The Housing problem and my proposed solution

[Anova]

Prey, Reunis, can we not off-track the discussion and focus on something constructive rather than these personal attacks please?

Obviously, Prey is comparing a feature in another game she thinks did housing really well. The video highlights it well, but could you please tell us specifically what we're looking for? As far as I can tell, it's about how players can buy plots designated as housing spots and build houses there. There's some obvious differences in graphics and house size, but as far as I can tell, it's not anything different from the current housing system.

The current system is this: You have a plot of land you see is available for purchase and you choose to buy it. You then pay additional money to build the house, and use materials to customize it to your liking.

Rheunis, despite his tone, is correct that there's nothing particularly different from the current building process with what was shown in the video. He is also getting hung up on the graphics, which is fine. Some people can't actually handle the analogy of using another game as a prototype. Move on. There are others here who are following the conversation and maybe our examples will make more sense to Rheunis.

If it helps both of you, just imagine everything is Lego. It's a lot cheaper than paying a development team 6 months worth of salaries to code the damn concept and then having to spend 1 year to recode any changes we make.

Now, can you please explain how the video you showed would be different and help address the problem (chiefly housing space), Prey? I'm honestly not seeing it.

[Colorful]

snip

The housing systems in those games are far more complex, [I]while/I] also being able to accommodate every, or close to every player. As for the graphics, yes the graphics are going to be dated, they're dated game. What's your point? If in 5 years time they still haven't fixed this system, are those graphics going great? No, they're going to look even worse than Rift is to us now due to the quicker advance visuals in games, and the lack of incredibly dated hardware support. Rift's system allows any single character to own 20 dimensions, that's 20 fully custom housing areas to do with what you wish. 2 of them are free IIRC, and the other 18 are paid for through the store, or through in game gold. This is perfectly acceptable for a game without a subscription fee. The point is, FFXIV's housing system is not only incredibly lackluster, but also lacks availability. They should have invested far more time into it, especially if they're going to keep updated it while those issues remain.

[Preypacer]

Obviously, Prey is comparing a feature in another game she thinks did housing really well. The video highlights it well, but could you please tell us specifically what we're looking for? As far as I can tell, it's about how players can buy plots designated as housing spots and build houses there. There's some obvious differences in graphics and house size, but as far as I can tell, it's not anything different from the current housing system.

The videos, along with their audio/narratives, and the small tidbits of info I provided in that post should at least indicate how the housing systems in those games - some near or over a decade old, now - go well beyond what XIV offers us, or is even close to being capable of.

I'm incredulous that you saw nothing more than what you describe in any of them, even implicitly.

To wit: both you, and Rheunis, have somehow overlooked what's being displayed/described in those videos.

I'll put it this way...

We can start and finish the list of ways that XIV's housing system falls short in one single point, which happens to be at the core of this thread, at least:

Every one of those MMOs accomodates every player with at least one personal home (with Guild-sized homes being an option). Further, in some of them, players can own multiple homes, in various locations, of various sizes.

But, to expand on why this is so... I'll focus on just two MMOs.

1. In EQ2, every player gets access to a small house/apt, with 2 rooms. It has full customizability (floor, walls, ceiling, etc), can hold numerous pieces of furniture and other items. It provides additional storage, and direct access to sell one's wares to others through.
   
   Beyond that, every character can own up to 25 homes, total, from tiny homes, way up to full on mansions. And, unlike XIV's current system, they can do this without impeding anyone else's ability to acquire even one.
   
   EQ2 has had this system in place for at least 10 years now.
2. In RIFT, players get 'Dimensions'. These are essentially their own plot of land, based on their choice from a number of different environments, derived from areas in the game.
   
   In these Dimensions, they can build, almost literally, anything they want, from scratch, using a wide variety of building materials and items available in-game. If they're not keen on building, and just want something ready-made, they can purchase pre-built houses as well. Or, build a mix of the two.
   
   Further, unlike FFXIV's current system, they can own several Dimensions, of varying sizes... without impeding anyone else's ability to acquire even one.
   
   If you want to see the kind of community that can build up around a well-designed and put-together housing system that empowers and supports players' creativity, take a look through this site. Check out this video in particular, for just one example. This is all built by a player, through Rift's take on a housing system.

If the glaring disparity between XIV's system, and other MMOs - including one over a decade old - isn't clear now, then I don't know what else to say, except "there are none so blind as those who will not see".

That's just two examples. The key thing to take from this isn't necessarily the features they have (though many of them are damn awesome). The point is, that each of these MMOs, one of them over a decade old, has managed to pack all of these features into their respective systems, while still guaranteeing that each player can have not only one home (given for free), but can acquire multiple if they wish, without limiting anyone else's ability to do the same.

Now, folks may still somehow dismiss all that as unimportant, or whatever, "because reasons", or because "it doesn't affect them", but it's a major gripe - and a valid one - among many, many players.

At this point, I think most people would be satisfied to be able to get a house at all, in a neighborhood of their choosing. That such a desire is so out-of-reach, to so many, is really at the core of this entire issue.

In a nutshell: FFXIV's housing system was poorly designed, poorly implemented and is far far too restrictive and limited in its current form. The band-aids they are applying to "remedy it" are not what it needs. In my opinion, it needs a complete overhaul, from the ground-up.

[Sandpark]

@ Preypacer
The graphics do look bland on those videos and the building look very basic with not much details. Ok let's say those do housing itself better than FFXIV according to you.

The bigger question is:
What purpose do those houses serve besides decorating?
Is there any content that can only be done from those houses like Skycastles or FFXIV guild airships?
Can large groups of people hang out in the same area or do they have to zone into different instances?

Because Free Company houses are not just for decorating, crafting and hanging out. There is more content coming after island exploration for Free Company guilds to do I assure you. Content tied to the free company houses. One example is multiplayer crafting things such as cakes and sailboats, etc.

Let's look at some other possibilities for guild based content for Free Companies shall we?

-Airship Guild Vs Guild(Battle Airships designed and controlled by FC possibility)
-Submarine exploration(Designed and controlled by FC)
-Lunar expeditions(Spaceship designed and controlled by FC)
-Magitek Armor crafting( Designed and controlled by FC for guild vs guild wars)
-Magitek Battle/Racing circuits(Designed and controller by FC, Nascar type race teams(FC teams), think pod racing in Star Wars), with rankings, rewards, achievements,etc.


So people without guilds are not locked out of that playstyle of content, they can have queues for smaller scale stuff in DF, And personal smaller designs of things in crafting.
-

[Preypacer]

@ Preypacer
The graphics do look bland on those videos and the building look very basic with not much details. Ok let's say those do housing itself better than FFXIV according to you.

Graphics are not a Housing System.

You're looking at games that are upwards of 10+ years old, built for older systems, with much lower hardware specs... running hardware (servers, broadband connection speeds, etc) that were also much lower. Yet, those older MMOs managed to pull off what they did, for all characters. Meanwhile, SE can't pull off what is really a pretty basic housing system, without leaving many players and FCs waiting and hoping for the chance to get one.. somewhere down the road. If they're lucky.

The bigger question is:
What purpose do those houses serve besides decorating?
Is there any content that can only be done from those houses like Skycastles or FFXIV guild airships?
Can large groups of people hang out in the same area or do they have to zone into different instances?

Well, your questions are completely besides the point, and are not at all the big question. More of a deflection from the main point, really.

All of those things being tied to FC housing are great.. if you're fortunate enough to be in a FC that has a house, or are able to get one yourself. But many can't.And that is the key problem here, which some people seem determined to argue around, make excuses for, or otherwise avoid addressing.

However, regarding what you can do in those housing systems.. I'll cover EQ2, in particular, at least as much as I remember from last time I played...

Well, for starters, in EQ2, if you want a house, you can actually get one. You can get up to 25, if you want. That alone sets it apart, without even getting into anything else.

However, you can have crafting stations, a huge variety of housing items (walls, stairs, etc), decorations that can be rotated and scaled, to suit your likes/needs, expanded storage (which you can increase significantly by using large storage boxes), NPCs to buy/sell goods, Market Boards to sell your wares from (and others to come buy directly from, to avoid broker fees), you can have teleports between all your houses (up to 25 of them), making hopping between them very easy. You can have furniture that lowers the upkeep cost (of course, only relevant because EQ2 has them).

And of course, there's the same reasons many people enjoy housing in any game - it gives them a way to express themselves creatively, and to give them a place "of their own" online. In EQ2, you can also have pets in it, which will interact with you, and with each other. There's a very large, and very active community that's developed around EQ2's housing, such is its importance and relevance to the game, and its players.

EQ2 has had all of that stuff for up to a decade or longer... and it's been available for every single character created in the world since the beginning.

Let's look at some other possibilities for guild based content for Free Companies shall we?

-Airship Guild Vs Guild(Battle Airships designed and controlled by FC possibility)
-Submarine exploration(Designed and controlled by FC)
-Lunar expeditions(Spaceship designed and controlled by FC)
-Magitek Armor crafting( Designed and controlled by FC for guild vs guild wars)
-Magitek Battle/Racing circuits(Designed and controller by FC, Nascar type race teams(FC teams), think pod racing in Star Wars), with rankings, rewards, achievements,etc.

Hypotheticals are never the basis for a debate or meaningful discussion. However, all those things, if they were implemented, would be separate systems, apart from the Housing itself, and could be accessed from outside a FC House, and without the need for a FC house, if SE decided to implement them in such a way. SE is already making this possible with airships and chocobo stables... both of which have been announced as becoming available even without a FC house at some point in the future. This is one of the concessions it seems SE has had to make, as a result of their poorly designed/implemented housing system. If everyone were able to get a house, such limitations wouldn't have been an issue to begin with.

[Sandpark]

@Preypacer
No these questions are the big point. You seem to think FC housing is just for storage and playing decorate. Those things are great for FC and as long as they give others without FC a smaller scale instance of that then it is super. FC housing is proving that it is more than just an art house and storage with the upcoming airship content for FC. Those things you listed from other housing has been done in most mmos, but there hasn't been many mmos that design content out of it.

These systems would not be separate. Huge FC airships are FC only, SE is only offering airships outside to allow people who do not like big FC or can get one to still have access to some content. If you look at it solely as a housing system. Then perhaps those games you listed were more accessible. FFXIV FC housing is more than just your typical housing district with upcoming content tied to the free company housing. Every hypothetical I listed is tied to the housing system.

Has it been perfect so far? No, they had some design overlooks. But as with everything they create, it is iterative not perfect out of the gate.

[Kosmos992k]

*SNIP*
In a nutshell: FFXIV's housing system was poorly designed, poorly implemented and is far far too restrictive and limited in its current form. The band-aids they are applying to "remedy it" are not what it needs. In my opinion, it needs a complete overhaul, from the ground-up.

Well, I'm not certain, but I have a suspicion that some or all of the housing system in those games operates at the client or peer to peer level rather than running entirely on the server side. FFXIV has adopted the much more server centric architecture as a countermeasure to cheating. Games that use more client side processing or peer to peer networking are open to cheating, even on the consoles.

Yes the housing system has many problems, yes we need them fixed, but, when comparing alternatives and trying to pull from those alternatives possible modifications or additions to the FFXIV housing system, we all have to be careful to remember that whatever is implemented will be done on the server side. The key point being that the load imposed by housing is real and no matter how much hand waving and assuming people indulge in; the truth is that there are real limits imposed by operating server side. Those limits exist both in terms of what a given server can handle, and also in terms of the bandwidth between the server and client (and/or the cummulative bandwidth inbound and outbound from the server itself).

In other words, consider the load on the servers of any changes to the housing system and try not to scoff at the concept of server load being an issue.

[Preypacer]

Well, I'm not certain, but I have a suspicion that some or all of the housing system in those games operates at the client or peer to peer level rather than running entirely on the server side. FFXIV has adopted the much more server centric architecture as a countermeasure to cheating. Games that use more client side processing or peer to peer networking are open to cheating, even on the consoles.

Yes the housing system has many problems, yes we need them fixed, but, when comparing alternatives and trying to pull from those alternatives possible modifications or additions to the FFXIV housing system, we all have to be careful to remember that whatever is implemented will be done on the server side. The key point being that the load imposed by housing is real and no matter how much hand waving and assuming people indulge in; the truth is that there are real limits imposed by operating server side. Those limits exist both in terms of what a given server can handle, and also in terms of the bandwidth between the server and client (and/or the cummulative bandwidth inbound and outbound from the server itself).

In other words, consider the load on the servers of any changes to the housing system and try not to scoff at the concept of server load being an issue.

They already have instancing in place that handles who-knows-how-many players, across who-knows-how-many dungeons and other instanced areas at any given time. They can clearly handle high-stress, high-volume instancing scenarios.

If it is a case of them keeping everything server side, well, then that's a problem for them to work out. And I have full faith that they could and would, if they felt it was important enough to address. They'd have to change things up, reallocate resources and such, but I'm confident they could do it.

Generally speaking...

At this point, with how much SE has accomplished with this game, that some people are still so quick to believe they can't do something, simply because they haven't yet, is mind-boggling.

People thought 1.x could never be improved enough to be playable, or worth a subscription to anyone. SE turned around, improved 1.x, and managed to not only get people to pay a sub, but tripled the number of players playing besides (all those names in the credits of 2.0 are not all of them; not everyone got their name in the credits).

People thought 2.0 could never happen. That a MMO could never get a second chance, and that SE would never succeed with it; that it would crash and burn a second time. Yet, they did the impossible, and didexactly what most everyone said they couldn't.

People insisted that large, sprawling open areas could never be done "because PS3 limitations". SE turns around and delivers us Heavensward, with massive open areas, that you can see clear across from some vantage points.

And so on.

Yet, here we are again with people quick to assume SE can't perform improvements/changes to a housing system - which are greatly needed - for whatever reasons.

I can be skeptical about things... Very skeptical. I was one of the people who believed 2.0 would crash and burn for a time (specifically around its final betas and launch). Still, even I reached the point where I had to acknowledge that what seemed "impossible" to me (and others), was quite within SE's capacity to do... if they set themselves to doing it. At some point, you have to start giving them benefit of the doubt, I think.

I don't buy for a second that turning the housing situation around completely is a matter of "can they do it". I believe it's a question of "will they do it".

[Kosmos992k]

I don't buy for a second that turning the housing situation around completely is a matter of "can they do it". I believe it's a question of "will they do it".

Oh no, don't misunderstand, with sufficient time, resources and infrastructure I am sure practically anything can be done. However, rearchitecting systems or subsystems pretty much from the ground up while they are in place and operational, is easily the most expensive way to affect change. They'd be better suspending further work on housing as it is and starting over on housing 3.0. In terms of realities and practicalities, there are thing than can be done, and things that cant realistically, or practically, be done at this time.

I'm not defending SE here, I think the housing system we have makes sense for free company housing, but absolutely fails at addressing personal housing. I also think that blending personal housing into the FC wards as they have both dilutes the worth of housing to a free company, and offends those FCs unable to obtain a plot because someone bought a medium(or small, or large) lot for personal use and subsequently quit... That doesn't even begin to addrsss how badly it fails the vast majority of players.

Actually, I'll go one further, the housing system as it is fails both gatherers and crafters as well. Instanced personal housing within the reach of any active player would have stimulated the market for furnishings and related items creation much more cash flow in the economy. Howver, as it is it became nothing more than a property bubble and the economy as a whole suffers from that.

I aleady made my suggestiojs on fixing things;

• Create 'condominium' style system with an entrance lobby accessible from the main square in each ward.
• The homes are expanded versions of personal chambers with an outdoor area.
• The starter unit costs twice the amount of a private chamber in a FC house, but is larger.
• The starter unit also has a back yard outdoor area permitting indoor and outdoor furnishings and things such as garden plots and chocobo stable.
• The existing wards are locked for future purchase by FCs only.
• Abandoned lots in exitsting wards are actively recovered and offered for sale to Free Companies.
• Additional expansion of the personal house would be added through in game purchaseable items using gil.
• The homes are instanced, but visitors can enter them the instance only exists while an owner or guest is present.
• A premium version of this is also available for a small additional monthly fee expanding, similar to the retainer fee.
• The premium version has a full outside instance with a home and larger yard.
• Item limits would be doubled (except for gardn plots and the like) within a Premium house.

This makes housing available to all, provides a potential revenue stream from people who want a bigger and better personal home and preservesthe existing system intact without unduly penalizing existing owners of personal homes. It makes use of existing systems in the game and can be developed in parallel to the existing system without impacting that system negatively - IMHO of course...

[Anova]

I'm incredulous that you saw nothing more than what you describe in any of them, even implicitly.

To wit: both you, and Rheunis, have somehow overlooked what's being displayed/described in those videos..

Ah sorry, I was only referring to the Vanguard video rather than the other three you posted (since that was what Sandpark was getting hung up on). Sorry if there was any confusion over that. I'll refer to the specific videos from now on.

I do generally agree with the concept of Rift and EQ2's instancing of housing. The limited spaces do not make sense, and I never meant to imply that the status quo was good. I doubt there's any arguments that we DO NOT need more housing slots, but the question is how to add it within the current system. The alternative is to tear the whole thing down and wait 1-2 years for development to revamp it (because SE'll only have about 6 developers working part-time on this, not to mention testing and QA who will definitely be juggling a bunch of other updates such as class/dungeon balance in addition to housing).

I for one am fine with moving personal housing to instanced servers, while leaving the neighborhoods open for FCS to fight over. There's some merit in the competition for the spaces, and some players genuinely enjoy it. Just don't tie them to FCs, otherwise it's not actually a personal house.

I'm all for customizing and would welcome the ability to customize the layout of my house. My concern with EQ2 housing though is that while it is highly customizable, it is not very friendly to the console market. Similarly, if you want to import textures, that's going to be difficult to do with a PS3 or PS4. That doesn't mean I wouldn't want a house like that, but it limits the type of player who will be able to build a house and customize it. It's a good feature to have, but it's not important at all. Maybe we'll have them in 5-10 years (because it needs a lot of tweaking to make it work on a console and gamepad), but I do not expect Rift or EQ had that robust of a system at 2 years. Minecraft did, but that game is built around crafting.

As for the Vanguard video, which was my argument, FFXIV already implements those features where it can.

• You have a plot of land you can see and buy on the spot.

• Building houses requires gil, which all players can contribute by depositing in to the FC box.

• Airship construction has a UI and list of crafting materials that registered players may add to (just like Vanguard).

If you want players to become porters and buy/deposit materials to build their houses like a giant fetch quest, that's fine. But I didn't hear you say that in your post and I honestly expect many players would like the shortcut to just pay the gil there than to pick it at the marketboard/retainer and then run all the way back to the house lot.

Anyway, hope that clears up my points. If there was anything I missed in the Vanguard video, feel free to add to the case.