Using housing from SWTOR as base for the housing system.

[Pimsan20]

So I heard that the housing system of SWTOR would be a perfect base to update XIV’s housing without the limited option to decorated the houses. So think with the overhaul coming, would they pick SWTOR‘a housing as base to make improvements so that everyone can have a house of their own in their favorite location?

[Jeeqbit]

SWTOR is a very good example of why it is not impossible to have "a house for every player" in an MMORPG. But many other MMORPGs have also proven this with their housing systems, including WoW recently.

Moreover, SE themselves have proven that a "house for every player" is possible because Island Sanctuary, on a technical level, is a "garden for every player". Essentially the same thing, technically speaking.

I like the idea of a collection of player houses. The problem is the implementation is bad and they have failed to improve it in 13 years. The way to solve it is to disconnect houses from plots. If a house is disconnected from a plot, then you would teleport directly inside it as if it's instanced housing. The demolition timer could then merely disconnect houses from plots due to inactivity, and keep wards a reflection of active players.

This concept of disconnecting a house from a plot would then allow said house to be connected to a content like Island Sanctuary or other specifically-designed instanced area, in case of the event that no desirable plots are available.

[Pimsan20]

SWTOR is a very good example of why it is not impossible to have "a house for every player" in an MMORPG. But many other MMORPGs have also proven this with their housing systems, including WoW recently.

Moreover, SE themselves have proven that a "house for every player" is possible because Island Sanctuary, on a technical level, is a "garden for every player". Essentially the same thing, technically speaking.

I like the idea of a collection of player houses. The problem is the implementation is bad and they have failed to improve it in 13 years. The way to solve it is to disconnect houses from plots. If a house is disconnected from a plot, then you would teleport directly inside it as if it's instanced housing. The demolition timer could then merely disconnect houses from plots due to inactivity, and keep wards a reflection of active players.

This concept of disconnecting a house from a plot would then allow said house to be connected to a content like Island Sanctuary or other specifically-designed instanced area, in case of the event that no desirable plots are available.

If that is the case, how would they avoid that problem?

[Naphtalia]

If that is the case, how would they avoid that problem?

The running theory is that the way they set up housing to begin with was poorly implemented and now it would take a lot of man hours/resources to rip the whole thing apart and fix it to the scale of WoW/SWTOR/etc. It also runs the risk of pissing off people who are dead set on having ward housing, along with Yoshi specifically saying that he wants ward housing to exist because it was taken from one of his favorite games or something. So it's all unavoidable problems in my opinion until someone at SE starts allocating resources better and makes it a priority.

[Jeeqbit]

If that is the case, how would they avoid that problem?

I just explained how they would solve it. The exact details depends on their code, but I guarantee this: 13 years is enough time to learn to code and gain 10 years of programming experience. Moreover, programmers at a billion-yen company should be capable of achieving the feat.

Coding can be challenging, but nothing is impossible, and if SE ever says that then it is a mindset issue. Unreal 5's graphics are "impossible" yet programmers made it possible, because it is programmer's job to make things possible.

[Pimsan20]

I just explained how they would solve it. The exact details depends on their code, but I guarantee this: 13 years is enough time to learn to code and gain 10 years of programming experience. Moreover, programmers at a billion-yen company should be capable of achieving the feat.

Coding can be challenging, but nothing is impossible, and if SE ever says that then it is a mindset issue. Unreal 5's graphics are "impossible" yet programmers made it possible, because it is programmer's job to make things possible.

And if it work, they can use the plots for free companies only.

[Jeeqbit]

And if it work, they can use the plots for free companies only.

They actually have Free Company-only wards already.

The issue with FC wards is people can use alts to get as many as they want. The issue with personal houses is at minimum that, due to fear of complete destruction of their house, many people login to keep their house then don't play at all for months/years. They would not have this fear if the house wasn't destroyed, but merely detached and moved to an instanced location.

[Keumjo]

I love SWTOR housing, my Dromund Kaas Apartment is so cozy with the rain and jungle in the backdrop. FFXIV chose Aion as its housing guide to the detriment of us all.

[Daralii]

SWTOR is a very good example of why it is not impossible to have "a house for every player" in an MMORPG. But many other MMORPGs have also proven this with their housing systems, including WoW recently.

Moreover, SE themselves have proven that a "house for every player" is possible because Island Sanctuary, on a technical level, is a "garden for every player". Essentially the same thing, technically speaking.

I like the idea of a collection of player houses. The problem is the implementation is bad and they have failed to improve it in 13 years. The way to solve it is to disconnect houses from plots. If a house is disconnected from a plot, then you would teleport directly inside it as if it's instanced housing. The demolition timer could then merely disconnect houses from plots due to inactivity, and keep wards a reflection of active players.

This concept of disconnecting a house from a plot would then allow said house to be connected to a content like Island Sanctuary or other specifically-designed instanced area, in case of the event that no desirable plots are available.

I wonder if disconnecting the house from the plot would allow for glamour dressers to be placed in houses without crashing the server.

[Xylira]

The ward system is bloated, archaic, and a waste of system resources.

Housing interiors are already entirely instanced and don't use up resources when not in use, as seen when Island Sanctuary was added and people couldn't get into their homes when the housing server was overloaded. Wards on the other hand, remain loaded all of the time, regardless of whether there is anyone in the instance, meaning server resources are potentially being wasted. This is part of why SE struggles to add enough wards to keep up with housing demands, the other part being that they can't seem to add more or less wards on a server by server basis.

Fully instanced housing on the other hand, doesn't have the same wasteful overhead as ward housing does. Aside from a small data storage imprint when not in use, there would be no additional server load unless the home was actively being used by a player. This makes fully instanced player housing significantly more scalable to player demand, and would allow far more players to access the housing system. And as mentioned by Jeeqbit, there would also be no justifiable reason to add demo timers to them because they're not taking up finite plot space in wards if a player decides to take a break from the game.

I get that some people prefer the ward system, and I don't necessarily think it should be removed from the game. But like with countless other past game systems in FF, ward housing is outdated and holding the game back. The best path forward would be to add a new system in parallel that doesn't have to be restrained by the same poor design choices so that more players can better enjoy the housing aspect of the game.