I'm just gonna say it; Blizzard is being stupid by NOT implementing a Housing system

[crakerjack]

What's more important, gear with higher item levels? It'll all be useless in six months. It boggles my mind that people spend all that effort to be THE VERY BEST for all of five minutes, relatively speaking. Give me something permanent any day.

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Why does everything have to improve end game? This isn't a battle royale, it's an RPG. There should be things in the game that don't necessarily work toward a goal of ever increasing item levels.

Because end game is what's carrying the game. If they removed m+, raiding and all organized PvP, the game would die. If they don't create new end game material, the game dies. WoW has always been end game focused. All class balancing is done at max level, all cool gear/tiers are obtained through raiding. If you want to be super geared, you won't do so by grinding old raid achievements. There's plenty of garbage content out there if you don't want to do end game content. You can collect transmogs, mounts, achievements or even do pet battles. If that's not enough for you, then quit. Just don't push that stupid player housing on everyone. It has no value in the game and doesn't make it any more fun. It would only thin out the world like I said.

[Soon-TM]

I never understood wanting "housing" in WoW, and obviously it's not as requested of a feature as OP makes it out to be if it isn't in the game yet.

The same line was being mindlessly repeated back in Cata about xmog. Lo and behold, it's one of the most popular features today, for pretty much the same reason: one of the few features that actually allow you to customise your toon, at least visually.

[Briselody]

It has no value in the game and doesn't make it any more fun.

Well that's, like, your opinion man. One that obviously many people don't share, if you've bothered looking at responses in this thread.

Nobody says it should pushed on you. People that want true player housing want a system divorced from progression and too much utility, to avoid the world thinning like you said. You want to ignore it and push your keys or whatever it is you do? Fine. Go for it. Why do you not want other people to have things they want?

[JoshuaNLG]

How many people play the game casually, barely raid, but spend the majority of their time chasing transmogs? Now imagine those same players were chasing furniture or items they can place and decorate their own home with.

If you don't like housing systems, power to you, but it's an incredibly popular (if not thee most popular) feature in just about every MMO i've ever played that features it.

As to people saying "uuuh how could they do it without causing lag!" instances. Done.

[dacoolist]

I'm supposedly on one of the top populated servers ON EARTH.. Illidan btw.. and it's freaken DEAD right now: imagine this with player housing.

If you're reading this post blizz: Move on

[Leetbeartank]

Nobody wants to play house and dress up with you OP, you Nancy.

[brigada]

Whats the % of players actually interested in housing? I for one couldnt care less about it

[huth]

Implying that Wildstar failed because of housing.

It certainly wasn't enough to make it succeed.

[Alyajna]

I am not a RP'er, and most of my time spent in WoW was raiding up until this xpac where the decisions on classes & progression killed my interest. I was never really for or against housing, but have wanted it myself in recent months the more I think about it.

Blizzard has an issue developing features meant to be fun or optional from the start and then mangling them into being mandatory so that their hard work isn't wasted on something no one pays attention to, as well as themeing it to the expansion of the time and not thinking in terms of permanent features. I remember when Garrisons were announced as a completely optional thing, and the original idea was that there were going to be several locations that we could pick from, there was originally supposed to be a lot more customization. I was sort of interested at the very first announcement and, as development continued I quickly lost all interest and hated them before they were even released because of what Blizzard changed them into.


I don't know why they changed their minds and morphed it into what it became, but it was not what anyone asked or asked for, and it is a very poor comparison to make to "player housing". NO, no one was going to pay attention to garrisons in the state they were in so getting people involved with them required them to make them absolutely mandatory. No one was going to pay attention to them because every bit of personality was gutted from them in favor of... I don't know what. Easier to implement, I guess. While a true housing system would take development time up-front, something Blizzard seems scared to take away from raiding, I believe that up-keep afterwards would be minimal, and provide a constant stream of things for interested players to do.


I certainly think housing could work and be very beneficial to the game. And, if it was done in the way that FFXIV does it, it could offer a way to build back up server communities as well. In FFXIV, each sever has it's own housing instance with neighborhoods of sorts in different aesthetics that has limited houses available for purchase, but each house is visible inside (if unlocked) and outside (so your yard can be decorated too). So it's not totally instanced off and feeling pointless and lonely.
You know who your neighbor is, things like that. I think part of the problem with garrisons besides total lack of customization was it being 100% instanced, the same exact thing for everyone, no one could walk by "your" garrison and know that theirs was nearby or in any way different. I would just love to be able to pick a "neighborhood" somewhere in the world, on my sever and within it's community. Not just a single house on a hill that 1000s of people share until you are inside it, then you are instanced off, alone.
And I want it to be completely optional with nothing more then achievement points tied to it, or vanity rewards. I don't want a daily quest there, I don't want raid supplies there, I don't want a mission table there, I don't want it themed for a 1-time expansion. I want something built for WoW that I can continue to put effort and time into for the rest of it's lifetime, just like my character.

It would give use for old mats throughout the world, new mats, something could be added for every profession to make/sell, another reason to go do old raids just like people do for transmog, for-fun quest throughout the world, music scrolls like the Garrison had can be added. Not everyone is going to like it and that is FINE. I still think it would be worth the development if we are going to claim WoW is a RPG game, which is the excuse they used recently for the portal rooms.

[Soon-TM]

It certainly wasn't enough to make it succeed.

A single well done feature won't save an otherwise botched game, more news at 11.

[TheRevenantHero]

How is WildStar doing these days? Oh right...

WildStar was shut down because NCSoft is fucking stupid and decided they didn't want to keep the game going despite its thriving community. But your comment is really dumb because WildStar getting shut down literally has nothing to do with housing.

[Marakesh]

No, they need bigger changes than a new side game.

[Zyky]

Everyone wants to point to Warlords of Draenor, like it was some sort of "real attempt" at a housing system. It wasn't; it was half-assed, and anyone who has even TOUCHED another MMO could look at Garrisons and see, there was zero passion behind it. Nothing about it was fun or interesting, it didn't offer any ACTUAL personal customization. Everyone's Garrisons were identical.

This just shows how bias you are. Garrisons weren't remotely identical, while short on options, you still had a variety of options to decide how you wanted to build and what perks you wanted. They attempted housing and people gave them shit for it because they never got to see other players because they just sat in their "house" all day long. Wildstar did housing too, and look where they are now, despite having an amazing game.

[Mellrod]

How so? I don't think the point of either was to be player owned housing like other MMOs have done it. None of that animal crossing or sims-style crap where you just have a space to place down collectibles and invite friends over. It's obvious Blizzard wants player-owned property to serve more of a purpose than that. To feel more connected with the world. That much is evident in Garrisons and Order Halls being integral parts of their respective expansions stories, as well as having plenty of immersive details and features that are unlocked from quest progression and serve to do different things out in the game world.

I'd rather they deviate from what other mmos have done rather than just copy/paste the same concept. Love it or hate it, Blizzard tends to enjoy putting their own twists on things, which makes for better developer instincts than following the status quo

[Claymore]

People seem very insistent on housing being easily doable in game though. I will issue a challenge.

Let us imagine that 9.0 has housing as a feature.
Try to describe it. How it would be obtained, what it would contain, where it would be located and how it would stay relevant without being used as a hub.
I will concede player housing is possible if someone can come up with a concept completely reasonable that does not fall apart under closer scrutiny.

Full disclosure: I have an idea of how it could work in my head, mostly just curious what people think the roadmap to player housing will be, since it seems so easy to some.

I'll take a stab at it.

After the end of this expansion, a few Kul Tiran or Zandalari sailors (depending on your faction, obviously) return from a long voyage at sea, having come across a series of islands. While they seem to lack any useful resources, they are said to be a paradise unto themselves. As a champion of the Horde or the Alliance, you are given one such island. However, it is stressed that it is YOUR island, and your faction cannot divert funds into helping you build it up; instead, it is a reward for your loyalty and service to your faction (obviously, this might take some twists or turns if you're on the Horde, depending how things play out).

For your first journey, you must take a boat there. However, a powerful Mage accompanies you setting up a beacon in which you can use a hearthstone to return to your island from then on.

Lore-wise, this is an extremely long and arduous journey, too far in the middle of nowhere to realistically be used as a "staging ground".

It would start out a blank island. In a perfect world, it might start out with some randomly-generated terrain, but no biggie. The island is completely barren (barring possibly a short intro quest, where you clear out some monsters living there and then tear everything down). Basically, though, it becomes a blank canvas. Just a big, mostly un-noteworthy island. You can then begin acquiring housing items, even *buildings*, to place upon your island.

Furthermore, by requesting the assistance of a powerful Shaman or Druid (thinking Thrall for Horde, Malfurion for Alliance), you can also do a couple of things:

- Change the environment. Instead of a flat landmass, you could add mountains, subtle inclines, maybe rivers -- even if they "snap-in" like LEGO pieces, it could spice things up a bit.

- Pull more land from up from the ocean. Either as part of the "main island", or even pulling up small "isles" that you could connect with via bridges of some sort (ie maybe you add a series of rocks to jump between them, or a rope bridge, or a massive stone-bridge; cool opportunity to add some personality to the place)

- Change the ground itself or type of native foliage. Maybe you want a tropical sort of beach island, or maybe you want it to look like a harsh stone pillar jutting out from the ocean. Maybe you want somethings "exotic" like Crystalsong Forest, or maybe you want something that will have autumn-colors year-round,

- Change Weather effects. Maybe you want your place in a constant state of winter, where "sand" looks more akin to snow, maybe there are suddenly blocks of ice out in the water. Or just set it to "random", where it changes daily or weekly.

- Maybe even allow you to build "caves" or "underground caverns" into your island.

In addition, you could request the assistance of a powerful Mage (maybe Jaina for Alliance, or whoever the Nightborne chick was) to let you change the "skybox", which not only gives you some cool options for the sky itself, but might also greatly affect the general lighting and atmosphere of your place.

To REALLY begin decorating, though, you might have to consider varying degrees of gold-sinks for different sort so of "Keeps" you could build. These wouldn't be mandatory, mind you, but would be the easiest way to incorporate very large, detailed buildings into your property. Maybe you could even drop gold on entire "themes", such as "I want a new Forsaken fortress, complete with small cemetary, and constant eerie moonlight that makes the water appear almost green.

I would probably add a new tradeskill (like Archaeology, where it doesn't preclude any "REAL tradeskills") that focuses on building house-items. I would actually use this in conjunction with EXISTING tradeskills. So for a simple chair, you can build it entirely with tradeskills. Something more extravagant, like a wrought-iron chair, mind require a Blacksmithing component. If you want a Nightborne-inspired chair, maybe it requires a bit of enchanting dust, and/or some ingredient found around Suramar. Truly EXTRAVAGANT items -- like entire BUILDINGS -- might require items from numerous tradeskills (ie. a bunch of stuff from Jewelcrafting, Blacksmithing, and Enchanting might let you build a magical vault, full of gold and gems).

Other ideas might include building a dock, and being able to acquire different types of ships to dock at your port (you CANNOT use them to travel; purely cosmetic, otherwise players would be OBLIGATED to have them).

PERSONALLY, I would make your island Faction-wide. I'm not opposed to having Character-specific housing by any means, but I can just see where that would eat up a *LOT* more server space. I think two houses per actively-subscribed account is still totally worth it.

All House-items should be Account-wide, however (even if some are Faction-specific to actually place).

In addition, I would say that ALL Followers and Companions you've unlocked (NPC's from both Draenor and Legion) could randomly appear on your island. No "actives and inactives" (or at least, no limitations; maybe you can simply "uninvite" NPC's you don't like). Certain house-items would cause NPC's to appear near them (ie. certain tables might spawn 3-4 NPC's randomly near them, certain buildings might randomly spawn NPC's within, etc). This has the dual effect of encouraging players to have multiple classes, to access those different Class Hall NPC's.

Or -- like many other MMO's already do -- you could simply treat NPC's as "house items" themselves, letting you place them as well. I just thought "spawning them near 'social' items" might feel a bit more organic.

If you are unsubbed for X number of days (I feel like 90 is a good number), then all of your house-items are returned to you. That way, you can ease the amount of space being used on housing by inactive players. As long as they don't LOSE anything, they would just have to "re-decorate" their island after returning.

Now, as far as "staying relevant"...

Well, it should only be as "relevant" as you are interested in it. If you honestly don't care, then just do the quest to get your island, and you never have to touch it again. I suspect a lot of players would REALLY dig it, though.

[tacoloco]

If I wanted to play The Sims, I'd play the Sims.

[rrayy]

WildStar was shut down because NCSoft is fucking stupid and decided they didn't want to keep the game going despite its thriving community. But your comment is really dumb because WildStar getting shut down literally has nothing to do with housing.

Thriving community? LOL. They shut it down because it was a money pit. If it had a thriving community it wouldn't have been losing money. Other games ahaving housing doesn't mean WoW should have it. If you want to play house The Sims -->. This is WARcraft. not Playhousecraft.

[Acidbaron]

It would have to be another feature they would have to update every expansion and seeing how they want to bring out content lighter expansions and faster to increase profits.

It's highly unlikely this will ever happen, shame the one mmo with a great and detailed system got shut down.

[minkage]

Player housing is prolly wanted by 0.2% of the current playerbase.

It was implemented in WoD in the form of the garrisons and everyone hated on them because they made capital cities and the world as a whole feel empty.

[KaPe]

Player housing is prolly wanted by 0.2% of the current playerbase.

It was implemented in WoD in the form of the garrisons and everyone hated on them because they made capital cities and the world as a whole feel empty.

Any other fact-based-statistics you have in that crystal ball of yours? You don't know how many people want housing or would use it if it was done well. No one does.

Garrisons were just lazy solution that had some basic ideas of housing without any actual depth. Customization was limited to a single statue, choosing race of guards and moving one elemental/teleport around. No shit people didn't enjoy it if Blizzard didn't put any effort into it. They half assed it then immediately abandoned it as a failure - which is a self fulfilling prophecy.

Plus replacing capital cities was because it offered self sustaining source of herbs and ores, not because of any instristic design of housing.