Simple Housing Fix: Island Sanctuary

[NegativeS]

The reality is that many players don’t just want housing, they want specific housing. That’s completely valid. However, no solution proposed so far meaningfully addresses that distinction. Adding districts or plots may temporarily relieve pressure (as mentioned above), but it does not prevent the same issue from re-emerging around the most desirable locations.

If it needs to be auto-generating wards, then let it be auto-generating wards. Hell, make new types of districts that are still neighborhoods, but smaller like cul-de-sacs, the same for every plot, that automatically creates a new one when filled up. Separate types for every size house if they really need to.

I might flesh this idea out a bit for a post of its own.

Discussing system limitations or trade-offs isn’t a bad thing, it’s acknowledging that different solutions affect different players in different ways. Everyone really needs to stop with the us vs them mindset because in reality it's us vs Housing/Square

It's a bit hard to forget the 'us vs them' mindset when every time someone posts about how housing in this game blows chunks, someone inevitably comes in to say that youre delusional, you just need to already have a gil industrial complex set up to scoop up larges whenever they're made available, and that the system is fine because I have all the housing I'll ever need.

I know it's us vs Square in reality, but I will never pass an opportunity to call out housing mains because every one of them that exists is a chance that a dev will actually look at feedback on the forums and see positive affirmations to the current system.

[AyahM]

However, no solution proposed so far meaningfully addresses that distinction. Adding districts or plots may temporarily relieve pressure (as mentioned above), but it does not prevent the same issue from re-emerging around the most desirable locations.

This is extremely accurate! If we look at how supply / demand works in the 'wild', we can see that the only way to satiate the demand is to make all plots desirable, or more desirable plots. The issue I have is that scarcity is currently a factor in creating desirable plots. If all plots become M35, will everyone be happy? No, because scarcity is no longer driving some demand.

If instanced housing is introduced in addition to the current system, it could satisfy some demand, but not all. Particularly not demand driven by scarcity because it is not the same as non instanced housing. The game is currently reflecting economic supply and demand quite well. This doesn't mean its a good or great system. Without fundamentally changing it all, adding more districts makes sense to me. But who wants to live in an empty ward? Well, the people who are OK with instanced housing should be OK with an empty ward.

What is the problem we are trying to solve?

Affordable housing
More desirable plots
More housing on congested servers
More housing options for aesthetic or playing purposes
Time constraints on playing in conjunction with housing (auto-demo)

Once we arrive at the problem, we can propose a system which solves it, but not all problems can be solved and not all people can be happy.

[Absurdity]

It's not such a simple fix, they would need to expand server space for the housing districts anyway because Island Sanctuary runs on those too. I remember when IS released and you couldn't enter your own house because the instance was overloaded.

[Vespar]

Ya know, instead of making a boat load of new servers for folks to play on (that are currently low population as heck), they should have made a few into housing specific servers. Treat it kind of like a world visit function when you visit them, but it's just wards and wards of houses for personal use. Then keep the FC houses on the actual server.
To be fair, I've no idea if this could even work as a solution, but if housing is just a bunch of "instanced zones" it seems like it could. (Though I also dont know if doing it like this would force the same world visit restrictions (retainers/mail/etc) or if they just made those up to promote you staying on your home server.)

[EmilySummerstar]

That would be a great place for a private estate. The island is already my favorite place in the game. It's so peaceful. While having it instanced would suck to share your creation with others, it might not be too bad. Nobody ever seems to visit other people's houses and apartments anyway.

Also I hope they could have grass around the house independent of the hideaway grounds we choose. I like using the tiled bricks for the grounds but would hate a house surrounded by it.

[Solowing]

That would be a great place for a private estate. The island is already my favorite place in the game. It's so peaceful. While having it instanced would suck to share your creation with others, it might not be too bad. Nobody ever seems to visit other people's houses and apartments anyway.

Also I hope they could have grass around the house independent of the hideaway grounds we choose. I like using the tiled bricks for the grounds but would hate a house surrounded by it.

People occasionally warf in and out. But it has to be a inner curiosity as there is zero benefit or reason to visit the ward outside personal urge to do so.

Nobody visits Island Sanctuary for the same reason, except. The owner has to be Friended and Online. Making it a even bigger hurdle to not bother with.

I will occasionally check out plots and apts alike, to leave a message. As a way to let them know someone can always come up and look around. Maybe not often, but a curious passer-by might want to see what housing is cooking.