We need Hot, Warm and Cold Blooded horse body shapes (lots n' lots of juicy pictures inside)

[Malena 2,854]

So as we all know, we got a whole bunch of new horse colors into the game, which is AWESOME. 

 

But something that concerns me a bit is how I see colors and breeds confused a lot in these horse related posts. It is not the color of a horse that will make a horse go faster or pull a heavy load, it is the blood within. The genetics. The breed. You can have a quick and nimble Arabian stallion that is colored black, brown or pinto. Just like you can have a slow and strong draft horse with those same exact colors. 

 

 

When I was watching Factional Fight Adam's car video, he talked about wishing for different qualities to be integrated into the colors. While I absolutely love the thought behind it and while I fully agree that it'd be great to have some variation in horse mechanics, I was wondering whether instead of matching functionalities to color, instead introduce new body shapes to represent those functionalities. Over the years, we've seen people request again and again for the game to have heavy built work horses to pull their carts - essentially what they're asking for is a cold blooded horse body shape. I on the other hand would love to see a beautiful hot blooded horse shape, such as what Arabians represent.

 

So let's say we had three different shapes in the game: Hot, Warm and Cold. How could those be paired up with mechanics people have suggested?

 

Hot blooded horse shape:

- Has precise feet, is able to climb and descend steeper slopes

- Is more agile and turns corners more nimbly and quickly while riding

 

Warm blooded horse shape: 

This is the default that we have in the game now (an "all round" horse with no qualities that make it especially stand out) It would stay exactly the way it is right now.

 

Cold blooded horse shape: 

- Is very strong and is able to pull carts and wagons more efficiently

- Has more stamina. When ridden, is able to carry a rider with a heavy inventory without tiring out as much as the default horse.

 

I've been thinking about this topic for years and have been meaning to play around with the horse mesh we have in the game to see if the shape can be changed easily. Same vertices, same texture mapping. Simply moving those vertices around a bit. Essentially, this is exactly how foals work. They use the same "base mesh" and texture mapping, they've just been reshaped a bit. 

 

So tonight I finally tried it.

 

Behold: Hot blooded, Warm blooded (our default horse that I didn't change at all) and cold blooded horses in all of the colors:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 29, 2018 by Malena

[Malena 2,854]

 

 

 

 

 

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[Malena 2,854]

 

 

 

 

 

[Malena 2,854]

 

 

[Fairyshine 3,183]

+100 YES

But cold blooded need more hair on their feet and a bushier type tail and longer fringes like proper cart horses.  And should be slightly bigger too.

 

Edited November 29, 2018 by Fairyshine

[Joelle 728]

1.) I am in love.

2.) The horses are cool too.

 

You are spectacular, Malena! Amazing work! I think this would be such a valuable change to animal husbandry and horse mechanics. For something thrown together in one night of “moving vertices around a bit,” it’s just... Wow! You never cease to amaze me!

 

+1, obviously. +1 million, if I could!

[Malena 2,854]

10 minutes ago, Fairyshine said:

+100 YES

But cold blooded need more hair on their feet and a bushier type tail and longer fringes like proper cart horses.

 

I did the best I could with the existing 3d mesh and texture mapping. So you can see the feet are "fluffier" and the tail is cropped, (which is common for draft horses). 

 

The thing is, that if we make a completely new mesh that goes full out with everything you describe, that means we need a new mesh, new textures, new texture mapping.

 

This would mean that all the nice horse colors we have wouldn't work with it automatically. 

 

My solution is trying to work with our existing mesh and mapping so we could have BOTH new colors AND new shapes in a practical feasible way. 

Edited November 29, 2018 by Malena

[Roccandil 959]

+1

[Muse 2,223]

+1

 

Yes, your idea has serious merit and is presented beautifully.

 

Thanks so much for putting in all the hard work.

 

Warm-bloods are created by cross-breeding cold and hot blooded animals to produce a more useful all rounder - I would like to see that ability using your models.

 

One thing that I would love to see is the smaller 'native' breeds such as Shetland, Mountain, Moorland and Fell Ponies.  Whilst these would be comical to ride(!) they would more truly represent the 'wild' ponies we would find out on the steppes - e.g Europe's heath and moors, the New Forest UK, and the steppes of Russia, and Mongolia.  

 

Thanks Malena!  

[Malena 2,854]

14 minutes ago, Muse said:

+1

 

Yes, your idea has serious merit and is presented beautifully.

 

Thanks so much for putting in all the hard work.

 

Warm-bloods are created by cross-breeding cold and hot blooded animals to produce a more useful all rounder - I would like to see that ability using your models.

 

One thing that I would love to see is the smaller 'native' breeds such as Shetland, Mountain, Moorland and Fell Ponies.  Whilst these would be comical to ride(!) they would more truly represent the 'wild' ponies we would find out on the steppes - e.g Europe's heath and moors, the New Forest UK, and the steppes of Russia, and Mongolia.  

 

Thanks Malena!  

 

Don't tempt me, now I feel like trying a pony body shape as well :-D. 

[Wiolo 219]

+1, needs more FLUFF!
Hot blooded horses should be worse in carts. more agile and nimble and better at climbing (As you recommended) maybe have slightly less carry weight due to having a nimble frame. And also faster up slopes.

Warm blooded should be the balanced all round horse. Kind of the same it is now.

And cold blooded should be powerful wagon/cart pullers and carry far FAR more weight, and maybe even have more body strength and reduced riding speed, and maybe be able to carry 2 people. You know, a power horse! They're huge!

I'd love to see some nice huge plumes of hair for those cold blooded horses too, added to the mesh of the texture.
Fluff! 

Edited November 29, 2018 by Wiolo

[Wiolo 219]

Also nicely made post! nice work, and love the suggestions.

[Muse 2,223]

Those heavy horses should easily be able to carry a knight in full plate armour complete with a full set of weapons and tools, to ride out to defend their Kingdom and their honour!

 

Of course once we have heavy horses - we will have to have.....jousting tournaments!

 

Lance model anyone?

 

Which knight will receive the lady's favour?

 

I can see we are all going to need to purchase more deeds to keep all these extra horses! 

 

This post opens up many possibilities.

 

[Brash_Endeavors 4,735]

I believe that different horse shapes (not just colors) were something that the devs were exploring back in 2012, so it would be fabulous if this were to finally go ingame:

 

 

 

[Malena 2,854]

3 minutes ago, Brash_Endeavors said:

I believe that different horse shapes (not just colors) were something that the devs were exploring back in 2012, so it would be fabulous if this were to finally go ingame:

 

 

 

 

WOW! What a wonderful thread!! Thank you so much for sharing this! It's really heartwarming to see that the dev team themselves were already planning this. I was concerned that I might be too demanding with body shapes in addition to colors. AND with traits as well! All too familiar from what we're talking about here. But even they themselves were considering it. Holy hell this is cool!

[Malena 2,854]

1 hour ago, Wiolo said:

Hot blooded horses should be worse in carts. more agile and nimble and better at climbing (As you recommended) maybe have slightly less carry weight due to having a nimble frame. And also faster up slopes.

Warm blooded should be the balanced all round horse. Kind of the same it is now.

And cold blooded should be powerful wagon/cart pullers and carry far FAR more weight, and maybe even have more body strength and reduced riding speed, and maybe be able to carry 2 people. You know, a power horse! They're huge!

I'd love to see some nice huge plumes of hair for those cold blooded horses too, added to the mesh of the texture.
Fluff! 

 

Oh you make such a good point about the negative qualities of each. I totally forgot about that. Very very good! Love it!

 

As for changing the mesh to make more fluff. Again here's the thing I was trying to explain to Fairyshine. Any additional vertices to the mesh would then mean that the existing textures would not work as is. You see for the horses in the game. All colors, all ages (even foals) they all use one common mesh file layout. The foal mesh is shaped differently, but it still has the same vertices in the same places, just slightly adjusted. This means the textures can map onto it. All the color variation textures are mapped identically onto that one mesh. So if we change the mesh to have more fluff for instance, that means all horses in the game have fluff. 

 

If we make a new horse mesh that has extra vertices to support more detailed "fluff", this means that the existing textures will not work with it due to it requiring it being mapped differently. This means a different texture would need to be made for "fluff" horse separately. And to be able to support all of those colors we have in the game, it would mean a double amount of all the textures. 

 

Of course, this can be done technically, but is it worth it? We have to then consider whether we're willing to "spend" in regards to texture pack size on a whole second set of textures for horses, only to support a version that is slightly fluffier than what you see above. When we could instead be spending that space for completely new textures for completely new items in the game. Ya know? 

 

At the end of the day, I think we'd all love to have every little detail perfect in the game, but it's always a matter of considering practicalities.

Edited November 29, 2018 by Malena

[Malena 2,854]

I just wanted to add an image to explain what I meant about how one texture/one texture mapping can be used to work for all three shapes. It's because it's the exact same set of vertices in pretty much the same spots, simply shifted around a very small amount.

 

As soon as you start adding new details (thus needing new vertices), it messes up the mapping of the texture, requiring a new texture. And that opens a whole new can of wurms. (see what I did there? ha!)

 

The way I did it means we can enjoy variation without it causing big problems or complications or a huge amount of extra textures.

 

 

 

Edited November 29, 2018 by Malena

[JakeRivers 2,921]

We already have 2 horse colors that do provide a 'speed' bonus, the ebony and molten. 

 

But I like your idea, it would mean tossing out the current and quite frustrating breeding system for something more simple.

 

Gives people the option of having a top speed horse in there favorite color.

 

 

Edited November 29, 2018 by JakeRivers

[Budda 2,673]

If we do this I demand that their model changes based on their fat layers too. I want super fat boyes.

[Niki 2,278]

horses in general need more polygons, +1 but i'd like to see a updated new horse rig as well as other creatures.

[Malena 2,854]

1 minute ago, Niki said:

horses in general need more polygons, +1 but i'd like to see a updated new horse rig as well as other creatures.

 

I'm actually kind of ok with the horse mesh and rig. Although admittedly I was a bit sad one time when I tried to make a pregnant looking version and realized that the belly simply did not have enough polys to expand in a nice rounded way. 

 

If you ask me, it's the player character meshes and rigs that dearly need a renovation. I hate how our characters are so rigid and unable to pose in fluid natural ways.

[Niki 2,278]

Just now, Malena said:

If you ask me, it's the player character meshes and rigs that dearly need a renovation. I hate how our characters are so rigid and unable to pose in fluid natural ways.

Yeah I agree, would be a nice future update potentially.