Never Have I Felt My Time & Support So Disrespected In Over a Decade of Online Gaming

[MitsukiKimura]

Let me preface this by saying that this is not a critique of housing demolition on its own. While I don't exactly love the system, I understand its necessity given the finite number of housing plots available, and the only way to give everyone a fair chance at finding a home.

My problem is the deletion of housing decorations.

I am a hardcore MMO player, though many would consider me a casual since I don't generally partake in hardcore raiding or PvP in most games. Rather, I concern myself with light role playing, customization, fashion, and, of course, housing.

I have played FFXIV since the release of Heavensward - certainly not as long as many of you, but long enough to have amassed my own collection of items from story quests, past holidays, or personally bought or crafted. Each of them holds as much value to me as the end game gear of a raider, especially when I can use them all to make a space feel like my own.

Recently, however, I had my years worth of progress thrown away because I could not login for a few months. Not because I did not pay my sub, not by any intentional doing of my own, but because my house got demolished and I missed the window to reclaim my items.

As stated before, I'm not upset over the demolition of my house, the loss of the Gil I had invested in the property itself - I knew the risk when I got into that. And while you might say I should have known the same could happen to my individual items

You have 45 days to log in at least for even 1 minute out of that 30 day time span to prevent your house and items from being lost. You even get a Email warning ahead of time about it so it's not like you weren't given any sort of warning. I'm sorry if you feel this is wrong or if you felt like your stuff was taken for no reason but Square enix should not be responsible for your mistake.

[HyoMinPark]

You have 30 days to log in at least for even 1 minute out of that 30 day time span to prevent your house and items from being lost. You even get a Email warning ahead of time about it so it's not like you weren't given any sort of warning. I'm sorry if you feel this is wrong or if you felt like your stuff was taken for no reason but Square enix should not be responsible for your mistake.

It’s 45 days—not 30—to prevent auto-demolition of an estate.

[Risvertasashi]

You have 45 days to log in at least for even 1 minute out of that 30 day time span to prevent your house and items from being lost. You even get a Email warning ahead of time about it so it's not like you weren't given any sort of warning. I'm sorry if you feel this is wrong or if you felt like your stuff was taken for no reason but Square enix should not be responsible for your mistake.

I mean, it's not like there's no way to improve this system either.

For example, some other MMOs - if something like this happens - will have your stuff sent through their delivery system to you. And there is no expiration date. You could log in 5 or 10 years later, and your stuff would be there waiting for you.

So my question is... why are we complacent in accepting subpar systems for one of the biggest and most successful MMOs on the market?

[MitsukiKimura]

I mean, it's not like there's no way to improve this system either.

For example, some other MMOs - if something like this happens - will have your stuff sent through their delivery system to you. And there is no expiration date. You could log in 5 or 10 years later, and your stuff would be there waiting for you.

So my question is... why are we complacent in accepting subpar systems for one of the biggest and most successful MMOs on the market?

It's not hard to log in for 1 minute out of the 45 day time span you earn. Though It could be better, it's not impossible nor hard to make sure your house stays there. Also your moogle mailbox can only hold 20 mail at a time so my question is.. Are you going to put more work on the development team just because you don't wanna log in for that 1 minute?

[Risvertasashi]

It's not hard to log in for 1 minute out of the 45 day time span you earn. Though It could be better, it's not impossible nor hard to make sure your house stays there. Also your moogle mailbox can only hold 20 mail at a time so my question is.. Are you going to put more work on the development team just because you don't wanna log in for that 1 minute?

I've been lucky enough to never miss a window in the years of playing that I've had an in game house.

But I'm also experienced enough to know that, as they say, "sh** happens". And, yes, one day there might be a time where I can't login because of unforeseen circumstances.

Also, that's 20 messages you can receive at a time. You can have more than 20 pending messages. With the currently existing system as is.

[MitsukiKimura]

I've been lucky enough to never miss a window in the years of playing that I've had an in game house.

But I'm also experienced enough to know that, as they say, "sh** happens". And, yes, one day there might be a time where I can't login because of unforeseen circumstances.

Also, that's 20 messages you can receive at a time. You can have more than 20 pending messages. With the currently existing system as is.

Out of the 45 days? That's giving you plenty of time if you can't manage to pay your subscription or afford internet or whatever may be the case for a entire month. I'm all for suggestions for it being better but as it is, it is not impossible nor hard to keep your property.

[Risvertasashi]

Out of the 45 days? That's giving you plenty of time if you can't manage to pay your subscription or afford internet or whatever may be the case for a entire month. I'm all for suggestions for it being better but as it is, it is not impossible nor hard to keep your property.

Well, at the moment, I think it would be more fair to allow people to recover their belongings indefinitely. Maybe keep the gil on a timelimit, but at least the unique decorations. This costs no one anything; no one is kept from owning a limited plot by allowing this.

But if you want to talk housing systems. Those MMOs that have had similar systems to FF14 have automatically added wards when existing capacity hits 80% or so. Still others have had systems where you can lose your house, but your layout and all belongings are saved - so when you do come back and find a new plot, you can simply put it down and everything is as it was before. You lose the old spot you had, but not the home itself and everything therein.

FF14 combining both a limited availability system and the complete destruction of all items/property is not unheard of, but it's was mostly seen in those MMOs of the pre-3D era and it's a bit harsh, a bit antique. But for the sake of simplicity, I don't think it's so bad to at least have furnishings/decorations delivered to the character that loses their house.

[Brynne]

Well, at the moment, I think it would be more fair to allow people to recover their belongings indefinitely. Maybe keep the gil on a timelimit, but at least the unique decorations. This costs no one anything; no one is kept from owning a limited plot by allowing this.

QFT. At least make it longer than 30 days. How about a year? Six months? 30 days is ridiculously short when someone has already missed their 45 day window - if something in their life has kept them from logging in for that long, they're unlikely to make it back in that soon.

OP, I'm sorry to hear this happened and you have my sympathy.

[IsaacGondel1]

I agree the system they are using is in my mind set up to get more money from players.

Now I will say I agree with auto demolish if you are unable to log in because of how many players want a house.

But the 35 day limit to reclaim your item and 80% of your gil is just a way for square enix to show greed. I have played other mmo's with housing and they send the items back to your character no reason it cant be done this way here. Now I might have missed it but when i got my house I knew about the 45 day rule for the auto demolish but I never saw anything about this 35 day rule for reclaiming your items and gil.

I had to stop playing in 2018 made it through most of Stormblood story but I was in the hospital with cancer that is in remission now I was in every way unable to log on in 35 days to reclaim my stuff. Also didnt know i would have to.

I also saw someone in here post something about they dont know what character the item belongs to. Thats why you would have the system give it all back to the house owner because it does know that.

Now this and what I have been through plus the fact I dont make gil fast in mmo's it took me for ever to get the money for a medium house infact a friend even helped me with a few million. Was unable to get a large because of not having the gil. Plus all those event and quest rewards for housing are gone as well I dont have time to start over and I shouldn't have to.

I do honestly believe the 35 days to reclaim your stuff is based on greed and nothing else. Because there is no reason for that to even be a thing.

[MOZZYSTAR]

It's not hard to log in for 1 minute out of the 45 day time span you earn.

It is if you can't physically afford to log in. Plenty of times, I haven't been able to play for months because I quite literally couldn't afford it. I didn't have an extra dollar to my name to spare.

But unlike the OP, I actually knew about that housing rule (it's never changed since housing has been implemented as far as I'm aware), so I had moved all of my items out of my house just in case.
Despite knowing that rule, I can't say that I agree with it. Forty-five days isn't long at all. If they wanted to clear up the backage in case these people are "gone for good," I would go with maybe 6+ months and then deletion of stored items.
Even then, I find the deletion of items (not the demolition of houses) hard to justify.

Because I'm usually on a very tight budget, I totally forgo houses now, and only have an apartment. Houses just aren't worth the IRL money or stress to me.