Not pictured: Massive state of decay.

Broadsword Online Games made a few additions to Publish 89 for Ultima Online at the end of last week, which affected how the game handles old player houses that, due to neglect, have been deemed In Danger Of Collapsing (IDOC):

• When a house goes into the condemned stage the house will go private and all access will be removed.
• Trial accounts will no longer be able to pick up loot from an IDOC house
• When the house drops Grubbers will spawn with some of the house loot in their packs, you will have to chase them down to get the loot they have.
• After a house is in the IDOC stage the timers are no longer random, it will drop at either 5, 10, or 15 hours, with the exception of houses with rental vendors. Houses with rental vendors will become OSI owned and have to go through a cycle for the second time to notify vendor owners.

And call me crazy, but for some reason I can’t help but feel that the above changed are related to the issues that are currently affecting housing in the game:

Due to the large number of houses going into decay we have turned off the Housing Warehouse until we can look into this issue further. We will keep everyone informed as to when it will be turned back on as soon as possible. Due to the holiday tomorrow we will not return to the office until Tuesday.

The Law of Unintended Consequences applies even in Britannia.