Politician Archive
Thread: Auto-packup of cancelled players' houses
Khristen wrote:
As a side note, one thing to keep in mind is that a city only downgrades one rank at a time. If you are rank 5 and drop to 35 citizens, you'll go down to rank 4 after your first update instead of rank 3.
Thats good to know
Thanks!
MiraLuka3 wrote:
Mayors should not be given this ability. It should be a normal feature of the game to have a periodic purge (pack-up) of player housing. This would solve the problem, if it would just be implemented. (And then I wouldn't have to read hundreds of threads on more or less the same topic.)
I'm sorry but at this point, we SHOULD be given some ability.
SOE has shown a constent lack of desire to follow through with a purge or pack up feature on abandoned houses. If a system where put in place to allow a player to cancel the pack up with in a few days, there would be no greifing possible with this system. How hard is it to respect the work of other people? Greifing player cities by shutting off house destruction was the single worst idea since the CU. This is an issue with not only locking cities but has created a huge amount of lag on most servers.
As for not reading hundreds of threads about this, perhaps if we got somewhere with this issue that effects the entire game, we wouldn't need to have so many outcries for a solution. As I recall, aren't there hundreds of threads about 0 condition clothing being equipable still in YOUR forum? Funny how none of us have come there to take a shot at the area of the game that is killing your usefulness as a profession.
Maybe I'm taking that last comment the wrong way but that was a little uncalled for, especially by a Correspondent...
MiraLuka3 wrote:
MasterMic wrote:
already on the Issues/Wish List thread ? Yes, ok, but for how many more months? years?
We don't know. We can't control the devs' programming schedule. We can add things to issues lists and we can ask and push for the devs to do things, but we can't control them.
And in return, the need to stop offering things that they have no desire to follow through on. (/pointsAtSmugglerRevamp)
This has been brought up before by the Dev's and to be honest, I don't think they have a clue as to how to make this work. At Celebration 3, Tiggs wanted no part of a conversation about this and that was pretty clear to the people that where with me.
Setting up a simple "see if the account is canceled for X months, then pack up" will NOT work 100%. If a player is on Station Pass and happily playing away in MXO, EQ2 or EQ, the will continue to take up space here in SWG indefinatly.
A system where the mayor can turn on a pack up warning that is over ridden by voting or simply clicking on an "I'm still here!" button is the ONLY way to keep this from missing some houses. There seems to be a huge hang up with the griefing aspect of this ability. Please, tell me where the hell the grief is? Mayor X can only screw themselves with this. You pack up a citizen that is active, guess what, THATS ONE LESS VOTE FOR YOU! Not to mention that player will more then likely see to it that everyone they know knows that Mayor X tossed them out of the city. It won't take long before that city is either gone of has a new mayor that's packing up the former Mayor X.
Please, let's get this right and understand this from the larger picture. Setting up a generic timer won't do squat. If someone reups for a year and walks away in the second month, thats still 10 months of active time and another 6 months before the system would pack them up. That is in no way acceptable to me at all. Give the ability to the Politicians (heck, master box if they want it there) and allow the player to overide it by either voting, clicking and "I'm alive!" button or a simple option on the Structure Maintenance Terminal.
We all agreed in the TOS that we where 13 or older (or where the guardian of an under 13 player). Is it too much to expect them to have the responcibility to pay upkeep and to take action to keep from being removed from a city?!
MiraLuka3 wrote:
Cigaran wrote:
MiraLuka3 wrote:
Mayors should not be given this ability. It should be a normal feature of the game to have a periodic purge (pack-up) of player housing. This would solve the problem, if it would just be implemented. (And then I wouldn't have to read hundreds of threads on more or less the same topic.
As for not reading hundreds of threads about this, perhaps if we got somewhere with this issue that effects the entire game, we wouldn't need to have so many outcries for a solution. As I recall, aren't there hundreds of threads about 0 condition clothing being equipable still in YOUR forum? Funny how none of us have come there to take a shot at the area of the game that is killing your usefulness as a profession.
Maybe I'm taking that last comment the wrong way but that was a little uncalled for, especially by a Correspondent...
I was stating a personal opinion. I want a solution, I really do, and I agree this is a huge issue that effects the entire game. I just don't think that the idea proposed by the OP is the right solution.
And just because I'm the Tailor Correspondent doesn't mean I don't play other professions. This forum is one of many that I enjoy posting in. Look around, I post (and have posted)here often, both on this account and on my old "Jutewr" account.
Thanks Cigaran,
No more to add at this point. If they decide for a one-shot cleanup using a certain timer, it will be antoher bad decision and It will grief more than necessary.
It's quite simple: Give us a tool to cleanup ourself cities, give us time to do, then cleanup the rest and restart the cleanup after all restart server.
Why not "mark" structure saying "This structure will be clean in 2 months" ?
Could be a great idea.
Dude... not in here, please. Don't bring your 'jedi nerfing' issues into another forum of a class that is so nerfed that it makes Jedi's look like.. um.. freakin JEDI's! I've been sympathetic until now... don't ruin the goodwill your class still might have with others by trolling.
And yes,I understand it's probably part of your sig... but it just makes it look like you are /signing things just to put the sig in front of people. Sorry, if I'm wrong... I'm just telling you what it could look like. Particularly, when your sig is more than just a phrase, but an entire paragraph AND a complaint... and takes up more space than your posted reply to the original thread.
Message Edited by ArthurP on 10-26-2005 06:55 AM
We cannot simply trust players with that powerful of an ability, and no way in hell would SOE grant it.
Its a waste of time and effort to even be asking for such abilities.
Mayors would grief their citizens to no end with that. Mayor doesnt like you. House pack you and out you go. New Mayor takes over, thinks some of the old citizens suck. The house packs them and out the go.
Mayor starts to lose an election, he packs up the houses of the opposition and makes all their votes go away like they never existed.
Its a never ending potential for greifing that would only serve to rip cities apart.
Kinshi wrote:
I can never, ever support giving Mayors the ability to force house packup.
We cannot simply trust players with that powerful of an ability, and no way in hell would SOE grant it. Why not? They trusted us enough to allow us to create the cities in the first place didn't they?
Its a waste of time and effort to even be asking for such abilities.
Mayors would grief their citizens to no end with that. Mayor doesnt like you. House pack you and out you go. New Mayor takes over, thinks some of the old citizens suck. The house packs them and out the go. And that Mayor would be out on his butt. The system of voting would keep this in check.
Mayor starts to lose an election, he packs up the houses of the opposition and makes all their votes go away like they never existed. How would this be possible? I've got now way of knowing who has and hasn't voted for me and to my knowledge, there is no way to find this out without asking. There would be no way to do this on the person running against me either since what we are asking for is the ability to initiate a Pack Up on a house thats owner has not been online for a specified number of days and for the Pack Up to be canceled by that player if/when they return in a specified number of days. The player running against me would have been online to register against me and there for, invalidate any attmept to do this as a way to keep myself in office.
Its a never ending potential for greifing that would only serve to rip cities apart. And the lack of any clean up hasn't? They have allowed people that have gotten pissed off with SOE or have just gotten tired of the game to grief us haven't they?
The idea that seems to have the most support playerwise atm has a very good set of checks and balances in it. As I'm understanding the current idea the following would need to happen:
Player A has a house in City X and has not logged in for 30 days. They Mayor of City X is sent notice that a house in the city has been abandoned for 30 days and gives the Mayor a waypoint to that house. The Mayor then has thier the option to go and activate a House Pack Up timer. For the next 30 days, that house is flagged for Pack Up. However, at any time in those 30 days, Player A can log in and turn the House Pack Up off. At this time, the Mayor would get an e-mail stating that Player A has successfully aborted the House Pack Up.
Now, in that plan, where is the potential for grief? The player would have to be gone for 30 days. Then, ANOTHER 30 days would have to go by without them logging in and taking action. Even then, the house is relocated to the player Datapad for replacement if/when they return. There is no way in this for a Mayor to go on a power trip and just pack people up at random. There is more grief potential in my ability to drop a statue and block you from entering you house.
I appreciate you opinion but I don't see where you are drawing some of the conclusions you have listed above. If I am missing something, please let me know.
The cities exist because cities were part of their orginal design, and they already had their checks and balances worked out. (not to mention the fact that building decay was in full force, so abandoned buildings were NOT the nusiance they are now.
Also, I dont trust SOE's design ability to create a system of checks and balances that would actually work, and not make a worse situation than already exists.
No Mayors would not get kicked out..why?
1. less than 50% of the average city population bothers to vote, just like in r/l
2. most people subscribe to the notion that the mayor owns the town and is free to do what he wants w/o oppostion. They wont vote him out, worst that would happen is they leave.
3. of the people who do vote, they are most likely to belong to the mayors PA and will back him up for that reason alone (especially if the mayor is also the PA leader)
PA leader/mayor combo who also get the ability to make houses go away? Talk about too much power in one persons hands. Contest them and you could find yourself out of the city, out of the PA, and citybanned to boot.
The ONLY thing that needs to happen to solve the abandoned building problem is two-fold
a) reactivate the orginal game design where buildings either are destroyed when maintenance runs out or force them to auto packup when maintenance runs out. Unhook them from the bank account, and forget about 'Condemned' status.
b) go ahead with the inactive account purge, and auto-pack/auto redeed structures beloning to inactive accounts (over 6 months old)
Any more than that is overkill, and is making a new situation more complex than the orginal problem.
Kinshi wrote:
My point was that the system of checks and balances required to be created for SOE to allow Mayors the power of packing houses is too great an effort for them to desire to undertake.
The cities exist because cities were part of their orginal design, and they already had their checks and balances worked out. (not to mention the fact that building decay was in full force, so abandoned buildings were NOT the nusiance they are now.
Also, I dont trust SOE's design ability to create a system of checks and balances that would actually work, and not make a worse situation than already exists.
No Mayors would not get kicked out..why?
1. less than 50% of the average city population bothers to vote, just like in r/l True. This is sad both here and irl. I will grant you this one.
2. most people subscribe to the notion that the mayor owns the town and is free to do what he wants w/o oppostion. They wont vote him out, worst that would happen is they leave. This one is going to be a philosophical difference. I am elected Mayor by my citizens to run THIER city. While I may be in the minority with holding this view, I do think that there are more Mayor's that look at it in this light then we are aware of.
3. of the people who do vote, they are most likely to belong to the mayors PA and will back him up for that reason alone (especially if the mayor is also the PA leader) Again, we'll differe here to how I handle my business. I founded our PA but I do not hold the leadership position. It's not good politics (here or irl) to allow one person to hold that much power no matter if it's a game or not.
PA leader/mayor combo who also get the ability to make houses go away? Talk about too much power in one persons hands. Contest them and you could find yourself out of the city, out of the PA, and citybanned to boot. Again, this would require a person to be gone for 60 days. At that point, the are gone or should understand upon thier return that they have been packed up.
The ONLY thing that needs to happen to solve the abandoned building problem is two-fold
a) reactivate the orginal game design where buildings either are destroyed when maintenance runs out or force them to auto packup when maintenance runs out. Unhook them from the bank account, and forget about 'Condemned' status. How would this work for people that just toss ina million in maintenance so the don't have to worry about it for a while.
b) go ahead with the inactive account purge, and auto-pack/auto redeed structures beloning to inactive accounts (over 6 months old) 6 months is a bit long for me here. The maximum that I could live with is 90 days. When you cancel an account, 90 days is all the more SOE will guarantee that the toon will remain. At some point, SOE is going to have to own up to the fact that most of these canceled accounts are NOT comming back.
Any more than that is overkill, and is making a new situation more complex than the orginal problem.
I respect you opinion but I do not think that this is asking too much to allow us to maintain our cities. There are more then enough safe guards in place to keep it from getting out of hand.
Now, as for SOE and how hard it would be to impliment this, how many other things have they wasted thier time on that we have had no desire for nor a need of?