FFXIV Housing System is Unhealthy for its House-less Players (Endgame life?)

I cast Resurrection on this thread because I started playing about six months ago. I have just learned how inadequate this system is.

I keep wondering what kind of horrible code must be the server architecture... this game seems to bump into an invisible "CAN'T" in the oddest of places. My gut tells me the server was never, ever meant to handle the number of players that exist AND it was never coded to be easily scalable.

Shame. Shame. Shame.

I wasn't even a *good* programmer and I can smell cut corners so often in this game. Not on the client end. It's pretty tight (aside from the infernal fighting of console UI conventions). But the servers absolutely stink of "not good enough".

I mean, if I were being a complete hack, and didn't want to facilitate a house per player, I'd write a system similar to what's in place.

They tried to apply an 80/20 rule, but they had the ratio backwards in terms of demand.

Ultimately, it doesn't matter, but it IS frustrating to not be able to access an entire avenue of gaming expression because I started in 2021. And no... a FC apartment isn't good enough. It's not mine. I cannot get a free standing house or my own, unaffiliated apartment. It's a game feature that I cannot access or use.

That is not a good feeling.

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Originally Posted by Elizabetha

I cast Resurrection on this thread because I started playing about six months ago. I have just learned how inadequate this system is.

I keep wondering what kind of horrible code must be the server architecture... this game seems to bump into an invisible "CAN'T" in the oddest of places. My gut tells me the server was never, ever meant to handle the number of players that exist AND it was never coded to be easily scalable.

Shame. Shame. Shame.

I wasn't even a *good* programmer and I can smell cut corners so often in this game. Not on the client end. It's pretty tight (aside from the infernal fighting of console UI conventions). But the servers absolutely stink of "not good enough".

I mean, if I were being a complete hack, and didn't want to facilitate a house per player, I'd write a system similar to what's in place.

They tried to apply an 80/20 rule, but they had the ratio backwards in terms of demand.

Ultimately, it doesn't matter, but it IS frustrating to not be able to access an entire avenue of gaming expression because I started in 2021. And no... a FC apartment isn't good enough. It's not mine. I cannot get a free standing house or my own, unaffiliated apartment. It's a game feature that I cannot access or use.

That is not a good feeling.

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It's not the code that's the problem here.

It's the supply. No matter how much players want to dance around it and talk about ways to mix up the purchase system, housing here will always be substandard because SE will not adequately address the supply issue.

I do wish you luck when Ishgard housing opens in the next patch cycle. I hope you are finally able to get a house so you get a chance to fully participate in the content.

You are incorrect though when you say you cannot get your own apartment. You can (unless you're on Balmung). I even popped on my Primal alt just now to make sure I could find available apartments on Hyperion and found several as soon as I popped into a random LB ward. All it takes is obtaining the rank of Second Lieutenant with your Grand Company (very easy to do with a character over level 60) and 500,000 gil. While apartments lack a couple of the features of houses, they are still a foot in the door when it comes to having access to housing.

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Originally Posted by ItMe

The difference is that if you don't engage with loot boxes you don't get the loot.
Here, there are many ways to approach getting a house other than clicking a placard instead of sleeping.
Choosing to not click for hours doesn't lock you out of the content the way choosing to not buying a loot box does.

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How does one get a house in this game without clicking on a placard for hours? Genuinely curious.

Thanks.

I'm probably just going to give up on houses. I had a FC apartment but it wasn't large enough once I "got it" and began really constructing neat spaces. I won't keep an apt attached to a FC. I don't want to feel chained to a FC because I want player housing. So I'll walk away from it.

I'm simply frustrated because once I start appraising parts of a game as "oh that's not for me, that's for someone else", that game doesn't mean as much to me and it's easy to just...

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Originally Posted by Aaran

How does one get a house in this game without clicking on a placard for hours? Genuinely curious.

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Most of get our at every new ward release
Sleep then wake up before sever is back up
Paste password and get into Q
Never go for so called dream plot
Plan our route to our plot of choice
Park toon not inside major city and practice our travel speed

Well now instead of clicking on plaqards, you get to roll the dice in a lottery, 1 entry for you, and 1000 entries for a botter.

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Originally Posted by Oizen

Well now instead of clicking on plaqards, you get to roll the dice in a lottery, 1 entry for you, and 1000 entries for a botter.

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Did you confuse with script allowing character to multi click with an illegal intrusion of SE network.?
They are not the same.

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Originally Posted by Oizen

Well now instead of clicking on plaqards, you get to roll the dice in a lottery, 1 entry for you, and 1000 entries for a botter.

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Probably should put your emotions aside and think the process through based on what information SE has shared so far regarding the lottery.

It's one entry per lottery period per account. I doubt anyone is going to buy 1,000 game licenses (and keep paying a monthly subscription fee on each account)just for the sake of maybe being able to buy a house. That's USD20,000 up front then an additional USD15,000 a month (or a total of USD 200,000 over the course of one year).

No doubt there will be a few players with multiple service accounts trying to purchase but they will not be able to stack the odds in their favor against the large number of players trying to buy. If there are 1000 different entries in a lottery for a plot, having 10 of those entries still means 990 chances to lose.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

Probably should put your emotions aside and think the process through based on what information SE has shared so far regarding the lottery.

It's one entry per lottery period per account. I doubt anyone is going to buy 1,000 game licenses (and keep paying a monthly subscription fee on each account)just for the sake of maybe being able to buy a house. That's USD20,000 up front then an additional USD15,000 a month (or a total of USD 200,000 over the course of one year).

No doubt there will be a few players with multiple service accounts trying to purchase but they will not be able to stack the odds in their favor against the large number of players trying to buy. If there are 1000 different entries in a lottery for a plot, having 10 of those entries still means 990 chances to lose.

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Nothing a little RMT cash can't fix. I agree 1000 is an exageration. But if you think people aren't making profit, more than enough to pay for the game multiple times over with RMT bullshit I don't know what to tell you.

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Originally Posted by Aaran

How does one get a house in this game without clicking on a placard for hours? Genuinely curious.

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I got mine literally with 2 clicks on a placard when the new wards opened up back in 5.3. Mind you I was on a 400+ queue before I was able to get in and it was pretty much a ghost town still when I got into the ward. Just plan ahead and play smart when the new wards come out

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Originally Posted by Oizen

Nothing a little RMT cash can't fix. I agree 1000 is an exageration. But if you think people aren't making profit, more than enough to pay for the game multiple times over with RMT bullshit I don't know what to tell you.

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How can RMT get around the one ticket per lottery per service account thing? Please, I'm dying to know.

(I understand how it could in a FC setting, since we don't know if the FC can have multiple tickets. But it is impossible in a Private setting)

I sincerely hope that the lotto will allow someone to enter a lotto as a FC leader and also one for a personal estate at the same time. In addition I hope they maintain the first come first served option for new ward releases at least for some of the wards.

Hoping a clarification for the new housing rules is coming soon.

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Originally Posted by Oizen

Nothing a little RMT cash can't fix. I agree 1000 is an exageration. But if you think people aren't making profit, more than enough to pay for the game multiple times over with RMT bullshit I don't know what to tell you.

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I know that there are some people profiting from the system not just in gil but in real money. I also know that the changes SE has announced for 6.1 won't stop it from happening, though the changes will make it less common.

Still overall 6.1 will push things more in favor of players who are trying to get a house for their personal use over those who are buying for profit. I just wish SE would stop pouring resources into a ward system that cannot accommodate the entire player base and work on a system that will.

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Originally Posted by Kenky

How can RMT get around the one ticket per lottery per service account thing? Please, I'm dying to know.

(I understand how it could in a FC setting, since we don't know if the FC can have multiple tickets. But it is impossible in a Private setting)

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It's not truly one ticket per service account from what I'm able to tell from the info in the last Live Letter. It's one ticket per service account per world. That means a single service account has up to 40 opportunities per lottery period. A single lucky hit per month will more than pay for that account's subscription if the purchaser then goes the RMT route to sell the FC with plot. The flipper might be down to only 39 opportunities for the next few lottery periods while waiting for the buyer to pass out of the new member period but that's not exactly a deterrent.

That's something that SE seems to always overlook - allowing players to own plots on multiple worlds still takes supply away from the rest of the player base and increases profits for those who do flip because they can use fewer accounts for purchases.

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Originally Posted by LaylaTsarra

Hoping a clarification for the new housing rules is coming soon.

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I'm sure we'll get that information in one of the upcoming Live Letters for 6.1, and probably also in a Lodestone notice just before Ishgard opens.

I am more-or-less convinced I am never going to get a house.

Veterans warned me even when I was a sprout that housing in this game is extremely toxic and can easily get to someone emotionally. The fact that you pour hours of waiting, sitting at the PC and clicking when a bot user beside you is afk and gets the plot is not only outrageous but makes you feel rubbish. Why pour in this much effort when someone else with no effort and no consequences gets away with cheating anyway?
2. Early mornings (3-4 hours before my usual wake-up time), evenings after work, entire weekends went into me house hunting for /months/ at a time and failing. I have a dog that needs walking, I have a full-time job and after four hours my eyes simply cannot take looking at the screen anymore and still I kept pushing on. No luck whatsoever. Then my sprout friend who barely played the game 2 months, gets a house on his third try. At that point I almost broke down crying and almost quit the entire game.
3. Just in the other thread (Turn auto-demo back on), someone admitted that they were not even playing the game anymore, but still logged on every 45 days just to keep their house. Maybe the auto-demolition isn't short enough. Someone who doesn't even play the game anymore gets to keep their house just because??
4. Auto-demolition has been turned off because of the congestion. Even back then I was baffled and angry because of this decision because even though I play full time - ergo I could also only log on during peak hours - I had a handful of days when I could not log in. The Horrendous Congestion TM period barely lasted a month because SE battled it as best they could and it worked. Still, auto-demolition is still off and I'm sitting here thinking do the devs intentionally want people to be discouraged from having a house? Are they trying to tell me: "just give up already"?
5. When the Ishgardian housing drops, it will cause chaos and murder in the housing market. Since Auto-demo is off, people are going to be toxic and irritated beyond measure because other than the new districts, they have no other means of getting a house - auto-demolition, just because MAYBE turned back on, won't help so much right there and then. It will take time again for plots to open up and considering that, again, as a working-living person I won't have a single ounce of chance with my "luck" history in getting a plot. The Ishgardian houses are going to be gone within the first five minutes. Mark my words. And then the player base is going to be at the throat of the devs for not having turned auto-demolition back on earlier.

My feelings are mixed between disbelief, disappointment and angry. With auto-demolition turned off, it is an absolute madness that people get to sit on the plots right now without having the pressure of logging back on, while players who actually play the game, are stuck without a chance.

A snippet of what Jojoya said:

"I just wish SE would stop pouring resources into a ward system that cannot accommodate the entire player base and work on a system that will."

-That right there is the absolute best solution and the ONLY one we should be pushing for.

-I agree 100% wholeheartedly, there is NO REASON by now, SE cannot come up with a way to make this happen.
-Either redesign the current ward system OR leave current wards alone and implement an ADDITIONAL form of full functioning housing for EVERYONE.

By now its sheer laziness.

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Originally Posted by Kanie

I got mine literally with 2 clicks on a placard when the new wards opened up back in 5.3. Mind you I was on a 400+ queue before I was able to get in and it was pretty much a ghost town still when I got into the ward. Just plan ahead and play smart when the new wards come out

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I had a similar experience on Tonberry, shortly after the great exodus of OCE players to Materia. A great many plots became vacant at once, the placard I wanted was available, and not another soul around.

So if you own a small home, you will be punished. You must check in once a week. You may never become sick, have surgery, go out of town, work extra, have a broken system or internet failure that you can’t fix in 7 days. No vacations! You really thought this through.

Truth be told, I like houses in games a lot. And would be 50% of why I want to play this game. I unfortunately misread the situation in advance with Materia DC opening about compensation for moving, and took a break before the expansion which I am fine to have released my well placed 'S' in Kugane, but rue I missed a couple million in return, hahaha.

Housing is important enough to me that I've chosen to sacrifice the populated servers and gone on one of the least popular in an attempt to get a specific 'M' that I want.

If I don't get it, well that's the luck of the drawer, but I would cease my subscription and only return towards the end of expansion once significant new story has come into to replace the already completed launch MSQ, which is only logical.

I am sure I am not the only player with this outlook, and the point being that while houses are held to ransom with maintaining a subscription. It acan lso backfire in that players like me won't just keeping their sub up if there's no reason for them to do so.

Anyway, my 2 cents, neither here nor there.

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Originally Posted by Nafreyu

I am sure I am not the only player with this outlook, and the point being that while houses are held to ransom with maintaining a subscription. It acan lso backfire in that players like me won't just keeping their sub up if there's no reason for them to do so.

Anyway, my 2 cents, neither here nor there.

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It won't backfire, it's just a different player paying the subscription.

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Originally Posted by Nafreyu

houses are held to ransom with maintaining a subscription.

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If they would design systems in a way to keep players subscribed they wouldn't make it a system that only affects like 1% of the players who actually own an house. They would design something that would keep the 99% of people subscribed which they currently don't really do and have multiple times said that "it is ok to unsubscribe until you want to check a new patch again"

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Originally Posted by Nafreyu

the point being that while houses are held to ransom with maintaining a subscription.

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No one has to maintain a constant subscription to keep their house, they only need to keep to a schedule. One month subbed, 6 weeks unsubbed works perfectly. That's only 40% of the year you need to be subbed to keep a house.

SE is well aware of that, part of why they can freely say "take a break if you want".

It is not unhealthy, the game is not forcing you to stand clicking 2 days in a row, that is all on you, however the lottery system will plug that problem.

Personally I'm all for the lottery system. Yes, there will be people taking advantage of that still if they have the means. Aside from removing the sometimes insane click method, the lottery does ultimately reward a wider audience of the player base, under the relatively safe assumption that this results in more free company owned homes with 4+ players.

It's impossible to please everyone. Even an instanced option doesn't please everyone. Some individuals will long for the ability to openly share their home in a ward and have neighbors. It's my hope that the Island Sanctuary will at least allow an instanced version of housing for individual players to design. If some day it's feasible to implement a permissible means of sharing your unique island to a select few or all that'd be fantastic. Though that's a totally different problem for another time. There's no harm in saying though that SE should continue to try their best to continuously improve on the housing system. Including more resources towards identifying (flagging), investigating and removing the RMT involved in housing.