An Open Letter to Yoshida-san: Please Slice One Zero Off the Housing Prices

Good post. Thanks for making this, OP.

It is really ridiculous that for months they've been showing so much housing stuff in all those live letters. Yoshi-p is always holding up all the neato furniture and whatnot, even stuff that won't be in the game for months like leviathan fountains and junk. And then bam, barely anyone will get to experience any of it. Crafters don't benefit from the new furniture recipes because there will be little to no demand for any of it. The most your average player could hope for is maybe joining a medium sized FC and having everyone scrape up enough to buy a small porta potty tool-shed to cram their 50 members in after prices drop in 3 months.

They wasted so much time and resources, both making all this crap and promoting it in nearly every live letter since the game launched, on something that barely anyone will get to enjoy unless they change things. Really makes me question whether it's worth devoting more time and money towards this game if there are the types of decisions we have to look forward to...

I throw in my hat, and support, with this thread. Everyone needs to speak up and voice their displeasure, to show it's not just a few whiners complaining, but the whole playerbase! This isn't some ridiculous grindfest cheap FTP MMO, this is a triple-A piece of work, we pay our monthly, we love the game, we deserve not to get screwed!

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Originally Posted by Reiterpallasch

2.0: Everyone just sleeps in the streets, in inn rooms, or while standing on their feet for weeks on end. Everyone is happy, nobody cares.

2.1: People can't afford gigantic mansions, and suddenly they're homeless, face down in the snow in Coerthas, unable to sleep without being attacked by wild animals.

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Large difference between not having a feature, and having it and not being able to participate in it at all.

By the way "People can't afford gigantic mansions" is a strawman argument of the worst kind, as it's not that people can't afford "gigantic mansions." People can't afford a small one-room house.

If you want to disprove an argument, you may want to try to refute it in its original form, and not in an exaggerated form that has nothing to do with it.

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Originally Posted by Reiterpallasch

2.0: Everyone just sleeps in the streets, in inn rooms, or while standing on their feet for weeks on end. Everyone is happy, nobody cares.

2.1: People can't afford gigantic mansions, and suddenly they're homeless, face down in the snow in Coerthas, unable to sleep without being attacked by wild animals.

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I think it's that the vast majority can't afford any of the housing that was advertised since before 2.0 was released that has everyone riled up.

Or not, I could be wrong.

Getting a house was a huge goal for my FC. A lot of my members are fairly new / non legacy, and they chipped in what they could here and there. We were very excited for the housing concept, but honestly. The prices are outrageous. We saved up around 4.5 million, and we are no where close, even remotely, to any kind of plot of land. I'm sorry but what am I supposed to tell my members -- "oh, just another 12-18 months and we'll have our small plot of land with a small house!".

10 million, maybe 20 for a large, but I'm looking at some of these servers. 650 million? Who has that kind of gil? Even for the worst possible residence, it's 20 million! We'll still enjoy all the new content, but these prices crushed morale today

Think they misplaced a 'gil sink' for a 'gil black-hole.

Personally I don't see a problem.

Even if you are a small to medium FC of 40 people, you only need to put in 100K each (unless my math fails me horribly which wouldn't be surprising). If you can't afford that you shouldn't be looking at FC housing in the first place.

When we were talking about raising gil for the FC housing we thought "Oh, it'd be like 10-15, maybe even 20 mil for a big house. How do we do the donations?" Well SE, way to say NO to us getting a house on Sargatanas with these outrageous prices. Every MMO I have played with housing has *never* made it a punishment to own a house. Sure there were upkeeps but it was easily manageable and didn't cost an arm and a leg like this bombshell of a price. Do they want us to actually experience the housing or just go "Oooh pretty!" and move on? As someone said earlier in the replies, this definitely looks like 1.0 prices where people could make millions in a few hours...so far I've only seen people make a couple hundred thousand in the same time frame. Sacrifice life everyone! We gotta get the gil for the FC house!

I'm sorry but I cannot support such expensive housing fees. I will also cosign with the OP and support his post. Forgive me but you guys act as if your economy is strong enough to support such prices it does not. Get the crafting to a Star Wars Galaxies level of functionality and interdependency and perhaps maybe you could justify these prices.

I will agree with those that also say that these house prices are on the level of what one would expect a FTP game to have. Its quite discouraging to see something like this, especially for the western market where we are not as interested in grinding our lives away.

If these costs were for housing that served the same purposes as the upcoming WoW fortresses or Wildstar warplots I could get the price as the functionality of the housing would justify the cost, but atm the costs are not justified. You are also not taking into account both of these games as your competition. While I know in Japan neither of those games are factors I can tell you now you will lose people to both WoW and Wildstar because of a move like this. I am begging you please take the factors of the playerbase of the western market into consideration.

Forgive me Yoshi - san but I remember you saying that you like roleplayers. Its the Roleplayers who would be selling your housing in the western markets and with a move like this you are outright telling them that you do not support them. Even in the anime Log Horizon it took only 5 million gil for Shiroe to buy the guild building. I wonder what his reaction would be here at such prices.

You want to justify it by saying that this is FC housing and the costs should be more? Well then I am justifiably saying no because even if the FC I was in -had- the money we would not spend all of our money on this and have our bank accounts be dry of money. This smells like a Nexon move and if that's the case then just outright put these houses into a cash shop and make us pay for them with real cash because I'd surely prefer that to what you are doing now. Hell I'd outright buy my FC a large house by putting down 200 dollars for it, but this. No way sir no way, your world is not that big and not that interesting. You also basically killed the concept of rp neighborhoods with a move like this and even worse for those on legacy servers who have the added negative of not being able to transfer to a new server like mine where for a large house it costs 100m.

Forgive me if I don't want to do or see the same content ten times for something that only gives me a stat buff at this point and makes it so rp guilds like mine can't even be in the same neighborhoods.

How bout we just keep it real at this point and put these into a cash shop, it hurts less that way at this point.

Perfectly articulated OP, I agree wholeheartedly.

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Originally Posted by KenzieLynch

Personally I don't see a problem.

Even if you are a small to medium FC of 40 people, you only need to put in 100K each (unless my math fails me horribly which wouldn't be surprising). If you can't afford that you shouldn't be looking at FC housing in the first place.

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I like how you think 40 is a small FC. Small means something like ten. I've only see a couple that break 100 and only that breaks 400 on my server.

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Originally Posted by KenzieLynch

Personally I don't see a problem.

Even if you are a small to medium FC of 40 people, you only need to put in 100K each (unless my math fails me horribly which wouldn't be surprising). If you can't afford that you shouldn't be looking at FC housing in the first place.

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Yah that's only 4 million gil. Only 20% of the way to the ghetto of ghettos =P

Well thought out OP. I will once again repeat, in support, that I am incredibly interested in personal housing, but my grip on my gil just tightened with these prices announced. I can't help my FC with their house when I may not be able to afford my own home.

Creative expression is a vehicle used to enjoyably reach goals, not a long term goal itself. I have never seen any housing feature, in any MMORPG, placed on such a high, inaccessible shelf.

In a world where RIFT, with its amazing and accessible dimensions, is without subscription fees, this is not the way to go with FFXIV's housing.

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Originally Posted by KenzieLynch

Personally I don't see a problem.

Even if you are a small to medium FC of 40 people, you only need to put in 100K each (unless my math fails me horribly which wouldn't be surprising). If you can't afford that you shouldn't be looking at FC housing in the first place.

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On my server 40 people putting in 100k = not even half the amount of money you'd need for the lowest quality plot of land that holds a one room house (for 40 people...). That's after the price has dropped to the lowest possible amount, which would only happen after 3 months of the plot being unsold. That same amount of people could put in ten times that amount and not even come close to being able to afford the starting price of the lowest quality medium sized plot. They'd be 35 million gil short.

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Originally Posted by KenzieLynch

Personally I don't see a problem.

Even if you are a small to medium FC of 40 people, you only need to put in 100K each. If you can't afford that you shouldn't be looking at FC housing in the first place.

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40 People, in a Room as small as the Inn, with a Limit of 50 Items to place in. So right.. 1 Chair for each of the 40 Members, a couple flowers and the room will burst, since there is not enough room..... <_<

People need to stop thinking that Small houses are meant to be used by FC's with around 40 Members. Have you actually seen the Size of a Small House from the Inside? With around 12 people it will start looking like a clusterfuck.

Very well said. These prices are really grossly unfair and impractical and truthfully make no sense, more so just simply because prices are not the same on each server and are greatly increased on Legacy 1.0 servers on top of our previously suffered gil reduction at the start of ARR. Here our FC had dreams of just owning a small house and here we have to pay 25 million? vs 4 Million on the cheapest server block? 25 Million when I know larger FC's with 65+ members that can barely afford a small house? Theirs a problem in this. Please Yoshida, re-evaluate the prices of housing ;_;

YOSHIDA-SAN PREASE!

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Originally Posted by Nikita

It just dawned on me and I had to laugh out loud thinking about all of the new furniture we will be able to make for the housing we can't afford.

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I was thinking about the people shouting, selling all the furniture that is already available. Even worse, the people who spent millions on them, now unable to afford a house to put them, lol.

+1 to the OP

Honestly, I think the Dev Team's Eorzean economic calculator must have used 1.0 gil currency circulation numbers to spew out those outrageous prices.

My FC, not including alts, is made of maybe 25-28 strong members. We don't need more than that, and never really had any plans to expand. We have enough people we trust to run content with, and it's small knit enough to not feel intimidated. I think.. a lot of FC are like this. Although some may hold massive amounts of players such as socials and leveling FCs, most people just want a small community they can stick with. Given that, it's still what? 11 mil per person? I know the price will decrease over time, but in the end it's still about 5 mill per.
Does SE wish to punish smaller groups? Housing is something everyone has been excited for since it's been announced, seems silly that it's pretty much impossible to access. I even remember Yoshi saying that "a player can afford a small house by leveling 1-50". I don't know about you kids, but I certainly didn't get 20 mil. >:V
Oh well, guess I'll live in my Inn and talk to my plants some more.

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Originally Posted by Abriael

Dear Yoshida-san

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（；¬＿¬) . . .

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Originally Posted by Kluya15

Yah that's only 4 million gil. Only 20% of the way to the ghetto of ghettos =P

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Yeah..I only saw the amount in digits earlier and thought it was 4 million not 40 million. So an FC with 40 members would need to put in 1mil each...

It is a little expensive, but I kind of like the fact that it would be difficult to get and only the really dedicated FC's would obtain one. My only real criticism of the game thus far is that it gives a little too much too easily, and things have no real value. Maybe they could lower it to 20 or 30 million, but honestly I have a hard time feeling angry about this.

With how disappointed I am with SE there is no way I could have worded my displeasure so eloquently, especially without using profanity.

These prices feel like a punishment for gil farmers/sellers and it's not fair to the real players. They go around and ban anyone who has 7M+ gil and then expect us to amass 20M to buy the smallest land. Or maybe I didn't understand the bans they did the other month correctly.

If they wanted to make a gold sink why not make special furniture the gold sink instead of the land? I'm sure there are tons of small (or poor, which ever you prefer) free companies out there that would be happy with a small house and simple furniture while letting the free companies that miraculously have enough gil go off and buy their mansion and furnish it with cool couches to feel special.

Guys, I think SE's STFs are just waiting around the corner to strike at the large plot buyers on every server. This is clearly the trap they laid out for RMT. Awaiting mass ban on first day of patch release :)

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Originally Posted by MariyaShidou

Guys, I think SE's STFs are just waiting around the corner to strike at the large plot buyers on every server. This is clearly the trap they laid out for RMT. Awaiting mass ban on first day of patch release :)

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No joke, I fully, completely expect this, it's the only way the pricing makes sense!

http://static4.businessinsider.com/i...ing-quotas.jpg

You have my support OP. Good post, very well explained.

please Like my article here and hopefully we can get the SE mortals to realize their folly
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...ving-in-Eorzea

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Originally Posted by Nikita

It just dawned on me and I had to laugh out loud thinking about all of the new furniture we will be able to make for the housing we can't afford.

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That pretty much sums up my real life job. And now I am sad.

i think the prices may look high, but fine. now all the FC members have a common objective, something that will make them work together to buy an house.
and remember that's something made to burn gil and show off… and burn gil. so start saving :p

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Originally Posted by ZohnoReecho

i think the prices may look high, but fine. now all the FC members have a common objective, something that will make them work together to buy an house.
and remember that's something made to burn gil and show off… and burn gil. so start saving :p

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Unless one of them cuts a corner and RMTs it up, costing everyone their investment.

i agree yoshida please

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Originally Posted by KenzieLynch

It is a little expensive, but I kind of like the fact that it would be difficult to get and only the really dedicated FC's would obtain one.

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That's what Tier 1 Large plots should be for. Not the slummiest of slum houses.

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Originally Posted by Alphi

please Like my article here and hopefully we can get the SE mortals to realize their folly
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...ving-in-Eorzea

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Why not post yours here so the posts that are well stated are in one thread?

I've read yours, and it is well stated, but I wish it had been added to this already existing thread.

So... I have been saving my gil from Legacy to buy a house for nothing.
Exactly BECAUSE I saved it, we're punished.

SE: "You saved your gil in 1.0? Let's reduce that to 1/10th in ARR to be fair with the new economy."
- Hmm. OK, I see you point. My purchase power will stay the same and prevent creating a gap with new players, so no harms done.

SE: "You still have those gil from 1.0? (We thought you'd go crazy and spend everything) Well, let's bump up the housing prices so much as to completely nullify your purchasing power of 1.0 that we had already brought down."
- Well, you could have stolen everyone's gil from the start. Your logic is inconsistent, flawed and not fully oriented to the spirit of fun that MMORPG should be.

And, that's why you should never trust MMORPG developers. Well, since I won't be able to afford a house on Aegis with my current player style until I'm 658 years old, I guess I'll just go homeless.

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Originally Posted by wilder-polterer

Please SE give me a tent

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The tent would be priced at 2 million on Aegis, after 3 months... nah, I'll just live in the inn and totally forget about housing.

Housing, what is housing? Is that the new white-elephant feature they added in 2.1?

Excellent post, and convey's my feelings on the matter.

When there are tons of plots for sale and no one buying even once they hit the 50% of their starting price, and the playerbase starts leaving, maybe then they'll get the message.

Nucking Futs is what this is.

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Originally Posted by MariyaShidou

Guys, I think SE's STFs are just waiting around the corner to strike at the large plot buyers on every server. This is clearly the trap they laid out for RMT. Awaiting mass ban on first day of patch release :)

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Even more so when they write in deep red text under the "Purchasing land" heading on the patch notes

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* Purchasing land or housing using gil obtained from RMT (real money trading) or other illicit means is strictily prohibited. Any land or estate hall deemed to have been purchased through such means is subject to seizure.

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I'll add my support for you as well, OP. I was already completely uninterested in the idea of FC Housing, but those prices are unnerving. What does that say about future personal housing if they think your average sized community of players can put together the kind of money they're wanting? Or, heaven forbid, what if they continue with the idea of making your "personal house" just a room in an FC house? Add into that all the content that could end up locked behind this and it's a fairly bleak looking proposition. With regards to Legacy servers specifically, are they even considering 1.0 players who didn't have much to begin with when coming into 2.0?

I'm not doomsaying or anything over this, but I would like a more clear and forward response from them on why they've decided to spend months and months hyping players on housing, and pitching it as a major community cornerstone, only to drop all this content behind such a steep entrance fee. Even assuming I wanted to be part of a Free Company house, there's no way I'd feel comfortable giving up the amount of money required of individuals to make it a realistic goal. For that kind of investment I want full control over where my money has gone and where it will continue to go in the future.

Please SE give me a tent

While I think the prices need to be lowered dropping a zero is too much. The most expensive parcel shouldn't go from 312.5mil to 31.25mil that's just stupid ridiculous. I'd much rather see prices dropped say %30-40% across the board

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Originally Posted by Marowit

While I think the prices need to be lowered dropping a zero is too much. The most expensive parcel shouldn't go from 312.5mil to 31.25mil that's just stupid ridiculous. I'd much rather see prices dropped say %30-40% across the board

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That's what the Ward (i.e. instances) are for. Remember, there aren't just one instance of housing, there are multiple plus SE is ready to add more based on demand. With the current pricing, there is no demand.