Thread: Housing Improvements on the Way!

Well I got all excited when I saw the announcment today about the next game update coming out soon, but there is no mention of houseing changes. Super bummer, so many great ideas in this thread and still no changes to houseing.

If I missed it please point me to the annoucnemnt about hoseing changes.

Originally Posted by sgttoe

Well I got all excited when I saw the announcment today about the next game update coming out soon, but there is no mention of houseing changes. Super bummer, so many great ideas in this thread and still no changes to houseing.

If I missed it please point me to the annoucnemnt about hoseing changes.

I did not see any while I was playing on Bullroarer.

It does not look like there was any housing updates. I bet there are some new decorations. I have not seen them.

Originally Posted by Yula_the_Mighty

I did not see any while I was playing on Bullroarer.

It does not look like there was any housing updates. I bet there are some new decorations. I have not seen them.

Weeelll, did they not mention in some diary or interview somewhere that three things they were looking to change were radiance, LIs, and housing? Radiance and LIs are down... maybe housing is coming up after this update.

/hopeless optimist

Sadly the only way housing will ever get any kind of update is if they can put a LOTRO Store button on your house. It just seems that all of the updates are driven by the store now.

Originally Posted by CGDrakken

Sadly the only way housing will ever get any kind of update is if they can put a LOTRO Store button on your house. It just seems that all of the updates are driven by the store now.

Housing will be updated, I believe. Sapience said that they are working on it, but there is no time frame for when it will be done. Housing is a prime candidate for Store fodder. There are already a million things related to housing they could add to the store: maintenance payments, chests, furniture, etc. And if they're smart they could add a lot of new features that are purchasable through the store, like multiple houses or additions to your house like extra wings or stables. I can't believe they wouldn't tap into that potential for making more money. It will probably just take them a good amount of time if they want to do it right.

I don't like the feeling, but somehow tying up expansions to the LOTRO Store will end up like paying ransom to Tom Nook in Animal Crossing. I like the idea of having extra storage, and having your horse showing outside when you're in the house. Come to think about, wouldn't it be cool also to turn on the lights when it has people inside? That way the neighbors will know when to visit.

Originally Posted by keithherzog

One thing I would like to see added in the housing areas is a pub

Hear, Hear! And I'll buy the next round for the person who submitted this request!!

I fully agree that housing is prime store fodder, but I must admit I have mixed feelings about this.


Hopefully They Do This Carefully:

While this fact can bring hope, as it means it's something turbine will have to address at some point, it could also bring misfortue. I like turbine profitting just as much as anybody else, they deserve it. They have made a great game and there is no other ftp like it out there at this time. However if they lean on the store too much it can ruin the feeling of freedom the game carries.

I have many bad experices with housing from other gaming companies, and I am sure I'm not the only one. Gems or some likewise items costing TP and being needed to upkeep your house would be in poor taste and I hope the staff is wise enough to realize this. One of the great marvels that brings LOTRO, and thus turbine, its funds is that everything feels within reach. You can earn your way in this game, and it's a great feeling. It sets turbine apart from others.

While much of the higher end content does require the store, you don't feel cheated if you can't afford it. It's worth getting, but you can move on without it. And in light of that, there seems to be a sense of graditude. Many have felt that a small purchase here or there couldn't hurt. In my case for example, all my real life friends who play this game pooled money together and helped each other buy moria. This is something we've never done in such a unifed fashion before, especially for an online game, and we did it because we didn't feel pushed. We each spent each cash to support this game, and are quite interested in it's survival.


Considerations:

I for one very much look forward to a remodel of the housing system, as this has been something that has bothered me quite a bit. It seems like a lot of unused poteinal. I just hope this remodel does not come at the expense of this sense of community between the player and the company. I also hope they keep us posted. I help serveral people with homes from time to time, and so any data on changes would be of special note to me.

Also it would be a horrible shock to some folks if they got sent out on duty and returned to find the house they had was not cared for and their items gone because some changes had occurred while they were away.. so as changes are made, it might be best to be mindful of who has what permissions, and make an effort to preserve them if possible.


Some Refinements:

I support the idea of a crafting mechaism of some sort in these neighborhoods. Like a vast majority of other players, I buy my mats in these zones, where they are cheapest.. but am then forced to port or run to the nearest town just to make what I had in mind. This back and forth manner simply does not appear streamlined, and is a huge waste of player time. Whatever they decide on this, I imagine there must be some sort of reasonable comprimise that can be made.

And if nothing else, permissions for each chest would be a god send! When I was first learning about housing chests, I thought that my friend was joking when he said chest permissons had to be "all or nothing."

I'm not convinced that having crafting stations inside the housing instances is such a good idea. It would be very convenient, I agree with that, but this is supposed to be a game with a strong social intereactive element, so to my mind we should be rubbing shoulders at the public crafting areas with players who haven't bought a house.

Apart from that I really only have one specific gripe with housing, the hook system. I only have one house on one server, a deluxe hobbit house. It has a huge main room with a couple of hooks in the center and the rest of the hooks in that room near or on the walls. I'm not someone who wants to fill the entire room with items, but the current hook system is so inflexible.

If I could I'd also make one other change to housing. De-instance the vendor part of the neighbourhood and only have the actual houses instanced. Doing that would require redesigning the entire neighbourhood layout and some people won't be happy about that, but the idea is to have a common area that everyone in the same housing zone uses. If I go into the neighbourhood where my house is and use a vendor there, and someone else goes to a different neighbourhood in the same zone to use the vendors there, we never see each other, we never have the opportunity to interact unless we cross paths at the instance entry. By having a single common area that all people have access to, the opportunities to interact with each other are increased. Doing that may also free up some resources on the servers since they won't have to run multiple copies of the same NPC's and landscape because having 10 people in 10 different housing instances won't cause 10 seperate sets of the same NPC's to be active at the same time.

A Layered Space In An Already Layered Place?

I think the reason NPC's are currently in the instanced areas of the nieghborhoods is that although it hits resources more, it's easier to handle from a dev stand point. If the NPC area is shared across each of the different housing neighborhoods (ie hobbit, elf, man, ect) then it would need a layered set up so as to avoid over crowding. This is why such areas work elsewhere.

But so close to the neighborhoods, such a set up is redundant. You already have instances that must be layered, and these are set up. Opening the NPC zone to a shared space just adds extra work, and doesn't use what is already available. As you said, you'd have to rework the whole space rather than adding an NPC or other system that simply moves someone to a location.

Also this would not solve the "rubbing shoulders with those without a house" issue. It sounds like your concerns are partly rooted in the need for a gathering place, and the dead nature of neighborhoods. While I'm not sure how this issue could be resolved, I can comment on the sense that you never run into folks.



Housing Graveyards:

As it currently stands, if a person does not pay upkeep on a house they bought, their stuff is soon move to escrow where it sits for a set time. If they still do not pick these items up, nor pay upkeep, their housing items vanish entirely, but the house is still theirs. Meaning that anyone who just stops playing for whatever reason leaves behind an empty unusable lot, no matter how long they've been gone.

This not only makes neighborhoods look less appealing, but slowly turns housing areas into grave yards. I'm not sure if it was an over sight or not, but what it boils down to is that a person must hit "abandon house" before it goes up on the market again. Many of the homes that get taken by players are standard homes.. the very same ones most people trade out of in time.

No matter how careful you are, someone will come along, not pay upkeep, and your area is soon filled with people who don't even log in. Blank yards soon dot the land.



Kinships Are Just A Name:

I might have an awesome kin that helps each other, parties together often, and just has lots of fun. But my kin home will always get left behind and soon it might as well be a ghost town. There is no reason to gather at these neighborhoods, and these places are no exception. The kin homes certainly don't feel like headquaters. The "special decorations" are anything but.. they are limited, and do nothing. Same with much of the other stuff. Why spend time here when you could be leveling, or a number of other things? All in all, it's a boring place.

Even if my kin did like the neighborhoods, as they traded out homes, they'd have to leave the zone for another. Say I pre-plan a whole neighborhood, and if we all pay for assigned houses, who's to say a week from now all those people will still be in the kin at all? If so, what of those living in basics? Where will they go afterward? What if I grow in size? Any of these factors mean I can't even think of moblizing my kin in this fashion.

The way kinships are handled in the housing system leaves much to be desired, and frankly, does nothing to aid in a sense of community.. which is something this game is supposed to about!



Overview:

I feel so strange whenever I see that the "nieghbor" NPCs are more active than my fellow players. Neighborhoods should be places to meet and greet your fellows and have fun together. A social place away from all the mindless grinding that brings community back.. not something that hinders it.

Kins should feel welcome there, and it should be natural to spend some down time doing something together in the kin homes. Neighborhoods should feel more like, well, a nieghborhood. People need to have a reason to come here should they desire to. Hobbits kick back at home, why can't we?

These places should have a natural flow to them. Folks visiting each other, fishing and the like. Please no more foreclosures running rampant through the streets. That's just bad for everyone. Neighborhoods don't have to be kept barren just to protect the towns. Done right, there will still be plenty of reasons to visit these hubs. I mean, I don't see an AH going just anywhere. lol

I have to say I was really hopeful why I saw this topic line. SO much needs to be fixed in housing here.
Things that should be fixed right away include:
1. Remove ALL hooks! Period
2. Add many times the number of items a home inside and out, can have relative to the size of a home.
3. Add quest and vendors who sell items for homes.
4. Add recipes for craftsmen to make things. Let Tailors make couches, beds, rugs, wall hangings, banners. Jewelers make paintings, art objects and statues. Armorsmiths make iron braziers, fireplaces, stoves, pots and pans, cutlery. Woodcrafters make beds, tables, carts, book cases, dressers. Cooks make plateable food, cupboards of foodstuffs.
5. Remove the escrow and loss if items to accounts. Place a lockout on home until back rent is paid. House on an account should be saved.
6. Allow the items to be increased or decreased in size and rotated on axis within reason.
7. Allow items to be placed on items and in items.

That should be a good start!

Galadolor, the Minstrel of the Rock

Originally Posted by Maholix

A Layered Space In An Already Layered Place?

I think the reason NPC's are currently in the instanced areas of the nieghborhoods is that although it hits resources more, it's easier to handle from a dev stand point. If the NPC area is shared across each of the different housing neighborhoods (ie hobbit, elf, man, ect) then it would need a layered set up so as to avoid over crowding. This is why such areas work elsewhere.

But so close to the neighborhoods, such a set up is redundant. You already have instances that must be layered, and these are set up. Opening the NPC zone to a shared space just adds extra work, and doesn't use what is already available. As you said, you'd have to rework the whole space rather than adding an NPC or other system that simply moves someone to a location.

I didn't mean a single housing vendor area for all neighbourhoods in all zones, I meant one single vendor area for each zone. One set of vendors for the Shire neighbourhoods, one set of vendors for the Bree neighbourhoods, one set of vendors for the Celondim neighbourhoods, etc. If you have a house in the Shire, you go to the housing vendors in the Shire, and from that location you can enter the neighbourhood instance your house is in. It's basically reversing the current setup. In the current system we go to the instance entrance, and once we're inside the instance we go to the vendors in that instance. My way, the vendor locations are part of the relular landscape, outside the neighbourhood instances. We would go to the vendors who are part of the normal landscape, and the entrance to the neighbourhood instances is next to those vendors.

I do have trouble understanding why Turbine decided to put the housing areas in their current locations. For Bree and Thorin's hall at least, it could have been possible to have the entrance to the housing instances inside Bree/Thorin's Hall, in a lane/alley somewhere in Bree and a doorway in a side corner in Thorin's Hall. Celondim shouldn't have been too hard either, Turbine had an almost blank page to work with and could have put the entrance to the housing area somewhere inside Celondim, or on one of the docks to simulate a ferry service across the river to the housing area (Turbine wants us to accept the instancing between the Shire and Ered Luin with all the missing landmass between the two, so why not have an instance entrance on a dock in Celondim to get across the river to the housing area?). The Shire would have been the hardest case, but considering how much of the game landscape around Michel Delving was designed by Turbine, surely there was an opportunity to put the entrance to the housing area closer to Michel Delving itself.

The only way I could agree to crafting in neighborhoods is if its ONLY in Kinship halls. And it adds extra to the rent and probably requires a Kinship rank

Even then I wouldnt think its a good idea in general. A stable just outside each housing area(or inside) with swift travel would solve a lot of the issues and keep Bree/Thorins/MD as the social hubs.

A way to make housing a bit more lively is to put some of the holiday events inside the neighborhoods and have decorations change and whatnot.

I'd love to see some new housing content, but I'm not holding my breath. RPers and immersion junkies are like lepers around here, or so it seems.

Originally Posted by Almirin1103

I have to say I was really hopeful why I saw this topic line. SO much needs to be fixed in housing here.
Things that should be fixed right away include:
1. Remove ALL hooks! Period
2. Add many times the number of items a home inside and out, can have relative to the size of a home.
3. Add quest and vendors who sell items for homes.
4. Add recipes for craftsmen to make things. Let Tailors make couches, beds, rugs, wall hangings, banners. Jewelers make paintings, art objects and statues. Armorsmiths make iron braziers, fireplaces, stoves, pots and pans, cutlery. Woodcrafters make beds, tables, carts, book cases, dressers. Cooks make plateable food, cupboards of foodstuffs.
5. Remove the escrow and loss if items to accounts. Place a lockout on home until back rent is paid. House on an account should be saved.
6. Allow the items to be increased or decreased in size and rotated on axis within reason.
7. Allow items to be placed on items and in items.

That should be a good start!

Galadolor, the Minstrel of the Rock

I 100% agree!

Originally Posted by Melureus

Wouldn't it be cool also to turn on the lights when it has people inside? That way the neighbors will know when to visit.

Awesome idea if people actually used their homes. The way it is right now just about every house I try to visit is in foreclosure. After a certain amount of time goes by people should lose their homes once they go into foreclosure. No more graveyard neighborhoods like someone else mentioned earlier.

I played EQ2 for a time and the thing I loved most about that game was the housing. You could get so creative with your homes. Because there were no hooks people came up with the most amazing designs for their homes. You could personalize your home to fit you and it became a pleasant place to visit.

Please Please Please Turbine fix housing.

Originally Posted by Almirin1103

I have to say I was really hopeful why I saw this topic line. SO much needs to be fixed in housing here.
Things that should be fixed right away include:
1. Remove ALL hooks! Period
2. Add many times the number of items a home inside and out, can have relative to the size of a home.
3. Add quest and vendors who sell items for homes.
4. Add recipes for craftsmen to make things. Let Tailors make couches, beds, rugs, wall hangings, banners. Jewelers make paintings, art objects and statues. Armorsmiths make iron braziers, fireplaces, stoves, pots and pans, cutlery. Woodcrafters make beds, tables, carts, book cases, dressers. Cooks make plateable food, cupboards of foodstuffs.
5. Remove the escrow and loss if items to accounts. Place a lockout on home until back rent is paid. House on an account should be saved.
6. Allow the items to be increased or decreased in size and rotated on axis within reason.
7. Allow items to be placed on items and in items.

That should be a good start!

Galadolor, the Minstrel of the Rock

Could have just told the Dev's to check out SWG for housing ideas, because it seems to me that's exactly what you've described.

Originally Posted by BeerBringer

Could have just told the Dev's to check out SWG for housing ideas, because it seems to me that's exactly what you've described.

Sounds more like EQ2.

Originally Posted by forlorn_hope

Sounds more like EQ2.

EQ2 and SWG are by the same company, I imagine SOE has lifted popular ideas from one game to add to another

Article at Massively mentions the housing issue.

They aren't working on it at all at this point in time. No mention on when they will.

A bit disappointing.

Originally Posted by Jaeds

I love the housing feature in LoTRO. It is easily one of the best parts of the game for me.

The only thing that I wish were changed, is the amount of houses one can own per server. I play each character as their own individual, and with styles varying, would prefer to have their own homes/decorations -- especially for roleplay purposes. My Hobbit Burglar doesn't quite fancy hanging out in my Elf Scholar's book cluttered home. xD

The worry of people buying up all homes in a single neighborhood on one account could be abolished by not allowing two characters on the same server to purchase in the same neighborhood. Or perhaps putting a housing cap of up to 3-4 per racial area per IP? (Not sure if that's possible or whatnot).

Anyway, I personally would like to have more homes available.

I agree. My characters are all independent and collect a lot of stuff. I am a member of a kinship (on two worlds) and have a deluxe house for each world...but I still could use more room. Each person could use at least a single house for themselves, use the deluxe for the group and the kinship house...well, everyone wants to put special stuff there. I think that the upkeep would not be a problem. I am a lifetime member and have just retired from teaching for 44 years and love the game. I spend a LOT of time playing all my characters, and have just taught my husband how to play and we are enjoying it very much. (I have talked him into buying a house also...but I do need more room)
Thanks for listening
Cynthia Olson (Thorsma in Brandywine)

Originally Posted by BrianDavion

I'd like to see the abilty to buy a house per character instead of it being connected per account. even if you had to pay TPs for I dunno "house slots"

Everybody's so quick to toss their Turbine Points to purchase stuff. I'm not picking on you or anything. You just happened to mention the TP thing so I'm talking about it. Personally, I would prefer to not pay real money to buy fake stuff. If I can purchase these expansions or what ever it is the improvements are going to be, if there are any to be purchased, I'd rather have an in-game option as well. I'm sure they will, but all over the forums I see ppl talking about how they'll buy just about everything with their TP. All that stuff adds up. Then next thing you know, you'll have ppl talking about how everything costs too much TP. :P

I wholeheartedly agree with you on being given the ability to buy multiple homes on the same account. I'm not holding my breath on it or anything, but it certainly would be pretty awesome thing if we could

Originally Posted by LeRaginAsian

The Tell the Community Team thread is here, in case you hadn't noticed.

F2P must be going well if housing's back on the plate for actual improvement. Between this and the fall festival, I couldn't be more excited for lotro.

Give your suggestions, make 'em count! (don't forget mention free-form placement)

Darn I missed it. I was out of town.