PSA: Purchasing a Personal Room can result in being unable to leave a Free Company

A situation that has unfolded recently on Balmung in the community has brought a rather serious issue to light.

The thread can be viewed here: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...-Estate-Access

Short version:
-If people cannot access their Personal Rooms, they can't clear their furniture out.

-If they can't clear their rooms, they can't vacate and demolish their rooms.

-Without being able to demolish their rooms, they can't leave the FC.

There needs to be a way to access your Personal Room directly through the front door, or give us the option to demolish from the menu anywhere (like say, the front lawn of the FC house.)

Take extreme caution when purchasing Personal Rooms! If the guild leader wants to, they can force you to stay in the Free Company against your wishes (you apparently cannot even transfer off-server to get away if you can't leave your FC)!

Edit: The situation is specifically if the FC leader revokes Guest Access and then won't let anyone into the house, thus, no members can get in and get to their rooms to demolish them.

While you make a good point, I feel really confused that you made a second post to link to a post that was made yesterday.

Whoops! I didn't see this post before I made my own thread.

why can't we put our private room in some kind of fourth dimension and when we move to a new FC or new house, the room will be transferred with everything in the room stay in their positions? Shouldn't be a hard task for SE programmers.

This is still a problem? I remember this being brought up months before Heavensward. I can't believe this is still around.

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Originally Posted by Saint_Angeles

While you make a good point, I feel really confused that you made a second post to link to a post that was made yesterday.

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Because the purpose of my thread is to call attention to the issue in general. I don't know how many people visit the housing forums regularly, for one, two, this gets a serious oversight more exposure and hopefully a developer will notice. The link is just so people can go and read more about the actual situation if they'd like to, not just the general problem.

Theyu really should take that off the permissions -_-;; Giving an FC leader thatr much power is just gonna get abused.

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Originally Posted by Saint_Angeles

While you make a good point, I feel really confused that you made a second post to link to a post that was made yesterday.

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The housing subforum moves like molasses. Posting it in the General Discussion subforum gives it more exposure and hence more visibility. This means more people who play the game will know of this -and- gives it the voice needed for community managers to bring it up to the development team.

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Originally Posted by Evangela

why can't we put our private room in some kind of fourth dimension and when we move to a new FC or new house, the room will be transferred with everything in the room stay in their positions? Shouldn't be a hard task for SE programmers.

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This so much... I'm in an FC hoping to upgrade to a medium house with forced evictions in a month. I would like to get a room, but I don't want to only to have to get a new one in a month...

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Originally Posted by Azazua_azura

Theyu really should take that off the permissions -_-;; Giving an FC leader thatr much power is just gonna get abused.

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Agreed. Or short of that, the option to leave a FC should override any other parameter the FC sets. I suppose the working logic behind this is to prevent people stealing stuff from a FC, but now we have the opposite problem.

WOW how ist his not fixed, laso if the fc leader was gone for over a month shouldn't it had defautled to one of the officers?

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Originally Posted by Cylestea

WOW how ist his not fixed, laso if the fc leader was gone for over a month shouldn't it had defautled to one of the officers?

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According to the recounting of events by one of those involved, the FC leader would login every 29th day to ensure that it wouldn't default.

This sort of stuff has been going on pretty much since the room feature was added. I thought it was fixed when reports of this stopped, but apparently it wasn't fixed. <_>

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Originally Posted by Sove92

This sort of stuff has been going on pretty much since the room feature was added. I thought it was fixed when reports of this stopped, but apparently it wasn't fixed. <_>

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Ohhhh wow. This is still pretty horrible and I hope it is changed. Just because others were resolved (aka leader being shamed, getting what they wanted etc) that doesn't mean it should continue.

I'm a little disheartened by the fact that this kinda thing happened a year ago and we still have the same issue. Also by the fact that the GMs weren't able to do anything - I feel like SE as a company should have afforded the GMs more power and enabled them to go in and remove the items for the players so they could be free in this kind of situation.

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Originally Posted by Sove92

This sort of stuff has been going on pretty much since the room feature was added. I thought it was fixed when reports of this stopped, but apparently it wasn't fixed. <_>

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Jeez the GMs have no agency at all do they.

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Originally Posted by Sove92

This sort of stuff has been going on pretty much since the room feature was added. I thought it was fixed when reports of this stopped, but apparently it wasn't fixed. <_>

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This is absolutely wild and I wish we could get this fixed. People shouldn't be held hostage in a game.

This is making me extremely happy I've now found an FC leader I trust. I would not want to be stuck in an FC for who knows how long while the FC leader just does whatever they want. The only thing I would have to do is -wait-, quit or make an entirely new character. None of these are options that I find particularly... pleasing.

I'd heard about this sort of problem a long time ago, but had thought it was long since fixed. Disheartening to hear it still isn't. :(

Why is access to the FC house even an assignable option? It makes sense that things like changing the furniture or harvesting the garden is assignable, but all members of an FC should automatically have access to the house itself. If not, then how can it even be considered an FC house?

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Originally Posted by Niwashi

Why is access to the FC house even an assignable option? It makes sense that things like changing the furniture or harvesting the garden is assignable, but all members of an FC should automatically have access to the house itself. If not, then how can it even be considered an FC house?

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it's not an awful feature for probationary members. it should just be fixed.

i do tink what SE needs to do is what the personal rooms aren't placed on the fc house, but place them more as a gc rooms enabled to you because you are member x fc, or simply remove the whole be member of a fc and place it on the gc side only

Something I posted in the linked thread but should warrant being mentioned here. If you are unable to leave your free company because of being held hostage due to private chambers, you can't transfer server because you're still in an FC.

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Originally Posted by Paladinleeds

Something I posted in the linked thread but should warrant being mentioned here. If you are unable to leave your free company because of being held hostage due to private chambers, you can't transfer server because you're still in an FC.

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Can't a simple call to a GM resolve this pretty swiftly?

I mean, it's obviously a problem, and players should be able to enter their private chamber regardless of whether the house has been locked. Certainly you ought to be able to vacate it without accessing it. But, I'd think that this would fall under the terms of abuse since one player is absolutely interfering with another player's ability to enjoy the game.

Everyone involved called GMs and were unable to be helped. I don't know the language used to speak with them, but there was also a previous situation a year ago where something similar happened and even then - the GMs were unable to help. My only guess is that the GMs themselves are limited in how they can handle that kind of situation. Outside of SE giving them more power - the only solution available is for the devs to fix this glaring flaw and make sure it never happens again.

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Originally Posted by SendohJin

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Originally Posted by Niwashi

Why is access to the FC house even an assignable option? It makes sense that things like changing the furniture or harvesting the garden is assignable, but all members of an FC should automatically have access to the house itself. If not, then how can it even be considered an FC house?

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it's not an awful feature for probationary members. it should just be fixed.

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It's every bit as true for probationary members as it is for anyone else. If the house is an FC house, then everyone who is a part of the FC (probationary or otherwise) should be guaranteed access to it. That's what makes it an FC house.

Having a probationary period is because some FCs like new members to be around and involved for a while before deciding whether and how much they can be trusted with stuff that could be detrimental if abused. That's rights like withdrawing items or gil from the FC Chest, decorating the estate, harvesting from the gardens, etc.

Entering the estate does not fall into that category. That's just about excluding them from taking part in the FC while just leeching off of their activities for FC points. (Indeed, when a member is genuinely probationary, it's all the more important for them to be able to be involved, since that's what the officers are supposed to be judging to determine when and whether to grant them more rights. Excluding them during the probationary period makes that period useless.)

Yeah you cannot transfer if you are part of an FC.

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Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

Can't a simple call to a GM resolve this pretty swiftly?

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unfortunately they seem unable/unwilling to resolve this issue.

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Originally Posted by Shofie

Because the purpose of my thread is to call attention to the issue in general. I don't know how many people visit the housing forums regularly, for one, two, this gets a serious oversight more exposure and hopefully a developer will notice. The link is just so people can go and read more about the actual situation if they'd like to, not just the general problem.

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I thank you for this. I rarely visit the forums aside from the General forum, (and rarely the DPS/Tank/Healer forums), because most of the time there's not any topics there worth responding to or the threads don't get replies for quite some time if ever. While I don't see the point in getting a private chamber personally, I still feel it's good to know about these types of risks in case I change my mind at some point or get one on a whim......

Reiterating that This is a terrifying flaw, and absolutely needs to be addressed asap. How many times has this happened that didn't have the benefit of social media to draw attention to it? This is entirely unfair to anyone in an FC and anyone who buys a room.

Does S-E know how inept they look when they allow situations like this to happen? There is a thread on the forum about a guy who has yet to get his account uneffed up for over 6 months now. Blizzard would have had his issue resolved in less than a day, if not an hour. I mean seriously, does S-E outsource its customer service to Steam?

If I were to experience this myself, did not give in to the petty demands of an immature player keeping me in an FC I do not want to be in anymore, I would very highly consider not playing the game anymore. At the point I am at (multiple 60s, lots of the gear I want etc) I would not enjoy making a new character just to get away.

I've tried to point these issues/threads to certain peoples' in Square Enix's community team on social media to no response whatsoever.

This flaw is ridiculosly easy to fix: If someone has a room in a FC house they CANNOT be locked out of said house regardless of what setting the FC leader has set. Thats all it takes.

Hahah this is awesome

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Originally Posted by Raiya

This flaw is ridiculosly easy to fix: If someone has a room in a FC house they CANNOT be locked out of said house regardless of what setting the FC leader has set. Thats all it takes.

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An even easier rule: If someone is a member of an FC, then they cannot be locked out of the FC's house under any circumstances. Since that would automatically include everyone who has a personal room, it would prevent any issues like the current problem. And in the meantime, it provides a bit more fairness to everyone else. There's no legitimate reason for locking FC members out of the FC's house.

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Originally Posted by Lurial

Everyone involved called GMs and were unable to be helped. I don't know the language used to speak with them, but there was also a previous situation a year ago where something similar happened and even then - the GMs were unable to help. My only guess is that the GMs themselves are limited in how they can handle that kind of situation. Outside of SE giving them more power - the only solution available is for the devs to fix this glaring flaw and make sure it never happens again.

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I understand and I'm not really sure how the GMs could justify not taking some form of action. If a player who owns a personal chamber is being prevented from accessing the FC house by the FC master, and thus cannot leave the FC or even transfer their character to a new world, I can't see how anyone can argue that this is not an abuse of power and therefore clearly a griefing tactic. I mean seriously, any FC leader petty enough to do this deserves a lengthy temp ban, among other things.

That said, the easiest way to take care of this is to make it so that any FC member can access the FC house regardless of the privacy options set on the estate.

Still I would like to see the community managers declare this type of abuse by FC leadership is a griefing tactic and will incur disciplinary action.

And the worst part of it: you cannot shame him/her on shouts, else they'll report you.. Sometimes I wonder if SE is sleeping or don't want to see it's errors..

as other suggested, if could be a simple fix.

not giving too much power over a person; they aren't god, only fc leaders..

I've got the chills thinking of my last FC leader; this could have been is scheming way of refraining people from quitting it's FC, then ask for a ransom to get our stuff back.. *goosebumps*

This needs to be bumped to the front page. Something needs to be done about this, especially when GMs refused to help and didn't (apparently) realize that they couldn't just leave the FC, as a GM advised them to do.

Simply, just let players select enter their rooms directly when clicking the house's main door from the garden.

But YoshiP had mentioned that DEV wanted fc members passthru the living room. ^^;

A player can be kicked from the fc even if they have a personal room, right? Then why can't they leave on their own... So stupid. Any housing options wouldn't even need to be changed. Just let people leave the fc and collect their stuff from the npc. SE really has no excuse to not have fixed this yesterday.

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Originally Posted by Niwashi

An even easier rule: If someone is a member of an FC, then they cannot be locked out of the FC's house... There's no legitimate reason for locking FC members out of the FC's house.

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Couldn't agree with you more. I can see no reason why the FC master should have that much power over Company members.
It's disturbing this doesn't seem to be covered under the rules against harassment and griefing.