It's honestly baffling to me that Blizz still refuses to implement Housing

[therealstegblob]

TIL expressing my opinion and supporting it with the reasons I feel the way I do is "making an embarrassment of myself."

News flash: You're the one who tried to diminish my perspective with garbage logic. Grow up.

Grrrrrrr you use GaRbAgE lOgIc because I don’t like that it’s making me self aware of how ridiculous I’m being grrrrrr.

[Relapses]

Grrrrrrr you use GaRbAgE lOgIc because I don’t like that it’s making me self aware of how ridiculous I’m being grrrrrr.

Knock off the aLtErNaTiNg CaPs bullshit. This isn't Twitter or reddit.

You originally quoted me by trying to justify player housing by virtue of entitlement on behalf of players. As I have mentioned many times in this thread, Blizzard has many much important issues to fix in this game before player housing should be considered. It's my opinion that threads like these where people pretend that player housing is something that needs to be implemented immediately are incredibly unproductive because instead of talking about ways to make the game better, we just get page after page of players circlejerking each other about how Blizzard is stupid for not being like every other fucking MMO out there.

[infinitemeridian]

Because people in this game only care about combat and gear (and when I say gear, only bigger numbers). They could care less about immersion, player expression, customization, or sandbox / non-combat oriented activities.

And don't tell me Garrisons were housing, because they weren't. Or at least, they were housing done poorly and we should hold Blizz to a higher standard, especially when plenty of other MMOs have housing.

- - - Updated - - -

Knock off the aLtErNaTiNg CaPs bullshit. This isn't Twitter or reddit.

You originally quoted me by trying to justify player housing by virtue of entitlement on behalf of players. As I have mentioned many times in this thread, Blizzard has many much important issues to fix in this game before player housing should be considered. It's my opinion that threads like these where people pretend that player housing is something that needs to be implemented immediately are incredibly unproductive because instead of talking about ways to make the game better, we just get page after page of players circlejerking each other about how Blizzard is stupid for not being like every other fucking MMO out there.

There will always be issues with them game that are more "pressing" to fix, so that's not an argument against housing because then we'd never get anything new.

[Relapses]

There will always be issues with them game that are more "pressing" to fix, so that's not an argument against housing because then we'd never get anything new.

It's an argument against player housing when the development time necessary to make player housing work in WoW is better used fixing said pressing issues. Player housing wouldn't be something that you'd read in the patch notes between buffs to Mages and nerfs to Warlocks. It would be an extensive feature that would require a lot of effort on Blizzard's part. And much like Garrisons before, Blizzard would not be able to resist the urge to include content loops with such a feature so any form of player housing we get will ultimately have all the same problems Garrisons did.

[Ragedaug]

Would really want to know from someone that is eager to have this.

1- Could you describe what a player housing is then?
I suspect you don't actually care, as it's been described in this thread by many who are eager to have it. There's a good video linked in post 235 on Page 12 does a pretty good job explaining it.

2- What are its main feature?
That you get to customize it. (Same main feature as transmog)

3- What could make it attractive?
That you got to make it what you wanted it to be

4- How does it impact character development for a non RP player?
It doesn't. It's more for the player, not the character. Same way neither transmog or pet battles impact character development.

5- How does it benefit the game as a whole?
Gives people a thing to do when there's nothing else they way to do
Gives people a reason to want to go out into the world and farm stuff
Gives people something that reflects them.

6- How do you ensure the time and resources required to do this does not take time away from more important and urgent things that are needed in game?
I would call Blizzard on the phone and I'll be like, "don't not do the other things, especially the important and/or urgent ones". And that would ensure they also did the other things. I dunno. Maybe that would work?

- - - Updated - - -

They gave us housing, we hated it. We had our chance, they're not going to waste time on something we hate again.

I've only been playing WoW since the end of Vanilla, so maybe I missed player housing during the first part of Vanilla. Was that when they gave us player housing? I'm asking because I guess I missed it.

[Astator]

It needs to be Guild housing (village / castle / fortress) that you all contribute to build together.

Player housing would end up like garrison when everyone was alone in their own instance (boring) and reducing world interactions. No one cared about other people garrison.

[Shakana]

@otaXephon @kaminaris

Guys calm down pleaseee.
Ota: What kaminaris is saying is that blizz can't please everyone and that's why surveys would help them understand what they do right or wrong
Kami: Ota is saying that just focusing only on things people want will not please everyone regardless and it's not how it should be done

Overall ota means to say: the game could have more good things than just housing. But that blizzard always tries to make housing part of their promoting expansion/patch, so much they even made it just once and made it the center of WoD gameplay. And it was ridiculous.

[Relapses]

@otaXephon @kaminaris

Guys calm down pleaseee.
Ota: What kaminaris is saying is that blizz can't please everyone and that's why surveys would help them understand what they do right or wrong
Kami: Ota is saying that just focusing only on things people want will not please everyone regardless and it's not how it should be done

Overall ota means to say: the game could have more good things than just housing. But that blizzard always tries to make housing part of their promoting expansion/patch, so much they even made it just once and made it the center of WoD gameplay. And it was ridiculous.

I went back and added a bit about surveys in post #333. Surveys, imo, are not effective because you're only sampling a very small portion of players. Why would Blizzard need surveys when they assuredly have tools which allow them monitor every aspect of the game? Player engagement is the most important metric for WoW, especially so since it relies on a subscription-based business model. Surveys would simply skew the developers perception and potentially alienate more players than they serve to please. And again, to reiterate my position, while I don't necessarily agree with Blizzard designing the game solely around engagement data I do understand why they do so. (The alternative is fewer people playing WoW.)

[Shakana]

I went back and added a bit about surveys in post #333. Surveys, imo, are not effective because you're only sampling a very small portion of players. Why would Blizzard need surveys when they assuredly have tools which allow them monitor every aspect of the game? Player engagement is the most important metric for WoW, especially so since it relies on a subscription-based business model. Surveys would simply skew the developers perception and potentially alienate more players than they serve to please. To reiterate, however, I don't necessarily agree with Blizzard designing the game solely around engagement data but I understand why they do so. (The alternative is fewer people playing WoW.)

I think that is good for them to gather data of what is more appealing. Because let's be real, blizzard wants to sell their game, they need to know what pushes others to play, but how they do it, it can come in many forms. But i wouldn't trust forums to do so. As i wouldn't suggest for people to ask every damn thing they think of.
I think the idea of "what is pleasing to you" that it doesn't exist yet, it's very subjective. If instead they have something they implemented and it has not been very welcoming they should understand this is a sign that they should drop it.
Once housing already have been tried, they did it wrong, next time if they try making it again, try to make it not related with the gameplay at all.
Surverys should be done this way: They have like 3 ideas, on a brainstorm, and they don't know what would work better, they would make a survey to see what would be better.
And not a survey to like "what do you like and what you don't like". - I think also they have those tools to understand what is not being good to have on the game. Subscriptions can mean way more than a post on a forum or a survey.

[Ragedaug]

It needs to be Guild housing (village / castle / fortress) that you all contribute to build together.

Player housing would end up like garrison when everyone was alone in their own instance (boring) and reducing world interactions. No one cared about other people garrison.

Folks wouldn't be spending all their time in their with no game play value.

[kaminaris]

You're suggesting that surveys -- which would only gather feedback from a small demographic of players -- are somehow more pertinent than actual engagement data Blizzard is able to collect from their game. I'm saying that Blizzard doesn't need to survey its audience because they already have tools that gauge what does or doesn't work within WoW. I'm not saying that every decision they make based off of the information they gleam from this engagement data is correct (or even good for the game) but I am saying that surveys are an inherently weaker method of gathering feedback.



There is no majority in this game. I feel like I've typed this out in a number of posts replying to you but WoW is many different things to many different types of players. There isn't any one feature that a majority of players will or will not like and as such it is pointless for Blizzard to try to design the game this way. You are literally advocating game design by democracy and that simply cannot work in WoW because of its broad appeal. Moreover, since this is not getting drastically off-topic, once more, player housing is not the panacea this game needs.

Surveys would gather a lot better and 1000% more quality feedback than from small amount of forum screechers. And a LOT better than statistical data.

Lets assume 3M of players. Send survey to 20% of playerbase, even if 2% of players responds it that is still 12 000 surveys done.
A lot more than trying to figure out what people want from forum shitposting.

AND blizzard can say - guys we are asking you each month, and only 2% of you responds so don't blame us, we ARE trying to communicate.

Engagement data is (almost) USELESS. Slap big rewards on island expeditions like tons of mounts pets and even high ilvl gear and suddenly it will become most liked feature according to engagement data.

This is not how do you check if player likes certain features.

Doing something is NOT the same as liking it. Otherwise cleaning the house would become top past time activity.

[psyquest]

Been playing since day 1 vanilla. I dont see player housing as even remotely interesting. I dont like anything ressembling garrisons or quests tables shit.

I just see this as ressource hogs that serve no game purpose, sorry to be frank.

I rather blizz spent ressources in:
adding a new class
adding a third spec to demon hunters
reintroducing class sets
adding class quests mage tower like
making classes more distinct and balanced
reintroducing lost abilities and talents and adding way more to each class
making pvp more attractif
making high end pve more welcoming to new players
making game systems less cumbersome requiring a third party website to sims your toon.

just my take.

[Naiattavain]

blizzard is a bunch of lazy sons of bitches.. they could do as better job but they don't.

[Relapses]

Surveys would gather a lot better and 1000% more quality feedback than from small amount of forum screechers. And a LOT better than statistical data.

Lets assume 3M of players. Send survey to 20% of playerbase, even if 2% of players responds it that is still 12 000 surveys done.
A lot more than trying to figure out what people want from forum shitposting.

AND blizzard can say - guys we are asking you each month, and only 2% of you responds so don't blame us, we ARE trying to communicate.

Engagement data is (almost) USELESS. Slap big rewards on island expeditions like tons of mounts pets and even high ilvl gear and suddenly it will become most liked feature according to engagement data.

This is not how do you check if player likes certain features.

Doing something is NOT the same as liking it. Otherwise cleaning the house would become top past time activity.

You act as if Blizzard must act on the whims of the playerbase. I'm sorry dude, but developers absolutely NEED the ability to tell the community to fuck off so they can design the game the way they feel is best. And when you have a community as divided into tiny segments as WoW's is, surveys would only serve to upset more people than they'd please. There is no easy solution to WoW's many issues but surveys are not a magic eight-ball that will cure its ailments. It would only make it worse.

- - - Updated - - -

Also, surveys would be full of responses like this:

blizzard is a bunch of lazy sons of bitches.. they could do as better job but they don't.

...which does absolutely nothing for Blizzard as a developer. "Do better" is not good feedback.

[kaminaris]

You act as if Blizzard must act on the whims of the playerbase. I'm sorry dude, but developers absolutely NEED the ability to tell the community to fuck off so they can design the game the way they feel is best. And when you have a community as divided into tiny segments as WoW's is, surveys would only serve to upset more people than they'd please. There is no easy solution to WoW's many issues but surveys are not a magic eight-ball that will cure its ailments. It would only make it worse.

- - - Updated - - -

Also, surveys would be full of responses like this:



...which does absolutely nothing for Blizzard as a developer. "Do better" is not good feedback.

They are doing it like this currently, does it work? No. Sorry but that is a mindset of 2000y. Software development went much further ahead.
I have been working for like 5 international companies and collecting user feedback is 180 degree different from what blizzard represents.

Basically each customer feedback is taken pretty seriously meaning it is reviewed, combined with other similar feedbacks, converted to stories or like we we used to call it "cases". Sent to project manager then converted to task and sent to developer.

You are completely and utterly wrong about surveys. Surveys are not meant to ask customers what they want. To properly make survey questions you need to figure out the way to ask customers (apes) how to make your product better. Without actually asking that specific question.

And to do so, you ask smart questions like:
1. What do you like most in feature A - predefined answers
2. What you dislike the most in feature B - predefined answers
and similar questions like this.

Using data from couple of surveys you can identify what causes people to be upset the most and what pleases them the most. Then you devise a plan how to design you game to be able to make sense of it, and complete features within the timeframe.

This process is called a feedback loop.

It is much much more valuable data than pure statistics.

Right now we have NO viable and sensible way to relay our feedback.

[Relapses]

They are doing it like this currently, does it work? No. Sorry but that is a mindset of 2000y. Software development went much further ahead.
I have been working for like 5 international companies and collecting user feedback is 180 degree different from what blizzard represents.

Basically each customer feedback is taken pretty seriously meaning it is reviewed, combined with other similar feedbacks, converted to stories or like we we used to call it "cases". Sent to project manager then converted to task and sent to developer.

You are completely and utterly wrong about surveys. Surveys are not meant to ask customers what they want. To properly make survey questions you need to figure out the way to ask customers (apes) how to make your product better. Without actually asking that specific question.

And to do so, you ask smart questions like:
1. What do you like most in feature A - predefined answers
2. What you dislike the most in feature B - predefined answers
and similar questions like this.

Using data from couple of surveys you can identify what causes people to be upset the most and what pleases them the most. Then you devise a plan how to design you game to be able to make sense of it, and complete features within the timeframe.

This process is called a feedback loop.

It is much much more valuable data than pure statistics.

Right now we have NO viable and sensible way to relay our feedback.

Perhaps this works in your field of software development but as a developer you should be able to understand that what works for one developer may not work for all developers. You keep saying that Blizzard needs to look at feedback then iterate from it. The issue with an approach like that in WoW is that Blizzard would be getting all sorts of different (often conflicting) feedback from every segment of the population. There's no way to iterate on such feedback when moving the bar in any direction has the potential to isolate people on other ends of the spectrum. (For example, making the game more casual-focused would please people who do WQs but alienate those who enjoy hardcore raiding. Conversely, focusing strictly on raiding, a la WoD, is equally detrimental.) Blizzard is left in a difficult position where I'm sure they want to innovate and change but the fact that they've broadened the game to include so many different kinds of players somewhat hamstrings their ability to do so. The best solution is exactly what we've seen happen over the last few expansions: New systems are introduced, Blizzard evaluates feedback then in turn either continues to expand on the system or they scrap it and try something new. I don't think this is the best possible approach but I do think it's the only approach they can take without inadvertently ruining the game for certain segments of its population.

[Claymore]

1- Could you describe what a player housing is then?
2- What are its main feature?
3- What could make it attractive?
4- How does it impact character developement for a non RP player?
5- How does it benefit the game as a whole?
6- How do you ensure the time and ressources required to do this does not take time away from more important and urgent things that are needed in game?

Would really want to know from someone that is eager to have this.

Absolutely!

1. Player housing is essentially a blank canvas (either a generic building, or even just a blank parcel of land) in which players can create a space that says something of themselves or their character. Be it a large stronghold, a cozy little cabin in the woods, or a series of tents with string-lights, it would be a space that players create for themselves, showcasing some aspect of their personality, much like Transmog.

2. This is difficult to layout, because Housing systems vary quite wildly between games. Some have pre-made homes with "hooks" or "slots" to put "house items" into. Those could be anything from couches and tables, to more creative options like mounts, creatures, NPC's -- whatever you can think of. I personally consider "WildStar Online", a now defunct game, to have set the gold-standard for what an amazing Housing system could be.

3. Much like Transmogging, it's really just another outlet for creativity. While WildStar is probably MUCH more ambitious than I think Blizzard would be, I think this video showcases how much variety and creativity this sort of system would bring to the game (as a point of context; the place literally started out at a flat square of land floating in the sky):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pk8Gkq4enjY

4. Much like transmogging, it doesn't really "impact" the game, so much as adds something to interact with. For some, it might be a compelling new feature that inspires them to pick the game back up; for others, it might just be something they fool around with when they're waiting for a raid to start or queue to pop. For players who don't care or want to interact with it, they lose nothing.

5. It would give a pretty meaningful gameplay loop again. Many players forget that transmogging *TRANSFORMED* the entire game when it was implemented. It single-handedly brought old-school raids back to relevance (besides those that dropped mounts, which I'm sure were still being run). For myself, it gave me a ton of stuff to do when I wasn't raiding. I would often log onto WoW and *find* new transmog items to hunt down, across each of my classes. Problem is, eventually you just run out of stuff to collect (or at least, can collect *solo*), or like me, you eventually feel like "I already have all the coolest stuff". A Housing system means an all-new type of items to hunt, be it solo or as an additional type of reward for every form of content. Imagine 5 years from now, seeing some cool Throne in some dude's house, and saying "Oh snap, that could only come from killing The Jailor on Mythic and Ahead of the Curve!!!".

6. Fact is, all resources are finite. Now, artists aren't exactly in charge of class-balance or designing raid encounters, but yes, technically speaking this would take some resources that theoretically could be put towards other content (unless they just hired all-new people to work on Housing... which isn't a terrible idea, since they could likely snap up some of the former WildStar devs). That's always going to be true of literally anything that goes into a game, though. I don't think it's a compelling argument *not* to implement new features. It just comes down to "is this the BEST new feature that Blizzard could bring to the game?". Personally, I think that it is. But I'm also not the one managing the WoW Dev team, so it's obviously not my call to make.

[Sarkli83]

Again Blizzard attempted a form of "housing" in WoD. It wasnt that great. Could it be done again, sure but be careful what you wish for. It would be interesting if it actually was good and had full on customization from things collected in the world like Wildstar. All in all it's a good idea but a rendition of it has been tried before and was rather lackluster so seeing how Blizz does like to reuse things I foresee a similar suckfest if a new one was developed.

[Kokolums]

The only way I've seen anything close to housing or player-designed content work well is a wax museum. The wax museum idea was that, if you accomplished something great, you got a statue of yourself placed in the museum. This statue could be raided for loot. You also got the design the loot table. As more people accomplished things, the museum got bigger and bigger and became a raid event.

[chaoticcrono]

blizz knows what all the fun stuff in the game is.... they constantly remove it.

if they just did the opposite of what they did now the game would improve greatly...

Sadly its all about milking this cow.

Housing could be done fairly easily... just give us a variety of assets we can use to build our own homes and have trophy mounts and armor stands etc.

the game is largely a collectathon for a lot of people so giving us a place to show off our collection makes a lot of sense.