Homes

This article is about the player-owned home system. For the command, see HOME command.

One of the biggest benefits to being an estate holder is the ability to own a private home for your characters.

Acquiring a Home

As of January 2017 onward, all accounts which subscribe at the Premium level are awarded home ownership as a benefit immediately upon subscribing.

Previous to that date an account would have needed 90 days of paid Premium time to qualify.

Platinum subscribers also have access to owning a home.

Non-premium account holders can pick up a 30 day home deed in the Crossing Estate Holder Headquarters. They are on a table in the room [Estate Holders' Headquarters, Foyer] and cost SimuCoins, a real life currency, to purchase. These deeds can be renewed to continuously keep a home on a non-premium account. The Premium and SimuCoin systems are completely incompatible, and one cannot be used to extend the ownership of the other.

SimuCoin Homes

You may deed a home for SimuCoins at a housing office. You may also extend the deed of the home with 30-day, 60-day, and 90-day extensions. Extensions DO stack properly. You can extend your home purchase for longer than 90 days by purchasing multiple extensions. HOME RECALL will show the time remaining.

In Crossing:
Deed's may be extended at Estate Holders' Headquarters, Foyer, by purchasing an extension off the table, next to the deeds.

NOTE: Only the character that owns the home can purchase and use the extensions. Verbiage when another character on the same account tries to access a home that is past the limit is a bit misleading.

By Claim

The most basic way to obtain a home is by deed. In order to claim a home, you must go to a Housing Clerk and ASK CLERK ABOUT HOMES for pricing information. You must then GIVE CLERK <AMOUNT>. Now locate a vacant home plot within an appropriate housing area, and enter HOME CLAIM to move in.

Housing Clerk locations:

• Crossing - Estate Holders' Headquarters, Housing Permit Office (west of Raven's Court), go building (the towering limestone building),(go business hallway and housing doorway to redeem vouchers)
• Aesry Surlaenis'a - Home Permits Office, found within the Debt Collection Offices.
• Theren - Ibec Hall, Homes Licensing Office. Price here is 3 platinum Lirums.
• Mer'Kresh - Housing Arcade, New Homes Office. Found within the Town Hall.
• Inner Hibs - Hibarnhvidar, Office of Housing
• Shard - [Shard Housing Office, Prospective Buyers]
• Riverhaven - [Riverhaven, Permit Office]

By Deed

Homes may also be traded with players. This is accomplished by deeding the current home, and the new owner giving the deed to the Housing Clerk. This process is described with HOME HELP 12, which is summarized below:

1. Stand outside the home to be transferred
2. HOME DEED
3. Give the deed to the new owner
4. The new owner should go to the Housing Office (see HOME CLERKS for current listing)
5. Give the deed to the clerk

Notes when transferring a home by deed

• Once a home is converted into a deed, if it is not redeemed at a housing clerk within 24 hours the home and all items inside will be lost.
• SimuCoin home owners CANNOT acquire a home via this kind of deed. The Premium and SimuCoin systems are completely incompatible, and one cannot be used to extend the ownership of the other.
• To avoid problems with the home, make sure that when you claim a home you actually go inside it. If you do not, the home will still show as being abandoned and possibly could affect your ability to customize.

Reroll/Retire and Homes

CHECK IN REROLL will not affect either your Premium or SimuCoin home. Your home will remain intact through the Reroll process without the need to deed the home in advance.

CHECK IN RETIRE forfeits your home and everything inside regardless of subscription level.

Moving to a new Home

The process for moving from one home to another is described in-game using HOME HELP 3. The following synopsis of these steps will move all of your belongings out of your old home (making it available for others to claim) and into a new home (that has not been claimed). The old home is not abandoned until you use HOME CLAIM.

1. Go to the Home Exchange Office (use HOME CLERKS for a listing)
2. ASK CLERK ABOUT HOMES to find out the current moving fee
3. GIVE CLERK {AMOUNT} (in coppers)
4. Go to a room with an available home.
5. Use HOME CLAIM to claim your new home and your belongings will automatically be moved in

Housing Exchange Clerk locations:

• Crossing - Estate Holders' Headquarters, Housing Exchange Office (west of Raven's Court), go exchange door

Discontinuing Premium

It used to be if you stopped being Premium, your home and everything in it was gone forever.

Now, you'll still want to remove any items you had on the furniture that you'll want to be using, but your furniture and stuff will wait for you to re-up if you decide you want to. You can also, while inside your home before you change your subscription, type HOME REMOVE and turn your empty furniture/fixtures into furniture vouchers that you can save until you get a home again, and then turn in at the housing clerk. You can also remove most customizations from the exterior of your home by typing REMOVE (name of whatever your house is), and save those for later as a parchment scroll.

If you did forget something on your furniture before downgrading, even then all is not lost, because you can HOME RECLAIM which will give you back the stuff that was on your furniture. Be careful with this, as if you're carrying 490 items in your inventory regularly and you had 300 items in your home, you're going be spending some time making painful decisions in the junkyard if you're lucky enough to not corrupt your character!

Upgrading to a Premium Home

If a SimuCoin home owner becomes Premium the system can convert it into a Premium-style home:

• If your SimuCoin time is expired and the home owner (as Premium) tries to UNLOCK it, it will convert it to a normal home. If it's not expired, though, it doesn't convert but skips over to allow you to enter (intent was to avoid nuking a 6 month lease if someone upgraded for just 1 month).
• Each home 'checks in' about every 15-30 days to check the status of the owning account. If it detects you as Premium during one of those check ins, it will convert your home into to a standard home.

Note that if your home converts because you go Premium, the tracking/remaining time of the scoin mechs goes away. It's tracked on the home, not on the character.

Housing Areas and Home Types

Homes are generally segregated within discrete areas of Elanthia created especially for residential use. There are many home sites available throughout all five provinces. On the Ranik Maps, housing areas are indicated by a square colored in with pale blue ().

Homes are divided into several basic categories:

• Urban or Rural
• Lower, Middle or Upper Class
• Freestanding Structure or Door
• Race or Class restrictions (select homes only)

To determine whether a home area is restricted by class or race, enter HOME LOOK.

The category a home belongs to is indicated by the description of its exterior:

• Lower Rural: bothy, hut, hutch, lean-to, shed, shelter, shack, or door.
• Middle Rural: cabin, cottage, dwelling, home, house or door.
• Upper Rural: cabin, chateau, domicile, farm, lodge, retreat, villa or door.
• Lower Urban: house, hovel, hut, shed, shanty or door.
• Middle Urban: abode, cottage, dwelling, home, house or door.
• Upper Urban: domicile, hall, home, house, manor, residence or door.

A home's price is not affected by its category. The type of home determines what the outside of that home may look like. In order to change the exterior you must do so at a home shop appropriate to your home's type. Note that if you move your home to a different location, everything inside it will move with you but the exterior will remain behind.

Estate Holders also have the option to raise or lower the class of their homes for a not-insubstantial fee.

Exterior Housing Shops:

Type	Freestanding	Door	Knoll	Ondjai
Urban Upper	Elite Architecture A Flawless Facade	Grand Entrance	-	Building Supplies for the Honorable Ondjai
Urban Middle	City Statements	City Statements, Doors of Distinction	-	-
Urban Lower	Exterior Motives	Thrifty Doors	-	-
Rural Upper	Estate Home Exteriors The Noble's Barn, Quaint Exteriors for Posh Cabins	Estate Entrances	Fillop's Finest Knolls	-
Rural Middle	Dove's Delightful Dwellings Marscern's Cottages	Dove's Doors	Fillop's Knollshop
Rural Lower	Hayseed and Hatchet Sheds and Shacks	Hayseed and Hatchet, Door Stack	-	-

Occasionally, special homes become available by auction or raffle, or as a prize for an in-game event. In the past these have included treehouses and houseboats.

Access to the Home

Each premium account may now have one home for every character on that account.

Entry and Exit

To enter a home, you must first UNLOCK <HOME> to unlock the door. No key is required. Then OPEN <HOME>, and GO <HOME> to enter. For <HOME> use the one-word type-name for your home, e.g. HOUSE, COTTAGE, SHACK, DOOR, HOME etc. If more than one such home type is present in the area, you might have to use an ordinal modifier e.g. UNLOCK SECOND HOUSE. It is a quirk of the game engine that each time the game is reset after a crash or other system shutdown, the listing order of homes in an area is reversed. This means that sometimes you might have to use the ordinal modifier and other times you won't.

Alternatively, you can enter or exit your home in a single action using MOVE <HOME>.
(This command will UNLOCK, OPEN and GO without needing to input each step individually.)

Entering and exiting a home breaks groups, so everyone who wishes to enter must do so on their own. Once inside, CLOSE DOOR then LOCK DOOR to prevent others from coming in. GO DOOR to exit, and CLOSE and LOCK <HOME> after leaving. Your home will close and lock itself after a few minutes if you forget to do so yourself.

When the door is open you may PEER through it to observe the area outside. If you have a window, you may peer through that as well. CLOSE WINDOW to prevent people outside from peering into your home. OPEN WINDOW if you have nothing to hide.

In order to reduce load on the game servers, the home system was coded so that the rooms are only actually running in the game engine when the home is opened. When vacant, the homes are removed from the game and packed away as data in a save state (see HOME SAVE below). Opening and closing a home too frequently within a short period of time will incur a long roundtime so that this process does not itself overly tax the server.

Guests

When the door is open, anyone may enter. Other characters are forbidden from entering a home when it is locked. You may, however, grant special guest privileges to one other character by typing HOME GUEST <PLAYER>. This allows your designated guest to unlock and enter your home on their own. Your friend must be with you when you name them as your official guest. To remove these privileges enter HOME GUEST CLEAR.

Please note: Regardless which character on your account owns a home, all other characters on your account implicitly have access to the home, too.

If a visitor becomes unruly, you can kick them out by typing SHOW <PLAYER> TO DOOR. The first time will give a warning. The second time will remove the player from your home and prevent them from returning for a few hours.

Furnishings and Home Environment

There are many ways to customize the appearance of your home and the objects within it. HOME CHANGE can be used to rearrange the appearance of your furnishings. When you get everything just the way you like it, typing HOME SAVE will store the various appearance and environmental settings so they will remain that way for the next time you visit.

Starting

• sturdy oak table
• dusty oak floor
• tasseled cotton rug
• rough-hewn oak wall

Attached to wall:

Estate Holder plaque

• simple stick cot
• small firepit
• door

Furniture

Furniture and other home furnishings are available in shops across Elanthia, and fit into the following categories:

• Miscellaneous item [2 slots available] (table, couch, or bed)
• Chairs (single or set of several matching)
• Floors
  • Rugs, Carpets, & Floormats
• Fireplace
• General storage item (chest, cabinet, closet, trunk, wardrobe, or woodbin)
• Armor Stand (standard ones holds three pieces of armor)
• Weapon Rack (standard ones will hold two weapons)
• Window
• Door
• Wall
• Pet
• Exterior decorative items

A house will only allow one piece of each type, with the exception being the two miscellaneous items which are interchangeable. Items are replaced by purchasing a different one of the same type. Once placed in the home, furniture can be rearranged to suit your tastes through the HOME command.

They can be turned into a furniture voucher via the HOME REMOVE command.

Sources

• Furniture can be purchased from many 24/7 shops within the game. These shops can be found using HOME CATALOG.
• Furniture that holds more than the default/minimum number of items can be found in some festival shops such (e.g. Tea for Tamsine).
• Furniture tables that hold 15 items can be crafted using shaping and carving.
• A furniture coupon can be purchased using SimuCoins that will create a piece of furniture holding 75 items.

Minimum number of items

Currently, furniture items have a required/minimum number of slots ON them. This typically corresponds to the default size of storage items sold in 24/7 shops.

• Armor stands must have 3 slots ON.
• Weapon racks must have 1 slot ON.
• Beds must have 2 slots ON.
• General storage items must have 2 slots ON.
• Tables must have 2 slots ON.
• Walls must have 1 slot ON.

Storage Within the Home

An additional benefit to home ownership is that you can safely store a small number of items inside. Each storage slot may only be filled with items that are completely empty. Labels make things count as having something inside it, so items with attached labels may not be stored within a home. An item with a price tag on it will count as two items also.

Standard Capacity:

• Tables can hold two items.
• Beds, sofas, couches, or loveseats hold two items on top, and one underneath.

(if you HOME SWAP the table/bed slots then the item holding slots are also changed.)

• Walls may be hung with one appropriate item such as a mirror, plaque, or painting. (You can actually put any item on the wall, but it might look silly!)
• Storage trunks or closets generally allow four items within, and one placed on top. Woodbins will only hold combustible wood items for the fireplace such as logs.
• Armor stands hold three pieces of armor.
• Weapon racks will store two weapons.

Not that special furniture may store more items than the basic ones.

Only the principal homeowner (or another character on the account) & the designated Guest can place or remove items as described here. Visitors cannot remove or add items within a home. Be advised however that anything left on the floor of a home is considered fair game for the janitor.

It is important not to modify items while they are being stored on/in/etc. furniture. Modifying being something such as repairing an item, picking a box, charging cambrinth or using runestones. Doing so will cause problems with the home and will require GameMaster assistance to restore functionality.

• Special note about the janitor in homes: The housing mechanic is different than janitor mechanics, in that anything left in a house is deleted as soon as the house is closed/left (unloads). So if you have something on the ground and the game crashes, it really is, actually, gone forever (deleted).

Pets

Pets are available at pet stores, some of which have rotating stock or only appear during festivals or similar events.

Once you have purchased a pet, it is delivered to your house. Pets give random messaging specific to the animal unless you POKE them, which causes them to fall asleep until poked again. They are also interactive and respond to such verbs as RUB, HUG, KISS, SCRATCH, SNUGGLE and others.

Older pets may or may not allow your assigned house guest to interact with them. Newer pets generally treat your guest as they treat you and some pets (many from HE fest) will also allow limited interactions with any visitor to the home as well as interesting, not quite as friendly ones with your guest.

A pet's gender can be changed once by TAPping it. There is a timer on changing your pets gender, and not all pets can have their gender changed.

Exterior Decoration

Each type of home will only accept certain types of exterior decoration, usually listed at the shop. The types are knoll, tree, door, and freestanding.

You can add items to the home by PUTting it on the home.

To remove the exterior decoration, REMOVE <home noun>, such as REMOVE CABIN.

This will leave you with a parchment scroll, which you can add to a home the same way you do any exterior decoration. No need to go to the housing office!

Appearance

There are other ways to control the appearance when you LOOK inside your home. Certain standard home elements such as the door or rug may be TAPped to toggle concealing or revealing them.

Scents

You can add a scent message to the LOOK of your home, but it won't be detectable by SMELL or SNIFF. Typing HOME SCENT when inside your home will give all the options available, of which there are many. You can choose from dozens of different aromas, and set the intensity as well.

home scent

Usage:
HOME SCENT CHANGE CLASS <CLASSNAME>
HOME SCENT CHANGE SCENT <SCENT#>
HOME SCENT CHANGE STRENGTH <#>
HOME SCENT LIST <CLASSNAME>

Valid Class Names:
Floral
Forest
Spices
Foods
Miscellaneous
Profession
Animal
Unpleasant

Scent Numbers are 1-99, Strengths 1-10
To change your scent, change the class first.

Dancing

Dancing within a home may be turned on or off via TAP FLOOR.

See Dance floors for options.

Neighborhoods

See Category:Housing.

Related Forum Posts

Click here to search for related posts.

Additional Information

• Housing Shops - Furnishings and decor for your home
• HOME command - HOME CATALOG will help find furniture
• Unsigned deed: Means of gaining a home for non-Premium accounts.
• URCHIN GUIDE HOME