Where have all the wild horses gone?

[Kadmint 528]

I have checked Melody's many steppes many times, some of the coastlines, islands and forests. I have found exactly one wild horse many weeks ago, but not any other. Some steppes haven't had new spawn for weeks, same bison herds linger there. So is this a bug, or are the horses attracted to location I do not know of?

[Corin 11]

Simplifying a bit here, but in essence there's a soft cap on the total number of horses, bisons and basically every kind of creature per server. This means that, when people have too many non-wild horses, no wild horses will spawn. The reason it's a soft and not a hard cap is that horses can still be bred to make more horses beyond the cap.

[Finnn 3,321]

A good question is... why does the server.. "think" that a wild horse = bred-in-captivity, the two are two different things in nature... and should not be considered the same

Edited July 16, 2023 by Finnn

[amorfides 49]

1 minute ago, Finnn said:

A good question is... why does the server.. "think" that a wild horse = bred-in-captivity, the two are two different things in nature... and should not be considered the same

My guess would be that there's currently just no distinction between the two and maybe they want to keep it that way to keep a lower cost on server performance. But in the end your guess is as good as mine.

 

If they were to separate wild vs domesticated. Probably the easiest thing to do is put branded and non-branded animals in a separate pool. But how many animals are branded on a deed since there's a limit based on the size. There are even many players holding a big pen outside of their deed to hold animals but keep their ratio up. 

 

Easiest thing of all to do would be to just increase the number of animals and decrease the chance of animals having an immortal trait for example. But this would have an effect on the required performance of the server. 

 

I'm sure they're already thinking about this in some way.

[Vorticella 958]

There is some distinction between them because the inspect animal window says "It has been bred in captivity" or "It is a wild creature". That info was added along with the animal husbandry update, if I remember right. Maybe it's a hint that they have been working on way to address this.. hopefully. I completely relate to new players who want to find their own wild horses to start with. It's a pretty big letdown if the only option is to buy/trade or accept handouts from others because the wilderness is empty.

 

Edited July 16, 2023 by Vorticella

[Kadmint 528]

50 minutes ago, Vorticella said:

There is some distinction between them because the inspect animal window says "It has been bred in captivity" or "It is a wild creature". That info was added along with the animal husbandry update, if I remember right. Maybe it's a hint that they have been working on way to address this.. hopefully. I completely relate to new players who want to find their own wild horses to start with. It's a pretty big letdown if the only option is to buy/trade or accept handouts from others because the wilderness is empty.

 

 

Thank you all for the answers! I suspected this was the case and it appears to be so. 

[Locath 533]

3 hours ago, Vorticella said:

That info was added along with the animal husbandry update, if I remember right.

"Bred in captivity" trait is there for at least 10 years, possibly longer.

[Vorticella 958]

1 minute ago, Locath said:

"Bred in captivity" trait is there for at least 10 years, possibly longer.

 

Ah ok. Did it used to be that it only showed up with pretty high animal husbandry skill?

[Locath 533]

Just now, Vorticella said:

Ah ok. Did it used to be that it only showed up with pretty high animal husbandry skill?

Depends what you consider "high" 🙂 It was visible at 83AH

[Vorticella 958]

2 minutes ago, Locath said:

Depends what you consider "high" 🙂 It was visible at 83AH

 

I would consider that high   Ok so it was just made visible regardless of skill when the inspect animal window came in, but it wasn't actually a new thing with the AH update.

[Locath 533]

2 minutes ago, Vorticella said:

so it was just made visible regardless of skill when the inspect animal window came in, but it wasn't actually a new thing with the AH update.

Pretty much:

 

https://www.wurmpedia.com/index.php?title=Animal_husbandry&oldid=85971

 

[tomcatvmp 43]

seems odd to me that the devs introduced donkeys and mules instead of fixing this, just odd  😋

[Arno 298]

They do spawn from the vynora holy site if you really want to find your own wild horse.

I saw one of them in broccoli hills recently, though it was venerable having spawned a long while ago.