(Large Housing Problem) 177 Bids on One House

[Themarvin]

Lottery is the only fair system and the best one to get rid of people botting, it is what people asked for the lottery, and no matter what, even if it was the system before you would still lose to people using botting systems and those that click the buy plot button for days before it gets active.

It also battles the real estate system, which is illegal according to the Terms of Service with current system and is at least one weapon against that as well.

[Antoine_Lenheim]

Basically, I said it way before lottery got added into the game, that it will fix nothing. I really don't get why out of MYRIAD of other choices and ideas, they chose to go with the one that fixes the least number of problems housing have.

I mean, I do understand that for some unknown reason majority of players here think that lottery is a better system and yes, it is better in ONLY ONE aspect. You don't have to stay in front of placard for hours, damaging your health and sanity, battling against botters and occasional relocators who bypass the system. This is the only step in the right direction that they made. Aside from that, is not a better system. It doesn't fix the main problem -- you won't get a house. Well, unless you pack four leaf clovers in all places imaginable. It doesn't fix housing shortage, it doesn't make houses easier to obtain. It only makes it more "fairer" by throwing you against other one hundred poor souls who decided to throw their name into the hat and hope for the best. If you were frustrated to be competing against 20 other players (whether bots or not), how frustrated are you going to be when you're competing against 100? Or 1000, once the first couple of lottery periods have passed for the new supply to sell out and plots vacated by relocation filled again. How many swearwords and venom you will spew after losing your 10th lottery in a row?

And Im not even mentioning absolutely stupid decision of giving us piddly number of personal wards. Are they aware that FC transfers are the preferred way to RMT houses? That by giving whopping 18 wards to FCs and not limiting amount of FC houses you may own on one account, they help RMT to flourish even more? Gah.

When you think they can't screw up with housing even more they come up with something even more ridiculous. Good job, you never cease to amaze, SE.

[Stormpeaks]

Basically, I said it way before lottery got added into the game, that it will fix nothing. I really don't get why out of MYRIAD of other choices and ideas, they chose to go with the one that fixes the least number of problems housing have.

I mean, I do understand that for some unknown reason majority of players here think that lottery is a better system and yes, it is better in ONLY ONE aspect. You don't have to stay in front of placard for hours, damaging your health and sanity, battling against botters and occasional relocators who bypass the system. This is the only step in the right direction that they made. Aside from that, is not a better system. It doesn't fix the main problem -- you won't get a house. Well, unless you pack four leaf clovers in all places imaginable. It doesn't fix housing shortage, it doesn't make houses easier to obtain. It only makes it more "fairer" by throwing you against other one hundred poor souls who decided to throw their name into the hat and hope for the best. If you were frustrated to be competing against 20 other players (whether bots or not), how frustrated are you going to be when you're competing against 100? Or 1000, once the first couple of lottery periods have passed for the new supply to sell out and plots vacated by relocation filled again. How many swearwords and venom you will spew after losing your 10th lottery in a row?

And Im not even mentioning absolutely stupid decision of giving us piddly number of personal wards. Are they aware that FC transfers are the preferred way to RMT houses? That by giving whopping 18 wards to FCs and not limiting amount of FC houses you may own on one account, they help RMT to flourish even more? Gah.

When you think they can't screw up with housing even more they come up with something even more ridiculous. Good job, you never cease to amaze, SE.

What are you talking about 18 fc wards lmao

[Antoine_Lenheim]

What are you talking about 18 fc wards lmao

Yeah, I think it was around that until they fixed it, probably around 12 now.

[Stormpeaks]

Yeah, I think it was around that until they fixed it, probably around 12 now.

There's 7 fc only wards... 1 to 6 included and 25... out of 30 wards.

[Antoine_Lenheim]

There's 7 fc only wards... 1 to 6 included and 25... out of 30 wards.

Doesn't really matter to my point though x) Private housing is in shambles because of lottery and that FCs can bid multiple times on one house. Fairness in a nutshell.

[Stormpeaks]

Doesn't really matter to my point though x)

I'm aware lottery fixed nothing and I said that back then as well, but fcs are not at fault for that, and the ratio personal/fc is perfectly fine as it is really. What this game needs is more wards to be opened.

[Kaiproberts]

I'm aware lottery fixed nothing and I said that back then as well, but fcs are not at fault for that, and the ratio personal/fc is perfectly fine as it is really. What this game needs is more wards to be opened.

Our hopes for more housing focus were killed with island sanctuary. Island sanctuary should have been scrapped to make room for more housing; it was a complete waste of game resources and server space. Now we are left with a half-baked system for both.

[Jojoya]

Yeah, I think it was around that until they fixed it, probably around 12 now.

You were correct about the number of FC only wards at the time that the lottery was first introduced. Wards 1-18 were designated for FC purchase and 19-24 were for personal purchase. A few months later, they changed it to wards 1-9 for FC only and 10-24 for personal (except for the 4 EU worlds that had just been added). Finally when wards 25-30 were added they changed ward designations to 1-6 FC, 7-20 mixed, 21-24 personal, 25 FC only and 26-30 personal only (except on the Dynamis, Materia and 4 EU worlds where wards 25-30 are still unavailable).

Some thought that the 30 day waiting period on FC master eligibility would kill housing RMT. I don't know the actual outcome since I don't study RMT but my guess is that it was reduced but not stopped. Those who do study it say a fair portion of the RMT housing ads seen are scams and not legitimate sales attempts.

SE is still going to favor FCs over individuals when it comes to availability of plots since houses were originally a FC only content with FC only features gated by ownership of a FC house. I'm certain they're aware that RMT still occurs but they have to balance that against what they intend for legitimate FCs.

It's not the lottery that has placed housing in shambles. It's been in shambles all along. It is the supply system that is the problem and will continue to be the problem until SE makes changes so supply will meet demand. That includes demand by size of plot, not just overall number of plots.

If Housing Mirage gets implemented, it will reduce part of the demand by size but not eliminate it. Gardeners are going to prefer large plots to be able to place 3 garden patches instead of one. Players like me are going to prefer larges for the outdoor decorating potential even if we prefer smaller interiors.

If a greatly improved instanced housing system gets implemented, it's hard to say what it would do to ward demand. We don't really know how many players will prefer having a house in a ward to getting the instanced housing. A lot of that will depend on exactly what improvements are made to it. I can dream that SE will bring RIFT style housing to FFXIV but getting it is doubtful.

Our hopes for more housing focus were killed with island sanctuary. Island sanctuary should have been scrapped to make room for more housing; it was a complete waste of game resources and server space. Now we are left with a half-baked system for both.

I don't agree. Island Sanctuary was added to address player requests (evidently primarily from the JP player base) that SE couldn't implement into the current housing system.

I also feel like Island Sanctuary may have been used as a testing ground for instanced housing and possible features in the same way that Squadrons were a testing ground in the development of Trusts and Duty Support.

What will happen if every player is given their own private instance? We had temporary congestion at the contest release then after those first couple of weeks players had no issues entering their islands unless there was a technical issue with the servers. Instanced housing would likely have a short period of congestion since there would be no need to spend hours in it gathering materials and trying to rank it up.

Can a system be created that allows players to place multiple copies of a furnishing they own instead of needing to own and store that number? Yes. Imagine the improvement to player inventory if we only needed to have one of every item we wanted to use then could place it into our housing as many times as we like up to the total item limit.

Things they would still have to work on: allowing players more flexibility in setting up guest permissions for their private instance. Players are constantly requesting ways to blacklist players from entering their housing while allowing anyone else to enter. Island Sanctuary went to the opposite extreme - only those included within specific social circles of the owner (friend, FC, party) could enter.

They also need to set up a search function for finding housing to visit. Estate tags are a good way to accomplish in a multi-lingual game. If they could also record Likes in the Message Book to a central database, that could become another way to search for housing to visit.

Hopefully all these little things will add up to a better housing system in the future for all players, not just those lucky enough to score a plot in the lottery,

[Khryseis_Astra]

Hopefully all these little things will add up to a better housing system in the future for all players, not just those lucky enough to score a plot in the lottery,

Agreed. You can definitely see them trying out stuff here and there, that could add up to an amazing updated housing experience if they have the desire to do something with it! There’s so much they could be doing, especially in the areas that are already instanced, like the housing interiors.

I do think housing mirage could help with the size disparity, especially if they offer a handful of new layout options. (And if that could extend to apartments too, which people have been suggesting for ages!) I’m sure some will always want their preferred size, if only because of the exterior skins and/or yard. But many, given the choice of being 1 out of 100+ bidders on a plot, or just making the inside of a small bigger, would probably go with the latter.

I’d definitely like to see a true instanced option added to the ward system though. Everyone should be able to have a house period, and that’s still not happening on lots of crowded worlds. I do think that another district could help, and who knows, they could announce Old Sharlayan housing for Dawntrail at JP Fanfest for all we know! lol or the new “lifestyle content” could end up being an instanced housing plot! But right now there’s still multiple bids on most plots, and others aren’t happy with the amount of larger sizes available. Instanced could fix that, whereas any changes to the wards, whether it’s just adding more or redesigning to include more sizes, would require a lot more server resources.

And we have to keep in mind that Xbox players will be joining us shortly… while another housing district or additional wards could almost come close to solving the scarcity problem on some worlds with their current population levels, unless they funnel Xbox players onto Dynamis from the get go, crowded worlds are just going to get more crowded. And even if they do make them all start on Dynamis, it will eventually fill as the other worlds have done. Good for actually getting content done there, but not good for housing availability! They need to invest in a system with the ability to scale with its player count.