With every release I despise player housing more and more

Why, yes, I'd rather see floating people than some of the out of place combinations of stacking objects. It's one or the other, eh?

Both are out of place.

 

So you want a house, in order to allow anyone and everyone to come in and PK you?

Why own a house if you have no safety anywhere in the game?

Edit: The point being, why allow objects that can stack sky-high that players can stand on? Wouldn't it be simpler to fix that, than have floating people or homes that people might want to make invisible?

 

Right now, people are blocking the entry of their home to keep people out. Most of those people are calling for locked doors. So how does a person stand on top of their stacked objects and target people below - on and off their property? That would clearly be a game design that has to change. Advocating no way to make stacked objects invisible just to spare you seeing someone floating in the air is not a solution. Not even close.

 

so which is it?

my thoughts on this: i don't think people should place anything that blocks entrance to their homes, until the devs say "ok, game is going live tomorrow" or "ok, we're done making passes on housing what you get, you get"

once either of those two come to pass, then i say introduce door locks and allow people to block acces to THEIR homes, if they choose. - until then, we're all renting anyway.

 

This is a great discussion thread. I admire creativity when I see it in game. But wholeheartedly agree that the work cannot be of dubious quality. Rules for stacking, etc. are probably best as the control mechanism, as judging otherwise is very subjective.

 

What do you mean, which is it?

The dev team needs to solve this issue. How are they going to program that objects can't be placed in doorways? If they could take the time to do that, they could surely take the time to make physics rules about stacking.

If home owners are allowed to stand atop stacked items and shoot at people from afar that can't reach them, that will be an exploit. No need to see people floating in the air if they were to somehow make the stacked objects invisible.

They would solve a whole lot just following some simple rules of physics of the game. In any case, something will need to be done to avoid exploits.

And for the record, not that it matters, my husband disagrees with some of what I say. He also thinks the home with the ankh's sky high is creative.

Men.

 

I think the physics rules for stacking is much better use of dev time, but they've already got a template for restricting where items can be placed... Within the bounds of the lot. It probably isn't very much effort to make it so doorways have to be free from decorations. It would be a harder problem (although already solved in computer science) to make all paths in/out of the house open for player movement. But why would we want to force players to not block their door? It's their lot they should be able to do whatever they want.

I've noticed true distance calculations aren't used when casting ranged spells. Instead, only distance along the surface is used... It's easy to see this is the case when standing atop my bugged monstrosity tower. My guess is that this is a bug, or should be considered one in any case. Assuming this is fixed at some point, shooting people from long (vertical) distances won't be possible.

 

Personally? I have no problem with people blocking their doors. Let them do it. It's their property. My only issue is if they can use an exploit to attack people and people can't attack them in return.

 

sounds like the purpose of testing I doubt the developers like it either so expect it to be changed in the final release as player housing means a lot to them, its one of the only things that make this game stand out for now

 

it isn't their lot. not yet. we are still in pre-alpha, we are just renting. what we should all be doing is testing in the world, not just living in it.

example:
Player A has a town lot with a town house on it, but restricts access to their place.
Player B comes along, with dozens of years of QA experience, so they know what to look for..but doesn't have access to do the testing. result: bad dev fault: Player A.
Player C comes along, with zero years QA experience, but wants to take a look at what they'd get if they up their pledge to developemnt now...they can't do so. result: less money for dev. fault: Player A.

Player A, has disallowed active testing by all other Players. - THAT should not be allowed.

when the game goes live, things change becauase we WILL be living in the world. it is understandable that Player A will be able to restrict access to Player B. it isn't Player B's content.

another example: me.

i have a village lot. when the game goes live, i may have upgraded to a pledge that gets me a town lot. i certainly will never upgrade my pledge, if everyone with a town lot restricts access due to the desire to simply have early access to the game instead of testing it..i will not be able to decide if i want that town lot nor will i be able to ensure that the bugs are worked out of it...

for the longevity of the game: thats extra money dev would miss out on, because the people who paid to test, are not testing.

 

What Players decide in their own Player owned villages/towns should be up to them.. What gets put into towns like Kingsport/Owls Head/Ardoris should be controlled. The atmosphere of these towns is totally destroyed by all this stacking. I understand the creativity part but stacking hundreds of one item is way out of line. Chess boards propped up by chess Pieces, Wood Walls all over the place. Sorry but much of this is just plain UGLY. Call it creative if you want, I is still UGLY. The existing homes and those to come have the feel of this period in time. I will start objecting when they start making houses out of Crystals or any other material that just does not FIT.

An Artist who spreads Poop on a Canvas may be called creative, but to me it is just Smelly Poop on a Canvas, and disgusting.

 

There will be many houses in the final release that u may find ugly but for now this is exactly what they need to see what is possible with their actual coding and what needs to be changed. Im confident some changes will be made in the next releases like stacking items through the roof, Im 100% sure that is NOT intended.

 

wtf did I just watch!?

thx for posting your childhood memories

 

I guess I'm highly amused by the development goal or tactic, to create non-immersion breaking homes since that was a chief complaint about ugly houses in UO. So they designed them "for us."

And now people can still create a scene. lol

Instanced housing like Runescape may not be ideal, but at least no one else can see your mess unless you invite them over.

 

I was watching a video on Asheron's Call housing (I used to play years ago, and we had to share a house for storage and mules). The housing has changed a lot since those days, but what intrigued me is their use of "hooks." You can place things outside your home so long as there is a "hook" for it. Since there are no hooks in the air, it would eliminate that stacking possibility. Of course, this could also stifle a lot of creativity. But perhaps only homes in town would have these hooks, where player owned towns or outlying villages would have more freedom. Just some thoughts.

 

LOTRO also does the "hook" mechanic, and it works well enough. It does make the housing entirely worthless, though. I only use mine as a free teleport zone when needed.

My only issue with the housing is that I have managed to get *REALLY* lost in some of these towns. That's realistic, but also pretty annoying when all you want to find is a merchant.

 

I agree that this kind of thing really kills the "vibe" of the game. Although I hate to cramp anyone's stylistic preferences, doing this kind of thing just "depreciates property value" by giving me a headache. On the other hand I love eandering into some random houses and seeing how meticulously people have detailed their homes. There definitely needs to be some control on this kind of thing, like the "Owl's Head Neighborhood Homeowner's Association" LOL

 

Hear ye hear ye, Owl's Head HOA meeting is now in session. As you know some Owl's Head citizens have *cough* uniquely decorated their lawns. Today's agenda: voting on regulatation for obnoxious housing decorations. As President presiding over the office of Ugly Grounds and Houses (UGH) I move to block the vote and instead allocate 100,000 gold as an effort of good will to all owners of uniquely decorated lots. This concludes today's HOA meeting; thank you for your attendance. Meeting minutes to follow.

 

I think the meeting should actually take place in Owl's Head, not the forum. lol

Then I can officially smack you.

 

In fact, in front of the ankh house........ lol