How complex do you want Animal Husbandry to be?

I know that it's been stated that Breeding will follow the Mandelian Inheritance form of breeding, which is to say the derivation of genetic traits and alleles Inherited from the parent(s) in the form of dominant and recessive genes. Everyone remembers their punnet squares, right? 😆

So I was wanting to gauge the community here on the forums for how complex you wanted the system to be and what systems/information would you like to have access to for the breeding system.

I'll start. For instance, on a scale of fourth grade punnet squares (your 4 quadrant BB, Bb type squares) to whatever complex mathematical f***ery went into the Pokémon egg groups and famalies and moveset determiners and the IV calculator...on that scale I think some nice high level high school traits and allele calculation is fine. But I shouldn't need a math degree to ensure that my horse has a solid mathematical chance to hedge for a sprinting ability vs a super jump.

And obviously there will be systems like the compendium to help keep track of traits and abilities over the generation, so I hope down the Animal Husbandry mastery we have the ability to be nearly perfectly selective of certain recessive genes we'd like to bring forward in an animal. Almost like modern day geneticists I want to be able to make it very likely to induce gigantism in an animal if I am a master and I'm going to be selling this animal to a siege team or something.

Those are my initial thoughts, what do you lovely peoples think? What cool ideas do you have?

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Azherae

I for one am here for the Math Degree.

tautau

Pretty darn complex. Complex that it needs some real study to understand...not something that is obvious to a college drop-out.

Goalid

I wouldn't even give people access to what alleles a mount has. You can determine the genetic propensity a creature has for a certain trait solely by the environmental range you're given. So for example, if I'm training two creatures with animal husbandry, and one can get max HP at 1500 and the other 1700, I know the latter has alleles that grant higher HP. That's what breeders have been doing for centuries, they don't need some UI detailing the exact alleles or SNPs.

The most I'd give users would be a family history of bred animals and their stats, not even the range their stats could have fallen between.

As to the actual complexity, I'd have several genes affecting a single trait, something like 15-20 per trait. Then those alleles differ within species, and between species at different gene locations, meaning that cross-breeding would give the best chance of getting a BiS mount / battle pet / mule.

I also had a post awhile ago detailing how I would make it harder for breeders to min-maxing over time, and keep tamers relevant: https://forums.ashesofcreation.com/discussion/51985/using-inbreeding-and-outbreeding-depression-to-keep-tamers-relevant-in-the-breeding-market#latest

And I also agree with others who've mentioned that these animals should eventually die, otherwise the animal market is quickly going to get oversaturated. And others have suggested adding neutering to the game.

CROW3

I want AH to be very complex, and benefit from knowledge gained within the game - such as scientific node advancement. This would provide AHs more finely tuned tools (e.g. more dimensions for breeding, better UI, more documentation) to produce overall better mounts.

I’d like to see observable, consistent traits in different breeds, so that an AH can experiment with species to target a desired blended outcome. That said, I’d also like some genetic curve-balls added where the gestalt of very specific breed-blends create an outcome greater than expected (almost creating new species).

Goalid wrote: »

And I also agree with others who've mentioned that these animals should eventually die, otherwise the animal market is quickly going to get oversaturated. And others have suggested adding neutering to the game.

Gelding needs to be in as a control for AHs to control the use of their product and research. Think of it more like a patent than a medical procedure.

I’m not a fan of mounts aging and dying, but if they go that direction, my hope is that longevity is a breedable dimension in the combinatorial math. Then there’s another trade off for breeders and buyers.

Sengarden

Unless they incorporate an unrealistic level of artificial randomness to the mix, patterns in how various animals pass on their traits, whether consistent across or different between all species, should emerge in time. We are in a fantasy world, after all. Who the hell knows how Snorses pass on their genes? Players, if they're interested and willing, should be held responsible for managing those patterns themselves. I think we should have an in-game log-book of sorts that keeps track of family lines and traits of each animal we've bred - this would be the material a player would analyze in order to try and nail down some sort of genetic pattern.

But yes, I do believe there should be a level of complexity that rewards players who go the extra mile to analyze the intricacies of the system with more reliable products of their time investment.

Halae

I think a level of complexity roughly equivalent to pokemon isn't a bad idea. Those games have an extensive way of handling breeding, family groups, egg production, skills taught to descendants, and so on. The major thing I'd change is that I'd make it so that there's no way for players to see the internal state values of a given creature you're breeding so that there's no way to rigidly define what a "best" version of an animal is, leaving that up to a breeder to determine rather than an online guide or wiki list.

Leaving stats and potential and genetics as unknowns is wise because it keeps people from developing a metagame around it. People will still demand specific things out of mounts, such as "Oh, I love having high HP mounts to deal with bandit attacks" or "I only care about getting from place to place so I like speedy mounts" or "I like pretty skins". But if we know maximum potentials and stat caps, people are going to demand mounts that are at those stat caps, and completely shun everything else. That's not great for the ingame economy.

JustVine

Halae wrote: »

I think a level of complexity roughly equivalent to pokemon isn't a bad idea. Those games have an extensive way of handling breeding, family groups, egg production, skills taught to descendants, and so on. The major thing I'd change is that I'd make it so that there's no way for players to see the internal state values of a given creature you're breeding so that there's no way to rigidly define what a "best" version of an animal is, leaving that up to a breeder to determine rather than an online guide or wiki list.

Leaving stats and potential and genetics as unknowns is wise because it keeps people from developing a metagame around it. People will still demand specific things out of mounts, such as "Oh, I love having high HP mounts to deal with bandit attacks" or "I only care about getting from place to place so I like speedy mounts" or "I like pretty skins". But if we know maximum potentials and stat caps, people are going to demand mounts that are at those stat caps, and completely shun everything else. That's not great for the ingame economy.

Do you consider pokemon breeding to be particularly complicated by the way?

Halae

JustVine wrote: »

Do you consider pokemon breeding to be particularly complicated by the way?

I don't. I consider it to be thoroughly middle of the road; complex enough that people can dig deep into it and get the perfect stuff out of it if they want, but also simple enough that it can be accessed and understood on a casual basis by people who aren't deeply invested in the breeding aspect of pokemon. This makes it an ideal mixture of accessible and complex for appealing to a wide audience and being customizable for the player in question.

The biggest problem the Pokemon breeding system has is being able to access your 'mon's statlines and knowing what the caps are, which makes it so that the only pokemon ever used are the ones at those caps, because everything else is unnecessarily crippling your capabilities.

JustVine

Halae wrote: »

JustVine wrote: »

Do you consider pokemon breeding to be particularly complicated by the way?

I don't. I consider it to be thoroughly middle of the road; complex enough that people can dig deep into it and get the perfect stuff out of it if they want, but also simple enough that it can be accessed and understood on a casual basis by people who aren't deeply invested in the breeding aspect of pokemon. This makes it an ideal mixture of accessible and complex for appealing to a wide audience and being customizable for the player in question.

The biggest problem the Pokemon breeding system has is being able to access your 'mon's statlines and knowing what the caps are, which makes it so that the only pokemon ever used are the ones at those caps, because everything else is unnecessarily crippling your capabilities.

Cool thanks. I find that people tend to have a difference in opinion as to what actually counts as 'complexity' so I wasn't sure which way you may have considered it to be.

GethOverlord

Halae wrote: »

if we know maximum potentials and stat caps, people are going to demand mounts that are at those stat caps, and completely shun everything else.

Goalid wrote: »

The most I'd give users would be a family history of bred animals and their stats, not even the range their stats could have fallen between.

As to the actual complexity, I'd have several genes affecting a single trait, something like 15-20 per trait. Then those alleles differ within species, and between species at different gene locations, meaning that cross-breeding would give the best chance of getting a BiS mount / battle pet / mule.

I think these are both thoughtful approaches to Animal Handeling and both address what I suppose my number one concern would be and that's the striving for the minmaxing and removing the rpg choose your own animal kind of aspect from the system.
I find myself agreeing the level of complexity in the system should be complicated enough that the number of genes would have to be decently high. And leaving genetic unknowns in a scenario is, for a lot of people, a lot of the fun.
I look forward to seeing what Intrepid does with the compendium and modifiable traits, and I'm very curious how much information they give people on purchased mounts. 🤔😌🤔

daveywavey

I'd like it to be doable and understandable, but complex enough that it doesn't require any RNG whatsoever.

Warth

Easy to get into on a fundamental level

Very complex/deep if you are planning to breed to top tier mounts and pets. With lots to customize, decide and plan

AidanKD

While I don't think Complex in its use is bad, I think complex isn't the word i'd prefer to use as opposed to perhaps depth I feel it conveys it well. I want it to have layers and most importantly discovery!

Not as depth but think of a game like football manager. You have all these stats, some not even visible and both individually and in combination have an impact on the final product also dependent on the role you want a player to perform as.

I don't want THAT MUCH DEPTH in the animal husbandry system. But I would like it to share those elements of hidden stats (kind of like pokemon breeding actually in the main games) - whereby certain animals genuinely are just innately better. It can be a minor % increase to speed, resistance to fall damage or dismounting, but it's just something to determine quality.

These can be further augmented by the breeding and training process - perhaps different methods can focus on different stats.

I personally feel there will probably be an optimal way to breed that will be determined, but if they can make certain mounts more situational like GW2 mounts so that you actually WANT an array of mounts to help you navigate different landscapes, then that would to me see the system at its best.

You can also have some elements for the visual elements i.e. visual FX (think Shiny pokemon maybe for achieving a minimum overall level of quality??) but most of what I think of is more easily attributed to the functional side.

GethOverlord

AidanKD wrote: »

You can also have some elements for the visual elements i.e. visual FX (think Shiny pokemon maybe for achieving a minimum overall level of quality??) but most of what I think of is more easily attributed to the functional side.

I mentioned this in the other Animal Husbandry thread going right now about removing breeding from mounts but I'll throw it out here as well.
I feel like introducing the visual effects like Shiny or irl Albanism and Melanism are fantastic places to start with Ashes special visual breeding and truly hope they implement that and more for visual customization.

Asgerr

I think the level of complexity in breeding should be just a little higher than what breeding Pokémon for competitive play is.

It's not so much hard as it is long and tedious and requiring specific items and in Ashes you would add knowledge obtained from leveling and class instructors and manuals found in the world as loot in dungeons etc.

My one doubt is whether one should be able to reverse engineer a specific bred beast. By that I mean:

Player A has bred a perfect specimen. Player B buys or inspects the specimen and can see what items and parents and traits were used, so that he later goes and buys those to replicate it.

I think maybe an advanced enough level in Husbandry could make that a cool "inspect" result. But I also see it as being detrimental to the artisanship of Player A who has mastered his craft enough to be able to produce such fine specimens.

tautau

Well, B might be able to say, "That sure looks like you somehow got a mix of a Siamese cat and a Barn Owl, darn thing can see at night better than any spell in the game!", but that doesn't mean player B can catch a barn owl, breed a Siamese or much less convince them to mate!

B will never know that you first mate a barn owl with a red hawk and a calico cat with a bobcat, then take the offspring of those matings to make the Siamese Owl that gives you underground and night vision.

PenguinPaladin

animal Husbandry should be complex enough that tulnars are self explanatory....... and should be shunned.

Zilola

Animal Husbandry (AH) complexity simple answer:
Make it easy to get into AH and still able to do moderately well with a normal professional effort, but allow hard-core AH enthusiasts to excel due to their dedication to discovering the intricacies of AH. Beyond leveling your AH to get to Grandmaster, allow a layer of learning AH intricacies based on observation, listening to NPc dialogue, and performing quests. This "beyond" Grandmaster knowledge is where AH enthusiasts can show their knowledge and skills. This style of AH allows for the whole spectrum of gamers to enjoy learning about and participating in all the different aspects of AH and each individual player decide to limit their knowledge based on their effort.

I would like to see that gamers who just want to get into it be able to have moderate success with basic level of inputted effort. I.E. if you want the profession to be a side thing you do, then it should be able to be like a harvest moon. You generally know that you can breed creatures for x purpose and there are basic dominant and recessive phenotype for breeding to get what you want and you have the same dice roll when breeding to get a good line up, mixed, or bad line up of genetics based on the two beings you are combining. This allows non-hard core AH professionals to still enjoy the basic concept of genetic reproduction with out a feeling of "grinding" to show anything of use for your efforts. I would rather the profession be fun and instill a love for animal breeding than be tedious and too technical to ever create something of worth.

That being said, people like me who enjoy not only animal breeding but the art of genetics might play more of a realistic style gaming that requires some effort to discover the intricacies of breeding, rearing, and training. There are also people who enjoy discovery in general and get excitement from discovering hidden "gems" of game mechanics. Allow us to delve deeper into how to "craft" the best types of mount, beast of burden, combat pets, and utility pets. We will put the time in to discover and sell our knowledge at a price. Risk vs. reward. Also observation could be used to learn more about animals and give clues. Steven said he wanted traveling to not be a burden but be as purposeful as a quest. If I am traveling and I see creatures behaving a new way or interacting with the environment in a new way, then I would want to stop and observe. Making field notes has a purpose to me because I might find horses that are seeing running more are more apt to have higher speed, turtles that fight other animals more are more apt to have higher defense, this type of animal prefers this type of flower to eat, and this type of animal always nests in this type of tree. Taking the risk to study the creatures of the world would result in better knowledge of breeding, rearing, and training which results in eventual rewards of purposefully higher quality creatures, better breeding/rearing/caring techniques to improve stats like longevity, etc., and higher prices for our better branded goods. This should also allow that people can choose to limit their time to one type of species (like mammals) or one purpose (like mount, or livestock) to become known as more than just a titled Grandmaster in the game, but a nitch AH Profession Master. A player might go to a nitch AH Profession Master specific to breeding mammals of higher quality and pay to learn their techniques for geographical locating of specific genetics and spotting indicators on wild animals for habits and phenotype that indicate higher quality genetics or pay to get one of their mammals to enhance your own brood. A player might go to a nitch AH Profession Master who has the knowledge, genetics, and training ability to either sell you a grade A mount or sell you their knowledge of training/rearing techniques to create grade A mounts. Then for the hard-core AH, you shouldn't have to be forced into only being able to do some of this, but with a lot of effort you should be able to put the time in to learn all of the techniques.

WHIT3ROS3

daveywavey wrote: »

I'd like it to be doable and understandable, but complex enough that it doesn't require any RNG whatsoever.

But breeding animals has a significant amount of RNG.

Enigmatic Sage

Probably be based on how genetics work in real life and in other games.

Phenotypes, Alleles and Genes
Dominant and Recessive Genes

Real question is if we'll get things like Gametic Isolation.

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