Topic
Questions About New Housing and Group Halls -- NOW WITH STOOT ANSWERS!
UPDATE: Scarlett Bearsdale has provided a summary of questions and answers here.
Thanks Scarlett!
** ORIGINAL POST FOLLOWS *****************************************
I have many questions in my mind about the new housing and group halls that will be coming to Glitch. I am going to post some of them here. Maybe others have questions they would like to post.
HOUSING QUESTIONS
1. Once the new housing is introduced, what steps will current users need to take to acquire a house and what steps will new users need to take to acquire a house?
2. Will a new house consist of a template that can be extended and added to? If so, will there be one template that everyone starts with, or will there be different starting templates to choose from?
3. Will houses have an exterior that is visible from public space such that any player could pass by, see the house, drop something in front of it, or knock on the door if they wish? If so, will there be ways to customize this exterior to make something that is visually unique?
4. Will there be spaces with clusters of houses similar to the current housing quarters? If so, will there be public access to these spaces such that any player can come into them and wander around?
5. Will the new houses have a permission system that is more flexible and layered than the current permission system which allows anyone who has access to a house to take almost everything that's not locked into a cabinet?
GROUP HALL QUESTIONS
1. Will a group hall look like and function like (a) a building, (b) an outdoor street or streets, (c) an outdoor street or streets with one or more buildings, or (d) any of these a group wants?
2. Will group halls be available only to formal groups or can a collection of players get together and create a "group hall" without also creating a formal group?
3. Will group halls be considered to be owned by their associated group (however such groups are defined), owned by a subset of the group, owned by the entire community, or what?
4. Will group halls be accessible only to those who are members of their associated group, or will there be a more flexible permission system (e.g. public, public w/ blocklist, permanent guest list, limited-time invitation, etc.)?
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Maybe TS will answer some of these questions, maybe not. Either way, I'm interested to know what others want to know :)
UPDATE: See below for some answers from stoot :)
Replies
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These may be hard to answer, but it never hurts to ask!
1. How will TS notify players when the changeover occurs? (I'm not sure how many players are regular forum readers.)
2. Will it be possible to have a large amount of time to prepare for the change? Like, perhaps a month? (I have a personal reason for asking: I'll be on vacation/honeymoon for 3 weeks starting mid-May, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who has RL stuff going on LOL). - +1 all very good questions, even if the answer is, "We haven't worked that out yet, but it's very technical and we've been listening to your ideas, some of which will work, and some of which won't for technical reasons, and others that won't for game balance reasons; we can't get into a debate about those judgments though."
- @Scarlett Bearsdale - If I were TS, I would NOT be giving lot of specific answers yet -- but I would want to know what questions people had, lol. And I would maybe give a few hints or ask for opinions on a few points.
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Considering they have been working on this since probably at least Oct 2011, if not longer, they should have some of these answers worked out that should be able to share...one would hope they are getting rather close to implementing this stuff at this point, so there is enough time to adequately test it out, which is truly what a beta is for...testing. So, I think the OP (and additional) questions are good ones at this stage of the game.
I'd also like to know which will come first. Originally they said group halls would be next, then housing. Now, it almost sounds like they might be nearly simultaneously introduced.
Also, will we be able to link our house 'islands' to our various group hall 'islands' (islands being a loose term, not necessarily what we will have), thereby making our own neighborhood of sorts via the groups we belong to? -
Housing Questions! (I won't answer the Group Hall questions now.)
1. Existing users will go through a tutorial/explain-y transition process to move from their old to new houses the first time they log in after we make the switch. You will get some form or "credit" for the price of your old house, translated into the new system.
New users will get a starter house as part of the initial tutorial.
2. New houses will start with a basic template, common to everyone. But everyone can extend and upgrade it in their own way.
3. Yes. And Yes.
4. No.
5. No. That may happen in the future, house keys are not related to what we're working on now. -
Ooooh, an answer. That gives me hope.
Will there be any sort of 'ceiling' on the new housing? I've reached the end of my rope as far as most of the current content goes. I've reached the level cap, gotten all the skills, earned a bazillion badges, and played at LEAST 12,000 seconds of GoC as well as trying out Rook attacks and street projects.
I hope that my new house at least shall never cease to have new land to add, trees to magic up, and levels to build :) Are my hopes going to be possible in the new reality? I'd hate to power through all the new housing has to offer in the first month and suddenly have an insane mega house that has everything the new housing is capable of offering.
For example, will there be maximums on how much land you can have, patches you can make, plots you can add, levels you can build? -
Thanks for the housing reply stoot...look forward to hearing about the group halls 'shoon'...
ETA: not to answer for TS, because I don't know what their actual plan is, but I know in other games such as Faunasphere, Nord, and even Free Realms we have limits to the amount of land we had (mainly due to server space since that amount of room had to be allocated to each player - though in FR you can have multiple home spaces, and they were starting to go toward multiple spheres on an account in FS before they shut down). However, even in that, there were an infinite amount of ways we could configure those lands...so there was always some creative thing we could do with our personal spaces. Some people (and even the game owners) would have contests for decorating or building things in FS and Nord. So there was always something to do, even if it was only in your own personal space. I would think that there would be similar limits, but of course, that is a good question for TS vice just me a fellow player to answer! :) I've not played Minecraft for very long, but at this point, it seems like that world is rather limitless...however, maybe I've just not hit the end of my personal space in game. -
Liza's reply makes me think of the Winchester house. :D Stairs that go to nowhere and doors that end over nothing!
And, yes, thanks, stoot! -
Thank you Stoot for some answers. ;)
Related Question _ so the NEW players incoming will just be GIVEN a house with out having
to work for it AT ALL ????? o-O . -
The implication is that that house will be a hovel on a plot of land the size of your shoe. And they won't have the skills or resources to upgrade it :P
At least, that's the feeling I get. That the template house will be a shack, essentially. -
+1 to Liza's question about expandability!
Also, as for extending and upgrading houses, will this be by donating resources similar to old school projects, or by spending the mysterious 'imagination' stuffs (whatever that is)? In other words, is hoarding resources now, in anticipation of future value wrt housing expansions, a complete waste of time, or will it be beneficial?
Also, when it comes to imagination - what is imagination (as related to the game, to avoid sarcastic response), and how will it map to current metrics? - In return I shall +1 your own comment Joe! All questions I've had since I heard about houses and imagination.
- Answers :D I wish the devs posted a weekly or bi-monthly (or even monthly?) update on upcoming things, and actually let us use our points to use for voting on new features!
- Does this mean it will not be possible anymore to play homelessly? Wandering around Ur has traditionally been part of the game play, and it's also something people sometimes choose to do from time to time even in advanced stages of game play. I hope we aren't going to now be 'locked' to a chunk of real estate by default.
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I hope no one will force you to go back to your house! You may leave it in its unaltered form and never visit it if you wish to be a vagabond :) I myself like wandering around all over until my bags are full to bursting with musicblocks, grain, meat, milk and treesources. (See what I did there?) Personally I like having a home to return to, but not wanting that is certainly an opinion anyone is entitled to.
Perhaps there will be some sort of option to reject the house for the time being? Especially since you've asked nicely :P -
That isn't at all the same as making the choice to 'sell everything and go mediate on a mountain.' It isn't the same as being a wanderer who has no 'roots.' Perhaps if there is the ability to 'reset your house' to nothing but the starter vacant lot, but even then, there it is, and there we are, like landlocked peasants, not free wandering spirits. This housing change makes the game more materialist. "There's a place over there with 'my stuff' in it." I guess if that's the developers vision of what it is to be a glitch, we'll just have to improvise within it.
Perhaps there can be a series of 'reset' buttons that perform a varying degree of 'reset.' Button 1 just resets the house to 'starter' whereas button 2 resets all quests, skills, etc. Or a player can just sign up for a new account I suppose.
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For the record, at the moment I have a 50k house and am enjoying it very much. But next week I might want to quit that whole gig and go live in a treehouse in Aranna. If we're landlocked can we ever be truly free? ("You are a unit of society." etc. etc. blah blah) -
@stoot barfield - Thank you so much!
@Liza Throttlebottom - I see what you did there :)
@Razzal - If a Glitch cannot go to the mountain, perhaps the mountain can come to the Glitch. - OMG ANSWERS! stoot! You are a god!
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Oops, sorry. I have this mountain of bags to get rid of, and then I'm free at last. At least with un-sellable bags, you can abandon them in the street. That house over there that I'm permanently assigned to? I guess I can pretend it's a mountain. Here, we can look at this slide show from my last trip to Aranna....
The difference between being a true wanderer and citizen of the world and just being another despised tourist is that a tourist has a 'place' with 'stuff' to go home to. It's a big difference. But I'm too close to beating it to death now, others can contribute their thoughts on the matter. -
If "wandering around Ur" is your only concern, then by all means wander around Ur.
I think a heck of a lot more people will be pleased that a home is part of the game in the beginning, and I think it will greatly improve the way new players perceive the game.
I think you're almost just trying your hardest to find something to be annoyed with.
Anyway, Stoot, does declining to answer questions about group halls mean they are delayed until after housing, delayed indefinitely, or just no longer part of the plan? - Why the need to turn a discussion negative? Different people have different play styles. You don't have to dump on other people's ideas in order to look better yourself. This isn't a groupthink hive, I hope. We're here to discuss the directions the game is headed in, not to champion our pet ideas.
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I said nothing negative. I think you're trying your hardest to find something to be annoyed with, and it seems not even you play that way.
But good question, why did you immediately jump to a play style that this wouldn't work with despite it not being a play style you currently use?
Why are you championing your pet idea that is not the direction the game is heading in?
Why would your definition of tourist versus citizen of the world have anything to do with Ur whatsoever? Since that's entirely a perception issue, why not change your perception and just spend no time at the home and no time working on it?
I don't think it makes me look better than you to find your concern a little silly. I don't think it's a sign of groupthink to tell someone you disagree and why. -
Please tell me we'll get a warning *before* the house is swept out from under us! Otherwise how will I be able to move all my extensive amounts of hoarded stuff out before the change! D:>
now sooo worried. :< -
Miso George: you don't need to worry about moving your stuff — that will all be automatic.
Liza Throttlebottom: there will probably be some eventual limit. But, it will get geometrically more expensive to imagine more land so any hard limit will more theoretical than not.
Razzal: you will not able to able to play house-less (just like you are not currently able to play inventory-less or leg-less or energy-less) but since the house is inside your own mind you'd have to twist yourself into an impossible-to-sustain conceptual pretzel to get to "landlocked peasants" who are "more materialist" because of being "permanently assigned" to "a chunk of real estate".
Saucelah: Group Halls will come after housing (and a few other things) and will make much more sense then.
Joe Blow: in general: to get more space/land, you'll be spending imagination; to get more stuff on the land, you'll be doing discrete project-like work, crafting or trading with other players. Hoarding stuff now will not help you very much (in the long run, having a billion cherries will only be valuable if there is demand among for a billion cherries among the other players). - Hints from Stoot! Yeah! Sounds awesome.
- Thanks so much Stoot!!!!! Great to get some answers before the big housing migration! (((HUGS))) to all the TS team!
- I wanna be an impossible-to-sustain pretzel!
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PHEW thanks stoot! I luvs uuu *^___^*
now I can go back to being excited and not terrified hehe~! - Is there anything you can tell us about timeframe? I think I've read early Q2 2012 for relaunching, but I'm guessing some parts of this would go into beta testing for a while before relaunch.
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*places stoot back in the ♥ column
The Jeez! frustration comment got to me. Happy to see the brighter side of stoot again.
Looking forward to the Glitchy future! - @stoot: Thank you so much for the info. Please keep it coming! Love you guys at TS. Huge thanks for all you do for us. Sounds very exciting! :)
- any chance there might be some more bog houses released to tide folks over or do we all just need to be very patient?
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Surely we'll have a good chunk of time in beta with New Housing, so as to work the kinks out of it. Isn't that the whole point of unlaunching?
I hope we'll also get a chance to try out our Subscribers' votes at some point too. That was a big selling point for me. -
stoot - thanks for the information.
Can you elaborate more on your "Hoarding stuff now will not help you very much" statement?
You say that a billion cherries won't help, but also say that crafting will be one of the ways to get more stuff on our land. This seems to be a contradiction, as cherries are involved in many crafting activities.
Is this to say that the "act of crafting" will be the thing of value, as opposed to the resources themselves? If this is the case, then the cherries do have value as raw ingredients. Or is it that "the acquisition" of a billion cherries after the new system is in place will result in a billion imagination points, which can then be used to buy stuff?
In short, many of us are at the point where we are simply acquiring resources in ridiculous amounts (including currants) in hopes that they will provide a future value. Will the items/currants we have now be of any use in the future, or shall I start creating The Trail of One Billion Cherries from my front door to your house now? -
Ahhh...ty, stoot!!
Now that you've explained some things a bit further, I'm starting to get some excitement about all of this, again!! - So... no more quarters? Wow. I'm honestly a bit gutted. I love living on the same block as all of my friends. We run into each other all the time. Have parties outside our houses. And IDK the idea of losing that to a house that just exists in some mystery place is making me kinda sad.
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agree with Gwyn- a bit sad.
While we are on this topic of houses , I saw this at glitchaddict that I had msised back in November : glitchaddict.com/blog/2011/... .
:) - Oh jeebus. What could MB stand for? It's an Animal Kinship colored skill... Hmm...
- Making babies?
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LMAO @ Making babies?
Oo...Maybe the B has to do with bees!!
Or honey bears - Mugging Bears, maybe? :D :P - Thank you Stoot. :)
- Okay, so there will not be housing quarters as they exist now. Will the houses still exist in some "physical" place on Ur? The neighbourhood snob in my wants to keep my location :)
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Where in UR will we be when we leave our house if the housing isn't a part of a street. I ask because i tend to stick to my neighborhood, learning the streets and local vendors, never wandering too far unless I need to go mining or get barnicles or something that's in a different part of the world. I think I would feel quite disconnected if I wasn't set in a place I called home.
Other than this I'm quite excited about the new homes. - Thank you Stoot!
- Joe, perhaps if only new items in the future are used in the crafting process, thus rendering hoarding of existing items not as useful. But this is just a guess.
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Octo, it sounds like you will be where you are, when you leave your house: to enter your house you enter your imagination, and geography of houses and halls is a friendship/interest network? Though now I'm having trouble imagining the relationship between the world that the giants imagine and the world that the glitches the giants imagine imagine.
Stoot thank you so much for helping us understand -- it sounds like your team is gearing up for some quite large changes, which sound pretty awesome. Whatever you do is going to make a lot of us cranky, but I hope that doesn't divert you from making the best possible game for new players. - Thanks!
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Just wanted to second Razzle's point.
Let's imagine for a second that you wanted to explore the geometric growth possibilities of the new housing system, and you decide to go full out and get the land and all the inner and outer customizations and what not. Then, six months or a year in, you decide that you really just prefer some earlier stage of the process. Can you go back?
In Hindu culture they have this idea of stages of life: student, householder, retired person then ascetic. Instead of merely having one option, to say reset to a starter home, maybe you can select another base house and change to it, which has a different set of options - which perhaps you could unlock once you reach a certain level of game...maturity, for lack of a better word.
I understand that, depending how it was implemented, this could add another layer and not be possible - but, just thought I would throw it out there as someone who occasionally thinks about taking up the homeless option in Glitch as it is currently put together. -
I'm not really happy about this. I like my house the way it is now. I don't want to have to spend time building it.
I just wanted a little customization like ... furniture and such.
But I will try it out despite not being happy. - @stoot in reference to the hoarding, does that mean that there will no longer be street projects and street project trophies? /me bites nails.