Quote Originally Posted by Penthea View Post
The problem with placard spam isn't the placard, it's the lack of housing. Taking the placard out of the equation doesn't magically fix anything. All that lottery would do is change the method of acquisition. It will not grant more even distribution of plots. It will not create more houses. It will not remove the rng placards produce because the nature of lottery is rng.
The placard spam is a huge problem. It encourages - on certain servers, requires - an extremely unhealthy, mentally draining playstyle, for the exact same results as a lottery would provide. Unless you're the only person at that plot, you have to sit there and spam the placard. Taking a break to use the restroom, stretch, eat, do something else for a while, risks losing the plot. And then you may not even be the one at the plot that was lucky enough to click at the exact moment it became available. That is obscenely, objectively terrible. Houses can be locked for as little as an hour or even longer than 14. But unless you already have a house, on several servers, that's your only option to get your foot in the door. On any server where placard spam "isn't a problem" that means there are already open plots ready to be purchased elsewhere, and they can buy said plot then relocate. They don't have to spam a placard unless they don't have the money to do that.

Nobody is expecting the lottery system to fix the whole system. But it will make it so people can do something that isn't awful. Yes, it might (will) increase competition, but I'd rather see that, then see people stuck having to mindlessly click the placard over and over for hours on end for the slim chance at getting one. And I think you're overestimating how many people are going to be so desperate for a house that they are willing to pay real money for a bunch of service accounts, get them all up to the point that they can buy a house, then lock themselves out of ever being in another FC. Increased competition is really the only downside here, and if they want to counteract that, they can raise house prices to the point where you have to actually work to afford one again. They never should have been lowered in the first place.