Disallow Relocation, At Least Temporarily

[Windstryker]

I spent five hours interacting with a placard today.

I thought for a little while this would finally be my chance, because aside from one other person stopping by to click with me for a little while, no one else was there. Five hours.

After the five hours, when the RNG still didn't allow the house to be sold, some random person walked up and relocated their home.

After five hours.

This is now the fourth time something similar has happened, but this five hours is the longest I've spent in one sitting, trying to buy a house.

I accept that the system is broken, and that there are certain things that need to be done in order to make what currently exists work, at least somewhat, in theory. But allowing someone to relocate instantly, just because they are already inside the broken system, does not make it right.

In total, I have now wasted several days' worth of hours trying to buy a house. Probably not very much to some players, but there it is. If someone else who had been there clicking managed to buy it, I would have been disappointed, but at least the system worked for someone.

Here's a couple of suggestions:

1. Change the current relocation system. If a player has a plot and wants to move, they must purchase the new plot under the same system as the players who do not already own one. All their stuff can still show up just as it was on the old plot, instantly, but they still have to play the same waiting game as everyone else.

2. Do away with relocation entirely. Don't like your plot? Sorry. If you want to move, you have to sell the existing plot first.

Personally I prefer the second option, because that would probably free up quite a few plots while the pickier players wait for their "dream plots" to open up.

The best suggestion, of course, is to redesign housing entirely. I understand that the "vision" of player housing in FFXIV has led to this utterly broken system and it is not easily fixed, but that can no longer be an excuse.

[ItMe]

I suggest trying when you're waiting in Que or waiting on your friends to log in.
Placard hunt here and there so you are consistently checking over a wide period of time, but you're not doing it at the expense of other things so you don't hate yourself if you can't get one.
It's how I got my house.
Best of luck to you.

[DrWho2010]

seek out the plot that was freed from the relocation. try to get that. then you can do the same later.

[Catstab]

2. Do away with relocation entirely. Don't like your plot? Sorry. If you want to move, you have to sell the existing plot first.

You should read the forums before you post. This was suggested last week. You don't even understand what you're asking for. Read on...

Relocation was an improvement. The process of 'Empty, Demolish, Re-purchase' you describe was how housing worked before 2018. It was horrible. An FC can't let go of it's house if there are FC private chambers inside. So FCs that wanted to move would boot all of their members to demolish their rooms, then empty the house, then demolish it, then purchase the new house, then re-invite all FC members who would each pay 300k gil to re-purchase their FC private chambers, and then each member would collect their room's contents from Resident Caretaker. They have only 30 days to collect, if not their items are wiped permanently, including seasonal decorations and mog station cash shop items. Mind you, if you lost anyone's name or they don't log back on in the next couple days, they're gone for good. It's an FC killer, in some cases. It's really bad for a social game. You're asking for this to come back??! With relocation, members can stay in the FC and their private chamber decorations even stay intact each move.

The timer itself needs to go. Currently the relocation system dictates "you only camp once, and then you can move anywhere." You want to make every move a new camp? You're actually advocating for more pain for players, and more wasted hours. "100 hours camping and then 3 instant moves? How about 400 wasted hours instead? That'll teach you!"

The answer is NOT to make the process even more painful.

The only problem is if you take the timer out, what do you replace it with? The problem before the timer was that people would dash out to an open house, buy it, and then hold it ransom:

You are player A, you want a house.
Player B gets to the placard first, buys the house for 3 million gil.
Player B says "I dont actually want this. If you pay me 40 million gil, I'll leave and you can have it"
Player A pays player B 40 million gil.
Player B destroys his house.
Player A buys the house for 3 million gil.

This happened every day. Newer players like you, taxed 20 and 40 million gil by faster (or cheating) players. So the timer was created to make the process impossible, and stop the cheaters from taking their ransoms.

My personal suggestion is that we take the timer away, and boost placard pricing to 40 million gil small, 200 million medium, 500 million large. Then only players who actually craft/farm/play will be house shopping, and people who are still just getting into the game are out there playing it. edit: This would also add a gil sink of more than 30 billion gil per year per server to the game, and boy do we need one.

[Austere]

text

I disagree that relocation should remain in its current form.

I believe that the housing system needs to be as available to people who don't have a house as much as possible. The housing system needs to expand horizontally, not vertically. Also that price hike is waaay too steep.

If I had the power to make a change, I'd make it so that people who own a small house cannot relocate to another small house. Medium and large houses can enjoy the same system that they do now.
If the FC house situation you mentioned is a problem, then allow FC's to relocate their small to a small but not individuals. This means that FC spaces (that are catering to multiple people (thus allowing multiple people enjoy some form of housing) can remain as good social systems. Sure this might seem like a targeted change against individuals, but it would introduce a greater improvement than what is "lost".

[Catstab]

I'd make it so that people who own a small house cannot relocate to another small house

This is perhaps not the worst thought. It would cause people to think long and hard before selecting a small house to camp. It's a lot more nuanced that OP's suggestion, for certain. And the fact that it applies only to individuals and not FC's is a must.

[Greyhawk]

I disagree that relocation should remain in its current form.

I believe that the housing system needs to be as available to people who don't have a house as much as possible. The housing system needs to expand horizontally, not vertically. Also that price hike is waaay too steep.

If I had the power to make a change, I'd make it so that people who own a small house cannot relocate to another small house. Medium and large houses can enjoy the same system that they do now.
If the FC house situation you mentioned is a problem, then allow FC's to relocate their small to a small but not individuals. This means that FC spaces (that are catering to multiple people (thus allowing multiple people enjoy some form of housing) can remain as good social systems. Sure this might seem like a targeted change against individuals, but it would introduce a greater improvement than what is "lost".

There is no gain/loss of a housing plot, just location - although the timer sucks because of this, it's still not necessarily a bad thing. We all agree that the housing system just sucks overall, and it needs to be changed to make it available to to everyone. Tearing apart the existing housing system isn't going to get us anywhere with obtaining the ultimate goal of them to redo housing, it just causes arguments and animosity directed at the wrong people, when it should be directed at who is making this dumb decision to keep housing as it is.

[ramsesh]

I guess there’s a reason ideas like this are called “hot takes”

I can’t advocate for this idea at all.

I’m sorry your experience has been so terrible. Keep at it. It stinks, but like you said, you understand the system.

[Penthea]

Relocation was an improvement. The process of 'Empty, Demolish, Re-purchase' you describe was how housing worked before 2018. It was horrible. An FC can't let go of it's house if there are FC private chambers inside. So FCs that wanted to move would boot all of their members to demolish their rooms, then empty the house, then demolish it, then purchase the new house, then re-invite all FC members who would each pay 300k gil to re-purchase their FC private chambers, and then each member would collect their room's contents from Resident Caretaker. They have only 30 days to collect, if not their items are wiped permanently, including seasonal decorations and mog station cash shop items. Mind you, if you lost anyone's name or they don't log back on in the next couple days, they're gone for good. It's an FC killer, in some cases. It's really bad for a social game. You're asking for this to come back??! With relocation, members can stay in the FC and their private chamber decorations even stay intact each move.

The first time my fc relocated its house was before the relocation mechanic was brought to the game. Even though two of us were online to do the process it was still stressful. We had to unfurnish the house super fast and we found that we could not remove the chocobo stable because an offline member had left a chocobo inside. We had to kick the player from the fc so we could remove the stable. That small extra step made us so concerned that the medium we found would be taken by the time we went to buy it. Fortunately it was not and we relocated successfully, and of course we invited that member back to the fc when they came online.

I'm very glad relocation is in the game now. I do not want any fc to go through what we did.

My personal suggestion is that we take the timer away, and boost placard pricing to 40 million gil small, 200 million medium, 500 million large. Then only players who actually craft/farm/play will be house shopping, and people who are still just getting into the game are out there playing it. edit: This would also add a gil sink of more than 30 billion gil per year per server to the game, and boy do we need one.

These prices would just be a new way of alienating players. It would be swapping one unpleasant situation for another. This would enrage any player who missed out on getting a house for a much cheaper price because of the placard or availability. A price hike that massive would make them feel like they're getting punished for a broken system preventing them from accessing content earlier. The backlash from this would be insane. I would be shocked if this ever happened because I think even SE realise how this would be a direct ticket to controversy. Never mind how this would encourage RMT, which is likely one of the reasons why SE brought in the placard timer to hinder house flippers asking for a price ten times the value of the plot.

The only way I can see that SE could alleviate the placard issues without alienating a huge amount of players, aside from introducing a proper instanced housing system, is to upgrade apartments very considerably. As they are now they are very small to the point that some furnishings completely dominate the one room they provide. Allow players to buy upgrades to make them bigger and/or add new floors, and a balcony for outdoor furnishing. Also add tenancy and allow fcs to use them. This won't make everyone stop wanting a house, but it would make a lot of players be happier with what they have and even some happy enough that not having a house would no longer be a big deal. Additionally this would provide a gil sink. Similar upgrade options for houses would also provide that.

IIf I had the power to make a change, I'd make it so that people who own a small house cannot relocate to another small house. Medium and large houses can enjoy the same system that they do now.
If the FC house situation you mentioned is a problem, then allow FC's to relocate their small to a small but not individuals. This means that FC spaces (that are catering to multiple people (thus allowing multiple people enjoy some form of housing) can remain as good social systems. Sure this might seem like a targeted change against individuals, but it would introduce a greater improvement than what is "lost".

Instead I would propose that the price of relocation gets increased by a lot. Make the decision to relocate be something that a player would have to weigh carefully instead of something they can do on a whim because it's so cheap. Unlike the aforementioned price hikes on the purchases of houses, increasing the price of relocation does not lock anyone out of content because the player already has a house.

Also the cooldown on relocation is ludicrously low right now. It's a mere 5 minutes. Some players with too much gil have used this to troll players by hopping plots several times in a day. The cooldown should be a week. Very few players could argue that they would need to relocate more than once in a week. The 5 minute cd is simply not needed for any legitimate reason.

[Themarvin]

just add ground tax to the city state it belong to, give minor great discount if you are a member of the same city state.