In my opinion the problem with the Goblet is that it's too open. Desert housing areas in real life are never like that, but rather three distinct types: Tent camps (Poor), Multi-apartment palaces (Average), and Palaces (Rich).

So you usually would see a landscape of richer palaces, simpler palaces, and tents in the outskirts.

"But if we all lived in palaces, no one would have a garden."

False. Residential palaces in the Emirates usually have inside gardens (The richest, who have their own palaces isolated from other people with high walls, can have palaces on the front and back).


Here is an example of an inside garden (well, a pool, but gardens would look the same). For a real Sultanate feel, this is what they should have done with Goblet housing really. Not everyone wants the classic fairy-tale house&garden, I would have preferred palaces split in apartments (with amount of chambers varying on housing "size" you can afford) for this very area.