Housing needs to be account based

[Boblawblah]

If people are losing their houses, it's because they aren't entering them to use them on a regular basis. No one would need email reminders or an in-game notification (which does exist in the Timers menu) if they were actually using their house on a regular basis.

If someone isn't using a house on a regular basis, should they be allowed to keep it when it could go to a player that would be using it?

If we had a good instanced housing system instead of just apartments, there would be no need for demolition timers. There would be no need for lotteries. There would be no point in house resells for gil or RMT. The majority of housing drama would disappear and instead of being a source of stress for many, it would be a source of fun for everyone.

I think you would find that there is a group of people that enjoy the fact that they have collected a large number of houses that are limited, and making housing instanced would take that away from them in their mind, as strange it may seem. I'm willing to bet there would be people that would actually quit the game over losing the perceived prestige of housing.

Overall though, I agree, making housing instanced, let the people with their real estate empires keep their empire, but make wards essentially unending, with new ones being created as they get filled up.

That said, I'm convinced that while SE could do it, they simply don't want to. Yoshi-P seems to still be holding on to an idea of wards being communities, and the c-suite types love the guaranteed income housing creates.

[Khryseis_Astra]

All of this is so subjective lmao, I cant

especially the "source of fun for everyone" part

I dont want instanced housing, so do a lot of people, your fun is not my fun, talk for yourself and not anybody else.

Point is, you could still have your kind of fun, with your preferred ward housing, and others could enjoy what you feel would be an inferior housing system alongside that. I don’t see how it’s not a win-win. You still get to have one (or some? I’ve lost track at this point lol) of the few “prestigious” plots, while everyone who doesn’t care about any of that gets a space to decorate. I’ll never understand the opposition to having instanced as an option for those who would never want to use it, when having it added wouldn’t negatively impact you in any way.

[Stormpeaks]

I think you would find that there is a group of people that enjoy the fact that they have collected a large number of houses that are limited, and making housing instanced would take that away from them in their mind, as strange it may seem. I'm willing to bet there would be people that would actually quit the game over losing the perceived prestige of housing.

Overall though, I agree, making housing instanced, let the people with their real estate empires keep their empire, but make wards essentially unending, with new ones being created as they get filled up.

That said, I'm convinced that while SE could do it, they simply don't want to. Yoshi-P seems to still be holding on to an idea of wards being communities, and the c-suite types love the guaranteed income housing creates.

That is the solution though that would make instanced housing not needed, once a ward fills up (all the smalls only), another opens, rinse and repeat, on the most populated worlds, that's what the solution is, not instanced.

Point is, you could still have your kind of fun, with your preferred ward housing, and others could enjoy what you feel would be an inferior housing system alongside that. I don’t see how it’s not a win-win. You still get to have one (or some? I’ve lost track at this point lol) of the few “prestigious” plots, while everyone who doesn’t care about any of that gets a space to decorate. I’ll never understand the opposition to having instanced as an option for those who would never want to use it, when having it added wouldn’t negatively impact you in any way.

Same response that I just posted to Bob, the solution is to add more wards when needed based on usage, not instanced housing, Ward housing is fine, it just needs more wards.

[Deccado]

Yoshi-P seems to still be holding on to an idea of wards being communities

I think you pretty much hit the nail on the head here, as I honestly cannot think of any other reason they would stick to the outdated, and IMO not fit for purpose, ward system.

I have seen people say it is due to the servers and related costs, but really, I mean look at EQ2, what, 10+ years back? It had the standard inn rooms and housing in the cities, but you also had paid for houses/palaces/castles/islands/etc. that people were more than happy to spend more than their yearly sub price on; I cannot understand why they do not move to a similar system here, as given what our player base are willing to pay for a single character mount... I mean, can you imagine if they released our very own private instanced castle? just how quickly we would crash the cash shop when half the player base try to give them money at the same time? ^_^

[Boblawblah]

That is the solution though that would make instanced housing not needed, once a ward fills up (all the smalls only), another opens, rinse and repeat, on the most populated worlds, that's what the solution is, not instanced.



Same response that I just posted to Bob, the solution is to add more wards when needed based on usage, not instanced housing, Ward housing is fine, it just needs more wards.

mmm, fair enough, yea, I guess it's not instanced housing, but unlimited housing. My error on the word instanced. Remove demo timers, unlimited wards, players would be happy.

[Stormpeaks]

mmm, fair enough, yea, I guess it's not instanced housing, but unlimited housing. My error on the word instanced. Remove demo timers, unlimited wards, players would be happy.

That's the thing that people misunderstand with my posts, I think everyone should have a house but not a medium or large because those are just made to be more limited while smalls should be open to everyone wanting one.

We have a perfectly working housing system. Let's make it better instead of putting people in pre fabricated dead wards in instanced housing.

Dynamic wards are the way to go, not instanced. Let the system open wards until people have small houses, which also opens more mediums and larges at the same time. It's win win, literally everyone wins instead of this boring instanced housing idea.

[RitsukoSonoda]

That's the thing that people misunderstand with my posts, I think everyone should have a house but not a medium or large because those are just made to be more limited while smalls should be open to everyone wanting one.

We have a perfectly working housing system. Let's make it better instead of putting people in pre fabricated dead wards in instanced housing.

Dynamic wards are the way to go, not instanced. Let the system open wards until people have small houses, which also opens more mediums and larges at the same time. It's win win, literally everyone wins instead of this boring instanced housing idea.

However it's also the most demanding resource wise since each ward is persistent just like the overworld areas and cities.

IMO the best option would be to keep wards but also find a way to implement instanced housing so that both options are available. Not everyone that wants a house see's a point to having a "neighborhood". There are places that have been introduced in game that could easily be used for instanced housing in ways that would make sense in game like the Sea of Clouds or Smileton. They could even go for broke and let players commission a housing airship from the Ironworks office. The main thing is making sure the instanced housing has the full exterior customization options ward houses get unlike with the hotel rooms.

[Tysilio]

However it's also the most demanding resource wise since each ward is persistent just like the overworld areas and cities.

IMO the best option would be to keep wards but also find a way to implement instanced housing so that both options are available. Not everyone that wants a house see's a point to having a "neighborhood". There are places that have been introduced in game that could easily be used for instanced housing in ways that would make sense in game like the Sea of Clouds or Smileton. They could even go for broke and let players commission a housing airship from the Ironworks office. The main thing is making sure the instanced housing has the full exterior customization options ward houses get unlike with the hotel rooms.

That's what I find the most reasonable as well. I don't know why people get so agressive and absolutely against the idea of letting anyone with enough gil the ability to buy a house. There are solutions to the root of the problem that doesn't cause anyone to lose what they already have or their neighbourhoods. "Go to Dynamis" is such a non-solution to the problem at hand. Switching DCs isn't a trivial task and responding aggressively without recognising that there is an issue is such an elitist way of thinking.


Having the choice of having an instanced house (that has an exterior and is at least as big as a small house) instead of being in a persistent ward seems like the way to go.
Nobody loses anything. Wards still exist and people can still explore them. People can still visit houses. The only thing now is that any player can get a house in an instanced zone if they desire, without the hassle of needing to bid for one. The ones that want to be able to show their houses to a larger public can still bid in a ward like usual.

[LianaThorne]

However it's also the most demanding resource wise since each ward is persistent just like the overworld areas and cities.

IMO the best option would be to keep wards but also find a way to implement instanced housing so that both options are available. Not everyone that wants a house see's a point to having a "neighborhood". There are places that have been introduced in game that could easily be used for instanced housing in ways that would make sense in game like the Sea of Clouds or Smileton. They could even go for broke and let players commission a housing airship from the Ironworks office. The main thing is making sure the instanced housing has the full exterior customization options ward houses get unlike with the hotel rooms.

Would be nice but they're not going to cut off a reason for people to stay subbed and potentially lose profits. Housing being the way it is, is only a positive for SE.

[Varilyon]

So many wards are dead because people are buying and leaving their house after or before they decorate it. In theory the ward system makes it easy to find Friends with your neighbors.
We did that, created a linkshell and a Discord for our activities. We even farmed together, because our ward is a FC ward and has potential more players.

But the reality is, the flux of players can be seen even in this ward, so most of the time there are just 2 people in the entire Ward online. All player wards are worse where it is a miracle to see another player, yet a neighbor.

Having a place to meet and socialize doesnt fit with everyone should have their own house in a ward. And if you are searching for cool housing deco or void homes with riddles or clubs, you will use other means of searching for them, which are just better.

Instanced housing is the way to go for the future. I would greatly give up on my personal house if I had to chance for an instanced house similar or better than my house.

This system could also take away lots of gil. It could go like this:

First you buy an appartment. Now you can upgrade it with gil. Having a small exterior for 1 million (like a small voidgarden in a middle of desert/forest/island/snowycliffs), where you have a small garden, where you can place down gardenitems (we really do have too many) and a small view. After that you can upgrade the interior and exterior for more gil. The more money you invest, the bigger it gets.

If you use the same models like for housing you would have hardly any work to do as a dev.

Or/and, like mentioned before, we could buy instanced houses like in TESO or similar MMOs. We saw with island sanctuary, that if you strip away 30 decorated small gardens from different players, you could easily allow more than 90 decorations per player, when they are alone.