Housing, a rant (but I hope a constructive one)

[Brynne]

So like, I don't know why people keep passing this over, but during the NA fanfest when they talked about the ishgard restoration content, they mentioned being able to live there. It's likely not housing wards, as you have to complete the restoration via doh and dol endgame content.

This is what I thought too, but most people still seem to be under the assumption that we're getting wards there. It sounded to me like they were saying we couldn't live there until the restoration content proceeded to a certain point, so unless it's a server-wide effort, it really feels like they're setting up for instanced housing. Imagine the salt if there were wards but you couldn't access them until you completed the restoration.

[Dustytome]

So like, I don't know why people keep passing this over, but during the NA fanfest when they talked about the ishgard restoration content, they mentioned being able to live there. It's likely not housing wards, as you have to complete the restoration via doh and dol endgame content.

Why do people not think ishgard will have instanced housing at the end of this?

The most likely scenario is the restoration is a means to introduce the housing, but not to distribute it. A chunk of story with it's own rewards similar to the enclave, but with the turn-ins being DOH/L only. The Ishgard ward will then be opened up similar to Shirogane. It'll require the expansion, they'll let everyone preview it and then the bloodbath after-patch login frenzy.

[DarkEiraStar]

From my understanding Ishgard reconstruction isn't a solo unlock, but a server wide one. I may be wrong but that is the impression I've gotten.

[Wynn_Storm]

I wish the housing system was better overall.

I don't wanting housing to be like an instanced thing, i do like the idea of living in a community. Its nice and makes things feel more lively and social.

That being said, i cannot get a house not because i lack the money there just isn't any available.

I'm hoping after the server split i'll be able to snag one.

I just want a house, an apartment doesn't cut it.

[LaylaTsarra]

From my understanding Ishgard reconstruction isn't a solo unlock, but a server wide one. I may be wrong but that is the impression I've gotten.

It would be a PR disaster in my opinion if they excluded the player base that does not craft or gather from that housing venue so I suspect it's server wide and when unlocked anyone can access it assuming you have completed the main story requirements if any like there was for Shirogane.

[Barraind]

If I was designing housing in the game, I would use a mostly instanced system.

Would keep the different districts (Mist, Beds, Goblet, ect), as a single housing hub "district" with a number of different styles of houses in a smaller sized area.

Each of those houses would be the instance entrance for that location/style plot, with an expandable yard/interior size (hello gilsink). Teleports would take you to the hub zone outside your style house, and house visiting would work in a similar fashion to apartment or FC house visitation.

Market boards, vendors (with enhanced selection, and having a vendor available that sells beast tribe materials you've unlocked, and one that has major city tradeskill merchant wares on it) and bells would be found in the hub, to encourage interaction and use of said hub, essentially turning them into player based cities.

You could even make unlockables for things like GC turnin/quartermasters, expanded materials vendors, and even test out an interface to have mannequin displays in the hub area based on who has things displayed to be sold in houses in that hub (that system needs a LOT of love. a LOT).

[Vasgarth]

I think the housing system is fine as it is right now, just perhaps add more wards as I know some servers are super busy. Other servers are fairly quiet - on Omega for example there are empty plots all over the place, even in more popular wards like Lavender Beds.

The more systems SE add to ease the 'housing crisis', the more ways people will find to cheat the systems.

I agree that the more SE tried to fix the system the worse it got, but that’s no excuse to not try and fix it again.

As it stands now, the biggest issue is the relocation mechanic, as this effectively means that people that already own a plot get preference over people who don’t (relocation bypasses the hidden timer), so if they’d remove that it would be great already.

My friends and I have already missed on 6 plots after camping them (one was camped for 12 hours in turns, not kidding) because someone relocated. We even found someone who wrote a script (internal, which is fine) to have their character check on the placard every second. Only problem was he was afk and was using a clicker or something similar to trigger the macro, as he kept doing the same action even after successfully buying the house. We got everything on video and immediately reported him obviously.

What upsets me though is that people almost HAVE to resort to this kind of behaviour because of SE’s poor management of the housing system. I’m not justifying it, however I do understand why someone would not want to waste days of paid time clicking furiously in front of a house.