SE's housing system doesn't favor anybody...

[Tridus]

The problem with instanced housing that everyone ignores/forgets/overlooks - is when it goes live for first time...your going to have a hell of a time getting things stabilized server wise

Yep, no way around that.

- then you got storage capacity issues.

Housing interiors are already instanced, so the only extra storage is if they add more of them, which they're doing anyway. I don't see this as a significant problem.

Then you got the factor in visitors/public/non-public....when people want to show up.when they don't.

Apartments already have this. While not perfect, it works reasonably enough. They could also copy what other games have done if they were going to full instanced housing.

Then the big one.....how many will be there? Available so to speak? There has to be a limit..a cap...it wont be endless.

It should be endless. The only acceptable answer at this point is 1 per account per server. Anything else is just hoping to make the group of people left out small enough that they can be ignored.

Multiply that for each-and-every-bloody-server on the network right now....in all worlds....

It'll be a problem initially based on what Raubhan's Wall did to the servers, but once the novelty wears off it shouldn't be. People by and large don't spend tons of time in their houses after the first week. There's no question that it'd be rough early on, but I tend to think people would be more willing to pay that price than be willing to have another "did you login within 1 minute of the servers coming up?" lottery.

This exponentially can get out of hand very fast/very quickly. In technology terms it adds up rapidly in terms of cost. - Trust me...I know these things working in a Data-center myself.
In terms of an idea its simple - but in deployment terms and hardware requirements? That's a whole different pandora's box.

I appreciate the insight of someone on the ops side of the fence, being a developer.

And while other games have done this....SE has to deal with a model that's already in operation..already deployed....square peg...meet round hole.
Bigger hammer may not be the appropriate answer..let alone a nuclear bomb.

Yeah. Layering another system on top of an existing system isn't great... yet it's what they're doing with the glamour wardrobe thing while also keeping the armoire, which kinda does the same thing but only for certain items because reasons.

I mean, adding more wards until the problem goes away is effectively what LotRO did, which wouldn't require adding a new system but would be even more expensive server wise since now you've got all those ward zones AND all the instanced house interiors. That would have to come with an account restriction so someone can't just buy 16 houses on a given server.

Will it be done? Not likely in the next patch or two...but i could be wrong.

I think you're right.

PS: Sorry if i reiterated what you said....sometimes my brain has to play catch up to get what your getting at...my point here...is its not an easy puzzle to sort out...on an already active model.

All good.

(lol, HyoMinPark and I both did an edit incoming post at the same time)

[Claviusnex]

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Yes it would take some work but sweeping it under the rug and trying to put a band-aid on a hemorrhage just makes matters worse. It will also cost money but I'm not sure that is the issue so much as having to admit that the original idea was not good especially after doubling down to try and force it to work. Even if SE changes course I don't see instanced housing as a patch item but something for a major release.

Part of the development work is determining how much server/storage/network will be needed to support the instances. SE should already have a decent idea as the interiors are already instanced. They also know the exterior requirements that can be added in for a rough total. With this they should be able to start a business case and architecture design. Once the implementation design and code are far enough along they should be able to start performance testing to better fine tune the system requirements and performance code paths. Nothing out of the ordinary as far as the development process goes.

As far as going live nothing says you have to let everyone hit it at once. SE could stage the user base access over some period of time. SE could also hire some folks who are use to working in large scale, high transaction computing to do much of the design and platform development. People who think it terms of 40K-50K of concurrent users plus background batch processing with millions of transactions/second as is done in large commercial systems. This would increase the odds of having capacity requirements determined correctly and working the first time out. It should also help with being able to dynamically add and remove server resources when peak load changes as it is common problem solved regularly on commercial systems. Of course you don't get these types of folks on the cheap.

Again keep in mind instanced housing doesn't have to be an all or nothing proposition. In fact I think it would be best to add it in parallel to the existing ward based system. The key is it makes housing with its benefits available to all who would want it.

[Stanelis]

So you basically say for each Player they had to load a single entire Ward.

Can you imagine how many Instances that would be? We don't speak about 50.000, we speak about over 200.000 - 400.000 as every Player had the Option for a actual House.
Not with those Servers, let alone they cannot handle 300 Players in a single Instance before the Servers on Square Enix's Side start to crumble and disconnect everyone.

I just say 300 Players in the Lochs is a good Stress Test on their Server, now do that with over 50.000 Instances loading.
You can kiss the Server Goodbye or you need to cut out a lot of Gameplay Options (Such as Inventory) just to make it enjoyable.
People always think they snip their Fingers and the Magic is done flawlessly, ya sadly not in Reality.

Let alone their Reasoning not to give us Au Ra the Option to seperate our Horns due of Issues coming from the Data.
Maybe in 10 or 20 Years we're rid of those Issues but not in the near Future, not with the Way SE is working currently.

Cut the crap out please, some mmorpg handle that just fine. Even FFXI allows players to do it. Also, nobody is saying that everybody should load a ward, just that everybody zoning into some housing area to define should load a small customized outdooor area with a house (such as the everquest II/ rift/ wildstar/TESO housing system).

Housing should have been instanced from the very beginning if allowing everybody to have a house in semi instanced areas was impossible (and I own a house).

[NephthysVasudan]

<snip>

^Real bonnafide developer....not fake.

Total respect points.

See people make a number of assumptions - and tend to forget the physical side of the coin.
SE has a damn good idea of whats in place...but its never as simple as it seems...they like are using a CLUSTER of servers...multiple servers tied together working in concert....physical..not virtual....and then you got the databases all communicating with each other....and the resources on top of that.

So yes..deceptively simple...but to deploy such a model on an active system? - Welcome to dev hell.

EVE Online faced this challenge and it took them years to get rid of trash code...YEARS. (Over 10-15 years old now)

<3 @Tridus

[NephthysVasudan]

<snip>

That's all good and fine...but your assuming (without knowing it) that the platform is a start from scratch system.
Don't work that way...because they have to impliment the changes into an already active system...that likely has "crap" all over the place.

EVE Online faced this issue..they fix one major issue - and broke 10 other issues that they didn't even see coming or predicted...and it chain reaction'd from there.
Do I know what SE has under the hood? No.
It's called - the bigger the game - the more complex the code - the more complex the code - the messier it gets - and its an endless cycle.

Am I saying it can't/won't be done? No.
For all we know they got something in the works.
What I am saying is...don't expect this to be over night...let alone next couple of patches.

[Melichoir]

Snip

People have to earn their gil to get houses, and that isnt easy (short of buying it illegally). I grinded out the cash, and then worked out the best places for me to get a house, and went with that. Is there a little luck to that? Sure. But thats just like Savage drops too. And the only time savage becomes "accessible" to everyone is once it falls out of high tier content, or people PAY for clears. Thats it. Youre not going to see everyone in Savage getting to the end, even in 340 gear. Same with anything such as limited Housing. People who can grind and get the cash, will have the opportunity to get the houses. Sucks for you if you cant get the money to get one, or youre not planning ahead enough to acquire one.

I wanted a Shirogane house, didnt get it, but I had back up places and managed to get one there. And I like what I got, and I worked to get it. So being told I was just "Lucky!" and didnt have a plan is kinda messed.

[NephthysVasudan]

<snip>

The luck factor is landing an open/available plot.....which is random...because people aren't that predictable.
Do you need to plan? Yes....to be able to buy it..and get it built.

But you still need luck....to get there.

[Melichoir]

-snip-

Having wealth does not mean youre entitled. You ahve to compete with others who also have the gil requirement. Some of that is going to be luck. Yeah, it sucks. I agree. But that is also the nature of the beast if something is in extrmely high demand. Having money but no one willing to sell to you means your money is worthless. And just because other people dont do a great job decorating doesnt mean youre also entitled to it and theyre not. Again, having money in of itself does not make you entitled to something. Once you have the money, you have the opportunity to compete to get the land you want, or attempt to buy it off someone. Thats it. Beyond that, youre footing is the same as everyone else. Thats why the pragmatic choice is to have a few options in various places.

But if people are so dead set on a location, then given time, someone will sell it to you at marked up pricing.

[Skivvy]

People have to earn their gil to get houses, and that isnt easy (short of buying it illegally). I grinded out the cash, and then worked out the best places for me to get a house, and went with that. Is there a little luck to that? Sure. But thats just like Savage drops too. And the only time savage becomes "accessible" to everyone is once it falls out of high tier content, or people PAY for clears. Thats it. Youre not going to see everyone in Savage getting to the end, even in 340 gear. Same with anything such as limited Housing. People who can grind and get the cash, will have the opportunity to get the houses. Sucks for you if you cant get the money to get one, or youre not planning ahead enough to acquire one.

I wanted a Shirogane house, didnt get it, but I had back up places and managed to get one there. And I like what I got, and I worked to get it. So being told I was just "Lucky!" and didnt have a plan is kinda messed.

Getting money is not the issue. Gil is incredibly easy to get in this game, and it serves very little purpose.

Anyway, try and justify it all you want, but there is no decent excuse for not providing housing for all players. SE just implemented a crappy system, and we are paying the price for it. Perhaps it's time they spend some more of their XIV profits on this actual game and find a way to make it work.

[Melichoir]

-Snip snip and Snip-

It's not as random as people tend to think. New wards open up, people tend to move to their ideal location, opening up other spots in other wards. If the place is high demand (Shirogane), expect A LOT of people to be trying toget housing there, expect it to be hypercompetative. Knowing this, Keeping an eye on Gridania, Limsa, and Uldah (with the help of friends too) can make a huge difference in acquiring a plot of land. Making sure teleport to the Housing district entrance is unlocked makes a difference. Knowing what kind of house location youre looking for makes a difference (plot 8 in Limsa as an example) and so forth.

Yes, there is some randomness involved, but the argument put forward is "Its all about the randomness! And cause of that, this system sucks!" rather than "Yeah, randomness isnt great, but its still pretty possible to get a plot somewhere if youre smart about things."