Nope you didn't add enough plots SE...

[Aniona]

You now..people wouldn't cry if additionally 12 wards (at least) would be added.
3 additional wards it's not serious at all.

[LaylaTsarra]

You now..people wouldn't cry if additionally 12 wards would be added.
3 additional wards it's not serious at all.

They should have added 6 wards per server it would have done a lot to relieve the stress. As it is they added 48,960 homes on 68 servers. They should have at least doubled that. Some servers still have houses. That doesn't help high pop servers however.

When Ishgard comes on line I suspect we'll see not only that housing district but additional wards added in each of the other residential areas. I also suspect that more wards could potentially be coming with 5.4.

[Warkupo]

I hope Yoshi P feels particularly ashamed about this. The Housing System is downright abusive; expecting your players to camp 24+ hours (as I did today) in order to get the slim possibility at a House is absolutely the worst housing system in any MMO ever. You needed to fix the problem several years ago but the best you can do is complain about server costs. Get it together. Pathetic.

[PrinceThrash]

I've played this game for years. I've done endgame content, crafting, leveled multiple classes to max. I truly love this game. All I want is a house. The system is broken. And you can tell me that they're working on it, or I need to camp more often or longer. I have a job and kids. I don't have the time for that. Everyone knows the housing system is broken. THIS GAME IS 13 YEARS OLD..... You're telling me it takes longer than that to figure out housing in an mmo!?!? No excuse anymore. I've unsubbed. Square Enix is clearly content with having the housing stay as is. I'll come back if they ever add instanced housing or some other fix. They won't ever address it unless more people do what I'm doing now. PS5 is coming out and plenty of new games. I'll miss FFXIV, but I wont be bored.

[Terin]

I'm gonna be honest; while I totally understand the disappointment and frustration, people really need to back off the personal jabs at the Devs. They ADDED MORE Housing, they shouldn't be taking grief because "it isn't enough".

That said, I've suggested numerous improvements myself, as I definitely think there are a lot of ways to improve. I can't find my previous thread (which I guess was thrown into this thread?), but I think my suggestions would help enormously.

Either way, I definitely hope they're able to continue making improvements.

[Almagnus1]

I initially supported the timer system as I naively thought it would help combat plot flippers. However, time has shown this is not the case. The timer didn't stop flippers. It just changed who got the house initially and who bought it. It just gets sold as FCs or to relocators now.

The system does nothing but punish legitimate players who actually put in the effort to sit at the placard for hours on end, not knowing if they will lose the plot just by going to the bathroom or getting up to eat. And while no house is more important than your health, good luck getting one if you actually attend to your needs - taking time away to rest your eyes, stretch, go for a walk, is time that you could potentially lose the plot you just spent 10 hours camping. As a result you are stuck dealing with elbow, finger, and wrist pain from clicking over and over. Those who run bots to auto click are more likely to get the plot than a real person.

I knew they weren't adding many houses this time around so I was prepared for this eventuality. However, I think the timer is the most egregious thing this game has ever done. When I tell people who don't play about what you have to do to get a house in this game, they are shocked. They can't fathom why any company would do this to its players, and continue to leave it in when time has shown it does not do what it was intended to.

At this point, remove the timer. If people buy houses to resell, so be it. They're doing that anyways. I know of several people who banded together in groups and made shell FCs to grab as many plots to resell to relocators/FCs as possible, at insanely marked up prices. Just stop punishing real players.

And this is why I want SE to completely kill off the shell FC housing (by forcing all FCs that do not have at least four active subscriptions to release their houses) and also end grandfathering of the personal houses. That would make it harder to do stuff like this.

[DrWho2010]

they will be adding more housing it's just covid threw a wrench into the works.

[Penthea]

they will be adding more housing it's just covid threw a wrench into the works.

This is true, SE did plan to add more wards but due to covid they couldn't add more servers so instead they optimised their current servers to add the wards we just got.

However I think the main thing to take away is if the game instead had a fully fledged instanced housing system none of the threads like this would exist because players wouldn't be running into availability issues.

[Shougun]

This is true, SE did plan to add more wards but due to covid they couldn't add more servers so instead they optimised their current servers to add the wards we just got.

However I think the main thing to take away is if the game instead had a fully fledged instanced housing system none of the threads like this would exist because players wouldn't be running into availability issues.

I know we interacted pleasantly a few times so probably not adding much here but.. also instanced housing could bring a lot of wonderful things to the game for everyone. Such that if everyone can obtain a house the game can add a lot of new interesting concepts and not make it a waste of resources (as currently its a bit unfair to put any system behind houses), as well the seasonal can not feel like a slap to the players who really wanted but couldn't get the lot they wanted lol. Or that if you want to take a break, something Yoshida encourages when you need it, that you don't feel held prisoner to your house. Meanwhile if you use an instanced you can make the progression far more smoother and integrated to the game experience, so you can get people investing in chunks that make sense to their ability at the time (while having a new sort of progression system).

On top of that simply adding more wards and themes is going to water down the neighborhoods even more. Neighborhoods being the main purpose to the system, the main thing it provides as a benefit over an instanced system (even though you can technically add social experience to instanced systems to if you try to support it). If you get lucky you might find a neighborhood with very high activity but most people are going to be players and not FC, as it becomes easier to get a house more will be casual house users (not an evil thing, just not going to be hardcore decorators at least probability speaking), and as more options open up more people will organize around the better choices which means you might have X and Y zones full to the brim and meanwhile because their system isn't dynamic Z zone (let's call it Goblet... lol) is going to have many open spaces.

Not enough houses = problem
Too many houses = problem

This game is too popular, the system too static, the game having a very large casual audience and not focused on the hardcore scarcity individuals. Of course you can make content that caters to the niche, but doing so with such desirable features I feel is a big mistake- better to create new and directly pointed towards that niche than take general concepts that would have suited your larger audience well and mutate it into something not for them.

Housing system is the problem and will remain the problem no matter what they do so long as it remains as it is, as soon as they introduce just enough that the vast majority get a house then people will be upset they can't be in the ward theme they had dreamed of, as soon then it'll be the size, as soon then they'll have so many open wards that the existence of the system is a joke (neighborhood vibe destroyed to meet the other demands). The system as they designed it needs to change (evolve / whatever), powerful instances would be better for everyone. In so much I mean not taking away the wards, many people don't care or actually dislike the neighborhood system (like people putting up ugly / mismatch houses), but still want a powerful house (not an apartment), some want instanced because it'll be potentially even more powerful (like letting players have a house in neat locations, Azim Steppe or whatever)- which is to say many who want a house is not because of SE's system and those who want it because of SE system would be treated better if they were surrounded by others who also actually wanted it. And ideally as I've said before they can make it so everyone can enjoy the new power, like housing ward users get the new more powerful housing system for their pocket world and house internal, while keeping the ward outside (using magical teleporting door like concept from FFXI flower girl quest and like Howel's Moving Castle), and instanced users just don't have a ward outside which is no big deal (the size of a pocket world can easily be vastly larger than a small plot yard, so not having that tiny bit of land will not matter to many people, especially if they don't care for the ward system). If you lapse on your sub your instanced is saved, only the ward may be lost (and all objects in the ward will move to your instanced storage holder, and you can rebuy your ward plot while keeping your instanced internal house and pocket world exterior). There are other ideas too like a bit like BDO where the door is phased to you personally, which could make very active wards (and sometimes so weird circumstances but technically should work still lol). Or even consider what LotR Online did with automatically growing wards based on occupancy. Naturally on the instanced concept they could be less ambitious and make their apartments gain an outdoor section like a decent balcony and floor upgrades (so they're in effect the same as outside houses, with all the same options but the house model- although if they can achieve that they could always just provide players with cottages of the exact same ward system but off on their lonesome).

It's also why I sort of started hoping they are working on another mmo, which might be why they didn't want to do something crazy for this one (the time frame from FFXI to FFXIV is about reached, and the current main story is going towards a close in 6.0 at least so they said). It would make a lot of sense to be resistance on making too many hyper large systems that you intend to implement in your new game (takes away sale value). Also a new game would potentially mean no more 9.99 sub lol, can get people to pay full price.

There is more than one option but this system is going to be the problem and remain the problem until it changes, slapping more wards only creates different problems while stressing and disappointing a lot of people in the process (people having to pray to get a house, get a house they didn't want, dislike the system, their neighbors, w.e).

. . .. . Alright alright I'm out now, I promised I wouldn't sit too much in the housing threads this time around lol. Maybe I'll go touch my airship thread which I still think could be an interesting sort of compromise (with new features and content rather than having to redesign old stuff, and value for current ward users) and not terribly hard on the servers at the same time (in comparison to a full blown house lol).

[Penthea]

I know we interacted pleasantly a few times so probably not adding much here but.. also instanced housing could bring a lot of wonderful things to the game for everyone. Such that if everyone can obtain a house the game can add a lot of new interesting concepts and not make it a waste of resources (as currently its a bit unfair to put any system behind houses), as well the seasonal can not feel like a slap to the players who really wanted but couldn't get the lot they wanted lol. Or that if you want to take a break, something Yoshida encourages when you need it, that you don't feel held prisoner to your house. Meanwhile if you use an instanced you can make the progression far more smoother and integrated to the game experience, so you can get people investing in chunks that make sense to their ability at the time (while having a new sort of progression system).

Yes the housing system is definitely a direct contradiction to the ideology Yoshida very frequently expresses. You can't really take a full-on break from the game if you have a house. Well you can just not log in aside from resetting the timer but a complete break would be unsubbing, which you can't do if you want to keep your house.

Having instanced housing could open a lot of cool forms of progression that are impossible with the current system: alter the size of your house indoors and outdoors without changing location, have far more customisation with the exterior (wouldn't it be cool if we could choose terrain types, different skyboxes and weather?), have a real chocobo ranch, and of course the increase in outdoor furniture slots due to the game no longer needing to load 30 houses worth of outdoor decor. SE could even create questlines to get certain types of upgrades and features.

Neighborhoods being the main purpose to the system

While I understand that the neighbourhood feel is SE's intention, the fact is SE are providing something most of the playerbase doesn't seem interested in.

People very often say housing areas are super quiet. Even dead. This does not mean the houses aren't being used, but it does mean most players do not seek social experiences with strangers while in housing areas. It appears that most just keep to the houses they have teleport access to.

I have had access to housing for over four years and I have made only one friend through the neighbourhood aspect. Everyone else I encountered was only interested in token emotes or entirely ignored my attempts to be social. I haven't been stuck in only the one area all this time. Both previous fcs I was in had plots in entirely different locations, my own fc has been in three different houses in different wards, and houses I have tenancy access to also relocated to new wards. In all the wards my fc house has been in we were most times the only active group who spent a lot of time outdoors. Very briefly a very outdoor active fc was our neighbour but years ago they left for a different ward. There is another active fc quite near us but they spend most of their time indoors.

My point is if SE consider the neighbourhood aspect of housing a strong reason to keep housing as it is, then it frankly means SE are not taking note of player habits. Housing has been around since ARR and for the most part the wards have not turned into the social hubs that they perhaps hoped they would be. By giving the players something they don't seem to be interested in using, SE are depriving players of what they have been wanting for a very long time: enough houses for everyone.

Does this mean I think neighbourhoods should be entirely abolished? No, I would quite like to see a system in which players or fcs could purchase small instances where they can have several houses so they could create their own neighbourhoods. But these would be completely instanced. I see this as a best of both worlds situation. It would be completely instanced housing so no one would be locked out of housing and players would have the option to create a neighbourhood if they wish to.

This game is too popular, the system too static, the game having a very large casual audience and not focused on the hardcore scarcity individuals.

That the housing system suffers greatly from the popularity of the game just shows how flawed it is. All other features thrive on the popularity of the game. The goal for every game company is to create something very successful. If something no longer works well due to the game becoming popular...well it means that feature never worked well in the first place. It just wasn't obvious until the player population reached a certain stage.

Sigh I feel so apathetic about this. For so long SE have had ample feedback regarding housing and at most we have gotten tweaks that often swapped one problem for another. I badly want proper instanced housing but I seriously doubt it will ever happen.

Congrats to everyone who got their house and to those who did not I know how you feel. It took me over a year to get my house, and I got the one I have because I was extremely lucky. Even our fc house was gotten through luck. Both were before the placard timers. The only work involved was getting the gil. If the placard timer mechanic existed back then I and my fc probably wouldn't have gotten a house as early as we did.