"First Come First Served" Plots

[Luxyn]

With Ishgard housing coming soon and the changes to housing in 6.1, I can't help but see a fundamental problem with how "first come first served" plots will work.

From what we've been told so far, there's going to be 2 types of ward from 6.1 onwards: "FC-only" wards, and "Personal-only" wards. These designations are going to apply to wards that already exist, but plots that are owned will not be affected until they are relinquished.

From there, plots are going to be broken into two kinds of purchase type: "Lottery" and "First Come First Served". SE has outlined how lottery plots will work, but they have not gone into detail for first come first served yet.

Here's the problem: If first come first served is just the same system as we have now, with a large group of people clicking for hours around a sign until one of them gets lucky... how is that any different to the lottery system, except one is far more painful?

It will be a decision between "Do you want to just throw your gil at the plot, walk away and hopefully get lucky" or "Do you want to click for hours upon hours upon hours of your life, wasting time and hopefully get lucky", if that is the case. They may as well make all plots lottery in this case, because the random-timer is the single worst thing they've ever done to the house buying system.

It won't be so bad if they at least tell us *when* the timer is running out for these plots. Sure, you have a bunch of people taking note of the time, and then they all surround the sign at the appointed hour and all get ready to click - but surely that's preferable to everyone standing around for hours on end? I've had friends stay up all night losing sleep trying to get a plot. People do it all the time, and it's not healthy, but it's what the click-system encourages.

Either that, or make first come first served plots work like housing did before the timer ever existed - as soon as it is relinquished, it is available for purchase. Yes, this makes house flippers a problem, but I think most people who really badly want a house would rather pay a premium in gil to a house flipper than spend countless hours clicking signs with no guarantee they'll get a plot.

Tl;dr: As long as the clicking for countless hours to get a "first come first served" plot is eliminated, it'll be better. Otherwise, they may as well make all houses lottery, because that would objectively be better than "easy lottery vs painful lottery".

[Risvertasashi]

FCFS is indeed how it works now.

As for why SE is proposing doing both types, it's that they recognize not everyone likes the lottery system - for those that can camp a housing site for hours on end, their chances of getting a home will actually go down with the lottery system. It largely benefits those that don't have the time to camp, or those that find it too painful.

But in that same liveletter they also said they're looking for community feedback on how much should be lottery vs FCFS. If you think they should all be lottery (or vice versa), that's valid feedback that they're looking for. However, unless the feedback is just about unanimous, it'll probably be some split to keep both camps happy (or erm... keep both from getting too unhappy).

...If you think the system should be redesigned from the ground up, well, I'll agree with you, but I think at this point what we got is what we got. Of all the suggestions, SE chose to implement lottery, likely because it's practical and works in place with existing systems.

[Luxyn]

That's just a new one to me - there's people who LIKE clicking for hours on end with slim chances of success? lol

[Risvertasashi]

That's just a new one to me - there's people who LIKE clicking for hours on end with slim chances of success? lol

I mean, they probably don't enjoy the act itself, but some of those that have a surfeit of free time want to be able to use said free time to increase their chances of getting a plot. (If it were up to me, I'd make every single plot lottery, but I also wouldn't penalize players for withdrawing from the lottery before the drawing - only if they do so after they've won).

Moreover, let's say you're an FC leader for a second. You can recruit your FC officers to also click the sign, and have coverage in case someone AFKs, and have shifts for when people get off to go to bed or plot your murder. This, too, significantly increases the odds the FC will get a house. The lottery hurts the chances of people that organize like so.

[LitheSuxman]

Or maybe they can just add more wards... problem solved.

[Risvertasashi]

Or maybe they can just add more wards... problem solved.

[Luxyn]

More wards are always nice yes. XD I just think the clicking system is so so bad and unhealthy for everyone.

On the note of FCs with lotteries, I think an FC can enter a lottery multiple times, or at least I'd assume so? Once per member, provided they have the gil. So an FC with 500 mil in their bank and 10 members would be able to submit 10 separate tickets each for 50 mil for example - if they win, they get 450 mil back, if they lose they get all 500 mil back. I could be wrong, but I'd assume it's that way to give larger FCs an advantage over smaller ones since they "need the plot more".

[Risvertasashi]

More wards are always nice yes. XD I just think the clicking system is so so bad and unhealthy for everyone.

On the note of FCs with lotteries, I think an FC can enter a lottery multiple times, or at least I'd assume so? Once per member, provided they have the gil. So an FC with 500 mil in their bank and 10 members would be able to submit 10 separate tickets each for 50 mil for example - if they win, they get 450 mil back, if they lose they get all 500 mil back. I could be wrong, but I'd assume it's that way to give larger FCs an advantage over smaller ones since they "need the plot more".

As described in november, 1 entry per lottery, and only one lottery may be entered at a time, and there are other restrictions like another character on the same service account can't "own" an FC house (exactly how they determine what qualifies vs just being a member of an FC with a house is, as far as I know, unknown). We don't have the fine details on this (maybe we'll get more next live letter), and of course, the final version implemented into the game may be different.

[Divinemights]

Just be prepared for waves of complaints on new lottery system:

"Lottery sucks"
"RNG is so bad"
"Someone must use hacks"
"1,000 ticket but still unable to get house"
"SE bad because lottery is horriable"

[Bladehawk]

That's just a new one to me - there's people who LIKE clicking for hours on end with slim chances of success? lol

Chances for success on this method are much much higher then there will be on a lottery. Also consider that many of those who want this method fully plan to run auto click macros so they don't need to spend hour upon hour of their lives clicking away.