Change to Collar of Lupus (and mount killing in general)

Jarrod

The problem (as I and others see it): More expensive mounts can become a liability if the owner doesn't have access to a collar. What this results in is people with rare (ex. bazaar) mounts not wanting to risk them by taking them places, and sometimes simply leaving them in stables or places where people won't see them. They become more of a 'yes I own X' as opposed to 'look at my horse, my horse is amazing'. With changes to mount killing (both novices killing mounts and suiciding, as well as mount killing in general) these rare mounts could become more useful, without the large cost of purchasing a collar for the mount.

Possible solutions:
A) All mounts respawn on a long timer, perhaps 24 hours? The Collar would change to drastically reduce this time (2-4 hours instead?) so that the mount is available more often, but it isn't required for the mount to be worth bringing out. A downside to this is it greatly devalues the collars as is.
Move all Riding skills down, new Transcendant riding skill that allows you to train one mount at a time to flee from battle. This would generally be whatever one mount you have out with you, and if that mount dies, instead it flees the battle, and is forced to recover in the stable for a set period of time. During this time, you can't train another mount.
C) Some gold-based training or item you can attach to a mount that causes it to revive once, after a long delay. This would have the effect of basically being a cheap gold-based collar, that would eventually be less efficient than a collar if your mount is dying all the time, but more efficient if you take proper care of it.

These are just some off the top of my head solutions, and I'm sure there are plenty of others that people could think up. I want to see more of the rare mounts that people own out and about because they're not a liability, they're a cool thing to show off.

Daslin

I support this.

Xli

I vote option B, although I don't see why any other riding ability should be cheaper, just have another skill available at trans riding.

Jonathin

Is mount-killing by novices still a big problem? I know that mount killing in general is irritating as all hell and I'm glad I didn't have to fork over the cash for a collar (SoW pegasus), but I just don't see it happening often anymore. 

That's not to say that I don't support this idea, because I do.

Eld

Jonathin said:

Is mount-killing by novices still a big problem? I know that mount killing in general is irritating as all hell and I'm glad I didn't have to fork over the cash for a collar (SoW pegasus), but I just don't see it happening often anymore. 

That's not to say that I don't support this idea, because I do.

Well, this was prompted by a rant about a novice killing someone's bazaar mounts, so it apparently happens at least occasionally.

Santar

Don't really like the idea as it stands, but I think it deserves some consideration. I think you have some good ideas, some bad ideas, and some ideas that need tweaking.

Here's what I'd do if I were going to implement an idea similar to this:

A. Create a transcendent riding skill that causes any mount you own to automatically 'flee from battle' upon 'death' instead of being slain. You could recover it at the stable of your city or at the Delosian stable after 1 achaean year from the time of it's death. I think a 24 hour timer would greatly devalue collars and have far too much influence on combat. You could buy 3-5 mounts for a relatively cheap 100k(15 credits)  per and basically always have a legend steed ready at very little cost.  So, the timer should be something long, in the 1 achaean year range. This would allow people to have their mounts without having to worry about losing them forever upon making a small mistake, but it'd still heavily encourage them to take care of the mounts. I don't think a change that makes all mount deaths irrelevant would be a good change, and a 24 hour timer to respawn a mount would definitely make their deaths irrelevant. A cost to recover the mount could also be looked at.

B. Leave everything else the same as it is now. The collar timer is fine(and I own a collared mount, for reference). I don't think there's any need for them to spawn every 2 hours. 

Basically, I think the idea is decent, but you're going far too extreme. Mounts are a living thing in Achaea that are supposed to be taken care of. I agree that losing a mount sucks, but I don't think the penalty should be almost completely removed as you're proposing.

Jarrod

@Santar yeah a lot of the numbers were very shot in the dark, and I'm tired. Definitely agree that the timers should be a lot longer.

Korben

I've never had a mount (not very useful for monks), but I agree that mount killing is a pain. In addition, people used to other games in which mounts are just another piece of gear may not realize they get left behind when you log off.

I'm in favor of an insurance-like mechanic. You pay X gold per Achaean year, and your mount will be recovered (with a delay) if it dies.

Cardan

Without meaning to derail the actual idea, I have absolutely no qualms about shrubbing and/or ip banning asshats who create alts just to grief everybody and be tossers in general, like screaming profanity over org channels, kill every mount they can get to, and then suicide.  If you come across newbies of this nature, file an ISSUE ME about it and they will be taken care of.

Now, back to the original purpose of this thread.

Dunn

Chryl/Chryll IP ban pls. 

Jarrod

Just ISSUE MEd that one, great minds do something or other.

Katzchen

What I dislike is that falcons cost 250cr to collar, 100cr to customise (after the free one) but -poof- if you switch class. This seems rather unreasonable. I guess it means I just won't bother to custom/collar my falcon in case I ever switch back to infernal.

Kyrra

Shouldn't lose falcons between knight classes, and I thought custom ones just hung around?

Azor

I'd go for something like this, but if it gets done I request the following buff to collars: collared mounts can be recalled from different continents even if the whistler doesn't have the "glass shatterer trait". 

That way there's something in it for me.

Katzchen

Kyrra said:

Shouldn't lose falcons between knight classes, and I thought custom ones just hung around?

Not according to the arties scroll, and someone who switched back to knight recently.

Kyrra

Wow that's lame

Eld

I know @Hhaos got his falcon back after switching from Infernal to Runewarden, but I think that was @Ourania doing something special for him for a pretty major turn in his character's life. So the possibility is there, but it's not a given.

Xith

Was literally just thinking about this while reminding myself why I do not possess a legendsteed or use any riding.

Blujixapug

I made a proposal a while ago, along the lines of... slain mounts respawn at your city's stables after ~12 hours, and can be reclaimed for 5% of the mount's purchase price. 10% at Delos if you're rogue. A Collar removes the cost and lowers the time.

People didn't like it because having a mount slain is a traumatic, memorable event for your character. Which I understand and respect. But still, Riding sucks atm because mounts cost 150k+ and die so easily.

Achilles

Katzchen said:

Kyrra said:

Shouldn't lose falcons between knight classes, and I thought custom ones just hung around?

Not according to the arties scroll, and someone who switched back to knight recently.

You keep your falcon as long as you switch to another knight class.  I have a custom-collared one and just switched a month ago.

Katzchen

Achilles said:

Katzchen said:

Kyrra said:

Shouldn't lose falcons between knight classes, and I thought custom ones just hung around?

Not according to the arties scroll, and someone who switched back to knight recently.

You keep your falcon as long as you switch to another knight class.  I have a custom-collared one and just switched a month ago.

The scroll should really say this...

Sylvance

Guess I'll brace myself for drowning in WTF, but here's my genuine viewpoint. If you don't like my thoughts on Theft, then you should probably stop reading at this point and save yourself having to yell at your monitor:

This is another step down Easy Street. Don't get me wrong, I would be as pissed as anybody in all Achaea if my rare mount got killed. I also don't like being stolen from. But the threat of loss makes things more valuable, not less. Yes, if people are rolling alts just to do things like killing mounts, then there is a different problem, which needs to be dealt with differently. Effectively making all mounts immortal is not the way forward on this one.

As a happy medium, how about making a denizen Alchemist that will grow you a new mount from a flesh sample of the now-dead mount. But he will charge you exactly the original price of the mount. This way, losing it is losing it, but you're never in a position that you can never again get the same type of mount, it's just freaking expensive.

Santar

Sylvance said:

As a happy medium, how about making a denizen Alchemist that will grow you a new mount from a flesh sample of the now-dead mount. But he will charge you exactly the original price of the mount. This way, losing it is losing it, but you're never in a position that you can never again get the same type of mount, it's just freaking expensive.

Would rather have a necromancer to make me an undead Rhinoceros.

Rangor

My horse is the best

Sylvance

Santar said:

Sylvance said:

As a happy medium, how about making a denizen Alchemist that will grow you a new mount from a flesh sample of the now-dead mount. But he will charge you exactly the original price of the mount. This way, losing it is losing it, but you're never in a position that you can never again get the same type of mount, it's just freaking expensive.

Would rather have a necromancer to make me an undead Rhinoceros.

Actually, whether or not that was a serious comment, why not go the whole hog and have each City have its own iconic mountrezzer.

One other thing I want bring to the table is the law of unintended consequences. I'd happily kill an opponents/rivals mount if I knew it was collared. If it wasn't collared, I wouldn't kill a mount under any circumstances, and that's because I would allow player etiquette to restrain what I think could, under circumstances, be a perfectly reasonable IC action. What I'm saying is that I think it's quite possible that adding a mechanism that allows mounts to return from death/flee/whatever would increase the number of mount attacks rather than decreasing it.

I guess that brings it up to 40c.

Santar

That's an interesting point. Whether or not something has a collar definitely impacts my willingness to attack it. I'm 10x more likely to attack a collared mount than an uncollared one. Yeah, I know, you guys all thought I was a heartless bastard.

Xli

Rangor said:

My horse is the best

Evidently you haven't seen my lovely horse...

Seftin

10x 100%.... (only joking)

Would deffo like a form of this but agree it needs a longer time limit. Not too keen on the alchemist idea. Maybe having the mount bolting in terror if it gets attacked and would subsequently die and then goes "missing" for an achaean year before being located at city stable. Collar would work same as normal but the mount returns to you after how many hours it is.

Sena

Sylvance said:

This is another step down Easy Street. Don't get me wrong, I would be as pissed as anybody in all Achaea if my rare mount got killed. I also don't like being stolen from. But the threat of loss makes things more valuable, not less. Yes, if people are rolling alts just to do things like killing mounts, then there is a different problem, which needs to be dealt with differently. Effectively making all mounts immortal is not the way forward on this one.

The main problem I have is that actually riding your favourite mount is a huge liability, and without a 250 credit investment it's often best to leave your rare/special/strong mount locked away out of sight most of the time and ride a cheap, common mount (or nothing at all) instead. Mounts being immortal is problematic, but mounts being able to be easily slain by anyone if you aren't constantly vigilant (and it's often not terribly hard even if you are) is far more problematic in my opinion. For me, it turns my rare bazaar mount from a loyal steed into nothing more than a garden decoration that eats a lot.

Old theft was entirely preventable most of the time with very little effort, and only certain people could attempt to steal from you. Mount killing is much harder to prevent, and anyone can do it, even a newbie.

Sylvance said:

As a happy medium, how about making a denizen Alchemist that will grow you a new mount from a flesh sample of the now-dead mount. But he will charge you exactly the original price of the mount. This way, losing it is losing it, but you're never in a position that you can never again get the same type of mount, it's just freaking expensive.

This isn't necessarily more expensive or harder than most of the proposals so far (since exact costs haven't been suggested). Although requiring the corpse would be a problem, if that's what you're suggesting, since you usually won't have access to it after the mount is killed.

Sylvance said:

What I'm saying is that I think it's quite possible that adding a mechanism that allows mounts to return from death/flee/whatever would increase the number of mount attacks rather than decreasing it.

I don't think anyone has suggested this would decrease the number of mount attacks, just make them less devastating when they do happen. I agree it would increase the chance of your mount being slain, but it would also mean you're able to actually use your mount, which is definitely worth it.

Sylvance

Yep, I get that this is entirely different from Old Theft, I just think that the suggested change is taking us down the same route of removing threat from the game. That said, I do recognise the points that you're making, and agree with them to an extent.

In terms of requiring a corpse, I should have explained myself better, but I more meant you'd bring him a flesh sample before the mount dies, like a kind of insurance premium. Then perhaps you have to pay him for the vat space so that he can store it until  it's needed.

Here's the thing on your final point: yes, each individual attack would be less devastating, but the increase in mount attacks overall is going to cost people more money in the long run.

Korben

Sylvance said:

Yes, if people are rolling alts just to do things like killing mounts, then there is a different problem, which needs to be dealt with differently.

Deal with it how ? They're throwaway alts, so shrubbing is not effective. IP banning may or may not work, and even if it does there are ways around it.

The amount of damage a throwaway alt can do needs to be minimized. That's the only way to fix this particular problem.