What would YOU like to ask the Housing devs? (Q&A)

bluebird

Player housing seems to have gotten more attention this year than any year before! Housing got two new major features, Cullen Lee posted about furnishing limit concerns, and we also got an ESO Live that featured housing content! You can watch it below if you haven't yet, I recommend that you do since it was very informative!

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/552012971?t=01s
In the stream, they talked about how houses get developed - coordinating the things that players requested with things that they know are coming up in their future releases, reusing assets that have been already created (such as the Orcish longhouse model from vanilla), then making a list of references and a crude map, and after some dev magic by 'Nick' we get the new house releases. When it comes developing furniture, Cullen talked about less things, but mentioned that they will sometimes go to the art team asking for some flowers for example, and the art team comes up with the unique models that we see in the Heart's Day Retreat pack for example.

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ESO Lives often feature information about upcoming content, and a lot of insight into the development process from idea to implementation (like the ESO Live about Antiquities or the new dungeons). I think I speak for all the housing community when I say that we really enjoyed seeing Cullen talk about housing, and wish there were more opportunities to learn more from the housing and furnishing developers! There is a new Precision Edit feature, and the new Character Pathing and Houseguests feature on the PTS right now for example, that would be great to show off in an ESO Live (since many newer players may not find it immediately and may appreciate an official video to show off its features)! Seeing Cullen, the mysterious 'Nick' who apparently works on converting assets into houses, or even Cardinal, doing a housing stream would be great!

Would it be possible to have more frequent panels that feature Housing and Furnishing news please? The article about furnishing limits was nice, but official communications are few and far between, other aspects of the game like ability changes regularly get developer's comments, and even during longer shows there is very little talk of housing content, even when there is stuff to talk about!

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So first of all, many thanks to the Housing team, and to Cullen for their recent communications, and all the work they do behind the scenes for housing! Many of us would love to hear more from you!

My question to the community is:

• Would you like to have more frequent Housing-related ESO Lives?
• If you could, what would you like to ask the Housing team ?

Here’s Cullen's article btw, so please read it so we don't just get 'Why is the furnishing limit only 700' questions over and over . https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/512076/february-2020-furnishing-limit-status-update
But other than that, go wild! Express yourself! What would you like to know about? What do you care about the most?

bluebird

To start things off, here are some of my questions

Is the Forum a good place where players can send suggestions, feedback, or requests, or do you prefer and frequent another medium (like Reddit or Twitter)?

When deciding which already existing assets to convert into furniture, what do you base your decisions and priorities on? (Because there are a lot of ingame assets that housing fans have had their eye on for years *cough weapons cough instruments cough*)

Do you have any influence on the upcoming architecture and furniture styles at all, or do you just work on converting the assets? E.g. are new regional styles envisioned with housing in mind, or is it purely the art team’s decision (for example Alinor and Vampire furniture have a very similar Gothic vibe)?

Are 'cluster' type furniture more taxing than singular furniture (e.g. Fern Cluster vs. Fern)? Because more Cluster type furnishings would help a lot with the slot issue (e.g. Writing Desk cluster items, Kitchen Counter cluster items)

How long does it take to convert an existing ingame house model into a player house? How difficult and lengthy is that process? (Because there are always tons of ‘Could we have a…’ house requests threads on the Forums.)

xF1REFL1x

Doors and windows... would like to see more options for housing.

StabbityDoom

I'd more like to tell them something(s)
1. Thank you for all you do, and especially for the recent attention. I'm glad you realize we're an active community. We go nuts when you give us new things, as you can see! This is me squeeing in joy through the whole Antiquarian home as a thank you ---https://youtu.be/tnXKtSN4PD8

2. I think the precision editor is already the greatest gift we could have gotten. But if I could ask for anything it would be to allow us to have a hub system that allows us to visit homes people have opened to the community. EHT does this but it would be WONDERFUL to allow even non-users, and consolers, to let people know their homes are open for viewing. This is actually a way for ZOS to monetize, think about it. The more homes people can see, the more they WANT these homes, the items, and to build in general. It's basically a loss leader. I urge you to consider this.

Thannazzar

Just one question:

If the 700 item limit in a home is a hard cap, why cant we have the limit on Classic Homes increased to 700 (even if we have to pay crowns for it)?

Moloch1514

Can we get an in-game reason to need housing? A small resting bonus that is stronger in a bed you own would be so easy and add so much "gameplay" to housing and inns.

Kittytravel

I'll start off with thanks for all the stuff you put up with from a pretty demanding community that is of course the harshest in critique since housing is a very visual thing; it's to be expected that we critique the work of the team the most and if you ever want us to buy donuts for you all maaaaaaaybe you can drop us a hint and the community would honestly probably chip in and do it. Probably.

My only two questions I'd like to ask is:
Is there any way we could get a "Guild House" button in the guild tab? Maybe right in on the home screen where that blank space is above "Updates" and it can either be by default the Guild Masters primary or allow the guild master to set it to another guildies home.

Second: Can housing get a feature that allows us to not be punished for traveling to it? Even if it's just in the form of a furniture that takes us to X city it'd be nice to not have to jump from one house to the other and then pay the wayshrine fee for teleporting to somewhere I own.

Khatou

I find that there is a cruel lack of "tricks" for the magi, and I'm very surprised not to see any.

So yes, there is one, well, if we can see this strange thing as such, but personally, I dream of a real tower quite classic, besides if a tower like in this screen so joined, would please me enormously and even more if tower seen as "remarkable residence"



this said it would miss an effect of grandeur and I would even say one or two floors, it would take one especially for the floor for one, not "worthy" of an archmage, I should say.

bluebird

Awesome posts, all! Good ideas and questions too, maybe ZOS will see the positive feedback and perhaps answer some questions too - in a future ESO Live or a Housing Q&A potentially? If we're lucky, lol!

Nord_Raseri

A proper nord longhouse, complete with back bedroom. The upcoming antiquarian house seems close but falls short wth 0 bedrooms(though if those tables are removable it may have to be enough).

TheImperfect

I know the answer keeps being no but the item limit being increased is pretty much everybody's number one desired feature. With the next generation of consoles will this be possible to increase? I'd love to see it doubled but would take any increase. Furnishings that can be combined into one item would be great. Maybe when you link items together they could be set as one item to lower the limit, but I don't know if that is possible?

Jaraal

Why can't we have a toggle for weather / light?


I got tired of sand blowing inside my player made buildings in the Thieves Oasis, and moved on to something else. It's a chore trying to place furnishings or having to wait 15 mins to take screenshots because sand is obscuring your view.

It would be my favorite house if I could control the sand, but it's just an expensive furniture warehouse now.

Khatou

I mentioned my personal desire above for a tower, but I forgot to mention another theme that I would like to see happen as much as the tower (and probably even before a tower), it's a landmark for thief or black brotherhood (I think it will go well for both ^^ ) it's a landmark, in sewers, either at Haltevoie or Aliki'y or see Raidelorn in one of its places, I think Alik'r could have a certain charm for that.

I dreamed of such a home after seeing this beautiful screen (below) visible during X loading of the game, which makes me salivate every time I see it.

Following this type of home strongly desired (for my part ), I would really like an idea of a secret passage, because every time I see a home in a theme for murderer or thief, I am always saddened not to see it in a home of this type.

The whole thing can be optimized by a sublime play of light

Please hear my fantasy



of course you need the water that goes with it and all that, because I already have some ideas in my head

React

Here's a copypasta from a post of mine in the PVP section about adding the ability to enable PVP within player owned homes, that would be great to see some developer feedback on.

Open spoiler for block of text

PvP players make up a very small portion of the playerbase and generally spend less money on cosmetics/housing/crowns than players from other areas of the game. As a result, very little development time is focused on PVP, and the content we have has been played through so many times that it has gone stale. So what PVP content could be added that would require little development time/effort from ZOS, while simultaneously providing incentive for PVP players to spend more money on housing/crowns?

The ability to enable PVP inside player homes. This would simply be a feature that a homeowner could enable from his housing editor menu, and would just set the home to a battle spirit affected/pvp enabled zone. The benefits from adding this to the game are NUMEROUS.

*Provides CUSTOM zones with infinite possibilities for player vs player combat, without developers needing to spend time creating environments.

*Allows for NEW, NEVER BEFORE SEEN FORMATS OF PVP. The system would only require a few very specific features to be a fully functional and enjoyable experience. By simply allowing any player OUTSIDE OF YOUR GROUP to be marked as "Hostile" within the pvp enabled home, the possibilities are once again endless. 2v2s, 4v4s, 8v8s, 12v12s, and 3-24 man FREE FOR ALL COMBAT.

*PvP players will have a reason to purchase homes. In my experience within the PVP community, pvp players care very little about crown cosmetics and housing. By adding this simple feature, there would be a HUGE incentive for players to go out and spend money on these things.

*These battles are confined to specific POH instances, keeping lag away from areas like major zones and cyrodiil, where players gather for duels and large scale combat despite the constant use of abilities adversely affecting performance.

The possibilities are endless, and the implementation of this would truly be a win-win for PVP players and Zenimax alike. As mentioned before, there are very few things that would have to be adressed/included with this update in order for it to be a fully functional and
genuinely enjoyable experience.

*PvP enabled option for homeowner

*Friendly/hostile detection based on grouping

*Designated safezone function to allow players ressurecting to have an area where they can adjust things/catch their breath

*Collision enabled housing objects - currently, almost every housing object has some sort of "player collision" disabled in pvp scenarios - meaning that knockbacks such as javelin, flame clench, leap, magnum shot, etc WILL knock you inside of objects within a house, if you're standing on/next to them.

*/kill or /safe command to instantly respawn at the door while stuck in combat (in the case of being stuck and being unable to leave combat)

I hope someone at ZOS sees this and passes it along for consideration. I truly think this could be one of the best PVP additions the game has ever seen, and from a consumer perspective it seems like something that would require very little development time to implement as most of the tools and features already exist within the game.[/spoiler[

Tigerseye

Khatou wrote: »

I mentioned my personal desire above for a tower, but I forgot to mention another theme that I would like to see happen as much as the tower (and probably even before a tower), it's a landmark for thief or black brotherhood (I think it will go well for both ^^ ) it's a landmark, in sewers, either at Haltevoie or Aliki'y or see Raidelorn in one of its places, I think Alik'r could have a certain charm for that.

I dreamed of such a home after seeing this beautiful screen (below) visible during X loading of the game, which makes me salivate every time I see it.

Following this type of home strongly desired (for my part ), I would really like an idea of a secret passage, because every time I see a home in a theme for murderer or thief, I am always saddened not to see it in a home of this type.

The whole thing can be optimized by a sublime play of light

Please hear my fantasy



of course you need the water that goes with it and all that, because I already have some ideas in my head

Yes, I've also always thought that the Sentinel Outlaw's Refuge is very beautiful and atmospheric.

I tend to think a door off the actual Refuge, leading to an underground, large luxury apartment type home (but, with a very generous 700 slot furnishing limit), would be the best way to utilise it.

The apartment should have six rooms, with one of them (the living/kitchen/dining room) being very large and open plan, with light coming in from above, in a similar style to the rest of the Refuge.

The rest of the rooms could be smaller and could be made into a crafting room, a bathroom and then 3 bedrooms.

Could also have an underground courtyard garden, in addition to the six rooms, again with light coming in from above and with water, like the rest of the Refuge.

Jaraal

Since we're talking about things/ideas in the game that we would like to see in player housing, why not let us acquire this beautiful fountain from the At-Tura Estate? The water flow effect it has is very well done, and doesn't seem any more graphics intensive than some of the newer furnishings available.

It would be the perfect addition to a Redguard themed home.

Gilvoth

question i want to ask is:
can i please have a small 1 room "underground" home, with a hidden entrance (preferably trap door hidden in the bushes)
if the answer is "no" then why cant this be allowed to happen?
i have been asking for this since many years now on this forum yet, constantly every new patch is some HUGE MASSIVE mansion.
here below is the post i have written from years ago ...

Gilvoth wrote: »

this idea came from a mod i had in morrowind, was the best mod i ever had for morrowind.
here is the mod link'
http://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/43134/?





my wife and i live a life of stealing and killing for the dark brotherhood and thieves guild.
our lifestyle is spent 100% of the time in sneak and hiding, so we need a home that is hidden away from the law, guards, and people.
so we ask, please give us a small hidden trap door [placed on the edge of town, under the bushes] that leads to a small 1 or 2 room cave with wood walls and floor for me and the wife would be Perfect!
i don't want a huge house and something small is affordable for my wife and i because we spend all our time in pvp means we only have around maybe 50 to 100,000 to spend, [not millions, like for the large houses]
me and my wife's lifestyle in eso fits perfectly in a very small underground hidden home.
thank you for reading this message.
located on the edge of town in preferably "Balmora" Vvardenfell location.
if Vvardenfell cannot be had right now then i prefer Dahlmora edge of town in Bal foyen


just like this ^
but hiden in the bushes so is a bit more hidden, and not out in the open.

laurajf

Note, I did not read all the responses, but my question would be:

Once you figure out the house you want to sell to us and the item limit, do you attempt to furnish it yourselves first so you can determine whether the layout and item limit make sense?

That's all I really want to know.

Jaraal

Gilvoth wrote: »

question i want to ask is:
can i please have a small 1 room "underground" home, with a hidden entrance (preferably trap door hidden in the bushes

Have you done Veya's quest line in Balmora, Vvardenfell? Exactly what you describe is there, a trap door, one room hideout. Perhaps they could put another trap door next to that one, with a similar layout for players to call home.

Ruhlf

I too would like to see a few more “thief” homes that could double as werewolf dens or vampire/necromancer/sorcerer/scoundrel type homes. This would be a lair for one to three-ish characters. Not meant to be a guild hall.

Nothing over the top. No gothic towers or fountains of blood. Not a million rooms. (Those things are all cool, but this is a Request for a different kind of “nefarious” lair).

Just a cool little cave, or part of a sewer.

-A medium sized dwelling/lair.
-Located in/under a town or city.
-Accessible via hidden door, trap door, sewer grate.
-Dirty, but not filthy.
-Kinda criminal vibe - but not supernatural.
-No specific themes that limit RP. (Ex. Not just for Pirates, Vampires, Ninjas).
-A few little rooms for us to decorate as we see fit.
-At least one large room to pile loot in.
-A decent item limit (for loot piles).
-A new pack of furnishings that are a little more run down with hanging drapes and broken/repaired furniture.
-Something cool about the location. Re-purposed cisterns are always fun. Water features. Abandoned sub-basement. Skylight cracks in the ceiling? Old distillery? Mossy garden? Mining tunnel access?

That would make my day (:

Thanks ZOS!

Feendish

I would want to ask the following:

1. Instead of a pathing feature, why not a limit increase on traditional furnishings--something many, many people have asked for over the years. Paths seem like they would be much more demanding of a lot of resources than a few more slots for normal furniture.

2. Will we ever see a list added in-game that gives a roster of everyone's open houses, without requiring a separate add-on? By default, houses should start out closed, and not appear on the roster, then populate when permissions are changed to limited visitor/visitor (this has also been requested, and has been done in other games).

3. Tying in with number 2, a list would also allow houses to be based per character, so that more than one of each house could be owned per account (I desperately want a second Coldharbour). Will we ever see anything of that nature?

4. Why not, rather than charging 15k crowns for Grand Psijiic Villa (a frankly ridiculous price), give players who missed that event the same opportunity to earn the house in game?

Requests:
More varied building materials that aren't broken, dirty or crooked. Building materials of a standard size would also be appreciated, especially if the item limit isn't going to increase.
Some sort of triangular piece to make custom roofing easier to make -- preferably matching the building materials.
The ability to resize items in length, width and thickness.
The ability to lock a time of day.
The ability to lock weather effects -- and especially to toggle off the sand storms in Twin Arches and Thieves' Oasis.
More plants and flowers that aren't tied to the crown store or random luck during harvesting.
Cycle out lux vendor items to make them permanently for sale, so that new items can be rotated in. Once something has been on lux for two or three years, it should be available through other means, with the costs reduced. Those other means can be writ voucher additions or whatever, but after three years, is something really lux?
More storage containers for furnishings.

Gilvoth

Jaraal wrote: »

Gilvoth wrote: »

question i want to ask is:
can i please have a small 1 room "underground" home, with a hidden entrance (preferably trap door hidden in the bushes

Have you done Veya's quest line in Balmora, Vvardenfell? Exactly what you describe is there, a trap door, one room hideout. Perhaps they could put another trap door next to that one, with a similar layout for players to call home.

that is a horrible idea, that is exactly what i do not want, and those apartments are exactly not what i was asking for, and this thread is for us to direct a question to the developers, which is what i did.

Kittytravel

Gilvoth wrote: »

Jaraal wrote: »

Gilvoth wrote: »

question i want to ask is:
can i please have a small 1 room "underground" home, with a hidden entrance (preferably trap door hidden in the bushes

Have you done Veya's quest line in Balmora, Vvardenfell? Exactly what you describe is there, a trap door, one room hideout. Perhaps they could put another trap door next to that one, with a similar layout for players to call home.

that is a horrible idea, that is exactly what i do not want, and those apartments are exactly not what i was asking for, and this thread is for us to direct a question to the developers, which is what i did.

Calm down they were just giving a suggestion for you to further clarify your idea if a developer reads it. A simple "Yes I have seen that but it's not at all what I envision." would have been more than sufficient.

Adding on a question I thought about recently: If an asset is used in the world is it just as easy to turn that asset into a furnishing (for example the rolled carpets in front of the wagon at the Vivec City traders) or is there a lengthy process that we aren't aware of?

Jaraal

Gilvoth wrote: »

Jaraal wrote: »

Gilvoth wrote: »

question i want to ask is:
can i please have a small 1 room "underground" home, with a hidden entrance (preferably trap door hidden in the bushes

Have you done Veya's quest line in Balmora, Vvardenfell? Exactly what you describe is there, a trap door, one room hideout. Perhaps they could put another trap door next to that one, with a similar layout for players to call home.

that is a horrible idea, that is exactly what i do not want, and those apartments are exactly not what i was asking for, and this thread is for us to direct a question to the developers, which is what i did.

Apartments? We must be thinking of different things. I was referring to the Morag Tong hideout, which looks similar to that picture you posted above.

bluebird

Upcoming Housing Stream!!! Yay! Check it out, everyone!

'Tune in to ESO Live this Friday to get an inside look at the new Homestead Character Pathing system coming with Update 27 and check out the winners of our official Greymoor Home Decorating Contest!

This Friday, July 24 at 4PM EDT, check out Twitch.tv/Bethesda for a live preview of the upcoming Character Pathing in Housing system and the announcement of our official Greymoor Home Decorating Contest winners. To help community managers Gina Bruno and Jessica Folsom dive into this Homestead-themed show, we’ve enlisted the help of Systems Designer (and Homestead czar) Cullen Lee.

Firstly, the team will introduce the new system coming with Update 27 and show you how easy it is to make your NPCs move around your home. Then, together, the team will announce the winners of both categories of the Home Decorating Contest (Nord and Vampire) and discuss each entry. If you love ESO’s housing, this is the show for you!

Throughout the show we’ll also have Twitch Drops enabled (link your account), discuss the latest ESO news, and have a giveaway, so join us this Friday, July 24 at 4PM EDT, on Twitch—see you there!'

Sounds awesome! I even forgot about the housing contest in my main post, lol, but yeah that's also very cool, and I'm glad we're getting another Housing-related Stream with new features and the contest entries!