Here's how to do player housing

[loras]

Based on the utter savagery I've seen in FFXIV's housing market, based on the number of people who demand that things last available nearly two decades ago, to the point some players weren't even born when they were originally made available, no longer ever be made available, based on the fact housing in WoW has been requested ever since Vanilla, based on the number of people who insisted Mage Tower never return....

Yes. There is absolutely a market for this.

Housing taps into that social community aspect of WoW which, frankly, is something that always needs a bit of a boost given the absolute hits its had, along with prospects for hitting the collector and raiding community. Its basically another outlet for people to express themselves in the game and go "This is mine". Its ultimately as pointless to the overall game as transmog, character customisation, or having different mount appearances, sure, but its something for people to go "This is My Character". Another way for folks to be expressive and get immersed in the game. Plus, well, you can go and look at the Dark Ranger threads to see how much just a minor skin can mean to people.

Its ultimately an immersion thing. Immersion's a big reason why Boralus and Dazar'alor are considered better cities than the donut that is Oribus. Just a reason for people to play a bit longer. Pointless if all people care about is clearing mythics, but it gives them something to do outside of that

Fair enough.
Also that bit i marked is gold in itself, worthy of a signature.

[OMGTwitchTV]

Well, I've never heard anything about housing in SWTOR, and after seeing so many mentions of it in this thread, I will definitely take an interest in their implementation, but in principle, we have already discussed this issue here locally and probably more than once.
It was nothing more than a sly figure of speech to put link at my post

Oh I would never suggest leaving permanently to play another game. My example was only intended to illustrate the possibilities which Blizz fails to go after. In SWTOR, you have to spend millions of credits (gold) to buy your Stronghold and then billions more to decorate them. Also, they have their Cartel Market (WoW's in game shop) where decos and deco bundles are sold in exchange for CCs (Cartel Coins) which are earned in small amounts each month for subscribers, or can be bought from 500-10000 at a time for real cash and then used to purchase these items from their market. Blizz could DOUBLE their profit potential by adding a similar system. If it took 100k gold to buy your apartment, or 1M gold to buy a house, Token sales would go through the roof. Then, just like SWTOR, make some decos drop in Dungeons, Raid, and open world (like gear) and the rest would be sold in their cash shop for real money. Some of the player housing could cost as little as $100, or other may spend upwards into the thousands to get everything they want. I know in SWTOR, I have spent more than $70 billion credits buying all of my strongholds and decorating them. Plus, they could introduce a new in game profession:

"Craftsman" - can chop down trees to use as a resource together with specific cloths, dyes, and threads to build furniture for player housing.

If only they would get creative, their cash cow could yield more money than Wrath with 12M subs.

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They should sacrifice all the raid wings. Turns out only a 5th of the playerbase does them anyway. Imagine spending that much of your development time on a game mode that most of your customers won't even do.

Well, if Garrisons, Class Halls, and Covenants had worked out better we wouldn't ask for it. Literally all they have to do is what they did in Classic with the Champion's Hall.



This one spot in Old Town near SI:7 and the Warrior Barracks had a portal for a doorway, much the same way Scholomance still does. All they have to do is replace ANY closed door in a major city with a "portal door" and put some basic decorations from the Inn inside. No new art cause it can literally be a copy/paste of a small inn, with a portal for the door. Only difference is, it is tied to the same software as the Garrison which only you can see until your party member selected "View Leader's Garrison" which would now replace the word Garrison with Apartment.

Really just sick and tired of the old "it would cost us a raid tier" whine/meme when there is zero new art or programming needed other than unlocking a door and pasting another interior inside. Not that tough, but the raiders and elitists of the game would all have a stroke if Blizz did anything that took away from the precious content they log in one hour a week to run vs something everyone could use at their leisure and RPers would use non-stop because they don't unsub unlike the Queue Heroes of Oribos.

[Echo of Soul]

Oh I would never suggest leaving permanently to play another game. My example was only intended to illustrate the possibilities which Blizz fails to go after. In SWTOR, you have to spend millions of credits (gold) to buy your Stronghold and then billions more to decorate them. Also, they have their Cartel Market (WoW's in game shop) where decos and deco bundles are sold in exchange for CCs (Cartel Coins) which are earned in small amounts each month for subscribers, or can be bought from 500-10000 at a time for real cash and then used to purchase these items from their market. Blizz could DOUBLE their profit potential by adding a similar system. If it took 100k gold to buy your apartment, or 1M gold to buy a house, Token sales would go through the roof. Then, just like SWTOR, make some decos drop in Dungeons, Raid, and open world (like gear) and the rest would be sold in their cash shop for real money. Some of the player housing could cost as little as $100, or other may spend upwards into the thousands to get everything they want. I know in SWTOR, I have spent more than $70 billion credits buying all of my strongholds and decorating them. Plus, they could introduce a new in game profession:

"Craftsman" - can chop down trees to use as a resource together with specific cloths, dyes, and threads to build furniture for player housing.

If only they would get creative, their cash cow could yield more money than Wrath with 12M subs.

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Well, if Garrisons, Class Halls, and Covenants had worked out better we wouldn't ask for it. Literally all they have to do is what they did in Classic with the Champion's Hall.



This one spot in Old Town near SI:7 and the Warrior Barracks had a portal for a doorway, much the same way Scholomance still does. All they have to do is replace ANY closed door in a major city with a "portal door" and put some basic decorations from the Inn inside. No new art cause it can literally be a copy/paste of a small inn, with a portal for the door. Only difference is, it is tied to the same software as the Garrison which only you can see until your party member selected "View Leader's Garrison" which would now replace the word Garrison with Apartment.

Really just sick and tired of the old "it would cost us a raid tier" whine/meme when there is zero new art or programming needed other than unlocking a door and pasting another interior inside. Not that tough, but the raiders and elitists of the game would all have a stroke if Blizz did anything that took away from the precious content they log in one hour a week to run vs something everyone could use at their leisure and RPers would use non-stop because they don't unsub unlike the Queue Heroes of Oribos.

We need to start saying "fine, sacrifice a raid tier. Almost nobody raids anyway"

[Relapses]

We need to start saying "fine, sacrifice a raid tier. Almost nobody raids anyway"

If you want to get laughed out of any conversation you enter, that's a good strategy.

[Echo of Soul]

If you want to get laughed out of any conversation you enter, that's a good strategy.

By 1/5 of the people OMEGALUL

[Relapses]

By 1/5 of the people OMEGALUL

It is impossibly arrogant to assume four out of five players would be fine with tossing away one of the core foundations of WoW's content loop just so they can get player housing.

[Jinpachi]

You weren't -- but other people in the thread were which is why I made the comment I did. I'm well aware of the opt-in nature of the bad parts of capitalism. It's all death by a thousand cuts as developers push the envelope with what players will or will not pay for. And once they realize they can get away with it, they push the envelope ever-so-slightly further. WoW started with a subscription fee, something which is kind of fucked up in the first place. Then it added a store. Then it added the token. Then it added the ability to exchange the token for Battle.net balance. And now, here we are in 2022 with players pitching player housing with one of its benefits being, "think of all the store revenue it'll bring in!"

I digress. I'm not here to debate the pros and cons of capitalism. I think you took my first response which was pure sarcasm maybe a bit too seriously; but I did want to touch on it because it is worth discussing.

There's no better alternative

[pahbi]

It is impossibly arrogant to assume four out of five players would be fine with tossing away one of the core foundations of WoW's content loop just so they can get player housing.

If Blizz was some small independent company, then the premise that housing would cost other content would be a valid concern.

Blizz is a billion dollar company, I'm pretty sure they could muster the resources to have housing without sacrificing other content.

At the end of the day I would say the only reason we don't have housing is bean counters in the company analyzed the cost and decided not to do it.

[Lochton]

If Blizz was some small independent company, then the premise that housing would cost other content would be a valid concern.

Blizz is a billion dollar company, I'm pretty sure they could muster the resources to have housing without sacrificing other content.

At the end of the day I would say the only reason we don't have housing is bean counters in the company analyzed the cost and decided not to do it.

Well, they have admitted that the biggest problem is their engine. They just don't have the ability yet to implement such a method as players being able to be in charge of placements of assets within such a size. No small independent company is running on as old an engine as WoW, even LOTRO's is newer yet the game looks older now.

[Relapses]

If Blizz was some small independent company, then the premise that housing would cost other content would be a valid concern.

Blizz is a billion dollar company, I'm pretty sure they could muster the resources to have housing without sacrificing other content.

At the end of the day I would say the only reason we don't have housing is bean counters in the company analyzed the cost and decided not to do it.

I touched on it on the first page of this thread but I think it has more to do with Blizzard not wanting to spend a bunch of development time on a feature that ultimately isn't engaged with widely. Less the bean counters and more that a feature like this goes against Blizzard's MO.

[Lochton]

I touched on it on the first page of this thread but I think it has more to do with Blizzard not wanting to spend a bunch of development time on a feature that ultimately isn't engaged with widely. Less the bean counters and more that a feature like this goes against Blizzard's MO.

The audience of housing might even be bigger than Mythic raiding, we don't know. Mythic raiding is a minority group just like Roleplaying is, but we have seen in other games that it isn't only Roleplayers who do housing.

[Relapses]

The audience of housing might even be bigger than Mythic raiding, we don't know. Mythic raiding is a minority group just like Roleplaying is, but we have seen in other games that it isn't only Roleplayers who do housing.

While correct, I don't think that means that we should be making arguments that we should intentionally make the experience of parts of the playerbase worse just because there's an idea that one section of the playerbase is larger than the other. That's mostly what I was trying to argue against in my reply to @Echo of Souls.

[Lochton]

While correct, I don't think that means that we should be making arguments that we should intentionally make the experience of parts of the playerbase worse just because there's an idea that one section of the playerbase is larger than the other. That's mostly what I was trying to argue against in my reply to @Echo of Souls.

True but having housing doesn't make another player base's experience worse but we can come to an agreement that the existence of a sacrifice is needed to make people update an engine (again) with its source code being over two decades old, which is a highly plausible thing.

[Relapses]

True but having housing doesn't make another player base's experience worse but we can come to an agreement that the existence of a sacrifice is needed to make people update an engine (again) with its source code being over two decades old, which is a highly plausible thing.

I've been pretty staunchly against player housing because of the whole "it'll cost a raid tier" argument in the past but I do agree that if Blizzard can find a way to do it that doesn't impact other areas of the game or ultimately require it to be an expansion defining feature then I have no problems with it.

[Vonazak]

Phased housing is not player housing.

Give me something like the houses in Última Online.

[Moggers1990]

First, it has to be implemented in the subtlest of ways.

- Ponder an inn in a major city, ThunderBluff, Darnassus.
- Now, for example Stormwind. Imagine simply walking upstairs into a phased room. And that's it.
- Outside a window, you can see players on the patio below. But, all it is is a room.
- The player literally enters a small room with the design of that major city.
- Adjust the phasing so a Night Elf of Darnassus could have a view of the Commons area in Ironforge.
- The player can have their own book shelfs which is a visual for achievements, they can actually click on a bed to sleep on for resting experience.
- They can have banners on the wall, rugs, etc.
- This could affect many elements of the game: guilds, auction house, mailing.
- armor rack (affecting gear durability)

- Unlike (or like) garrisons, there is no customization of the building itself. That's inheritant to the city. No new textures, just those of the city.
- In this way, they're not isolating.
- It would bring races to their inheritent cities, also remember its phased.
- Most importantly, is that its a subtle addition.
- Less is more. Adding small features at the start and eventually adding some more.
- It could work as an integral part of the game if done right but not overdone.
- Not isolating players but expanding this always thought about place thats never been implemented and needs to the right way.

I genuinely struggle to even think of a reason for player "housing" to exist. Don't people want the game to be more social? As in, people reminisce about the crowds in Ironforge and Orgrimmar, this negatively affects that.

And what do you even do with your "player house/room"? Go stand in there, looking at your achievements? Sit AFK in there instead of sitting in one of the cities? It is literally a pointless addition to the game. Also nowadays at max level you spend 90% of your time in a raid, dungeon or arena, the other 10% is either out in the world or sat AFK while you go for a shit.

I'd much rather people populated a city, not some "patio" outside a window you can look out of and see people running about every now and then that you can't even interact with.

I don't know a single person who would enjoy player housing, of any kind. The argument of "why not remove a raid tier for player housing because only a fifth of the player base raids" has come up in this thread, and I bet you even less of the player base would use player housing outside of the first week before they realise it's utterly pointless.

[The Stormbringer]

I would much rather see Guild Housing, where you can have a whole guild of people running around at the same time, with various amenities, cosmetics, and features that you everyone can work towards. Like Garrison Resources, only everyone contributes in several different ways, like raw mats, gold, dailies, tokens from raids or dungeons, completing PvP objectives, etcetera. If you really want to go the whole mile, make it into a big ship or airship that can be parked in different areas, or move around and do some sort of guild vs. guild combat.

[pahbi]

I would much rather see Guild Housing, where you can have a whole guild of people running around at the same time, with various amenities, cosmetics, and features that you everyone can work towards. Like Garrison Resources, only everyone contributes in several different ways, like raw mats, gold, dailies, tokens from raids or dungeons, completing PvP objectives, etcetera. If you really want to go the whole mile, make it into a big ship or airship that can be parked in different areas, or move around and do some sort of guild vs. guild combat.

Guild housing would be amazing.

[OMGTwitchTV]

We need to start saying "fine, sacrifice a raid tier. Almost nobody raids anyway"

I mean, We're down from 12M to what? 2.5M? Your statement is accurate.

[rrayy]

If Blizz was some small independent company, then the premise that housing would cost other content would be a valid concern.

Blizz is a billion dollar company, I'm pretty sure they could muster the resources to have housing without sacrificing other content.

At the end of the day I would say the only reason we don't have housing is bean counters in the company analyzed the cost and decided not to do it.

The devs are still given a budget that they must adhere to. So, let's stop this tired nonsense now.

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Here's how to do player housing.

Copy Wildstar.

Good idea, copy a game that died.