Balmung is Homeless on Christmas' Eve. Is this really what you wanted, Yoshida-san?

Hello Yoshida-san, and Merry Christmas.

For many of us, unfortunately, especially on legacy servers, it isn't that merry. We hoped to celebrate it in the new houses you publicized basically as the main feature of patch 2.1, but almost none of our free companies can afford one to celebrate in.

At the moment of this writing a whole TWO houses have been purchased on the whole Balmung server, and from what I've been told every single legacy server in group 4 and 5 is in a similar situation, over a week after the feature has been introduced.

I have to ask you, is this really what you wanted? Did you really want the housing zones to be a empty and gloomy ghost towns for a long while?

They look lovely, but at the moment they're basically wasted server space, which you're paying for, and which we're paying for as well with our monthly fees.

And there's a further problem, that I'll touch on in passing. Do you know what happens when you make one of the most anticipated (if not the most anticipated) features of a relevant patch extremely costly?

You paralyze the economy.

Not only on Balmung and other legacy servers almost no one can afford a house, but it became a LOT more difficult for crafters and gatherers (or anyone that has anything to sell really) to make gil.

Why?

It's easy: because when people are trying to save as much money as possible for their house, they don't buy stuff. They procrastinate putting materia in their armor, they ignore crafted gear, they use the cheapest possible food or don't use food at all.

To put it down simply, people don't buy. And the economy is nearly paralyzed.

I hope the dire situation of housing purchases will make you understand that the current pricing scheme is, for lack of gentler words, an utter failure. And you know, if you ever read my posts, that I'm not one to use hyperbole. I really dislike using such a strong term, especially since the rest of the patch is so good, but I feel there's no softer way to describe the situation.

Again, I must implore you not to wait further to drop the pricing on all legacy servers at least to the level of grouping 3, if not further. We have waited enough: a year or more since the feature has been announced and then continuously hyped. Please give us a better chance to enjoy it during the busy time of the holidays. This is when people have a lot of time to play, and this is when they should be given as much access as possible to the features, even in the name of account retention.

I apologize for the urgent tone, but I still hold hope that, while the Christmas of those that wanted a house on a legacy server has been rather somber, you'll see that the current prices are not reasonable or fair, and you'll drop them radically and in time for us to celebrate at least the new year in a new house, enjoying the fantastic feature you worked so hard for. All we're asking is to have a chance to marvel at all that work and praise you and your team for it.

Thank you, and Merry Christmas!

http://www.dualshockers.com/wp-conte...2-20-54-46.jpg

TL;DR, they're already planning to reduce legacy server prices, but they'll be doing it gradually not all at once. As long as it doesn't stay absurd forever I"m not too bothered. Not in any hurry to buy.

economy isn't really paralyzed, most people on legacy servers just said to hell with it and started buying/selling normally. As the prices come down people may reconsider their options.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

TL;DR, they're already planning to reduce legacy server prices, but they'll be doing it gradually not all at once. As long as it doesn't stay absurd forever I"m not too bothered. Not in any hurry to buy.

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Doing it gradually is not a solution, nor is beneficial in the light of account retention. Not to mention that it doesn't help in any way as a gil sink as well, because many people just say "to hell with it" and don't partecipate in the gold sink at all.

Basically, there's no reasonable reason not to drop the prices ASAP, and there's every possible reason to do it as soon as possible in coding terms.

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economy isn't really paralyzed, most people on legacy servers just said to hell with it and started buying/selling normally

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It's a whole lot slower than it was on December the 13th.

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Doing it gradually is not a solution, nor is beneficial in the light of account retention.

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I don't think the housing costs have had any effect on account retention whatsoever. You'd have to be reeeeeeally easily upset to quit over a mostly-non-gameplay-impacting feature.

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It's a whole lot slower than it was on December the 13th.

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Maybe on your server, but things seem pretty normal on Hyperion. any economy issues mostly relate to the devaluing of certain rather expensive goods but they were too expensive as it was IMO.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

I don't think the housing costs have had any effect on account retention whatsoever. You'd have to be reeeeeeally easily upset to quit over a mostly-non-gameplay-impacting feature.

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Entirely depends on who it is. There are some people for whom housing was a very big deal - much more important than, say, raiding or PvP. For those people, it might very well discourage them from subbing until after the 90 days are over, and by then they might not come back at all.

People are also forgetting that the current housing is guild halls. They've been expensive in pretty much every MMO with a comparable feature; Personal housing will not cost as much.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

quit over a mostly-non-gameplay-impacting feature.

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Firstly Aegis econimy has slown to a crawl selling items has reduced drastically in speed and in price (Not much in saturation)

But more to the point, we understand you think you know what people want or think is important. But just because you don't think housing was a deal breaker for some people doesn't mean it isn't for other especially after months of building it up to be something amazing. Call people crazy but they obviously care about it and making it unobtainable was the wrong way to go about the system in the first place. Should have held it back until you had proper server space and testing to know it would be stable for everyone once it was available.

Sure people would whine either way but at least they know that they are doing it to be able to release a system when it's ready, not when they can sort of half arse it.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

I don't think the housing costs have had any effect on account retention whatsoever. You'd have to be reeeeeeally easily upset to quit over a mostly-non-gameplay-impacting feature.

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Housing is very commonly a high engagement feature in MMORPGs, because most of the times it's the only way for players to own something persistent outside of their character. SE also publicized and hyped it way beyond anything else in the patch, which contributed to raise many people's expectations.

While by itself it might not make many people quit, lack of access to a high engagement feature that in basically every other MMORPGs is made (at least at the entry level) very accessible is definitely a weakening factor for account retention, and summed up to other factors (like having to bear trolls in a high percentage of crystal tower runs due to the impossibility of safely queuing with 23 people you actually know know), it might definitely tip people over the edge.

It won't do that to me (but I've stayed through a lot of bad stuff), but I know already quite a few that are considering it.

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People are also forgetting that the current housing is guild halls. They've been expensive in pretty much every MMO with a comparable feature; Personal housing will not cost as much.

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And this is pretty much false. Guild housing is definitely accessible at the entry level in most other MMORPGs. The problem is exactly that there's no entry level on FFXIV's legacy servers.

I can't remember a single MMORPG in which an overwhelming percentages of guilds couldn't afford entry level housing upon implementation, and this is made even worse here by the fact that there's no other kind of housing for now.

So... cold....

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Originally Posted by TohruHonda

So... cold....

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When we Duskers said we wanted more significance with regards to our races, this was not what we had in mind...:traps a fire sprite in a oil drum:

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And this is pretty much false. Guild housing is definitely accessible at the entry level in most other MMORPGs. The problem is exactly that there's no entry level on FFXIV's legacy servers.

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It's not pretty much false, i've played multiple MMOs with difficult to obtain guild constructs (houses, airships, etc- the latter in DDO) The only game ive played where any form of housing is "entry level" is FFXI where everyone starts the game with it (but it is comparably simplistic and for a long time was completely private).

What were you guys doing with this game before Housing was implemented that makes this such a gut-splittingly annoying problem?

Either way it happens, you aren't getting a house right now. Even if they lower the prices it aint happening anytime soon.

I really wish people would quit going "Yoshi said personal housing will not cost as much".. cause he said that about FC housing too. That doesn't really count as a valid defense as Yoshi has already lied about the pricing of houses. For all we know he could turn around when the patch is coming out for personal housing and go "well there's still a lot of gil on the servers, so we've had to adjust prices for that"... because the first gil sink didn't work.

I've also played a good deal of MMOs.. and never seen a "hard to obtain" house in and of itself. Hard to obtain upgrades for the house, hard to obtain decorative items.. but never the house itself, be that personal or guild hall.

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Originally Posted by Edellis

What were you guys doing with this game before Housing was implemented that makes this such a gut-splittingly annoying problem?

Either way it happens, you aren't getting a house right now. Even if they lower the prices it aint happening anytime soon.

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Waiting for housing to be available in 2.1.

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Originally Posted by Edellis

What were you guys doing with this game before Housing was implemented that makes this such a gut-splittingly annoying problem?

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We were saving up for housing, looking forward to it. :)

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Either way it happens, you aren't getting a house right now. Even if they lower the prices it aint happening anytime soon.

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Actually, if my FC was on your server, we could actually buy a house. :) Your smallest house starts at 4 million gil. The smallest house on my server costs 20 million. For the land. :)

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

It's not pretty much false, i've played multiple MMOs with difficult to obtain guild constructs (houses, airships, etc- the latter in DDO) The only game ive played where any form of housing is "entry level" is FFXI where everyone starts the game with it (but it is comparably simplistic and for a long time was completely private).

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It's very false. Entry level doesn't mean completely free. It means that most guilds can afford getting the least costly option, or the basic structure with no rare/costly furniture without many problems, and that's how it is in most MMORPG, if not all, that feature any kind of guild housing.

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Originally Posted by Abriael

It's very false. Entry level doesn't mean completely free. It means that most guilds can afford getting the least costly option, or the basic structure with no rare/costly furniture without many problems, and that's how it is in most MMORPG, if not all, that feature any kind of guild housing.

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Guilds CAN afford the least costly option, they just don't really want to pay it, especially when they know it will get cheaper and there is still plen-teee of space of available.

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Originally Posted by LiadansWhisper

We were saving up for housing, looking forward to it. :)



Actually, if my FC was on your server, we could actually buy a house. :) Your smallest house starts at 4 million gil. The smallest house on my server costs 20 million. For the land. :)

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The Gil on your server is not the same as the Gil on my server, so that's actually debatable. Which is sort of what this is all about. 4 million might as well be 20 million for me.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

Guilds CAN afford the least costly optin, they just don't really want to pay it.

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If that is actually true, why did Yoshi himself say that the pricing options are set in such a way that only 80% of FC's will have a house in 3 months? That's not a large house, or a medium house.. he said the prices were set so that 80% of the FC's would be able to own a house in 3 months.. that includes the small ones. The prices were intentionally put out of people's reaches, after giving a false estimate of what it would cost for the smallest one (3-5 people getting from 1-50).

There are actually houses built on Balmung (having just checked the zones)

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Originally Posted by Edellis

The Gil on your server is not the same as the Gil on my server, so that's actually debatable. Which is sort of what this is all about. 4 million might as well be 20 million for me.

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Not True.

The cash my small FC on Durandal has amassed was made without using the market boards. We made this gil from quest rewards, levequest rewards and main scenario rewards. If I recall correctly, those rewards are the same on your server as they are on everyone else's. We have 1.2 million. So, a small house on YOUR cheap-cheapety-cheapest server is exceedingly attainable.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

Guilds CAN afford the least costly option, they just don't really want to pay it, especially when they know it will get cheaper and there is still plen-teee of space of available.

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No. They can't. 20 millions (or 40) are a while lot/unaffordable when you don't have over 40-50 members. And there's a large number of guilds that are smaller. Which is why in other MMORPGs entry level guild housing is much more affordable, not to unfairly penalize the playstyle of those that prefer smaller, closer knit guilds.

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Originally Posted by Antanias

There are actually houses built on Balmung (having just checked the zones)

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You should have read the post too, would have saved you the trip. Yes, there are a whole two houses, meaning that the overwhelming majority of the server is homeless. I checked myself before posting.

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Originally Posted by TrystWildkey

Not True.

The cash my small FC on Durandal has amassed was made without using the market boards. We made this gil from quest rewards, levequest rewards and main scenario rewards. If I recall correctly, those rewards are the same on your server as they are on everyone else's. We have 1.2 million. So, a small house on YOUR cheap-cheapety-cheapest server is exceedingly attainable.

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Problem with this thought: you are now out of almost all quests, out of main scenario, and left only to levequests, but still have 2.8 million to go. Think you'll amass another 1.2 million just as quickly? Very doubtful; you could use the market boards, but sales have slowed to a snail's pace.

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Originally Posted by Peptaru

Problem with this thought: you are now out of almost all quests, out of main scenario, and left only to levequests, but still have 2.8 million to go. Think you'll amass another 1.2 million just as quickly? Very doubtful; you could use the market boards, but sales have slowed to a snail's pace.

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Ah, but there is new content in 2.1. New daily beastmen quests. Higher gil rewards for duty roulette. So far, it feels like the cash is coming in quicker for us now than it was before.

If we were on Brynhildr, we'd be happily working towards a FC house, in fact, probably changing our minds and working towards a Medium instead of Small. When the goal is reachable without taking up ALL of your game time, it's a good goal. But with the prices on Durandal, it's out of reach.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

economy isn't really paralyzed, most people on legacy servers just said to hell with it and started buying/selling normally. As the prices come down people may reconsider their options...

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

Maybe on your server, but things seem pretty normal on Hyperion.

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You must be on a different Hyperion Server than me.

- Food does not sell like it did before
- Crafting Mats do not sell like they did before
- Crafted Gear does not sell like it did before
- Materia does not sell like it did before | Price dropped drastically
- Philo Mats do no sell like they did before | Price dropped drastically

and so on, etc...

So please enlighten me how buying/selling is currently "normal", it is by far not. I usually made between 700k - 900k Profit a Week, and the last week i did with the very same Items 120k.. ( i am not a "try hard", but i am aiming for a steady income ). I am not worried about my Income, i actually found a couple Items i can sell, to get the same Profit again, but saying that everything is "normal" is simply not the truth. Abriael is pretty much right and that goes esp. for Legacy Servers.

I have no clue how you make your Gil, but obviously not on the Markets.

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Originally Posted by Abriael

No. They can't. 20 millions (or 40) are a while lot/unaffordable when you don't have over 40-50 members. And there's a large number of guilds that are smaller. Which is why in other MMORPGs entry level guild housing is much more affordable, not to unfairly penalize the playstyle of those that prefer smaller, closer knit guilds.

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There are also people who didn't have legacy characters and made them on those servers. My guild was almost on a legacy server (thankfully locking character creation early on caused us to switch in order to get everyone on the same server).

The legacy server's Market Board prices are not 5x's higher than the other servers, maybe they were at launch but that has long since passed. They are very much in line with other servers now. They don't get rewarded anymore for quests than we do. So if they can't sell things for a higher cost than us on the Market Board, and can't get more money from quests than us.. why exactly should their housing be 5x higher at it's cheapest? There is not a way currently in the game to make gil faster than any other server, so their prices are very much out of reach and I can sympathize.

My guild is probably going to be able to afford a medium sized house (which is what we're aiming for) within around 4-5 months. If we were on a legacy server that'd be a small house for the same amount of work.

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Originally Posted by Abriael

And this is pretty much false. Guild housing is definitely accessible at the entry level in most other MMORPGs. The problem is exactly that there's no entry level on FFXIV's legacy servers.

I can't remember a single MMORPG in which an overwhelming percentages of guilds couldn't afford entry level housing upon implementation, and this is made even worse here by the fact that there's no other kind of housing for now.

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Lineage II. Guild halls either required you to win the auctions (which were overpriced), win a castle through castle sieges (for which you needed resources as well as manpower while hoping you don't get double-crossed at any point during the siege) or the PvP forts.

So if you were in a small clan, you better price gauge/RMT/bot your way to riches to try to win an auction (in a game that had a horrid economy due to the Grim Collector bug that NC Soft never took steps to deal with other than fix the quest), because PvP forts were always up for grabs and you could get outn umbered so quickly it wouldn't be even funny. And LOL at any hopes of taking a castle for the aforementioned reasons.

Suffice to say, no we didn't have guild housing obtainable on day 1 of implementation.

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Originally Posted by Sunarie

*lots of truth*

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It's rare that I see a player from a cheaper server group actually understanding the issue. Thank you!!

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Originally Posted by Duelle

Lineage II. Guild halls either required you to win the auctions (which were overpriced), win a castle through castle sieges (for which you needed resources as well as manpower while hoping you don't get double-crossed at any point during the siege) or the PvP forts.

So if you were in a small clan, you better price gauge/RMT/bot your way to riches to try to win an auction (in a game that had a horrid economy due to the Grim Collector bug that NC Soft never took steps to deal with other than fix the quest), because PvP forts were always up for grabs and you could get outn umbered so quickly it wouldn't be even funny. And LOL at any hopes of taking a castle for the aforementioned reasons.

Suffice to say, no we didn't have guild housing obtainable on day 1 of implementation.

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Was pricing different between worlds, or consistent?

The daily beastmen quests will give you about 480g x 6 - cost of teleport if you teleport. You will need to spend all day in duty roulette to pull in some real cash, and that's what... 750 minus repairs, give or take, plus whatever drops in the dungeons. Then if you run any new content, you won't be pulling in gil, just using money on repairs. Yes it can all be positive gil flow, but it's nowhere near fast for people who don't spend 6-8 hours a day in roulette.

The fastest way, I think, may be guildhests. Your point, "When the goal is reachable without taking up ALL of your game time, it's a good goal," is on point, but that's exactly what it is right now. It takes all of a player's focus and time to make money for a house they might be able to afford in months, if they're on a cheap server. On an expensive server... just lol.

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Originally Posted by Edellis

The Gil on your server is not the same as the Gil on my server, so that's actually debatable. Which is sort of what this is all about. 4 million might as well be 20 million for me.

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Doubtful. I made exactly the same amount of gil leveling up that you did. I'm a new player, not Legacy.

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Originally Posted by Duelle

Some guy said MOST mmorpgs, so I'll counter with ONE example. . .

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One example still means MOST is valid. Your entire point was... idk... meaningless?

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Originally Posted by TrystWildkey

Not True.

The cash my small FC on Durandal has amassed was made without using the market boards. We made this gil from quest rewards, levequest rewards and main scenario rewards. If I recall correctly, those rewards are the same on your server as they are on everyone else's. We have 1.2 million. So, a small house on YOUR cheap-cheapety-cheapest server is exceedingly attainable.

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The costs wern't scaled to quest rewards leves and scenarios...they were scaled to the player economy and amount of gil in circulation between active players.

Besides, 1.2 million is only 30% the cost of the lowest plot. Your FC has a ways to go.

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Originally Posted by TrystWildkey

Was pricing different between worlds, or consistent?

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It was consistent, but as I said, NC Soft's people didnt really care about the economy, outside of "let's price this so that it takes anyone who is legit a lot of time or luck to get this much money together".

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Originally Posted by Peptaru

One example still means MOST is valid. Your entire point was... idk... meaningless?

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He claimed to not remember any MMORPG having housing unobtainable on day 1 of implementation. I mentioned one example of such.

The point, which you seemed to miss, is that this wasn't something that the devs wanted obtainable within a day. Yoshida took a page from the old school designs and korean MMOs because otherwise every FC from here to Atomos would have a house and add yet another item to the eternal whine list of "I have nothing to do".

I may raise a fuss if personal housing has the prices currently listed for FC Housing. As things stand I see the intent of the devs and simply shrug my shoulders.

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Originally Posted by Sunarie

If that is actually true, why did Yoshi himself say that the pricing options are set in such a way that only 80% of FC's will have a house in 3 months?

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Can afford and willingness to pay are two different things. Remember that the prices were also set with the understanding that gil generation is higher now (and it definitely is).

I'm not saying I think the prices are just right at the moment, but they are intentionally set up to go down over time. They are/were simply concerned with not having enough space initially. They admitted that the pricing particularly on legacy worlds was excesesive and that's why they're going to scale it back down. The first price drop (ignoring the regular devaluations) is to take place at the end of the month (next week), at which point I and quite a few people might be able to consider buying a small house. 80% in 3 months means a smaller percentage sooner. It only took a week before one of the larger companies was able to buy a large house with contributions from all their members. Larger company = larger house, only makes sense.

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Originally Posted by Edellis

The costs wern't scaled to quest rewards leves and scenarios...they were scaled to the player economy and amount of gil in circulation between active players.

Besides, 1.2 million is only 30% the cost of the lowest plot. Your FC has a ways to go.

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They were scaled to amount of gil on the server. Absolutely not to gil in circulation. The Market Board is an excellent indicator of gil in circulation. The more gil in circulation, the higher the prices because the "value" of each individual gil is less when there is more gil available. As I've stated before, their Market prices are not any different from ours. Meaning they can make the same amount (or very close to) from the Market as we do. Problem is their servers have a few people (Yoshi cited a whooping 10) who have over 100 million gil. There's nothing to support that those individuals are putting the total of their gil back into the economy for all to benefit from.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

I'm not saying I think the prices are just right at the moment, but they are intentionally set up to go down over time. They are/were simply concerned with not having enough space initially. They admitted that the pricing particularly on legacy worlds was excesesive and that's why they're going to scale it back down. The first price drop (ignoring the regular devaluations) is to take place at the end of the month (next week), at which

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Honestly, that would have sat a lot better with me -if- they'd been honest with it up front (as far as my server goes, still wouldn't be okay with legacy prices). Instead they lied about housing costs drastically, and continued to hype the feature as the main part of 2.1, and to hype it as if it would be easy for everyone to get access to. That led to false expectations that could never be close to being met with the patch.. and that's going to anger people.

They mislead their customer base... that I am definitely not okay with, and I expect them to hold true to their promises. I don't blame players one bit for being upset, and I fully support people complaining about this one. Customer trust is a huge thing, you don't go and do something that causes a lot of players to lose it.

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Originally Posted by Peptaru

One example still means MOST is valid. Your entire point was... idk... meaningless?

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Exactly. And Lineage is an extremely outdated anyway. It's not nearly within market standards.

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Originally Posted by Duelle

The point, which you seemed to miss, is that this wasn't something that the devs wanted obtainable within a day. Yoshida took a page from the old school designs and korean MMOs

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Taking a page from bad design is not a good idea.

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because otherwise every FC from here to Atomos would have a house and add yet another item to the eternal whine list of "I have nothing to do".

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False, because the concept of well designed housing is to let people buy the basic house and then making them work hard for rare furniture or to expand. You don't immediately run out of things to do once you buy a small house. Not even close.

Keep the strawman arguments coming :D

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Originally Posted by Duelle

I may raise a fuss if personal housing has the prices currently listed for FC Housing. As things stand I see the intent of the devs and simply shrug my shoulders.

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I wouldn't place my hopes or trust in that. They said the same thing about FC housing - that it would be affordable with only 3-5 players pooling their 1-50 gil on one job.

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Originally Posted by Edellis

The costs wern't scaled to quest rewards leves and scenarios...they were scaled to the player economy and amount of gil in circulation between active players.

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I have serious doubt about that part, it sure sounded like SE's definition of "in circulation" includes the amount that sits in people's wallet, which is an extremely flawed position to take.

Coming from Balmung myself I'd have to say I disagree with the paralyzed economy statement. Sure some things have shifted since it's easier to get some times of items now, but that's natural since the dynamics of the supply have changed. We most certainly do have a functioning economy.