Player Housing Suggestions

In Development Midnight Beta Test
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Making a new thread because of this statement by the blue post at the top of the housing feedback thread. I don’t want to do it wrong :slight_smile:

I’ve had so many housing thoughts over the course of the two PTR sessions, and rather foolishly I didn’t write them down in my notes file (only started that with beta). I used the in game submit thing on the PTR so I hope that was correct and enough. Anyway, here’s what I have for now:

My top #1 issue that I have been crying about since player housing got showcased on the alpha - why can’t I show off weapons/armor like decor?

They are already 3D models. I thought the promise of housing was to “show off 20 years of collections”. I worked super hard to collect every ‘main’ legendary in the game, from the rare drops like Thunderfury, to the months of questing for the daggers in Dragon Soul. I know it’s ‘easy’ to get them when it’s not current but it still represents a lot of time and effort. I ran Molten Core weekly for years until I got my drops and so it means a lot to me. I wanted to make a display.

I had in mind to design like a ‘war room’, thinking Arthurian round table and I was going to see if I could phase my favourite shields into the backs of chairs/on wall banners like heraldry. Also I know I’m not the only one to say this with the marvel movies being such a pop culture thing but who didn’t imagine a Tony Stark type ‘hall of armour’? Show off sets, or man even better favourite transmogs.

Please this is like the one absolute major disappointment. Let me put my own weapons and shields on the wall.

Utility

I totally get wanting to limit it but I think it’s practically criminal that I can go outside my house, mount my Yak and transmog, or I think there’s a transmog toy? But I can’t click my characters wardrobe, in my characters own house and change clothes. Clicking on the wardrobe should bring up the transmog window. Transmog is already very accessible from everywhere (yak + toy) so I don’t see that this would hurt anything.

I’m not suggesting you add barber shop functionality to the mirrors (I mean I’d like it) but I totally get that might be a step too far. We don’t have that functionality already away from the city but we DO have transmog.

We also have mailboxes absolutely everywhere. I think there’s a mount for that too and engineers have Moll-E. I think we should have a mailbox outside our homes, maybe next to the plot marker. It is a very ‘home’ type thing to go and get the mail.

Couple of random things

  • Scaling - I wish I could scale items out of proportion. Maybe I want it to be wider, or longer, but not taller.
  • Player Housing is like Lego - not one and done but endless creativity. To fully realise this we should have saved layouts (I think I recall you saying this would be coming) but what I haven’t heard about is something else we sorely need - a much improved photo mode. When I make Lego MOC’s I document every inch, photograph every angle, before I take them apart to build something else. Just screenshots really won’t do player housing justice. (You should probably just hire the guy behind Plumber/Narcissus to be honest. So seamless it’s hard to know where the game ends, and that addon begins. Guy is a genius).

I would have talked about ‘ghost’ placing of items to ‘try before I buy’ but apparently that’s coming? It’s not on beta yet but I am very eager to test it. That is an incredible feature and I am very grateful you are adding it.

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I’m also going to leave my suggestions here, so I don’t make an entire new post just for me.

  • Different sizes and shapes for stairwells. In my opinion, the regular ones are too big for general use and require a lot of decorating so they don’t look barren and out of place. Empty stairwells are very versatile, because of their height, so bigger sizes and more shapes, like octogonal, would be a great addition.

  • Making stairs is already getting pretty annoying, we really need some standalone stairs that aren’t as expensive and limit consuming as 50 beams.

  • We need a way to bulk buy decor, not to mention how annoying it is having to click the confirmation box over and over again for some items.

  • Boulders are very versatile, but take up quite a lot of decor points, considering that a lot of people are going to use them for caves and such. More types would be nice, too.

  • I noticed that some expansions are pretty barren of decor, most notable being Wrath and Shadowlands. I don’t know if there’s more coming for them in future builds or patches, but I hope that the devs are not worried that the Scourge or Maw aesthetics are too dark for most people, so spending time cleaning up and implementing decor from those expansions might be a waste of time. I can’t speak for other players, but I know I would love them!

  • Lakes and flowing water. People have found dupes, but the result still looks fake to some degree. In this category I would also add lava, fel lava and plague/acid.

This next list is slightly more niche, not as important as the stuff above, but I have seen others mention or ask for most of these.

  • I have no ideea how possible this is from a technical standpoint, but elevator platforms would open up so many possibilities. Teleporters too.

  • If basements aren’t possible, maybe a way to change our spawn location when entering a house to a different floor/door, after we build our house, to simulate that. The regular entrance could just remain where it is, as we can hide it with walls and such, unless they are both inextricably linked.

  • Ice, snow, frost. I’m surprised we don’t already have something like this in yet.

  • A music box, simmilar to the garrison one, with ambiental tracks from the various zones and instances of the game so we could better set the mood of our homes.

  • Chains and chain segments. I know we are getting some in Remix, but those are only Legion themed. Maybe some giant ones as well, similar to the Torghast chains that we could walk on.

  • More skulls. There are some in already that don’t have a source yet, but they seem to be of troll and ogre origin, so more types and sizes would be nice. Also bones and bone piles.

  • Some metal options for walls, pillars, floors and beams. Right now everything is just wood, stone and marble, which doesn’t much fit some races, classes or archetypes.

  • Flames with no source, just a floating fire. I’ve already seen people trying to clip braziers and such to give the illusion of a floating fire.

1 Like
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More thoughts!

  • So important I said it twice - we really need to be able to change where the entryway is connected. Right now whatever room it is connected to, is unable to be moved/changed if it’s connected to something else. So as soon as you start building your house, you are locked into whatever room you chose for that initial room. It doesn’t feel good.
  • I realise it’s probably a technical limitation but there are so few doors right now. I tried to see if I could connect other decor to them (like you can with e.g. books on tables) to make the doors look different but I can’t. The decor just attaches to the wall/floor behind and doesn’t move with the door. I just think it would be really cool to phase a table into the sliding bookshelf for instance, and then have a secret entrance in like a room built on a false floor in the empty stairwell, that then goes down - secret lair time!
  • More of a communication thing but it’s quite frustrating when you say you’re implementing a feature (like the ghost placement of decor not yet owned to ‘try before I buy’) and then I can’t work out how to do it, only to realise after investigation that it’s not been implemented yet on the beta. I wish there was like a blue post which had a “this has been added” and “this is upcoming” sections so there’s no confusion.
  • By the looks of things no decor is purchasable from timewalking at the moment. If that ever changes then upfront I want to say the vendors should be available all the time, and not just every six months or so when the rotation moves round to e.g. Cata timewalking, or TBC etc.
  • I second the request from the OP above ^^ for more material types, especially metal. We just had an Undermine patch - goblins need to feel at home too!
  • I think it’s probably been said to death but control over the ambient light would be cool. Also the ability to turn lights on and off. Imagine what I said above about a secret lair ^^ only when you first go down it’s pitch black and you have to fumble around for a light and then it’s only dimly lit. We already have cobweb decorations. Think like spooky abandoned workshop or something.
  • There’s a filter for dyeable decor, but I really wish we could sort the rest of it by colour (I wish this for transmog too).
  • The decor in the catalog which doesn’t list sources, should have it listed
  • I wish you could control, click to preview/learn more about the rewards from the house upgrades. Like I have seen the skybox room on streams (very cool, love it!!) but then the next one is night owl I think? I’m not in game at the moment. Is that the skybox but at night? Is that something else? I don’t know. I’m always more excited if I understand what I’m working towards.
  • Speaking of the skybox room I have not unlocked it at all to try it in person, but it would be neat if you could have a day/night cycle in the one room if you wanted - and never if you didn’t.

I think that’s everything in my head at the moment but I’m probably never going to be done thinking about things because this is such a cool feature. I know it probably seems like I have been endlessly critical but that’s just because I’m enthused about the potential. I think it’s awesome and I want to do more with it. Thank you for adding it to the game :slight_smile: