Reclamation of Inactive Housing announced

[worldofneil]

I can't have a vacation?

I wish I could take 45 day vacations. You're very lucky.

It should be 1 year of inactivity rather than 45 days.

1 year is way too long and wouldn't solve anything. As people would only have to resubscribe once a year there's a considerably lower chance of plots actually being released which is the whole point of this being added.

So basically owning a house requires a lifetime subscription, and you support this terrible idea.

Yes. Sorry, but I do. The houses are a finite resource and should be used by players who are actually playing the game. And yes, I have had a constant subscription since August 2013. I actually also have a second subscription for my alts since November 2014 (although I admit I am thinking of dropping the alt subscription as they only get logged in once every few months).

45 days is a long time and if players (or FCs) can't walk inside their house, even once, during that time, then it can't really be that important to them and they would likely therefore not even miss it if it wasn't there any more. It's kind of SE to even give them 80% of their money back, even if it is only if they collect it the first 30 days since when houses were bought it was assumed they were money sinks and no way to reclaim that money (outside of trying to sell it to another player outside the system)

[Colorful]

So if they did decide that people with more/earlier Savage clears could evict people with fewer/later Savage clears and buy their plot out from under them, you'd just take it on the chin and say "Welp, no problem here, that was SE's call and they made it."?

If you can't see the difference between a reasonable change to an unreasonable one, I don't see the point in discussing this with you.

@SuperZay, and owning FFXIV requires a lifetime subscription too? That's just the thing, when you don't need it, you drop it. Period. Also, you never answered the question about your amazingly long vacations.

Explain how it's more reasonable. Both of those things are completely arbitrary "Doing this thing with your active, paid-up subscription makes you more worthy to own a house" judgement calls.

Why is your arbitrary judgement more valid than mine? Bearing in mind that SE could easily choose either of them.

Reached post cap, so I'll just edit this in here. One is taking something away from a paying player, and the other is freeing up a limited resource from someone who isn't playing and isn't active, and giving it to someone who's active and paying, everyone the experience of every currently paying player, their main source of profit.

[Nalien]

45 days just seems like too short of a time, especially with the kind of content drought we have had 5 months between 3.0 and 3.1. It will be even worse in the future.

What? Final Fantasy XIV has had a pretty phenomenal track record when it comes to content updates, 3.1 was delayed for reasons and should be seen as nothing but an exception... Content updates have offered has been my only ever problem with the game, but I'm certainly not blind to the fact that SE churns out big content patches (I just wish that content wasn't a recycling of the same stuff over and over...) fairly regularly, where as other games perhaps have a 6 month wait for a fraction of the content...

[Crater]

If you can't see the difference between a reasonable change to an unreasonable one, I don't see the point in discussing this with you.

@SuperZay, and owning FFXIV requires a lifetime subscription too? That's just the thing, when you don't need it, you drop it. Period. Also, you never answered the question about your amazingly long vacations.

Explain how it's more reasonable. Both of those things are completely arbitrary "Doing this thing with your active, paid-up subscription makes you more worthy to own a house" judgement calls.

Why is your arbitrary judgement more valid than mine? Bearing in mind that SE could easily choose either of them.

[SuperZay]

I wish I could take 45 day vacations. You're very lucky.

Many people renew subscription just for 1 month for major patches. Then they take a 60-80 days break till the next patch because, let's be honest, there's not much to do when content gets stale like now.
By definition, they can't own a house even if they are regularly playing since August 2013.

[Catwho]

Many people renew subscription just for 1 month for major patches. Then they take a 60-80 days break till the next patch because, let's be honesy, there's not much to do when content gets stale like now.
By definition, they can't own a house even if they are regularly playing since August 2013.

Then they take a 60-80 days break till the next patch

regularly playing

Think real hard about what you just said there.

[SuperZay]

Think real hard about what you just said there.

Actively playing for 1 month, then taking a break, that's what I said. Unless you suggest regular players are supposed to live in the game for 8 hours every day without playing other games or taking a break.

[Catwho]

Actively playing for 1 month, then taking a break, that's what I said. Unless you suggest regular players are supposed to live in the game for 8 hours every day without playing other games or taking a break.

I'd argue that "regularly playing" means logging in at least once a week, myself. Routine. Having an on again off again pattern is the norm for many people, I know, but they're not "the regulars." The regulars are the people you see at the bar every Tuesday for happy hour. The regulars are the ones that go to your restaurant for dinner at least once a month. The regulars are the ones who run active XIV role play blogs and you know them by sight or name on Tumblr communities. Someone who pays for a month and then takes a 2 month break is not a "regular" by any generally accepted definition of the term.

[Nalien]

If each content patch can only satiate someone for one month, I doubt housing is on their list of concerns to begin with... That would be a player who barely even obtains an Esoterics weapon, certainly hasn't touched raids in any significant way, would have only one Red Scrips tool, and so on... Heck, how do you even afford a plot with that kind of play time?

Housing is pretty much for the people who are invested in the game. Not invested in housing itself, but invested in actually coming back to Eorzea regularly. Does that mean it's only for the no-lifers? No, not really, plenty of people can quite adequately balance their personal life and other activities with an MMO, while playing on a fairly regular basis. They're not keeping their subscription to keep their house, they're keeping their subscription to keep playing the game they enjoy, whether they enjoy that game 12 hours a day each day every day, or a few hours every other day.

Someone who pops in and out every couple of months does not have that investment to the game, and I sincerely doubt they have any kind of investment to "owning" part of that world as a result.

[CGMidlander]

Many people renew subscription just for 1 month for major patches. Then they take a 60-80 days break till the next patch because, let's be honest, there's not much to do when content gets stale like now.
By definition, they can't own a house even if they are regularly playing since August 2013.

For ARR it was ~3 months (~90 days) between major patches (Patches 2.x) with intermediate patches spread out in between as well (2.xy)

The scenario you are describing assumes people blow through the content major patches offer nigh instantly, and do not log on for intermediate patches at all.
Those are not people who play regularly.