Row Houses are good!

I'm not trying to state that I think the Row house is on the same level as a Village home. What I am saying, is that SoTA has made it so that row home owners, are able to utilize the small footprint to it's fullest. More so, than a village home owner can.
There's not a 5 story village basement, where each level is the full size of the lot. There's no 4 story homes. (you can argue the roof of the Knight marshal home constitutes a 4th floor, but, you're having to pledge to a tier that includes a town lot, to try and meet the full potential of a village lot).
So, do you have more space in a village lot? Potentially, yes. You can have a 5 story basement that is larger than the row house 5 story basement. You can add a home that exceeds the max sized row home. And, you do have a yard. A lot of row house owners, will have a grave stone yard decoration, and no yard. Probably could put it in the basement. (bottom floor, don't want to dig a grave into the the level below)
One more thing, the addition of the row house, actually makes me feel better about my village home. Now I'm no longer in the smallest house lot. And, I feel better knowing that housing is much more in reach of the majority. Number wise, the people without a tier that includes a house, way out number the ones with. And a small house, is better than no house. Might not be what you stick with for years. But, then again, some will stay with what they have.
One of the weird thoughts I've had is this. People who end up with a tax free lot, be it row, village, or town (yeah, left city out on purpose) may find it a glass ceiling to seriously contemplate upgrading to a larger lot. You give up a nice bit, to go from a tax free lot, that you only have to log in once every few months to maintain, to a gold bought home, that has taxes, and a monthly log in requirement.

 

A Village lot owner doesn't need to utilize the full footprint of the lot, though. Village lots are actually pretty big. See the Knight homes for example.

Row lots, on the other hand, will be like being stuck permanently with a multi-story Citizen house. For my part, no thanks. Waaayyy too small, regardless of whether it takes up the full lot or not. I know you can technically get a good amount of space if you combine a four story house with a five story basement, but man alive, it'll be so claustrophobic, with each floor feeling like a closet.

 

I hope that there'll be some row houses available in R7 for us to go and poke around in and see how big they really feel. It's true that they don't look very big, but it depends on the layout and how much usable space there is. I won't know if I find it claustrophobic until I get to actually go into one and see.

I'm happy to have a little house of any kind right now, but I admit that I would still love to move up to a village lot before launch if I can afford to! After I've been able to actually walk around a row house in-game, I'll know better just how important raising some extra cash is...

 

I love the row houses. I'm not all that much for house decorating, just here and there, although I will have a house. Maybe for some who just want a place to call home and store stuff they offer something pretty special and unique looking. Imagine right on the water, well as it looks in the pics. Way to have a water lot. I think they look cool.

 

They do have a nice medieval feel to them, and are reminiscent of places like Amsterdam as others have said. I think they'll look great in a town, but I'm not sure they'll look right in a different setting like a woodland village. Hopefully we'll have a chance to find out!

 

If Row houses are added in addition to the classic lot types (in other words if they don't lower the numbers of other lot types because they're adding Row lots), I think it's a jolly good idea to use them only in towns or cities. It would indeed be super awkward to have that city-style super dense housing in a remote little woodland village.

 

I think row house lots should not be allowed to have basements, or at least very small ones (one room?). It's much more realistic and immersive lol

 

well, to get technical, how many houses have you been in that have multi-story basements?
Modern houses or medieval. I don't think 5 story basements where put in to be immersive.
I think they where put in, to give people the added space they wanted, while not impacting the look of the world.
If they had wanted, they could have had the inside of a house instanced. and have no relation to the external structure.
But, that would have felt silly every time I entered one.

 

mostly, I 'm talking about basements. No, a house bigger footprint than the knight home, means zero yard. A house as tall as the 4 story row home? well, maybe. they have 3 story homes in the add-on store. So, not far from that already.
But, why not have 5 story basements that use the full foot print of the village lot? It's done with the row home. and basically done with arena basements but not 5 stories.

 

I love that they added row houses, making housing available to lower backers was a smart move. Most people want a home base, even if it's not massive property. Also, I believe it will make cities look much better having densely packed buildings. As far as the basements, yeah 5 story rows might be unrealistic but they are basically hidden from view from everyone but the owner and his friends. I wouldn't stand in my friends house and say "Your basement is breaking my immersion, so you should get rid of it."

 

Did they specify yet the no show time allowed before the row tax free lot is being returned to the inventory?
Did they specify yet if you could place a vendor on the door steps?

Both questions were asked on the FAQ two weeks ago, but i failed to read the answers..

 

Keldrin, you keep bringing up the point that the row house basement's ia the same size as the row lot. I look at it differently. Looking at the images of the basement, the only thing we can go on right now, I'd be inclined to say that the basement is aligned to the dimensions of the house not the lot. It just so happens that, by design, the row house takes up all of the space of the row lot. The village basements also follow the same rule, they are aligned to the dimensions of the village house.

By the way, I'm sure you are aware that the row lot, and therefore the house and basement size is 1/4 the size of the village, even when placed on a village lot.

 

if the

basement is aligned to the size of the home, shouldn't the basement be bigger if I put down my knight house, as opposed to my citizen house?
Sorry, that only flies if the basements adjust to the house put down. But, was a nice try at a different angle. Also, take a look at the mine basement, the stone and timber basement, and the arena basement. The useable footprint area of each are different. So, they don't seem to have a direct relationship to any specific other structure. I'm guessing that max useable footprint of the basement wasn't the main goal. It was asthetics, that drove the design. Something that they felt looked good, rather than a attempt to give as much space as possible.
Yes, I'm aware that the foot print is the same no matter what lot size it is placed on. (actually when the "Flexible Lot Placement of Structures" stretch goal gets implemented, I've wondered if some people might put 3 or 4 row homes on their village lot. Also wondered if that would effect ability to potentially place more than 1 basement. Like 3 or 4 row house basements, instead of 1 village basement)

 

Are you just counting stories or does square footage count to you? If you want to put a Row House up next to a village house I wouldn't be surprised if there is similar amount of "usable" space. Clearly the village basements are much larger on a village lot.

 

Well... mostly useable space. Which, honestly is guess work at this point until I can actually play around inside the row house and see. Plus basements.... And even then, once I've got the space to play with, sometimes a little creativity can change how well you utilize the space available. So, you could argue that it might takes months of playing and adjusting and thinking before you can really say you know the full potential. I have guesses, based on other games.
The useable space argument, is another unknown with village basements. What I mean by that is, if they actually made basements that had the full foot print of the village lot as open space for each floor, does that create more useable space? or less? If most everything gets lined up along the walls, so the rooms don't look cluttered, then effectively, you might have less, than the stone and timber setup due to potentially more wall space to put things up against. Again, if I had that option, I would have to play with both setups and see which looks and works best for me.
Maybe the ideal basement would be 1 or 2 full foot print floors, then the balance being like the stone and timber. Giving you different floor plans to work with. hmmmm.....

 

Yeah, row housing is not good, not good at all...

Its amazing! Definitely the right size, one slight beef with the smaller side rooms, but on the whole, I am very happy with what I have seen.

 

The row houses will be great on town lots too. If people just want square footage, the 4 story row house will be great for a citizen pledger that wants to have a lot of room above ground.

However, I think it will come down to looks in the end. I bet many will go for square footage at first, but as time goes on I think people will go for looks rather than how much crud you can fit in one house.

Bigger isn't always better, but it's nice though.

 

Go to Owl's Head and look at the very first house there - Eks' 4-story Row House, with all the plants around the edge of the lot. (At least, I think it's a Row house! That's what it looked like, but the sign doesn't tell you.)

It's very nicely decorated, and quite amazing how much stuff they managed to get into it! If you added a basement to one of those, there would be lots of living space - no garden, on an actual row lot, but you can't have everything.

I was quite impressed with the amount of usable space there is in these little homes.

 

I have to ask, if we get the Ancestor pledge, and the 'tax free' row lot deed, since the 'tax free' status stays on the character even if the deed is sold, would we have tax free lots from then on out, for village/town/city lots as well?

Basically a cheaper way of getting 'tax free' any kind of lot.

This would mean that it is more appropriate to spend up to Ancestor and then buy a house from the add-on store w/lot as well.

unless of course it's not possible to bring the 'tax free' status to other sizes. :/

 

It would need official confirmation, but I wouldn't expect it to work that way. Where are you reading that the tax free status stays with the character?

I would think that if you sell your tax-free Row lot and buy an 'add on' city lot, for example, that the city lot will incur taxes as normal.