[imported_Papa Smurf]

I look at it like this, 3 months is a LONG ****ing time to not log into INX. I work days and days in a row, go on vacation and still at best i might not be logged on for 2 weeks. People who haven't logged on for 3 months deserve to have their items fall to the ground and their houses crumble. I dont see why a "few" people are making a big deal out of this. Its pretty simple, dont log on for 3 months and we get to go on a scavenger hunt (which are tons of fun by the way) and we get to pick the cool spots for houses. By "we" I mean us ACTIVE players. For the life of me I cant think of ANYTHING that is negative about this. This is probably the best idea I have seen for INX

[imported_Shade]

I don't know what the big deal is about this... you are making a big friggen stink about something that is not a big deal.

Addressing your comments...

1) This creates more work then is needed. Not only would we have to check all the existing houses and log them for reference purposes, we would have to constantly update that log, check for houses that people don't bother to get approved, check new houses that people actually did post about, etc. Even if we changed the housing system (which is a ***** to do actually) people could still place empty lots all they wanted and I don't think any staff wants to hop around the world like an idiot looking for them. Sure we could add a new logging method for housing but that just eats up system resources. All in all this idea is a waste of staff time as well as unfair to players considering you are suggesting that they need to babysat even when making houses...

2) Who is anyone to say what is ugly or anything along those lines. You said have the staff team vote on it but someone might make a house that has no value or meaning to anyone but themselves. I have seen people recreate houses that used to be near their old house elsewhere for a nostalgic feeling. Again, you want to put too much regulation and limits on players for no damn reason as well as waste staffs in game time.

3) Work 16 hours a day, only play an hour a week? 80 don't care, tick tock!
Stop suggesting limitations and pointless rules.

4) Another suggestion about limiting? How shocking
Look even if there was a limit that doesn't fix a damn thing. Eventually, without decay, the world will be full and there is no arguing that fact. Houses add up and rarely get removed. If the playerbase doubles so does the house count, and if those players leave their houses don't thus accumulating the house count. You don't seem to understand that eventually all land will be taken up one day without decay.

It doesn't matter what you think a player needs and doesn't need. That isn't up for you to decide. If they want to blow their money on some houses, who cares? As long as they are active and participating in the shard let them buy all they want. Granted there may be a maintenance fee for excess houses but it still wouldn't be putting a limit on anyone.

I am totally against any form of limitations, especially when the simple fix here is a house decay. We could even link it to accounts, log in to refresh. That is not much to ask once every 3 months.

All in all this is starting to annoy me. You are arguing something that won't effect existing players and it has like a 1% chance to piss of someone if they return one day. Meanwhile it would make several players happy, not just the ones who posted here but the countless pages and queries about places that are taken by players who quit.

[imported_LudaKrishna]

All I'm saying is wtv's done make sure ppl gets to know about it via email...

It would be nice if all we had to do was log on in order to keep the house from not decaying imo.

[imported_Papa Smurf]

That would be to easy, just to log in. I think you should have to go and open the door to your house in order to refresh it. That is easy enough to do, dont want to make it to easy for the inactive's.

[imported_Ryuuku]

It doesn't matter what you think a player needs and doesn't need. That isn't up for you to decide. If they want to blow their money on some houses, who cares? As long as they are active and participating in the shard let them buy all they want. Granted there may be a maintenance fee for excess houses but it still wouldn't be putting a limit on anyone.

I am totally against any form of limitations, especially when the simple fix here is a house decay. We could even link it to accounts, log in to refresh. That is not much to ask once every 3 months.

Amen. Totaly agree.
Limit House Sux.
(But for sure something need to be done about those houses in minoc north mines, I dont know who the owner, but its just to annoy people...)

About need to open door or open sign to refrsh it...hmmm, I think just login is pretty good already, maybe login and stay for 5 min.

[Eighty Swords]

Thanks for taking the time to read my novel Shade, but after reading your replies I don't think you took the time to understand what I'm writing because in your mind the solution is house decay so you dismiss my suggestions right away... I know you're busy and I can understand and appreciate that. I don't mind waiting a week for you to answer me, but at least answer me after you have the time to read and understand or consider what I'm arguing here... The way this is going there's no point to anyone, even you, discussing it because you're refusing to see the other side to the argument. This is a closed minded discussion :/

I don't know what the big deal is about this... you are making a big friggen stink about something that is not a big deal.

The big deal is that it's not all the players who even want or see the need for this. It's about a 50-50 split among the player if you look over all the posts.

Furthermore, what makes it such a big deal (at least to me) is the fact that you're considering implementing an idea that will completely wipe out all the time someone spent with us on INX working for those items and gold to buy their house. Did you ever consider that some of the people who haven't been playing lately are just waiting for us to get out of beta and then they will be back? There's no reason to punish these people because they're waiting for us to get out of beta. I know that's not the case for everyone but I'm sure there are a fair amount of people that fit into that category! Well kudos on screwing these people over by deleting their houses and items on them.

1) This creates more work then is needed. Not only would we have to check all the existing houses and log them for reference purposes, we would have to constantly update that log, check for houses that people don't bother to get approved, check new houses that people actually did post about, etc. Even if we changed the housing system (which is a ***** to do actually) people could still place empty lots all they wanted and I don't think any staff wants to hop around the world like an idiot looking for them. Sure we could add a new logging method for housing but that just eats up system resources. All in all this idea is a waste of staff time as well as unfair to players considering you are suggesting that they need to babysat even when making houses...

If there's SOOO much worked involved in mainting this, make me staff and I'll look after this menial task that is too lowly of a job for other staff...

Here's yet another attempt to explain my suggestion. And to be honest it's getting really annoying to explain it over and over because people don't take the time to read and UNDERSTAND the whole suggestion. You can't just look at 1/4 of the suggestion and dismiss it all...

My suggestion wouldn't have to be repeated every other week, it's a 1 time thing for existing custom houses, and the other parts of my suggestion would take care of all future custom houses. Remember what I'm suggesting only takes effect for CUSTOM houses, not the classic ones so it's not quite every house in existance that has to be examined.

Step 1) One time a GM goes through existing custom houses and removes the ugly ones. AND FOR F*CKS SAKES READ WHAT I MEAN BY UGLY! IT'S SERIOUSLY ANNOYING HAVING TO REPEAT MYSELF OVER AND OVER WHEN PEOPLE DON'T READ... a house saying HI in colored tiles is USELESS!! I'm not talking about deleting a house that has sandstone walls instead of marble walls... That's designer's choice, not a useless house!!!

Step 2) Change custom houses so you have to be a GM or higher to finalize it. - This makes sure that all future houses aren't useless and will serve a purpose.

Step 3) Make a tweak so that houses have a timer and once this time limit is over if the house isn't finalized a staff member receives an automated message saying check out the house at co-ordinates x y z. You talk about my suggestion taking more work, well this part of the suggestion has to be done anyways; a timer set to self-destruct the house after x weeks/months.

2) Who is anyone to say what is ugly or anything along those lines. You said have the staff team vote on it but someone might make a house that has no value or meaning to anyone but themselves. I have seen people recreate houses that used to be near their old house elsewhere for a nostalgic feeling. Again, you want to put too much regulation and limits on players for no damn reason as well as waste staffs in game time.

Like I said before and again a few lines above this I'm not talking about a house that has sandstone walls isntead of stone walls, that's not a useless house. I'm talking about a house that serves no purpose. Don't clasify them as ugly if that makes a difference, call them useless.

ANd are you kidding me? I barely see GROUPS of houses as it is and I really don't think anyone is making 5 houses around theres just so it looks like it did 5 years ago... If you're worried about item count putting a strain on a server, then unused houses put just as much a strain and this should be restricted.

3) Work 16 hours a day, only play an hour a week? 80 don't care, tick tock!

What? Please refrain from answer me in a non sardonic and cold response... I have no idea what you're getting at here...

Stop suggesting limitations and pointless rules.

You do realize that society is nothing but rules and limitations? Sure, let's get rid of the speed limit because it's a limitation or pointless rule that stops me from getting to my destination. Oh wait, don't tell me... there are rules on INX too... oh snap, we better get rid of those...

4) Another suggestion about limiting? How shocking

Please refrain from answering me in a non sardonic and cold response... This really doesn't help us come to a solution...

Look even if there was a limit that doesn't fix a damn thing. Eventually, without decay, the world will be full and there is no arguing that fact. Houses add up and rarely get removed. If the playerbase doubles so does the house count, and if those players leave their houses don't thus accumulating the house count. You don't seem to understand that eventually all land will be taken up one day without decay.

I agree with you, there has to be some kind of measure against useless houses but I don't think at this time or within the next 6-12 months the necessary steps are to go from NO regulations to full on automatic house decay and loss of items.

It doesn't matter what you think a player needs and doesn't need. That isn't up for you to decide. If they want to blow their money on some houses, who cares? As long as they are active and participating in the shard let them buy all they want. Granted there may be a maintenance fee for excess houses but it still wouldn't be putting a limit on anyone.

Alright fine, lets say I agree with you 100% and house decay has to be implemented tomorrow. I'll be sure to run around placing USELESS houses all over the world just to block people from putting a house there and other then my main house I'll only visit these once every 3 months... Same problem that we apparently face today: no free space.

All in all this is starting to annoy me. You are arguing something that won't effect existing players and it has like a 1% chance to piss of someone if they return one day. Meanwhile it would make several players happy, not just the ones who posted here but the countless pages and queries about places that are taken by players who quit.

You said in one of your posts that I'm only thinking of the current moment and not down the road... Well this house decay issue will exist our present playerbase when they want to take an extended break. You're awefully fast to turn your back on someone who spends x amount of years here but then wants to take a break for a short time...




When was the last time people in favor of this idea actually ran around for more then 5 minutes and tried going to different parts of the world to find a space for their house? If you did you'd see there's actually still plenty of space for a house. And not everyone wants to buy the 1 million gp castle that covers a huge area. Some people just want a tiny 1 room house or that tower at ~360k. Don't tell me it's impossible to find a place for these houses...

[Eighty Swords]

I look at it like this, 3 months is a LONG ****ing time to not log into INX. I work days and days in a row, go on vacation and still at best i might not be logged on for 2 weeks. People who haven't logged on for 3 months deserve to have their items fall to the ground and their houses crumble. I dont see why a "few" people are making a big deal out of this.

You're absolutely right, 3 months is a realistic amount of time and it's the same amount of time in some other games. What I don't find right about this is that someone could spend 2+ years with us and then they take an extended break (by choice or not) and in 1/8 of the time they played with us they just lost all their stuff. Does that sound right to you?

Did anyone ever watch the movie The Last Castle? One of the main characters; the general, tells a soldier he committed one crime which lasted 5 minutes in all the years he was a solder, so by his count that makes the solder .0001% criminal and 99.999% a loyal obedient soldier who now has to suffer x years in jail. Well here in our little fantasy world players aren't committing a crime or breaking rules by taking a break. They didn't sign a contract when they joined INX saying they'd never take a break.

I don't think people deserve to have all their items wiped because they don't log in in a 3 month period or because they missed the log in! And with the way this system is being suggested, there's no leeway where a staff can intervene and say yea you're right, you only missed it by 2 days... here's your stuff back. Try not to miss it next time. I'll say it once again... you haven't played INX in x months, all of a sudden you get an email saying 'houses will start decaying if you don't log in every 3 months'. That email takes you not even 5 minutes to read but 3 months later if you forget you're screwed...

You're right, it is only a few people making a big deal out of this, but as I said to Shade, if you look through all the replies you'll see it's a 50-50 agreement and disagreement by the players. Not the greatest idea ever to me...

Its pretty simple, dont log on for 3 months and we get to go on a scavenger hunt (which are tons of fun by the way) and we get to pick the cool spots for houses. By "we" I mean us ACTIVE players. For the life of me I cant think of ANYTHING that is negative about this. This is probably the best idea I have seen for INX

You're forgetting that item decay is 30 minutes or so, and once the houses decay you have to find those houses and take everything you want within 30 minutes or you can kiss it all bye bye. Not a very good scavenger hunt to me.

And of course you think it's the best idea ever... you suggested it lol I've never seen someone disagree with themselves!



[SIZE="4"]QUESTION:[/SIZE] Will this house decay also apply to statics or only classic and custom houses? And if this also applies to statics (I sure as hell hope so) where they can be repurchased, how do we have the chance to take the items from them?

[imported_Shade]

You're absolutely right, 3 months is a realistic amount of time and it's the same amount of time in some other games. What I don't find right about this is that someone could spend 2+ years with us and then they take an extended break (by choice or not) and in 1/8 of the time they played with us they just lost all their stuff. Does that sound right to you?

Again, players can request their houses get refreshed for x amount of time if they take an extended leave. It takes 30 seconds to pm me or any other staff to leave us a message. If a player can't take 30 seconds to protect their homes then they won't care if its gone.

Did anyone ever watch the movie The Last Castle? One of the main characters; the general, tells a soldier he committed one crime which lasted 5 minutes in all the years he was a solder, so by his count that makes the solder .0001% criminal and 99.999% a loyal obedient soldier who now has to suffer x years in jail. Well here in our little fantasy world players aren't committing a crime or breaking rules by taking a break. They didn't sign a contract when they joined INX saying they'd never take a break.

Just like they didn't sign a contract, neither did we. We offer a service to our players and if a person is no longer a player then we can't exactly offer them a service anymore. If you ditch your car on the side of the road, when it gets towed you still own it and can go claim it if you care about it but after x amount of time the car is forfeited by the owner, once charges > car's worth. Much like that, every player has a value on this shard but when they leave for an extended period of time that value diminishes and eventually the cost of expecting them to come back outweighs the value, by that I mean the cost is effecting active players.

Added note: 95% of shards have house decay and even OSI too(at least the ones that have been open for over a year).

You're right, it is only a few people making a big deal out of this, but as I said to Shade, if you look through all the replies you'll see it's a 50-50 agreement and disagreement by the players. Not the greatest idea ever to me...

This is not 50/50, UO is not a forum game. As I have already said, people have asked about this countless times in-game.

You're forgetting that item decay is 30 minutes or so, and once the houses decay you have to find those houses and take everything you want within 30 minutes or you can kiss it all bye bye. Not a very good scavenger hunt to me.

Since the house system gradually works in stages you can see which houses are decaying and which aren't by clicking the sign. If there is a location or item people want, they will camp the house for a few hours when it hits its final stage, I've seen it many times.

Will this house decay also apply to statics or only classic and custom houses? And if this also applies to statics (I sure as hell hope so) where they can be repurchased, how do we have the chance to take the items from them?

Yeah there is a very high probability that it would also work for statics. The main reason being statics are set up as a normal custom house, but staff define the staff lot coords, so we would have to go out of our way to change that so it wouldn't effect statics which wouldn't be fair anyway. Plus preferred statics get taken and the owners might not ever plan on coming back, that should not mean nobody can ever own it.

[imported_Papa Smurf]

You're absolutely right, 3 months is a realistic amount of time and it's the same amount of time in some other games. What I don't find right about this is that someone could spend 2+ years with us and then they take an extended break (by choice or not) and in 1/8 of the time they played with us they just lost all their stuff. Does that sound right to you?

Did anyone ever watch the movie The Last Castle? One of the main characters; the general, tells a soldier he committed one crime which lasted 5 minutes in all the years he was a solder, so by his count that makes the solder .0001% criminal and 99.999% a loyal obedient soldier who now has to suffer x years in jail. Well here in our little fantasy world players aren't committing a crime or breaking rules by taking a break. They didn't sign a contract when they joined INX saying they'd never take a break.

I don't think people deserve to have all their items wiped because they don't log in in a 3 month period or because they missed the log in! And with the way this system is being suggested, there's no leeway where a staff can intervene and say yea you're right, you only missed it by 2 days... here's your stuff back. Try not to miss it next time. I'll say it once again... you haven't played INX in x months, all of a sudden you get an email saying 'houses will start decaying if you don't log in every 3 months'. That email takes you not even 5 minutes to read but 3 months later if you forget you're screwed...

You're right, it is only a few people making a big deal out of this, but as I said to Shade, if you look through all the replies you'll see it's a 50-50 agreement and disagreement by the players. Not the greatest idea ever to me...




You're forgetting that item decay is 30 minutes or so, and once the houses decay you have to find those houses and take everything you want within 30 minutes or you can kiss it all bye bye. Not a very good scavenger hunt to me.

And of course you think it's the best idea ever... you suggested it lol I've never seen someone disagree with themselves!



[SIZE="4"]QUESTION:[/SIZE] Will this house decay also apply to statics or only classic and custom houses? And if this also applies to statics (I sure as hell hope so) where they can be repurchased, how do we have the chance to take the items from them?

I would like to start off by saying, the decay system will have some sort of telling sign or atleast it should. Meaning the sign to the house will say like "this house is about to crumble" or something when you click it. So I will mark a rune there and keep checking it if it is about to decay and I along with many others will mark runes to these places and hopefully have fun battle while trying to loot them. Also, 80 I think you quote movies and keep repeating yourself because you are trying to make INX forum history by posting about everything and anything. Also I would like to say that if I was inactive and got the email and I cared about INX and my items I would make it a point to log in once every 3 months lol (like thats hard to do). If I came back after 3-6 months with an extension and I was late and my items were gone, then thats my fault and I would expect to loose my items.

[Eighty Swords]

Did anyone ever watch the movie The Last Castle? One of the main characters; the general, tells a soldier he committed one crime which lasted 5 minutes in all the years he was a solder, so by his count that makes the solder .0001% criminal and 99.999% a loyal obedient soldier who now has to suffer x years in jail. Well here in our little fantasy world players aren't committing a crime or breaking rules by taking a break. They didn't sign a contract when they joined INX saying they'd never take a break.

Just like they didn't sign a contract, neither did we. We offer a service to our players and if a person is no longer a player then we can't exactly offer them a service anymore. If you ditch your car on the side of the road, when it gets towed you still own it and can go claim it if you care about it but after x amount of time the car is forfeited by the owner, once charges > car's worth. Much like that, every player has a value on this shard but when they leave for an extended period of time that value diminishes and eventually the cost of expecting them to come back outweighs the value, by that I mean the cost is effecting active players.

Added note: 95% of shards have house decay and even OSI too(at least the ones that have been open for over a year).

Actually, when you join the the military you do sign a contract agreeing to certain things just like depending on the nature of your job you have to sign an NDA (non-disclosure agreement)

This house decay thing is like if you have a bank account and you don't withdraw any money or make any deposits in 3 months the bank keeps all your money lol!

In the 3 versions of XUO I played there was never house decay and running out of space was never an issue. XUO2 was up for at least 2-3 years, maybe more, and this never became an issue and we didn't even have static houses so the % of houses that are static houses on this shard would be regular houses taking up open space on XUO.

You're absolutely right, 3 months is a realistic amount of time and it's the same amount of time in some other games. What I don't find right about this is that someone could spend 2+ years with us and then they take an extended break (by choice or not) and in 1/8 of the time they played with us they just lost all their stuff. Does that sound right to you?

Again, players can request their houses get refreshed for x amount of time if they take an extended leave. It takes 30 seconds to pm me or any other staff to leave us a message. If a player can't take 30 seconds to protect their homes then they won't care if its gone.

Don't take this the wrong way but there isn't always a staff online to page and leave a message for, and even when there are staff online and legitimate pages with questions about something ingame (and not a page like 'please host an event') they aren't always answered. And I don't mean not answered in 30 seconds, I mean in several hours...

You're right, it is only a few people making a big deal out of this, but as I said to Shade, if you look through all the replies you'll see it's a 50-50 agreement and disagreement by the players. Not the greatest idea ever to me...

This is not 50/50, UO is not a forum game. As I have already said, people have asked about this countless times in-game.

You're right it's not all based on the forums, there are plenty of people who don't post here that play. The other factor you're not considering though is that people against house decay aren't spontaneously coming up to you and other staff saying 'please don't make houses decay' if they never see any talk about it.

You're forgetting that item decay is 30 minutes or so, and once the houses decay you have to find those houses and take everything you want within 30 minutes or you can kiss it all bye bye. Not a very good scavenger hunt to me.

Since the house system gradually works in stages you can see which houses are decaying and which aren't by clicking the sign. If there is a location or item people want, they will camp the house for a few hours when it hits its final stage, I've seen it many times.

Are you saying as a player I can click on a house sign and see how close it is to decaying? I've never noticed that before, but then again maybe there was never house decay on a shard I played...

Will this house decay also apply to statics or only classic and custom houses? And if this also applies to statics (I sure as hell hope so) where they can be repurchased, how do we have the chance to take the items from them?

Yeah there is a very high probability that it would also work for statics. The main reason being statics are set up as a normal custom house, but staff define the staff lot coords, so we would have to go out of our way to change that so it wouldn't effect statics which wouldn't be fair anyway. Plus preferred statics get taken and the owners might not ever plan on coming back, that should not mean nobody can ever own it.

OK that's good to hear then. This was one of the big 'gripes' I had about this issue where it was sounding like it wouldn't happen for statics too.

Also, 80 I think you quote movies and keep repeating yourself because you are trying to make INX forum history by posting about everything and anything.

Oh yes, you're absolutely right! I don't give a flying f*ck what happens to this shard, I just want to be the leetest poster on these forums :badgrin: You ever hear of an analogy? Apparently not... Come on man use your brain if you want to discuss something with me. If I didn't care about this shard do you really think I'd spend so much time on these forums trying to help balance ideas or argue why I don't think they'd help?

[imported_Shade]

Actually, when you join the the military you do sign a contract agreeing to certain things just like depending on the nature of your job you have to sign an NDA (non-disclosure agreement)

Yeah thats a lovely story but I was giving an example more fitting for the scenario.

This house decay thing is like if you have a bank account and you don't withdraw any money or make any deposits in 3 months the bank keeps all your money lol!

No its more like buying property/house and then abandoning the house. Eventually it will be foreclosed or condemned.

In the 3 versions of XUO I played there was never house decay and running out of space was never an issue. XUO2 was up for at least 2-3 years, maybe more, and this never became an issue and we didn't even have static houses so the % of houses that are static houses on this shard would be regular houses taking up open space on XUO.

And? 3 shards makes up like .01% of all total shards that were ever in existence. Do we have the exact same players here with the exact same habits or something? Just because people didn't buy many houses there doesn't mean they don't here. This has no relevance whatsoever.

Don't take this the wrong way but there isn't always a staff online to page and leave a message for, and even when there are staff online and legitimate pages with questions about something ingame (and not a page like 'please host an event') they aren't always answered. And I don't mean not answered in 30 seconds, I mean in several hours...

Thats why I said they could pm me... Again only take a moment to leave me a message.

You're right it's not all based on the forums, there are plenty of people who don't post here that play. The other factor you're not considering though is that people against house decay aren't spontaneously coming up to you and other staff saying 'please don't make houses decay' if they never see any talk about it.

So fact vs speculation now? You are assuming it will bother people because you don't like it. Meanwhile people have asked for this countless times in the past, sometimes around other people, and nobody has ever said anything against the idea until now.

Are you saying as a player I can click on a house sign and see how close it is to decaying? I've never noticed that before, but then again maybe there was never house decay on a shard I played...

The default house system has "levels" and each one shows on the sign when its enabled. It would work something like:
This house is like new (1-7 days old)
The house is slightly worn (2-3 weeks old)
I forget the next two..
This house is in danger of collapsing (24 hours remaining)

I just want to be the leetest poster on these forums

The truth comes out.

[imported_Jackal]

So first off i would like to Thank Eighty and Shade because I haven't read a book in awhile, and after reading there posts i feel like i've read a Novel:p Second House decay is a awesome idea! I would say 95% of the houses on the shard are inactive so why would we keep those houses if the chance of the player coming back is.........ill be generous 10% will say. If a person knows that there items might disappear then i'm sure they will hop on to refresh so no biggie. If they don't care about there items or even logging back in then houses will decay. Whats so wrong in that? Shade already said you could pm a staff member if you weren't able to get back on to refresh to let them know the situation. So my question is.....What is the big fuss about? This is not a 50/50 split its more like a 98/2 split. In ending I would also like to add NO MORE NOVELS PLEASE!