Pet Revamp: More Details Please!

[MalagAste]

Assuming that tamers should be able to swap out pets then isn't the solution to this one simple? Have a pet ball work both ways. If the pet is in stable then it calls the pet (assuming you have the control slots available) and if the pet is with you then you can send it back to the stable (assuming you have stable slots available). It could also be split into two crystal balls but doesn't seem necessary. You would have to carry a pet ball for each pet that you may want to call.

Yes it would be nice... and Yes I would like that... even if it had a short cooldown or you had to be out of combat mode. So you can't swap mid-PvP... but you could swap between rooms in Doom.

 

[Merlin]

Yes so I can kill it sssslllllooooowwwwwlllllyyyy..... you have any idea how slow it is? And yes I can have a compliment skill of magery or something but cut in two because I already have 360 points wrapped up in taming... or I can drop Animal Lore and cripple myself because when my dragon dies I won't be able to rez it...

And crippled even further because all dexers can make weapons that are specific to the mobs easily and pick exactly what they want on them.... but mages are still left with NO imbuable spellbooks leaving you to chance trying to make a decent spellbook the best of which is a Scrappers that has a 0.00001% chance of actually having it be a "slayer" and getting a slayer of anything actually useful is closer to a 0.0000000000001% chance... without the scrappers you get little to no SDI which for someone who can't have Eval on the template leaves you do little to no damage as a mage. Or you drop something else like meditation so you can't keep up with heals on your pet and since most things now do insane amounts of area damage you can't stand anywhere NEAR your pet to heal it so you are always low on Mana..... but then they gave us these wonderful Masteries... only those too take Mana.... So then what do you sacrifice??? Don't use your Taming Mastery so you can use the mage one??? Or don't use the Barding Mastery if you are a bard tamer to take the Taming one.... but again no mana.... So you build your suit around giving mana and what then do you sacrifice? But as Dexers don't have to make these sorts of sacrifices... you think that tamer who is there to tank the boss so the Dexer can get all the damage in and reap all the reward is happy about being the "support" player who walks away with sometimes not even doing enough to get looting rights is happy????? But saved your dexer from having to tank. And once again your stuck with the GD. Slow... cumbersome and does seriously little damage. But I got crippled magery to back me up... so I should rock.

Per your post above, it sounds like you want to have max taming skills, casting skills, AND bard skills... AND you want to be able to instant switch pets, AND have some type of slayer, AND be able to roll through a champ spawn at the same speed as a dexxer? Respectfully, what you're asking for would be way too over-powered.

So to answer one of your self-posed questions, yes, you will either have to sacrifice some skill points somewhere on your template and/or find some items or high end jewels (yes - antique ones) with skills points to your templae. But even with adding a bunch of skill points from items, it's probably not going to come close to what you're asking to have.

Every template is not going to be able to do champ spawns at the same rate. Comparing tamers doing a spawn to dexxers/sampires/archers is comparing apples to oranges. Every template shouldn't be able to do the same content with the same rate of ease and the same speed as others. Different templates doing different encounters is always going to have different results. There's always going to be pluses and minuses to every template.

If I remember correctly, in the past you've said you don't play Fel much. So if it is Tram spawns you're doing, you can recall to the nearest stable when levels change and pick a different pet accordingly. If you're doing something like Humility, I don't see how this would take more than 2-3 minutes to swap and come back.

Further, the chance of getting a super slayer scrapper is better than "0.0000000000001%". If you don't want to spend the time and effort to make one, the market price on super slayer scrappers has come down quite a bit in the past 9 months. They're out there and they're not impossible to find. Keep tabs on Trader's Hall and Vendor Search and you will find a good deal on some of the more important ones. If the super slayers are too much for your budget, I've seen plenty of good double skilled scrappers for less than ten million that could add more skill points to your template. You definitely have options - but they require gold and/or effort.

 

[Spock's Beard]

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Everyone is going to say they want the a la carte "imbuing" approach but the pre-packaged "reforging" one would make your life much, much, much easier in the long run.

I have no idea what the back end of the pet system looks like, probably a spaghetti code trainwreck, but just make sure you don't tack the upgrade bonuses directly onto the pet's base stats. Store the selections and bonuses from the new system separately so that you can selectively nerf them when the time comes.

What I mean is, you want to be able to go "Oh it looks like Defensive Package X is giving too much HP, time to reduce it!" You don't want to be left saying "Oh crap, Defensive Package X gave too much HP, but there's no way to tell which pets took that package or what their HP was before they took it, and thus no way to nerf them retroactively!"

 

[PlayerSkillFTW]

Yes it would be nice... and Yes I would like that... even if it had a short cooldown or you had to be out of combat mode. So you can't swap mid-PvP... but you could swap between rooms in Doom.

There's a simple fix for that. The devs could put a Hitching Post in the Doom Gauntlet's "hidden" room, like they did with Castle Blackthorn. They might not want to do that though, because then a Tamer could stay in the Doom Gauntlet indefinitely, while other templates would eventually have to leave for repairs.

 

[MalagAste]

There's a simple fix for that. The devs could put a Hitching Post in the Doom Gauntlet's "hidden" room, like they did with Castle Blackthorn. They might not want to do that though, because then a Tamer could stay in the Doom Gauntlet indefinitely, while other templates would eventually have to leave for repairs.

Most tamers would have to leave to empty your pack and to get more bandages or instruments.

 

[The Craftsman]

Per your post above, it sounds like you want to have max taming skills, casting skills, AND bard skills... AND you want to be able to instant switch pets, AND have some type of slayer, AND be able to roll through a champ spawn at the same speed as a dexxer?

...and, dont forget, on top of that they also want to be able to inbue their pets with no additional skill required.

 

[Merlin]

Everyone is going to say they want the a la carte "imbuing" approach but the pre-packaged "reforging" one would make your life much, much, much easier in the long run.

I think it would ultimately make everyone's lives easier. The idea of pet customization on an ala carte basis is great, but I also wonder if it's going to be yet another complicated system added to the game. Regular armor and weapon crafting is onerous enough. As long as the 'pre-packaged' customizations have enough viable options, I would lean toward that route of pet customization.

But I do note, It's hard to speculate before we know the more details of the differences between the 'imbue' and 'package' routes.

...and, dont forget, on top of that they also want to be able to inbue their pets with no additional skill required.

Exactly. I am all about giving tamers additional pet options, but proper balance needs to be considered before they're given an 'easy button' such as instant pet switching. If they were to do that... at the very least it should have some type of cool down (similar to changing Masteries) or weekly limit (similar to Sacrifice virtue resurrections).

On the imbuing topic, I think Animal Lore should some how factor into how well 'pet imbuing' works if they go that route instead of the pre packaged route. Per my comment above, again, it's something difficult to speculate about until we get more solid details from the developers. Posters who advocate solely for the benefit of their template need to be taken with a grain of salt.

 

[MalagAste]

I think it would ultimately make everyone's lives easier. The idea of pet customization on an ala carte basis is great, but I also wonder if it's going to be yet another complicated system added to the game. Regular armor and weapon crafting is onerous enough. As long as the 'pre-packaged' customizations have enough viable options, I would lean toward that route of pet customization.

But I do note, It's hard to speculate before we know the more details of the differences between the 'imbue' and 'package' routes.


Exactly. I am all about giving tamers additional pet options, but proper balance needs to be considered before they're given an 'easy button' such as instant pet switching. If they were to do that... at the very least it should have some type of cool down (similar to changing Masteries) or weekly limit (similar to Sacrifice virtue resurrections).

On the imbuing topic, I think Animal Lore should some how factor into how well 'pet imbuing' works if they go that route instead of the pre packaged route. Per my comment above, again, it's something difficult to speculate about until we get more solid details from the developers. Posters who advocate solely for the benefit of their template need to be taken with a grain of salt.

What I want is to be able to actually do content in the game without needing other people to help... not everyone can play a sampire... Not everyone can have the Uber suit and connection and everything required to solo everything... and since there are fewer and fewer players around to do things... and not everyone plays on Atl and personally I would rather quit UO than go there... something needs to be done so other people than the top tier need to be able to actually be able to do content other than stuff from prior to ML... I shouldn't have to run 2 or 3 accounts at the same time to play the game. And yes while ideally I'd like to play with someone else and do things lets face it most people anymore don't want to do things with other people. They want everything for themselves... And there just aren't that many other players around much of the time... a brief window in prime time but that's about it... lately I'm fairly sure most people are off on whatever shard happens to be having their EM Event so they can nab the drop and sell it so they can get all the golds and make RL cash... If you want total honesty... and I just don't care to do that. And even with the advent of the Turtle all you see pretty much at the EM Events is 20 to 30 dragons. I for one would like to see something else. Mostly I play an Archer or I play my Tamers... I don't much play anything else... don't care for it... but since they are once again trying to nerf archery into extinction I'd like something to fall back on. I'm not 20 anymore I don't have the reflexes and such that I did years ago. So my days of wild button mashing are over.

But the Tamer is becoming more and more obsolete and NEEDS a boost. Anymore there are no pets that you can take to do much of anything besides the GD and Turtle... everything else dies in .2 seconds and there is NO WAY to heal them fast enough to keep them alive... Making taming dull and boring. I have one pet to take... one .... and only one. While yes you create a nice bond with that one pet it really is rather limiting... and GDs don't really do that much damage and waiting for them to do their breath attack so they do actually do a bit more than 4 damage takes a while...

For years everyone has believed Tamers to be super at everything... and for years the DEVs have seen to it that they are not... adding in more and more things to thwart the tamer... making it impossible to stand near your pet and heal it... creating mobs that actually heal if you try to use a pet on them... having things switch target and kill the tamer if you try to use a pet etc... to the point where now so many things are out of the tamers reach and the game is getting dull and grindy.

 

[The Craftsman]

Not everyone can have the Uber suit and connection and everything required to solo everything...

In my opinion no one should be able to solo everything. In an MMO there should be content that absolutely requires a group.

 

[Merlin]

What I want is to be able to actually do content in the game without needing other people to help... not everyone can play a sampire... Not everyone can have the Uber suit and connection and everything required to solo everything... and since there are fewer and fewer players around to do things... and not everyone plays on Atl and personally I would rather quit UO than go there... something needs to be done so other people than the top tier need to be able to actually be able to do content other than stuff from prior to ML... I shouldn't have to run 2 or 3 accounts at the same time to play the game. And yes while ideally I'd like to play with someone else and do things lets face it most people anymore don't want to do things with other people. They want everything for themselves... And there just aren't that many other players around much of the time... a brief window in prime time but that's about it... lately I'm fairly sure most people are off on whatever shard happens to be having their EM Event so they can nab the drop and sell it so they can get all the golds and make RL cash... If you want total honesty... and I just don't care to do that. And even with the advent of the Turtle all you see pretty much at the EM Events is 20 to 30 dragons. I for one would like to see something else. Mostly I play an Archer or I play my Tamers... I don't much play anything else... don't care for it... but since they are once again trying to nerf archery into extinction I'd like something to fall back on. I'm not 20 anymore I don't have the reflexes and such that I did years ago. So my days of wild button mashing are over.

But the Tamer is becoming more and more obsolete and NEEDS a boost. Anymore there are no pets that you can take to do much of anything besides the GD and Turtle... everything else dies in .2 seconds and there is NO WAY to heal them fast enough to keep them alive... Making taming dull and boring. I have one pet to take... one .... and only one. While yes you create a nice bond with that one pet it really is rather limiting... and GDs don't really do that much damage and waiting for them to do their breath attack so they do actually do a bit more than 4 damage takes a while...

For years everyone has believed Tamers to be super at everything... and for years the DEVs have seen to it that they are not... adding in more and more things to thwart the tamer... making it impossible to stand near your pet and heal it... creating mobs that actually heal if you try to use a pet on them... having things switch target and kill the tamer if you try to use a pet etc... to the point where now so many things are out of the tamers reach and the game is getting dull and grindy.

We simply come from different schools of thought.

I don't want too much content to be solo-able, if any at all. This is a MMO, after all. I play on Atlantic in the biggest guild in the game. UO is more about my guild community than anything else. I want all encounters to have their difficulty increased, not decreased so that the game can be played with little to no interaction with the rest of the player base. I want all encounters to require thoughtful group effort. If one of your complaints is that the game is getting dull, then I don't think making it easier will help.

I'm not sure archery is going to be 'nerfed into extinction', but that's probably a comment better discussed on one of the combat tactics threads.

Tamers received a very significant boost with the Shadowguard encounter. While it probably wasn't meant to be this way, but the easiest way to complete and ultimately farm the Roof is to have a tamer. Whether you bring a couple of GDs, or throw a Cu Sidhe in there, tamers are hands down the most beneficial class for doing this piece of the game. That's not to say mages, archers, sampires or other templates can't complete it... I know they can because I have... but if you want to do it often and efficiently, having a Tamer is the way to go.

I too want there to be more viable tamable animals. There is no debate there. But I also don't want the template to become too over powered either. Balance in this game is delicate and careful thought needs to be given before providing all of the boosts you implied was necessary in one of your earlier posts. Unless I am completely off-base, tamers will get more versatility in pet selection, pet customization and ultimately see a lot of growth in the upcoming publish.

If you've given up the community aspect of the game because you refuse to try ATL, that's a shame. There are many great people there, despite all of the animosity that is directed toward it by folks who haven't ever given a full try. Time and time again, I've seen people make these comments about Atlantic... and then when they finally suck it up to leave their dead shard, many of them end up in UWF on Atlantic. You should give it an honest and good faith try if you are tired of playing alone. Create one character and find a group to play with - you don't have to move everything you love on your other shard. I can understand the sentiment to not want to give up everything you've worked for in your years of play, but I can't sympathize with the refusal to try something new or the desire for all in-game content to be completed in a solo fashion.

I will keep a space open for you in UWF if you ever desire group play again. Good luck.

 

[Pawain]

In my opinion no one should be able to solo everything. In an MMO there should be content that absolutely requires a group.

Let us know when you find that game.

 

[MalagAste]

We simply come from different schools of thought.

I don't want too much content to be solo-able, if any at all. This is a MMO, after all. I play on Atlantic in the biggest guild in the game. UO is more about my guild community than anything else. I want all encounters to have their difficulty increased, not decreased so that the game can be played with little to no interaction with the rest of the player base. I want all encounters to require thoughtful group effort. If one of your complaints is that the game is getting dull, then I don't think making it easier will help.

I'm not sure archery is going to be 'nerfed into extinction', but that's probably a comment better discussed on one of the combat tactics threads.

Tamers received a very significant boost with the Shadowguard encounter. While it probably wasn't meant to be this way, but the easiest way to complete and ultimately farm the Roof is to have a tamer. Whether you bring a couple of GDs, or throw a Cu Sidhe in there, tamers are hands down the most beneficial class for doing this piece of the game. That's not to say mages, archers, sampires or other templates can't complete it... I know they can because I have... but if you want to do it often and efficiently, having a Tamer is the way to go.

I too want there to be more viable tamable animals. There is no debate there. But I also don't want the template to become too over powered either. Balance in this game is delicate and careful thought needs to be given before providing all of the boosts you implied was necessary in one of your earlier posts. Unless I am completely off-base, tamers will get more versatility in pet selection, pet customization and ultimately see a lot of growth in the upcoming publish.

If you've given up the community aspect of the game because you refuse to try ATL, that's a shame. There are many great people there, despite all of the animosity that is directed toward it by folks who haven't ever given a full try. Time and time again, I've seen people make these comments about Atlantic... and then when they finally suck it up to leave their dead shard, many of them end up in UWF on Atlantic. You should give it an honest and good faith try if you are tired of playing alone. Create one character and find a group to play with - you don't have to move everything you love on your other shard. I can understand the sentiment to not want to give up everything you've worked for in your years of play, but I can't sympathize with the refusal to try something new or the desire for all in-game content to be completed in a solo fashion.

I will keep a space open for you in UWF if you ever desire group play again. Good luck.

It's not that I want all the content to be solo-able... the point is it already IS... for some.

Many folk already solo 99% of the game... that means the rest of us who "can't" can't compete either. Most of the fact that I can't do much of anything solo in the game... and the fact that the hours I work leave me playing when no one is around to do things with... means that most the time I'm BORED. And I don't want to spend day after day grinding out the crap I can do by myself... and as much as I long to do the things I can't do by myself... it isn't going to change the fact that there isn't anyone to do those things with. And considering I have a LOT of accounts and characters it's 100% impractical for me to move to another shard... the cost of that would be more than the benefit...

And in that I am NOT alone. Yes I would like to go back in time when there were tons of folk to do things with who wanted to do them and who helped do things... but it really irks me to spend 5 hours gathering keys to take people who do nothing at all into a dungeon so they get all kinds of the drops I'd like to be getting in the 5 min it takes to do the dungeon that other people can do solo but I can't... And NEVER get a drop.

Do you have any idea how frustrating it is to go with people who always get stuff? How irritating it is to work really hard to get a pile of gold skulls or 5 runs to lady M so you can take people who get all the dyes, get the Crimmy, get the Orny and get the stuff that you'd like to get but never do??? After you spent all the time gathering the keys to go and all they had to do was show up? Meanwhile you brought the tank so they can stand back and pluck away on the archer and get all the reward???

 

[MeTheGreat]

In my opinion..

There are some issues in this thread that should be separated off into their own discussions. (solo vs. group playstyle preference considering shard population and connection speed; template vs template in regards to pvm viability)
While I have opinions on those topics, I will refrain from commenting on them here.


Regarding the pet revamp..

I am concerned with the possibility of permanently altering a pet, thereby making it less desirable in the future and/or to another player. I would like to see, regardless of which system-type is implemented, the ability to undo the alteration. This could be similar to the armor enhancement system, or through use of an npc-based system. (It could even be something that resets at server up, in which a tamer runs through a short quest (10 mins or less) that sets the abilities of a pet for the rest of that day.)

I would very much like to see other pets made useful in both pvm and pvp settings. Since those settings are very different, it may help to consider each setting individually. Following that logic, we should first look at the reasons that certain pets have become dominant in their respective settings.

pvm
1. greater dragon
2. dragon turtle
3. cu sidhe
(honorable mentions: nightmare/rune beetle, nightmare/white wyrm, frenzied ostard pack)

These pets have come to dominate because they are the only pets that can handle the damage output of most boss-level mobs and spawns. Cu sidhes barely hang on even when they are not the current target. (All of this is out the window if you have a large enough group healing the pet)

For other pets to be used more often, some combination of their hit points/resists/wrestling need to be improved.

pvp (this sections should get redone by someone who has more experience in pvp..)
dreadmare
bane dragon
cu sidhe
(honorable mentions: bake kitsune pair, greater dragon, beetle/mare)

Admittedly, I do not pvp very often (I'm terrible..). When I have dabbled, I have found that those three are the hardest hitting pets that can be used as mounts. Mounted pets have another distinct advantage in that the only way to harm them when they are being ridden is through the riding swipe move. With the ability to use slayer weapons/spellbooks, unmounted pets can be killed very quickly. Furthermore, if one is not trying to hold a chokepoint, the movement speed difference between mounted and on foot makes pets that cannot be mounted undesirable.

If more pets are to be viable in pvp, either a pet's movement speed should match that of a player, or nearly every pet should be mountable. To keep from further unbalancing pvp, pets should not be able to move while they are casting spells.
(I would very much like to see two items introduced to the game - 1) earrings that let human/elf characters "fly" or move at mounted speed yet can still be "dismounted" through special moves, 2) a gargoyle item that lets them ride mountable pets - this item should not need to be equipped or should not take up an existing gear slot)


Something else that I think would be cool would be that each magic skill, when combined with taming, would have a special pet that could only be tamed/controlled/bonded by players that have both skills on their template.
bushido - greater hiryu
necromancy - skeletal dragon
ninjitsu - shadow tiger
chivalry -pegasus
mysticism - greater skree
musicianship - siren
spellweaving - ancient cu sidhe

 

[Lythos-]

Horrible ideas.

It's a hard enough job separating Siege from the rest of the shards. I couldn't imagine the horror of trying to separate pets from one ruleset to another.

Matching pet speed to players would also be a disaster in pvp. It was bad enough when "prepatch Cus" were all the rage.

Earrings that let humans/elf fly and can still be dismounted? Just buy an ethy...

Combining skills to tame and control pets is also a bad idea. Who wants to swap skills just to tame different pets?

Altering a pet should be perm. It gives incentive to keep taming. Special moves are the only thing that should have the ability to swap once customization is complete.

 

[Lord GOD(GOD)]

I like the Imbuing idea, but to be useful it would need to be full pet edit, add or remove any of their ai's, and allow that removal to be used to boost other things. Especially along the lines of removing things like Bleed/Angry Fire which serve little/no purpose but aggravating monsters that counter attack to trigger more.

 

[Uvtha]

but I also wonder if it's going to be yet another complicated system added to the game.

I personally wouldn't wonder. If it doesn't end up at least fairly convoluted I'd be shocked.

 

[Uvtha]

What I want is to be able to actually do content in the game without needing other people to help... not everyone can play a sampire... Not everyone can have the Uber suit and connection and everything required to solo everything

You just have to accept that if you aren't willing to use extreme tactics then you won't, and shouldn't get extreme results. Soloing isn't required, and shouldn't be something every template can do.

 

[Thrakkar]

In my opinion no one should be able to solo everything. In an MMO there should be content that absolutely requires a group.

I agree.
But unfortunately that boat has sailed long ago...
And UO makes it very easy to do so, when a single character can be tank, healer & damage dealer at once (plus bosses mainly just being big meat shields).

Let us know when you find that game.

In most, if not all modern MMOs you can't solo any content, which the developers explicitly created as group content.