I also hope that this will change in the next game. Unlike before, there is reason to hope for such an update: even if Nintendo never intended paths to be a thing, they ultimately made paths in their own NL town and later prohibited villagers to move on paths with the update. So I think there is a chance we could get placing houses as a full feature in the next game, or at least an expanded version of the don?t-move-on-paths feature
All that aside, NL probably won?t get more updates, so we have to work with what we get. This game is just too amazing to let yourself hate it because of this missing feature (even if it?s an important one to many).
You said you already lost things to villagers moving into that space multiple times, so I think there is a problem here.
This community is here for such occasions, I?m sure we can help you figure out how to make the best of the features you have available and enjoy landscaping in your town again^^
That said, I will start with some advice on what I would do in your situation:
- focus on getting the villagers you want (preferably 10) before doing very detailed landscaping to make everything perfect
- as long as you don?t have 9 villagers: never leave an space of 3x3 tiles without a design on the floor UNLESS you are prepared to have someone move there
- so firstly, decide on where the new villagers should live and surround that 3x3 area with designs
- then make sure to not have any other 3x3 space without a single design in your town
- find a space where you didn?t do fancy landscaping yet, so you can use it to place a new characters house
- start plot resetting
Whenever you have less than 9 villagers, don?t start the game with an already existing character but create a new one and walk around, if you ....
- a) see no house = take the character to the open space you selected for his/her house and place it there, save the game, delete the character
- b) see a house, its in the space you marked = do the same as with a)
- c) see a house, but NOT in the space you marked = restart the game without saving AND find out what went wrong there are two options (c1 and c2)
- c1) you missed a 3x3 area with no designs, in that case, turn the clock back to yesterday and place a design there (dont use a new character but one that already lives in your town) and save, then set the time back to today and start a new character (now try to get option a) or b), if you can?t the reason and solution might be the same as in c2) )
- c2) the house is CLEARLY on a path you put down, so the villager didn?t move onto a 3x3 are you missed but in a place where you had a design, in that case the 3x3 area you marked for the villager to move in doesn?t work (that can happen for various reasons) You should try to select a new area for them to move (like c1, go back one day and change designs)
Based on what I know, the villager only moves on your designs if there is no free space for them in the town.
- repeat the above scenario untill you have 9 villagers in places you want them to be, never start a game unless you have 9 because the game will always give you a new villager. it might not be on day one, but after 3 days the possibilty of someone moving is really high! That?s also why its important to save with the new character you created when no one moved in: the chance of someone moving in is still the same so if you don?t save after not seeing a house, next time you start there might be one.
- don?t do streetpass untill you have 10 villagers to avoid someone randomly moving in. if you had a streetpass encounter with someone, start the game with a new character on the next day and do the steps (a, b or c) to check if there is someone moving in and make sure they move on the right spot.
All in all, I would really try to use plot resetting to get the full amount of 10 villagers. After that you don?t need to worry about someone moving in on the wrong spot so you can remove all the designs you scattered across your town and do the final touches to your landscaping.
Also important:
- once you have the full set of villagers where you want them to be, try to talk to 2 villagers a lot every second day. If one tells you a "rumor" after talking to him a few times, move to the second villager and talk to him untill he tells you a rumor too.
- As long as a character tells you rumors, no one is thinking about moving. Its important to do this every few days so you can talk to the villager who wants to move and make them change their mind in time.
- It?s also important to talk to two villagers when you do this because you might be questioning the one who wants to move out, he might tell you somthing that sounds like that villager?s rumor-line but still want to move. But if you question a second villager and they also tell you about rumors, no one wants to leave.
At least so far I have had no problems with this method. I started to focus on getting all the villagers first after someone moved in a spot I really hated and I wanted to avoid that ever happening again.
Maybe I mentioned something you didn?t already know and I?m sure you will get more tips from all the other commenters (that?s why we are here after all!)
I hope you find a solution that lets you enjoy this game again!
i hope they improve the game more not only in this way but also extra details for example being able to cook and actually use furniture!!! i've wanted that for the longest time
