3.3 & 3.4 Housing Updates

[LiadansWhisper]

Right. But we do know that their existing housing system is incapable of meeting demand, and we know that very few, if any, other MMOs with housing features suffer similar issues.

 

We don't need to know what they are doing to know they are doing it wrong.

 

No one has said that they're satisfied with the housing system as it currently works. I certainly haven't.

 

What I've said is that it's completely stupid and entitled to state that they're just doing it wrong when you don't even know what they're actually doing. You don't know. You don't know what the constraints are, the lattice they're working in, you don't know why they're doing the things they're doing. Don't forget that despite the changes Yoshi-P has put in place, they're still working over the base code written by the previous team.

 

This happens with WoW, too. Both MMOs are built on layers and layers and layers of code put down by people who likely no longer even work there. You fix one thing and it breaks two other things, because deep inside that labyrinth it's connected in ways that the current devs don't know about (but discover in fun ways!). This isn't the fault of the devs being "stupid." It's the fault of MMOs being built on these many layers of code, with things added and taken away over time. You never know what you're going to break accidentally, and there may be insurmountable limitations on what you can and can't do without completely starting over from scratch.

[Kellach Woods]

Literally semantics tho.

 

They're doing it wrong because they can't meet the demand or even make a housing system that doesn't end up fucking everyone over. Whether or not it's the best possible system and they did it very right on the technical side of things really doesn't matter when the end result on the consumer side is fucking atrocious.

 

I mean, I've been there, I've my name attached to a clusterfuck of a product that had massive problems at launch (and further problems down the line that have nothing to do with us). Even if I told you that my team did it right, would the consumer be satisfied with their purchase? Nah.

 

Sure it's insulting to get told that when you know in the back of your mind you did it in the best way possible, but arguing against that is more like "YOU SHOULD BE SAYING SOMETHING ELSE SO MY EGO AIN'T BRUISED."

[LiadansWhisper]

Literally semantics tho.

 

They're doing it wrong because they can't meet the demand or even make a housing system that doesn't end up fucking everyone over. Whether or not it's the best possible system and they did it very right on the technical side of things really doesn't matter when the end result on the consumer side is fucking atrocious.

 

I mean, I've been there, I've my name attached to a clusterfuck of a product that had massive problems at launch (and further problems down the line that have nothing to do with us). Even if I told you that my team did it right, would the consumer be satisfied with their purchase? Nah.

 

Sure it's insulting to get told that when you know in the back of your mind you did it in the best way possible, but arguing against that is more like "YOU SHOULD BE SAYING SOMETHING ELSE SO MY EGO AIN'T BRUISED."

 

If you did the best you could do within the constraints of what you were able to work with, then actually, yes you did do your best, and no you didn't do anything wrong.

 

If you were lackadaisical and being sloppy, then sure, you did it wrong. We do not have enough information to judge that one way or another.

[Kellach Woods]

Fortunately 3.3 isn't there so we can't say for sure housing is fucked (for now).

 

But that's my point - whether they did it right or they did it wrong is completely pointless. It has absolutely no bearing on whether or not we actually like the housing system (and I'd dare say a majority here don't).

[LiadansWhisper]

Fortunately 3.3 isn't there so we can't say for sure housing is fucked (for now).

 

But that's my point - whether they did it right or they did it wrong is completely pointless. It has absolutely no bearing on whether or not we actually like the housing system (and I'd dare say a majority here don't).

 

I just feel like saying, "Well, I really don't like what they did here" is different from saying, "Wow, they suck, they don't know what the fuck they are doing. You'd think their developers would know how to do their jobs!"

[Aldotsk]

They are having the positive feedback from low populated server players, but when it comes down to overpopulated servers like Balmung, this is pretty much of a poor decision. 

 

For me, I still think they could have gone with everyone starting with small plots of house, and build their way into large mansion like you do in Workshop for Airships instead. This would have made people put interest in gathering, and crafting to build their dream house. Also this could prevent from people complaining that they can't purchase large mansion because either they don't have gils to purchase it, or they are too late to purchase it and plots are very limited, or some other people overcharge the large plots or even they just won't ever sell it since that is the last expansion size of the plot. You know, kind of like Sims. Build bigger house as you go along.

 

There could have been better ways to do it, but it seems like they just make decisions at the last resort. I've just ended up dealing with their decisions because it's Square Enix.

[Branson Thorne]

It's not a gil sink if everyone and their mother has access to them. So I'm essence, housing is working exactly how SE planned it. The only problem is, it's doing it a bit more successfully then I think,they originally planned for.

[V'aleera]

A money sink is a mechanic that permanently removes money from circulation. They only work well when everyone can access them. Less accessibility means less money drained.

[Kilieit]

Yeah... for me as an individual, housing is not a gil sink.

 

Because I cannot obtain the opportunity to sink gil into it. I'm not even bothering to aim for a gil total with any sort of haste because I cannot access the opportunity to spend it. This removes the incentive for me to participate in the economy in order to amass gil in the first place, which - I mean, correct me if I'm wrong - I believe is supposed to be the entire point of having money sinks in an MMO.

 

Sure, "not everyone and their mother" should be able to obtain the content in question - but to be a proper money sink, the gating should be the high currency requirement, not what's essentially a "limited edition" system where only a set number of entities per server ever even get a chance to put down the gil...

 

I'm disabled and therefore don't work. I'm the exact kind of "no-lifer" who should be interested in obtaining money-sink content in a game; especially with my love of "if my character had an X, what would it be like?" type content. But I'm not even trying with housing, because obtaining a plot is too unlikely. I don't want to have all that gil just sitting in a retainer not doing anything when I could have spent the time it took to earn it working on my alts, or levelling secondary classes, or roleplaying, or doing literally anything else.

 

It's frustrating because it's this huge avenue for crafting, customisation, community integration, unlocking two fairly sizeable minigames (chocobo stables and gardening), and just plain old having fun... that I'm unlikely to be able to access at all unless someone is very, very kind to me and notifies me ahead of time that they're relinquishing a plot of my desired size and location.

 

Maybe the scarcity is a deliberate design decision and not a technical limitation... but if it is, I don't think it's a design decision I agree with.

[Gabineaux]

It's not exactly a money sink either, if your fc builds airships and builds them to gather certain things that sell well.. over time you can make back what you spent on the house in the first place.

[V'aleera]

Accessing more goods via airships doesn't put more money into circulation though, it just shuffles the existing money around.

[Aedan Marceaux]

It's not exactly a money sink either, if your fc builds airships and builds them to gather certain things that sell well.. over time you can make back what you spent on the house in the first place.

That's not creating new currency. That's circulating currency already in existence.

 

If the airship ventures brought back gil itself, then what your saying would be true. But since you're taking items brought back and putting them on the market board, that's just gil changing hands (save for the tax which is a negligible sink if you care to call it that).

[Gabineaux]

Aaaah true. I can't think of any other gil sinks in this game. WoW had the mount speed crap, which I'm glad we don't have here.

[Edda]

For those of you staying up:

 

[siclest]

would have been nice of them to add to the maint post before we stayed up all night

[Lydia Lightfoot]

[Branson Thorne]

would have been nice of them to add to the maint post before we stayed up all night

 

In all fairness, they DID, in fact, tell us when the servers would be up.

We just wrongly ASSUMED they would be up before then, though time was clearly given.

[Arrelaine]

Man, only 12 wards added in total.

 

What are you thiiiiiiiiiiiinking SE???? lol

[RiniKett]

Leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet's get ready to ruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuumbleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!

[Gegenji]

Four or five login errors and now a 1.4k person long queue...

 

I know I shouldn't stress but... I am! I'm afraid all the houses will be gone before I can even get in to TRY for one! :<

[Silinat]

All gone in Mist.

[Edda]

All houses have now been sold.

[Gegenji]

All houses have now been sold.

So glad I stayed up all night, tried to get in the moment it went live, and still end up with nothing for the effort because of login server crashes and several thousand other people trying to do the same thing.

[Lydia Lightfoot]

[Edda]

For those of you who are wondering, I recorded to the best of my ability a play-by-play of the housing situation on Balmung. All times are approximate and some events may have occurred before the listed time, since I can only teleport so fast. All times are by EST.

 

6:00 - Servers open

 

6:01 - Mists begins to fill. Ward 11 fills twice as fast compared to the three other wards.

 

6:06 - Approximately half of Mists is sold.

 

6:15 - Lavender Beds almost cleaned out. ~6 Large plots remain with a straggling Medium or two.

 

6:15 - Half of the Goblet is sold.

 

6:16 - Mists sells out.

 

6:17 - Only plots 36 and 58 of Ward 9 Lavender remain.

 

6:19 - 12 plots remain in the Goblet.

 

6:19 - Lavender Beds sells out.

 

6:21 - One medium in the Goblet remains.

 

6:21 - Goblet sells out.

 

 

 

Congratulations to those who were successful in their endeavors, and encouragement to those who were not so fortunate. There will always be more chances in the days to come.