Regarding Animal Husbandry.....one weird question:

Morning! So for the last few weeks I was thinking about a potential problem with Animal Husbandry, wanted to ask about it in the livestream, but decided to put it as a forum post first.

So, as far as I understand, genetics will play a big role in how the mounts/pets players will make in game. Its going to decide both the looks of a mount and its stats.

My question is this: Can we castrate mounts before selling them? I know its a weird question! However, when you have genetics involved, its quite valid.

If I spend hours to craft a mount with legendary stats and a unique look, I dont want its genome to go on the market and have someone just copy it. It's like a "recipe" i developed.

Imagine if buying a sword on the market lets to copy the sword yourself. Makes no sense right?

I think there should be a way in the animal husbandry menu to permanently "snip-snip" the mount's ability to pass its genes. What do you all think?

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Ludullu

I mean, you could just sell it for a ton of money, considering it's pristine genes. Yes, your potential buyers would go down in quantity, but that's the reality of selling something that's super exclusive.

Not saying that there shouldn't be an option to prevent future breeding of your animals, but I don't think it's that big of an issue overall.

Schmuky

NiKr wrote: »

I mean, you could just sell it for a ton of money, considering it's pristine genes. Yes, your potential buyers would go down in quantity, but that's the reality of selling something that's super exclusive.

Not saying that there shouldn't be an option to prevent future breeding of your animals, but I don't think it's that big of an issue overall.

Here is the thing, I agree that a mount with amazing genes would sell for a lot of money to another player that is into the profession as well. However, that should be separated from the market. The market should be for all players to find mounts that they would use. If all mounts will be able to breed, then the price of the mount will come from its genes, and might be way to high for a player that is just looking from a better horse for example.

If we can prevent breeding in a mount, yes, that takes its price way down, but that is fine, because yes you get less money, but the "recipe" you used to make it is safe, so you could make another one and still have no competition.

If we can't prevent it, at the start all mounts will have waaay inflated prices, that will plummet to nothing when all breeders have all genes and everyone can make any mount.

Tulima

NiKr wrote: »

I mean, you could just sell it for a ton of money, considering it's pristine genes. Yes, your potential buyers would go down in quantity, but that's the reality of selling something that's super exclusive.

Not saying that there shouldn't be an option to prevent the future breeding of your animals, but I don't think it's that big of an issue overall.

I think there would be an issue without having some sort of mechanic that prevents the breeding of legendary mounts. You will effectively have a legendary mount printing machine and if you print too much then legendary won't mean anything.

Instead of castrating, maybe a capacity of times a mount can be bred. The cap could decrease depending on the grade of its genetics

Schmuky

Tulima wrote: »

NiKr wrote: »

I mean, you could just sell it for a ton of money, considering it's pristine genes. Yes, your potential buyers would go down in quantity, but that's the reality of selling something that's super exclusive.

Not saying that there shouldn't be an option to prevent the future breeding of your animals, but I don't think it's that big of an issue overall.

I think there would be an issue without having some sort of mechanic that prevents the breeding of legendary mounts. You will effectively have a legendary mount printing machine and if you print too much then legendary won't mean anything.

Instead of castrating, maybe a capacity of times a mount can be bred. The cap could decrease depending on the grade of its genetics

i feel that is overly complicated tbh. Plus a number of times mounts can breed makes no sense. Easier and more realistic to have an option to remove the mounts ability to breed permanently.

Gathoderiz

Tulima wrote: »

NiKr wrote: »

I mean, you could just sell it for a ton of money, considering it's pristine genes. Yes, your potential buyers would go down in quantity, but that's the reality of selling something that's super exclusive.

Not saying that there shouldn't be an option to prevent the future breeding of your animals, but I don't think it's that big of an issue overall.

I think there would be an issue without having some sort of mechanic that prevents the breeding of legendary mounts. You will effectively have a legendary mount printing machine and if you print too much then legendary won't mean anything.

Instead of castrating, maybe a capacity of times a mount can be bred. The cap could decrease depending on the grade of its genetics

You can't breed royal mounts

Halae

I don't think a capacity is actually necessary as long as there's another limiter; like either a significant cooldown/gestation period (Gotta get the animal pregnant and carry the child to term, after all!) in which case you can permanently have a golden goose generating money for you, but it's limited by time scales in the same way that farms will be for plant life. This encourages you to seek out more of these high-grade animals so that you can get more breeders, meaning there'll still be demand for tamers to be out and about looking for high-end animals.

Schmucky's request for neutering still has a practical purpose at that point; if you neuter the babies, you prevent other players from making use of the genetics of your mount, preventing them from breeding their own version of those same children and undercutting your corner of the market. That's simple self-interest in terms of animal production; you allow other players to gain your mounts/battle pets, all of which are high quality, without risking them being capable of producing more of those same animals.

This would also create a breeder's market, where you can sell the same animals at a markup because you haven't neutered them, creating bidding wars for high-end breeding animals that wouldn't be present for baseline mounts. I think it'd juice up the economy in fairly interesting ways to have both of these available.

Tulima

Schmuky wrote: »

i feel that is overly complicated tbh. Plus a number of times mounts can breed makes no sense. Easier and more realistic to have an option to remove the mounts ability to breed permanently.

How is it overly complicated though? It's a simple maximum capacity of how many times you can breed. I think that the breeding system of itself will be extremely complicated. Finding correct genes, cross-breeding. geographical location are things a "breeder" need to consider. That sounds way more complicated to me

If you give the player the option to castrate so to speak, then that one player can single-handedly crash the top tier mount market.

Gathoderiz wrote: »

You can't breed royal mounts

Maybe I didn't word it correctly but I'm not talking about a royal mount. I meant a for example horse with the best genetics. Maybe calling it this a legendary was incorrect

Schmuky

compare this profession with blacksmithing. The limit there is the materials, but you cannot copy a sword just because you bought one on the market

Ludullu

Schmuky wrote: »

Here is the thing, I agree that a mount with amazing genes would sell for a lot of money to another player that is into the profession as well. However, that should be separated from the market. The market should be for all players to find mounts that they would use. If all mounts will be able to breed, then the price of the mount will come from its genes, and might be way to high for a player that is just looking from a better horse for example.

Not necessarily. Just design a proper market UI where people can see the stats on the animals and you won't have insane prices on shittily-statted ones. Also, it's not like every single person can just breed a perfect replica of the animal they buy, nor would they be able to perfectly breed the genes down the line. That will require high husbandry proficiency (at least I hope it will) and I doubt that most people will go down that artisan route.

Schmuky wrote: »

If we can prevent breeding in a mount, yes, that takes its price way down, but that is fine, because yes you get less money, but the "recipe" you used to make it is safe, so you could make another one and still have no competition.

I'm against monopolies, so we disagree there.

Either way, we have very limited info about this system so we dunno how Intrepid wants to balance it. I'd be fine with a "neuter" option if they decide to go with that.

Halae

NiKr wrote: »

I'm against monopolies, so we disagree there.

I'm concerned you may be disappointed with the game's planned economy, then, given from what I understand temporary monopolies are a planned-for and intended thing.

Schmuky

NiKr wrote: »

Not necessarily. Just design a proper market UI where people can see the stats on the animals and you won't have insane prices on shittily-statted ones. Also, it's not like every single person can just breed a perfect replica of the animal they buy, nor would they be able to perfectly breed the genes down the line. That will require high husbandry proficiency (at least I hope it will) and I doubt that most people will go down that artisan route.

I don't mean scams, mounts with good genes will go for high prices

NiKr wrote: »

I'm against monopolies, so we disagree there.

Either way, we have very limited info about this system so we dunno how Intrepid wants to balance it. I'd be fine with a "neuter" option if they decide to go with that.

The monopoly argument is weird, because any breeder can go and find animals with amazing genes. The argument is: If I spend hours finding an amazing set of genes, i don't want another breeder to instantly be able to steal it when i sell my first mount

Schmuky

I keep coming back to the blacksmith argument. A blacksmith that sells their swords on the market dosent have to worry that the sword will be copied instantly. It should work the same with mounts

Tulima

Halae wrote: »

I don't think a capacity is actually necessary as long as there's another limiter; like either a significant cooldown/gestation period (Gotta get the animal pregnant and carry the child to term, after all!) in which case you can permanently have a golden goose generating money for you, but it's limited by time scales in the same way that farms will be for plant life. This encourages you to seek out more of these high-grade animals so that you can get more breeders, meaning there'll still be demand for tamers to be out and about looking for high-end animals.

Schmucky's request for neutering still has a practical purpose at that point; if you neuter the babies, you prevent other players from making use of the genetics of your mount, preventing them from breeding their own version of those same children and undercutting your corner of the market. That's simple self-interest in terms of animal production; you allow other players to gain your mounts/battle pets, all of which are high quality, without risking them being capable of producing more of those same animals.

This would also create a breeder's market, where you can sell the same animals at a markup because you haven't neutered them, creating bidding wars for high-end breeding animals that wouldn't be present for baseline mounts. I think it'd juice up the economy in fairly interesting ways to have both of these available.

This is an interesting idea that would indeed slow down the breeding of high-grade mounts. However, the issue I take with this is that you would only need to log in once a week(or whatever the cooldown is) and possibly make as much money as someone who plays every day for that week.

Once you have achieved 1 perfect male and 1 perfect female then there is no need to further breed more animals. At least from a gold-making standpoint. This is not the case with for example crafting a sword. Once you have crafted the best sword, you still need to venture out into the world and gather all resources again.

AidanKD

I think I actually agree with this your method of thought though I can see why animal husbandry works differently. So to make sense of it, just because you have seen an awesome show horse, it doesn't mean you have the experience to know how to make it with a combination of all of its components, training etc that was required.

But from another tangent, if you have have this animal and choose to breed it with another, then you will end up with a cross-breed of sorts.

if you have this animal and breed it with another of its breed i.e pure breed then in theory you should be able to replicate it, ALTHOUGH, some of the breeding elements which aren't just what animal is being bred, i.e. what you feed it, training and other components outside of just the breed of the animal, those should be somewhat of the "secret recipe" which can distinguish it from the quality of the final product.

So I guess my thinking is that in addition to just the "product" we also have varying quality which could work with the tier system somewhat. So you might make it, but it will be lower quality so might not move as quickly, perhaps it has access to different skills or less skills.

And given that most mounts will be land mounts, or gliders - I think that a quality system could be quite fun. Maybe some breeds are hard locked to not ever have gliding, but others can have the potential unlocked through higher quality breeding.

I think because of the "realism" we are trying to apply, it is difficult to think that way and also properly critique/theorycraft the system from a game design and balance perspective but I think incorporating quality will help to find a middle ground perhaps.

Halae

Tulima wrote: »

This is an interesting idea that would indeed slow down the breeding of high-grade mounts. However, the issue I take with this is that you would only need to log in once a week(or whatever the cooldown is) and possibly make as much money as someone who plays every day for that week.

Once you have achieved 1 perfect male and 1 perfect female then there is no need to further breed more animals. At least from a gold-making standpoint. This is not the case with for example crafting a sword. Once you have crafted the best sword, you still need to venture out into the world and gather all resources again.

You say that like feed for your animals is a non-issue, and that you won't need any kind of resources for training a growing calf/pup/hatchling/whatever. I could see cooldowns on training as well as necessary consumable resources being a thing before you can actually sell the baby to a customer.

Schmuky

Would love some Dev input on this tbh. Probably gonna ask this on this month livestream

Tulima

Halae wrote: »

Tulima wrote: »

This is an interesting idea that would indeed slow down the breeding of high-grade mounts. However, the issue I take with this is that you would only need to log in once a week(or whatever the cooldown is) and possibly make as much money as someone who plays every day for that week.

Once you have achieved 1 perfect male and 1 perfect female then there is no need to further breed more animals. At least from a gold-making standpoint. This is not the case with for example crafting a sword. Once you have crafted the best sword, you still need to venture out into the world and gather all resources again.

You say that like feed for your animals is a non-issue, and that you won't need any kind of resources for training a growing calf/pup/hatchling/whatever. I could see cooldowns on training as well as necessary consumable resources being a thing before you can actually sell the baby to a customer.

I have played monster catching/taming/breeding games before and in those games breeding the perfect monster can be a real headache, at least for a slightly less than average brain size like myself, whilst the training part is a bit simpler. So you are correct that I probably neglected the time it will take to raise the animal.

In that case, I would probably say it depends on how difficult and how much resources it takes to train the animal.

Dygz

I highly doubt that Ashes will have castration.
Doesn't seem like a question they would choose for the Dev Livestream, but... doesn't hurt to try asking.

Ludullu

Schmuky wrote: »

I don't mean scams, mounts with good genes will go for high prices

I think there's a misunderstanding somewhere here. I was talking about normal people buying up mounts. Even if the mount can breed further, a normal person who just needs a mount wouldn't care about that. And if you're in the market for the top statted animals, you either have a friend breeder or have the money to buy the expensive bois.

Even if we have the neutering option in the game, any high stat animal will go for a ton of money, just because that animal would've taken insane luck or a ton of hours of work (most likely both). I guess the relative pricing would be cheaper, if we have that option, but at that point if I was a breeder I'd prefer to just get more money by selling a non-neutered animal, but we obviously have differing opinions on this.

Schmuky wrote: »

The monopoly argument is weird, because any breeder can go and find animals with amazing genes. The argument is: If I spend hours finding an amazing set of genes, i don't want another breeder to instantly be able to steal it when i sell my first mount

Schmuky wrote: »

I keep coming back to the blacksmith argument. A blacksmith that sells their swords on the market dosent have to worry that the sword will be copied instantly. It should work the same with mounts

But blacksmiths can literally copy the design of that sword. If they've spent the same amount of hours honing their craft, they'd have the ability to copy an intricate design.

And like I said, we don't know how the system will work. You might have to do a ton of work on top of just getting lucky with an animal that has good genes. So you selling such an animal would just reimburse your hours spent looking for that animal, while the buyer would've spent the same amount of time farming that money. To me that sounds like an equivalent exchange.

Schmuky

Let me tell what i think will happen if there is no neutering: Breeders will spend more time in the market place hunting for animals with good genes rather than either going to get them themselves or buy them from a professional tamer (which btw, is a profession that needs breeders to sell the animals too).

Then because they can just buy amazing stats, every mount make will have amazing stats, so tamers wont have anything more to do and new breeders wont be able to compete. Fast forward a few months, the price of mounts will be next to nothing because every mount will be top tier and as far as i know there is no sink in the mount system, so normal players will get 1 mount of each type and be done with it.

If there is neutering, then taming will be super important, as each breeder will need their own high quality genes, and the market will have more medium-quality mounts as breeders cant just buy top tier genes. It will take waay longer for the market to be supra-saturated with mounts.

And, its realistic, this is something that happens real life for this exact reason. Yes, breeding isnt an exact science, but even IRL, those that do this professionally are mindful of giving their competition good genes.

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