Horses...

[J.A.R.S.]

I've seen it is possible to have a nice horse and cripple it so it loses speed. I was wondering, if you keep a horse over time, couldn't it gain experience and therefore "level up" by recovering its original speed?

 

[powerg8]

Yes,but it takes like weeks so you might aswell get a new one,and put the crippled one in you inventory.

 

[Lhorkan]

You mean by using it a lot so it gains "experience"? Putting the horse in your inventory works already. If you mean that a lame horse should recover over time by riding it, that doesn't make sense of course.

Maybe your (normal) horse could get a "spirited" or "heavy" bonus when you used it a long time?

 

[compfreak]

I could understand spirited, but heavy would only happen if you overfed it.

 

[Destichado]

In all fairness, I've met a few horses who overfeed themselves.

This one stable-kept draft mix came in with a belly, and we thought we could get rid of it. We worked him like no other -dressage, hunting, trailrides, lessons... turned out every night so he wouldn't be sedentary... and three months later he was fatter than when he came in. Because every second that he wasn't being worked, that damn dumb thing was eating.

 

[Can O Soup]

I think that heavy would happen to your horse the more you charged people, as this would build it's toughness etc by smashing people over, whereas spirited would come about by riding around the enemy more than charging, as that would boost it's heart rate better and let it run longer and faster.

 

[J.A.R.S.]

well the basical idea is to focus on horse's skills... so charging could increase, not necessarily the horse type, but its characteristics... there is so much work put into making heroes, sub-heroes and army units more than goods that the horses feel a lil... like random meat parts... I really think players should value their horses more and earn bonuses for keeping one horse safe over time

 

[DaLagga]

I agree with JARS. It really doesn't make much sense that a game called MOUNT & blade treats horses just like piecies of equipment.

 

[The Pope]

It treats blades just like pieces of equipment .

 

[MMad]

It treats blades just like pieces of equipment .

My opinion exactly.
Mounts and blades are weapons of war. You pick them up, you put them to good use. If they break, heck, get new ones.
They're tools, not friends.

 

[J.A.R.S.]

yet the game would allow you to lose 1 or more horses per battle yet always buy new ones... it makes NO sense at all... if its a medieval life simulation, be careful to your horse at the very least... i would love to see a general rarifaction of horses, bonuses for keeping them... this would also benefit lifestyles, you could basically, for economy purposes, choose to be a footman instead!... as noble as it can get to ride ... the dirt...

 

[Hardclyff]

I agree that high quality horses aren't rare enough. And expensive enough. As well as high quality armour and swords. It would be better if there were like 1 or 2 merchants who specialize on horses and be the only ones where you can buy warhorse and better. Same with swords and armor. And you shouldn't be able to wear plate armor from loot, it always needs to be tailored for the wearer. But that's just my 2 eurocents.

 

[J.A.R.S.]

ya, and you could add durability for repairs... and horse treatments ( you know horse "shoes" or whatever they call it in english) and maybe the armor could be apart from the horse... so you`d need to find a good horse who can hold a good armor without losing too much speed... but that`s getting a lil off hand here... its always better to keep things simple yet cool, so rarefaction is a go here.

 

[Sir Prince]

I wouldn't mind a companion horse One that won't get crippled.

 

[J.A.R.S.]

lol ya, with flames going out of his nostrils and horns you`d have to pick him froma dark rider first... no seriously, the whole point is to steer away from the mercantile aspect of... buy low, sell high, kill people, get ur money to the shopkeeper and get a good horse and sword... all this is simply $... taking care of your horse brings interesting strategical choice... such as NOT using it against pikemen/crossbowmen... using it not in every battle so he can stay fresh and top speed/charge...

also, what about horse stamina, and you could hold control button to overspeed him (stamina decreases drastically) which would make a real "charge" cause rigth now, any random horse running pretends to be rushing and deals damage without actually looking like it is... that super extra speed would allow you to do more, but calculate with the horse`s stamina, for like, jumping from cliff to cliff but finding yourself vulnerable on the other side... it would be a quick leap, but at the cost of further mobility... just random thoughts there, but horse stamina just sounds logical and reasonable... 'cause its all about what an horse is...

and if you overdo his stamina too much for too long, he could get winded or the like, forcing you to leave it somewhere and fight for yourself... or crippled, or whatever! it could even permanently lower its stamina, while if you`d keep its stamina about halway all the time, it would increase total stamina over time (physical moerate work in endurence) and no boosting would get it far lol

 

[Sir Prince]

I still want to be crushed by the hooves.

 

[Khalid ibn Walid]

Don't know if I should start a new thread on this. But it occurs to me that we have far too much ease & control of our horses.

One possible way to tone that down is that enemies should be able to "stampede" our horse, i.e. that when your horse gets hit on the side, it accelerates automatically (possibly making you miss your perfectly-timed shot or even drive you involuntarily into a bad mob).

I mean, the horse can't really tell whether it's your spur or a bandit's mace that's hitting it on the side. It just knows its got to run faster.

Whaddya think?

 

[GonZ]

Don't know if I should start a new thread on this. But it occurs to me that we have far too much ease & control of our horses.

I agree. I made a post about this ages ago, this is an expansion of that post - I still think its a good idea:

When you want to speed up instead of just pressing forward, how about if you had to give a couple of knocks on the forward key to get the beast moving. Once at a trot another knock of the heels might get the horse to canter... another to charge. Conversely to slow down you hold down the back key.

This would roughly equate to kicking your heels (or spurs) into the horses flanks. Or pulling in the horses reigns.

I think it would add a certain amount of realism and make playing the game more skilful.

How this would work would depend on various factors:

• Your riding skill - at low skill levels you would have to rely on lots of spurring to get the beast to co-operate. It would also be easy to over spur and make the horse bolt out of control. At higher skill levels the horse would be much more under your control and operate more like they way riding is at the moment.
  
  The type of horse - warhorses by their very nature have been trained to charge so getting them to charge and controlling them would be easier. An old nag would require a lot of persuasion to control.
  
  The temperament of the horse - a stubborn horse might require a lot of spurring to get moving, and its wayward nature would make it easy to bolt it out of control. Conversely a good horse would be forgiving and understand the orders of even an inexperienced rider. Having said that if an inexperienced rider over spurred a good horse, the horse might throwthrow the rider and never let the rider back on!

I reckon this could lead to quite a bit of fun on the battlefield as well as adding a certain amount of realism to the game. It would also mean that you would have to learn to ride each new horse as each one would be different.

In order to make this possible you would have to make some changes:

• You would have to get rid of the skill restrictions on what horses you can ride for this to be max fun. This would mean that low skill riders could try to ride high level horses.
  
  Hiding the temperament of the horse to low skill riders. i.e. low riding skill players can't recognise the horses temperament. High skill riders can tell instantly and know what they're dealing with.
  
  It would also be good if you had to equip your horses with saddles and reigns and buy spurs etc. All of these could add variables to make riding more challenging.

--

For instance: Baldric the peasant has riding skill one, but has somehow managed to acquire a warhorse (with skill one he can't recognise the fact that it's a stubborn one).

So there's baldric sat upon his mighty steed at the top of a hill, looking down on a bunch of angry river pirates (you'd be angry if you were that crap). He spurs the beast forward (forward key)... nothing. Again he kicks the beasts flanks... the horse yawns. Frustrated, Baldric double spurs the warhorses flanks (double tap on the forward key). The beast rears up, nostrils flairing and bolts straight forward through the astounded river pirates and proceeds to run out of contriol round the map. After two circuits of the battle map the horse stops suddenly at the edge of the river hurling the happles baldric through the air and into the river... Baldric luckily recouvers and manages to knife the river pirates whilst they are incapacitated with mirth.

At the other end of the scale...

Temüjin the horse whisperer can master any horse and control even the most stubbourn beast with ease. He is so at one with horses that he needs no saddle or tack.

 

[MMad]

Khalid, GonZ - excellent ideas. I think GonZ's description might be going a bit too far, but giving the horses (small) minds of their own would rock.

 

[J.A.R.S.]

gonz, awesome summary I'd really love to use even more of my play skills... so far, the game isn't overbalanced on the side of "if you level up, you are unkillable" cuz u always need some playskill. And learning to ride different horses would be definatly fun, you could go and look for your favorite kind of horse... who knows, you might love stubborn horses