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End The Siege Housing Experiment

T

Tazar

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I've heard a lot of people say that and each time I disagree. 125 items is easy to play around. Hell, I didn't have a house until I moved to Siege, 2 years after I started playing UO in 2000...la


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Yep - you've been gone for a long time I see... Currently - there are more than 125 crafting items alone. Various ore/wood/leather types... imbuing ingredients... reforging materials... even a crafter needs more than 125 storage.
 

Speranza

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I've heard a lot of people say that and each time I disagree. 125 items is easy to play around. Hell, I didn't have a house until I moved to Siege, 2 years after I started playing UO in 2000...la


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I logged into Siege to start my life as a vendor. I was loaned an ethy beetle and enough gold to get started. After 3 days of trying to find a housing spot I gave up and have never gone back. Things may be better now but being naked and having 5-6 reds chase you down gets boring....
 

TheScoundrelRico

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Things may be better now but being naked and having 5-6 reds chase you down gets boring....
No worries, in my month long return, I've seen maybe 3 reds running around. Things are much different on Siege these days...la
 

Larisa

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I actually forgot all about this. I have a char there and love training...but it's really hard when you don't have the room. Now that I have been reminded of this I will be finding a nice 7x7 spot somewhere out of the way to set up. It's nice having a room at the NEW hotel lol but my bank box is full and I don't like carrying stuff around. I know I won't get killed because I am in NEW but once that tag goes away :( So yeah I can't wait to place my little house, thanks for reminding me! :)
 

DJAd

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I'll sell you my Siege spot Rico for gold on Atlantic ;-)

Its a nice 18x18 just West of Zento on the open grass area.
 

Giggles

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Well I guess I now fall into the category of a prodo shard player who is taking up a spot of siege.. but here is my take on it.

I own a castle on siege. I consider it to be a "prime" location because it is north of Minoc close to the t2a entrance. I placed this castle vs 20 other people when the previous castle had fell. This was on my second day being on siege, so you can imagine my excitement. This was also prior to them allowing a second house on siege. I paid for an account specifically for siege housing.

I played siege pretty solid for a few months, and I am madly in love with it. Several players helped me get started, and I was involved in many fun fights. During my time there I built 3 usable characters, and so did my husband. But like most I have a small group of friends that I have played with for years. They eventually drew my focus away from Siege. So maybe you are right.. I am taking up prime housing while playing a prodo shard. BUT, in my case even if they didn't allow the free placement, I would still be paying for that castle. It is home to myself, my husband, and a few friends for when we do get the urge to play siege. Granted I am not there every day, but when I do have time and desire to play there, it is nice having a space to call home and a space to hold my things. If I lost my castle, I wouldn't play there.. ever. I wouldn't invest the time to regather things and start all over.

So thought I understand the point, I do believe that allowing that siege housing does allow the "part timers" to be a part of Siege. I guess it would boil down to how much you value the part timers in the overall Siege community. I feel like I am a productive member of Siege when I play there. Would a extra house location have more value then a new face or two every few months? I guess that's up to the individual to decide.
 

MalagAste

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I have only seen one red in like a month. And it was the same red multiple times, and now he isn't currently playing. Public spammed hours before IDOC this morning, like 10 bluebies open looting in peace 3 screen from a moongate. There really aren't many reds any more from what I can tell.
I haven't had really too many issues on Siege... least not in awhile... couple close shaves when the housing first opened up... Which I'll say this about the housing... I wouldn't have spent any time at all working up more characters than the one I had started over there. And honestly she'd probably still be barely skilled had they not opened housing. And likely I'd have continued to ever so slowly work on her and living out of your bank stinks. So I really never cared to do much of anything there prior to the housing change.

Now that I have a "base" of operations so to speak... I felt I could actually work on building up some real characters there and actually have enjoyed it. Working on a crafter out of the bank is not really fun. Anyway that's my 2cents... Granted I don't play there "regularly" since my home is on GL's ..... and that comes first. I do play on Siege when time allows.
 

TheScoundrelRico

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Maybe to amend the original post, I would say, don't eliminate the second house, but absolutely require it to be refreshed on a regular basis. And instead of allowing any size house, set a maximum size (say 10x10) for those who select Siege as a place they don't play, but still want a house...who knows maybe even code it so there are restricted areas for these players. Their restrictions are removed when a player makes Siege their primary shard...la
 

MalagAste

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However the devs have made it easy on Siege as it appears they've setup a whole crafter area right in front of West Brit bank...la
Actually don't spend much time in Britannia... Infact I don't think I've spent much time at all in Britain save when I went there for the Broadsword plaque.
 

Lady Michelle

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The housing is not about you I know that is true, but I do believe your hidden agenda is where are all the players are hiding what good is a thief if there is no back pack to snoop, and yoink things from. :p
 

TheScoundrelRico

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While you are correct in your analysis of playing thief needing other players, the mistake you've made is assuming I am playing a thief. I have decided to retire my thief account and start another account so I can re-learn it from other avenues of playstyle. While I reserve the right to return to thieving, I don't plan to add stealing or snooping to my current new account.

I have never recruited for Siege to attract more players to steal from...no matter what people may think...la
 

SpyderBite

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I have never recruited for Siege to attract more players to steal from...no matter what people may think...la
I'm sure many can confirm this. And, I'd add, finding players to steal from is not a problem on Siege.

@Lady Michelle Everybody has to bank, pickup/turn in BODs, shop player run vendors, train skills or farm dungeons, empty ship's holds out at public docks. There are plenty of people to steal from on Siege. So, I promise you, Rico has no self serving motives in this thread. :)

As this thread evolved I've realized that the whole "housing experiment" on Siege, for better or for worse, is probably something that is going to have to stay in place. Personally, I would have attacked it at a different angle and made it a limited time offer kind of deal sort of like RtB and then shut it off until a later date when it was deemed advantageous for the server to reinstate it. However that is the past, and I am and never have been on the Mystic payroll so my opinions are null.

With that said. I did some intense house placement shopping last night. I love the current location of my home. But I want a bigger plot. I tried to look in areas relatively close to moongates for my magery-challenged character. No more than 4 screens away. I found a couple spots near the Yew gate. Nothing bigger than an 8x14. Obviously nothing near Jhelom or Skara Brae. Three spots no bigger than a small classic house or 7x7 custom in Moonglow. And so on..

Now, there is plenty of housing available on Siege. I will not dispute that. If one doesn't mind Homare or Malas one could place large homes until the cows come home. And of course, there are more than enough small housing spots around Fel and larger housing in more desolate spots in Fel. So, people are correct when they say that there is plenty of housing on Siege. And, there seems to be enough support behind allowing any second homes, abandoned or not, to remain standing that playing with the setup as it is now is probably fruitless.

Lets talk castles and keeps! Mow 'em down and build something creative you Lemmings! A lone castle sitting out in the wild near a shrine is nostalgic. 24 keeps surrounding the only road from Vesper to Britain sucking up bandwidth while they slowly render creating a Dark Wisp Death Trap is just Urban Sprawl. :)
 

FrejaSP

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I think there are waaay too many castles and keeps. They have ceased to be terribly special and they deprive good areas of place.

If you want to make a memorable location... only 1 castle that serves the town and surround it with lots of smaller dwellings. Placemaking is largely lost. We have some talented home designers but no good town designers. Gilfane the town is too spread out with too many castles and keeps. It's not a town, just an idea of one. Safe Haven could be something more but it too has way too many castles and keeps.

Tear a castle down and replace it with a smaller dwelling (not a keep or tower), see what happens.
I would give up my castles anytime if I could have a large tower or a 18x18 with same storages. I do love my castles but I really hate all the place they block.
 

FrejaSP

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I logged into Siege to start my life as a vendor. I was loaned an ethy beetle and enough gold to get started. After 3 days of trying to find a housing spot I gave up and have never gone back. Things may be better now but being naked and having 5-6 reds chase you down gets boring....
There had been free house plots on Siege since we got Malas. It's many years ago, the last years you rarely see more than 1-2 reds at the time.
If we go back to before Malas, it was very hard to place a house. A large tower far away from town was worth 6 mill and yes at that time, you would see several groups of 5-6 reds roam the shard but that's loooong ago.
 

Barry Gibb

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I've heard a lot of people say that and each time I disagree. 125 items is easy to play around. Hell, I didn't have a house until I moved to Siege, 2 years after I started playing UO in 2000...la
It all boils down to the character build when trying to live only out of a bank box. It is near impossible to do so as a fisherman, craftsman, or warrior. There are some builds which can pull it off, but not many. Add in any holiday or anniversary gifts and the bank box gets alot smaller.
 

kelmo

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Thats my fault actually... it's hideous. :/
It is not hideous. I wish you had a second shot at it with a clearer set of instructions.
 

MalagAste

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It is not hideous. I wish you had a second shot at it with a clearer set of instructions.
I wish we all had that. GL's is just horrible. But it was the only one submitted as to actually do what they asked pretty much required mastering paint and everything else.. without inside UO or some sort of program to deco it like UOHousebuilder it was a task that was either so overly tedious or you had to have access to a free shard server to be able to do it properly. Something most of us don't have.

Also most of us never considered or weren't aware that we could put some things into it.... like moongates. Really wish we had been given better instructions and more tools to be able to do it right.
 

Kandalff

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I think there are waaay too many castles and keeps. They have ceased to be terribly special and they deprive good areas of place.

If you want to make a memorable location... only 1 castle that serves the town and surround it with lots of smaller dwellings. Placemaking is largely lost. We have some talented home designers but no good town designers. Gilfane the town is too spread out with too many castles and keeps. It's not a town, just an idea of one. Safe Haven could be something more but it too has way too many castles and keeps.

Tear a castle down and replace it with a smaller dwelling (not a keep or tower), see what happens.
I appreciated with you
 

Uvtha

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It is not hideous. I wish you had a second shot at it with a clearer set of instructions.
It would have been better, I assume, but I had to do it all in photo shop... and it took forever and was a huge pain in the rear. It usually takes me like 3-5 attempts when building a house for example before inspiration strikes. So the bank got my crappy off the top of my head idea. :(

Worst of all, the best part of it was the dark father, and he dissapeared ages ago.
 
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