Instanced Housing

[PercibelTheren]

Laughing at the pre-emptive callout, but I don't think instanced housing is the answer. Lately, I've been more and more interested in the idea of housing wards with malleable plots. If any plot could accommodate a medium or large, much of the demand would be satisfied.

This would definitely solve the situation on less populated servers. I'm on Zodiark. All the mediums and larges are taken, a lot of the smalls are free because they're not worth it to a lot of people. Malleable housing plots would be really nice.

[Reinha]

Yes!, those people need to go away as far as possible. Otherwise there might be enough people asking about it and devs might actually listen and implement housing system slightly better then begging RNG for 0.2% chance of getting a house bigger then just a small

I see those posts as suggestions to stop wasting one's own time complaining about a game that isn't going to change to one's liking.

There are apartments for people who just want to store holiday items and don't want to worry about auto-demolition. There are abundant small houses for people who think they are missing out on gardening. The devs just invested into a new district, additional wards and a lottery system for wards during this expansion, providing more M/L houses and a fair way to distribute them. They didn't do that for nothing. Housing works fine and it also keeps people subscribed.

It's a 10 year old game that had its peak in 2022 and is slowly going to fade out in the next decade. We will get new content but they are not going to tear down and reinvent major game systems. Why would they? Anyone who thinks the game is getting an instanced housing system is full of copium. If that's the only way someone is going to enjoy housing, there are other games out there to try. It doesn't mean one has to unsub from this game.

[Palin]

I see those posts as suggestions to stop wasting one's own time complaining about a game that isn't going to change to one's liking.

There are apartments for people who just want to store holiday items and don't want to worry about auto-demolition. There are abundant small houses for people who think they are missing out on gardening. The devs just invested into a new district, additional wards and a lottery system for wards during this expansion, providing more M/L houses and a fair way to distribute them. They didn't do that for nothing. Housing works fine and it also keeps people subscribed.

It's a 10 year old game that had its peak in 2022 and is slowly going to fade out in the next decade. We will get new content but they are not going to tear down and reinvent major game systems. Why would they? Anyone who thinks the game is getting an instanced housing system is full of copium. If that's the only way someone is going to enjoy housing, there are other games out there to try. It doesn't mean one has to unsub from this game.

Wasting people's time posting here seems to be the entire point of these forums. Not like anyone from the devs is reading all that. Anyway it technically exists also for the sake of giving feedback, big or small, so it's here.

Anyway given how many threads we get for housing each month it is safe to assume that housing is not working as intended. It's a mistake of a system that takes too many resources and not enough for people's demands, and housing should never be implemented this way. Just because they added some band-aid solution until all houses that people actually want run out and we are back to square one. But yes, definitely it’s the fault of these spoiled gamers, who dare dream that if they managed to get 50 mil, they should have slightly higher chance for their wanted house then 0.1%

And it’s not the first time some systems and game modes got scrapped due to negative feedback and/or devs' decisions. The feast, original diadem, you can even count the entirety of 1.0 getting scraped. Or when they iterate on previous systems, such as Trust and duty support being upgraded and refined squadrons. So why couldn’t housing be improved?

[AlexiaD]

Wasting people's time posting here seems to be the entire point of these forums. Not like anyone from the devs is reading all that. Anyway it technically exists also for the sake of giving feedback, big or small, so it's here.

Anyway given how many threads we get for housing each month it is safe to assume that housing is not working as intended. It's a mistake of a system that takes too many resources and not enough for people's demands, and housing should never be implemented this way. Just because they added some band-aid solution until all houses that people actually want run out and we are back to square one. But yes, definitely it’s the fault of these spoiled gamers, who dare dream that if they managed to get 50 mil, they should have slightly higher chance for their wanted house then 0.1%

And it’s not the first time some systems and game modes got scrapped due to negative feedback and/or devs' decisions. The feast, original diadem, you can even count the entirety of 1.0 getting scraped. Or when they iterate on previous systems, such as Trust and duty support being upgraded and refined squadrons. So why couldn’t housing be improved?

Because what you deem an improvement is not an improvement for everyone.

[Palin]

Because what you deem an improvement is not an improvement for everyone.

I have seen instanced housing implemented in other mmo games. It works as intented and people don't make drama fighting over houses. It would be an improvement

[AlexiaD]

I have seen instanced housing implemented in other mmo games. It works as intented and people don't make drama fighting over houses. It would be an improvement

Once again, that's an improvement to certain people, but not for everyone, that's your opinion that it would be an improvement for everyone.

[Reinha]

Anyway given how many threads we get for housing each month it is safe to assume that housing is not working as intended. It's a mistake of a system that takes too many resources and not enough for people's demands, and housing should never be implemented this way. Just because they added some band-aid solution until all houses that people actually want run out and we are back to square one. But yes, definitely it’s the fault of these spoiled gamers, who dare dream that if they managed to get 50 mil, they should have slightly higher chance for their wanted house then 0.1%

What part of housing isn't working as intended? We can design the outside walls, decorate, store furnishings, use functional items like bells and gardening plots, teleport there, leave messages and likes, add tags, lock the house or let people enter, change the lighting, and move to a different plot. It's functional in every way. They are working on increasing the item limit for all house sizes next expansion and apparently there is also talk about housing mirage which I understand could be a way to increase the size of the interior.

The only people complaining are the people on a few overcrowded NA serves and people who want a bigger house. That's it. Neither of those are problems that require an entirely new system to be developed. And the idea I've seen thrown around that the whole housing system should be scrapped, is... I don't even know how best to describe it. Self centered and delusional? That thousands of people around the world should have their houses deleted from the game because some people didn't win a house with more space and got mad. What?

[CidHeiral]

I have seen instanced housing implemented in other mmo games.

Unless the backend of those "other MMO games" are identical to this one your comparison is completely irrelevant.

I understand why people are salty about getting a larger house but "jUsT Do InStAnCeD hOuSiNg" is a non-starter.

[Divinemights]

Yes!, those people need to go away as far as possible. Otherwise there might be enough people asking about it and devs might actually listen and implement housing system slightly better then begging RNG for 0.2% chance of getting a house bigger then just a small

You are wasting your time and energy.
Loud minority forced changes via lobbying and social media is not really acceptable by Devs raised under culture focus onobedience
If an objective is set (in this case, ward system), devs will only making attempts to improve it instead of copying other failed MMORPG's instance system

Name me a successful MMORPG in 2024. (I wouldn't call Skyrim Online successful)
WoW has no housing system and FF14 has Ward system

[Jojoya]

Anyway given how many threads we get for housing each month it is safe to assume that housing is not working as intended.

Only if our assumptions match the developers' intent for housing, which I suspect they don't in some cases.

Wards weren't a bad idea in concept but the developers executed them badly if they were truly trying to create a neighborhood feeling. It's pretty easy to point out the flaws - too few owners per ward for a game that's running 24/7, too strict a limit on tenants that would bring in additional foot traffic not to mention tenants are at the mercy of the owner's willingness to keep playing the game, marketboards being scattered all over the ward instead of just having one or two placed in the vendor areas so players are drawn to a central location instead of more or less sticking to their house, mini-aetherytes allowing direct teleportation to an owner's house and aethernet shards allowing visitors to bypass most of the ward to get where they want to be (both again reducing foot traffic), vendor selection being too limited to draw most players to visit them at all let alone on a regular basis.

Yet an improved instanced housing could help salvage part of the idea if integrated into the wards. More owners per ward means more potential foot traffic. More foot traffic means more opportunity to meet other players and chat. We already have apartments as part of the wards. Why not instanced private estates that likewise are reached by entering the ward?

Name me a successful MMORPG in 2024. (I wouldn't call Skyrim Online successful)
WoW has no housing system and FF14 has Ward system

Why wouldn't you call ESO successful? It's hitting its 10 year anniversary this year (only a year behind this game if you start with ARR instead of 1.0) and still going with new content continuing to be added.

People have a warped idea of what success is for MMORPGs (thanks, WoW).

I think a better question is how many active MMORPGs can people name regardless of whether they'd call them successful or not, and which have any form of housing.

WoW players have been asking for housing since its inception and there had been a crude version in the alpha version of the game that the developers scrapped before it moved to beta. No, Garrisons were not housing. They were a phased individualized quest hub.

Guild Wars 2 has a very limited form of instanced player housing based in its guild halls.

SWTOR has its instanced housing (Strongholds).

LotRO has a ward-style system (but one that at least automatically adds new Neighborhoods as certain plot types fill up instead of waiting for everything to fill up).

Lost Ark has instanced housing somewhat similar to Island Sanctuary but with more features.

New World has instanced housing.

ArcheAge has open world housing (neither instanced nor confined to housing specific zone).

Black Desert Online has instanced housing.

Old School Runescape has instanced housing.

Star Trek Online does not have housing (customizable ship interiors are for engineering purposes, not residential).

EverQuest II has instanced housing.

Star Wars Galaxies (it's been revived with a private server) has open world housing (though with a few more restrictions than ArcheAge).

Ultima Online has instanced housing.

Aion uses both instanced (guaranteed to each player) and non-instanced housing (limited in number, traded through player auctions and getting a lot of hate from its players because of player monopolies).

I found references to several more that I hadn't heard of but wanted to abbreviate the list. I also didn't dig deep into whether the instanced housing was interior only or both interior/exterior. Many were both.

You can be dismissive of each game's "success" as you want but they are all still active MMORPGs with active player bases. Whether housing is part of the success of any specific game could be endlessly debated. It comes down to whether a housing system is a source of satisfaction, dissatisfaction or is irrelevant to the individual player.