How would have implemented housing in XIV?

[Mahrze]

...

I was thinking the same thing in regards to how housing should work at this point. Thought my thought was instanced neighborhoods with a reservation queue. Each lot could be upgraded with facilities to expand on the things people want:

* Additional floors/rooms.
* Plot size.
* Workshop: Not just the FC one, but a workshop to help you with crafter stuff like the 2.0 tables but a facility.
* Greenhouse: Which can be expanded and help with gardening instead of the paltry options we have now.
* Stable: Actual stables where you can see your favorite mounts run around. This would not limit you to summon them in the field.

[Evogolist]

Hey everyone, updated the OP with a second question (instead of starting a whole new thread that is, lol). But if you don't feel like going back to page 1, then here's my second question.

I know that a lot of people are still asking and waiting for Ishgard housing. There's also a number of people according to other housing threads, that would like for some sort of housing in the Sea of Clouds. So my second question is, where are some other areas you'd like to see housing wards or just housing in general open up at in future patches/expansions?

[Stormfur]

This is what I would have done.

Everyone starts off with the ability to purchase an apartment.

As you continue through the game and your reputation spreads through your deeds (i.e. completing ARR for example), you would be able to buy a small plot of land in one of the three major city-states.

When you complete the MSQ of heavensward, you'd unlock the ability to relocate (if desired) to:
1) Ishgard
2) Sharlayan
3) The sea of clouds

You would also unlock their architectural styles for your home

Upon completing the MSQ of Stormblood, your heroics would earn you the option to relocate to
1) Shirogane
2) The Azim Steppe

As before, you'd unlock their architecture for your home.

Now, so that this wouldn't be a race to see who could complete the MSQ the fastest, the actual housing wards themselves would be separated into
a) Instanced FC wards and
b) Instanced personal wards

This way, as you grow as a character, so too do your options for owning land. Everything, including mog station purchases, goes with you when you when you move, through the miracle that is pack chocobos.

[Besame]

Very hard to fix what came into being as broken in the first place. I would of started with instanced housing to begin with. One look around the MMOs a few years ago and anyone with a clue would of seen how popular housing was and what other MMOs were doing to provide it. Working out of the box doesn't seem to be SE's strong suit. Now they are just working with a box of bandaids and bandaids don't hold water...

[Evogolist]

I don't think they'll ever be able to fix this mess of a housing system as long as the demand for it remains high and they're unable to meet that demand. However, it's nice to see that they're finally somewhat listening to us and trying to fix it as best they can and this patch showed that, enough if they did mess up and announce it too early.

[Evogolist]

As for my second question, just to get the ball rolling, someone mentioned the Ruby Sea earlier and I think that would be an interesting and nice place to have a housing area.

[Besame]

As for my second question, just to get the ball rolling, someone mentioned the Ruby Sea earlier and I think that would be an interesting and nice place to have a housing area.

I like that idea!

[wizisi2k]

if I were in charge of housing, I'd probably do things slightly differently. I would probably involve the mogstation at some point like it is for eternal bond ceremonies in the terms of reserving a plot. Pick your ward, plot, and size. If you have the gil, you own it. If you are on a high-population server with NO wards open, you would have to pay a small fee (goes directly towards servers supporting it-maybe $3-5 for a small, $8-10 for a medium, $12-15 for a large. ONE TIME PAYMENT!) Of course, the restrictions for mogstation owned houses would be severe (cannot relinquish land but it won't be taken from you like if you paid using gil through housing demolition; if a FC dissolves, it reverts to the owner. If they own a personal and that house, cannot buy another). Benefits: everyone can get a house where they want. SE buys more servers rather than reallocate housing servers from dead servers to active ones. I also liked the ideas of upgrading your house. I would also have in affect the restrictions SE has on ownership. Moving to new areas sounds like it would be work but useful. Add a couple hundred k to relocate to a new ward that isn't open to everybody (mogstation purchases cannot relocate maybe? Or if they can it's at a lower cost?)

[Besame]

I don't think they'll ever be able to fix this mess of a housing system as long as the demand for it remains high and they're unable to meet that demand. However, it's nice to see that they're finally somewhat listening to us and trying to fix it as best they can and this patch showed that, enough if they did mess up and announce it too early.

Yes, as I stated previously, they don't think before they act. I feel bad for the individuals that want their first house still waiting after a week. Only plus side: the lucky ones will be able to nab them for half the cost so that's a plus hehe.

[Dustytome]

if I were in charge of housing, I'd probably do things slightly differently. I would probably involve the mogstation at some point like it is for eternal bond ceremonies in the terms of reserving a plot. Pick your ward, plot, and size. If you have the gil, you own it. If you are on a high-population server with NO wards open, you would have to pay a small fee (goes directly towards servers supporting it-maybe $3-5 for a small, $8-10 for a medium, $12-15 for a large. ONE TIME PAYMENT!) Of course, the restrictions for mogstation owned houses would be severe (cannot relinquish land but it won't be taken from you like if you paid using gil through housing demolition; if a FC dissolves, it reverts to the owner. If they own a personal and that house, cannot buy another). Benefits: everyone can get a house where they want. SE buys more servers rather than reallocate housing servers from dead servers to active ones. I also liked the ideas of upgrading your house. I would also have in affect the restrictions SE has on ownership. Moving to new areas sounds like it would be work but useful. Add a couple hundred k to relocate to a new ward that isn't open to everybody (mogstation purchases cannot relocate maybe? Or if they can it's at a lower cost?)

So designing from scratch you'd keep the same system of limited size availability, you'd keep the ward system as is - limiting overall availability and then you'd add mogstation availability so if people didn't get in the initial release they'd have their subs paying for other peoples' houses while having to pay extra for their own? What if everyone wants a large and there's only 3 per ward so you have to set up 300 servers (requiring continuous payments on the business end for staff/service/hardware) just to keep up with requests for large houses? That one time payment isn't going to cut it for server costs.

edit: Just to be sure, I'm not going after you, simply pointing out some issues with the current system and connecting it to the mogstation. Most people have a variety of ideas of how the housing should/could work, but any company should be brainstorming how a feature can progress, the flaws of limitations and the possible abuse of the system many times over after adjusting before putting something out into the live environment.