So, I'm fine with the auto refresh on our homes and castles and I understand the need for it. The down side of this, however, is that there is no land being freed up for new players or those who wish to move to another area.
I have an idea to solve the overcrowding issue and it comes from another game I played for a while, "Lord of the Rings" and it's a pretty good system. Their homes are static and you rent them at varying rates, depending on size, location and such. If you fail to pay the rent for a while (3 months maybe?) everything gets packed up into escrow and you are informed that you need to contact the escrow person at a bank to retrieve your items.
I wonder if there could be a way to implement this in UO. The deed for the home could also be included in the escrow account so it's a win-win. The only penalty, really, would be that of trying to find a new plot to put the home on and get set up again.
I wonder if this has been discussed and if there is a way to implement this in Ultima Online.
The problem in this idea is, IMO, that LoTR is, correct me if I'm wrong, a totally F2P MMORPG, whereas people that have Houses in UO pay a Sub, and frequently they pay that Sub exactly to be able to have a House...
Yes there is a F2P aspect but you need a paid sub to access and retrieve items from escrow or rent a new house, etc, even to access certain areas in the game.In the case of this game, the sub would have to be paid up to access escrow or replace your deed. Rule would be, if the house has not been accessed by a character on the account, from a paid sub within (insert length of time here), then escrow it is. Think of it as the moving crate, it's the same principle.
All those houses belong to paid accounts. Please do not mess with housing
Ok, if they're all paid and active, great. I am only referring to those who have left their homes behind when they left the game. That would mean no paid account. Just an idea to free up space on some of the servers.
Are you saying you want a change to the current rule? Where houses become IDOC (in danger of collapse) after the account has been unpaid for 90 days and are then deleted from the server?
The easiest way to solve the housing issue (even though to UO it's probably not an issue) is to expand new lands and allow new housing there. There are entire large areas of maps on every shard that have several (sometimes a dozen or more) houses clustered into a region that are owned by one person and have been owned by that one person for almost 20 years. It's tough to ask them to remove them, but it does hurt gameplay for new or returning players looking for their own little slice of heaven. I don't think its possible that people left the game and their houses are still up and taking up space. They drop after the account becomes inactive (60 day window)?
But there largely unexplored lands for housing even on Atlantic, it's called fel. Tis a quiet peaceful place devoid of life where the neighbors are few and traffic is light.
Not exactly 7x7, placed another tower for a friend last night in fel. Took about 10 minutes to find the spot. *Shrug*, housing situation increases sub count and keeps the game alive at its core, good or bad seems like one of the only reasons we're still here to talk about this.
I would like to see malas opened up to keeps and castles. With most shards it’s pretty empty
You can place a large tower in fel on atl. It takes time and effort to find big house spots, but they are there. Malas/tram you could still find 3 story house spots.
I think it is perfectly OK to let the house fall if the player did not pay sub.
However, I feel it is terrible to let his items fall together with the house and allow others to loot.
Yes, say all you can and justify why this is necessary. But I can say for sure many players may not return in future if they probably lost an entire castle worth of items collected since day 1 in 1999.
Drop the house but pack their stuff into a cheap memory space on your Server HDD and you will get more returning players.
Currently there are no advertisements to attract new players and yet existing players keep dwindling down and they lose their stuff just because they didn't pay rent for few months.
Yes, you can still charge them a small fee to retrieve their old items, maybe the faction horses, rares, original lieutenant sash, extinct bane dragons etc will still be around today. They can even sell their accounts to other players.
At this rate soon we just need a few shards, because most will be empty.
I solved my atlantic problem. Went to LS. Prices are still outrageous but there is lots of room for a house.
Be like me. Started in Baja at the beginning. Left for Atlantic years later. Returned again, I could only place a small on Atlantic when I returned last month. Came back to baja. Took less than an hour to place a keep.
Give away some free server transfers to servers with some space and fresh air.
Come back to Baja, where the fishing is good, trees as far as the eyes can see. Where the wild dragons have become fat and lazy and the gold just lays on the ground, waiting to be picked up.
Thanks Bilbo, its good to be home.
"It does not matter if that account is active or not as long as it is being paid for then the house stays."
You hit the nail on the head Bilbo.
