On House Relocations...

[Elamys]

1. SE has stated multiple times their hardware cannot handle such a feature, because the wards are constantly active in memory, and creating more and more each time one fills up is too much strain server-side

What bothers me about this is that when the apartments were first announced, they were supposed to dynamically add more apartments as they filled, to be added at a later date once they saw how apartments worked. That feature mysteriously disappeared without a word.

[MizArai]

What bothers me about this is that when the apartments were first announced, they were supposed to dynamically add more apartments as they filled, to be added at a later date once they saw how apartments worked. That feature mysteriously disappeared without a word.

I thought Yoshida said it would be a simple thing for them to add more per apt building (up to like 500 or something) but they were starting with 90 each and would see if they needed more. I don't remember it ever being said that they would be dynamic with added more as they filled (though since FC rooms can do this, it is curious that apartments don't). Since I think only 2 or 3 servers had max capacity apts, they probably decided it wasn't needed since it was only 2 or 3 servers. With the new wards, there were 4320 more apartments added. If they just follow through with the promise of making apartments upgradable to something reasonable in size (preferably up to at least a medium house type size) then I think most of the housing crisis should be solved, minus the lack of being able to garden.

[Elamys]

Maybe that's what he meant, I'm fuzzy on the details of it after this much time. But they still haven't even done that lol. Either way, they need to focus on apartments if they want any hope of solving this. Then just add planter boxes for apartment gardening. Ta-da. (Also, add an FC chest to apartment lobbies...pls)

[Hasrat]

We're paying for the game and aren't allowed to complain about not having enough? Wouldn't you try to give your most populated server more while waaay less populated server don't get that much for now?

Hmm, their world/population balancing incentives would seem to suggest that no, they'd rather eliminate the "empty/overpopulated" problem altogether.

[Final-Fantasy]

I'm guessing OP didn't get their plot they wanted.

Yes...

I can't help but feel that some people are intentionally trolling us by relocating as often as they can to reset the lockout timers.

And about relocating, why would anyone relocate just to reset the timer, not only would it cost a lot of Gil but you also give up a plot, no matter what, doing so is going to leave another plot available.

What is more likely going on is, other players go buy a plot they don't want else where, and relocate to the plot they do want, i have done this myself while others just sat at the placard complaining while i walked up and bought it instantly

[HyoMinPark]

What bothers me about this is that when the apartments were first announced, they were supposed to dynamically add more apartments as they filled, to be added at a later date once they saw how apartments worked. That feature mysteriously disappeared without a word.

The difference is, apartments are completely instanced and only load when someone is occupying them. The wards are loaded and rendered constantly, regardless if anyone is actually occupying them. Dynamic wards would be completely different from dynamic apartments.

That being said, I think the devs thought apartments would be another band-aid fix to the Housing system, and then didn’t expect people to basically rage (and rightfully so) at the fact that they were just more expensive FC rooms with none of the perks of being in an FC. I think they should definitely expand apartments sometime in the near future and attempt to make them competitive against ward housing.

[Rinuko]

snip

I'm sorry but i can't help but giggle to your "story". Sounds like you not really friends with people if all your interactions is a emote or a small hi.

Even if you had multible friends who did not wish to transfer they will introduce cross world LS and FC soon enough hence no need to stay on a overpopulated server. Imho

Also since you value housing so low, why even bother complain about it? You don't seem to care about it.
If it was so important you would done something.

[InkstainedGwyn]

I'm going to get roasted for this analogy, but I don't really care. I'm not writing it because I think, miraculously, someone is going to read it and go, "oh my god! You're so right!" I'm writing it to explain why most non-Balmung players don't care about Balmung.

There is a chain of grocery stores in a city. There is absolutely nothing that differentiates these stores. However, there is one particular store on the second floor of a highrise downtown that is far and away the most popular - not because of the store, but because that's the popular place. Some people go because they like the crowds. Some because they like to say that they go to the popular one. Some because their friends shop there too, and they like to see their friends. However, the safe occupancy number on this store routinely gets overlooked, and there's often many more people in this store than there should be.

This store also sells amazing bread. Like, people will kill for this bread. It's kept limited, though, and every store gets the same allotment every day to sell. At the One Store, it always sells out within seconds. Everywhere else, it usually sells out, but sometimes there are leftovers. But they don't send extras to the One Store.

Why? Because the One Store shouldn't have that many people in it. Every time the occupancy exceeds by 50, 100, 200, there's a chance that the floors will actually give way and also end up wrecking the other stores in the highrise. They don't want to encourage any more people to go there. Especially when there are plenty other stores within the same distance.

Nobody feels sorry for the people who can't get bread, because they decided that shopping at this store was more important than getting bread. But as much as you want to say "this is dumb, physical limitations don't apply to digital," you're wrong. Your "but nothing's going wrong so clearly it's fine" means that the people who are watching the servers and desperately reallocating resources so that you don't crash the datacentre are doing their jobs. I work for an online homework assessment company - at peak times we have hundreds of thousands of individuals accessing our servers at any one time, and I've seen the dev slack channels. They sometimes have to take some pretty crazy steps to keep the servers running at high loads. Just because you don't see it stutter (or you see the stutter but not the crash) doesn't mean it's not in danger, it means they've put on enough Band-Aids.

Does it suck that they have these limitations? Yep, but they exist and you can't just demand that they change it, especially when only 1-2 servers, picked arbitrarily, suffer. Do I blame you guys for having picked friends over bread? Nah - but I don't want to hear "but I should get bread *too*". You picked a server that exceeds its finite resource, so my sympathies are zilch. (Should they be finite? That's SE's decision. And when it comes to the implementation vs space issue, it makes sense why they are. Was it the best choice? No, but they didn't ask me.) And the fact that most of you don't care if you crash the other servers in your datacentre puts a sour taste in my mouth.

Oh, and the safe load occupancy? Yeah, it can be enforced. People can be kicked out. Servers can be forcefully split. It wouldn't surprise me if they actually do that some day.

Yeah, I know there are differences between my analogy and the real situation, but for the most part I think it describes how a lot of us view your complaints. Like I said, I don't expect anybody to change their mind over this... but I do hope you understand that most of us don't care.

[Madbunny]

Yeah, I know there are differences between my analogy and the real situation

Not really, you nailed the situation pretty good. Actually the same thing "we" (i and many others) were pointing out as we saw wards on our servers sitting half empty for days. All this boils down to the same thing - "i dont want to change anything to get what i want so everyone/anything else must change to adapt to my wishes".
Btw good analogy but sadly i dont think any of "those" people will understand or change for the simple fact they repeatedly refuse to accept the logic behind their situation (problem).

[Nerfworthy]

I'm writing it to explain why most non-Balmung players don't care about Balmung.

You hit the nail on the head, analogy is 100% spot-on. Best explanation I've seen on why Balmung does not deserve special treatment.