player housing should be available to everyone.

[Dfess]

I came from EQ2 as well. And while instanced, the housing was much more nuanced. It was limited in some things, but one of the major things, is that you could actually resize your furniture. Also almost every book you owned was a housing item and you physically could place them in you house. You could create a lot of amazing stuff with the system.
And then there were proper Guild Halls. Even small ones were the size of or even slightly bigger than FF XIV Large houses. T3 Guild Hall is a huge zone you can decorate to your heart's content and they were sights to behold.

I do like placing books lol. I had a whole functional library. You were able to interact with every book. Granted there were duplicates but, It was fun. My library was my best achievement. But, i had to break it down to move to mistmoore and was in the process of putting it back together. Ended up stopping not long after. So my library will never be finished again. But, more to the point. You said it was limited and I agree. Which is why I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility for ffxiv. To me ffxiv should be malms ahead of what eq2 can do. But, I don't feel that it is. Ffxiv feels pretty much the same with the only difference being there are houses with an exterior and that they are split into their own special zone.

[Renato]

I find the FFXIV community very understanding. Also, very snowflakey. They dont have the balls to tell SE they are dissatisfied with something lol. They will bend over and take it and then defend it with their dying breath. J/k

I agree and disagree with this...there is a vocal minority that voices their disatisfaction with a lot of the content that is released. Sometimes it's warranted, sometimes it's just complaining or ranting. The issue is that there seems to be a lot more people who white knight for a lot of the decisions that SE makes. Which is why I think they constantly keep doing some of the stuff that they do. Like...I get that sometimes you just can't satisfy everyone especially working with a system that is very old. Plus many of us aren't devs or have done any coding. Sometimes what we want isn't always within reach.

The reason we are willing to settle for is because we come from games that have that less (EQ2) or none at all (WoW).

But then you hear about stuff like this...EQ2 was initially released in 2004. I used to play Aion Online heavily which also had instanced housing with huge wards. That game was released in 2008. FFXIV was released in 2010. Honestly...I think that if SE focused on remaking the housing thing insead of things like a new Diadem or adding umbrellas, they make it work. But like I said, I know nothing about coding.

[Dfess]

But then you hear about stuff like this...EQ2 was initially released in 2004. I used to play Aion Online heavily which also had instanced housing with huge wards. That game was released in 2008. FFXIV was released in 2010. Honestly...I think that if SE focused on remaking the housing thing insead of things like a new Diadem or adding umbrellas, they make it work. But like I said, I know nothing about coding.

This is what I am trying to say. EQ2 is a much older game and yet the ffxiv housing system feels equivalent to it instead of being ahead like it should be.

[Penthea]

I think to start they should expand apartments, giving them balconies where you can place outdoor furnishings and enjoy gardening.

This is several years overdue at this point.

[Stepjam]

People who ask for instanced housing are basically declaring they're willing to SETTLE FOR LESS, and don't pretend otherwise! It's understandable, to be sure, since there's not enough of the higher-quality product to go around, but an preferable solution would be housing as it is (or better), but with enough available for all.

I wouldn't call it settling for less, just something different. It's "less" in that you don't have the wards, which are nice. But it's more in that there's more housing available for everyone. And some players don't care about other peoples' houses as you've said, so losing wards wouldn't be "less" for them.

[BunniEclair]

My FC leader and I often muse that it would be fun/nice to have a new form of instanced housing called "hermit housing" or something along those lines; it would be a system that would allow you to pick various locations into an isolated housing instance. Some old ruins in the wilds, a lonely tower on a snowy coast, a yurt on some floating rocks in the sea of clouds... you would unlock the location and build/refurbish the structure and then decorate. It would be a great DoH/L required way to have another housing option. Lower server demand by making it count as the one house you are allowed to own (thus also freeing up more housing for those that like the more social neighborhoods that are Housing Wards).

It's just a rough idea.

This changed my mind. I take back what I said. Give us Hermit Housing today!!!!

[Dfess]

This changed my mind. I take back what I said. Give us Hermit Housing today!!!!

Lol. This does sound like a great idea.

[RitsukoSonoda]

IMO instanced housing if added should be exclusive to sea of clouds. That way people that want a house in their own little world can be off on their own little rock in the sky away from everyone else.

The neighborhood design we have with current wards is fine. The problem is that the plot costs haven't been adjusted for inflation over the years and as such its incredibly trivial to get the gil needed to buy a housing plot as a player. The rest of it is entitlement issues of people that either didn't want a small plot that was available because they didn't like the location of it or wanted something bigger that was already taken, decided they didn't want to put the effort into getting a plot when it was announced more were being added, or just feel like a house should be given to them then make arguments along the lines of everyone in NYC should have a house, just build more so everyone can have one.

I also wouldn't mind if Ishgard were eventually opened up as a new housing area but had things switched up so that players had to spend the time using crafting skills to actually build their initial home, at which point they can then customize it like the homes in other wards.

[Kalise]

FFXIV's housing is so weird...

Mostly, because it and all of its issues revolve around the "Neighbourhood" but, the odd thing about that is... Neighbourhoods are only relevant when you're outside of your house.

Meanwhile, most of the housing stuff is for inside your house. Which is an instanced location, with no windows or any influence from nearby locations at all. Literally, being inside a house is functionally no different to having a customizable Inn room (Only, an inn room doesn't cost several million gil and comes with a free Glamour Dresser, Armoire, Aethestician, Orchestrion, Toy Box, Neverending Story and Retainer Bell of which most are not available for player housing at all).

In addition to this, the social aspect of neighbourhoods are shot in the foot by the "Real space" they take up. So, instead of having everyone sharing a common housing area, so whenever you weren't in your house you were in the same zone as everyone else who is outside of their house, we have each location (Of which there are 4, soon 5) split into like 20 Wards, each split into 2 sub-wards. So, really, outside of your house is only going to be shared by like a handful of people unless you're next to an active FC house.

All for what? So, you can show off how you painted your house and put a couple on knick-knacks on your lawn? (And an Aetheryte Shard so you can access your house by direct teleport instead of via... The Aetheryte crystal in the city where your house is located which functions almost exactly like how instanced housing would...)

It seems really bizarre to not have simply converted to an instanced system at this point. Allowing everyone to obtain a house and to make for actual lively "Neighbourhoods" (Since, one of the main reasons why so many people gather in places like Limsa and Gridania is because, they're not all segregated to "Limsa Instance 1/40" or "Gridania Instance 32/40" everyone just is able to go to a singular common area and thus can see and talk to everyone else)

[Eldevern]

+1 with Kalise

...

There's nothing to do with jalousy. I had two mansions and I spent a lot of time in it (I've lost them since). The areas were dead empty, almost never any folks. The apartments? They are supposed to have several players. But dead empty again. I meet someone one or two time in a month.

You will probably pretend I rarely go there. Huge mistake. I do several step there each time I'm connected, it's a part of my system to save TP cost (and I TP a lot between levelling, gathering, crafting, relics etc.).

So, what the point with wards? Neighborood? Dead empty. Fishing then??

Wards are built like a map but there's nobody. They spent ressources to make a ghost town, a dead empty area. With an instancied system, they could offer a more lively system with a common aetheryte and eveolutive instancied houses (you start with a little and depending of your gils, you can upgrade).

Wards were not a bad idea for a FC-only housing area (thought tiny houses are really too little) but for individual, it quick meet its limits. If individual only, a ward is... 35/40 players? How many chances do we have to meet them? The neighborood for individual is a joke. The one who are really entitled are thoses who believe they show off... what a show off in a dead empty area.

And that's not the only argument, BDO offer the possibility to get the three biggest houses of the game (you need to meet the conditions but these are not hard to reach). Wildstar, it was instancied island system.