So We've Got Garrisons. When Do We Get Player Housing?

When Garrisons were announced, they were billed as "WoW's Version of Player Housing." In practice, at least so far in the Beta, but I can't really imagine how they could change enough before they go live, they just aren't.

Mind you, in a vacuum, the Garrison concept is pretty neat. We're building our own special base that we get to customize, and it'll help us out with soloing and professions.

But this is not player housing in the sense that it's generally understood among the gaming masses.

The point of player housing in MMOs and any game that has housing as a concept, is personal expression. It's a part of the game that doesn't really have a huge impact on the main through line of the game, which is typically about amassing player power and beating the bad guys. One does not get upgrades to the house in order to benefit one's progress in the main game, but rather, one gets upgrades to the house because those upgrades are COOL.

To be clear: this is the implementation of Garrisons as it looks on the Beta:

You gather resources, which are used to create buildings. You unlock plans for those buildings during the leveling process. As you build those buildings, you unlock new tiers of the garrison, which allow for more buildings. The buildings have either passive effects, or they can be used to create whatever a profession's daily cool down reagent is, and there will be a professional who can create things using that reagent.

The buildings are all functional, so you'll be expected to choose based on their mechanical value.

You have a few statue pedestals that will have special monuments for different achievements. This is the only thing you can really customize without having a mechanical effect on the garrison.

So what's wrong with this? Well, technically nothing. But it ain't player housing.

Here's why:

Personal Expression is an afterthought, if that:

The buildings you get are cool, but you're really going to want to pick the ones that benefit you best. Sure, you can rearrange them  bit, but chances are, you'll figure out which buildings you want, and you'll stick to those.

No matter what, Lunarfall is going to look like it was made with stones taken from the same quarry as the walls of Stormwind, and Frostwall is going to be very reminiscent of Orgrimmar.

It'll All Be Irrelevant When the Next Expansion Comes Along:

The Garrisons are strongly tied to Draenor, which is fine, as that's going to be the focus of the expansion. But that also means that when we move on to Ny'alotha or Argus or the Emerald Dream or wherever we wind up, it's likely that these places are going to just be sitting around, gathering dust.

How often do we go back to Outland or Northrend? There was one quest in Wrath that briefly took us to Shattrath and you would have gone back to Outland if you're a Warlock going after Green Fire. Does anyone still worry about their Aldor Rep?

The Garrisons are not built on a strong foundation here, because they're destined to be swept under the rug as soon as Draenor becomes just another place to level through.

There's not enough choice:

Here's the ultimate boil-it-down: Every player's Lunarfall is going to look basically the same. Every player's Frostwall is going to look basically the same. I play a lot of toons. A lot. And while mathematically there might be technically enough combinations for me to never have an identical garrison, the fact is that I probably won't be able to tell the difference between two Alliance garrisons unless I look very carefully.

But Let's Not Get Too Negative:

Is the feature disappointing? That depends on your expectations. I will blame Blizzard for referring to it as player housing, because it clearly does not live up to our expectations based on what that kind of feature looks like in other games.

But taken on its own, it's actually pretty cool that we have a little home base that we get to go back to. I like the idea that we're finally being given the respect that we deserve, and that by level 90, our factions are willing to take commands from us.

Honestly, it's not like Warlords is going to be ruined because of this. A solid WoW expansion is more about the quality and quantity of its meat and potatoes stuff: Dungeons and Raids (and PvP stuff, I guess.) It's a little like Blizzard offered to take us out for Pizza, and then get us Ice Cream afterward, but then decided that Ice Cream was a little too much. We're still getting the Pizza, but it's natural, and justified, to be pissed off about the lack of Ice Cream.

But seriously, Blizzard. Eventually, we should all go out and get some Ice Cream.