Intrusive Tree Placements Affecting Friend's Performance

[SuperQ]

Hey all! Hopefully this is the right place to post this, please let me know if I need to post this elsewhere!

I've been playing for around a month and a half now, and am loving this game! I have some end-game friends who have an FC house in Shirogane and it looks really nice! Well, except for one thing. Our neighbor has trees lining the front border of their house. You wouldn't think this would be a problem, but it's a huge annoyance for pretty much everyone in our FC. Here's what I see when I teleport to our FC house. (I put it in as a link since the image was too big for the forum's layout)

https://i.imgur.com/kKHix4y.png

As you can see, they block the view of our house when we teleport in. I LOVE taking pictures, but can't get a good shot of the front of our house due to this frustrating foliage.

Two of my pals from the FC have mentioned that these trees make their games lag. They've said this is the only time while playing this game (they're level 70 in multiple classes, so a LOT of playtime) that this consistently happens to them.

To make matters worse, we've NEVER seen the owners online at their home to ask them to remove them or move them back. And we all have varying schedules, so unless they log on in the dead of the night once a month, I feel we would have seen them. My friends say it's been a little over a year since they bought the house and it hasn't changed.

I contacted a GM to see if this would count as Nuisance Behavior (Obstruction of Play) since they updated their Prohibited Activities today, but they directed me here. Is there anything I can do about this? Any advice for maybe hiding the trees on my end? Thanks!

[Dustytome]

You could wait a bit until the auto-demo timer kicks back on and hope to either run into the owner or perhaps they won't log in to save it. The only other option you have is to go house hunting and move.

As far as contacting a GM over obstruction of play, the person hasn't done anything wrong to their yard. The houses in some spots were just poorly placed and the camera angles run into these issues.

[Jojoya]

As long as the trees have been placed normally within the plot's boundaries, there isn't anything you can do about it other than zoom in your camera view to get a better angle that might not be obstructed by the trees.

[Penthea]

I'm not surprised that this happened in Shirogane. I remember the first time I went there before you could even buy the plots myself and my fc mates noticed a lot of them are quite cramped together. We anticipated there could be problems with neighbouring gardens having very tall furnishings obstructing the view of the fc plot, as well as tall roofs from housing skins. We ended up not moving to Shirogane for a couple of reasons, one of which was it seemed that for scenic reasons the amount of well placed plots is, in our opinion, quite small compared to the other housing districts.

I am curious about these trees that are causing lag issues for some of OP's friends. How many trees are there? It must be a crazy amount in a small space to do that.

I don't think the furnishing placement in this case can count as harassment. It sounds like poor design on SE's part is the real culprit. If the plots weren't placed in the manner that they are OP's problem may not exist.

OP, you and your fc may want to consider moving to another plot location. There are a lot of plots in the game that are secluded so your view you won't be greatly obstructed by the furnishing choices of other players. You could also try to find a plot that is on the edge of the map to reduce the amount of houses surrounding it.

[Risvertasashi]

As long as the trees have been placed normally within the plot's boundaries, there isn't anything you can do about it other than zoom in your camera view to get a better angle that might not be obstructed by the trees.

Aside from what Jojo said... you can keep trying to contact the owner, or hope since they're so inactive that it just ends up being relinquished. Or try to find a new plot for your FC.

Otherwise, no, you can't do anything about how someone else decorates their property.

[SuperQ]

I am curious about these trees that are causing lag issues for some of OP's friends. How many trees are there? It must be a crazy amount in a small space to do that.

Here's a view of their front lawn. I suspect it's due to the lighting effects in the dandelion trees?
https://i.imgur.com/OBBKOAK.png

And gotcha, everyone. It sucks that SE designed Shirogane to be this way in the first place, but with demolition turned off (at least, I think it is? My friends were saying it was, at least) it's making finding a similar plot sort of difficult. Not to mention we REALLY like being around another set of neighbors nearby. We'll probably just grin and bear it for now, but since SE changed their Prohibited Activities, I didn't know if this counted as Nuisance Behavior since to me and my FC, this placement is obnoxious and makes having a house here less fun.

[Canadane]

If you’re just looking for a screenshot, you can try using /gpose. Zoom in normally than adjust the fov in the gpose settings.

[Risvertasashi]

We'll probably just grin and bear it for now, but since SE changed their Prohibited Activities, I didn't know if this counted as Nuisance Behavior since to me and my FC, this placement is obnoxious and makes having a house here less fun.

While I hope you can get something worked out - either getting in touch with the owner or finding a new plot or whatever - I will say I am glad SE isn't doing this. Think about the implications of what you're asking.

What if someone glamors weapons or armor with particle effects - and it causes performance issues for people with low end PCs. Or using spells like Holy, Flare... or any Limit Break for that matter. Would someone with a low end PC be allowed to request these things not be glamored/used because it lags them? Even though the wording is incredibly broad - broad enough to allow the GMs to take action if they really wanted to - I hope you can see how this would be a pretty bad idea.

Now if someone found a bug/exploit that let them place stuff outside of their own estate's bounds, that would be a different matter.

[Penthea]

Here's a view of their front lawn. I suspect it's due to the lighting effects in the dandelion trees?
https://i.imgur.com/OBBKOAK.png

And gotcha, everyone. It sucks that SE designed Shirogane to be this way in the first place, but with demolition turned off (at least, I think it is? My friends were saying it was, at least) it's making finding a similar plot sort of difficult. Not to mention we REALLY like being around another set of neighbors nearby. We'll probably just grin and bear it for now, but since SE changed their Prohibited Activities, I didn't know if this counted as Nuisance Behavior since to me and my FC, this placement is obnoxious and makes having a house here less fun.

Demolition will probably be turned back on pretty soon. It's been a few months already as far as I'm aware.

It likely is that the white trees are causing the lag issues. They do glow at night and they're pretty detailed as well. On top of that you're across from a mansion so that's a lot of garden furnishing slots your neighbour has. Some of the furnishings are clipping outside of the garden fence but these are not the ones causing you issues so I seriously doubt GM intervention would happen.

I think it could only count if you could somehow suggest that your neighbour decorated their garden with the intention of causing grief. For example some outdoor furnishings are super noisy (looking at you Namazu effigy) so filling a garden with those would be super loud and intrusive to anyone with sound effects on. Quite a bit harder to prove something like that for a silent furnishing that is causing lag for only two people. SE could easily state that there is something wrong with the end user's connection, game settings or gaming machine if the trees are causing them lag, and they're probably right. It is odd that they get performance issues from them but most don't. As for the obstruction when zoning in to the area after a teleport SE would likely tell you to change your camera angle.

So in short I don't think you have a case for any form of harassment. If the situation is causing enough grief certainly look in to moving.

[HadesNight]

I can't even believe this is a post. What level of entitlement is there to think just because you don't like how someone decorated in their space that it's nuisance behavior.

I am also relieved SE isn't doing something about this. Housing is a form of expression. Everyone gets to decorate how they please. It would be incredibly sad if someone complaining they can't take a picture with their ideal background is all it took.

Smh.