housing got decoration hooks :((

[Xakthul]

Incoming roleplay robberies and unannounced house parties..

 

Yes, just yes.

[LordArtemis]

On the RARE occasion someone presents their credentials and put forth an argument, it is almost always met with welcoming arms.

 

Unfortunately, most people do not work with engines, video games, or even in the industry (or even have the most basic of project management skills or understand the most pedestrian business acumen).

 

The reality is that the loudest and most obvious complainers are often typical armchair analysts who know nothing about the process as a whole. Its just complaining to complain often matched with unreasonable demands.

 

I understand, but the point I was making was that I know of well known community forum participants that actually do work in the industry.....and I have seen community members accuse those folks of being "armchair developers".

 

I always chuckle when I see that.

 

My point was that simply because someone posts an opinion that is not agreeable to one that another community member may post does not mean that they are "automatically" an armchair developer.

 

That was all.

Edited July 8, 2014 by LordArtemis

[Deewe]

As far as the reason they chose hooks, they were not exactly clear, but they generally indicated the reasons in the feed....it seems their were "issues" with some worlds, problems with placing objects, and also a desire to make the system easy to use and visually appealing to all....which I translated to mean they wanted to control what you could do and how the decorations would look.

To me it was pretty clear in the galactic twitch series, the reasoning starts @1.25:

 

• Wanted an as easy as intuitive system to use giving much flexibility
  
• Free placement would have meant difficulties to line up, give symmetry or to fit items right
  
• Also stated they gave the best of both world
  

.

In fact we don't even have the best of any feature, because the hook system is more cumbersome to use than free placement. Simply because it's by placing items one after the other that the layout or possibilities emerges.

 

With the hook system you first choose an item to drop, then select one of the hooks layout that fits it, then you build in the now restricted space. Meaning soon enough you're going to either get stuck as you can't get the desired layout, or eventually dismiss the chosen layout (and associated objects) to redo the whole thing.

 

In the end your are more restricted and use even more clicks than a well done free placement UI

 

 

Another example is hooks have classes, in the firsts minutes of the video they mention the starship hook.

In short don't expect to design a nice terrace on this area, or an exotic open air bedroom: it's either space ships or things like huge Jawa crawlers.

Edited July 9, 2014 by Deewe

[Damask_Rose]

I had fun with LotRO's housing system despite the very restricted hook system. CoX had limited placement, but a lot of flexibility which allowed for a tremendous amount of individualization. Now, I never had my own house in SWG, but all of the ones I visited were dumps, so I tend to look unfavorably on free-placement.

[Deewe]

I had fun with LotRO's housing system despite the very restricted hook system. CoX had limited placement, but a lot of flexibility which allowed for a tremendous amount of individualization. Now, I never had my own house in SWG, but all of the ones I visited were dumps, so I tend to look unfavorably on free-placement.

 

That is because SWG had no UI to set up things properly.

[brutall]

This post got almost 50 pages i hope they atlest give it a shot to give us option to turn of hooks. I even be happy if we could place small hooks on tables and stuff. So we can put lamps or random stuff on it. But what i realy want to know is if we can paint the walls and change the look of the floor

[Xakthul]

This post got almost 50 pages i hope they atlest give it a shot to give us option to turn of hooks. I even be happy if we could place small hooks on tables and stuff. So we can put lamps or random stuff on it. But what i realy want to know is if we can paint the walls and change the look of the floor

 

I'm pretty sure we can.... the engine is better than many MMOs that do allow you to change/paint the wall and floor

[Sambril]

I'm pretty sure we can.... the engine is better than many MMOs that do allow you to change/paint the wall and floor

Actually that question was answered in the first twitch TV session - we will not be able to recolour the walls, floor or ceiling. Just another example of the limitations of this system.

[LordArtemis]

I did find it disappointing that we could not change colors or patterns of the walls and the like. I am curious as to why they made that decision.....naturally I do not expect them to qualify this one since it is not an issue that I am particularly concerned about.

[Arkerus]

Actually that question was answered in the first twitch TV session - we will not be able to recolour the walls, floor or ceiling. Just another example of the limitations of this system.

 

God forbid a video game have limitations. OH thats right, they have to exist for the system to even work.

 

Get real.

[brutall]

Actually that question was answered in the first twitch TV session - we will not be able to recolour the walls, floor or ceiling. Just another example of the limitations of this system.

 

Bah that suck

[Vinak]

God forbid a video game have limitations. OH thats right, they have to exist for the system to even work.

 

Get real.

 

dat strawman argument....

 

To me it was pretty clear in the galactic twitch series, the reasoning starts @1.25:

 

• Wanted an as easy as intuitive system to use giving much flexibility
  
• Free placement would have meant difficulties to line up, give symmetry or to fit items right
  
• Also stated they gave the best of both world
  

.

 

This is just depressing PR crap.

 

Free placement is not hard or unintuitive. Hooks by definition are rigid, inflexible systems. Frankly it's a bit insulting that Bioware thinks we're all too stupid to decorate on our own.

 

Number 2 is just wrong. Assuming symmetry is important to an individual (it may not be) it is not difficult to achieve with a free placement system. A simple fix would have been to implement a grid overlay...not lock the whole thing down with hooks.

 

And finally the "best of both worlds". What does that even means? It's a hook system. Period. It's lazy and outdated. A system purely motivated to sell crap on the cartel market.

Edited July 9, 2014 by Vinak

[LordArtemis]

God forbid a video game have limitations. OH thats right, they have to exist for the system to even work.

 

Get real.

 

Your off your game a bit today Arkerus.

[Daekarus]

47 pages and not a word that the devs can actually act on. Guys, you make my head hurt when your denial gets this bad. Do the mature thing and accept what you can't change: it's a hook system. You're going to have to deal with that. You can still make suggestions within that framework though. What specific things do you want to be able to do and what ideas can you offer on how to achieve those things within the hook system?

 

I'll give you a hint, an advanced hook system like this is like a free placement system with multiple mobile XYZ origins.

[ScarletBlaze]

Maybe it is because I have only played SWG (not counting the month of Wow and STO) but even in SWG you could not paint the walls, floors or ceilings so not sure why this is an issue.

[Daekarus]

Maybe it is because I have only played SWG (not counting the month of Wow and STO) but even in SWG you could not paint the walls, floors or ceilings so not sure why this is an issue.

 

Because it would remove an opportunity to complain.

[LordArtemis]

47 pages and not a word that the devs can actually act on. Guys, you make my head hurt when your denial gets this bad. Do the mature thing and accept what you can't change: it's a hook system. You're going to have to deal with that. You can still make suggestions within that framework though. What specific things do you want to be able to do and what ideas can you offer on how to achieve those things within the hook system?

 

I'll give you a hint, an advanced hook system like this is like a free placement system with multiple mobile XYZ origins.

 

...and I will give you a hint...you didn't likely read 47 pages. If you had, you would know that there have been suggestions placed within the current expected confines of the system.

 

Quite a few posts in fact.

[Infernixx]

Because it would remove an opportunity to complain.

 

I am outraged that I'm not allowed to tear down walls in my own Stronghold and build new walls out of lamps and astro-mech droids. Fail system is fail.

[Daekarus]

...and I will give you a hint...you didn't likely read 47 pages. If you had, you would know that there have been suggestions placed within the current expected confines of the system.

 

Quite a few posts in fact.

 

I read nearly the whole thread, and I saw a whole lot of suggestions from people who don't really understand what will and won't be practical. You made a few suggestions that might work but you gave no specifics on how those things might actually be done within the UI that they're going to build for hooks. If you're interested in getting the devs to listen, then you're going to have to be specific and organized. Since you seem to be a pretty smart guy and are familiar with the free placement system, perhaps you might take the lead and create a list of in-system suggestions and flesh them out a bit. I think some of the limitations that people are objecting to might be addressed if you present solutions in that way. The current direction of the thread doesn't seem to be headed towards anything constructive.

[Arkerus]

Your off your game a bit today Arkerus.

 

Oh, I can spell it out for you. I know its hard for people to keep up.

 

The loudest complainers throw out ambiguous complaints like "missed opportunities" and "bioware's rules".

 

They are just blanket arguments that have NO meaning.

 

Get it?

 

Bioware created a housing systems with limitations. You can't place a hat on a vase or put a space couch on the ceiling because they looked at their options and decided for a myriad of reason this was best for the game.

 

BUT even if they had used an "open" system, IT still has RULES. It's still not completely open. A system has rules to make it work. All the whining, crying, moaning armchair analysts have to understand their complaints mean essentially nothing because they can't put together an argument with actual valid complaints. Someone complaining their "creativity is stifled by bioware" gets a "boo hoo, get over it" from me.

 

If someone doesnt like the very flexible system that we are apparently going to get, they can bug off. No system is limitless; that is a pointless argument and no one cares if the artist in you is hurt by bioware's decision.

Edited July 10, 2014 by Arkerus

[Arkerus]

I am outraged that I'm not allowed to tear down walls in my own Stronghold and build new walls out of lamps and astro-mech droids. Fail system is fail.

 

Can you BELIEVE I can't tear up my house and bury it into the ground? Bio FAIL. I can't even plant a space forest. Bio fail again.

 

Oh. Through the wormhole is on. Time to put the forums down.

Edited July 10, 2014 by Arkerus

[Xakthul]

Can you BELIEVE I can't tear up my house and bury it into the ground? Bio FAIL. I can't even plant a space forest. Bio fail again.

 

Oh. Through the wormhole is on. Time to put the forums down.

 

Yeah, I can't believe I'm unable to travel through time and space in my already floating Nar Shaddaa house.... Where's my superlaser? Where's my nuclear missile silo?

[deanth]

Bioware created a housing systems with limitations. You can't place a hat on a vase or put a space couch on the ceiling because they looked at their options and decided for a myriad of reason this was best for the game.

 

If someone doesnt like the very flexible system that we are apparently going to get, they can bug off. No system is limitless; that is a pointless argument and no one cares if the artist in you is hurt by bioware's decision.

 

Why do most of you guys defending against free placement keep pulling out the "you can't put a couch on the ceiling" card, to me that is like the "heal to full" statement, it sounds stupid.

 

Housing has "as much flexibility as possible" (quote from dev twitch stream) to rotating and marginally moving decorations in a confined XY axis and hook placement, in other words, not very flexible. As other posters have said, we would like to put a vase on a table, or showcase a mount on a stand/podium, or create a variation of shroud's production facility from the shroud's final stand.

 

It's great that swtor is getting housing, but as it stands right now, from watching the twitch stream, housing looks and feels like a glorified trophy cabinet.

Edited July 10, 2014 by deanth

[LordArtemis]

Oh, I can spell it out for you. I know its hard for people to keep up.

 

Oh, if there is anything I am sure of Arkerus, its that I have no problem "keeping up"......

 

The loudest complainers throw out ambiguous complaints like "missed opportunities" and "bioware's rules".

 

.....AND people have to accept whats there, you can't break the game, ad nauseum....unless you think the folks that don't like hooks are the only ones being loud.

 

They are just blanket arguments that have NO meaning.

 

Get it?

 

I agree, they are not very constructive, SOME OF THEM. Same thing on the "defender' side. Some folks, however, have tried to post helpful constructive comments, both pro and con....but naturally the loudest folks on both sides of the fence soundly trounce those folks more often than not.

 

Bioware created a housing systems with limitations.

 

I think we are all aware of that Arkerus.

 

You can't place a hat on a vase or put a space couch on the ceiling because they looked at their options and decided for a myriad of reason this was best for the game.

 

A bit of speculation here, but again, I think everyone knows this.

 

BUT even if they had used an "open" system, IT still has RULES. It's still not completely open. A system has rules to make it work.

 

ONE OF THE VERY FEW SENSIBLE THINGS THAT HAVE BEEN SAID BY ANYONE SO FAR. Funny what happens when you put down the 4 year old giddy shenanigans and actually use adult speak...eh?

 

All the whining, crying, moaning armchair analysts have to understand their complaints mean essentially nothing because they can't put together an argument with actual valid complaints.

 

Same can be said for the defender side. There is plenty of silly behavior that lacks self respect to go around.

 

Someone complaining their "creativity is stifled by bioware" gets a "boo hoo, get over it" from me.

 

....which places you firmly in the "lack of self respect" group. This kind of comment makes you exactly the kind of person you are complaining about.

 

If someone doesnt like the very flexible system that we are apparently going to get, they can bug off.

 

Could someone who doesnt like the fact that folks complain do the same? Methinks that is probably the case.....

 

No system is limitless,

 

AH! One more grown up comment in a sea of diatribe! Its too bad you can't have more of this and less of "hit myself in the head with a brick" kind of comments.

 

that is a pointless argument and no one cares if the artist in you is hurt by bioware's decision.

 

Hmm. Pointless argument? Plenty of that from both sides. No one cares? Who the heck are you to speak for everyone! If the artist in you is hurt....or the little kid with his toy is hurt his little sister or brother doesnt like his toy, goochy goo?

 

Come on guys. A bit of snark is fine, but do you really lack self respect so badly that you can't post positive or negative comments without sounding like your trying to whistle out of your bum?

 

How about everyone puts down the bricks and pitchforks and try making sense for once? BOTH SIDES.

 

....did I keep up?

 

How about this....stop acting like annoyed little children and actually make sensible arguments pro and con....and lay off those that do. If you like the system and others don't....suck it up. People will always dislike something about the things you love. If you don't like the system suggest something to make it better, instead of simply raging about it.

 

ABOVE ALL try and concede that this could be bad for Bioware OR this could be fine. Both things are possible. We will have to see.

 

NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE TO CHANGE but we have to be sensible about this. Raging about it accomplishes nothing.

 

Above all, try and keep in mind the SENSIBLE part of Arkerus's post....now unburdened by diatribe.

 

...even if they had used an "open" system, IT still has RULES. It's still not completely open. A system has rules to make it work. NO SYSTEM IS LIMITLESS.

 

Very wise words Arkerus.

 

I will add some of my own.

 

SWGs system, without a UI was a bit TOO LOOSE IMO. Do you really want a system that loose? This system has a nice UI...perhaps there is room to consider some kind of compromise as some folks have suggested?

Edited July 10, 2014 by LordArtemis

[LordArtemis]

I read nearly the whole thread, and I saw a whole lot of suggestions from people who don't really understand what will and won't be practical. You made a few suggestions that might work but you gave no specifics on how those things might actually be done within the UI that they're going to build for hooks. If you're interested in getting the devs to listen, then you're going to have to be specific and organized. Since you seem to be a pretty smart guy and are familiar with the free placement system, perhaps you might take the lead and create a list of in-system suggestions and flesh them out a bit. I think some of the limitations that people are objecting to might be addressed if you present solutions in that way. The current direction of the thread doesn't seem to be headed towards anything constructive.

 

Fair enough. I will try and post something to that effect shortly, I actually have a post I wrote prior to this announcement. I'll try and expand on that later.