R61 Land Rush Status

It's time for another update to the housing census! If you're looking for a place to call home, there are thousands of empty property lots ready to be claimed!

Also be sure to check out the POT subforum and the Housing Rental / Free Places to Live marketplace.

Some quick metrics for R55 vs R61:

NPC Lots Claimed
R55 - 60.4%
R61 - 56.9%

PRT Lots Claimed
R55 - 8.0%
R61 - 7.4%

Brave Coast and Southmarsh Village are completely empty and likely should be removed from the game. There are about a dozen PRTs with only 1-2 residents in them.

Overall, NPC and PRT towns are less populated than the previous census, either due to decay or movement into POTs.

R61 Land Rush spreadsheet (anyone is free to edit and update):
https://goo.gl/2oXhR7

See you in the next update in 6 months and feel free to discuss below!

 

Some quick thoughts on the "ghost town" perception that has been present since persistence, when I started doing these surveys every 6 months.

Not much can be done about NPC towns, as it is unlikely existing ones will ever be redesigned to remove housing. I would propose that any new NPC towns that are planned for Ep2+ do not have any player housing in them at all. This solves a ton of issues, not just around perception, but around performance, artistic direction, (new) user experience and the offline game. I think they are already allowing POTs to move to the new Ep2 lands and that should be sufficient given the surplus of empty property lots in Ep1 towns.

For PRTs, clearly you don't want to kick anyone out of it. But they could take the same approach with POTs, such that if the population of the PRT drops below a certain amount, the PRT should be removed from the overworld map. It's still accessible via Teleport or Recall, but won't be visible on the map. Or they could revisit housing decay timers in some way, but that seems unlikely.

 

I don't think that kicking anyone out of the towns they are living in because people move is going to make anyone happy, make anyone want to play the game.... leave it alone.

We are finishing the year with 1/3 the steam players we started with for whatever reason.

It is what it is and I don't think removing more towns and forcing people out of their comfort zones into new POTs that also might collapse or change owners with less users. I don't see how it helps at all. Let those of us left enjoy what we have. I for one don't want to have my main housing in a POT. I see that they're cool but I don't see the need to consolidate. Some people want space from others.

If towns are totally empty, then remove them, but not kicking people out because their neighbors moved out or moved on. One of the things that never materialized was the concept of having remote housing in wilderness or hard to find areas. that would have been cool.

As far as performance, the worst culprits ATM are Brittany, Ardoris, and the Crafting towns. The wealthy owners of those towns put up large amounts of expensive decorations, like the 5 aether dragon statues in a row in Britt mart or wherever it is. Most other POT, PRT and NPC towns aren't that bad.

 

Gotta agree on this. With no player housing, NPC towns can be dynamic to changes when and where required. POT can address to housing requirements in the beginning, and slowly add small PRTs to address those wishes to have an alternative.

I propose for these PRT be like that of blood bay, where the governor can slowly add lot markers for players to claim, and 1 per account if necessary.

 

I can't really say this is surprising.

The NPC towns have always been unappealing places to live due in part to the rigid, often inconvenient marker placement, spread out amenities, etc. I think early on perhaps there was an implication that npc town = greater visibility = better for selling things, but POT market towns have rendered this rather moot. That and the whole "urban blight" problem of people who claimed lots and log on once a year just to keep anyone else from having it despite having apparently no interest in playing the game to date, has made a lot of them visually unappealing as well.

For the new continent, I would imagine if there is some sort of major city/hub it may make sense to have -some- housing in it, but think we should really avoid the big empty large lots or clutter in prominent NPC areas. In many towns it is very difficult to navigate around all the "player stuff" to find needed npcs for quests and services.

 

I like the idea of not introducing new housing in R2 NPC towns, at least to begin with. I think that the existing PRTs that have zero amenities (like Holtrot) should be equipped with the basic shops and crafting options. Currently they are only attractive to players who want to live in an empty scene for quick loading and simply want to place a house right next to a town exit.

 

Any town with the entrances halfway across the zone from the town hub is a no go zone for me.

 

Oh, I agree. But the layout of most of the NPC towns leaves a lot to be desired, with player 'stuff' blocking key npc access or being unreasonably far away. Combine this with the annoyance of npc "schedules", the lack of being able to place devotionals or POT npcs (requiring a lot more running around to buy crafting supplies, reagents, etc.) and they just aren't good places to call home. With the recent addition of 'teleport to zone' where one sets one's bind point is becoming increasingly less relevant, however.

 

Pretty sure most people checked in last year to see the games release. I bet a bunch of housing will expire after April and May for those that are no longer playing and allow clean up.

 

I agree that new npc towns have no player housing lots.in them.

 

@smack Yes very good suggestions. NPC towns should not have housing. POT are so popular , they should be the only venue for housing moving on from now. PRT might be an interesting option if the lots are closer together and the towns more functional like most of POT's out there.

 

I think it will be weird if new npc towns dont have it. Not on this bandwagon.

 

While I agree with the general feeling that we shouldn't have player housing in NPC towns... it's somewhat a hypocritical belief... since I live in Braemar. I like having a home there. Its not a large place, convenient to get in / out. I don't have to worry about getting booted or moved by a Gov who wants to change things.

Mostly though I would like to see things happen to towns. I want to see a town under siege. Not just some external bypass scene... but zombies in the town, spawning more / closer to the town center as an event progresses. Buildings burn or get damaged if they're not defended. I want to see NPC soldiers appear and wage battle alongside residents and adventurers. Prices for food or resources in the town should skyrocket.. but things like arrows or weapons the merchants might sell cheaper, extolling the people to help defend the town.

 

You had me at the title of this post... "Land Rush"...

Spoiler: Do not open

 

Brave Coast and Southmarsh Village. I sense dual deep impacts in your future.

Thanks again for keeping us up to date on these lists. Hopefully you haven't had to jog across as many vast grasslands to get to the town criers in the PRTs these days? They should give you a title for your persistent efforts, maybe Lord of the Land Rush or something equally befitting.

 

the brave coast is the only pvp prt left since blood bay is now a dev pot. it might do better if it weren't for the fact that brave coast, estercove, and port mirren are the only prts in the game not accessible from the overworld. they really need map boats.

 

You're right, those PRTs are nested. I would agree that they should get overworld boats, but only if their populations warranted it. As it is, Estercove and Port Mirren has 5 and 2 residents, respectively. Yet that's still more than the half-dozen or so PRTs with overland access that only have 1 resident.

I'd guess that anyone still living there is using a Recall scroll to get there and not even using the boats in Kingsport. I'll bet if the devs removed the boats entirely, nobody would even notice.

 

Estercove was my home for a long time during development. Fond memories.

 

I feel like the game "has potential". And I don't mean that in a dismissive way, but more an excitement of "what can we do with this?" Fishing and Decoration Simulator 2018 wasn't it.

I live in a PRT, because it's the closest I can get to "survivalist", I think. What I'd really go for is the ability to enter "survivalist" mode, similar to activating PVP mode, but there's a 1-month cooldown.

• You could go out into the overworld, and find any biome, and start your encampment. You get to choose biome and placement.
• You could put down all your deeds without property tax (because there's no town) (if you exit survival-mode, all your stuff goes to the bank)
• It'd only be visible/accessible to you
• No amenities, or even bank access
• Eating/drinking were required, but you got more bonuses from it. There'd be a point to agriculture.
• Your encampment would be occasionally attacked, but your otherwise completely useless traps or pets could help defend. Failure to defend could cost damage/loss to house/content.
• Having a basement would be more relevant, as that'd be more a safe spot.

I really really really really want my property, house and stuff to have a *purpose*. I want to build a base. I'd leave my PRT that I'm sharing with one other person in a heartbeat.

But since the devs don't seem to share this vision, or anything compatible with it, I'm probably once again shouting into the void.

 

Isn't that the truth! Sad... but true. But it's okay.. we and our pets can join the next dance party. Wait, maybe we can go to the next dance party where Darkstarr is DJ'ing and try and shout there?