doesn't feel sufficient.

I suggest adding a secondary option to the crafting stations so when clicked you can choose between these options:

1) Receive crafting buff based on the type of crafting station that you activated.
2) Allow you to purchase ALL materials from NPC's that are related to that type of crafting (because lets face it, no one still teleports all over the game to aquire them).
3) Allow you to purchase ALL materials from the market that are related to that type of crafting.

This wouldn't kill off the populated area's and would not stop people from using the market board. They would simply stop crafting "in front" of the market board. Because lets face it, no one likes 10 people crafting in front of a market board and lets be honest here... only a small chunk of FFXIV players concentrate on crafting. I have been a player for almost 5 years and only have 2 crafters above 70 (I only know a hand full of people who have all their crafters maxed after all those years).

At the same time this gives houses a small chance of getting more popular where now they are only visited daily by 10% of all house owners xD

[RicaRuin]

I would love that!

However, I wouldn't want them to sell all the materials. Gatherers have to make a living too. My suggestion would be to go with your Option 2), with the special limitation that you only can buy materials that are sold by Beast Tribe Merchants if you unlocked the corresponding Rank.

[Penthea]

2) Allow you to purchase ALL materials from NPC's that are related to that type of crafting (because lets face it, no one still teleports all over the game to aquire them).

3) Allow you to purchase ALL materials from the market that are related to that type of crafting.

I don't see this happening. For obvious reasons SE want players to go out into the world. If you want to make crafting indoors more convenient then put the material supplier vendor next to the crafting stations. My fc house has two of those npcs so they can be quickly accessed whether you're using the crafting stations or parked at the retainer bell.

This wouldn't kill off the populated area's and would not stop people from using the market board. They would simply stop crafting "in front" of the market board. Because lets face it, no one likes 10 people crafting in front of a market board

You could, you know...just go to another marketboard? There are plenty in the game that are not in housing areas but are in quiet spots. And if you have a house or apartment then you have a cheap teleport to a quiet marketboard.

At the same time this gives houses a small chance of getting more popular where now they are only visited daily by 10% of all house owners xD

Where are you getting that statistic from?

I'm sure my neighbours think I rarely visit my house. Usually as soon as I teleport there I go inside. My door is locked so they can't come in. I also haven't changed my garden furnishings in ages because I love how it looks. The only sign that I do visit are the plants growing in the gardening patches. I actually go there multiple times every day but it could look like I rarely visit if you happen to not be around during the few seconds between me teleporting into the garden and entering the building.

[Kytrin]

Right now we have crafting stations that give us a temp boost to crafting which is nice but it doesn't feel sufficient.

I suggest adding a secondary option to the crafting stations so when clicked you can choose between these options:

1) Receive crafting buff based on the type of crafting station that you activated.
2) Allow you to purchase ALL materials from NPC's that are related to that type of crafting (because lets face it, no one still teleports all over the game to aquire them).
3) Allow you to purchase ALL materials from the market that are related to that type of crafting.

This wouldn't kill off the populated area's and would not stop people from using the market board. They would simply stop crafting "in front" of the market board. Because lets face it, no one likes 10 people crafting in front of a market board and lets be honest here... only a small chunk of FFXIV players concentrate on crafting. I have been a player for almost 5 years and only have 2 crafters above 70 (I only know a hand full of people who have all their crafters maxed after all those years).

At the same time this gives houses a small chance of getting more popular where now they are only visited daily by 10% of all house owners xD

I would settle for the crafting stations being viable above lvl 50 or 60 (I can't remember if they raised the cap or not) period honestly. The blasted things are largely useless as the buff isn't shiny enough to make a difference in the long run.

To your suggestions...

1) I like that. Let's buff the buff while we're at it. I know the restoration makes lvling crafting stupidly easy anyway, but if you're going to take up slots in your house you might as well get a solid benefit from it.
2) Ehhhhhhh... I'm six of one, half dozen of the other, on this one? I mean, in general your npc materials don't go above level 20 unless you're referring to beast tribes, bicolor gems, or other gated content. Sure, it would be helpful, but you can already find a fair chunk of what you need for low levels off your house material supplier, and for the rest you can hit up your guild suppliers or the housing npc. Which never struck me as a huge deal honestly. Though having access all in one place would be very convenient.
3) No, I don't see that happening. I would rather they made a mini market board furnishing than that.

I hate to break it to you hon, but there will ALWAYS be people crafting in front of the MB lol. I can't speak for anyone else, but I absolutely would not haul ass back to my house for that when I can nab what I need on the spot and get whatever I want made.

Also, I'm somewhat baffled by how you think a small chunk of people focus on crafting? I'm a max level omnicrafter and there are several others in my FC with more up and coming. People most definitely craft. Now more than ever thanks to the restoration making the leveling super easy. Crafters everywhere man. You could hardly move because of the sheer numbers when it dropped. And 5.2 will be the same way I'm sure.

[SXTC]

Lets just put it this way. I get that they want to keep the local area's crowded but there's no use having housing at all if people "rarely" ever visit their housing. Its not cuss you may visit it that others will. There's plenty of housing around my private and I never saw the owners near them.. its been like that for many years. So I think something should be done to make housing more attractive, especialy when we speak off FC's.

So in worst case scenario if you disagree with the market function, I strongly believe crafting stations should have access to all NPC materials of that type through the crafting station itself.
In that situation you can combine it with any other housing NPC that when placed doesn't force you to go find the materials all over Eorzea. Adding a change like this could at least persuade 2 to 10% (best case scenario) crafters to use the housing a little more often.

The only issue would be that high lvl crafters need high lvl materials and I doubt NPC's sell those. So I still recommend a market function for the crafting station would be the best solution to this problem & to not cancel out visits to the markets outside, they could simply levy more taxes on market board functions being used inside housing with a reminder that its cheaper outside. But ofcourse, if adding a market function is too hard... the NPC suggestion would be an improvement by itself.

[Kytrin]

Lets just put it this way. I get that they want to keep the local area's crowded but there's no use having housing at all if people "rarely" ever visit their housing. Its not cuss you may visit it that others will. There's plenty of housing around my private and I never saw the owners near them.. its been like that for many years. So I think something should be done to make housing more attractive, especialy when we speak off FC's.

So in worst case scenario if you disagree with the market function, I strongly believe crafting stations should have access to all NPC materials of that type through the crafting station itself.
In that situation you can combine it with any other housing NPC that when placed doesn't force you to go find the materials all over Eorzea. Adding a change like this could at least persuade 2 to 10% (best case scenario) crafters to use the housing a little more often.

The only issue would be that high lvl crafters need high lvl materials and I doubt NPC's sell those. So I still recommend a market function for the crafting station would be the best solution to this problem & to not cancel out visits to the markets outside, they could simply levy more taxes on market board functions being used inside housing with a reminder that its cheaper outside. But ofcourse, if adding a market function is too hard... the NPC suggestion would be an improvement by itself.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds more like your complaint is that you never see people using their housing rather than anything to do with crafting at all. And because you want to see people around the ward (or your FC house, I'm unclear on which) instead of being out in the world, you're looking for ways to pull them back to the house.

Your other threads and various comments indicate you're, personally, relatively vague on how omnicrafting/endgame crafting works and crafting in general isn't a priority for you if you've only gotten two of them to lvl 70 at most in 5 years. Thus, this isn't about crafting at all really is it? It's about enticing others to be around the part of the game you enjoy most.

To be sure, your ideas aren't without merit. A housing MB of some variety, buffed crafting stations, craftable glamour dressers... these are all things that have been asked for many times in the past, but the devs have refused (house MB) or haven't found a way to make it work (craftable glamour dressers). I think though, if your objective is to make the wards livelier (which will always be a coin toss no matter what due to time zones and play times existing), you might want to try another angle. Maybe improvements to the gardening system? Or workshop? Neither of those have gotten much love in quite a while.

Just to throw that out there.

[SXTC]

My suggestion is merel based at making my FC house more active, give some of my members what they said they wanted in the hopes that more people may join them so it might increase social community behavior within the group.
We have meetings once in a while and if we had crafters in the house overhearing us, they might actually start sharing their opinion or even join in. Thats all it is to me, a chance to draw more people to my FC house and see them there more often.

I'm a community kind of guy.

[Penthea]

My suggestion is merel based at making my FC house more active, give some of my members what they said they wanted in the hopes that more people may join them so it might increase social community behavior within the group.
We have meetings once in a while and if we had crafters in the house overhearing us, they might actually start sharing their opinion or even join in. Thats all it is to me, a chance to draw more people to my FC house and see them there more often.

I'm a community kind of guy.

I understand that you want your members to use your fc house more often, and that you do not like that it appears other things pull them away from it. I also commend you for wanting to do things that have a goal of community building. I can certainly relate to that being a fc master myself.

However I'm inclined to think that some of your members don't use the fc house much due to the sort of person they are. I say this because with my fc most use the house several times a day and they use the outdoor area as their idling place. While some members don't visit super often and use their personal house as an idling place instead. It sometimes is just a personal preference thing.

I do admit that the placement of our house is a contributing factor. We are in the centre of the Goblet so we are super close to a body of water and we have a big open space where the market board is in view of the house itself. So even if members are parked at there, we can still see them, which I know isn't the case with every plot in the game. Perhaps if your fc house isn't placed in an ideal location (some plots have the marketboard and retainer bell super far away and around a corner, which would not be in view of the house) you could consider figuring out a different plot location to move to, and then move there if it is possible.

A thing I do which does draw attention to the house is I refurnish the middle floor (the floor at the entrance) and the garden to match whatever event is going on in the game. I also do the decor differently every year. So what I have this year for Valentine's is not the same as what I did last year or the year before. Every time there is an event members come over to the house to see what I did, and sometimes they have some fun taking screenshots with the festive decor.

Usually how I do it is I leave the vendor corner the same (npcs, retainer bell, armoire) aside from dyeing furniture and adding some tabletop decor, but I completely redo the rest of the room. The garden can be challenging to do as there is very little outdoor festive decor (I use a lot of dye to turn something mundane into something festive) but I follow a similar approach and, I leave the corner with the stable and target dummy mostly alone, and completely redo the rest of the garden. I also change the exterior of the house itself either with dye or with a completely new housing skin. And I take care to make sure the music on the orchestrion is a good match for the festive decor.

Doing this is actually a really fun project for myself. I often plan the furnishing weeks in advance, and I used the basement in my house to test ideas that I am thinking of using for the fc house.

Another thing that helps community building is having a discord server. For our fc even in the quietest times in the game when people may not log in much, like right now which is just before a patch, the discord server remains very active. People can still chat to each other when they're playing a different game or whatever. That doesn't really help with the fc house, but I figured I would mention it because I came across a few fcs who didn't consider that a discord server could be beneficial.

There is a huge increase in fc ranks coming in the next patch so hopefully there will be some goodies you can unlock that will make the fc house more popular with your members.

Something that I know would definitely increase traffic at a fc house is a glamour dresser furnishing. It would be more convenient to have it in a house than the inn because in a house you can have access to the fc chest, mender and vendors that sell dye without leaving the area. SE haven't said anything about this but I'm hoping we will get one soon.

[SXTC]

Penthea that might just have been the most mature answer I've gotten on this forum in weeks. Thank you for your input and I'm glad you understand my frustration. I hope that in the long run, SE will find a sollution that benefits all. Peace out!