Just like i predicted.

[Lambdafish]

snip

I addressed this in my previous post, so apologies if I didn't retread it in the post you replied to. I think the current system is poor, and that people should be allowed to have access to this content, but this is NOT the fault of the "greedy" players that this thread is about, it's entirely the fault of the system that SE has created. The solution was made clear in the recent live letter in that more plots are coming, and so are apartments.

TLDR: Blame square, nobody else

Again, I hope that clarified my point

[AnnietheCat]

...

I wasn't finding fault with what you said, nor was I being combative(trust me, you'd know when I was )
And I'll reiterate: The problem is SE's faulty system, but blaming the shitty players who are doing shitty things is fair as well. Just because a purse is sitting unwatched out in the open doesn't make it ok to take it. Just because the system can be exploited doesn't mean it's anyone's right to exploit it. Literally everything in this game can be abused. But that doesn't make it okay when they do get abused.

[Lambdafish]

The problem is SE's faulty system, but blaming the shitty players who are doing shitty things is fair as well. Just because a purse is sitting unwatched out in the open doesn't make it ok to take it. Just because the system can be exploited doesn't mean it's anyone's right to exploit it.

I won't dispute what you are saying, because the housing market is broken and people are upset, but my big point is that I want people to forget about the players who are doing this, because it's turning into a witchhunt (I heard them get called the housing mafia in one thread) thanks to player entitlement. The entire game runs on a capitalist market, and square chose to allow housing to be a part of that capitalist market, and naturally, as with the real world, supply < demand prevails. Should Americans do a witchhunt on wallstreet and the 1%? No, they complain to the government to change the system, which is the point im trying to make.

And just so you know, your argument of stealing an unattended purse is incorrect, because that IS against the law, selling houses for these huge prices isn't against the ToS, and is completely legal in the games rules, like I said, its more akin to the diamond industry or companies like apple.

Also, this is not an exploit. An exploit is a bug or feature in a game that is not working as intended, and fundamentally breaks the way the develops intend for you to play the game. But Khuja, you say, thats exactly whats going on; WRONG, we have had actual exploits in the game before, and square are very efficient in spotting them as soon as players start using them, and are quick to release a statement asking players not to do this, with this problem, the developers have said nothing except that they know there isnt enough housing. Conclusion: the system is designed to allow players to buy and sell houses, the system is also designed to allow players to buy multiple houses. Ergo, this is not an exploit, this is working as intended. Whether working as intended is good enough is another story, but calling this an exploit is wrong.

[Karlek]

What is wrong with sale of the houses in the first place? Everyone is grabbing houses in order to benefit themselves in one way or another. Should your desire to benefit yourself take precedence over someone else simply because you might use the house in a way that your mind justifies as "correct"? So instead of grabbing and selling unwatched pursue, you instead decide to grab it and hang it around your neck. How does this give you a moral high ground?

[MihaelB]

What is wrong with sale of the houses in the first place? Everyone is grabbing houses in order to benefit themselves in one way or another. Should your desire to benefit yourself take precedence over someone else simply because you might use the house in a way that your mind justifies as "correct"? So instead of grabbing and selling unwatched pursue, you instead decide to grab it and hang it around your neck. How does this give you a moral high ground?

It's not in the spirit of the service nor is it's purpose. If you're justifying something based on people's benefits, then we may as well scam and rob every single person for individual benefit or troll every dungeon for individual satisfaction. Certain precedence does exist.

[Knahli]

And just so you know, your argument of stealing an unattended purse is incorrect, because that IS against the law, selling houses for these huge prices isn't against the ToS, and is completely legal in the games rules

Ethically. Unless you are insinuating that law/ToS are the only moral guides to follow, or that anything is fine so long as you know you won't get caught. Housing is an extremely desirable and highly limited feature. Equating the massive anticipation surrounding it to the desires of someone wanting to rip-off and limit land to the highest bidders is nowhere near to being the same thing, even if it is technically legal. Do you honestly think SE would condone this behaviour if there was anything they could to do indisputably detect and correct it?

[Lambdafish]

Ethically. Unless you are insinuating that law/ToS are the only moral guides to follow, or that anything is fine so long as you know you won't get caught.

You aren't wrong, but that doesn't take away from the fact that they are well within their right. I just thought of a great example. This is like Star Wars: Battlefront. The treatment of that game was poor considering the hype surrounding it, and the price charged (including DLC) for the amount of content was close to ripping people of. Is this unethical? yes. Is this business? yes. Should you whine and rant about it? no, should you pay with your wallet and I dont know.... boycott housing so that the sellers don't have a market? yes.

SE are adding more plots and apartments, and the more people are tolerant of waiting, and less whiny and salty about current housing, the less of a market for housing there will be, and the prices will drop.

[Kloudix]

SE are adding more plots and apartments

Man... Just stop right there. Do you realize that they'll do that in... 6 months? Do you realize that this'll mean an 18 months wait to fix a functionality completely unavailable for 90% players of each server?
Seriously people, I'm wondering if you realize that YOU are CLIENTS...

If you pay a monthly fee for a car and something in it is just not working. Let's say the radio for example. But you do like radio. What will you do? You'll ask the garage to repair it or to give you another car. Because this one obviously isn't working fine. But look, it's working fine: you can drive it anytime anywhere. So why did you consider that it wasn't in the first place?
Because everyone has different expectation. And that garage did not just rent you a car to drive: they rent you a car to drive WITH a radio. There's that feature and it has to work.
So tell me, why wouldn't you be expecting the same quality of service from SE?

[Lambdafish]

Man... Just stop right there. Do you realize that they'll do that in... 6 months?

Oh geez... read a few pages back to get some context... I said already that SE have developed a poor system and that housing is broken, and that I feel bad for anyone that has to endure what we have right now.

As for the 6 months, I ask how long would you expect it to take? It has been quite clear that the game is underfunded and server limitations are a problem, so it looks like the development team have finally gotten over that hurdle and are now developing the system. Do you know how long it takes to develop a system like that? I'll give you hint, its not a week. I'm just happy that they have said it is coming, and that this broken system will finally be fixed (mainly so the housing saltiness will be gone). This is more like a building project for an architect than a missing radio, in that limitations and funding cause delays.

[Knahli]

You aren't wrong, but that doesn't take away from the fact that they are well within their right. I just thought of a great example. This is like Star Wars: Battlefront. The treatment of that game was poor considering the hype surrounding it, and the price charged (including DLC) for the amount of content was close to ripping people of. Is this unethical? yes. Is this business? yes. Should you whine and rant about it? no, should you pay with your wallet and I dont know.... boycott housing so that the sellers don't have a market? yes.

SE are adding more plots and apartments, and the more people are tolerant of waiting, and less whiny and salty about current housing, the less of a market for housing there will be, and the prices will drop.

People aren't debating the legality of it for the most part since that remains unclear as far as I know. Whining and ranting can be a sore point for many people, especially when it drags on for a long time about the same issues they are tired of hearing about, but that is the only way for the community to express their utter distaste for the current state of things. If everyone suddenly stopped talking about it then more likely than not it would slowly begin to be deemed as something of lesser priority because people seemingly have nothing to complain about. If that's all that people can do to feel they have the tiniest chance of having their gripes be heard and dealt with, then they will continue doing so and I can't blame them for that - as frustrating as I'm sure it is for some of the more active forum users.

And boycotting.... is just incredibly unrealistic and impractical. The idea may sound great on paper in an ideal world where everyone works together and isn't just out for themselves, but for those who have the ability to pay through the nose and see no reason to risk their opportunity against the next person who needs the prices to be a little lower than what they can afford, there is just no way all of them are going to obediently and happily cooperate - even considering the scenario where each and every person was made aware of the idea. You may as well ask the same for any expensive item in-game, like minions which are incredibly overpriced. People with the ability to afford such absurd price tags will always exist and be there to sustain the will for sellers to create high-priced listings, only that they aren't a finite source with even a fraction of the overall desirability.

I am not sure that there is very much else to burn your money on in this game other than housing, so I am leaning to believe that people are mostly upset because the prices are pushed way beyond the majority's budget, so add that to the fact that you'll never be able to stop the rich from purchasing the overpriced lots, "waiting" won't do anything for very many people. All they can do at this rate is wait a further six months for the next "maybe" when new wards are added, the servers are hyper-congested to the point that people are locked out for upwards of an hour after servers go online, and they are left with no option but to pray that people aren't once again taking advantage of the opportunity to buy up tons of lots for the sake of reselling - on top of the legitimate competition that were lucky enough to get in ahead of them.