Hoarding Houses - Sometimes a Depressing Sight (a rant)

[Numenor1379]

Answer: barely any in comparison to how many have been added over the years on top of auto-demolition.

Says the guy who owns 27 houses...

[Alien_Gamer]

Says the guy who owns 27 houses...

Lets see, we started with 9 wards, now we have 18 and a 4th housing area with 18 wards for a total of 27 new wards (54 including subdivisions). Oliver has less than 1.

I can't place an exact number of reclamations per month but I'd estimate it around 20 (approximately 1%) on Jenova across all wards. So in 2 months the system would have reclaimed more houses than Oliver owns. Even at half that rate there's still be more houses opened each patch than removing his houses would account for.

Based on what I know of Jenova, if you removed all houses that were grandfathered in you might free up 1 ward. Given a few months that many wards are freed up from reclamation.

Regardless of your personal feelings for how he approaches housing, he is correct. Wards and reclamations both put more houses on the market than removing his houses, or any grandfathered houses would.

[MizArai]

Lets see, we started with 9 wards, now we have 18 and a 4th housing area with 18 wards for a total of 27 new wards (54 including subdivisions).

"We" started with like 5 wards or something. There were 8 plus the subdivisions when I started playing, so I wasn't around for the really rough times of no one being able to afford the houses and there not being very many.

[Alyanna_Elingval]

Lets see, we started with 9 wards, now we have 18 and a 4th housing area with 18 wards for a total of 27 new wards (54 including subdivisions). Oliver has less than 1.

I can't place an exact number of reclamations per month but I'd estimate it around 20 (approximately 1%) on Jenova across all wards. So in 2 months the system would have reclaimed more houses than Oliver owns. Even at half that rate there's still be more houses opened each patch than removing his houses would account for.

Based on what I know of Jenova, if you removed all houses that were grandfathered in you might free up 1 ward. Given a few months that many wards are freed up from reclamation.

Regardless of your personal feelings for how he approaches housing, he is correct. Wards and reclamations both put more houses on the market than removing his houses, or any grandfathered houses would.

I have no dog in the fight because I was able to get my dream house, but I don't know if I completely agree with this. Yeah, houses are opened up through reclamation that would cover the multiple houses this person has. However, that would only be a remedy to the overall shortage if the number of people seeking a house stayed flat. Reclamation would have to outpace the number of people currently waiting, and all of the new players who have saved up their nest egg to buy their first home in order for the multiple houses owned by players not to matter.

But at the end of the day it was a failure in foresight and planning by SE. They should be able to look at what their putting in place and think of the ways it can be abused. This one was pretty obvious. The only way I could back taking a house from someone was is if they could show the player either bought gil to buy it, or paid real money for it flat out somewhere outside the game. Because at that point they would have violated rules that existed at the time they purchased the house. But if I had an alt that earned the money in-game, bought a house and SE took from me after the fact I would probably stop playing.

[Alien_Gamer]

I have no dog in the fight because I was able to get my dream house, but I don't know if I completely agree with this. Yeah, houses are opened up through reclamation that would cover the multiple houses this person has. However, that would only be a remedy to the overall shortage if the number of people seeking a house stayed flat. Reclamation would have to outpace the number of people currently waiting, and all of the new players who have saved up their nest egg to buy their first home in order for the multiple houses owned by players not to matter.

The rate at which people buy houses and the rate which people leave are always going to be variable things. More people buy around big patches and expansions as people come back and more people leave towards the end of the expansion and between patches. None of that is really a surprise to anyone. But even during 4.2 when the new wards and restrictions were put in place, not all plots were bought on all worlds; most worlds were full but not all, and that was really the point of peak demand this expansion. Availability has only increased since then; many players have posted increases in plot availability on multiple worlds since then. So I feel confident that the rate of reclamation over the past year has been greater than the rate of purchase.

But at the end of the day it was a failure in foresight and planning by SE.

I agree there. They vastly underestimated the demand for housing and they've refused to make some necessary changes to the system. Whether thats from stubborness or server restrictions I don't know but its clear they aren't going to revamp it. The most I'd expect is more wards, more cities, or an expansion on apartments. None of which will happen before 5.1 though.

[Millen1]

As for the pre 4.2 housing/FCs. The FCs were more work to make but worth doing if you use the airships and gardens, which I did on a large number of FCs I created. I bought mostly medium houses for the extra gardening space and I could afford them back when housing was pricey and a large was out of the budget. Back then the garden provided items that were given to FC members to use or just have access to gardens if they wanted to try. The airship also brough back useful stuff which was also handed out to FC members as the needed it. Mostly materia for melds. Slowly over HW it felt like the rewards were nerfed and lacking in change as the game changed. Subs, They have been ok but I would call them useless compared to the airships. So all my extra FCs supported a 100 player main FCs with materials that everyone could use. Though I can understand why airship and sub rewards are lacking, Since they are locked often to the FC leader or co lead, they often turn around and sell everything on the MB leaving the FC members without anything. It could be fixe by housing having some type of ariship or sub for those that would like to use them when they are in FCs that don't hand out items that only come back on airships and subs. Having said all that, the FCs I had were used and went to a goo use. Buying them just to hold land is wrong and I agree with that. I honestly don't know how to fix the multiple FC issue as it has its upsides and downsides. A land grab by SE would fix nothing though. That is certain.

[LuciferMink]

As a player on Balmung, I have felt the housing squeeze for a long while. My old FC was lucky enough to snag a small when the subdivisions first hit, but it was RIGHT after patch, and she went straight for a middle subdivision. I got my small personal before the housing prices were to drop and the new wards were to release from a friend who relinquished his old FC plot in hopes of getting a new one in the Mists. I bought the land RIGHT before maintenance. He, unfortunately, 90k'd at the log in screen and did not get a plot. When Shiro launched, I had enough to relocate to a medium. If you did not have under a 400 queue upon log in, you were NOT getting a house. Balmung houses always sell out in less than 10 minutes, Shirogane was sold out in 5. We actually had entire FCs that would go around and buy up half of a ward then advertise on reddit or even in PF that the plots were for sale. Smalls would go for 50+ million gil.

When they cracked down on the 1 personal and 1 FC house per account per world, I was very happy, normal people had a chance! What makes me irritated is seeing an unused large or medium with 1 or 2 people in the FC. I had a few friends who owned a personal house, and a solo owned FC house. Yet, when they brought the new wards to Shiro, they made it so only 4 person FCs and those looking to relocate could buy right away. It was refreshing to see empty plots standing for longer than a day in any ward. I got my medium, only because I relocated. My friend who lost his FC house also got his new FC home, in the Mist, then as well. Even now, when a plot comes open, thanks to the random timer, the placard is swarmed by people on my server trying to get a house, either for their FC, or themselves. It's pure madness.

The other thing that has gotten a bit on my nerves are people who have more than one account and have a house linked to both accounts. I understand you have two accounts, but you don't really NEED two houses, you can add your other account to your fl and be a tenant of the house.

I wish when they changed the rules, they hadn't grandfathered in those who already owned more than one house. I wish they had contacted those players or looked to see what character is logged in on the most and designated that as the main character. I also think that the rule of "4 people in an FC is required to buy a house" should be in place to KEEP your FC house. On Balmung, I saw PFs offering payment for people to join an FC JUST to buy a house, they could leave right afterwards. I also believe SE should move from each character is it's own entity to more of an account based. Elder Scrolls Online is all account based, and the housing is instanced. My Argonian Healer and my Khajiit DPS both own the same house, even though my crafter is the one who technically bought it. You walk up to the gate and enter the yard. Then you enter the house. To enter MY house, you have to be friends or in a guild with me, then teleport to my instance.

[AriesMouse]

The other thing that has gotten a bit on my nerves are people who have more than one account and have a house linked to both accounts. I understand you have two accounts, but you don't really NEED two houses, you can add your other account to your fl and be a tenant of the house.

I wish when they changed the rules, they hadn't grandfathered in those who already owned more than one house. I wish they had contacted those players or looked to see what character is logged in on the most and designated that as the main character. I also think that the rule of "4 people in an FC is required to buy a house" should be in place to KEEP your FC house. On Balmung, I saw PFs offering payment for people to join an FC JUST to buy a house, they could leave right afterwards. I also believe SE should move from each character is it's own entity to more of an account based. Elder Scrolls Online is all account based, and the housing is instanced. My Argonian Healer and my Khajiit DPS both own the same house, even though my crafter is the one who technically bought it. You walk up to the gate and enter the yard. Then you enter the house. To enter MY house, you have to be friends or in a guild with me, then teleport to my instance.

See:

I still say they should give instanced housing. I also strongly disagree that they should ever, at any point, remove houses from people grandfathered in. It is never good PR for a company to punish people for following the rules, even worse if they were to do it after giving those people a pass. If SE wanted the system to work differently, then they should have planned and codded things to fit that. They didn't, and they are the only ones that should be getting grief for it.

Personally, if a house is being used, maintained, decorated, etc, then I don't care who owns it, or how many other houses they own. What bothers me is seeing the same houses sit for over a year, with literally nothing changing in them. Not a single new item. Nothing ever placed in the gardens. They just sit, collecting dust. They just feel like trophy items. I get it, we can't tell people how to use their houses once they have them, but at the end of the day, what is worse? Someone having more than one house, and spending hours upon hours decorating them, loving them, and using them, like housing is their end game content? Or someone that has a house and only goes to it once a month to reset timer(made worse when the people that do this do in fact have more than one house)?

At the end of the day, there is a slippery slope here, when it comes to saying something needs to be removed from players. Where do you draw the line? When does "this person has too much, take some away" stop? Does it just stop with people with more than 1 personal house? Or would it just move on to "no one should have a personal mansion", or "an FC needs this house more, take away the personal housing". I have seen those sorts of statements before. Once you open the door to things being removed, you can't close it. Also take for example people that have more than one house because they have more than one service account. Should they lose their houses to? They are 100% within the rules, but people will argue that they should still drop to just one. Rather than fighting to take away other people's toys, why not fight harder for SE to provide enough for all of us to play with evenly?

You are literally an example of the slippery slope I mentioned, which proves the point that SE doing anything other than providing infinite housing is going to do more harm than good. People will never be sated, they will always turn on each other and find a new way to try to rip houses out from under each other at every turn. So, for as long as people want to fixate on that (which helps nothing), SE will continue to put off giving us a real solution.

[not_ya_wify]

I only have one house but I'm fervently against taking houses from people who were grandfathered in. The example with the empty houses is very sad and I'm just as sad to see a single empty house.

However, most of the people who even bother to make several Alts and FCs and level all of that do so because they play mainly for housing. Do you know how much time and resources it takes to level 7 Alts to 50, level your grand company, level your Crafters to have the Gil to even buy those houses, level FCs to rank 6, etc?

People who support taking houses away from players often like to argue that everyone pays the same amount of money for a subscription but usually house hoarders spend hundreds of millions of gil or real money to get those houses. Then they probably spend have another 50-100 million Gil worth of furniture for each house. If they have really nice stuff it could be much more than that. Another $50-100 in mog station items.

On top of that, they'll probably hire a decorator for 50 million Gil or $100 for each house excluding furniture.

This house hoarders would be treated exactly the same as the hoarders with 7 empty houses.

If you had 7 houses, each of them exquisitely decorated and the storage probably full of furniture too, how would you feel if SE suddenly demolished 6 of them?

[ErysNight]

Dear SE,

I don't know if you're reading this post but some of us live for housing, adequately decorate our homes and really enjoy interior design. Some of us were fortunate enough to focus on housing YEARS ago and work hard to craft and save money to own our homes. We were grandfathered in, own multiple decorated wonderful homes and are happy to do so.

If you take away grandfathered homes, I will unsub. I spend a ton of money on 2 service accounts, and have bought both the windows and PS4 licences for those two service accounts. I spend a ton of money on the mogstation as well.

My houses are my most important investment in this virtual world and I will unsub if they are taken away.

Like with all the damn botters on Midgardsormr, if you focus on punishing people with grandfathered homes before you work on all the gathering bots at every single node, I will completely lose faith in this process.

Open Ishgard housing, make the rules to legitimately purchase homes more stringent, leave us long-time players that are grandfathered in alone.