Reactivate The Housing Demolition Timer

[moenbrydas]

ok so, me and my partner transferred to Materia once it opened but we had to keep someone in our old data center because of our FC house so they'd get our gil and furniture back and transfer to Materia once the plot got auto demolished.

i think it should be reactivated alongside the housing lottery fix in May so then people who havent logged in for literal months can give their housing to someone else who wants one.

[IckeDerTyp]

ok so, me and my partner transferred to Materia once it opened but we had to keep someone in our old data center because of our FC house so they'd get our gil and furniture back and transfer to Materia once the plot got auto demolished.

i think it should be reactivated alongside the housing lottery fix in May so then people who havent logged in for literal months can give their housing to someone else who wants one.

How about instead they leave it off forever and stop holding people with a house hostage? :3

Yoshi always says; "it's fine to unsub guys!".
I've spend years of my lifeblood getting and decorating a house.

And he wants me to unsub and literally condemn it?

Yeah, no.

Am sure if they really wanted - by they I mean the big CEO decision makers, housing could've been well supplied for a while now.

Remember when they had to stop selling the game?

Feels more and more like SE is spending the least amount they can to get the most out of it. Much to the detriment of the playerbase.

That's what it feels like to me atleast.

And hey, maybe they're gonna do everything I want tomorrow - who knows.

Hope dies last but it eventually does.

[GeminiReed]

Considering the state of the world I'm going to assume they have good reason to keep it disabled. Personally I think it underscores the utter failure of the system and my fervent hope is that this latest embarrassment finally gets a housing revision on the schedule.

Instead of asking for auto-demolition to resume perhaps it would be better to ask for the relinquish option to provide the same refund or a way to manually resume the demolition timer on a per-plot basis.

[Aldotsk]

War is still going on. It's not going to come back until it gets resolved.

[dspguy]

I unsubbed back during HW and lost my house. Back then, there were still smalls readily available on my server. By the time I returned about 1 year later, all plots were purchased. I was lucky to get a house during the auto-demo FCFS times where you didn't have to wait some random time to purchase it. And that was only because a friend quit the game and forwarded me the email with his plot demolition time.

Since then, when I want to take a break from the game, I rotate 40 days unsubbed, 30 days subbed, etc. My wife wound up benefiting from a black market sale gone wrong and she picked up the vacant large plot. Coming from our privileged position, it does feel like we are "held hostage" subscription-wise. Considering the methods in which we both got a house, I don't see that happening ever again.

If I could buy a large for 50M, possibly lose it due to unsub and purchase another for 50M with ease - I would do it. If only so I kept a house when I return from a 6-12 month hiatus.

[Jojoya]

How about instead they leave it off forever and stop holding people with a house hostage? :3

Yoshi always says; "it's fine to unsub guys!".
I've spend years of my lifeblood getting and decorating a house.

And he wants me to unsub and literally condemn it?

Yeah, no.

Am sure if they really wanted - by they I mean the big CEO decision makers, housing could've been well supplied for a while now.

Remember when they had to stop selling the game?

Feels more and more like SE is spending the least amount they can to get the most out of it. Much to the detriment of the playerbase.

That's what it feels like to me atleast.

And hey, maybe they're gonna do everything I want tomorrow - who knows.

Hope dies last but it eventually does.

Sub a month. Enter the house on the first day and last day of the subscription period to reset the demo timer.

Unsub 6 weeks.

Sub another month. Repeat entering to reset.

Unsub another 6 weeks.

And so on. If you get lucky, a free log in campaign will occur in the last 2 weeks of your unsub period and you'll be able to stay unsubbed an additional 6 weeks by logging in to enter your house.

You have been able to unsub - but you're also able to retain your house.

If you're playing the game so little you want to be unsubbed most of the time, why bother getting a house? Is it really worth paying a subscription just to keep something you aren't using? Especially when you can get an apartment that you likewise won't be using but at least it's cheaper and won't demo?

Instead of asking for auto-demolition to resume perhaps it would be better to ask for the relinquish option to provide the same refund or a way to manually resume the demolition timer on a per-plot basis.

While one of the old reasons for not offering a full refund no longer apply (resellers can no longer benefit by relinquishing to sell), it would reduce housing's effectiveness as a gil sink if the gil can be reclaimed at a later date.

It's also going to be hard to get players to relinquish plots when it will be very difficult to get another house if they later decide they want a house after all. Most will go ahead and keep it.

You'd only see players relinquishing if they're transferring home worlds or quitting the game for a long period of time. Neither of those situations would increase supply as the vacancy would occur regardless. It just makes that supply available slightly sooner.

[GeminiReed]

..., it would reduce housing's effectiveness as a gil sink if the gil can be reclaimed at a later date.

It's only a partial refund -- 80% -- so some gil is sacrificed. One time purchases are awful currency sinks. If they were all that effective we would have seen several more of those gaudy golden mount reskins by now. FF:XIV housing is a particularly bad sink because of scarcity and the account limitations placed on it. Not to mention that auto-demo's been paused more than it hasn't so new purchases have been incredibly rare.

It's also going to be hard to get players to relinquish plots when it will be very difficult to get another house if they later decide they want a house after all. Most will go ahead and keep it. ... It just makes that supply available slightly sooner.

In case you missed it the topic is about an FC that migrated to another DC with the exception of the caretaker waiting for auto-demo to kick in. It is not about getting more houses into circulation. If that's all this was I wouldn't have bothered with it.

There are legitimate reasons people no longer want to be tied to housing. If auto-demolition is going to remain on hold then some QoL changes might be in order.

[Shibi]

ok so, me and my partner transferred to Materia once it opened but we had to keep someone in our old data center because of our FC house so they'd get our gil and furniture back and transfer to Materia once the plot got auto demolished.

Mmm, it was nice that when we transferred we got 1,000,000 back for an apartment and a full ~4.5 million back for a personal small. And it was nice that we got a million more for getting an alt to level 30.

It would have been ideal if they could have made it that the FC leader transferring returned the full FC house gil + million bonus to cover furnishings as well, like the personal did.

It would have freed up a few more houses for people in NA and EU for sure.


I am not sure SE will re-enable it though, wars have happened for decades, but this one seems to have a bit more flow-on to the economy than usual. Plus of course, COVID-19's disruption isn't over yet. And the floods in Australia and Canada. And people are still reeling from the bushfires....

Get a level 1 alt in, and don't worry about being nice to other house hunters is about where you are stuck.

[Jojoya]

There are legitimate reasons people no longer want to be tied to housing. If auto-demolition is going to remain on hold then some QoL changes might be in order.

If someone truly does not want to be tied to housing there's nothing to stop them from removing all furnishings, dismantling the Estate Hall and relinquishing the plot.

Is it really worth putting things on hold for the sake of getting a gil refund?

What we pay when we purchase a plot isn't a security deposit. We're paying to be able to use the plot. We shouldn't feel entitled to a refund when we've used it.

I still believe that's where SE is making a mistake since they're making house ownership a limited resource system- not requiring a meaningful gil investment to retain a house. If players had to pay more to keep a house, fewer would demand one.

[Big_Bap]

If players had to pay more to keep a house, fewer would demand one.

Only took you 4 years, wow! Did you stop drinking the koolaid or something?