Ishgard Restoration and Housing

[Zetsumei_Tsunarashi]

In Gamerescape's recent E3 interview, the question was posed, "Will Ishgard Housing be tied to the Restoration of Ishgard crafting and gathering content?" To which Yoshida replies, "It depends on the players ..."

Read the excerpt here:

Gamer Escape: We know that Ishgard Reconstruction is going to be considered crafting and gathering endgame content. Can you elaborate more on what this means? Will it be only level 80?

Naoki Yoshida: First and foremost, how this will be flagged as far as completion will not be by individual player, it will be flagged based on the entire world. The basic concept is going to be that all of the players within a particular world are going to rebuild Ishgard. Of course you can contribute more if you have a higher level crafter or gatherer, so in that sense you would be able to contribute more. There is also an element, however, where if your character does not have the crafter or gatherer jobs sufficiently leveled, you can purchase something like a lottery ticket that will allow you to participate in the reconstruction. Also, as more of Ishgard is reconstructed, there will be festivals that will be held, kind of like a seasonal event, and players can participate in those events to obtain additional rewards.

Finally, there will also be a ranking system where, if you are one of the top crafters or gatherers, you will have a title that can be awarded to you or a tool that you can obtain, sort of reminiscent of the ultimate battle weapons. So that will be an element for the top crafters and gatherers to attempt to achieve as well.

Gamer Escape: Is Ishgard reconstruction available at 5.0?

Naoki Yoshida: That will be implemented at 5.1.

Gamer Escape: Is Ishgard housing related to this system?

Naoki Yoshida: It’s up to the players I think…

So it sounds like Yoshida is asking for feedback on whether or not we as players would like for the Ishgard Housing to have special requirements for making it available. So to that end, I thought I'd open the dialogue and see how players feel about it. I can kind of guess what most people probably are going to say, and so I think I probably will have an unpopular opinion here but I'll share it nonetheless.

For me personally, I think the Ishgard housing should be tied to the restoration. So the question becomes to what extent should it be locked behind the content ?

Since this is high-end crafting/gathering content, it's not going to be something everyone will be able to do. So do you lock out those people from being able to buy a house in Ishgard completely ? I don't think that's probably the right direction to go in, however, I do think that participating in the content should give you some kind of benefit.

So before I give my opinion, I also want to bring up some of the problems that still exist with housing in general. Namely, the scarcity of land.

Prior to patch 4.2, players were able to purchase multiple plots of land on a single account using alts and dummy FCs. In extreme cases, there were instances of entire wards being owned by a single person or FC. After patch 4.2, restrictions were put in place to prevent this type of land hoarding from happening, however, those players who already owned land were allowed to keep what they had already purchased. So to this day, there are still a large number of plots of land that are owned by a small number of individuals. Going forward, players who wish to relocate to a different plot of land, must first relinquish all other plots of land in their possession.

So now knowing all of this, here's my take on how Ishgard Housing should be handled:

Upon the release of the Ishgard Housing ward, allow only those who have placed in the rankings for Ishgard Restoration to purchase land. The more exclusive the better. Perhaps top 3 ranked in the server only. This will make the Ishgard Housing ward the most prestigious housing ward to live in. For high end crafters, it will be a symbol of your achievement to be among the first to live in the new housing area and have your pick of land before anyone else. This prestige will be very attractive for those high end crafters who are the individuals most likely to possess multiple plots of land. This will entice those players to give up their multiple plots in order to move into this prestigious new housing area, thereby freeing up land for more people who can afford it in the older zones.

Allow this to go on for a few seasons of the Ishgard restoration until enough players have ranked to fill a single housing ward or two. During this time SE can collect data on how many are relocating and giving up their land in the older zones. If the data shows that not many plots are being freed up in this manner, then they can start to remove the restrictions and allow everyone to purchase land. If many plots are being freed and housing plots are continuously opening up from rich crafters giving up their multiple plots of land, then continue to only allow those ranking high enough in the content to purchase land. Eventually the restrictions will be lifted regardless as the number of plots being relinquished starts to taper off, and everyone will eventually get access.

Sorry for the long post, but I really wanted to get my thoughts out there as I do feel like it is an ideal solution to a growing problem. Those who participate in the content get to feel like they get a bit of exclusivity for their efforts. Housing plots will be freed up by players who might never have a reason to give up their land otherwise, allowing more players access to housing in general. Those players who don't participate in the restoration can still have a chance to get a house in Ishgard, albeit not immediately on the release of the new wards.

TLDR; Ishgard housing should be exclusive to those ranking in Ishgard Restoration content at least at first, to incentivize rich land owners with multiple plots to give up their land to relocate to Ishgard.