A Residence Reborn - Instanced Housing the Right Way

This post is to outline an intensive break down on how to introduce an entirely new, instanced housing system, while leaving the current one intact (at least for now).

How We Put it All Together

The Social Hub

The social hub will replace the idea of a neighbour area. This location will be tailor made to show off the unique beauty of each residential area, while also creating places that will encourage players to come to the hub for more than just accessing the house.

GPose Heaven: Create specific locations designed specifically to give players amazing gpose backgrounds or interactable pieces. Flower walls, succulent and cactus gardens, under water gardens, a plethora of colorful fish, fireflies that come out at a certain place at night, all could be glorious. And a fancy outdoor picnic area complete with canopies, and adorable tables and chairs, and even fancy seating with, perhaps, unique /sit and /rest options?

https://i.ibb.co/gF9HbHk/Firefly-Hedge.png

https://i.ibb.co/1zRdtJw/Flower-Wall-Sketch.jpg https://i.ibb.co/FgmPCGg/Flower-Wall-04.png https://i.ibb.co/0Dx8bqV/Flower-Wall-03.png https://i.ibb.co/JBvFCbr/Flower-Wall-02.png https://i.ibb.co/WFP3mMd/Flower-Wall-01.png

Unique Settings/Activities: Underwater sunbathing in a Limsa bubble? A large scale maze with jumping puzzles within to help orient yourself in the maze in Gridania? Dune surfing in Ul’dah? The sky is the limit! Though, I have some quick sketches and photoshops to demonstrate.
https://i.ibb.co/jgcQhWM/Underwater-Sunbathing.png

https://i.ibb.co/12W35HH/Sharky-Shadow-Sunbathing.png
https://i.ibb.co/SJrkMqn/Maze-and-Firefly-Hedge.png https://i.ibb.co/5kQPRTj/Gridania-Bridge.png

Basically, imagine if every City, instead of a Neighbourhood (times x number of wards) was essentially 1 zone like Lyhe Mheg; an amazing, contained expression of utter joy and creation. And...maybe we can have some new emotes inspired by these areas. Personally, I would love to cheekily lean out from behind a cactus, or have sunbathing options on interactable towels. What about “Shaded View” where you lift your hand and look up rather than peering about like with /lookout? Or some poses with our hands held in ways like we are cradling a flower, or a firefly? What about a dramatic hand-to-head faint? Or a victorian/edwardian style swoon?

The Instanced Plot

Housing is already instanced. What is not is the plot. Essentially, an instanced plot would all have the same max capacity in terms of size, but those parts that were not unlocked would be “covered” in foliage, thus incorporating the plot into the greater background without having to actually create different sized plots. Ideally, the process would be that you would have more options in customizing this upgradeable plot. For this suggestion I have added XLarge to the list because why not dream big.

Backgrounds
3-4 “backgrounds” that would act as your surroundings in the outside portion of the plot. This would essentially be like 360 degree views from your house that you could choose and change.

Foliage
3 levels of sparse to lush for the foliage around the plot that has not yet been unlocked. This would basically have the first level, and just add more plants/rocks/cacti into the barren spaces as you increased it, rather than having 3 wholly separate foliage types.

Housing Footprint
More options on housing placement on the plot.
https://i.ibb.co/2tz1WGk/Plot-Size.png
Small House Position Options on XL Plot
https://i.ibb.co/pZWZtsn/Small-House-on-XL-Plot.png
Medium House Position Options on L Plot
https://i.ibb.co/9bx7KYC/Medium-House-on-Large-Plot.png
XLarge House Position Options on L Plot
https://i.ibb.co/hdRQF5n/XLarge-House-on-Large-Plot.png

Separate House and Plot Upgrade
If you want a tiny cottage on a very large plot of land that you want to treat as a farm, or if you want the biggest house possible on the smallest plot possible, this should be an option. There should be some limitations, such as you can only go up one house size for each plot size. Ie, you can have a Medium house on a Small plot (and have almost no yard space), but you couldn’t have an Extra Large house on the Medium plot.

A Market Board at the Gate
The social hub would have one or more gates that open up a menu like with apartments. Place a Market Board at every Gate so that simply exiting your property would have you at the MB in no time. Additionally, when leaving a House, have the option to leave the house, or leave the plot. This should be the same as entering via the Gate.

Optional Display of Yards
Since the social hub is where housing is accessed, it could be possible to have a certain number of plots around one or two sides of the hub that show off the exterior of houses. One would expect there would be an opt in feature within the Housing tab and X number of plots would be randomly selected each week. You could not enter the plot from the social hub, but there could be a plaque on the wall/fence that had the details/address so that you could visit it in the same way as apartments. I do not know how difficult it would be to take a “snapshot” of a plot and smack it into an out-of-bounds area. This is simply an optional suggestion to help counter the concern of not being able to easily show off property exteriors. However, I do think that we could also see an increase in content of people exploring instanced yards because of them being not viewable at large, generally in the theme of streams and videos.

What We Do with the Old System

I am operating under the assumption that instanced plots would be highly desired. Thus, it is my belief that as people leave our regular system for instanced plots, those plots in the regular system should be removed/condensed. How this would work would be via collapsing the wards down. When someone moves from Ward 20, Plot 16 into instanced housing, then Ward 21, Plot 16, would automatically get moved to Ward 20. Ideally, the coding would work in such a way that the highest number ward moves to the lowest number ward. This would require more coding than simply waiting for an entire ward to be abandoned, but it is much less likely to result in a small handful of standouts scattered all throughout the wards. Of course, this transfer would have to leave everything intact and not require people to redo their layouts. Since they are transferring to the same plot, this should, conceivably, be possible.

A Historic District

There is also the option of allowing for a small number of normal wards to remain. My personal thought would be around 5 wards that maintain the original layout. Of course, they would have to perfect the system of buying houses in the Historical Wards before even really considering this option. These Historical Plots would also not get any of the new benefits or upgrade options that the instanced plot system would have.

A Terrible Timer Turnaround

Speaking of the current housing system, we can all agree that the random timer system is horrible. It mostly fixes the problem of players gouging other players financially and replaces it with a system that can literally be a detriment to the wellbeing and health of those camping the signs for a house. At least in the old system we didn’t have people clicking on a sign on a laptop while driving to work, or spending 3 days with nothing but power naps to get by. So what is the solution?

It’s time to move to a lottery. We already have lottery systems in place. We already have the ability for the game to limit you to one per server. We need to bring these together. Here are my suggestions:

1. When a plot is abandoned there is a 4-6 hour window where people can enter their name into the lottery for that plot. This is not a hidden timer.
2. The gil cost for that plot is reserved and inaccessible until the lottery is over.
3. A player may enter no more than two plotteries at the same time.
4. A player can remove their name from a plottery at any time by going to the plot in question and removing it from the menu there.
5. If a player wishes to change the plot they would like to enter and already have their names in two plotteries, an option to replace one will appear when attempting to enter the third or subsequent plotteries. This will remove the need to return to a previous found plot to remove their name before entering the new plottery.
6. If the player wins one of the two plotteries, their name is automatically removed from the other.
7. In the event that two timers complete at the same time, there is a short period after the end time of the plottery to resolve any issues with winners entered into two lotteries, though this should not really ever happen.
8. Plottery locations a player has entered would be observed in the Housing menu.

And, clearly this is destined to be because “plottery” for a lottery based solely on achieving a plot of land is perfect. GIVE US THE PLOTTERY!

Nay to No Neighbourhoods (Paid)

A further option would be to allow neighbourhoods in a limited way. Like with retainers, we pay 2USD a month for access to them. My suggestion here would be to also allow for a monthly fee for a house in a small neighbourhood consisting of a max of 20 plots.

This one is likely the most difficult and controversial. My thought process would be that these plots act in the same way as instanced plots in regard to upgrading, but would not have the option to change scenery, obviously. For access to the paid neighbourhood, and rent, I would think 2USD a month might be suitable enough, but realistically one would want to see these neighbourhoods essentially pay for themselves, thus not costing the company any more than they are making to run them, and thus having the ability to, cost effectively, host as many as desired.

FC Neighbourhoods

With this system I could also see the option to purchase the first month of an entire 20 plot neighbourhood. FCs could collect payment from interested players and make the initial 40USD purchase and receive a code that would have to be added to a player’s mog station account to claim their first free month and confirm payment for future months. Once the neighbourhood is in place the purchaser could go in and have first pick of the plots. Perhaps with these pre-purchased neighbourhoods a password/code would be required on the plot plaque when purchasing your plot to guarantee that these plots got to the right people.

I am not sure if the 2USD a month should come with a “small plot” by default that you can then upgrade for Gil, or if the monthly fee should only pay for the access and continued contribution to the neighbourhood as a whole. I am leaning towards the purchase of the plot maintaining the same Gil amount as it would be to purchase an instanced plot of the same size, thus making the two plots equal and the only difference being the neighbourhood which is being paid for.

There is also the problem of once people leave an FC, or the housing plot within the neighbourhood. My thought is that the intention would be to have all paid neighbourhoods at full or near full capacity at all times. Otherwise they are not paying for themselves. This would inevitably result in things not staying as a cohesive group but the same is true when current FCs try to get a bunch of members to buy houses during a new ward release. However, this might also not be a bad thing. People could also move from one paid neighbourhood to another in a similar way to how things function at present, so maybe there could be a neighbourhood message board where people could post that they were seeking to purchase a house in a certain FC neighbourhood and see if anyone wanted to move to allow them to do so.

Would a Paid Neighbourhood Cause Abuse of the System?

My initial thought would be no, because these neighbourhoods would not be limited. Because they pay for themselves, there is no need to cap the resources put into them like we have to do for the present system. At least, that is the ideal scenario.

Could You Lose Your Paid Neighbourhood Home?

Yes. You are paying for access to a specific feature. If you stop paying for that feature, it goes away. This is difficult because it is a monthly payment so a warning would not work. And there really could not be a grace period because people would likely pay for a month, grace for a month, pay for a month, and repeat. They could lock access to everything on the lot, including the house, until the fee is paid, but there are also people who would set up the house to their liking and then let it stay locked and not use it.

I feel like the most acceptable option would be that if you stop paying, the lot is transferred to a regular instanced lot. Since these lots are all the same, just one is in a paid neighbourhood and one is completely instanced, this would preserve everything in and around the house as it was. At that point the paid neighbourhood lot could be locked for 2 weeks, giving the player an option to reinitiate the payment and return the plot to its original location. This seems like the most ideal options since the player would lose nothing that they have crafted in either their house or the yard, but would also prevent abuse of the system and allow SE to maintain paid neighbourhoods at full capacity.

Hello, Eoko!

I'm not into any special circle of knowledge, but, while yes I would love for something like this, I doubt it will happen.

The upfront costs of designing and implementing this system would need to be dealt with. In the United states every year there is a NDAA (national defense authorization act) basically a little budget summary of what is needed to sustain and upgrade our national defense strategy. Basically a list of ideas and costs for the year. This is a rough summary of that act, there are all kinds of politics and underhanded stuff snuck in there, but that is beyond my point for this conversation. Let's say at the onset of planning for an expansion or some large update, the dev team comes up with a roughly equivalent list of ideas/hopes and a rough budget /cost scheme in there. They probably don't get to do this yearly but probably once per expansion. They would have to list this among those options for the expansion. This will be heavily scrutinized by who ever is in charge of allocating whatever funds are available for the game. I'm almost certain there has been a genuine discussion among the development team and Yoshi-P and Yoshi-P and his select committee to the board of fund approvers detailing a need to address the housing situation but it is probably being shot down, time after time and thus we get the update on the situation we recently got. That and also as legitimate or not as it may be the COVID-19 response has greatly affected the ability to add physical systems needed to really give relief to the strained system.

I'm sure you know all or some of this, but adding a recurring payment system to this to sustain it is a good idea. It is that initial cost that is probably having a hard time being justified in the eyes of the key handlers of the game. The Dev team is good, I do have my complaints specifically about PVP and the ward system of housing, but I think they are making every effort they realistically can short of like protesting and striking and potentially losing their jobs. In general I feel the dev team is passionate for the game, and I'm thankful for a lot of what is there. But yes, for the record, I like the idea.

Oh, yeah. I don't think it will happen. And there would be a fairly major initial cost. My thought is that if the numbers are crunched, then the initial cost of the new system, plus the saving I assume it could generate, would then be more cost effective than the present and continued cost of the present system, plus inevitable future Ishgard. Of course, this also has to take into account the life of the game. Though, I would think that an instanced system would be exceptionally better as the game goes start to drift, or if another FF MMO comes out down the line. As players leave the game or log in much less frequently, more and more instanced houses would not have to load. Whereas, if wards start to become sparsely populated, but say 20% of people are still present in a ward... they still have to maintain that whole ward.

I know Yoshi P also wants to redo textures, because they weren't done in high res to start with. At the end of the day it would all come down to money, I would think. Totally random numbers, but if it cost 250k to implement the new system, and that new system, even with some historical wards, then cost 25k a year to maintain, then after 5 years it might have cost them 375k. But, if the present system costs them 100k a year to maintain, over five years that's 500k. So while it would be a 150k increase over the initial housing budget of that first year, it would save them 125k in the long run, and only continue to save them more over time. That is assuming that instanced housing would indeed be cheaper, which I feel like it might be since basically every other MMO does it that way. It's all a numbers game, and I would hope they would be crunching the numbers over a 5 year plan, since we're definitely getting 6.0, have about another year of 5.X, and could possibly see a 7.0.

But no, I don't think they'll change it. I think it's been like this for so long they are just going to bite the bullet and deal with people getting extremely frustrated every time the housing crunch pressure starts to build again.

I would very much like to see the bloody timer go though. If nothing else, do the plottery. The current system is atrocious.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

At the end of the day it would all come down to money,

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I imagine it's less an issue of money and far more one of time. Creating an Ishgard housing district was primarily adapting the existing housing district code and adding new textures. Creating what you suggest would mean writing completely new code.

You can't just throw money around to make that happen. There's a lot more to it than hiring a couple of extra employees.

While I do like your ideas, I agree it might be asking a bit too much. I'd happily settle for a simpler (i.e. cheaper) system. They could use the unused exits in the existing wards in ARR areas to access the instances and use the MB and Bells already in place. In fact, that might do something to breathe a little life into the existing wards, where it can be unusual to see other players.

I don't like the idea of a lottery so much because it's going to be massively unfair. RNG doesn't care how long you've been waiting for a house, or if you really want one or are just entering the lottery on a whim. I can only imagine the upset when people who have been waiting months see a few lucky new players get houses as soon as they hit 50!

I would love to have instanced housing and the ability to select where to put my house on a plot. Cool ideas!

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

I imagine it's less an issue of money and far more one of time. Creating an Ishgard housing district was primarily adapting the existing housing district code and adding new textures. Creating what you suggest would mean writing completely new code.

You can't just throw money around to make that happen. There's a lot more to it than hiring a couple of extra employees.

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Except you absolutely can just throw money at it, and it is completely about just hiring a "couple" extra employees. If you think of the social hub, they are a reflection of the area. This is resource reuse heaven. Steal a undersea bubble from The Ruby Sea, put some local undersea fauna from Costa del Sol. This is not new coding or design. This is using what is already present. The maze? We already have assets for a maze from the valentine's event. Sure, that one is small. But assets do exist. And building the maze itself? Heck, you could use an algorithm just to generate the placement of the hedges. And sure there would still need to be new designs and modeling done. But there are probably thousands of coders and designers out of work right now that would be capable of these things.

With housing, we already have coding for instanced zones, and houses. We already have limitations on size, and placement, and footprints. I would say the biggest feat might be the "backdrops" and even then, they have the backdrops already in place from the wards. Just pick 4 locations from a plot position and place existing foliage around. Heck, auto-generate random houses from standard items to fill space instead of just using foliage. These backgrounds don't have hit boxes or floors to worry about. No entrances/exits to housing or wards. We also already have the ability to relocate a house. And sure, we can't have all our items placed, but that is because the current system doesn't know what size of house you are going to end up moving to. If it was a 1:1 change, they could easily write the code to place everything in the same spot. I mean, the code of where that spot is in relation to the size of the plot is already there too. It's more using what we already have.

But... yeah. Still all about money.

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Originally Posted by Solarra

I don't like the idea of a lottery so much because it's going to be massively unfair. RNG doesn't care how long you've been waiting for a house, or if you really want one or are just entering the lottery on a whim. I can only imagine the upset when people who have been waiting months see a few lucky new players get houses as soon as they hit 50!

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I think you might be misconstruing what fairness actually is. A lottery is fair. No one has an advantage. Everyone is on the same chances of obtaining the house. What is massively unfair is people using bots to camp a sign. Having waited 3 years to get a house and losing a lottery is not unfair, it is unlucky. Nor should a game let you have something just because you were around longer. That brand new level 50 player sprout, who managed to collect 3mil gil has just as much right to that house as someone who has been trying to get one since they started the game. Playtime does not entitle you to anything, except subscription rewards.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

I think you might be misconstruing what fairness actually is. A lottery is fair. No one has an advantage. Everyone is on the same chances of obtaining the house. What is massively unfair is people using bots to camp a sign. Having waited 3 years to get a house and losing a lottery is not unfair, it is unlucky. Nor should a game let you have something just because you were around longer. That brand new level 50 player sprout, who managed to collect 3mil gil has just as much right to that house as someone who has been trying to get one since they started the game. Playtime does not entitle you to anything, except subscription rewards.

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Walking up to a placard and putting your name onto a list takes no effort at all. The entire server can easily do that do instead of a 1 in 10 or 1 in 20 chance you have a 1 in 1000 or more. Sorry that doesn't seem like a good idea to me. I'd rather fight it out with people willing to work at getting a house than those who prefer to do nothing.

I'd much rather they simply do away with the timer and have the few house flippers do their thing. They simply do it now anyway with FC purchases so the current system hasn't really stopped them.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

But... yeah. Still all about money.

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No, it isn't. Money doesn't solve everything contrary to what some people think simply because they can buy the consumers goods they want on demand if they have enough money. It doesn't work that way when you're running a business. You don't get to buy what you need on demand. You need to work with what's available.

I'm sorry, but a business is literally all about money. As a business, if spending a million dollars in one year will theoretically save you 1.5 million in 3 years, that is called an investment. If you are constantly in the red, aka not making money, then you go bankrupt and fail at that business.

No, a giant corporation does not need to work with what they have. In fact, the gaming industry as a whole is downright known for hiring a ton of people while a game is in development and then laying them off when that game is released. SE works in divisions. Division 1 will be working on one game while Division 2 works on another. Staff can and do move between divisions when necessary. And there is nothing stopping them from hiring more staff on a short term contract if doing so will indeed save them money in the long run.

I don't know where your thoughts on businesses comes from, but SE is a massive corporation. They have the foresight and staff to crunch the numbers and determine how to make money. People that work in finance literally deal with numbers all day, every day. If a business does not have the goal of making money it's not a business; it's a service or a non-profit. If spending more money now saves far more money than they would spend over the life of the game, that is something they would consider. The idea that SE is unable to do that if it makes financial sense is ludicrous. When it comes to a business, money does basically solve everything. Your leadership is failing? Replace the leadership. Hello Yoshi P. You need to redo your entire game code while supplying updates for your broken game? Hello 1.0 and ARR. SE has already done this. Their first version of the game was a flop. They hail mary'd into ARR and you can bet they threw more money at it in order to do both things at once. Because the cost of making a game that would last for years would bring in more revenue than they would lose if they just let 1.0 die as a failed game. Plus, SE is somewhat better at treating their staff, so hiring more staff is preferable than forcing who you already have to work ungodly hours.

Is any of this likely? No. We're in a global recession. But, that does not change the fact that when it comes to large corporations their intent is to make money, their duty to their shareholders is money, and they can and do spend money to make money. So, any concept of money not solving everything, in a company that has the ability to hire people to do the tasks, is asinine. The only way money could not solve all their issues is if there was not staff to hire. But coding and graphic design in gaming has far more surplus than demand. So yes, if it saved more money in the long run, money would solve these issues.

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Originally Posted by LaylaTsarra

Walking up to a placard and putting your name onto a list takes no effort at all. The entire server can easily do that do instead of a 1 in 10 or 1 in 20 chance you have a 1 in 1000 or more. Sorry that doesn't seem like a good idea to me. I'd rather fight it out with people willing to work at getting a house than those who prefer to do nothing.

I'd much rather they simply do away with the timer and have the few house flippers do their thing. They simply do it now anyway with FC purchases so the current system hasn't really stopped them.

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I agree. It takes no effort. But, in fact, buying a normal plot also takes no effort. Why should people have to fight tooth and nail for hours on end for a plot when others can relocate with no hassle, or have to fight against a bot? Is it fair if half the people are using a bot to buy the house and the other half are all doing it themselves? Sure, the bot is illegal, but how are they going to tell if everyone is doing the exact same thing? We already know they won't bring back the old system because it will be abused in a hot minute. If anything they will add further restrictions. Maybe an FC will have to be established for X amount of time and have X rank before they can buy a house. Who knows. Most of it would be solved with better instanced housing because people would just go do those. Give the apartment a deck, and then a larger deck, and then make the Large a bloody penthouse on the top with half the roof as your outside. Hell, even that would be more acceptable than their current layout. And it's not like there aren't apartments and condos that have more than one floor.

But, the current timer is still detrimental to people's health. Confessions of what people have done while trying to fight for a house are crazy. And then there are all the stories of being there for hours and then someone just comes in and relocates and all that time, all that fighting for it, is just gone. You waste your time, your energy, and your joints, for nothing.

So, yeah, if you win it might feel like you earned it. But it's still the luck of the click. And hell, do first come, first serve and cap a lottery at 30 people. Then the odds are still good and it favors they quickest. I'd rather see 200 people or more as a limit. But there are ways to restrict a lottery and still make it reasonable for the serious house hunters.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

So, yeah, if you win it might feel like you earned it. But it's still the luck of the click. And hell, do first come, first serve and cap a lottery at 30 people. Then the odds are still good and it favors they quickest. I'd rather see 200 people or more as a limit. But there are ways to restrict a lottery and still make it reasonable for the serious house hunters.

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So you said earlier that lottery means no one has an advantage over another person but with that cap you would automatically be at a disadvantage if you're on a server with a high population because those spots would get filled very fast compared to other servers with lower population. You could have no cap but that would increase the amount of participation so again being on a high population server gives you a disadvantage. Then there's the issue as to when the lottery application window opens. If it opens at a specific time players unable to be online for those times would be at a disadvantage. If the window opens at a random time then those who cannot be online for super long periods of time every day would be at a disadvantage. Sure players could change server to have a better chance at the lottery system, but that usually requires real money so then those with more money irl would be at an advantage...basically lottery isn't as fair as you think.

I completely agree that the placard mechanic is awful and relocation is something that makes it worse, but lottery isn't going to make things better. It would be just swapping one type of crappy rng for a different crappy rng. I don't consider this a good trade.

Housing acquisition can only be considered fair when all players have the exact same chance to get a house regardless of where, when and how much they play, and someone getting a house before them has zero impact on their chances for a house. The only difference would be who gets a house sooner due to gil. For that to happen we would either need an incredibly enormous increase on the amount of wards or a fully fledged instanced housing system.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

No, it isn't. Money doesn't solve everything contrary to what some people think simply because they can buy the consumers goods they want on demand if they have enough money. It doesn't work that way when you're running a business. You don't get to buy what you need on demand. You need to work with what's available.

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In addition to money SE need time. They often cite server limitations as reasoning for being unable to do certain things. Just throwing money at that issue isn't enough to fix it. Adjusting or changing server architecture is often a very delicate process. We can't even get a glam dresser furnishing due to server limitations and housing is far more complex than that. Yes money can mean more staff but staff need to be both qualified and trained, and then they need the time to do their tasks correctly. On top of that this work would need to be done with minimal impact on the live game.

Furthermore the time and money put into this needs to be considered profitable, and if SE don't think that throwing far more money and time at the housing system is going to result in earning even more money afterwards then they're not going to do it. As much as I love housing the truth is that isn't what draws most people to the game. Most new players seek things like interesting combat, story, mechanics and visual aesthetic. Housing tends to be secondary to all of that, likely because if the rest of the game isn't interesting to play then people aren't going to endure that just to get a house. They would just play a different game instead that also offers housing, and well FFXIV is far from the only mmorpg with housing.

And on top of all of this we have covid. While the game is an online experience, the people who create and maintain the game often need to be on site to do their work. This is especially true when dealing with servers because you have to maintain and adjust both software and hardware. Then there's the fact that security would mean that some work, even if it's software based, absolutely cannot be done remotely. So that makes getting anything done take longer than usual, which means even more money to spend.

Money is only one part of an answer that SE needs to massively improve and change the housing system. It certainly is my hope that more parts of the answer will present themselves to SE in such a way that they would be willing to vastly improve housing, but I'm not expecting it any time soon. So far SE seem determined to hang on to the ward system and covid complicates the entire process of creating and maintaining games.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

I don't know where your thoughts on businesses comes from,.

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I don't know where your thoughts on business come from but it clearly does not come from a position of ever been part of running one.

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Originally Posted by LaylaTsarra

Walking up to a placard and putting your name onto a list takes no effort at all. The entire server can easily do that do instead of a 1 in 10 or 1 in 20 chance you have a 1 in 1000 or more. Sorry that doesn't seem like a good idea to me. I'd rather fight it out with people willing to work at getting a house than those who prefer to do nothing.

I'd much rather they simply do away with the timer and have the few house flippers do their thing. They simply do it now anyway with FC purchases so the current system hasn't really stopped them.

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Ive never understood why making housing more accessible is seen as a bad thing. Like genuinely, we should be wanting everyone to have equal access to housing in this game. (Lets leave apratments/fc rooms aside for the moment, because they have their own set of issues that we arent talking about here). But the fact that you would rather just have the timer go away and have it be free for all instead of a lottery confuses me. It confuses me because the FFA style you suggest would have all the same problems that a lottery would have (in that now youre competing against the whole server instead of just the 20-30 dedicated people who can sit around for hours clicking a placard in the hopes of sniping it from the others while praying that no one relocates to it). But what a lottery does is it allows everyone an equal shot at the plot.

Id much rather be able to play the game, and when i see a plot is open, go drop my name in the hat, and then go back to playing the game, rather than having to meticulously scour the wards for when a plot opens or sit at a plot for hours literally not playing the game in hopes of getting a house. (I realize that, being on Mateus, this is particularly unique this server and one or two others, but still).

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Originally Posted by Avalon304

d much rather be able to play the game, and when i see a plot is open, go drop my name in the hat, and then go back to playing the game, rather than having to meticulously scour the wards for when a plot opens or sit at a plot for hours literally not playing the game in hopes of getting a house. (I realize that, being on Mateus, this is particularly unique this server and one or two others, but still).

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Yeah sounds like you just don't want to do much other than put your name in a hat and hope for the best. I got a house on Balmung working on a placard and it's worse than Mateus. I don't mind working for things but I sure don't want to give my chances up to the RNG gods and hope i can win a lottery. No thank you.

Yes the timer needs work but those willing to hunt and work at finding plots deserve a better shot at a house than those who simply want to do nothing but hope for the best with a lottery.

We lived for years without a timer and personally I don't think it would be much worse if they eliminated it. They certainly could improve it if they keep it by reducing the wait times to no more than an hour or two. It would at least prevent the direct selling of houses to people with instant sales after demo.

There is also lots they could do to reduce demand by improving apartments something they even said they were considering back around 4.2 with small, medium and large. The decoupling of workshops from FC would also help considerably. Lots of improvements they could made without resorting to a lottery.

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Originally Posted by LaylaTsarra

Yes the timer needs work but those willing to hunt and work at finding plots deserve a better shot at a house than those who simply want to do nothing but hope for the best with a lottery.

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Genuinely going to side with Tsarra here. If Housing was truly a lottery-esque system, what with dropping your name in a hat, it completely ruins the purpose. You have just as much a % chance to get the house as someone who isn't going to use the plot at all and just put their name in to be a troll. Sadly, these sorts of people actually exist and they're not going away any time soon.

If you want a housing plot, you put in the time to get it. If "playing the game" is more important to you, then you must clearly not want a house as much as other people who obsess over them. Not that its a bad thing, just that your priorities are in a different order and should be treated as such. You, who doesn't have housing as a high-priority, shouldn't have an equal chance to someone who has been trying to get one for the past month.

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Originally Posted by Kenky

If "playing the game" is more important to you, then you must clearly not want a house as much as other people who obsess over them. Not that its a bad thing, just that your priorities are in a different order and should be treated as such. You, who doesn't have housing as a high-priority, shouldn't have an equal chance to someone who has been trying to get one for the past month.

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The thing is it's not just players who want to play the game instead of hang around a placard that don't end up getting a house. Some players have missed out on getting a house because they needed to go to the toilet. That needing to do a completely normal bodily function can prevent you from accessing content just shows how flawed the system is.

Sure people can use bots to avoid toilet breaks preventing them from getting a house but it means risking your account and if you play on ps4 it's simply not an option.

That being said I do prefer the placard system to a lottery system as it does mean players more dedicated to housing have a higher chance than those who just cannot be bothered to even try. With lottery even people who are very "whatever" about getting a house would have equal chance to those who crave that content, and of course competition would rise due to it being very low effort.

The placard timer and the lottery idea are both really bad. They're just bad for different reasons.

I do want instanced housing in some form, simply because the housing i want would require it if SE is being truthful about server limitations. I don't want this small suburb. I want a full Ranch with my own chocobo stables and airship workshop. I want to make my own race track, and i don't want to be tied to some pitiful outdoor decoration number.

https://i.imgur.com/b2YbM9f.png

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Originally Posted by Penthea

basically lottery isn't as fair as you think.

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That is totally fair. I don't personally feel that having waited for a house for 4 years, or lost out on 50 placard wars, or being on a large population server entitles anyone to more chances at a house. I don't think the lottery is good. I just think it's better than the current system because it is less harmful.

I encourage everyone to discuss the ideas. We have seen changes to the acquisition of houses before, so input is valuable. A lottery is still the most fair compared to the options we have had. When complaints have been made about the housing system people mostly just say it sucks. Gotta throw out other thoughts, and get people talking, even if it's to disagree. Conflict can breed progress.

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Originally Posted by Penthea

Housing acquisition can only be considered fair when all players have the exact same chance to get a house.

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100% agree.

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Originally Posted by Penthea

Re: Money/Time.

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These are all very valid points. Though, I don't really consider time to be one because time is a product of the human experience. Regardless of what one chooses to do, time is going to be a factor, thus it becomes a null point. No one expects to just throw 1mil at a problem and for it to instantly go away. They money just pays for the means to make the fix happen. But, money would buy more tech and more people. And, profit margins have always been a point in relation to money. But at the end of the day, if it's not profitable, or at least a drastic saving to the company, it won't happen. That is why it's all about money. And regardless of time, money does pay for every aspect that is required to make it happen. Hell, I'm fairly anti-capitalist, but when it comes to businesses we all know that if there's not profit/massive savings to be had, it isn't happening. And I really don't expect anything to change. It's probably more likely the tech will just evolve to the point it's cheaper and able to handle more wards.

The forum post limits completely murder me, but I am loving everyone's comments. Even if I strongly disagree with you on certain points, your comments and thoughts are valuable. It has been through conflict and discord that my own thoughts had initially been expanded to include the possibilities for housing options I might not personally want, but other people do. At the end of the day, whether you love something or hate something in my hopeless little dream thread, voicing them is important. Your love or hate of the idea is important. We have no idea if there are people at SE that are trying to brainstorm ways to change housing. If you're passionate about the system, either as it is now, or how you want it, your passion is important to the discussion.

PS.
Atamis, I love your chocobo ranch dreams. Oh! Wouldn't it be fun if you could like, hire out chocobo stalls like an FC/Apartment, but on a private lot? I would totally go to a "private ranch". That just feels so nice.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

That is totally fair. I don't personally feel that having waited for a house for 4 years, or lost out on 50 placard wars, or being on a large population server entitles anyone to more chances at a house. I don't think the lottery is good. I just think it's better than the current system because it is less harmful.

I encourage everyone to discuss the ideas. We have seen changes to the acquisition of houses before, so input is valuable. A lottery is still the most fair compared to the options we have had. When complaints have been made about the housing system people mostly just say it sucks. Gotta throw out other thoughts, and get people talking, even if it's to disagree. Conflict can breed progress.

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I disagree that lottery is less harmful, to me it looks merely harmful in different ways to the placard timer. I don't consider swapping one set of problems for another to be a good trade. I want actual improvement, not just reshuffling what the flaws are.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

These are all very valid points. Though, I don't really consider time to be one because time is a product of the human experience. Regardless of what one chooses to do, time is going to be a factor, thus it becomes a null point.

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It's not a null point when you consider that the longer people take to do something the more money you will have to pay over time. Not everyone who works for SE is SE staff. Like any other company some of their staff are hired contractors who work for a specific amount of time agreed upon in a contract. If the task takes long to do then the contract would either be quite long or would have to be renewed multiple times. If a contract has to be renewed it puts the contractor in a position to negotiate for a higher fee. Additionally even SE staff themselves can negotiate for a higher wage if they learn that they have high-demand skillsets that SE cannot afford to let go of. SE is far from the only huge game company in Japan. There are certainly some staff in SE who would be spoiled for choice if they decided to go elsewhere.

Also if something takes very long to do you run the risk of completing the task when technology has moved on so you may have to restructure that work to keep up to date which then costs more time and money.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

No one expects to just throw 1mil at a problem and for it to instantly go away. They money just pays for the means to make the fix happen. But, money would buy more tech and more people. And, profit margins have always been a point in relation to money. But at the end of the day, if it's not profitable, or at least a drastic saving to the company, it won't happen. That is why it's all about money. And regardless of time, money does pay for every aspect that is required to make it happen.

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Time and money go hand in hand. Having all the money in the world is meaningless if the tasks take so long to complete that upon completion their high profit window is gone, and having all the time in the world is meaningless if you don't have the money to fund those tasks. Furthermore as people gain more experience they can ask for a raise and if their skills are in high demand the company may have no choice but to give them more money. And if they don't that person can just leave to go somewhere else that pays more money for their time. Turning time and money into a good profit is actually a very delicate balance, especially in a field as competitive as the gaming industry.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

Hell, I'm fairly anti-capitalist, but when it comes to businesses we all know that if there's not profit/massive savings to be had, it isn't happening. And I really don't expect anything to change. It's probably more likely the tech will just evolve to the point it's cheaper and able to handle more wards.

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And here time makes itself relevant again when we talk about money. Sometimes waiting for the point in which time and monetary cost would be lower is the most profitable solution.

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Originally Posted by Eoko

The forum post limits completely murder me, but I am loving everyone's comments.

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You can edit your posts to add more text to bypass the character limit.

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Originally Posted by Penthea

You can edit your posts to add more text to bypass the character limit.

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Well! You're my new favorite person ever.