Honestly I wouldn't blame personal housing per se for the "problem" right now.

I should probably elaborate. It may be true that Housing was intended primarily for FCs, and having seen the benefits of an FC house firsthand--it wouldn't be the same without it to be sure. It *would* have been a problem if the "rampant" personal bidding was preventing FCs from getting housing at all, and for a time--it absolutely was. Small FCs especially of 3-4 people were often trying to bid against some 20 personal prospects.

But the Ward distribution, whatever people think about that--*does* address that. If the primary focus is to make sure every FC gets a house, the 75/25 split *was* successful, while still giving people an (overwhelmingly) small chance at getting a house.

At times it's a little *too* successful. When you have nearly empty FC wards vs an overcrowding in personal there's absolutely cause to be upset. Granted until we see a couple more cycles it's difficult to say how many of those plots will remain that way. FCs are almost certainly operating as personals do: go for the large, when that fails try again on the medium, when that fails, try again on the small.


Honestly I think the bigger problem is apartment limitations. I don't just mean things like item slot restrictions or lack of space--creative lofting can help with both of those. You mentioned the gardening thing, but....I can't be the only one that wishes I could have a single tenant in an apartment--either to help build/loft something, or for a couple (can eternally bonded people enter their bond mate's locked apartment? This I don't know).

Especially with the housing shortage, just like in real life, you have a lot of people cohabitating in apartments now, so it'd be nice to see some of those similar cohabitation options, like you see with houses.

Also apartments are already nearly stuffed to capacity depending on the server. Again. Again this is an argument in favor of FC housing since they support 512 rooms, but I really have to ask why apartment buildings don't do that as well. I really can't see that being a resource limitation when there's basically 18 wards that (theoretically) each have houses that support 512 rooms.

Some people would say "join an FC", to which I would say, "yes! I'm in one! It's great " but some people might want privacy at times, or they might want the stability of an apartment never going away (some FCs kick for idleness, or some people just decide they don't fit in any more, or any number of reasons), or--let's be honest--FF14 does have a pretty solid single player experience. Some people might want to keep it that way, including for apartments.