Increase apartments

[Brynne]

Otherwise, it will completely burn most (not all) desire to have a house.

To be frank... so what?

Why does housing NEED to be superior to apartments? Right now there are not enough houses to go around, but apartments are (supposedly, according to what the devs have said) limitless. If everyone abandoned the wards to get an apartment, that would give SE some valuable information about what the player base in general is looking for. Odds are, not everyone will abandon the wards even if apartments are improved, but even if they do... who cares, and why do they care? If the argument against putting in something that people want is "but TOO many people will want it and not many will want (other thing) any more if there's an alternative", then maybe (other thing) isn't so great? Also, if the wards were not filled, maybe the auto-demolition timer wouldn't need to be there - because it was never supposed to be "this is the drawback of owning a house". It was put in so that people who didn't play any more couldn't tie up the limited resource to the detriment of active players.

You can also have a house and an apartment, so I find it unlikely that there will be hoards of players abandoning their houses, but if they do... eh. So what?

[Endeleon]

But it's not a contradiction?

As they stand, Apartments wouldn't be any more popular than housing, no matter what. Purely because of reasons I've already stated. They could be much larger than large Houses, but people will still complain purely for the sake of doing so. They could have a legit reason of hating Apartments getting preferential treatment (like many house owners may do, if apartments just get everything a house gets, minus the camping. I know that'd piss a lot of people off.) especially when housing is meant to be superior to apartments.

That superiority, of course. Comes with its own drawbacks. Such as the demo-timer. I still stand by my point that, if Apartments did indeed become genuinely even when compared to housing, then apartments should have to deal with the same ruleset the housing does. Otherwise, it will completely burn most (not all) desire to have a house.

Why own a Large House if a Large Apartment offers you the exact same, without the demo-timer?
For bragging rights? Nobody goes to the wards anyways, so that 'brag' is worthless.

It would cause more issues than it solves, as people would divert their hatred for apartments towards personal-house owners, because "Why own a house, when an apartment is better? You're just being a dick to FCs" being the assumed general reasoning.

(Not saying this would happen in any capacity. But given people on this forums, I am inclined to assume something similar to this would occur. People aren't happy, no matter what changes come. There'll always be someone pissed off it isn't what THEY want.)

I really don't think it will. Reason being, there is no functional use of a house beyond incredibly niche gardening that 90% of house owners don't participate in. It's purely for showing off, and that appeals to people who want that curb appeal. You can even see currently how wrong you are in that people routinely visit houses just to look around, but never visit apartments. Having larger apartments wouldn't change that.

[Endeleon]

Because apartments are permanent? It's not difficult to see why people would get upset...

So make them 10x more expensive. I'd be happy to pay that much to not have to deal with a demo timer. I currently sit on 80million gil that I have absolutely zero use for so a good gold sink is needed in this game anyway.

[einschwartz]

I still don't see how having apartment size upgrades will be superior compared to house. Assuming apartments can be upgraded into medium and large, house still have these following benefits:
Garden.
Can use outdoor furnishings.
FC airships.
Basements.
Upper floor (for M and L)

My emphasis on the last 2. Apartment owners are limited to having 1 floor only. Have to make lofts if they want additional floor in their space. This make it house owners have a lot more room to play with. Not to mention, SE often hand out housing items during events and apartment owners can't use it when they're for outdoor use (like this year's moonfire).

It's not like we're asking for unlimited size upgrades for apartments. That would be unfair. We mostly want an option for a larger space. Have to pay additional gil for upgrades? That's fine. Can make it cost just as much or close to the price of housing plot. But to add a timer to apartments to make it fair with house owners? That doesn't make sense to me. Because apartment are still limited in some aspect like I've listed above.

If house owners have to put up with demolition timer in exchange for having access to garden or multiple floors, apartment owners have to accept being limited to one floor only (and other features) without a timer on their backs.

[Jandor]

Because apartments are permanent? It's not difficult to see why people would get upset...

Yes, it is. You're allowed to have both you know.

[Kenky]

To be frank... so what?

Pretty obvious one. If there is no desire to have a house, why would SE put resources into upgrading it? It's the (assumed) same reason why Apartments haven't been touched since their inception. I am very well aware that you can have a house and an apartment, but one can prefer one over the other, or deny one of them purely for personal reasons. Something a lot of people seem to forget with the whole "You can own both, so there's no issue!" defense.

I really don't think it will. Reason being, there is no functional use of a house beyond incredibly niche gardening that 90% of house owners don't participate in. It's purely for showing off, and that appeals to people who want that curb appeal. You can even see currently how wrong you are in that people routinely visit houses just to look around, but never visit apartments. Having larger apartments wouldn't change that.

Really? Because when I was walking around the Housing districts on Mateus, Balmung and Leviathan, the only people that were there were camping housing plots in the district. Not a soul anywhere else. So care to offer proof that people do what you claim them to do? (Not being an ass. Genuinely want to make sure I'm not spreading fake news)

And again (for the third, if not fourth time this thread. My word, people don't read previous posts!) I stand by my point that Apartments being bigger would be a grand idea, but there are certain caveats to said idea. If Apartments truly do become more 'desirable' than housing (which you say is only for bragging rights and gardening. The latter you state hardly anyone does and the former being close to non-existent from personal view) then what would SE do, exactly? Because that's a rather slippery slide when 'instanced' housing (Apartments) become the majority choice, rendering all of their work with the Ward Housing a waste of resources.

After all, why put effort in making Ward Housing more attractive to the playerbase when the majority of them want nothing more than a hole in a wall. (Both figuratively and literally)

[TheForce]

I guess if an apartment is able to be upgraded to be the equivalent of a small house - and I have no objection to this - it would need to cost an equivalent amount. It would also need to be subject to the same account restraints as a house, including losing it if you don't use it for 45 days (or however long).

First good suggestion I've seen, I agree with this.

[TheForce]

Whoa, people are really against improving apartments? I'm surprised.

Right now, housing could stand to be less in demand, and apartments could stand to be more in demand, so I think SOME sort of improvement to apartments is in order. Personally, I'm in favor of decoupling the features - gardening, workshops - from houses in general, because locking content behind a limited-quantity luxury item doesn't sit right with me. And I think purchasable upgrades to apartments would be a nice feature, as well as a decent gil sink (say you start with the current apartment size and you can upgrade to a small house size for the price of a small house, etc, plus a cost for a small garden area and so on). The fact that you can have both an apartment AND a house and the fact that there are definitely people who enjoy the ward system, would be enough to ensure that the wards are filled while everyone can enjoy all the benefits of housing as long as they save up enough gil.

People aren't simply against improving apts (well, based off of what I've seen). People are against improving apts while houses remain the same and cost 6X the price (at best!).
If apts receive the improvements that most of you have been proposing, their prices will need to reflect that of houses, or, houses will need to receive improvements as well.
As a owner of both, I'd be happy with either option. As long as I don't feel like the millions I spent on my house was wasted, then please, SE make any improvements you want!

[Brynne]

Pretty obvious one. If there is no desire to have a house, why would SE put resources into upgrading it? It's the (assumed) same reason why Apartments haven't been touched since their inception. I am very well aware that you can have a house and an apartment, but one can prefer one over the other, or deny one of them purely for personal reasons. Something a lot of people seem to forget with the whole "You can own both, so there's no issue!" defense.

If the majority of players would prefer an apartment-style instanced house, then SE would actually better serve the player base as a whole by not putting more work into the wards and focusing on developing out apartments instead. Having a sunk-cost mentality (ie, we've already sunk so much into wards, we have to keep pouring more and more into it rather than exploring alternatives that the player base might find more satisfying) isn't going to help the game. At this point, I'd rather they put effort into SOME sort of instanced alternative to ward housing.

That said, my theory is that improving apartments won't free up much space in the wards. But it will put some more weight behind the old "just get an apartment" response to people trying to get their first house.

If apts receive the improvements that most of you have been proposing, their prices will need to reflect that of houses

I'm in favor of this. The game could use more gil sinks anyway.

[ERMITANYO]

Improved apartments available for everyone veteran and new players alike, give it a bigger horizontal and vertical space for non constrictive interior designing, with options to have indoor gardening and an instanced balcony following day and night as well as weather cycles kinda like the open balcony in eulmore tomestone exchange vendors.

And just continue the housing ward and district system as a limited resource for those who want to compete for plotted housing.