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]

Sorry you lost your house. I don’t think upping the demo timer to 60 days would be such a bad idea, and I say that as someone who has been trying to relocate with no success. If we could actually do something about the artificial scarcity problem (cough… instanced housing!) there wouldn’t be a need for auto-demo at all.

But I definitely agree with shortening the lotto cycle as a whole. Yes I understand they want it to stagger, so it’s different days every week. But as long as it’s not a 7-day cycle, they could still do that with, say, a 3-day bid, 2-day result period. And really, collecting your money from the housing NPC is way better than having to go back to the placard and see someone enjoying (or gloating over) what you lost out on.

Thanks, I miss it already. I spent a lot of time getting the outside, the fixtures outside, wallpaper and flooring inside. I designed a beautiful yard. Its truly disheartening for it to be gone. My own little piece of sanctuary. I can only imagine if my creative block ended what I could of made inside. Now I don't know if I'll ever know.

I would love instanced housing, despite I would be sad that the idea of having neighbors and others want to see your home would be gone in real time. But honestly, I just want a hidey hole to craft in the shade in solitude sometimes under my beautiful trees I put down. The long waiting periods are just not necessary and it makes the progress of getting a home for everyone long and anxiety inducing for no reason. I really appreciate you not focusing on the event that happened to me and more on the problems that the current system has. The only reason I put that there is what even made me feel like I should voice my concern about the inconsistency and logic behind this current system.

[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.

[Hasrat]

And what is your point? Is there something wrong with switching to activity online versus entering a house?

Kinda, yeah? Because the whole point to to encourage actually using the house.

Use it or lose it.

[Zaredth]

Kinda, yeah? Because the whole point to to encourage actually using the house.

Use it or lose it.

Im not gonna revisit the semantics from the previous Forum Topic but I did use it, I used its outside, the inside was what was undecided. The system does not recognize you using the house despite going into the housing under options reconfiguring the outside of the home. If anything technically, you could not be using your home inside either. All your doing is refreshing a stored instance and for whatever reason, the plot itself is not considered the home, its the instance itself.

My point is, your argument is flawed. Refreshing a stored instance to reset a timer does not mean you are accessing the housing function nor encourages it, you are sadly just paying gil for a instance. There is plenty of empty owned homes that proves this.

To add, you honed in only one part of that. Why couldn't you even engage that post in full context? I only explained my situation, I am not arguing to change it neither. I am addressing housing issues that makes no sense. With people losing homes despite refreshing said instance and others getting unwarranted Demo emails. You deny and defend a very flawed system? Are you ignoring the long bidding times as well? I just don't get why people cherry pick instead of staying in context of what the posts are really about.

[Pratini]

This looks like a “you” problem.

[Zaredth]

This looks like a “you” problem.

Why the grandstanding?

[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.

[4clubbedace]

You didn't read my statement of friends losing their homes when they have stepped into the house.

Literally untrue, if you entered and its the owner of the house then it doesnt demolish, period is a little over a month, if they forgot withen a span thats on them.

also not really, youre comparing a month and some change to a week , ive gotten a house by both clicking for a whole sunday and lotto, lottos better by far. i have no issue for the week process, its really whatever.

[ValkyrieL]

I know is frustrating but there is a BIG difference between just login and actually interacting with your house, many people buy house for the sake of it and have Gil to spend but they never set foot on it after couple of weeks, they don't deserve a house that is not been use