AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic - Eviction Notice! Let's remove the housing system

I want to raise an initiative to remove the Housing System. I am serious. This is for the benefit of the longevity of comm-unitizing the RP server. It is a waste of resource where players can isolate themselves in their own private Shangri La's apart from the rest of the module. There are better ways to do this. Meanwhile, empty bars and empty restaurants make the module appear more like a social server than one with serious RP convictions.
It is better we stick with faction-areas, or areas that are a result of character initiatives. I used to be a big proponent for this kind of RP when I ran The Broken Arrow Tavern in West Cordor using the housing system, but it is such a taxing commitment on the player to run, that it takes all time to operate just like a real job. It's better to use areas like the Gentleman's Club, or Okappas, or if your character has a home or an estate, maybe that can be a result of your character's involvement with the area/faction; not of paying rent for one week. Stop with these little locked dressing rooms, they're obnoxious. There aren't even enough players anymore to validate their existence.

You know my opinion on this from my tells, but I'll say it again for posterity's sake. I would totally be against this. Similar to parts of the initiative to wholly remove certain settlements, getting rid of "free space" does not guarantee PCs will go other places, or even interact when they get there. Our players are not a mindless gas that fills up all the free space given to them, randomly bumping into each other. We have hubs, highways, and crossroads that yeah, should naturally gather interest and attention. However, the answer to get more people there isn't lop off every other area they might go, but to make those areas interesting enough to draw them "out of their holes." Proximity may increase the likelihood of bumping into someone, but for lack of a better analogy, shoving every PC into the Nomad isn't going to do anything if the PCs/players don't want to be there in the first place.

I can honestly say that would my PC's house to be removed, what time I spend on Amia(when I actually have the time to spend) would probably decrease on an order of 25-50%. That's where his RP happens. That's where he is invested. That's where people know they can find him, when he's not at his other haunts(which include some of those bars, taverns, and so on you mention). But the RP that happens there is no more or less valid than had it happened with 30 other players in the middle of Cordor East, and the notion that isolation is always a bad thing simply isn't true. Why would loitering in front of a store shop and people-watching be more valuable than giving private lessons to two other PCs in his library? Why would randomly bumping into a nice enough stranger and talking about the weather be more beneficial to the server than him hosting yet another party to draw interest to his research or advance his other goals?

I'm all for increased efforts to draw interest and bodies to IC establishments and faction bases. Before I "left" the Tester's team, I know we had a whole list of suggested things that would do just that, that we simply never got around to for this reason or that. There are multiple ways we can make these places more interesting and more conducive to forming a community. If we have too many houses in the module at this point, fine, take out a few, but I don't think the load is actually that much until a PC walks into them and the PLCS spawn. In any case, there are several ways to fix the problem you're perceiving here, but I would never advocate getting rid of what I have personally seen empower my RP and that of others, simply because it doesn't happen in a public space to be viewed by all.

Won't fly. People- everyone, humans- are naturally exclusive, they LOVE creating 'secret' groups, they'll figure out some other way to be completely private, switch the location every week and only tell the 'cool kids' about it.

I agree with you and it'd be a dream to have people actually inside taverns but this almost never happened on the other servers I played on- with and without private housing. And Amia is even more prone to cliques, as we all know. As soon as someone people mildly dislike, or even a stranger not 'in' the group shows up, conversation will die. The queen bees will mysteriously disappear somewhere else.

What about inn rooms though? Do you want to get rid of those also? Not sure if you meant the entire housing system or just the houses. KEeping inn rooms forces people to at least walk through the inn. But it might be a bit unrealistic for, say, a rich wizard to live in a dodgy inn.

No. I wouldn't get rid of the inn rooms or the inns and I'd be for even creating more public space so that every building has an enterable area, but giving the keys to PC's not apart of factions in basic settlements, is kind of what I'm against.

just add a pickable lock to every player house with a DC reliant on a "security cost"

OpenTheRift wrote:

just add a pickable lock to every player house with a DC reliant on a "security cost"

Very interesting idea, but it would only work if the PC who owned the house was already in it. House layouts are tied to the PC who makes them. Until then, the areas are only copies of empty versions of houses that don't get filled up with stuff until an owner PC opens the door. Those areas aren't tied to a particular door in any settlement, either, they just connect to the doors by order created every reset.

In other words, to break into a PC's house you'd have to know that they were in it at the same exact time, or had opened it and left without the server refreshing it(it reuses old house areas if no one's in an old one and its about to create a new one, I believe). Probably best to coordinate something like that with the player and/or a DM. Not only because it's kinda complicated, but breaking into someone's home is an unprovoked hostile act that'd give an immediate green-light to retaliate, probably.

Edit: The only way I could think to have that done in a meaningful way would be to have the doors themselves also store the layouts from the widgets(I'm assuming that's what the layout is tied to, if not the PC itself, but I remember testing that being finicky). The most straightforward way until then, if something like this were to be pursued, would be to add a dialogue option to doors connected to created houses. You can try to break in if you don't have a key and the PC is there, but again, that's some pretty immediate grounds to attack or be attacked and I don't see many reacting well to it, valid IC action or not.

Speaking as a very active DM, the RP I see happen behind locked doors is not anything you're missing, by a long shot. It's romance-y love-y dove-y RP with meaning only to those explicit few taking part in it. Were the houses not there they would use another out of the way hidey-hole where they would not be interrupted either.

The problem you cite in the OP is not as epidemic as you might think it would be, again, speaking as a very active DM. It really wasn't even a a problem once upon a time, either: the juicy stuff happened behind the faction doors, not in PC houses. Personally interesting stuff happened there (because I'm a DM who loves personally entwining drama) but nothing you would call "furthering" to an overall plot for the server or things like that, 90-95% of the time. However: Like in DI's post, it is RP that helps create a community and further bonds between players, and brings a sense of togetherness that drives people to continue to log in day after day, especially now in a time when there is a dearth of DM activity and few are struggling to carry the weight of many.

This is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, and seeks to solve it by slashing out content in the server thta's used by players for personally fulfilling RP, RP they will still do elsewhere, but now without a space that's meaningful, but still in a place secluded from other players. That's what I did before the houses existed, and what I did when I played PCs that couldn't afford the houses.

Removing areas and content will not force people into hubs. Did killing Khem, the Triumvir, the Tropical Island, Illithids (a popularly run dungeon is de facto a hub.) and mor eturn Cordor into a hub with it's Nexus?

No.

It just pissed off everyone who loved those areas, some of whom left the server for good.

You are waving swords at shadows.

Please don't speak of the Tropical Island. That one gives me a sad

We should plop that back in somewhere >_>

If the problem is you want community rp then you need more ambitious characters and more dms who are active we sadly don't have enough very active dm's at the moment to help facilitate all the small things to help the world be responsive for those ambitions.

In my attempts and experience to try and further such aspect I've run in to the problem of new characters being un welcomed no matter the character concept. Either you're in or you're out. There really isn't a lot of friendly melding between groups of players that often play with each other.

My suggestion to every one is be more open and out going on your characters and try to interact with characters you don't normally do so. Try to be more inviting and things should flourish naturally.

PassionateShadow wrote:

My suggestion to every one is be more open and out going on your characters and try to interact with characters you don't normally do so. Try to be more inviting and things should flourish naturally.

+1 to this.

PassionateShadow wrote:

If the problem is you want community rp then you need more ambitious characters and more dms who are active we sadly don't have enough very active dm's at the moment to help facilitate all the small things to help the world be responsive for those ambitions.

In my attempts and experience to try and further such aspect I've run in to the problem of new characters being un welcomed no matter the character concept. Either you're in or you're out. There really isn't a lot of friendly melding between groups of players that often play with each other.

My suggestion to every one is be more open and out going on your characters and try to interact with characters you don't normally do so. Try to be more inviting and things should flourish naturally.

+2~

I would not say that is inherently true, as I've seen plenty of current groups that are welcoming to new members/characters/players. Of course, it also depends on how the character itself acts and such; it is the RP that follows creation which dictates how well-received someone is.

To play devil's advocate, nearly all of the planning needed for the Arcanum War was done behind closed player house doors.

NinjaClarinet wrote:

To play devil's advocate, nearly all of the planning needed for the Arcanum War was done behind closed player house doors.

True. I know this because I've weaseled my way in to things with lots of questions luck and a good hide score.

NinjaClarinet wrote:

To play devil's advocate, nearly all of the planning needed for the Arcanum War was done behind closed player house doors.

Ah, ok. This I didn't know. when I was around it was still faction places and sometimes even just 'out of the way' spots.

I know of a few other groups that utilize the player housing system to conduct their dealings and all. I feel that removing that would be a big mistake, as the player housing offers a far more secure location for plotting, shady dealing, etc than a public place that anyone could wander into.

The main problem is that they are -too- secure, and people lose their shit when their little slice of the server is "violated". Player houses are these weird, faceless, featureless, windowless stasis cells where it's impossible to know who lives where and characters inside basically cease to exist unless you're "in the know" oocly. Far too easy to change homes like clothes, too. They are really artificial and immersion-less.

On the other hand, I do think safe zones for interpersonal RP are important, and frankly it doesn't make sense for characters of even modest means to be homeless. There is a middle-ground solution, but I don't know what it is yet.

There are the cheap per reset rental houses. If we replaced the long term rental properties with more per reset rental houses and then make them pick-able with an extraordinary DC that would require actual investment into the Open Lock to get. You make rogues more useful, solve the issue of impregnable housing while retaining at least most of the private security.

Also means less people grinding for gold and instead interactively RPing.

And with areas becomining dynamic, it is a possibility to add such areas now i believe.

I feel like what happened with the Arcanum thing was more of a failing of the plot than the fault of the housing system. Whether it happened in a PC house or in a public space where only the involved PC's knew to gather, the fact that such a big thing could be handled by a few PCs and didn't outright have to involve others is a problem in itself. It's not really the PC's responsibility to go out of their way to involve others as much as it is incumbent on the plot to involve others, whether the original PCs want to or not.

NinjaClarinet wrote:

The main problem is that they are -too- secure, and people lose their shit when their little slice of the server is "violated". Player houses are these weird, faceless, featureless, windowless stasis cells where it's impossible to know who lives where and characters inside basically cease to exist unless you're "in the know" oocly. Far too easy to change homes like clothes, too. They are really artificial and immersion-less.

There seems to be a lot of perception that people are going into houses specifically to get away from the rest of the server. For me, a PC's house or business is just a different venue for RP. I'm not in there because I don't want to be bothered by other players, but because it's the setting I'd prefer for some things, just like sometimes I'd prefer it to be in an alleyway or a public library. There's nothing inherently malicious or selfish about not RPing out in the open with everyone. At least, no more malicious and intentional than not stopping to RP/Emote/interact with every single PC you do come across in public areas. And while it's a neat idea, I'm not sure if break-in-able housing is really solving the problem that people are complaining about, either. Okay, so you can bust into these supposed havens and... what now? It's not changing the fact that people are still choosing to RP exclusively with each other. Maybe it adds a new level to maintaining secrecy, but to be honest, if my PC is discussing something secret and sees a door fly open, and doesn't get a prompt response, he's probably going the AoE the hell out of his foyer until a body shows up. Which isn't uncommon in Shadowscape, but yeah. >_>

Now. On the other hand, most of our taverns and things that should be IC gathering places are pretty empty. But that is not really the fault of the housing system, because they were usually bare before we had them. Even when they did have PCs in them, it always seemed because the PCs were specifically looking for a place to drink or had no other place to be at the time. I won't derail this thread with the idea I liked the most out of what we talked about in making hubs cooler, but I may make a thread about it. I feel like one of those options does a better job at encouraging and facilitating new and inclusive RP, rather than punishing people for following the natural flow of their characters. I've always been a sucker for carrot over stick, anyway.

Just have house-like areas that anyone can enter and call their own for a while. The gold-sink idea is silly because it requires grinding, and the whole gold-sink idea was to combat the wealth that used to be a problem on this server. I vote no to houses (sorry DI).

While I agree with NC, though I don't think that sentiment stops at housing. Some people are in major cities, or even faction areas that are near impossible to get to, and have access (for various IC reasons) to areas there that are basically exactly the same situation. If it's not a sweeping change then it's not really going to solve any problems, either case. Just something to consider.

I never knew the housing could not be picked for entry. That certainly should be corrected. Nothing should be impregnable.

I also agree with DI that housing is a net good and should remain. I can think of 100 spots on each server you could have a private meeting in with nary a chance of discovery so removing housing doesn't serve to promote RP because if people want privacy they'll find it. One on one RP is still RP even if it's not out in the open in some hub where every Bill and Sue can see it.

Slightly OT but as someone who plays mainly a rogueish character, the amount of pickable locks on Amia is very low. Unpickable locks are rather the norm.

I do not think that removing anything at this point in time will come even remotely close to any sort of solution, I'm afraid.

ZoltanTheRed wrote:

I do not think that removing anything at this point in time will come even remotely close to any sort of solution, I'm afraid.

I.....agree.

Dont remove them. Just make them pick lockable.

Dead wrote:

Dont remove them. Just make them pick lockable.

Raua wrote:

Dead wrote:

Dont remove them. Just make them pick lockable.

I can see people placing PLCs in front of their doors if this goes ahead, but I agree with what Dead/Raua said.

Revak wrote:

Raua wrote:

Dead wrote:

Dont remove them. Just make them pick lockable.

I can see people placing PLCs in front of their doors if this goes ahead, but I agree with what Dead/Raua said.

If anyone does this.... It's utter bollocks.

Setting a trap on the inside of the door? Totally okay; paranoid defenses activated. The official IC fashion to make your base and defense it.

But, blocking a door way with a placeable because the game engine doesn't let you climb over them is essentially the same as abusing a bug.
If I caught someone doing this, i'd screenie it and shame them with terrible violent prejudice.

Strom wrote:

If anyone does this.... It's utter bollocks.

Setting a trap on the inside of the door? Totally okay; paranoid defenses activated. The official IC fashion to make your base and defense it.

But, blocking a door way with a placeable because the game engine doesn't let you climb over them is essentially the same as abusing a bug.
If I caught someone doing this, i'd screenie it and shame them with terrible violent prejudice.

Yeah, it was just a concern I thought of really. I don't even use the housing system anymore due to how little I used it and how hemorrhaging for coin it can be. :cry:

TormakSaber wrote:

....

Said very good things! I agree whole-heartedly.

Naivatkal wrote:

I would not say that is inherently true, as I've seen plenty of current groups that are welcoming to new members/characters/players. Of course, it also depends on how the character itself acts and such; it is the RP that follows creation which dictates how well-received someone is.

Yeah. This is my first nwn server, first rp anything, aside from race hate for being a kobold everyone has been great.

Though it is exceptionally hard to wrangle any DM that isn't tormak.

I think all doors for the most part should be lock-pickable doors.

AirPhforce wrote:

Though it is exceptionally hard to wrangle any DM that isn't tormak.

Yes, it has been hard to get a DM to oversee anything or interact with a group for a long time now. I think we need some way of having more in the player's hands instead of having to have a DM for everything anyone wants to do that provides actual activity on this server.

Richard_Edmund wrote:

And with areas becomining dynamic, it is a possibility to add such areas now i believe.

This is the angle we should be looking at, I believe. One of the huge selling points of the Dynamic system was that we could then have essentially infinite Areas to play with because they are called up only as needed.

If we can grab the rental widget and make that applicable to Areas outside of the current rental houses, then we should do that. The doors would then link up to one specific Area, allowing it to be lock picked and go to the correct, singular destination. It would also allow us to have homes that aren't all the exact same layout and tileset, which would be REAL NICE.

Dead wrote:

Dont remove them. Just make them pick lockable.

I don't really care either way, but to play Devil's Advocate here... Who in their right mind would pay money for them then, honestly?

A house has a ridiculously stupid price to begin with and it serves zero purpose. None. Nil. Bupkiss. You cannot even get a very basic functionality out of one. My characters basically pay 100k every week to have one less square in inventory. Now that that 100k doesn't even thwart a basic pick monkey, why am I wasting money again when I can just hold my secret and totally not boring RP beyond a 2k inndoor I can see open/shut or take some other anti-sneak measure that's free?

To be frank, I don't care either way, but if people wanna smooch each other behind closed doors I see no reason to give a blah about it just because you're feeling lonely and can't find someone at Bendir (which is all this thread is amounting to, really).

Secret roleplay will just move to PMs, Skype, tells or whatever. There's lots of ways to justify it IC from dead letter drops and ciphers to magic.

Being pickable is fine to me, as long as we're all on the same page that it's a hostile act. If you forcefully break into someone's house you should full and well expect them to defend their life and property. It does however call into question what of houses that have NPC guards more or less posted near them, if someone is attempting to break in.

My main thing is that it's not really an answer to the original gist of this thread, however. If the problem is "people are holed away and won't RP with me," being able to get into their home or place of business doesn't actually fix that. You're not gonna show up and suddenly insert yourself into the RP that they've chosen to do there. You're probably gonna get yelled at, immediately asked to leave, blown up by a trap, or attacked. It's not solving your feelings of exclusion at all or enticing people to involve you any more than they were or weren't already. It's a perfectly fine option to have as an IC option, but it doesn't add much to anything.

Even if we can save the houses to the doors, I'm not sure what players would be getting out of it. Spying is really hard to do given our house layout where seeing any door open is super easy. And the moment someone realizes their privacy has been breached, they'll either stop talking about whatever or, again, go after the intruder. If you manage to get into a house stored by a door, and the PC that owns it isn't home... then what? There's nothing to do inside them with no one there. None of the PC's belongings are actually in there. I guess you could break some of their furniture, but what's the point of that? If they're not on, they won't see it anyway and the reset will restore their house to however they had it set before. I still think in situations where you want to spy on a person's or group's secret conversations, you're better off coordinating with them or a DM.

PassionateShadow wrote:

In my attempts and experience to try and further such aspect I've run in to the problem of new characters being un welcomed no matter the character concept. Either you're in or you're out.

I've got nothing to say about housing, but rather this thing...
I've been playing here on/off-ish for years now, never really being "one of the cool kids". Walked into an event, where PC guards were doing stuff, asked what was going on...to be told that it was none of my business. Another player who has nothing to do with the things walks in, a better known player ("a cool kid"), and asks the same question, gets full explanation. Kinda makes one think that you have to be known by everybody to be knowledged/included in things.

Why should people share a plethora of important information with complete stranger over trusted friends?

Eviction Notice! Let's remove the housing system

Who is online