Bid Time and Housing system is infuriating!

[Titor]

I have heard of people saying they lost their house despite entering it, but never really had any solid proof of it. All the instances I have heard of it were people having a lapse of how much time had passed, or never actually entered their house and just thought logging on was enough. SE has never acknowledge a relinquish glitch, and I've never seen it happen in practice.

[Zaredth]

I have heard of people saying they lost their house despite entering it, but never really had any solid proof of it. All the instances I have heard of it were people having a lapse of how much time had passed, or never actually entered their house and just thought logging on was enough. SE has never acknowledge a relinquish glitch, and I've never seen it happen in practice.

The issue is, a couple of my friends who had this problem, unlike me. Made a ticket in-game to the GM specifically, marked the title and did everything. They just automated response all of our inquiries as in "we hear you and sorry for this inconvenience" summary but doesn't let us know if they are investigating it or looking to try to resolve it or not. It was a total blow off. Its really disheartening. The irony is, in my post on the support forum, a SE employee responded to it and said I should contact a GM and shelved it. Its the typical customer support not wanting to deal with you and giving the run around.

While I do not have proof myself, I would argue these others may have met the same issue we did and just gave up. I do not know for certain however.

[Jojoya]

While I'm sorry you lost your house, your suggestions don't solve anything. What they do is make things easier for you based on how you tend to play the game without concern for how others play it.

Why force players to go into the house? To make certain there is some use of it rather than have it never get used at all. The game doesn't seem to have been set up to track your movements on your specific plot as opposed to just being in the ward in general. Going into the interior should at least register because you've entered a separate instance. If an active subscription was all that was required, even more houses would sit undecorated and unused. This way the player has to go to some effort to keep the house at the very least.

Why the long lottery entry and claiming period windows? Because not everyone has the ability to log in daily on demand, especially service workers who can be required to do multiple day shifts and sleep at their worksite or near to it instead of at their home. It also allows a few houses to accumulate during those periods when plots are sold out so bids get spread over a few houses instead of every player that is trying to get a house dogpiling on the same one. It also discourages players from camping the placard trying to intimidate others from entering and makes it less likely that winners and losers will encounter each other, possibly leading to harrassment problems (still happens but much less than it would with just a 24 hour window to claim).

Also on the subject of a 24 hour window, no game should make a player feel forced to prioritize it over their real life obligations. The longer window gives player time to claim when it's convenient for them to log in, which is fine. The money from those of us with more time to be able to play is no more meaningful to SE than those who are also still paying but playing less per month. We already have advantages in other areas of the game due to the additional time we have; SE doesn't need to give us more.

So for your proposals:
No, simply having an active subscription and logging in to play should not be enough to reset the demo timer.

The lottery period does not need to be changed.

Apartments may not have all the features of a house but considering how many players use the houses they already have, they're just as convenient and don't have the risk of demolition. Depending on the player's individual circumstance, I'm still going to recommend getting an apartment especially if there are no available plots.

Not going to say it's your fault you lost your house because the system does have some flaws. Seems to me that if SE wants to suspend demo out of compassions for those who have suffered misfortune, it should happen whether it's one player being in the hospital for an extended time due to serious illness/injuries or an entire region getting hit. Or better yet, use a better instanced housing system to solve the supply problem so players won't need to worry about their house demoing anymore than they have to worry about their apartment.

I have heard of people saying they lost their house despite entering it, but never really had any solid proof of it. All the instances I have heard of it were people having a lapse of how much time had passed, or never actually entered their house and just thought logging on was enough. SE has never acknowledge a relinquish glitch, and I've never seen it happen in practice.

I witnessed it with a friend a couple of years ago (I was a tenant in his house). He had been for about a month dealing with real life but had come back to the game. I checked estate timers and saw the timer on his house still active so I reminded him he needs to go into the house. He said he had just the day before so I told him do it again.

I watched him go in. Demo timer did not reset. He logged out, logged back in, went back into his house. Demo timer did not reset. I told him to mess with a Summoning Bell or vendor inside. He did and the demo timer reset. He now makes a habit to repair his gear in his house instead of elsewhere. Better safe than sorry.

Why does it happen? Don't have a clue. I was a skeptic about the stories myself until I saw it happen to my friend.

[DeNada]

I witnessed it with a friend a couple of years ago (I was a tenant in his house). He had been for about a month dealing with real life but had come back to the game. I checked estate timers and saw the timer on his house still active so I reminded him he needs to go into the house. He said he had just the day before so I told him do it again.

I watched him go in. Demo timer did not reset. He logged out, logged back in, went back into his house. Demo timer did not reset. I told him to mess with a Summoning Bell or vendor inside. He did and the demo timer reset. He now makes a habit to repair his gear in his house instead of elsewhere. Better safe than sorry.

Why does it happen? Don't have a clue. I was a skeptic about the stories myself until I saw it happen to my friend.

That seems quite worrying. Shouldn't just entering your house reset the auto-demolition timer? If your friend didn't realize that the timer wasn't reset even after entering his house and did not interact with a vendor, what is his recourse if he loses his house through no fault of his.

[Zaredth]

While I'm sorry you lost your house, your suggestions don't solve anything. What they do is make things easier for you based on how you tend to play the game without concern for how others play it.

While I respect your disagreement and you give some solid points rather than usual "Don't change it just cause" which I have seen often in these forums. I do agree that while at sometimes I feel its stricter, there should be some forgiveness in certain scenarios. One thing I disagree on is how they give money back if the Lotto was not one. We have an NPC for this and that is thr Housing Enthusiast that holds your money if your house is Demo-ed. To tie the money specifically to the placard and create a unneeded result window is inefficient and unnecessary in my honest opinion. 2-3 days in my opinion should be enough in my opinion for Lotto Period. Its not a matter of easier for me, it should be easier for everyone to get their results and move on without being dragged out. But for that part that is my opinion.

My biggest discrepancy is where SE has one foot on being strict on one area and lenient in another that both just doesn't make sense. I rather them be either very lenient in all respectable areas or strict cause their design philosophy for this type of content just doesn't make sense.

While I understand some people feel like "if you dont use your house you should lose it" comes from a attitude and resentment for not getting a house for a long time. I read here that there is so many inconsistencies with the system. Thats why I say simply logging in should rectify it and simplify it. But eh, its a massive flawed system. Can't have everything right?

[LianaThorne]

While I respect your disagreement and you give some solid points rather than usual "Don't change it just cause" which I have seen often in these forums. I do agree that while at sometimes I feel its stricter, there should be some forgiveness in certain scenarios. One thing I disagree on is how they give money back if the Lotto was not one. We have an NPC for this and that is thr Housing Enthusiast that holds your money if your house is Demo-ed. To tie the money specifically to the placard and create a unneeded result window is inefficient and unnecessary in my honest opinion. 2-3 days in my opinion should be enough in my opinion for Lotto Period. Its not a matter of easier for me, it should be easier for everyone to get their results and move on without being dragged out. But for that part that is my opinion.

My biggest discrepancy is where SE has one foot on being strict on one area and lenient in another that both just doesn't make sense. I rather them be either very lenient in all respectable areas or strict cause their design philosophy for this type of content just doesn't make sense.

While I understand some people feel like "if you dont use your house you should lose it" comes from a attitude and resentment for not getting a house for a long time. I read here that there is so many inconsistencies with the system. Thats why I say simply logging in should rectify it and simplify it. But eh, its a massive flawed system. Can't have everything right?

Housing is literally being held together by elmer's glue and prayer. We won't be getting any changes unless they rip it apart and fix it from the ground up (which they most likely don't view as worth it since they're deadset on having the neighborhood system that we have).

[Zaredth]

Housing is literally being held together by elmer's glue and prayer. We won't be getting any changes unless they rip it apart and fix it from the ground up (which they most likely don't view as worth it since they're deadset on having the neighborhood system that we have).

True, I would be fine waiting though but that is just me, whether I have a house or not.