Suggestion: Housing stays as is, but add full housing to Sanctuary Islands too

Hello all!

As we all know there is a mass shortage for housing, which absolutely sucks for those wanting a house, and those are quite many (myself included).

This idea will solve that problem and keep everyone happy.

1. Add full and complete housing to Sanctuary Island. As much detail as the usual housing.
2. Keep the Wards as they are and add more wards according to capacity too.
3. Apartments, perhaps build on that too. Add a balcony!


1. Sanctuary island, the Sanctuary that is your Home.

Sanctuary Island was and is the perfect sollution to put an end to the Housing shortage ingame.
All you have to do is add full housing in there too, what house you want, garden decorations, interior decorations, every detail normal housing has too on Sanctuary Island too.

Give people the choice on their Sanctuary Island to build a Small, Medium, or Mansion as a house, each costing their own equivalent price.
Let the players make and shape it as they wish, like I said, it has to be in as much detail as the usual housing in the Wards.

This way Sanctuary Island truly becomes your Sanctuary, you Home away from Home.
Your ephemeral place of rest and relaxation.

Sure, people cannot see your house and beautiful garden unless you invite them to your island but all players will have a Home then they so desire, I know I do.

Added some later:
Of course for the Island it would be nice to be able to choose the way it looks, fore example like Mist areas, or Lavender Hills areas, etc.
Oh, and choose other more natural looks/things instead of robots and machines/factories, magical stuff. (I am personally not a fan of robots and factory/machine looks either)

2. Wards, the neighbourhoods you know and are there to stay.

The wards will be staying as they are, that's definitely nice for the people that got their plot there, plenty having gone through lots of frustration and disappointment trying to get one, sometimes even for years I came to understand.

Add more Wards along the way, increasing the capacity on the servers for them as needed. (quite needed for sure, people like having a nice home, it's immersive too)

This way people having a plot in a Ward will keep what they had, and if a plot gets free and/or new Wards get added people will still and always be able to get such a plot. (which now is done through that lottery of course)

That way those who had that can still and forever be in their sweet sweet neighbourhoods, and others can still try to get that too.

Unlike The Housing on Sanctuary Island that can only be seen by those you invite, Wards of course can and will always be as they were and open to walk into by whomever wants to go check around the Wards and into people's Houses there (Unless someone locked his door for visitors, those also exist of course haha).

3. Apartmens, did you say Balcony?

Yes, I did say Balcony.

Add an optional Balcony to the Apartments, no loading screen between them, just make them part of the Apartment if purchased.

This gives people who take an Apartment the ability to use outdoor decorations, plants, gardening, etc.
Unless too tall and reaching the roof I guess, though, perhaps that can be solved too by rooms actually sort of being "zigzag build".
Apartments are instanced so one can play with this, a background of the Ward they are in as if really outside.

No loading screen between the Apartment and it's Balcony means able to just walk in and out as if walking to the basement and such in a House.

An Apartment is 500.000gil of course, perhaps if you want a Balcony it will be 750.000gil.

If only purchasing the Apartment the Balcony will be sealed, however! You will always be able to still purchase the Balcony later if you so wish.
On top of that you can choose what door you want in between, big glass sliding doors, those japanese sliding doors, something else.

Like this people who just want an Apartment can use their outdoor rewards often given in events too, and do some extra gardening, while making a nice cosy Balcony of their own.

I'd rather have instanced house plots in a separate location. Island Sanctuary may look nice but it's not really the environment I would want for my home. I'd rather see each of the housing districts have instanced house plots built around their themes so players get a choice.

But if placing them in Island Sanctuary would be the only way we get them, then I'd settle.

Yeah, that can be a good nice option too, instanced houses added as a choice to the existing housing wards, then also adding something for those choosing instanced ones to make them able to have a garden, like an underground garden or something with a little waterfall and a stream or something, greenery, nice rays of light in the day, something atmospheric looking.

The problem with island sanctuary is that you have to be online and in your island for it to even be accessible to anyone else.

I'd rather see instanced houses that are accessible from a directory in the wards, just like apartments. At least that way you can make your house available for the public to visit. They should also be mutually exclusive with ward houses (but not apartments), so that people can choose between having the neighborhood feel or choosing the house size they want and not having to deal with auto demolish.

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Originally Posted by Pablomaldito

The problem with island sanctuary is that you have to be online and in your island for it to even be accessible to anyone else.

I'd rather see instanced houses that are accessible from a directory in the wards, just like apartments. At least that way you can make your house available for the public to visit. They should also be mutually exclusive with ward houses (but not apartments), so that people can choose between having the neighborhood feel or choosing the house size they want and not having to deal with auto demolish.

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Being unable to visit someone's house unless they were online and already there would be horrible. That's why I'm hoping they don't tack on player housing to island sanctuaries.

I would love to own a larger house with a yard in an instance like an apartment though. Wards can be incredible. I have a friend who owns the same exact plot I do, but every house nearby is decorated nicely and open to the public, with players hanging out nearby and forming a great community. Then you have my house...3/4 of the houses that border mine are closed, with minimal if any outside decorations, and my views are dominated by a large Paissa house and a large candyland house. I've seen one nearby neighbor once in the past few months. I was so sad when my neighbors installed that candyland exterior...

My wife owns a house next to an FC (before the ward designations were introduced). It is nice to see actual people hanging out around the area. Same with my FC house. However, the only people I see in the vicinity of my FC house are our FC members. There's never any neighbors that I see coming up to the MB or summoning bell or seen porting to their houses.

So much of the housing wards are ghost towns.

"This was NOT my intention" - Yoshi

hm yeah, there is of course indeed the point of whether or not Island Sanctuary is a nice environment to someone, perhaps that part could be solved by making the whole Island customizable to whatever environment you want it to be.

I have not gotten to the island yet myself, did hear something very recently about robots and factories being there, which I agree would not be much of a sanctuary to me either.
I like nature and cosiness, not cold buildings or machines etc.

I very much prefer the environment of Lavender Hills, nature, beautiful trees and water, best place to me personally.


The neighbourhood feel would be nice indeed, hence why I also put that down as a thing that has to stay.
Wards do always seem the best options, like I said, I would go for Lavender Hills, but I have no idea to what capacity they can keep adding those.

In the end it's just nice to have a home yes, in a Ward/location you like the most, and indeed if a nice neighbourhood in terms of people, that's cool.

So perhaps not the "best" suggestion but at least a good way to see what people want I guess.

Seeing Sanctuary Island though for every player, also buildings placeable on that etc, should adding much more Wards then not also be a possibility (instead)?

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

I'd rather have instanced house plots in a separate location. Island Sanctuary may look nice but it's not really the environment I would want for my home. I'd rather see each of the housing districts have instanced house plots built around their themes so players get a choice.

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If only they'd left that rank 10 spot available for future placement of a house instead of a landmark. It kind of makes me wonder if they made that little island off the beach specifically to hold a house in the future. Tsunami and hurricanes aside, having a house on that outcrop would be pretty badass.

Added a bit to the Sanctuary Islands section:

Customization of what you want the island to look like, aka, like Lavender Hills, Mist, Shirogane, etc.

Plus the option to not have robots/machines/factories but more natural or magical choices instead.
I myself am not a fan of factories etc, I highly prefer natural and magical.

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Originally Posted by Altherael

Added a bit to the Sanctuary Islands section:

Customization of what you want the island to look like, aka, like Lavender Hills, Mist, Shirogane, etc.

Plus the option to not have robots/machines/factories but more natural or magical choices instead.
I myself am not a fan of factories etc, I highly prefer natural and magical.

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Just to clarify, it's not "robots and factories". All the buildings on the islands are mainly wood with accents made of various plant fiber and metal. Think Swiss Family Robinson if you've ever seen any of the TV shows or movies based on the book. The "factory" would be an open air workshop made mostly from wood like the other buildings. There are mammets of a more practical design than the ones you see standing around the Goldsmith's Guild in Ul'dah. Mammets are partly magical in nature so they're good on that point of your request.

Considering you said you haven't been to the island yet in your later post, I find it strange that you're coming up with a list of what it should be when you don't know what it is. It would be better if you unlocked your island first (or at least visited the island of a friend/FC member) to see it. Some suggestions just aren't possible, like allowing players to customize the climate theme.

What do you expect this game to actually want to do something rational?

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

Just to clarify, it's not "robots and factories". All the buildings on the islands are mainly wood with accents made of various plant fiber and metal. Think Swiss Family Robinson if you've ever seen any of the TV shows or movies based on the book. The "factory" would be an open air workshop made mostly from wood like the other buildings. There are mammets of a more practical design than the ones you see standing around the Goldsmith's Guild in Ul'dah. Mammets are partly magical in nature so they're good on that point of your request.

Considering you said you haven't been to the island yet in your later post, I find it strange that you're coming up with a list of what it should be when you don't know what it is. It would be better if you unlocked your island first (or at least visited the island of a friend/FC member) to see it. Some suggestions just aren't possible, like allowing players to customize the climate theme.

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I will have to see that myself yet, things Island are just what I heard, so it's not strange, I was just thinking up some ideas for those that did.

Mainly this thread of mine is just about housing, I do wonder though, if every player can get a whole island, in my views it would not be difficult to have given everyone a plot and full housing instead.
I agree with people that getting a house is more impossible than for example running into a pink elephant, and rather depressing having to go to the sign and having lost yet another lottery, and another, and another, and another, and before that clicking house signs.

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Originally Posted by Altherael

Hello all!

As we all know there is a mass shortage for housing

This idea will solve that problem and keep everyone happy.

2. Keep the Wards as they are

2. Wards, the neighbourhoods you know and are there to stay.

The wards will be staying as they are

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I fully agree with these points OP!

From today's live letter

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Yoshi: "We are trying to allow players to place garden housing items on their island, we don't have a release schedule for this feature yet, but we are trying"

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Originally Posted by Shibi

From today's live letter

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Just to clarify for those who aren't aware, the yards of our houses are referred to as the "garden" in Japanese. That means outdoor furnishings in general are what they are trying to add. We can't be certain if the garden patches will be included in this and work for crossbreeding until they give us more information.

I appreciate the desire to just info dump a wishlist for new housing features, but it seems extremely likely that housing options will come into play for Island Sanctuary. That said, to implement something like this would be a HUGE undertaking and the team is only so large. Give them time, I'm sure they're working on it.

But yeah, since we're doing wishlists, I think Island Sanctuary housing should just be simple and people should understand what they're getting, which is a limited, more constrained housing option, should one come around. It's already subtly implied that this is going to be considered and the idea of simple housing that requires cowries and workshop crafting (instead of player crafting or MB purchases) should be treated as a best case scenario.

Anything else, like themes (don't forget this is an island) and additional social features might be a bridge too far. Also, there is no bridge back to Moraby so clearly you gotta make use of what's on the island and that might mean coconut dinnerware and palm frond carpets for the overwhelming majority of folks.

I would prefer instanced housing as well. But I doubt it will ever happen due to difficult housing being key to keep players paying subscription during content draughts.

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Originally Posted by rxantos

I would prefer instanced housing as well. But I doubt it will ever happen due to difficult housing being key to keep players paying subscription during content draughts.

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One month subbed. Enter house on first and last days of subscription (and any time between). Six weeks unsubbed. Repeat.

You keep your house. That's only 40% of the year you have to be subscribed. If you're playing less than 40% of the year, you should be questioning why you need to own a house in a game you rarely play.

Not to mention that demolition is still suspended and probably will continue to be suspended until the new EU and NA worlds fill up so there's zero need to be subscribed right now.

So much for the "they're greedy for subscription dollars" theory. If they were doing just to force players to stay subscribed, there would be more houses (though still not quite enough) to force even more subscription retention and there would be no suspension of demolition.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

One month subbed. Enter house on first and last days of subscription (and any time between). Six weeks unsubbed. Repeat.

You keep your house. That's only 40% of the year you have to be subscribed. If you're playing less than 40% of the year, you should be questioning why you need to own a house in a game you rarely play.

Not to mention that demolition is still suspended and probably will continue to be suspended until the new EU and NA worlds fill up so there's zero need to be subscribed right now.

So much for the "they're greedy for subscription dollars" theory. If they were doing just to force players to stay subscribed, there would be more houses (though still not quite enough) to force even more subscription retention and there would be no suspension of demolition.

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Yeah on that you and I can agree. I've never subscribed to the conspiracy theory of 'they want us to stay subbed and that's why we have demolition'. It was a stopgap effort instituted when they didn't have the resources (and couldn't get them quickly) to handle the demand for housing. It wasn't part of their vision for housing. If they can manage to actually meet demand somehow, something tells me auto demo will either be drastically changed (i.e. people unsubbed for six months to a year) or simply done away with all together.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

One month subbed. Enter house on first and last days of subscription (and any time between). Six weeks unsubbed. Repeat.

You keep your house. That's only 40% of the year you have to be subscribed. If you're playing less than 40% of the year, you should be questioning why you need to own a house in a game you rarely play.

Not to mention that demolition is still suspended and probably will continue to be suspended until the new EU and NA worlds fill up so there's zero need to be subscribed right now.

So much for the "they're greedy for subscription dollars" theory. If they were doing just to force players to stay subscribed, there would be more houses (though still not quite enough) to force even more subscription retention and there would be no suspension of demolition.

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I did that with my First ever large for a year. It's just too much honestly.

If I want a break from the game, I'm not even going to reinstall it for that whole year+. Let alone pay 9$ to spend 4 hours of my time downloading on top of it lol.

Adding plots to the island (or even a new zone) would work wonders.

As for visitors.....I wouldn't want someone up in my "instance" while I'm offline anyway, stalkers!...... so the island doesn't bother me lol.

P.S. Wasn't it already Data mined that a housing plot is in Island Sanct? Photos were posted.
Few people "assumed" it was fake but that's all they did, was assume. Nothing proving it was, just more confirming it was there.

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Originally Posted by UnrealTai

P.S. Wasn't it already Data mined that a housing plot is in Island Sanct? Photos were posted.
Few people "assumed" it was fake but that's all they did, was assume. Nothing proving it was, just more confirming it was there.

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I wouldn't be surprised if they put one in there for future use just in case. At least I hope they'd be smart enough to keep the option available should their hands be forced.

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Originally Posted by UnrealTai

P.S. Wasn't it already Data mined that a housing plot is in Island Sanct? Photos were posted.
Few people "assumed" it was fake but that's all they did, was assume. Nothing proving it was, just more confirming it was there.

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No one knows what the source of those pictures was. All we could tell is that the terrain and flora didn't match any spot on our current island though it did match the general aesthetic for Lower/Middle La Noscea.

We do have the things that YoshiP has told us, though. He's said that Island Sanctuary is not a replacement or extension of the housing system. He also said during the 14 hours broadcast that adding tenancy for alts is low on their priority list while they focus on optimizing and adding more wards to all worlds for players that are still unable to get a house. It doesn't sound like they have plans to add housing to Island Sanctuary regardless of the authenticity of the supposed datamined screenshots being circulated.