Housing

[EaMett]

Going to post all my responses in no particular order (don't feel like multi-quoting)

To address one aspect. It's clear that there's a mismatch between what some expect the system to be (QoL) and what it is (competitive). Neither are inherently bad and I'm sure you could write books about the pros an cons of each.
As for proof that the system is PvP, it's in the actual mechanic as described in previous posts. If you want a source that it was intended as such, the devs (I believe yoshi-p himself) have stated that it was, and I'm paraphrasing, "meant to be hard/limited so as to give owning one a sense of accomplishment". I will look for an actual quote but it's been a long time and given how hard it is for me to sometimes find quotes from 2-3 live letters, let alone 4 years ago, I wouldn't hold my hopes up. If anything, other people's comments here and in similar threads will attest to this actually being a thing.

Also lets not mix mechanics with rewards. You can have pvp mechanics with no rewards/titles/etc. You can lose your ranking if you idle, you can lose your house if you idle all the same. It's a real issue that you can outright lose items in the process and this should be addressed but it's an issue entirely different from availability.

Devs have recognized at several points that there was a supply issue. They initially added subdivisions, then Shirogane, then more wards twice. And soon to be Ishgard. There are currently ~5k plots per server for about ~15k active characters for the more populated servers (as per census data). They've always been chasing roughly 1/3rd the active player base of the most active servers with their updates. This has been pretty consistent and intended.
They also acknowledged that the community wanted higher priority housing for FCs and gave them just that during the post Shirogane ward expansions. This is a big reason why mansions are currently really hard to access for individuals (they were always in low supply but this made it extra hard). Again, I reiterate, this was a community request.

When it comes to the question of whether or not wards are lively or fill the desire the devs had of a "neighborhood feel" you really need to scope out your expectations for such a requirement. And try to guess what the dev's own requirements were. There's a huge range here, from wanting it to be a Limsa crowd all the time to wanting to see some people in the ward at all times of the day or maybe only during peak hours, or perhaps just being fine running into your neighbors every now and then. And how do you want this to be across the wards? Does it have to be in all wards? is it ok in only a few?
It's hard to judge how successful the system is without knowing what the initial goals were. Personally I run into most of my neighbors, I'd say once a week or every other week. I have a chat, sometimes I go into content with them. I wouldn't call my ward lively by any measure but it's good enough.
With that said I don't know what their goals were, I don't know what you guys think they should be and my personal experience of it being good is anecdotal at best.

[Cirque-it]

Going to post all my responses in no particular order (don't feel like multi-quoting)

I like this post. I am going to argue against it but please take it with a grain of salt as I am doing it is intended with respect. I realize that was not always the case but it is now

So you mention this

"meant to be hard/limited so as to give owning one a sense of accomplishment".

I dont think you realize but I always intended it to be the same way, I just believe these words have been interpreted differently.

In my scenario (scenario 1), it is designed to reward the players that work their ass off, crafting selling, rouletting, treasure hunting, doing whatever and everything you can to aquire the gil you need to buy a mansion Then once you HAVE the gil, you are (Supposed to be) free to go and buy your mansion. you made 50 million gil! go enjoy the quality of life you earned it cuz making 50 million gil is not easy! (maybe its easier with the inflation of players, but thats another story)

Scenario 2 peope chose a completely different interpretation namely its a RACE to get to 50 million gil as fast as possible, first 3 players get the mansions al the losers who took their time to get to 50 million gil TOO BAD! wait till someone relinquishes their mansion (NEVER happens) and then it's another race to get there first

Scenario 2 is nuts!! (in my opinion!!) I'm not attacking you. I just think for anyone to have that thought process behind something that many people inherantly assume is a QoL mechanic

This was a community request.

This freaks me out!
I've seen it some youtubers as wel. Cool youtubers like Meoni who just do everything and talks about how fun the game is... and veteran final fantasy youtubers that are used to running around like god in a vido game, complaining about the devs making crafting accessable to new players, or the lvl 70 boost mogstation sales. People (elitists) need to understand that there are a lot of people in this game, a lot of them are new (me included) we want to enjoy a lot of the end game, and the game is old!! Change is inherent!
This is why I really did not like you (at first) you sound like an elitist with a mansion that likes to run around showing off and rubbing it in peoples faces. This because elitists like to "interpret" the devs in a way that benefits them and sprout it around like its fact.
If you DO find a letter of a dev stating their philosophy behind their ward system. I would LOVE to read it!! because what you said "meant to be hard/limited so as to give owning one a sense of accomplishment" can very easily be interpreted as scenario 1 (my interpretation) or scenario 2 (the pvp interpretation) And I would really like to know which is correct!!!

I hope you're wrong....

[Eldevern]

It is not some kind of PVP, it is some kind of player versus "system" with some kind of Pay-to-win logic. There's... nothing to do with PVP (to be some kind of PVP, at least, it should be players vs players only and not player vs players vs FC thought the current system doesn't value any kind of merit or skill... just luck with time of connection and RNG.

What I can notice is NA players are focused really much more on rivality and competition, than European players who are more QoL oriented. More I'm reading the forum, more it appears to me. We will never agree, that's cultural as it seems.

[EaMett]

It is not some kind of PVP, it is some kind of player versus "system" with some kind of Pay-to-win logic. There's... nothing to do with PVP (to be some kind of PVP, at least, it should be players vs players only and not player vs players vs FC thought the current system doesn't value any kind of merit or skill... just luck with time of connection and RNG.

What I can notice is NA players are focused really much more on rivality and competition, than European players who are more QoL oriented. More I'm reading the forum, more it appears to me. We will never agree, that's cultural as it seems.

FC's are owned by players and the players go to the plots to purchase them. You as a player are competing against other players to be the fastest to purchase a plot. It's PvP. You're entitled to not like it, but doesn't change it's nature.
And the main component towards your ability to purchase one is time. It has some randomness and some "skill" related but those are both minor.
If purchasing houses when no wards are added, you just need to spend a lot of time on placards, that's all there is to it. Yes there's a RNG component and some people can get lucky/unlucky but overall more time spent = higher chance of getting one.
When wards and new housing areas release it's a measure of time skill and a bit of luck that come into play. People rehearse their movements for hours to leverage all movement abilities from their classes (that they spend hours leveling for those abilities sometimes), jumping from nin to brd etc... They place post-its on their screens to know exactly where to click in order to validate menu choices before they see them (or rehearse controller patterns). They put thought into picking their plots to avoid competition or at least have a backup option that is also fully rehearsed. They decide where they logout to avoid congestion. They stay up all night to make sure they don't get caught up in patch issues and are ready to go on launch. They refresh their launcher non-stop to get in. It's PvP, if you don't go that far you'll lose to those that do. And if you go that far you can still miss out to people who are faster. Simple as that.
Yes you can do all that and then rng error out or get dced and put into a queue but if you're prepared you'll still get access to a plot despite that, even if it isn't what you were originally going for and you're stuck on a small in the goblet. As long as you get your first entry house upgrading is easier on you, from there it's just a waiting game (time).

[Eldevern]

...

Fair PVP is one player vs one player, not several versus one. Never mind. We will never agree anyway. Now, it's just trying to have the last words. It's kind of useless talk. You wil no change my opinion, neither I will change yours. Let's stop that.

[kaynide]

I can accept the disagreement above, but the current business model simply doesn’t allow for most players to own a home. So unless they restrict ownership of the L and M size homes in some way, it is just going to suck for most people.

I mean, it is entirely possible for my account alone to own 9 different houses with shenanigans and loopholes out of the available 2,500 on my server. A server that supposedly has about 5,000 players (it’s a full one).

So, I would hate it personally as our FC of 8 has 3 Ls 2 Ms and 4 Ss would lose houses.. but I can’t really think of any other way other than “omg just add more wards!”

(And who knows, perhaps that is what they are doing with Ishgard)

[Eldevern]

...

I've found a FC who own two full wards... I really don't get why they designed things that way. Did they expect players to be reasonable and fair? Even considering RP it is going too far. They designed wards too fast. People were asking housing and they just designed an extended version of Aion housing (without the auction system).

Before the release of the first wards, most people were talking about instancied personal islands (more or less what Wildstar created).

The tricky thing is wards are heavy for only one reason (after all the system can handle one single player in Eureka, Squadrons and so, then it is not one player - one instance the problem), the problem is really simple : they need to load all the gardens items.

If they could solve this specific problem, they could probably solve a big part of the availbility matter. And to alleviate the system faster, they could modify the apartements with offering different sizes and adding some kind of greenhouse (the faster and cleaner way).

[kaynide]

....

Truth be told I would rather they completely erase the housing wards entirely and just do instanced housing.. ideally with larger yard space and/or a higher cap to placement. Basically like how FC private rooms work, but loading an exterior area. No real good way to implement that without hurt feelings though. Again, I personally own 2 houses + FC estate.. I don't wanna give those up...but I would accept it if that's what the Devs decided.

I mean, even "in game" it doesn't really make sense story-wise not to be able to purchase a house. Yes, it's a game.. but in story every character is supposed to be the hero/savior of the world... quite possibly loaded to the gills with cash...but can't find a house to live in? Talk about NIMBY. The locals afraid of a tax hike if a celebrity moves into the neighborhood?

[CazzT]

It's been said ad nauseum, but.... Instanced housing. Keep the Wards and/or Neighborhoods, but make the housing itself phased/instanced. This would solve pretty much every problem with housing.

[Divinemights]

It's been said ad nauseum, but.... Instanced housing. Keep the Wards and/or Neighborhoods, but make the housing itself phased/instanced. This would solve pretty much every problem with housing.

You are describing the Apartment in which it is an instanced housing by itself except the garden part.