Apartments need Rent

[Catstab]

And you've got to accept that I have opinions you don't like... or perhaps you're one of these players with ill gotten gains and don't like the truth being pointed out?

You can have opinions. Frame them as opinions, then. "I feel they should release their gains that I find to be ill gotten" instead of "they should release their ill gotten gains." The second one sounds like you're quoting facts, when you are not.

And I have a small house on one alt for RP purposes, yes. I took two of my servers 5,760 houses and did it well within the rules. For SE to come and delete my alt house would make as much sense as SE coming to de-level my combat classes, or to strip me of my mounts and minions. It's earned rewards, and SE is smart enough to know that, which is why they grandfathered in their players.

I get that you personally care nothing for the players' experience on this game, but SE quite literally makes caring about players their business.

[Mimilu]

You're opening statement was that you were thinking of a way to make apartments a "more attractive option compared to housing" and while making them cheaper and accessible earlier is a small start, how does adding a rent do that?
Is it just a counter-balance to your proposed price and earlier access?
Are those two points really going to make apartments more attractive compared to houses, which allow for more furnishing items, outdoor furnishing, cross-breeding gardening, have multiple floors (that allow for easier glitching when decorating without the aid of a third-party tool), and can be bought by FCs?
And where do FC private chambers fit into this?

[Catstab]

No it's not, they hate me and hate anything I have to say.

Untrue. I have no feelings toward you personally one way or another.

I simply disagree with the idea that grandfathering should be undone, because I know it would damage player experiences. You have expressed before that you think this damage would ultimately be for the greater good. Both myself and SE disagree and think it would destroy a lot of player enjoyment and cost SE a lot of sub money and customer faith.

I also disagree regarding this apartments and rent idea. I moderate on a discord called Sadu's Housing Alerts. What we do is hand out information to first time house hunters and give them a space to coordinate their ward-checks with one another, to help determine the age of open plots. The discord is 10,000 strong between campers and volunteers. A lot of people put blood, sweat, and tears into the timer daily. And one of my first pieces of advice is "Get an apartment. It's cheaper, it gives you a place to play decorator for now, and it never demolishes even if you take a break!" The housing system is brutal. We all know it. Apartments permanence is one of the best things about housing. Suggesting we make apartments expire is bad for players, it just is.

I did also disagree when you suggested (in jest, apparently?) that relocation "has to go." My reasoning here was that FCs in the past would have to boot offline members to demolish their bedrooms to move a house before 2017. Relocation was added to the game then and stopped FCs from having to disband to move. This is helpful because some FCs never recover from that disband, and playing with your friends should not be made harder.

So I don't hate you, you're off base with that one. I just find you to be off-base also when you attack what I see as cornerstones of housing. And I'm the sort of person who's generally not afraid to walk up to someone and say "you haven't quite thought this through, allow me to show you what you're not seeing."

[Almagnus1]

Untrue. I have no feelings toward you personally one way or another.

And yet... you will respond to almost every single post I make. It's almost like you're in some ersatz mating ritual...

[Almagnus1]

You're opening statement was that you were thinking of a way to make apartments a "more attractive option compared to housing" and while making them cheaper and accessible earlier is a small start, how does adding a rent do that?

If everything (but the FC rooms) have rent attached to them, and the rent is easily doable, the apartments would become cheaper and easier to move into, and since there's rent on everything, it gives players an opportunity to do housing stuff without necessarily being in a house. That said, the apartments should definitely have more features to them (and not basically be another instance of an FC room) so there's actual incentive to do so beyond a cheaper price.

Is it just a counter-balance to your proposed price and earlier access?

Partially, but 10k gil/week is peanuts, especially if anyone can pay for the apartment by walking up to the NPC that sells them and extending your rent.

Are those two points really going to make apartments more attractive compared to houses, which allow for more furnishing items, outdoor furnishing, cross-breeding gardening, have multiple floors (that allow for easier glitching when decorating without the aid of a third-party tool), and can be bought by FCs?

With the anticipation that we're seeing gardening moving away from housing (or having a system that's superior to it with Endwalkers), hopefully the gardening stuff changes enough that it's not as heavily associated with housing as is. I would also be OK with SE increasing the size and capabilities of the apartments as they should be more distinct from FC rooms.

And where do FC private chambers fit into this?

FC private chambers would be attached to the FC house, so they should remain unchanged. The FC house, on the other hand, should get rent and at a higher rate than a personal house because FCs need a minimum of four characters to found, so they should have the resources of at least four people to help fund them.

[Mimilu]

While I don't agree with the idea, wouldn't a more streamlined version of this be to just give houses a rent and let apartments be rent-free? Then, they would still have the appeal of being the free, eternal option, versus homes being costly and having the time requirement.
Like you said, 10k gil is easy to get, so why bother charging it?

[Almagnus1]

While I don't agree with the idea, wouldn't a more streamlined version of this be to just give houses a rent and let apartments be rent-free? Then, they would still have the appeal of being the free, eternal option, versus homes being costly and having the time requirement.
Like you said, 10k gil is easy to get, so why bother charging it?

Eh.... part of the problem with a live service is that you've got to do some form of cleanup, especially if you have something that isn't designed from the ground up to be always available to the player... so by factoring in a way for the system to remove unused resources (in this case, a long forgotten apartment) it helps make sure that people are actively using or are at least willing to continue to pay for the resource and it better frees up resources for others that want to use them.

AFAIK, SE never actually promised that a player would be able to keep their apartment for forever.

[Catstab]

And yet... you will respond to almost every single post I make.

You've previously made some accusations that were pretty ridiculous, and those got the no response at all that they warranted. But when you're being civil and conversing with me directly as you are now, I have no reason not to respond. And in the case that you're airing proposed negative changes to housing and asking publicly for feedback, I don't see why you would be surprised by responses from anyone in particular, or why you would take responses personally.

You may perceive me however you like. I'm simply someone who pops up to say "relocation was a good idea" and "grandfathering was a good idea" and "apartments should last forever with no maintenance" when the conversation calls for such things to be said.

[Jojoya]

AFAIK, SE never actually promised that a player would be able to keep their apartment for forever.

Game developers never make promises unless they're positive it is something they're ready to implement. At the same time, they don't randomly change what's already implemented without good reason.

When apartments were added back in Heavensward, SE told us they would not be subject to demolition because it would be relatively easy for them to add more wings to apartment buildings (compared to what they have to do to add entire new wards) if there was a need for more apartments on worlds.

Could they change their mind 5 years later? Certainly, if they had good reason. Right now, there doesn't seem to be any good reason to change their mind about apartments when it comes to lack of demolition.

Keep in mind how players react. What do you think the realistic outcome would be if your suggestions were implemented? Would the game be in a better place than it is now? Would players be happier than they are now?

[Almagnus1]

You've previously made some accusations that were pretty ridiculous, and those got the no response at all that they warranted. But when you're being civil and conversing with me directly as you are now, I have no reason not to respond. And in the case that you're airing proposed negative changes to housing and asking publicly for feedback, I don't see why you would be surprised by responses from anyone in particular, or why you would take responses personally.

You may perceive me however you like. I'm simply someone who pops up to say "relocation was a good idea" and "grandfathering was a good idea" and "apartments should last forever with no maintenance" when the conversation calls for such things to be said.

Looking at your post history.... your account lives to respond to mine. That's the textbook definition of stalking.

Thank you for proving this point.