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Malena

Shoo animals away to "break up" crowded tiles

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Today as I was checking on my cows, I noticed them all bunched up in one end of the pasture. A classic and longstanding problem in the game which seems to be especially challenging to get solved by the devs. 

 

So we - the breeders - are left to our own devices. Either we pen them up in 1x1 (or similar) enclosures or else like me who strongly prefer open pastures, we have to manually lead some of them away as not to get diseased animals.

 

Anyhow today as I walked into the tightly packed herd, a few of the cows ran off (as cows tend to do) and it made me think how cool it would be if we could:

 

Use command "/shoo" to break up overly crowded tiles.

 

And if this could be made into a keybind, even better. Then we could just run around shooing our animals to better places! 

 

Even if the animal behavior algorythm is fixed some day, the shooing mechanism would not go to waste as it would still be a fun thing for the game to have and to add immersion.

Edited by Malena
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Another problem that can be solved with the proper application of high explosive.

 

Kidding aside, would be great especially for herders.

 

Could even recycle or call the code used in Taunt or taming with a chance of making animals go hostile with a skill check.

Edited by Klaa
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+1 I have wanted something to move them around like this for a long time! Maybe a tamers staff or something :)

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could be cool, assuming the shoo doesn't result in all (or most) of the animals moving together to another spot.  +1

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6 minutes ago, Aniceset said:

+1 I have wanted something to move them around like this for a long time! Maybe a tamers staff or something :)

 

Oh I LIKE that! Even better!

It reminds me of the "Sheperd's Crook" that we had in Ultima Online. "Herding" was a a whole skill in fact:

 

http://www.uoguide.com/Herding

 

Herding.JPG

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Not to mention a potential usage for tamed pets, especially dogs.

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Exactly! Sooo many good things from UO. I would love more usefulness for the tamers on Wurm :)

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Yee Haw!  And +1 but please, don't make it that an item has to be activated....just make it a keybind, like "say help" for guards.  Also, I am not sure if this should be only for animals within a pen or within a radius from the person shooing the rogue beasties.

 

 

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+1 for sure, i'm tired of leading them in random places in my pen so they look more natural.

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Cat herding! We have lions and wildcats. Let's do it!

+1 to the suggestion too.

 

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Would be a nice stopgap... but what we really need is AI that intentionally spreads out and doesn't clump into the corners of pens while trying to inexplicably pathfind out of them, or whatever the situation is. Better AI in general would be great, even if it just means they spread out a bit more when enclosed.

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4 hours ago, Ostentatio said:

Would be a nice stopgap... but what we really need is AI that intentionally spreads out and doesn't clump into the corners of pens while trying to inexplicably pathfind out of them, or whatever the situation is. Better AI in general would be great, even if it just means they spread out a bit more when enclosed.

 

I am not a programmer but maybe if no path is found, mill around.

 

EDIT: Real animals do congregate but they also move the group around. Weather seems to play a role. I'm not a herder either. LOL

 

Edited by Audrel
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On 7/31/2016 at 2:21 PM, Fairyshine said:

Yee Haw!  And +1 but please, don't make it that an item has to be activated....just make it a keybind, like "say help" for guards.  Also, I am not sure if this should be only for animals within a pen or within a radius from the person shooing the rogue beasties.

 

It might be a bit more tedious than it needs to be, you're right. And the way I envisioned it was definitely a very quick and light process where you could run around just spamming the command. If we make shooing animals "hard work", then it's really no better than what we do now: activate rope/halter rope and lead one at a time. 

 

So how about this:

 

Have a herding skill exist in the game.

 

/shoo command to "vocally" shoo animals away - no items needed. The higher herding skill, the more the animals will "listen and obey" and actually disperse.

 

So how to raise herding skill? 

 

Have an item called a shepard's crook / staff. Practise herding animals with it which raises herding skill. Activate item and right click animal to ask to "Follow". The higher the herding skill the more likely it is to succeed and the longer they follow faithfully.

Edited by Malena
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I like the idea of shooing animals but would prefer if it didn't require an item or skill. I would just need the ability to get them off a single tile more than need to lead them around. We already have taming and ropes.

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On 8/1/2016 at 7:04 PM, Malena said:

 

It might be a bit more tedious than it needs to be, you're right. And the way I envisioned it was definitely a very quick and light process where you could run around just spamming the command. If we make shooing animals "hard work", then it's really no better than what we do now: activate rope/halter rope and lead one at a time. 

 

So how about this:

 

Have a herding skill exist in the game.

 

/shoo command to "vocally" shoo animals away - no items needed. The higher herding skill, the more the animals will "listen and obey" and actually disperse.

 

So how to raise herding skill? 

 

Have an item called a shepard's crook / staff. Practise herding animals with it which raises herding skill. Activate item and right click animal to ask to "Follow". The higher the herding skill the more likely it is to succeed and the longer they follow faithfully.

+1 just to keep the dream alive

 

but.. I'd rather see a scarecrow/bale of hay or something like that around the fields.. making the animals group around, 1 or 2 animals per tile, perfect case would be to group them in pairs m+f(I read somewhere that the game AI does include RNG breeding when pairs are on the same tile..). Add 2-3 tiles inbetween such 'enchanted' bales.. where animals will gather to lower the 'abuse' at farms.. and farmers, breeders, herders, even the fat dragons.. everyone - everyone will be happy to see more crops, meat, wool, etc.. and less packed tiles.. this will be like a charm solution for bison's will do pack every green tile. Farmers unite!

 

p.s. sorry for derailing the topic, I'm still +1 for it, but I'd personally not spend time chasing animals around for the new "Shepherd" title

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On 7/31/2016 at 4:29 AM, Klaa said:

Not to mention a potential usage for tamed pets, especially dogs.

 

Don't starve the Wurm devs though.

 

Pet -> Scatter livestock -> level check -> RNG -> Success/fail -> RNG -> 0.1 to 0.4 loyalty loss.  

Gives butchers a reason to exist too, and fisherfolk to some extent.

Have success rate be affected by taming level vs what pooch you got... dog, <something> wolf, HELL HOUND <3 

 

To encourage taming, I'd say give bigger pooches a better chance.  Watch a hell hound cause a 20 bison stampede.  Tie it to the cooking updates requiring more specific meat types (if you haven't yet, still gotta check it out).

 

Would be interesting with bears if they were able to knock multiple sheep over a fence... evil evil sheep.. 

 

Edited by Mordraug

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On 9/12/2016 at 5:25 AM, Lianya said:

I like the idea of shooing animals but would prefer if it didn't require an item or skill. I would just need the ability to get them off a single tile more than need to lead them around. We already have taming and ropes.

 

At the end of the day, that's all I need as well Lianya. I'd really just be happy with just this alone :). It's nice that people throw ideas around and we brainstorm regardless, and I like to join in too of course. Sometimes I just fear that these brainstorming suggestions "shoo devs away" (see what I did there?) from the original purpose and that they'd be like "oh no way are gonna go use valuable time on making a complex system for something that is not really needed." The /shoo command -is- needed, it's this other stuff that is merely "nice to have"- 

Edited by Malena
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How's shoo-ing going to help when the animal AI stacks them all at the pen's same border/corner soon after it's performed?

practice makes perfect?:huh:

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2 hours ago, Finnn said:

How's shoo-ing going to help when the animal AI stacks them all at the pen's same border/corner soon after it's performed?

practice makes perfect?:huh:

I know, it's unfortunate. But let's look at the reality of the situation as it is now:

AI stacks them no matter what

They've tried time and time again to fix stacking. It's been going on for years and will probably keep on happening. And who is left with the reality of having to deal with it? Us. I'd much rather have a tool to help me deal with the aforementioned reality than not have a tool. Spamming /shoo with a keybind would be so much more pleasant and quick than having to rope the animals and lead them around in groups of 4, letting them go one at a time. 

Besides, it's not like the animals instantly teleport back into the same stacks. It takes hours, even days depending on the area and fencing.

 

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Maybe this could be added as a benefit to horse shoes since it is only a few ending letters difference. Then you might ask what about animals other than horses. Well, if the shoe fits wear it, so then just fit the shoe to the other shoo'es. Just a shoe on another foot, so to speak. And only one will doo too! Ya knew?

 

=Ayes=

Edited by Ayes
addstuff

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13 hours ago, Malena said:

I know, it's unfortunate. But let's look at the reality of the situation as it is now:

AI stacks them no matter what

They've tried time and time again to fix stacking. It's been going on for years and will probably keep on happening. And who is left with the reality of having to deal with it? Us. I'd much rather have a tool to help me deal with the aforementioned reality than not have a tool. Spamming /shoo with a keybind would be so much more pleasant and quick than having to rope the animals and lead them around in groups of 4, letting them go one at a time. 

Besides, it's not like the animals instantly teleport back into the same stacks. It takes hours, even days depending on the area and fencing.

 

I kind of suggested some animal magnets.. which could be used as template for pretty much any animal pair, and lag the server with it's AI auto breeding.. 

 

On 9/13/2016 at 0:27 PM, Finnn said:

+1 just to keep the dream alive

 

but.. I'd rather see a scarecrow/bale of hay or something like that around the fields.. making the animals group around, 1 or 2 animals per tile, perfect case would be to group them in pairs m+f(I read somewhere that the game AI does include RNG breeding when pairs are on the same tile..). Add 2-3 tiles inbetween such 'enchanted' bales.. where animals will gather to lower the 'abuse' at farms.. and farmers, breeders, herders, even the fat dragons.. everyone - everyone will be happy to see more crops, meat, wool, etc.. and less packed tiles.. this will be like a charm solution for bison's will do pack every green tile. Farmers unite!

 

p.s. sorry for derailing the topic, I'm still +1 for it, but I'd personally not spend time chasing animals around for the new "Shepherd" title

Didn't want to derail, I do not claim to have solved the issue with my random thought there.. but it's some solution which could end 1 problem and create another..:huh:; animals will look weird to be all packed to a hay bale.. on client side they could be animated to randomly move around a tile..(which is still within player's reach, ofc.. not teleport though walls and such:rolleyes:.. for the server they can be pinned to that one tile with the bale.. blabla.. things like that.. it's far by from perfect idea also.. but it's a lazy solution.. and I'm lazy.. don't blame me for coming up with it:)

 

I do have a pack of horsey scientists creating a new ebola strain on my yard.. for now.. no way to discourage them from their plans:(

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