A training question

[Sarsmi]

Ok, so when training an animal who will gain strength (and therefore hit points) is it better to tame (or aquire) one with low strength and high HP in order to get as high as possible? This is not an animal that can exceed any caps (pack horse). Does it matter? Do they all end up with the same max strength and HP?

 

[Tina Small]

Sarsmi, I think a lot of the low-level animals end up with identical stats (and skills, of course) once fully trained. I think the only thing that ends up varying are the resists. I'll take a peek at the pack animals I have spread hither and yon, though, and see if my guess is accurate. Seems like I've lored my couple of fire beetles a few times and they all looked the same on the stats, other than perhaps dex being maxed out or still raising to the cap.

 

[Tina Small]

Hmmm.....this may take a while. Already seeing something that may vary by animal and that's hit points. Looking at a pack horse with 72 strength and 78 hit points. I think hit points is unique per animal. Will post a summary in a bit.

 

[Harlequin]

I remember for chickens (normal ones, not greater chickens), you find the ones with lowest str and highest hp. They will gain hp as they gain str. Remember that any pet with stats lower than 125 can have those stats trained to 125.

Haven't trained small pets for a long time, so not sure if this was changed.

Giant (and fire beetles) are a bit different, since they have more than 125 str when spawned. Even after the code that halves their str post tamed, it's still higher than 125 and so will not gain str/hp.

 

[Tina Small]

Here's what I've found after loring a few of each type of animal commonly used by mule characters. I'll try to lore a few more because I'm finding out that my mules ... ummm .... are very neglectful and their poor beasts of burden are all STARVING.

Pack Horses
Have lored 7 so far. Hit points varies by animal. So far, the lowest has been 62 and the highest 79. (Hunter's guide max hit points: 80.) Strength/dex/intelligence are all over the place, but I'm guessing will cap at 100/100/25 when fully trained. Someone who has spent time training them will need to confirm that their stats actually DO raise with training. (Hunter's guide maxes: 120/55/10. Not sure that Intelligence max is correct because I have one with 30 intelligence. The other maxes I've seen have been 90 strength and 53 dex.) Resists also vary by animal with the following as the HIGHEST numbers seen in each resist out of my sample set: 25/15/25/15/15, which matches the Hunter's guide max resist information.

Pack Llama
14 lored so far. Hit points on 13 of them has been 50; one oddball has 51 hit points. Strength/dex/intelligence vary but guessing will cap at 100/100/30 (?) when fully trained. If stats don't raise, the maxes seen so far have been: 73/55/40. (Hunter's guide maximums: 80/55/30.) (Smarter than pack horses but fewer hit points. But what do smarts count for when you're a llama??) Resist maxes seen so far: 10/10/15/9/9. (Hunter's guide max resists: 10/10/15/10/10.)

Fire Beetle
8 lored. Hit points always 100. Strength always 150; intelligence always 500. Dex has varied between 51 and 61; none of these are trained so I'm not sure what dex caps at when fully trained. Resists: Four of the five have identical resists of 40/74/10/30/30. The other three have had fire resists of 70, 71, and 75. (Hunter's guide max resists: 40/75/10/30/30.)

Giant Beetle
3 lored. Hit points always 100. Strength and intellience always 150 and 500. Dex has varied between 50 and 56. Resist maxes seen so far: 35/25/28/30/29. (Hunter's guide max resists: 40/30/30/30/30.)

 

[Harlequin]

I have a couple of semi trained packies, 125 str and gm wrestling.

1 has 115 hp and the other 110 hp.

Beetles have their str and hp halved upon taming and will never go above 100 hp coz their 150 str is still above the 125 cap, well, not unless you use a trick...

 

[Sarsmi]

You guys are fabulous! I may do another round of horse packy buying to see if I can improve on what I got so far. *mutters low str, high hp*

Thanks yall!

 

[Barry Gibb]

Fire Beetle
8 lored. Hit points always 100. Strength always 150; intelligence always 500. Dex has varied between 51 and 61; none of these are trained so I'm not sure what dex caps at when fully trained.

A fire beetle will maximize its dex at 125. I have trained a few, it is the slowest thing to train on them. Once Tactics and Anatomy are GM, the dex will raise very quickly. Until then it does up a handful of points.

All animals that have a stat lower than 125 once tamed, will be able to achieve 125 in that stat when fully trained. When you are training the animals, like fire beetles, it is best to bless them if your spell can raise their dex to at least the next multiple of 30 dex (60 or more; 90 or more, etc..). They will train faster, since they will be hitting faster. Their swing speed is based off every 30 points of dex (just like us). Blessing your pet will not hurt it gaining stats or skills, it will just make it faster and give it a few more hit points during training.

Stayin Alive,

BG

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

Fire Beetle
8 lored. Hit points always 100. Strength always 150; intelligence always 500. Dex has varied between 51 and 61; none of these are trained so I'm not sure what dex caps at when fully trained.

A fire beetle will maximize its dex at 125. I have trained a few, it is the slowest thing to train on them. Once Tactics and Anatomy are GM, the dex will raise very quickly. Until then it does up a handful of points.

All animals that have a stat lower than 125 once tamed, will be able to achieve 125 in that stat when fully trained. When you are training the animals, like fire beetles, it is best to bless them if your spell can raise their dex to at least the next multiple of 30 dex (60 or more; 90 or more, etc..). They will train faster, since they will be hitting faster. Their swing speed is based off every 30 points of dex (just like us). Blessing your pet will not hurt it gaining stats or skills, it will just make it faster and give it a few more hit points during training.

Stayin Alive,

BG

I have always found it to be the case that if I go round up 6 (+-1) Spellbinders in New Haven to train Resist Magic that by the time the Resist Magic is done the Dex is atr or to within 3 of being 125 as well. I am going on human memory but I am 100% confident several trainees have started with dex in the 50's. Extending the Trainees time there by 15 to 30 minutes has always had Dex caped.

 

[Sarsmi]

I've never done the spellbinder thing. Should I just attack with the pet then quickly say "all follow me" then walk around the area and vet? I usually park in fel and have them stay and get pretty ok resist gains just casting on em. But looking at having to do five packies...yikes.

 

[Wenchkin]

All kill then all stop, all follow me should work on those.

I tend to use small casters elsewhere, but I kill them regularly too, otherwise they have zero mana and the gains slow to a crawl.

Casting on pets is my first choice though, it's much more controllable and you don't need to spend time setting anything up. If you're doing a pack you could always get a few friends to cast on them too, but I tend to line my pet(s) up and cast on them till I run out of mana then hunt. I do a few bursts of that a day if I can. Set up a macro to cast on the pets you're training and then it's just a case of hitting the macro key for a bit whenever you feel like it

Wenchy

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

I've never done the spellbinder thing. Should I just attack with the pet then quickly say "all follow me" then walk around the area and vet? I usually park in fel and have them stay and get pretty ok resist gains just casting on em. But looking at having to do five packies...yikes.

Well, I do get the SpellBinder as close to the edge of a screen (the first few) as I can and tell the pet to All Kill and immediately hit the all follow hot key.

If the pet is not in danger from the Spellbinders I just park it with an All Stay. Go find a Spellbinder lure it to the pet, cast invis, do the All kill hotkey, hit the Spellbinders gump, immediately hit the all follow me. Then all stay. Rinse and repeat until there are around 6.

Once I have 6 I figure on spending an idle hour (Casting Greater Heals rather than vet) for Resist Magic to go from the mid 50's to 100 and Dex to get to 125 (actually 123 as the Spell Binders will curse? it).

Well the Spell Casting variety it is a tad tricker as they like to teleport but after one does it a few times the rhythm gets easier and the more Spellbinders on the pet the easier it is to do.

From the game mechanics point of view the pet is not required to actually do any actual engagement of the mob, the pet just needs to ... lets say, issue the challenge that hooks the mob

 

[uoBuoY]

I've never done the spellbinder thing. Should I just attack with the pet then quickly say "all follow me" then walk around the area and vet? I usually park in fel and have them stay and get pretty ok resist gains just casting on em. But looking at having to do five packies...yikes.

I recently trained 2 GDs this way. If you can Disco the pet, it really is fast training. Disco and 8 Spellbinders maybe 4 hours to ~115.0.

 

[Sarsmi]

I've never done the spellbinder thing. Should I just attack with the pet then quickly say "all follow me" then walk around the area and vet? I usually park in fel and have them stay and get pretty ok resist gains just casting on em. But looking at having to do five packies...yikes.

I recently trained 2 GDs this way. If you can Disco the pet, it really is fast training. Disco and 8 Spellbinders maybe 4 hours to ~115.0.

Hrm...maybe if I SS a skill, get some music/disco jewelry and buy up the skill I can do packies at 45/45 music disco.

And just wanted to ask, is it really dumb that I'm excited about training pack horses? I want the week to be over already so they'll be bonded!

 

[Hinotori]

Trained pack horses fight suprisingly well. I think any char that needs packies should have trained ones. On a packy, definately go for the low str, high hp. Check out the stam/dex too. Those critters can get fast with the stamina. They follow quicker too. This one outruns the untrained and partially trained ones my lumberjack has and can keep up fairly well when I'm running on foot.

 

[Sarsmi]

Oh thats nice!

 

[Hinotori]

I spent a very long day and about 40k getting that critter if I remember right. I think he was worth it though. I use him for bone farming. He kills the shadow wisps then carries the bones.

During the moonglow invasion I was using it to kill dark wisps because I was bored and it was funny. I find the little one slot pets very amusing.

 

[Sarsmi]

I spent a very long day and about 40k getting that critter if I remember right. I think he was worth it though. I use him for bone farming. He kills the shadow wisps then carries the bones.

During the moonglow invasion I was using it to kill dark wisps because I was bored and it was funny. I find the little one slot pets very amusing.

I spent 20k today buying up horses to try to refine my pack. It's kind of addictive, and the number range isn't so big that it's a huge time sink. I had one with almost perfect resists (only 22/25 phys though) but it's str was high and its HP low. Maybe I was getting a little picky, hehe. The only annoying thing is waiting to be able to rebuy from the NPC vendor (well that and having to wait a full seven days for bonding). I wish I knew the formula for converting str to HP, (and dex to stam) that way I could have more easily figured out what HP/stam they would end up with after training.

I use trained blue beetles for killing wisps for bone, I can ride in the sic them around, then ride them out and recall. I didn't pick them for their resists though, but next time I need to tame a blue beetle I probably will. It wouldn't be worth it to replace the ones I have fully or mostly trained.

 

[Hinotori]

It's 125 minus current stat (str or dex). Then add current HP/Stam to that total.

That will tell you what their HP or Stam will end up being.

So if a pack horse has

75 str 86 hits
94 dex 111 stam

It would end up with 136 hits and 142 stamina

 

[Sarsmi]

Oh so it's a direct conversion of str or dex to HP or stamina...well that's easy to remember, hehe.

 

[Harlequin]

The only annoying thing is waiting to be able to rebuy from the NPC vendor

If you have not done so, maybe you can try using multiple chars to buy. 1 will be your tamer that can lore the packies. If you have only 1 PC, you can consider soulstoning your taming/lore/vet to the training char. Discord and music too if you can. Note that 120 discord will reduce your pet's stats more than just the 45 discord you plan on getting

Or, if you multiple PCs and have someone else that can play on a second PC, use the 2nd PC to logon a discord tamer that will help with the training. Best if the discord tamer has a cu for tanking shadow ellies while your weaker pets nip at the ellie.

 

[Sarsmi]

I could actually have done it using KR on the same computer. We have two PCs, but one of them doesn't have UO on it right now (for some reason it was uninstalled when my husband uninstalled the other EA game he was playing for a few months). I have three accounts with chars that can lore, hehe.

I'm pretty happy with the group I have now. They're in a range of 122-140 HP and 158-175 stamina with pretty good resists. I think the first time I pk someone with them they're going to be awfully surprised.

I think I'll do KR to log my main account tamer in, since they also have disco, and train that way. Good idea! Ty!

 

[Harlequin]

Nice dex...grr... you made me want to get high dex packies too (besides attack speed, high dex = move faster as well. edit: Sarsmi already knows this, I'm just saying for others that may not know)...

Never underestimate the ability of 5 pets to block someone in Fel plus 5 concurrent and continuous attacks going off to disrupt spellcasting

Absolutely dirtiest way is with 5 pixies too (lvl 5+ circle lets u summon 5 in 1 casting)... No regs required...

But it only normally works against folks that have not faced packs before...Once most people see it once, they'll know what to do next time...2 pack tamers working together with at least 8 pets is a different story...

 

[Sarsmi]

Nice dex...grr... you made me want to get high dex packies too (besides attack speed, high dex = move faster as well. edit: Sarsmi already knows this, I'm just saying for others that may not know)...

Never underestimate the ability of 5 pets to block someone in Fel plus 5 concurrent and continuous attacks going off to disrupt spellcasting

Absolutely dirtiest way is with 5 pixies too (lvl 5+ circle lets u summon 5 in 1 casting)... No regs required...

But it only normally works against folks that have not faced packs before...Once most people see it once, they'll know what to do next time...2 pack tamers working together with at least 8 pets is a different story...

Haha yeah, I don't figure it will work a second time on the same person...I do plan on attacking at least a couple people I know, just for the humor value of course. I'm going to macro up some war cries and unleash the pain!*











*pain = horse bites and hoof-shaped bruises