So I'm relatively new.

[Dfess]

While not just starting I am still new to the game and still learning how this game plays. I only just finished the MSQ and made my way to unlocking everything on my main. I have 2 alta atm and I am sluggishly going through the MSQ on one of them. The other I paid for story skip.

Anyway my question is why cant I have alts as tenants in my mains house or send mail to them? Just seems silly not to have these things in an mmo these days.

Also, why cant I use my bed in my home to log out? Why is that only a thing for the in? Can't they add the log out to every item generically called "bed" and call it a day?

Please and thank you for your responses.

[Enkidoh]

Welcome to Eorzea!

The restrictions on alts is an attempt to combat RMT/botting, something which FFXI suffered from for most of it's life. It was also to make players not reliant on so-called 'mule' characters that they created solely for extra storage space (which is the reason retainers exist). A plain old financial incentive may also be at play here - extra retainers cost an extra subscription where as extra characters (as in, alts) are free, so hence not being able to mail gear between alts on the same account, it encourages you to purchase extra retainer subscriptions instead of having mule characters.

As for not being able to log out in bed, it's for technical reasons to reduce the amount of processing the client and server both have to do when logging in, as the interior of houses has to be loaded every time you enter (it's not kept in memory whether you're inside or out, or not logged in). It's been asked in the past by other players and the development team has responded that is the reason for it and that as a result they have no plans to change this sadly, despite it being widely requested (including myself).

[Dfess]

Ok. I guess the bed makes sense but, not the mail. If they wanted to limit rmt then why have the mail system? Isn't sending mail to alts no different than sending mail to any other person in the game?

What about house tenants? Why cant my alts live in the same house as my main? This is the main question I have.

[Raldo]

What about house tenants? Why cant my alts live in the same house as my main? This is the main question I have.

No one knows. I'm sure the answer is either "system limitations" or "they haven't gotten around to adding that functionality yet". I'm sure the number of people that own houses & have alts & actually care about this is pretty low, so it's probably pretty low on the priority list.

[Niwashi]

As to the sharing a house part, I'd thought that was supposed to come when they added the restriction to only allowing one personal house per account. If other alts can't have their own house because we've already got one on another character, then they should be able to share that one we do have. But that was a while ago (4.2 I think), and I haven't seen anything since about getting the sharing part implemented. (Or did they add something and I didn't notice it? That's entirely possible.)

For both the mail between alts and the logging out from the bed in our house issues, they've both been repeatedly asked for (including by me), and I still wish they'd be put in.

Passing items between alts has a few workarounds. If they're both in the same FC and both have access to the FC chest, you can use that to pass items between them. (Though unless it's a personal FC for just your alts, please be courteous to other members and not tie up all the chest space for your own use for long.) Passing gil between your characters can be done by selling something to yourself through the marketboard. If you have a friend you trust enough, you can ask them to hold something while you switch alts and give it back to your alt. But the workarounds are all more cumbersome than just being able to mail stuff to yourself or have a shared bank like some MMOs offer.

A plain old financial incentive may also be at play here - extra retainers cost an extra subscription where as extra characters (as in, alts) are free

That's not strictly true. A standard subscription that allows multiple characters per world is more expensive than a basic subscription that only allows one. So we already are paying extra for the ability to have additional characters, even though it's not each one individually.

(Besides, the mail limitation was in place from the beginning, long before paid retainers were added to the game. So while retainer sales might now be a disincentive to changing the rule, they're not the reason for the rule.)

[Dfess]

The problem with the FC thing is when I make alts they have their own personalities and feelings. They dont want to be in the same FC.

Like this character is the oldest siblings and she believes in doing the right thing.

Her sister Kael, the middle child, is angry and is always taking her frustration out through her words or beating the shite out of whoever is near her.

Kiar, the youngest resents Kair (the oldest) because, their parents were always comparing the 2 and she's been in her shadow since they were children. She still loves her sisters for their beliefs.

When they are together they are unstoppable but, they hate being close to each other for too long. Except Kair. She is always trying to keep everyone close. And so far she's failing cause she cant get her sisters to move in together. They keep fighting. Until they can work out their differences the house will be only Kair. (Atleast that's the only excuse I can come up with til SE adds alt tenants XD. (Damn you SE)

[SannaR]

Last I knew they said they'd look into it/work on it for the alt house share, but don't have your hopes up as housing is just a mess and with two fan fests and any last QA checks they need for the expansion and the world visit function coming up other things get put on the back burner sadly.

[Enkidoh]

That's not strictly true. A standard subscription that allows multiple characters per world is more expensive than a basic subscription that only allows one. So we already are paying extra for the ability to have additional characters, even though it's not each one individually.

(Besides, the mail limitation was in place from the beginning, long before paid retainers were added to the game. So while retainer sales might now be a disincentive to changing the rule, they're not the reason for the rule.)

Retainers have been in the game since the launch of version 1.0 and SE always intended to have extra paid options for them - from the very beginning they were always meant to be the replacement for player bazaars that FFXI had (and which RMT used as their fences for their ill-gotten gains), as well as replacing the need for mule characters.

As for the subscription thing, you are right that the 'entry' subscription only allows one character per server, with the 'standard' one allowing more characters on a server for a higher price, but it still works out cheaper than how FFXI handled it (which is what I was referring to but wasn't clear about) - in FFXI you have to pay for each character's subscription individually (SE called it a 'Content ID') meaning for those who liked making a lot of alts, it would turn out to be very expensive, making FFXIV's Standard subscription with it's 8 characters per server under the one subscription offer still far more cheaper by comparison.

Also I admit I tend to forget the Standard subscription is quite pricey, as I have the special 'Legacy' subscription which has the Standard sub's benefits with the Entry's lower cost, so I'm sorry for that confusion.