Crazy Idea: Everyone can get a house

[IdowhatIwant]

I am at the point where I wish they would just get rid of housing cause I am so tired of seeing people whine about how they can't get a house.

[Packetdancer]

Realistically, I strongly suspect the issue is that the server architecture of the game is not well suited to scaling resources.

Having X housing districts, each with Y wards, each ward having Z houses… you have a known maximum quantity of resources needed. Even then, we see that housing ward servers can get overloaded, when we get the “You failed to leave the area.” error on trying to enter a house on a ward with heavy load.

Imagine if every single player could create a house on-demand. Hypothetically, that looks great! But let’s say that everyone did that, all at once. The housing servers would be overloaded at best, assuming they didn’t just cry mercy and implode in on themselves.

For good or ill, FFXIV inherited a server architecture from an older generation of MMOs. Doing servers in the cloud allows a lot more scalability (though it also has drawbacks), but to do that you really really have to design the MMO server architecture that way from the start.

(And even then it’s hardly a fix for everything. Witness the many many issues New World has had; if you think our forums here have a laundry list of complaints, I stared into the abyss over there before I gave up on the game entirely...)

I strongly doubt the devs are sticking with the current system because they still think it’s the best option; no one still thinks it’s the best option. People who’ve never heard of FFXIV probably still somehow know we have housing issues, at this point. I imagine even microorganisms living in the oceans beneath the ice of distant Europa are aware the current housing system is broken, at this point.

I suspect the devs are sticking with it because the alternative is just not possible, at least not with the server architecture as it presently stands.

[Momo_Kozuki]

Allow me to point out what instanced housing will never bring a player...



This screenshot I took of my message book it not to boast or brag. I don't even have any idea what would constitute a high number of likes and messages. I am posting it for a couple of other reasons:

The first is I don't know 597 players. Not even close, let alone talk to that many players. I think you can like a plot more than once, but I digress.

The second are the comments. I can only show one tab, but I have 3-4 tabs with comments about my home. I put an astonishing amount of time into my place, and it was finished long before message books were even available. Each and every single one of those comments made it all worth it. It also makes me wonder how many players have actually stopped by that I don't know about.

To know people have came and visited my plot, loaded into the house, looked around, loved it, and left me a comment, and did so completely unsolicited means so much. I can't even describe the elation that is felt. If housing was instanced, like so many players feel they want and would make things better; this would not exist. I would have this home I've spent hours on, and nobody can see it. It just exists in this little tiny corner in cyberspace. All by itself.

Might as well put instanced housing in Ultima Thule. That would be a very fitting zone to have them.

Eh, I think the same effect would happen with instanced houses. Just minus the need of walking around. Maybe even more people will visit your house cuz they teleporting inside is not a pain compared to regular visits. Like I know someone love to knock doors of every FC rooms/apartments to check the decorations.

[Momo_Kozuki]

So... apartments?

Size-aside, you cannot have outdoor item with apartments. Some seasonal events give you outdoor items that you cannot use without a house, like adding salt to the injury.

[spookiebruh]

Isn't this kind of what island sanctuaries will bring? But instead of just a house, it's a whole island too

[Krotoan]

Isn't this kind of what island sanctuaries will bring? But instead of just a house, it's a whole island too

The only things that have been officially announced are it is :

Something to do with gardening (themed). Will involve our minions.


Anything else you've heard is wild conjecture and you probably shouldn't build hopes on.

[Amenara]

Isn't this kind of what island sanctuaries will bring? But instead of just a house, it's a whole island too

Yoshi P himself said to lower your expectations when it comes to island sanctuaries. I would be extremely surprised if it was more than a personal hang out place for your minions and maybe a mini game or something. If we're lucky, there will be a few buildings we can place around the island and not be able interact with.

[UkcsAlias]

Well, for the sanctuary i would at least suspect that you can have a house, which you can detail similar to that of regular housing. This then would feel very similar to housing on that, and by that can be enough for most players already to accept not being able to get a house. Especialy if just like appartments, friends can still visit your house (and maybe even work on it like a tennant).

That its instanced should on that be an advantage, not a restriction! If no one can visit your house, what is the point to it? Islands would be no diffirence here, unless they can give massive boosts at other places. Being just a place for minigames would be useless. Those minigames could just be just part of the saucer. There must be a personal thing you can share to make it worth it, otherwise it would just be a waste of resources that would better be spent on additional wards.

[Lecru]

Hey OP. You're right. Everyone DOES get one. Take a walk up to that giant building in a ward and get yourself a home. An Apt. Or hey take a walk inside your FC and grab an FC room. No. Not everyone will own a house in the game. Idk how many times I have to go through and point this out. Housing was made for FC's. And everyone lost their shit so they let players buy houses that were left over. And since then, it's been for FC'S STILL and he's mentioned this over and over. It will always be a system that caters to FC's because they get far more out of it. Imo, they should cut player housing all together and leave Apt's and FC rooms so that the complaining can just simmer down when nobody gets one.

[Amenara]

Hey OP. You're right. Everyone DOES get one. Take a walk up to that giant building in a ward and get yourself a home. An Apt. Or hey take a walk inside your FC and grab an FC room. No. Not everyone will own a house in the game. Idk how many times I have to go through and point this out. Housing was made for FC's. And everyone lost their shit so they let players buy houses that were left over. And since then, it's been for FC'S STILL and he's mentioned this over and over. It will always be a system that caters to FC's because they get far more out of it. Imo, they should cut player housing all together and leave Apt's and FC rooms so that the complaining can just simmer down when nobody gets one.

Thanks for contributing to the conversation.

Or we can just try to improve on the system so that we can make the game better for everyone.