Housing: Purchase Timer - Alternative Idea

[MizArai]

From the past few days, my friends have been house hunting non-stop. Of course it is our fault for doing so, but it has interfered with our gameplay (and I'm concerned for my friend's physical and mental health at this point lol).

Feedback appreciated for why this might work / might not work, just no toxicity please. Also if somebody else has already posted this idea or anything, links are appreciated because I did fairly minimal research on this topic.

Honestly, now isn't a good time to be house hunting on a higher population server. The demo timers are still paused for both NA and JP data centers. The JP timers will resume with 4.5, we have no time frame at the moment for when timers will resume for NA data centers. Without the auto demolitions, that only leaves houses being voluntarily vacated for things like server transfers creating a smaller selection for buyers currently.

I would not be a fan of the lottery system mainly because you can pretty easily switch between a few houses in the same district to check if the timer is over (assuming they're not being heavily camped), while the lottery system would have you placing all your eggs in 1 basket (location) for x amount of time (up to 24 hours in your example). If people are trying to get an FC house and not a personal, you could actually have people actively stalking multiple locations for a house with the current system and you would lose that with a lottery system.

I'm not a fan of our current system. I'd prefer that people didn't have to camp a plot for multiple hours only to lose it when someone else walks up while the first player had to use the restroom (something that happened to me once); however there were lots of people complaining about the housing problems before and this was the best solution SE could come up with at the time. I would still hope that the housing system could be expanded with some sort of instanced housing so that every character on every server could have a house if they wanted without taking away from anyone else.

[Fluffle]

Honestly, now isn't a good time to be house hunting on a higher population server. The demo timers are still paused for both NA and JP data centers. The JP timers will resume with 4.5, we have no time frame at the moment for when timers will resume for NA data centers. Without the auto demolitions, that only leaves houses being voluntarily vacated for things like server transfers creating a smaller selection for buyers currently.

Absolutely understand, timing is pretty important especially since I'm basing this mostly on recent experiences.

I would not be a fan of the lottery system mainly because you can pretty easily switch between a few houses in the same district to check if the timer is over (assuming they're not being heavily camped), while the lottery system would have you placing all your eggs in 1 basket (location) for x amount of time (up to 24 hours in your example). If people are trying to get an FC house and not a personal, you could actually have people actively stalking multiple locations for a house with the current system and you would lose that with a lottery system.

Very true, it is crucial to prevent loopholes like FCs camping then. But what if one person can enter multiple lotteries (as long as they have the money for it) but only enter an individual lottery once and an FC counts as one person (an FC member can apply for personal housing but the FC can only apply once as though they are an individual)? It allows everybody (fairly) equal opportunity (except for FCs being an immediate & "unfair" example of holism). It would just pull all other applications out if they win one lottery.

I'm not a fan of our current system. I'd prefer that people didn't have to camp a plot for multiple hours only to lose it when someone else walks up while the first player had to use the restroom (something that happened to me once); however there were lots of people complaining about the housing problems before and this was the best solution SE could come up with at the time. I would still hope that the housing system could be expanded with some sort of instanced housing so that every character on every server could have a house if they wanted without taking away from anyone else.

Kinda like WildStar or GW2 (the only other MMOs I can vividly remember with housing). The only problem I had with WildStar/GW2 housing (from what I can recall) is that you don't have a sort of neighborhood, which I feel is very important & makes FFXIV housing special. I like to show off my house and present it to the world rather than show it off to myself or advertise people to come in (which RP places kinda already do).

Maybe instanced housing for FCs? (instance for each residential area)

Also, very off-topic, what if FC instanced housing must start with a cottage-sized house and use the workshop to upgrade the house? (Current FCs with houses automatically get their respective sized houses)

[Ittapupu_Berry]

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...53#post4842153

Lovely idea I made a post as well (though not nearly as articulated lol)

[Ittapupu_Berry]

Also, someone linked this post to me about the topic:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...or-house-plots

[Elamys]

I have friends that already refuse to join me in this game because they want a house but it's difficult to get one and they don't have the patience or energy to spam a placard.

I'm not sure how buffs to favor certain players would make them any more likely to play. Especially if they don't meet whatever the requirements are, which are most likely to be "how long have you been trying to get a house?" because the intention of the buffs is to assist players who have been trying and failing to win at the lottery.

[Jojoya]

Anyone have an example of another MMO already using a lottery system for game rewards similar to what would be required for a housing lottery and can give details on how it works?

I wouldn't be certain that a housing lottery system would be an easy thing for them to create and implement even if it bears some similarities to loot rolls or Cactpot. There are also some major differences that players would expect.

Stop and think things through. Exactly how do you think the lottery system should work.

What's the entry fee supposed to be? Some think it should be the price of the house just to prove the player has the gil to purchase it.

Can it be canceled and refunded before a winner is chosen if the player changes their mind?

How long do players get to enter?

If there is more than one house available, can a player enter multiple lotteries at the same time?

How is the winner chosen? How long does the winner have to claim the house?

What happens if the winner doesn't claim the house? Do their forfeit their entry fee? Does a new lottery start or is the game supposed to pick a new winner from the other entrants? If it's the latter, do the other players have to continue waiting for a refund of their entry fees until the house is claimed in order to still have a chance to win?

What's to stop people from trolling the system or manipulating it to increase their chances of winning?

[Elamys]

The problem with seeing if there's another MMO that does lottery for something like housing is that I can't think of a single other MMO where housing is a limited commodity.

[Jojoya]

The problem with seeing if there's another MMO that does lottery for something like housing is that I can't think of a single other MMO where housing is a limited commodity.

Doesn't have to be for housing specifically. Could be for any game reward that's in limited quantity/availability.

There are a lot of pitfalls with a lottery system that need to be considered before just blindly saying "but this would be better because it seems simple". It's not as simple as it looks.

[not_ya_wify]

I'm not speaking for myself here because I'm on a fairly low pop server and got exactly the houses I wanted without competition both times I tried: Large house on plot 46 for my FC when Shirogane first opened and medium house for myself on plot 31 in LB when they added new housing.

That being said, I know this is a problem on high pop servers. I have friends who tell me about plaquard spamming and how awful it is. However, after adding new wards MOST servers have an excess of unclaimed cottages. So, from SE's perspective, the housing market is balanced now. I know you're thinking 'but I'm on a high pop server, they should give us more housing.'

Have you ever considered this terrible housing situation may be intentional? Think of it from SE's perspective: they DO NOT want you to be on a high pop server, period. SE wants their servers to be as balanced as possible, so they offer incentives, such as free Transfers to low pop servers, road to 60 buffs, sometimes they won't allow new characters to be created on legacy servers at all. High pop servers are causing some kind of problem, so they are trying to incentivize people to spread out. Adding extra housing to high pop servers would do the opposite. It would incentivize people to stay on those servers, not make them spread out. In fact, the housing situation is probably the best incentive they have to force people to spread.

And I'm sure next time they add wards because the market becomes unbalanced or they add Ishgard housing they'll add the same amount of wards on each server and it won't be enough for high-pop servers. Purposefully. Because you're not supposed to be on a high pop server in the first place.

[not_ya_wify]

To get back to the whole lottery system discussion: I don't think anyone thinks that a lottery would be preferable over more housing but it is preferable over the current situation. The lottery idea would essentially be the same as what is there now, minus the hours of spamming. What's the big problem people have with the new timer system (as opposed to the old non-timer system): hours of spamming. So, yes this is a solution to the problem we have (and by 'we' I mean 'you' because I don't have that problem). It's not intended to be a solution to the housing shortage on high pop servers.

Stop and think things through. Exactly how do you think the lottery system should work.

As someone who works as a UX researcher, I can tell you that SE doesn't want us to design their games. They want us to tell them what is working for us and what isn't and then they give this information to their designers, their trained professionals who can come up with designs by themselves.

That being said, I'm still gonna answer your questions for the fun of it.