Devs - housing plans?

[Theo_GL]

Ok, now that you have finally caught up with alot of the RTB houses and things are falling over like dominoes and most shards are vast wastelands of open space - is there a master plan for housing?

More than one house per account?
Castles in Malas?

I'm not happy I lost my housing on some alternate shards and there is no way I would EVER pay for another account just to have a house on a 2nd, 3rd shard so I can play the game when GL is not interesting.

There are like 5 houses in the GL luna ring currently in decay or already dropped. Most of the hosues dropping ouside Luna have not been replaced. Some shards like Sonoma are complete and utter wastelands. I like to play sonoma and my RTB house has not even fallen there yet.

Its extremely hard to play from a bankbox as there are items that only work in a house (like scroll of trans book).

What is your plan?

 

[cazador]

I think one house is sufficient.. But maybe mobile tents are in order ! You can place in any housing area they are 7x7 anyone can get in but the boxes are secure and you pay a weekly rental fee land occupancy fee withdraw directly from your bank..maybe 15-20k

Would be cool to have a couple different types ..regular tent 7x7 up to 10x10 with one to 5 secure boxes that can hold up to 500 items per secure

 

[Tanivar]

I'm actually looking forward to not having any subdivisions of houses to run through on Chessie. It was one of the reasons I was heading for the door when I stopped by Siege.

Sosaria is supposed to be a primitive wild land, not suburbia.

 

[Vivacia]

I loved the idea of the gypsy cart when I seen it awhile back, that can be moved around from place to place.

 

[Gameboy]

I was thinking earlier today about whether or not things might be getting set up for a booster that lets us have an additional house on each account, or maybe that gypsy wagon thing that was on Grimm's personal website for a very short while and then vanished. If given the opportunity to enhance an account for that, I'm just not sure what I'd be willing to pay for it on a one-time basis as a permanent upgrade to an account. I just can't see myself wanting to pay for something like that on an ongoing basis. I'm having a hard time justifying paying $20 just to upgrade one account for increased bank and house storage these days when it feels like we're once again in a communication gap about UO's future. I'm trying to stay positive because I suspect all these server maintenance periods are tied into new, good stuff we haven't seen yet. But my "positivity" is starting to waver. It needs some bolstering. A letter from the producer would be very welcome indeed.

This saddens me a bit.

 

[DJAd]

1 house per account is plenty. I do also think that a 2nd house on Siege (like Mesanna has spoken about) would be a great idea.

Keeps in Malas or larger custom plots would be good though.

 

[Irulia Darkaith]

I agree with DJAd and Tanivar. While the reason for the lack of houses is depressing, it's kind of nice to have some green space back. No 2nd houses. You want a second house, buy another account otherwise we're going to have housing doubling over night but with the same number of players in the game....I hate seeing a bunch of houses just being used for warehouses . Extra storage? I'm as guilty as the next person...the more space you have, the more crap you hoard...take a look through your belongings one day and ask yourself if you really need to hang on to that stuff? Having said that, I personally would like larger plots to be made available just for design purposes

 

[Dregg]

If players are given the opportunity to place another house on the same account then Atlantic would be flooded. You would see people on Atl get back in the housing reality business so they could go find a 7x7 plot and sell it for 25 mil or more just to keep a tight raps on the housing market on Atl. I agree on one point of having a housing area set up that allows players to rent rooms weekly for a fee and giving them like 250 lockdowns available and gives them a place to insta log a red or to switch toons.

 

[Olahorand]

I replaced 4 small grandfathered houses on other shards years ago with RTB houses after I got the chance to demolish the large tower on the same account on my home shard and place a castle.
These are now decaying or have already fallen, bringing a big gap into my gameplay. I pay already 5 accounts per month to hold houses on Drachenfels and other shards, and there will be no way to pay for more.
A second or 3rd house, be it for everyone as purchasable account boaster or as veteran gift for 5, 10, 15 years, would be more than welcome.
Its already difficult with one account, to live out of the bank box (why don't we have the possibility to share the bank boxes within all chars?), but utter annoyance with chars mixed from 5 accounts, which need to access the same stuff.
And all the stuff, which requires a house. Its not longer that a public forge is serving all purposes sufficient, you have all these great store purchased items, veteran rewards etc., which, even if it makes no sense for several of them, require to be locked down in an house.
Why can only a house owner toggle sound of reward statues, but not the owner of the statue?
Why can certain items text only be edited by the house owner? (Floor mats, signs, ...)
Why can Davies locker not be used without being locked down?
Why can the garden shed not be optionally placed as a full size shed somewhere in the landscape or being used as Bank box add-on by choice?
Why can't we use the crystal portals in backpack or the commodity box without being locked down?
Why do we get a bunch of gifts for Xmas, anniversaries etc. on each char and each shard, which can only be shown/used in a house?
Why don't we have a central crafters hall, where a crafter can access all the house addon crafter stuff (forge, anvil, loom, spinning wheel, soulforge, ...) at one place and access resources in his bank box during crafting?

So yes, there is a need for a house also on shards, on which we only play limited time.

*Salute*
Olahorand

 

[Zosimus]

Dahlings,

Won't ever happen. It would be the true death of UO if they allowed extra housing on all shards. Players would close those extra storage accounts and UO depends on accounts. There are more accounts than players. EA sure isn't going to give up any revenue for free or a one time purchase.

If you all think the dev team is small now and CS is terrible atm with a sub fee, imagaine how it would be with people closing mutiple accounts and keep 2 to 3 acccounts active. Oh I know some will say they wont close accounts but plenty will.

Siege has been the only one mentioned about extra housing but that wa sa few months back and not set in concrete.

 

[Wenchkin]

When I had 5, maybe 6 accounts holding houses for a RP village, I did kinda envy my neighbour who had a grandfathered account holding 5 houses heh. But I don't want multiple houses per account. Castles and keeps litter shards already, even with restrictions I think one house per account is enough.

What I'd suggest (and want) for playing other shards is for us to be able to rent say the odd secure at a tavern or inn and perhaps "rent" our own room with a couple of boxes in it. There are so many inns over all the facets that there must surely be enough empty rooms for that. Make it something you had to pay rent on and use regularly to refresh it, then we could all visit other shards and wouldn't need a house. It would be worthwhile for us to have a box we could secure to swap gear between characters on one account etc too. But if a player just needs extra storage on a shard, I think rented boxes would be worth considering. Though you would need to cap how much a character/account could rent because the packrats might go nuts

Wenchy

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

I really can't help but recall widespread complaints some time back about over-crowding, sprawl, trailer park atmosphere....

-Galen's player

 

[Sauteed Onion]

I like Wenchie's idea about renting rooms at inns. How they'd make sot books, and davie's lockers work in there and not just ok them to work from a bank box I got no ideer.

 

[Shakkara]

Just allow us to place one 6x6 tent at one shard (not the one holding the house).

150 lockdowns.

 

[DerekL]

I really can't help but recall widespread complaints some time back about over-crowding, sprawl, trailer park atmosphere....

I'm minded of a quote from a dev from another game - "If this game printed twenty dollar bills, people would complain if they weren't in serial number order. Or they'd complain they weren't random enough".

Mark me down with the "I'm liking the open space group". We don't need more castles and keeps and grey laggy conformity. We don't need the land littered with houses placed because someone, someday, might want to play Chessie for a couple of hours because Cats is down for maintenance.

If you have too much stuff, it's time to clean house. If you can't afford another account for another house (whether for extra storage or for a shard you visit once in a blue moon or whatever), well, we all must live within our means.

 

[Minerva Foxglove]

How does this sound then? Every account can theoretically hold a castle. But if every account could hold a castle size footprint , or split that footprint into as many houses they want, and on the same or another shard. If you want house on lots of shards or a village on one shard, you have to stick to small buildings. I think it would be fair as we pay the same, but as a castle is huge it might be too many houses if everyone used this option wich I doubt.. But it would be fair . I would go for a small village around 2 of my houses in terrain noone will ever build in again.

 

[Eärendil]

Minerva, lemme think about that: I have 1 account with a Castle - no further houses possible. And I have two other accounts: One with an 18x18 House and one with an 13x9 House (I think). Your proposal would mean: I can get additional houses on the second and the third account until I reach the number of square-tiles that are used by castles?

Hmm... This is a nice idea, isn´t it? However, you should somehow prevent that people build dozens of unused very small houses, not? Would be really ugly...

 

[Gorbs]

Here's the problem as I see it: I play mostly on Atlantic, but my home shard is Chesapeake. I keep my tower on Chesapeake for mostly sentimental and pack-rat related reasons. If they allowed two houses per account, I would obviously want to place one on Atlantic. I have developed characters on Cats, GL, LS, and some of the west coast shards...but I'm not going to play them. I suspect many people wanting a second house are like me. This would, in my opinion, increase the number of houses on Atlantic, but do very little on many other shards to increase player base. Siege might be the exception.

 

[Olahorand]

Well, Atlantic might be an exception in that context (or even each shard, as soon as a certain percentage of house space is filled) - to allow only small secondary houses (one per account).
Also on ATL are still unused green acres in Malas, which could be opened in this context, or am I wrong?
The only question is: Should the second house rely on Autorefresh or require at least some activity in a certain time frame?
The idea with an inn is not that bad, but does not help homeless red chars a lot (I have two of those now). But is that really needed with all the free space now?

 

[Olahorand]

Why can only a house owner toggle sound of reward statues, but not the owner of the statue?

I stand corrected with this one - seems the devs fixed this annoyance as well in one of the recent publishs without notification.

Thanks!
Olahorand

 

[CovenantX]

What is your plan?

hopefully it has something to do with E-mailing previous customers and advertising for newer ones.

It's a good time to tell your friends/family to get them a decent spot for a nice size house in UO.

 

[CovenantX]

Apparently, Freja caught up with Mesanna in-game on Siege yesterday long enough to have a brief discussion about the "second house" issue: http://stratics.com/community/threads/mesanna-about-a-second-house.292717/ . It sounds like she's thinking no one would place a refreshable house on Siege unless they actually play there. The house would have to be refreshed every two weeks. If you had a "primary" house on Siege already, you could place one (presumably refreshable) on another shard.

I assume it would still cause houses to decay if you already have multiple houses on your account ?

 

[THP]

2 houses per account...on different shards is the way to go...trying to push people at siege is not

 

[FrejaSP]

2 houses per account...on different shards is the way to go...trying to push people at siege is not

I believe the idea of everyone having a second house on a different shard would work best.
I also like the idea of a gypsy wagon or a tent as the second house. Making it as a booster pack is fine too. Maybe one chest, 125 items, without booster and with booster, 500 lockdowns, where the wagon or tent comes with lockdowns for smithing, imbuing or for cooking or for tailoring and where you can lockdown and secure and friend/co-own to the home.

Make it so you have to refresh it, but if you forget or of some reason can't, it will end up as a deed in your bank including the items and you can replace it when you decide to play again.

Also so this tents /wagons do not block castle spot, make it so they only can be placed, where no keep /castle will fit.

If you stop paying for your account, the deed could start to decay just like your main house.

 

[Victim of Siege]

I believe the idea of everyone having a second house on a different shard would work best.
I also like the idea of a gypsy wagon or a tent as the second house. Making it as a booster pack is fine too. Maybe one chest, 125 items, without booster and with booster, 500 lockdowns, where the wagon or tent comes with lockdowns for smithing, imbuing or for cooking or for tailoring and where you can lockdown and secure and friend/co-own to the home.

Make it so you have to refresh it, but if you forget or of some reason can't, it will end up as a deed in your bank including the items and you can replace it when you decide to play again.

Also so this tents /wagons do not block castle spot, make it so they only can be placed, where no keep /castle will fit.

If you stop paying for your account, the deed could start to decay just like your main house.

if they do a Gypsy wagon, i'd say have the Forge/anvil/oven and other addons like that built into it already

 

[cdavbar]

This whole gypsy wagon thing sounds cool, but id have to go with pure storage only, no forge/oven etc. that is what the town shops and your house are for.

 

[Wenchkin]

I think it makes sense to have a communal forge and campfire around all the camps, because I'm pretty sure at least some have those already. Travelling folk with horse-drawn wagons would provide themselves with a method of cooking and working with metal because those were basic activities in their lives. I wouldn't put ovens and forges in the individual wagons (fire hazard for one thing heh) but a communal one is fine.

If we were to use all the NPC home and inn buildings around, that gives players the option of renting somewhere that suits their particular needs. So a trainee chef is more likely to stay in town because a tavern/inn has the oven and materials, or they can stop off in the nearest bakers for flour. Others could rent near a farm to gather fleece and spin it up for example. The facilities are pretty much there already, it's just the storage rental that has to go in.

Wenchy

 

[cdavbar]

I might add taht this would have been a great addition WAYYY back when instead of recalling everywhere and crap, make it more of an adventure where we had to walk places. Ahh the memories.

 

[Gameboy]

This whole gypsy wagon thing sounds cool, but id have to go with pure storage only, no forge/oven etc. that is what the town shops and your house are for.

Maybe they could have different types of gypsy wagons. Maybe some are more geared for storage and others geared for crafting.

 

[Warpig Inc]

This whole gypsy wagon thing sounds cool, but id have to go with pure storage only, no forge/oven etc. that is what the town shops and your house are for.

I was the one that gave the gypsy wagon (blessed) deed run down. Basic would be pet and boat control and ownership. Can friend.

Storage would be like one or two ship holds. The gypsy wagon can be walked into so why not have two those brit boat lockdown spaces?

Being a creature or object it would get moved during house placement. Command like - "name" move - would allow home owner to clear their lawn of squatter parking. Sure there would have to be a griefing rules "Accept" box checked that can be read before deed palcement.

Decay would be slower then a boat. And there are enough areas in the game that could have posting stakes that slows decay even more. Could place a few NPCs in large no housing areas for player run gypsy camps/city. Posting stakes and towner NPCs east area in Malas at other end of Luna mountain range? Gypsy wagon on a post could have two vendor placed like driver and rider.

Movement would be rowboat slow. Maybe add in a better speed on roads. No moongate use. Add in some those arches like to Buc's. Just some point to point jump on same land maps. Land pillars that have a gold fee for use.

Deed placement will have two options. One as above with own artwork. Second would have different artwork but will have HP. Open back like a buck wagon. Players dieing on this wagon while it is moving their corpse slides off or just spawns/forms to ground below. Second wagon could supply EMs with off the hip wagon train events in fel city to city caravan defence. Wagon death deed (blessed) pops back to owners pack.

As a vet reward to control a flood of wagons all over lands like the HS early dock days. New to the code mage tabler would be a new decay property. If a wagon decays the owner gets the reward count back. New character on another shard could then ramble and RV camp. One year reward account bonded.

 

[FrejaSP]

I think it makes sense to have a communal forge and campfire around all the camps, because I'm pretty sure at least some have those already. Travelling folk with horse-drawn wagons would provide themselves with a method of cooking and working with metal because those were basic activities in their lives. I wouldn't put ovens and forges in the individual wagons (fire hazard for one thing heh) but a communal one is fine.

I really like that idae about Camps and horse-drawn wagons. Maybe a special packhorse for the ones living in tent, so they could use a pack command to pack the tent and secure chest on a pack animal. The pack animal should be protected vs attack from monsters and players but as long the tent and secure chest are on the pack animal, they can't access it before they get to next camp, same with the wagon, when it is moving from one camp to an other, they can't access the context before they get to next camp.

If we were to use all the NPC home and inn buildings around, that gives players the option of renting somewhere that suits their particular needs. So a trainee chef is more likely to stay in town because a tavern/inn has the oven and materials, or they can stop off in the nearest bakers for flour. Others could rent near a farm to gather fleece and spin it up for example. The facilities are pretty much there already, it's just the storage rental that has to go in.

Rented rooms, that's a thing I would love to see too. In both cases, if the player not access the room or the wagon/tent for 2 weeks, the items exclusive the wagon/tent or chest in room, will become a deed in his bank. the deed will stay in bank so long the account is active.
When the player get on again, he will need to rent a new room or buy a new wagon/tent and then he can claim his items from the deed.

I think a system like this could work not just for Siege but for all shards. Let the wagon/tent/rented room have a max of 500 items . One wagon/tent/rented room max on an account on a shard, and max wagon/tent/rented room on 3 shards.
As Siege only do have one char slot, increase the bank storage to 500 items as other shards can have upto 7x125 items in banks for their chars together.