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Castle Tours Gripes and Suggestions

AuthorMessage
Survivor
Jun 28, 2014
31
Ok so I spent time crafting the Treetop Getaway, and then I logged over 70 build and design hours doing all kinds of really cool, very neat and well organized, things to my castle which made it not only unique but super fun. So I am curious to know how there are 50 million players in Wizard101 and I have only had a total of 10 visitors to my house since being placed on tour. I am also curious how someone has a top ranked home with nothing in it for the Botanical Gardens when the home just came out!

How does a home that just came out sit in the top 5 and my and other's homes only register low numbers of visits? How does that happen? I had a friend list his house again on the tour and I spent the better part of 3 hours that day, and a couple the next, trying to get to his home under new tours. I saw tons of homes that were either all mounts or barely decorated that I gave a single star and a handful that were masterfully done which I max rated. Yet, in all my searching I could not come across his house. This showed me that the numbers for houses being added to the tour far exceeded my ability to view in 24 hours. So again, how does a new house just introduced into the game, with nothing in it, make the top 5?

I have a strong suspicion that the game routes more traffic to crown homes or bundle homes. I suspect this because my Aquila home racked up more visits than my current, and infinitely more decorated and involved crafted home in the same period of time. If this is the case then the Castle Tours feature is a sham! Users are not offered an opportunity to see the average rating for their homes and the top houses do not have a listing that shows their total visits to the public. This is wanted information, and I am not alone in that sentiment.

There are a lot of people who invest a great deal of time setting up their castles and plying their creativity in ways that make people marvel at their ingenuity and eye for detail. These houses are almost universally loved because the players have taken the basic structure and boundaries of the game and found ways to bend the space to achieve artistic, fun, and in some cases jaw dropping feats. These players should be rewarded for their efforts, yet their houses, even with instances and public goodies, seldom seem to make it to the top. What gives? I challenge KI to implement some controls and features which I have listed below:

1) Automatically remove any house from the tour that drops below inside or outside item limits.
2) Automatically assign a rating penalty to any house which has more pets than items.
3) Show the total visits for houses on the leader board.
4) Give users an opportunity to rate leader board houses.
5) Show the total days a house has been on tour in the leader board.
6) Show the overall star rating in the leader board.
7) Show the average rating for personal houses.
8) Add a guest book.

Defender
Dec 25, 2011
127
i am getting tired of not being able to enter the spiral cup dungeon or the private fishing retreat because i am on castle tours.

Alexandra PearlBlossom Level 67

Survivor
Oct 21, 2013
7
Also another suggestion, when absolute strangers are in your home, can they rate it? If there are people that you haven't met that ports to your friend or a person touring that home as a group, why can't those not on an actual tour rate it? I see spectacular homes that might be on the tours all the time, and cannot rate them due to not seeing it randomly on a tour.

Delver
Jun 02, 2010
222
I am an very passionate about house decorating as you are so I feel how you do. Let me start by explaining a few reasons why I think these problems are happening:

1. Kids are the primary people who visit houses(which nothing wrong with that), but it means that they will likely judge the house based on how much fun and scenic the house is. You could have a house full of rare items and many things you worked hard to get or a complex maze with the good part at the end and the child will probably wander not pay much attention to that and then leave. They also may be more likely to be frustrated with mazes.

2. Lots of lower levels also visit.

Which again nothing wrong with this, but the thing is. They will likely not know the game as well so if you have a rare item, they will not necessarily realize its value and also may not know how hard it was to make the home.

3. I (think) that houses tend to get more visitors as they get higher rating and those with less rating and more ignored.

4. Lots of people select vote for new houses. There is a usually a huge decrease in traffic after the first day.

I have a non bundle house that got about 65 visitors in its time on tours so I don't think its that.

Survivor
Sep 26, 2010
28
I like all your ideas, except for the pet one, no offense but a lot of people would like to show off their pets to people. My favorite one's are the show the amount of visits a home has, the guest book and show average rating of personal house. Maybe they could add a person with houses for just dungeons? Any thoughts?

Logan RavenSlinger 59

Archon
Oct 24, 2010
4952
Scribble Scribe on Nov 30, 2014 wrote:
Ok so I spent time crafting the Treetop Getaway, and then I logged over 70 build and design hours doing all kinds of really cool, very neat and well organized, things to my castle which made it not only unique but super fun. So I am curious to know how there are 50 million players in Wizard101 and I have only had a total of 10 visitors to my house since being placed on tour. I am also curious how someone has a top ranked home with nothing in it for the Botanical Gardens when the home just came out!

How does a home that just came out sit in the top 5 and my and other's homes only register low numbers of visits? How does that happen? I had a friend list his house again on the tour and I spent the better part of 3 hours that day, and a couple the next, trying to get to his home under new tours. I saw tons of homes that were either all mounts or barely decorated that I gave a single star and a handful that were masterfully done which I max rated. Yet, in all my searching I could not come across his house. This showed me that the numbers for houses being added to the tour far exceeded my ability to view in 24 hours. So again, how does a new house just introduced into the game, with nothing in it, make the top 5?

I have a strong suspicion that the game routes more traffic to crown homes or bundle homes. I suspect this because my Aquila home racked up more visits than my current, and infinitely more decorated and involved crafted home in the same period of time. If this is the case then the Castle Tours feature is a sham! Users are not offered an opportunity to see the average rating for their homes and the top houses do not have a listing that shows their total visits to the public. This is wanted information, and I am not alone in that sentiment.

There are a lot of people who invest a great deal of time setting up their castles and plying their creativity in ways that make people marvel at their ingenuity and eye for detail. These houses are almost universally loved because the players have taken the basic structure and boundaries of the game and found ways to bend the space to achieve artistic, fun, and in some cases jaw dropping feats. These players should be rewarded for their efforts, yet their houses, even with instances and public goodies, seldom seem to make it to the top. What gives? I challenge KI to implement some controls and features which I have listed below:

1) Automatically remove any house from the tour that drops below inside or outside item limits.
2) Automatically assign a rating penalty to any house which has more pets than items.
3) Show the total visits for houses on the leader board.
4) Give users an opportunity to rate leader board houses.
5) Show the total days a house has been on tour in the leader board.
6) Show the overall star rating in the leader board.
7) Show the average rating for personal houses.
8) Add a guest book.
This is not correct: "I have a strong suspicion that the game routes more traffic to crown homes or bundle homes."
Of all the house/castle tours I've taken, most have ended up being those that can be purchased with gold (all crowns castles can be purchased with gold)

There are however major issues that remain. How a castle is 'top rated' is beyond me as I've seen castles that contain mostly pets running amok and very little else being a top rated castle.

Astrologist
Aug 20, 2011
1077
Thanks Scribble, I think we're way past due for a serious conversation about the housing tours. Right now it's an underused feature that has a lot of potential, but those of us who decorate are constantly irritated by the same problems day in and day out, and they never get addressed in updates. So, I'm glad you bring several of those issues up here.

I think there are two major problems:
  1. No one wants to rate houses because there's no point. You get absolutely nothing for doing it.

  2. Highly-skilled and thoughtful decorators don't receive their fair share of attention. The houses you actually see more of are generally dedicated to pet hoarding, collecting tons of mismatched trees, or showing off money-bought goods.

I don't know that all the suggestions you describe are fair, but I appreciate your thoughtfulness. I can tell you really just want to make the Tours better. I am in 100% agreement with suggestion 3, as well as 5-9. I find the others a bit debatable and 4 would likely would lead to petty down-rating behavior between top-rated players.

Historian
Jun 19, 2010
657
I love seeing and visiting decorated houses on the tour that are amazing and breathe taking.

However, I don't need any incentives to rate well decorated houses...

...but I'd love to see houses in their appropriate categories.

To facilitate this process, wouldn't it be great if players could click a button that best represents the house's actual category. This way, after enough players select the same category; the house is automatically reassigned to that category.

Survivor
Jun 28, 2014
31
First, thank you for providing input on this topic. I was fearful that it would be buried.

After reading through the posts, I agree that some of the suggestions would be problematic. Further, I also see how kids who do not have a full appreciation of the game or time it takes to get special items can give low ratings. Still there are some things that we should still discuss. First and foremost is the traffic that is being routed to the homes. If a house that is well decorated sits on the tour for the full time and receives 20-30 visits in that period of time, there is a traffic issue because that is an exceptionally low number of visits for a game that is celebrating 50 million accounts. Additionally, it still does not explain how new homes (or bundle homes) are receiving so much more traffic in a short period of time. If we simply ran averages, if each home got the same chance for visits and suffered the same challenges then it would reason that a new bundle home should not be capable of generating more traffic in a short period of time over another home put up at the same time. One person mentioned having a category just for homes with dungeons but this would break castle tours and it encourages leeching and will cost KI money. Right now people exploit castle tours for the purpose of using dungeons. While I have them, they are not the focal point of my castle and they give an unfair advantage to the rating system. This being the case, I am advocating that they do the following:

1) Remove the New Homes tour option - homes on tour should be treated equally in their class.
2) Remove homes below item limit or which are only pets or plants.
3) Show the total star rating on the leader board.
4) Show the average star rating for personal homes.
5) Have a guest book.
6) Have a reward for achieving a top rated homes - a pet, housing trophy, title, something.
- By setting everyone to zero and taking making all tours equal (no new homes option) it levels the field.