1 House 1 FC per DC Only

[Solarra]

I don't have a problem with tampering with the grandfathering, it is immature for those that is for, and for those who currently travel to other servers and bid on houses mostly for their own personal greed...

Well, from your OP, I already understood you don't have a problem with Square going back on their word but I do.

As to travelling to other servers to bid on houses... are you sure that's even possible?

Anyway, my point is, breaking your word repeatedly over an issue is bad policy and I don't think Square are going to do that. They had to roll back on the 'no demolition' and that upset a lot of people at the time, I don't think they're going to break their word again for something that doesn't solve the problem. Becaue house-hoarding, while annoying, isn't actually that much of an issue.
I mean that, it really isn't a big problem. Removing 'Grandfathering' and punishing people who broke no rule when they bought multiple houses is pointless. It won't get you a house and it won't get a house for the 200+ people on my server who are currently looking for one.
It will free up a few here and there, but where people are using multiple accounts or multiple FCs to buy up entire wards it will do NOTHING.

I don't mean to be rude but you are fixating on a tiny symptom of the actual problem. Housing supply is inadequete. It has been inadequete since HW and possibly even before. We need more houses not more inventive ways to take them away from other people.

[ElysiumDragon]

Whilst I've railed against Shell FC's before (my current server is especially bad for them though), I do agree that increasing the supply (and reducing the demand) needs to be the main focus.

[DeNada]

Well, from your OP, I already understood you don't have a problem with Square going back on their word but I do.

As to travelling to other servers to bid on houses... are you sure that's even possible?

Anyway, my point is, breaking your word repeatedly over an issue is bad policy and I don't think Square are going to do that. They had to roll back on the 'no demolition' and that upset a lot of people at the time, I don't think they're going to break their word again for something that doesn't solve the problem. Becaue house-hoarding, while annoying, isn't actually that much of an issue.
I mean that, it really isn't a big problem. Removing 'Grandfathering' and punishing people who broke no rule when they bought multiple houses is pointless. It won't get you a house and it won't get a house for the 200+ people on my server who are currently looking for one.
It will free up a few here and there, but where people are using multiple accounts or multiple FCs to buy up entire wards it will do NOTHING.

I don't mean to be rude but you are fixating on a tiny symptom of the actual problem. Housing supply is inadequete. It has been inadequete since HW and possibly even before. We need more houses not more inventive ways to take them away from other people.

I think what he meant by travelling to other servers to bid on houses is that people are already starting to create multiple alts and preparing to transfer them to the new EU servers so that that they can bid on multiple FC plots once housing is available. If a ton of people do that, this would severely restrict the availability of housing plots in the new servers to new players/legitimate FCs who are starting out in new servers for a better chance at housing as they would most likely go to the shell FCs once again if the loophole for people acquiring multiple FC houses is not closed.

[Reinha]

This may be a radical opinion but I think it should be 1 personal house and 1 FC house per service account. I don't care if that means someone's alt on another data center can't purchase a house.

[LaylaTsarra]

This may be a radical opinion but I think it should be 1 personal house and 1 FC house per service account. I don't care if that means someone's alt on another data center can't purchase a house.

They had the opportunity to do that but choose not to. Interestingly enough the only changes were rules limiting the ability of transferring a house instantly and the attempt to limit FC abuse which doesn't seem to have been that successful. I think people are prepared for new rules as long as they don't make them retroactive.

[Shazzinoth]

It's really surprising that that SE doesn't make greater use of gil for cosmetic gear purchase. That would be a very effective gil sink for the game.

They'd rather have a real money shop in a box price+ monthly sub game, since managing an in game economy is less profitable than selling cosmetics, mounts, extra retainers etc. for real money.
In conclusion - the real money shop is your main antagonist here

[Jojoya]

They had the opportunity to do that but choose not to. Interestingly enough the only changes were rules limiting the ability of transferring a house instantly and the attempt to limit FC abuse which doesn't seem to have been that successful. I think people are prepared for new rules as long as they don't make them retroactive.

I have to wonder if it's more of a coding limitation. The game isn't exactly consistent when it comes to recognizing characters being part of the same account. It shouldn't have been that hard to say "You already have a character on your account in a FC that has a house. Your other characters are therefore not eligible to enter the lottery on behalf of their FC." It shouldn't stop the FC from being able to get a house since the characters for other players in the FC could still enter.

Instead, they went with making the restriction "owned as buyer" to leave the gaping loophole for people to step through if they want to go to the effort to get multiple houses.

There are always going to be those fighting against rules changes if they see those changes as opposing what they want personally. Look at all the players unhappy with the lottery itself because they preferred FCFS even with the placard camping.

They'd rather have a real money shop in a box price+ monthly sub game, since managing an in game economy is less profitable than selling cosmetics, mounts, extra retainers etc. for real money.
In conclusion - the real money shop is your main antagonist here

It doesn't need to be, though. Almost everything on the cash shop is NPC cosplay, seasonal event or "import" of the glamours created specifically for the KR/CN markets at the request of the local publishers for those countries.

There's plenty of room for more glamour outside of that, such as cosmetic versions of popular role gear that players would like to see unlocked for use with other jobs. That's close to zero effort for gil sinks since those models are already in the game, and highly unlikely to be items that players would be willing to spend real money to purchase.

(sorry for the derail)

[Eraden]

I have to wonder if it's more of a coding limitation. The game isn't exactly consistent when it comes to recognizing characters being part of the same account. It shouldn't have been that hard to say "You already have a character on your account in a FC that has a house. Your other characters are therefore not eligible to enter the lottery on behalf of their FC." It shouldn't stop the FC from being able to get a house since the characters for other players in the FC could still enter.

Instead, they went with making the restriction "owned as buyer" to leave the gaping loophole for people to step through if they want to go to the effort to get multiple houses.

There are always going to be those fighting against rules changes if they see those changes as opposing what they want personally. Look at all the players unhappy with the lottery itself because they preferred FCFS even with the placard camping.


It doesn't need to be, though. Almost everything on the cash shop is NPC cosplay, seasonal event or "import" of the glamours created specifically for the KR/CN markets at the request of the local publishers for those countries.

There's plenty of room for more glamour outside of that, such as cosmetic versions of popular role gear that players would like to see unlocked for use with other jobs. That's close to zero effort for gil sinks since those models are already in the game, and highly unlikely to be items that players would be willing to spend real money to purchase.

(sorry for the derail)

Anet almost completely funds its support for GW2 on Gemstore purchases, most of which are cosmetics. Gems and in game currency are interchangeable at variable rates based on the market. SE could do well for itself by taking a page out of Anet's business practices with regards to these sorts of things.

[TaleraRistain]

All of my alts are on my server this would never affect me, but I don't get the DC restriction. If I had an alt on my DC but on another server, that alt is not an extension of my main. That alt exists on her own. I would build her up entirely from scratch. She would be her own entity. So I don't know why it would make sense that she couldn't partake of what my main could on my main server. DCs are collections of servers but each server is its own community. Yes, we have world travel now, but that doesn't make all servers on a DC a single shared entity.

[Puksi]

Something i haven't ever seen commented on is how is the interior decorating of tbe housing in these other games? Are you as free as in ff or do they have as much or more furniture?

Elder Scrolls Online housing makes XIV housing seem very, very basic. You can collect every house in the game, and no demo timers because it's instanced. People can visit your house. You can permit friends to move your furniture around, but you have to put it out for them--they can't take things, or add things. Furniture can be placed any angle, anywhere, no tricks needed. They come in all sizes--there was a recent ingame event "house" that was basically just a vast demonic plane, with giant NPC mobs fighting in your lava moat. We're talking bigger than XIV mansions big. In plots like these, you can use furniture to build whatever structures you want, but I've seen people do crazy things with even the more traditional houses. Their housing community seems very active.

There are furniture limits, but having a subscription doubles it.

The houses themselves aren't generics like XIV, either. Each one is themed, each has its own unique shape, and a lot of them have a yard. My favorite is a cash shop one that my friend got me for my birthday--a two story steampunkish fantasy called The Orbservatory Prior. If you're familiar with The Dark Crystal, it's like Aughra's place, but huge--and it's not even the biggest house you can get. It also has big moving gears and two huge outside decks overlooking the zone. (ESO houses are blended into the game zones, there are no "housing wards".

ESO as a game has its own issues, but housing design isn't one of them.