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Europa Chicken Fighting - Monday 14 December, trial run!

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
After much pondering, testing, and visiting the Great Lakes Chicken Fight Club for 'research' (or just plain stealing ideas!), a few changes to the way we planned the Europa battle chicken lizard fights have been made - and we'll be testing them with a trial event on the evening of Monday 14 December, 8PM UK time, so people can see how far we are towards a full 'regular event', suggest changes, and pick up the materials for their own chicken farm should they feel so inclined!


The arena, very kindly supplied by O*T, is slightly West of Zento -



We plan on having some gates cast to help people get there, we'll announce where those will be once we are sure how many people we have as volunteers to cast them ;)

Things we have learned - we'll have to have a guild for the events, which people will need to join so their pets can fight (otherwise, it gets hopelessly messy sorting out guilds at war, and similar...) - so if you are already in a guild, make sure your compatriots know you will be dropping out for a couple of hours so you can join in the contests!

No healing of pets, by any means, or affecting the fighting creatures in ANY way, will be allowed.

We will have people on hand who can res pets, should you not be quite at the skills needed yourself.

Gambling - after seeing just how popular that is on GL, there's been a complete change of plan! We will be running it, using pretty much their system, which is -

Bets of 10k, on the winner only (no betting who loses!).
There will be a vendor named ATM at the arena, with 10k cheques - just buy a few of those, saves you having to sort them out and carry them to the venue.
Go to the person at the betting counter (form an orderly queue - you'll be able to see exactly where when you visit the arena), say clearly which pet you are backing, and hand over the appropriate cheque. You'll get a receipt naming the pet (we'll keep a copy of the chat journal, so nobody will be able to try pull a fast one...) and if you win, head back to the teller and collect your money - winner will get double their bet back (bet 10k, you get back 20k if you pick a winner).

Fights will start when everyone who wants to has placed their bets and returned to the seating - which leads to our first ever job advert.....

There's a fair bit of 'down time' as people sort out bets, join the guild, get pets into the fighting area, and so on. GL addressed this with an 'entertainer - part jester, part quiz master, to keep people occupied while the necessary admin stuff goes on. Anyone who thinks they fancy that job, please let me know either in-game or PM here, and we'll have a chat. They have frequent trivia questions, about both UO and RL, with small prizes for correct answers (we'll provide the prize money!), which seemed very popular indeed.

For this first session, we'll only be allowing 'standard' pets - preferably battle chicken lizards, but other pure melee creatures are fine IF we can arrange a suitable opponent from the pets we have, or other entrants. Don't want anything too one-sided....

We'll be posting more precise details of the 'mechanics' of the evening later in the week, but any questions, just shout out and let me know!
 

Serafi

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Oh this sounds like so much fun!

Now if I only that battle chicken could bond soon...
 

Mapper

Crazed Zealot
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
My battle chicken 'Spot' is ready for action.. So far he can kill dogs, Won't be long now before he is killing Balrons.. *rubs hands* Muahahaha.
 
C

cheerful

Guest
Agree with Serafi, sounds like a barrel of fun, I'll try and be there and happy to gate if needed.

'Spot the chicken' !!!! could only be you *sighs*
 
H

HellaFarris

Guest
Awesome! the first Europa Battle Chicken Fight Night and it's on my birthday! woohoo I'll try to be there.
 

Zayin666

Lore Keeper
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Sounds like fun... well organaniced! Thanks for making these events!
This is what makes UO so much better/different from your standard hacknslash mmo like wow :)
 
E

Evlar

Guest
Having just moved over from Great Lakes, it's nice to see this get up and running here too :) CFC events are always great fun!

Need any help with these events, just let me know and I'll bring my tamer and his veterinarians kit!

I never actually battled chickens, but often battled "larger" pets, so hopefully as well as the battle chickens, future events will expand with the popularity I'm sure they will attract, to feature Cu fights, Greater fights... and so on ;)

PS... I'm itching to see how my Greater Dragon I've transferred over with me, compares to those here on Europa. I was always convinced he had the highest HP score on Great Lakes, as I never saw one with higher. He's also fully trained and my favorite pet by far... shame I called him Mongo really...
 

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Evlar - Expanding into bigger fighting creatures is in the plan for the future, once we know there's enough interest and most importantly, once we have the basics right!
 
E

Evlar

Guest
Cool... I'm sure it will catch on here. Always trial and error to begin with, but I'm sure the events will be good fun for everyone who participates.

Personally I think there should be a GM Cook on hand to distribute cooked chicken, donated by the losers ;)

One good approach to drum up interest would be to ally with the leading guilds / other "events" guilds on Europa... that way you can always remind people easily through alliance chat about upcoming events.

Also, I may have transferred Evlar to Europa by then... How's about I have him polymorph into a chicken and have a death match against as many battle chickens people want to throw into the ring as an end of evening event :)
 

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
One good approach to drum up interest would be to ally with the leading guilds / other "events" guilds on Europa... that way you can always remind people easily through alliance chat about upcoming events.
Nice thought - may well set that up for the main series of events, should this first test run go OK.

Also, I may have transferred Evlar to Europa by then... How's about I have him polymorph into a chicken and have a death match against as many battle chickens people want to throw into the ring as an end of evening event :)
Appreciate the offer, think I'll pass on that one this time around but may well take you up on it in the future - the gratuitous cruelty of watching you get pecked to death might well prove a crowd-pleaser, although since some of the battle chickens that are due to attend have better stats and skills than many of my characters, so it might be a bit one-sided though ;)

one question--Can we enter more than one battle chicken into the contest? ;)
Yep, can't think of any reason why not! I'd appreciate anyone who plans on submitting their pets letting me know how many they plan bringing, just so we can figure out how long the evening might run for.
 

Cailleach

Babbling Loonie
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Poor Serafi has been landed with the post of Saor Events Reporter. This means she gets to use the mass email button on the guild forum and send out emails to the whole guild about things like this. This event was on the last one :)
 

Alezi

Lore Keeper
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
What's the difference between a Trammie and a Jug of Water?
-Both of them are used to water plants.
 

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Things we've learned through testing ;

In those cases where one of the pets to be fighting is mine, it's fairly straightforward (I'll have a couple of mostly trained chickens available, and quite a few untrained, so we can guarantee enough fights through the evening to keep people's attention!) :

I'll enlist you in the ECL guild - you'll be promoted twice, any less than that and it seems your pets can't fight other Guild Members pets!

Lead your pet into the arena, tell it to stay, and head back to your seat. Tell it to guard you twice (for some reason, not doing so seems to mean sometimes, your pet won't fight back!). I'll start the fight by telling my pet 'all kill' and attacking yours, once people are back in their seats from placing bets.

If both pets are owned by other folks though, it gets rather tricky for me to control when the fight begins, and we don't want it kicking off before people have placed their bets, so a slightly different approach seems sensible :

Take your pets in to the arena, tell them to stay. One betting is done, I'll join you to ECL and promote - again, tell your pets to guard you twice, just to make sure they defend themselves! Ideally, once I say 'All Kill' (since I have that macro handy it seems reasonable to use it ;) ) either of you can say 'all kill' and set your pet onto the opponent's. No 'sneak attacks' before your opponent is ready, please.....


One thing we did notice in testing, if you use the context menu to order your pet to kill, they do have a tendency to stand still and slug it out - whereas saying 'all kill' led to them zipping all over the place while fighting, which looks a lot more interesting for the audience!
 
E

Evlar

Guest
Hope everything went well.

Have just got back online after some internet problems, so will most likely have missed the first event.

Do let us know how it all went though ;)
 

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Well, all told, I'm really pleased with how that went! Nothing too horrible went wrong, the crowd managed to understand my lousy typing, and thanks to everyone being thoroughly helpful things went pretty smoothly!

So now... my current plan is to run similar shows, roughly every two weeks, from early next year. Since the basics seem sound, we can open things up for casting pets as well as the melee-only ones we tried this evening, but it will help greatly if people tell us what pets they plan to put forward if possible, so we can make sure there are suitable opponents for them!

Also kicking around ideas for leagues, where a pet can build up points through a 'season', so may be announcing how that will work soon, and also pondering how guilds could compete in a similar 'league' but for a guild stables, rather than individual pets and owners. Of course, the pets and owners need to join the ECL guild for the actual fights, but if any guilds fancy having a go, drop me a line and we'll see what can be sorted out!

So - thanks to all those who attended for making it such fun, Rachel from Great Lakes (originators of the chicken fights) for advising and calling by for the event, and O*T for making it all possible and running the gambling, and gating, and setting up the arena!


Provisionally, we'll look to open the doors again on Monday 11th January - celebration hangovers permitting!
 

Mapper

Crazed Zealot
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Fantastic event, I managed to take some screenshots inbetween taking bets!













 

Winker

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Ok i need some eggs..anyone tell me where to get them from?
 

Winker

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
What's the difference between a Trammie and a Jug of Water?
-Both of them are used to water plants.
If your only input into the thread is going to be sarcasm, at least try and get it right. Asking what the difference is between one person and an inanimate object, then pointing out that they both perform the same function, is just STUPID

Maybe if you said, What do A Trammie and a Jug of Water have in common. It would have made more sense.

Ps. Grow Up


Merry Christmas Everyone
 

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Ok i need some eggs..anyone tell me where to get them from?
If you need the basic chicken lizard eggs, either just laid so you incubate them yourself of 'ready to hatch', I can hand you more that any sane person could ever need ;)

Matured battle lizard eggs though, can't say I've seen many for sale or trade at all...
 

Winker

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
If you need the basic chicken lizard eggs, either just laid so you incubate them yourself of 'ready to hatch', I can hand you more that any sane person could ever need ;)

Matured battle lizard eggs though, can't say I've seen many for sale or trade at all...
If i tame my own chicken lizards and feed them, then feed them again after 7 days. Do these have a chance of dropping battle lizard eggs?

If so then i might as well just tame 20 chicken lizards and wait for them to bond and start droping eggs.
 

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
If i tame my own chicken lizards and feed them, then feed them again after 7 days. Do these have a chance of dropping battle lizard eggs?

If so then i might as well just tame 20 chicken lizards and wait for them to bond and start droping eggs.
Essentially, yes - tame one, feed it, 'stable' in a coop for a week, feed again and it bonds, like other pets. After it's bonded, when you feed it there's a chance (maximum supposedly of two per week) of it laying an egg. Keep the egg in an incubator, water it daily, and in 3 days the egg will either become 'a mature chicken lizard egg' (if watered every day, there's meant to be a 90% chance of that, and it will produce a normal chicken lizard if you hatch it), or a 'mature battle chicken lizard egg', one of 20 random colours, and that will produce a battle chicken when hatched.

Can let you have 20 eggs for normal lizards right now, so you needn't tame any - although of course you'll need coops for them, coops hold maximum 3 birds (either normal or battle) each.
 

Winker

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Essentially, yes - tame one, feed it, 'stable' in a coop for a week, feed again and it bonds, like other pets. After it's bonded, when you feed it there's a chance (maximum supposedly of two per week) of it laying an egg. Keep the egg in an incubator, water it daily, and in 3 days the egg will either become 'a mature chicken lizard egg' (if watered every day, there's meant to be a 90% chance of that, and it will produce a normal chicken lizard if you hatch it), or a 'mature battle chicken lizard egg', one of 20 random colours, and that will produce a battle chicken when hatched.

Can let you have 20 eggs for normal lizards right now, so you needn't tame any - although of course you'll need coops for them, coops hold maximum 3 birds (either normal or battle) each.
Thx for the offer,i will cut out the 3 days waiting for eggs to hatch and tame 21 chickens today...found a nice place to buy the coops from too thx for your help
 

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Thx for the offer,i will cut out the 3 days waiting for eggs to hatch and tame 21 chickens today...found a nice place to buy the coops from too thx for your help
I can hand over 21 eggs already matured, so you can hatch them straight away for your basic 'chicken supply', but taming the 'wild' ones is fun so if you prefer that route, go right ahead - doing it that way, they 'feel ' more like your own anyhow ;)
 
O

o Kraken o

Guest
Twas a fun event Aurelius. I even won 10k from betting on lightning.
I might well look into breeding a battle chicken myself. We'll see :)
 

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Winker's questions got me wondering - are there any other folks out there who want to tame some chickens?

Since I have plenty of eggs, we could use the arena and one evening release a load there for people to tame.... any interest? We could maybe offer coops, incubators and such at the same 'event'?
 

Flame (DrR)

Sage
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
it was a fun evening thanks for all the hard work. Just an idea but an in game instruction book on the breading, rearing and keeping of battle chickens would be nice as would a vendor at the event that sells items for us to get started.
 

RainQueen

Journeyman
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
A really fun evening ......... thanks for all the hard work organising it. And to top it off ....... my BC Midnight won his fight even though he's only semi-trained. Yayyyy :cheerleader:
 

Winker

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Winker's questions got me wondering - are there any other folks out there who want to tame some chickens?

Since I have plenty of eggs, we could use the arena and one evening release a load there for people to tame.... any interest? We could maybe offer coops, incubators and such at the same 'event'?
You may want to offer them out free at the next event, to help others get started.

I cant wait untill i got me my first battle chicken and enter the next event. :gun:
 

Aurelius

Babbling Loonie
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Standing offer, should anyone want to set up their own 'chicken farm' in time to maybe have a bonded battle chicken for the 11th, PM me or ICQ 50812389 and we'll sort you out with normal chicken lizard eggs (not the battle versions though, don't have many of those!), coops, incubators and other bits you may find useful.

To check on colours, learn about training and generally ask anything you need to know, Stratics Tamer forum is of course the place to begin - otherwise, the best basic guide to raising the birds I know of is the UOHerald one :

http://uoherald.com/guide/guide.php?guideId=277

I'll have an 'in-game' guide put together shortly, and we'll be adding a vendor with the basic kit and those guides to the arena in the near future!
 
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