Player Housing and RvR

Now I know some like the idea of player housing and others could care less. With that said, here is an interesting idea that could potentially give player housing more weight and purpose in ESO:

We already know all the major cities from Oblivion will be present in Cyrodiil in this game. The topography is almost identical with some changes for the purpose of better suiting the world PvP. We also already know that whichever faction is dominant and takes the Imperial City will have their highest ranked player crowned emperor of Tamriel.

Now, an idea leading up to taking the Imperial City would be part of the fact that factions will need to gain territory and individually take the other cities in the capital province. When a faction invades, destroys, and rebuilds the captured city, they should be able to purchase homes in Anvil, Cheydinhal, Kvatch, etc.

Depending on what a player's rank within their faction and their contribution to the war effort is, they can elevate what kind of real estate they can purchase and how large of a house they can have. This can range from a small cabin all the way up to a mansion (the castle being reserved to the count/countess with benefits increasing with the size of the home).

This would give players a sense of belonging to their new territory and more of an investment in protecting it from being conquered. They could add in obvious benefits such as extra storage, benefits to have homes in Cyrodiil for battle, customization options, city benefits for protection, etc. The highest ranked player could also be eligible to become the count/countess of their respective city.

This would make it so ZOS would have complete control over where player housing would be, controlling how large it gets, and give players another reason and incentive to protect their new-conquered territory from hostile marauders. I think this would be a nice way to tie in player housing into what will likely be ESO's shining feature come release.

This could further be pushed into the Imperial City with citizens of the winning faction being able to purchase real estate after the defeat of the Imperials and Molag Bal's daedra. The largest homes going to the emperor and the Elder Council while everything else would depend on rank and wealth.

What are your thoughts?

That actually sounds like a really innovative idea. Getting real estate based on your contributions to the war effort sounds like something that would be fun to do. And the point about being more protective over your property is spot on, in my opinion. I would love to see something like this, or at least similar to this, implemented.

*Likes post*

While i like the IDea, it should be noted that the taking over will usually happen very quickly, usually over night.

I am actually more a fan of the Idea of claiming a Fort for your guild and actually defending this as an organzied guild instead of a lump of Players.

Generaly i can see these PvP homes, but only if you already have regular Player Housing. Also i dont think you can have it that you can have a specific house in the World thats yours, at least they wont do that. Probably as the Emporer.
I can see it happening in the same sense as it did in Everquest 2: just have it an instance, you usually had to pay rents and you could visit the homes of other players by getting invited to it.
It was not very immersive but its so far the only way i can imagine this working.

Instanced housing does seem like it would be the best thing to do, especially in the midst of a large player base. Having player houses scattered through a city would be very overwhelming depending on how many people had them - and most people seem to enjoy having player houses in games, so I wouldn't doubt that getting one would be the first goal a lot of people would set for themselves.

In EQ2 you actually got a home in the slums, like the first thing you did in the main City, it was absoluteley ugly and it realy gave you a sense of living in a shanty town. I liked that.

The idea of the faction fort seems more simple to implement. It may result!
But the idea of a personal house is also very appealing.
Both things yould be great. But as I said, the faction fort seems to be more viable.

Something i realy like about this in Guild Wars (it actually already was in WAR if im not totaly mistaken, and probably in DAOC) is that you can put your guild emblem over the Faction Banner.

And as our Factions seem to be colour Codet (Pact: red Covenant: blue Dominion: Yellow) that would be pretty cool, show some flag folks!

Yeah, if you can use your own flag, would be amazing. Would make you feel more identified with your guild.

(July 31st 2012, 01:35 PM)Sordak Wrote: While i like the IDea, it should be noted that the taking over will usually happen very quickly, usually over night.

I am actually more a fan of the Idea of claiming a Fort for your guild and actually defending this as an organzied guild instead of a lump of Players.

Generaly i can see these PvP homes, but only if you already have regular Player Housing. Also i dont think you can have it that you can have a specific house in the World thats yours, at least they wont do that. Probably as the Emporer.
I can see it happening in the same sense as it did in Everquest 2: just have it an instance, you usually had to pay rents and you could visit the homes of other players by getting invited to it.
It was not very immersive but its so far the only way i can imagine this working.

Actually, ZOS is going to avoid the issue of an enemy faction taking a conquered city at a unreasonable time so the defending faction would have time to defend their territory. I'm not exactly sure on the specifics, but I believe they mentioned it in the GI article.

Guild Halls are part of the TES universe so I could see that addition being practical with this idea along with the personal player homes. Regular homes could be possible as well if ZOS wanted to instance houses in the capital cities for the different factions.

From my own personal experience with Star Wars Galaxies, houses were not instanced and players could place them anywhere in the world. I don't know what the process would be in regards to building the homes then having them potentially destroyed, but I think it's an interesting idea to consider.

We likely won't be getting player housing at launch though and maybe never at all. I do think though this would be an innovative and refreshing way of putting a system many developers don't see as essential. Especially if it were tied to the RvR, I personally could only see it adding to the PvP. Just my thoughts though.

Not to be a dick here, but you wont get player housing like in SWG, this is just a thing of the past. I have Played Istaria myself where players built entire cities, but this is a themepark afterall and not a sandbox universe, not to mention it has all to be lore confrom. So too much sandbox doesnt work out too well.


Regarding the conquest of Zones. yeah but what is unreasonable time? In the current GW2 beta taking a fort takes about half an hour. I think thats not unreasonable, its about how much you can bear of beating on a gate to knock it open (the rest doesnt take too long, PvP battles have a tendency of beeing decidet rather qucikly)

So i still think that alot of the forts could be taken over in quite a short time in real life hours. I know day long sieges sound cool, but people get bored, have jobs or school. It just doesnt work that way most of the time.
Also you have to take into consideration how housing is implemented anyway. Can you actually place all your stuff? (like in EQ2) and what happens with that after it is taken over? Will it be applied the next time you conquer it? But what if you dont rank up as getting that house the next capture?

Its just very overcomplicated if you ask me. Not to mention they plan on going big. And even if they have so many zones. In each zone, and lets be honest here, its realy hard to implement more than 5-6 player homes. But they already were talking about 200+ people ONSCREEN that means there wll be 500+ people of each faction running around on the huge PvP map. And everyone wants a piece of that cake. You understand where im going at?

(August 1st 2012, 03:54 PM)Sordak Wrote: Not to be a dick here, but you wont get player housing like in SWG, this is just a thing of the past. I have Played Istaria myself where players built entire cities, but this is a themepark afterall and not a sandbox universe, not to mention it has all to be lore confrom. So too much sandbox doesnt work out too well.


Regarding the conquest of Zones. yeah but what is unreasonable time? In the current GW2 beta taking a fort takes about half an hour. I think thats not unreasonable, its about how much you can bear of beating on a gate to knock it open (the rest doesnt take too long, PvP battles have a tendency of beeing decidet rather qucikly)

So i still think that alot of the forts could be taken over in quite a short time in real life hours. I know day long sieges sound cool, but people get bored, have jobs or school. It just doesnt work that way most of the time.
Also you have to take into consideration how housing is implemented anyway. Can you actually place all your stuff? (like in EQ2) and what happens with that after it is taken over? Will it be applied the next time you conquer it? But what if you dont rank up as getting that house the next capture?

Its just very overcomplicated if you ask me. Not to mention they plan on going big. And even if they have so many zones. In each zone, and lets be honest here, its realy hard to implement more than 5-6 player homes. But they already were talking about 200+ people ONSCREEN that means there wll be 500+ people of each faction running around on the huge PvP map. And everyone wants a piece of that cake. You understand where im going at?

I understand your point. I wouldn't expect player housing similar to SWG and I never did. I'll be lucky if this game has half the depth of MMOs from a decade ago. My point though is if they were to implement player housing, there are a lot of previous MMOs they could take inspiration from in order to figure out what they'd like to do.

As far as the system is concerned, how much one could customize homes, could they be restored after sieges, etc., that's not up for me to decide. That is something ZOS would have to determine and what they believe is best for this game. I'm only merely suggesting an idea that they could potentially mess around with.

RvR is going to likely be the feature that makes TES shine. I think incorporating player housing could be a neat and innovative way of enhancing that experience, depending on how they would approach it. I personally wouldn't care one way or the other if player housing was in or not. But, this is an idea of how player housing could add to ESO rather than it being a side feature where it doesn't really add anything, like many MMOs.

ZOS understands making an MMO is a huge undertaking and a large commitment, and they have recognized that you either go big or you go home. There is a lot of potential for this game, and so far word seems to be positive of the direction the game is taking.

I will be happy with a bed and a stash on a redoran center. Nothing too complicated :P

Very interesting idea. I wouldn't expect placeable player housing a la SWG, but it would be quite reasonable to have a limited amount of existing real estate within each city that was available for purchase by the members of the reigning faction. Depending on the difficulty of capturing an enemy city I can see that some might be wary of throwing too much gold at it, but this would likely make cities near the faction borders that much more attractive.

Bruma, for example or Riften, if it happened to be south of the border at this point in time, would be very sought after places to have a house for members of the Pact, due to their proximity to Ebonheart borders, and the unlikelihood of them being captured by enemy factions.

(August 8th 2012, 03:37 PM)confusion Wrote: Very interesting idea. I wouldn't expect placeable player housing a la SWG, but it would be quite reasonable to have a limited amount of existing real estate within each city that was available for purchase by the members of the reigning faction. Depending on the difficulty of capturing an enemy city I can see that some might be wary of throwing too much gold at it, but this would likely make cities near the faction borders that much more attractive.

Bruma, for example or Riften, if it happened to be south of the border at this point in time, would be very sought after places to have a house for members of the Pact, due to their proximity to Ebonheart borders, and the unlikelihood of them being captured by enemy factions.

I agree. My idea is certainly not perfect and I can see why many would feel concerned if they could potentially lose their home. However, I do truly believe it could add to the RvR and make players that much more invested in the conflict and give them more of a reason to fight.

Who knows if ZOS will change their mind and decide to add in some sort of player housing post-launch. This is just an idea of how I think player housing could truly add to ESO and would be a nice bonus to player's hard work in fighting in the war.

Don't think this'd fly I'm afraid. The big reasons players want housing for is something to personalise and store stuff in. I don't people are gonna put more than a couple of sweetrolls in there if someone else could take it overnight, and I suspect they'll change hands too often for players to bother personalising anything.

I do like the idea of getting players to invest in conquered territory though. Maybe you could pay to create resource generators (mines, farms etc).