Persistent Rental System - Testing

[EO]

Greetings,

We're in the process of implementing a new and more efficient and flexible system to allow persistent rentals across the server, similar to what is done at the Governor's Hotel and the Tenements in Dementlieu but with more features. Here is a brief description of what the system entails:

-Players will be able to rent rooms/buildings at various locations through the server by talking to NPCs. They will be able to get extra keys, depending on the location by paying more.
-While renting a room/building, the "owner" will be able to return keys or get more keys up to the maximum limit for that location. They will be able to extend their stay in most locations and also vacate it if they want to leave earlier.
-DMs (and eventually some players or factions) will have the ability to forcefully vacate a room, block people from renting at specific locations and extend a person's rental.
-These rental locations will act as free rest areas and will also automatically store placeables placed there, which will respawn after resets, this includes both DM placeables and crafted placeables.

At first it will be implemented only in the Drain, the time to work out any bugs or issues with the system and get more feedback. Afterwards, it will be expanded to other locations. The goal is not to provide actual player housing (ie: renting mansions), since that tends to isolate people, but rather locations to conduct business, set up player factions, etc. As such, aside from a handful of inn rooms in the main hubs, it will consist mostly of warehouses, store fronts, taverns, etc., to encourage player interactions and dynamics.

Now, at this point the system is mostly done and "working" in the Drain on the test server but it'd be good if more players tested it before it is implemented on the roleplay and action servers. In this case testing involves trying all the different options, different scenarios, essentially trying to break the system. For testing purposes I've set the duration of the Drain rooms to 1 day but they'll be longer on the main servers.

The test server's IP is 46.4.59.55:5124. You'll need to manually download the haks/tlk though since we do not use NWSync on the test server; just extract them in your main NwN server. They can be downloaded here here.

[Kleomenes]

This is totally amazing 

[herkles]

Yay. This sounds so cool. 

[Leezil]

This is brilliant!

[FinalHeaven]

This is awesome news.

[EO]

With my upcoming update, this will be expanded further in Vallaki (Port is next):

Vallaki Bounty and Commissions Office will have the following locations to rent:
-Hospice (cleaned up version of the Derelict Hospice)
-Warehouse I and II (long-term)
-Warehouse III (one day rentals, for events)
-Shops I, II and III in the Warehouses district

These will be monitored by the Vallaki Guards just like now but the renting, renewing and key management will be done via the NPC at the Vallaki Commissions and Bounties Office.

There is also a spot linked to Anglers' Dive that will be rentable via that system.

[EO]

Alright, this is now live. If you notice any bugs or issues, let us know.

For those who have a shop (I, II or III), you can place placeables close to the door outside, so you could add your own sign.

[DM Bara]

Just wanted to give some feedback on it, as we rented shop 1. I know there are limitation to the system but here are my thoughts and feedback

Rental

Really smooth rental process but would be nice to get a "Contract" to check on when the lease runs out, a bit like the trading license. Would be nice to be able to talk to the NPC to know when the contract runs out

Placeables

The placeables are not "crafted" after a reset so they cant be removed with a carpenters kit. Some are indestructible like the weapon rack, torch and target dummy. Being able to do your own interior design is awesome and more blacables via crafting would be great, metal ones aswell.

Sign

The sign "Shop I" or "Shop 2" would be nice if they were renameable. Perhaps use the contract as the tool to do so

storage & sales

Being able to store items in the shop and not have to remove them from the container everytime (in fear or a reset) would be very nice.

We've had a blast with the store and had some very good RP with chars popping by just to look and leaving with fantastic gear =) Thank you for the great work!

[Kinga]

Some of the placeables in the shop II disapeared after the reset. It was one specific room as well as the sign outside.

[LivingWasteland]

The crates all over shop 3 are kind of in the way and placed in inconvenient places. Perhaps they could be removed? They don't even really fit a 'shop' decor. Also, perhaps change the background sound from that of a smithy. The anvil noise is maddening after a few hours in there, hah.

[HM01]

Just wanted to give some feedback on it, as we rented shop 1. I know there are limitation to the system but here are my thoughts and feedback

Rental

Really smooth rental process but would be nice to get a "Contract" to check on when the lease runs out, a bit like the trading license. Would be nice to be able to talk to the NPC to know when the contract runs out

I am not certain if this works, but you can use "Examine Object" tool on the key to the area you've rented, and it should tell you how much time is left before your rental expires.

[LivingWasteland]

Just wanted to give some feedback on it, as we rented shop 1. I know there are limitation to the system but here are my thoughts and feedback

Rental

Really smooth rental process but would be nice to get a "Contract" to check on when the lease runs out, a bit like the trading license. Would be nice to be able to talk to the NPC to know when the contract runs out

I am not certain if this works, but you can use "Examine Object" tool on the key to the area you've rented, and it should tell you how much time is left before your rental expires.

Confirmed to work.

[EO]

Rental

Really smooth rental process but would be nice to get a "Contract" to check on when the lease runs out, a bit like the trading license. Would be nice to be able to talk to the NPC to know when the contract runs out

As someone mentioned, you can use Examine on the keys to get that information. I'll see if I can easily add it to the NPC conversations as well.

Placeables

The placeables are not "crafted" after a reset so they cant be removed with a carpenters kit. Some are indestructible like the weapon rack, torch and target dummy. Being able to do your own interior design is awesome and more blacables via crafting would be great, metal ones aswell.

Should be able to fix that but it won't affect existing objects. New placeables are on their way; Dread is working on that project to expand the system.

Sign

The sign "Shop I" or "Shop 2" would be nice if they were renameable. Perhaps use the contract as the tool to do so

Nothing to be done about that but for the shops, you can craft a sign outside the shop with the shop name if you want; that should persist through resets.

storage & sales

Being able to store items in the shop and not have to remove them from the container everytime (in fear or a reset) would be very nice.

This is still not feasible for the same reasons it's not feasible for the general storage system; it'd be a massive performance drain.

The crates all over shop 3 are kind of in the way and placed in inconvenient places. Perhaps they could be removed? They don't even really fit a 'shop' decor. Also, perhaps change the background sound from that of a smithy. The anvil noise is maddening after a few hours in there, hah.

These are parts of the tileset so can't be removed; we have to live with them. They're prefabs. I'll remove the background sound though.

Some of the placeables in the shop II disapeared after the reset. It was one specific room as well as the sign outside.

Did you receive a yellow message saying the placeables had been stored? You need to leave the trigger area to store them, either by logging out or by leaving the building.

[MatticusCaesar]

Some thoughts/observations on rental of Warehouse III:

I am aware that this one differs from the rest because it is a one day rental that ultimately costs 6000/month as opposed to 750/month for all the others.

I took this space because it was the only one left and the idea was just a cool one from an RP perspective.  Overall, the in-game, RP response has been overwhelmingly positive, but as a higher-level character it has been a nightmare to keep having to run back to Vallaki daily just to keep it open.

The Garda Office offers rental extensions on Warehouse III, but they do not appear to work. 
He will take your money but the keys do not update. 
I have tried doing this both before key expiration and after, but it does not seem to work in either case.  You must acquire new keys for Warehouse III, which requires you to wait until the rental expires.

In the case of warehouse III's keys, it would be helpful if those particular keys showed an "hours left to expiration" rather than days.  When you examine them, they just say "0 Days Remaining" until they ultimately expire.

Will Warehouse IV, or other shop spaces, be opening up as a 30-day rental?

At the risk of sounding entirely self-serving with this request: please convert Warehouse III to a 30-day since it's pretty much now got a dedicated tenant and make IV the 1 day rental space?

[Hypatia]

Also, it would be nice if you could buy additional keys from the office any time, so long as you're holding one. I've got way more faction members than I have keys and no way to get more.  My people keep getting trapped inside because going to the OOC room doesn't seem to reliably unlock the front door, and never the back doors.

Also, is there a grace period where a person who rented it gets a bit of time to re-rent the space, or is it that if I got in there 2 minutes after my lease is up, but someone got there first, they can now lock me out of the church we built?  That'd be weird.

[EO]

Also, it would be nice if you could buy additional keys from the office any time, so long as you're holding one. I've got way more faction members than I have keys and no way to get more.  My people keep getting trapped inside because going to the OOC room doesn't seem to reliably unlock the front door, and never the back doors.

Also, is there a grace period where a person who rented it gets a bit of time to re-rent the space, or is it that if I got in there 2 minutes after my lease is up, but someone got there first, they can now lock me out of the church we built?  That'd be weird.

You can already get more keys, but only the one who actually rented the rental can get more keys, up to a maximum which varies for each rental. And the moment the rental has expired it has expired, so it's the responsibility of the keyholder to extend it in advance as necessary.

Some thoughts/observations on rental of Warehouse III:

I am aware that this one differs from the rest because it is a one day rental that ultimately costs 6000/month as opposed to 750/month for all the others.

I took this space because it was the only one left and the idea was just a cool one from an RP perspective.  Overall, the in-game, RP response has been overwhelmingly positive, but as a higher-level character it has been a nightmare to keep having to run back to Vallaki daily just to keep it open.

The Garda Office offers rental extensions on Warehouse III, but they do not appear to work. 
He will take your money but the keys do not update. 
I have tried doing this both before key expiration and after, but it does not seem to work in either case.  You must acquire new keys for Warehouse III, which requires you to wait until the rental expires.

In the case of warehouse III's keys, it would be helpful if those particular keys showed an "hours left to expiration" rather than days.  When you examine them, they just say "0 Days Remaining" until they ultimately expire.

Will Warehouse IV, or other shop spaces, be opening up as a 30-day rental?

At the risk of sounding entirely self-serving with this request: please convert Warehouse III to a 30-day since it's pretty much now got a dedicated tenant and make IV the 1 day rental space?

I'll try to make it indicate the number of hours left, however there are no plans to change Warehouse III to anything more than one-day rental. The point of that rental was to allow people to set up one-off events, not to be used constantly. The other two warehouses will remain open to all for now since we still need buildings that can be used by DMs or players outside the official rental system.

[Curbstone Trappings]

The automatic unlocking, closing and locking of doors inside the Warehouse 1 rental is very erratic. I have tried to see a system behind it to post an informed bug report, but I can barely see any.

When the main door is open and I wander around in front of it, sometimes it closes and locks.

When I close and lock it deliberately and wander away, it consistently unlocks, which is fair for people that are trapped inside, but prevents me from locking the door and people coming inside while i am doing setup.

When any of the three backrooms inside are open, wandering around in one of the other rooms may close and lock the door of the former.

It is difficult for me to test and report on a system that is invisible to me and that I didn't code and script, so much further information, I can not give.
Perhaps you could implement a manual fail safe to allow people to get out of the building when the owner is not logged in? Like a small button next to the doors on the insides that unlocks them when it is activated?

[itsriggs]

Really love this new update, [ i know im super late the the party] Its something Iv been dreaming of forever as a faction leader,
who gets asked to hold gatherings and meetings with others a lot.
There was mention of it expanding to other areas after testing, any idea when more spots in valaki will be added?

[InMyDarkestHours]

Adding an option to withdraw all additional keys/terminate their use (then able to re-purchase them for handing out) would be helpful as some characters who've been given one may no longer be around. This is specifically with long term Drain room use in mind.

[EO]

Adding an option to withdraw all additional keys/terminate their use (then able to re-purchase them for handing out) would be helpful as some characters who've been given one may no longer be around. This is specifically with long term Drain room use in mind.

This should be feasible; I'll look into it.

Really love this new update, [ i know im super late the the party] Its something Iv been dreaming of forever as a faction leader,
who gets asked to hold gatherings and meetings with others a lot.
There was mention of it expanding to other areas after testing, any idea when more spots in valaki will be added?

For now the expansion will be in Port-à-Lucine (though no ETA). We may eventually add some more around Vallaki but not in the next phase.

[Phantomswake]

Was trying to change the lease over from an inactive owner to an active owner but the lease ran out and had to ask a DM in game to help me. I don't know what happened but after I was  told to try it again it worked and I was able to get the lease in my name. However, the server reset just an hour or so later within the same day, and all my further attempts to get the lease have ended in failure.

[EO]

Was trying to change the lease over from an inactive owner to an active owner but the lease ran out and had to ask a DM in game to help me. I don't know what happened but after I was  told to try it again it worked and I was able to get the lease in my name. However, the server reset just an hour or so later within the same day, and all my further attempts to get the lease have ended in failure.

I don't think I fully understand the report. You can't transfer a lease, you need to wait until the room is vacant then rent it. What feedback message did you get after the reset? You'll need to be very detailed in the report for us to do anything with it.

[Phantomswake]

I apologize for the inadequate report. Perhaps I can do better.

By transfer I mean, we let the time run out fully on the lease and then attempted to pick up the lease. Not actually handing the lease over, but same outcome.

When the time ran out, the script still viewed the lease as owned (there was no option to purchase the lease). I waited some amount of time, I thought at least a couple of in game hours went by with no update. At which point a DM that was present told me to try the script again and I did and it worked. (I assume they updated the script manually)

After some passage of time, maybe half an hour ( several hours in game had passed), the server crashed. This warped the character back to a previous point in time. No active keys in my inventory. The residence of the lease not allowing entry because of no keys. Upon returning to the NPC who leases and supplies keys, it was as if I had not owned the lease anymore. (same scripts you see when you have no claim)  No option to update the lease, No option for keys,  lease not being available.

This NPC continued to do this (many different attempts over many actual hours in real time) until I made  contact with the same DM much later. Almost another day from when I first spoke with them initially. They claimed that the lease was in my character's name. However, I still had all my coin from the warping effect. After a few moments I think the DM reset the script once more and at their query to attempt again I repurchased the lease and keys. Since then everything has been working and has saved going on another real time day.

I hope this is more what you were asking. If you have anymore questions or I can help in any other way, I am eager to do so.

[EO]

I apologize for the inadequate report. Perhaps I can do better.

By transfer I mean, we let the time run out fully on the lease and then attempted to pick up the lease. Not actually handing the lease over, but same outcome.

When the time ran out, the script still viewed the lease as owned (there was no option to purchase the lease). I waited some amount of time, I thought at least a couple of in game hours went by with no update. At which point a DM that was present told me to try the script again and I did and it worked. (I assume they updated the script manually)

After some passage of time, maybe half an hour ( several hours in game had passed), the server crashed. This warped the character back to a previous point in time. No active keys in my inventory. The residence of the lease not allowing entry because of no keys. Upon returning to the NPC who leases and supplies keys, it was as if I had not owned the lease anymore. (same scripts you see when you have no claim)  No option to update the lease, No option for keys,  lease not being available.

This NPC continued to do this (many different attempts over many actual hours in real time) until I made  contact with the same DM much later. Almost another day from when I first spoke with them initially. They claimed that the lease was in my character's name. However, I still had all my coin from the warping effect. After a few moments I think the DM reset the script once more and at their query to attempt again I repurchased the lease and keys. Since then everything has been working and has saved going on another real time day.

I hope this is more what you were asking. If you have anymore questions or I can help in any other way, I am eager to do so.

What likely happened is that you were indeed the rightful owner of the room, which was stored properly in the database but since your character reverted to a previous version, the variables that should have been set on your character weren't. In such a situation the simplest thing is to have a DM vacate the rental and then have you register it again. It's unfortunate but there's no good workaround, aside from minimizing the number of crashes that occur.

[EO]

With this new update, I've added the following options (for now only available to renters, but will add support for guards and DMs if they work well):

-Transfer the rental to someone else using the Pick Target feat. The new owner needs to be visible and near the NPC for it to work.
-Change the locks; lets the owner update the locks of the doors and the keys in their inventory. All other keys will no longer work and the registered number of keys will be changed to what's in the owner's inventory (ie: if the owner has 2 keys in their inventory and 4 keys are given to others, once the locks are changed only the owner's 2 keys will work and be counted, so they can get 4 new keys).

I encourage people to test these new features and report any bugs you notice.