Architect Archive

First off. There are plenty of threads that are ranting about this. Let's not make this another one. Instead, I propose that we consider why item limits came about, and then add constructive ideas to help get things back in the right order.

So we can summarize the rants in one simple statement that the new item limits suck hard and are destroying the furniture business, the housing market (why buy a house when you can buy a backpack!), and many other artisan professions that relied on a reasonable item limit.

Why is there an item limit?

1. Disk storage space (server side)?
Unlikely, while each item made in the game does require a certain amount of storage space, its fairly easy to deduce that a small amount of each person's subscription fee can pay for storage space for a huge number of database records. This doesn't mean that SOE isn't using up disk space rapidly and is look at ways to slow it down... so it still could be a possibility.

The only reason I'd go with this as the reason is that they saw the storage space growing very rapidly and not slowing down at all. I also don't believe this is the reason since it is likely people will still have as many or more items as before, they'll just have to be more creative in which containers they use.

2. Memory space?
Memory follows the same argument as storage (note: disk storage and memory are different for you non-techies). Servers have more rigid max memory limits than they do for disk space. If memory utlization is high, then an easy target would be to limit the number of items.

More likely to be the reason for the limts than storage space, but again, will this actually reduce the number of items or just shuffle them around to other containers?

3. Performance?
The more items you have sitting in your house, the tougher it is for the your PC to render. Is the intent of the change to help improve performance?

Based on the number of polygons you encounter in cities with a lot of players, items in houses are hardly the performance hog. I have not tried to fill one room of the house with 250 high-polygon/animated items (250 small tables? 250 droid frames?). Why not let the owner of the house self-regulate their performance. Items are inside the house, so they shouldn't effect the performance of others running by outside. If you visit someone's house and it causes you to crash, you probably won't visit them again.

4. Housing balance?
Perhaps they want a way to distinguish houses functionally other than just having more square footage. Before the argument was, "Why buy a large house when a small house holds as much and takes less lots?" Their intent is to help increase desire for larger houses and to stop the "exploitive nature" of the small house's storage.

This seems most likely like the reason for the item limit. The question then is "Why set the limits so low"? The implication currently by Holocron is that the calculation is off. In which case, all this banter is moot. If it remains the way it is, the desire for factories will shoot through the roof, and house sales in general will tank -- so the goal to increase the desire for larger houses has failed.

5. Container balance?
Perhaps houses were seen as unfairly advantageous in their item storage capacity when compared to other containers. Why use the bank, droid, packs, storage compartments, etc when you can simply drop it on your rug? OK, you can only access the items in your house when you're there in your house -- so backpacks (and droids to some degree) have compensating advantages.

Houses should be big containers. What good are they otherwise? If I wanted to sell items on the street, I'd hand small bits of jewelry from the inside of my trench coat or sell them out of the trunk of my land speeder. I think it is neat to walk into a house and see it decorated properly. With the item limits now, you'll see little or no furniture. Houses will look as barren as the grand palace in Theed. If this is an effort to get us to use other forms of storage, then this item limit will certainly do that.

6. Stockpiling?
Some have speculated that this change is to limit stockpiling. I can't imagine a scenario where it would be bad to allow someone to stockpile hundreds of wall modules or droids. The only thing that comes to mind are those people who would rather save every item they grind instead of destroying their stock. This of course reaks havoc on the market as they reduce the price low enough to sell the huge surplus filling their house. The only other aspect I can see is SOE doesn't want people to be able to respond to custom orders quickly. If you don't have the space to store dozens of wall modules, you'll have to stop making them during dry selling periods.

No... preventing stockpiling can't be a consideration. You can still stockpile. You just can't do it in your house.



Are there other reasons? Maybe. Well let's take these six and consider other ways to achieve their goals.

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Ideas For Changes


1. Use the current calculation, just increase it (add a base 100 items to every house, double/triple the amount per lot, etc).

If the calculation is based on lot size, then the inconsistencies in lot size versus house size are going to problematic and need to be addressed. This does not solve the six possible reasons except #4. If the goal with item limits was to make larger houses more useful, then this would accomplish it except in the case of a smaller house using the same number of lots as a larger house.

2. Increase the current calculation and base it on the house size, not the lot size.
This is much like the previous suggestion, but it ignores the inconsistencies in the lot size. All large houses would have more than all medium houses would have more than all small houses (regardless of planet or generic).

With a reasonable bump in item limits, this would ease the pain and confusion. Again it does not address 5 of the 6 possible reasons for the limit; but it does nail the #4 reason of making larger houses more useful.

3. Add new houses that use more lots.
Of course it would be nice to increase the items per lot factor as well, but the main point is to "buy" more item space from the precious pool of 10 lots.

It doesn't really make since to have a small house that takes 3 lots and have a medium house that only takes 2. Besides, we're already constrained hard by our 10 lot limit. This doesn't really seem to solve any of the six possible reasons except #5 "container balance" (you can have more storage space, you just have to use more lots).

4. Make furniture installabe.
Add an "install" option to furniture (much like the house vendors). If you install a piece of furniture, it counts much less toward your house's item count. The penalty is that an installed piece of furniture cannot be moved, rotated, etc. It can only be destroyed. This would probably help keep the furniture market healthy in the long run.

This solution does not solve the first 3 possible reasons for the limit because disk/memory/cpu usage would not likely decrease. However the more likely reasons of using the item limit to balance things is solved. Furniture serves to decorate a house and has little function over that. Allow it to be somewhat abundant.

5. Don't count items stored in containers.
Items that are stored in containers or the vendor should not count toward the number of items in the house.

This definitely would reduce memory usage and help performance. You'd still have the same number of items, so disk storage would not be helped. I fear the safety deposit in banks will not see an increase in utility.

6. Make certain items unable to be stored in containers.
Allow with the above change, this could be used to deter stockpiling.


#1 is obviously the easiest to implement. #2 and #5 seems like the next easiest and are probably better solutions overall. #4 probably would take a bit of work to implement.