Question about where a lost nightmare would go?

[Henderson]

I just reactivated my account after about 6 years. Looking at my characters, it seemed they changed who can ride nightmares drastically, so when I dismounted one, I couldn't ride it again, it said I wasn't the owner and apparently my taming and lore skills weren't high enough.

So I logged on the original taming character, but couldn't get it to follow through a gate to a stable. Like an idiot I then dismounted my bonded nightmare, rode the other nightmare to stable it to Skara Brae, gated right back and the bonded nightmare is gone. It was left in the fenced in area on Moonglow, so it's doubtful it found the one slit in the gate and wandered off.

Is there anywhere I can find the missing nightmare? I've been gating back and forth between Skara Brae and the spot I left her, as well as running all over Moonglow with no luck.

Thanks for any help. And wow the game sure has changed.

 

[kitiara-atlantic]

If you log out and back in again, if the pet is still tame, it should appear with you.

 

[Henderson]

I logged out and then right back in and nothing. I logged out, switched chars so I was sure I waited out the 5 minute wait time still nothing then either.

I don't suppose customer support is any friendlier and would help with something like this?

Edit: Btw, I had just fed the nightmare before I gated away from it, it was at wonderfully happy. I was back to the spot in less than 60 seconds. The odd thing is the nightmare that the lower taming character could't ride again stayed in that area for like 30 minutes while I switched characters around to find the original owner of it and it didn't move. The bonded one I leave for 1 minute poofs.

Edit 2: It seems when I stabled the tamed nightmare, I also lost the 4 dragons I had stabled, they are nowhere to be found anymore. I had just removed them from the stable a few hours before losing the bonded nightmare, fed them, checked them with lore, and restabled them. Now when I go to the stables the only thing there is the tamed nightmare, nothing else.

 

[kitiara-atlantic]

That definitely sounds strange. I'd try first paging a GM in-game on the character that lost the nightmare. They may be able to help. I hope so! Good luck!

 

[Henderson]

I've petitioned 4 times now in game during the last 7 hours. Each time eventually the notices about your number in line stops, meaning you're dropped from the queue. But they send emails also about logging out from an inn and back in and then reclaiming pets from the stable. And if that doesn't work, there's nothing a GM can do to return pets.

So, the account is back to cancelled again. It was a very frustrating 15 hours to be back and that mistake will never happen again.

 

[kitiara-atlantic]

Sorry to hear that, Henderson

 

[Sinister703]

Henderson, if you are on ATL, send me a PM> I'd be glad to get ya a nightmare or two. Best place to farm them is in the KiRin passage in Ishenar. Only one there, and it immediately respawns when you kill the one before. Just be sure to lure the poison elemental away.

Silas

 

[woody_cats]

did you check your stable

 

[Sinister703]

his earlier post stated he did. Lost 4 or 5 GDs from stables also.

 

[Henderson]

Yes, I did check the stables for the nightmare, and when I stabled the one tamed mare, 4 dragons poofed from the stable.

Sinister703, I appreciate the offer, but without any customer support for something like this, it's just way too frustrating to play under those conditions. I can go get more nightmares also, but it's losing probably the first nightmare I ever tamed, the dragons were probably some of my first as well, and losing all animals off one character like that and getting their "nothing we can do" email just tells me to stay far far away from the game.

Thanks very much for the offer though, it's very kind of you.

Edit: I also logged in the next day and tried petitioning again for an in game GM with same result... eventually you're just dropped from queue, so after sitting near my monitor for another 8 hours that day for 5 more tries at petitioning, I'm done.

 

[Silverbird]

Actually this story sounds really weird.
Something like he was riding on one char a nightmare that was owned/tamed by another of his chars. I have never heard of anything similar.

@Henderson:
You shouldnt worry too much about all of your lost pets. There have been many new intruded over the last years. Hardly anyone rides/uses nightmares nowadays. No one actually uses dragons anymore. (Your speaking of dragons and 6 years ago ... i am not shure when GREATER dragons went into the game but I dont think you ment those.) Todays pets to use:
- rune beetle (only one, which could pair/would make sense with a nightmare)
- bane dragon/dread mare
- cu sidhe
- hiryu
- greater dragon
And for some situations really exotics reptalon, fire steeds, pack of animals or other. (Mostly for fun situations.)

Just had a closer look to confirm:
- nov 2004 SE was realeased
- sept 2005 ML was released
So he dont know about all those new and shiny new pets.

 

[Henderson]

When I played, all you needed was 42 taming to be able to ride a nightmare (needed some lore also, but not much, can't remember exact number). So I'd tame them with one of my 2 GM tamers, and then friend them to other chars on the account, something done all the time then. It was easier to have all chars able to ride them and keep the original tamer as owner. Are you saying you can no longer friend animals like that with the changes?

But through the expansion and changes, 42 taming no longer was enough to ride them, so when I got off one, the character couldn't get back on. Which is how the headache started.

I only have up to T2A currently, I wasn't about to buy any expansions until I saw how game play was, if I wanted to play again as much as before. And the lack of any customer service left me not wanting to play again.

 

[Silverbird]

All expansions up to Mondains Legacy are enabled for all active accounts. Only for the latest one (Stygian Abyss) is additionally payment needed. (Only exception to this are some housing tiles, which were enabled with one anniversary edition ... but it is possible to live without them.)

Riding an animal, that was only friended to someone? Never heard of that. Not shure, if this can still be done, but I doubt it. Besides that pets do now auto-logg with the owner. Somehow this tactic must have messed up your tamer and his pets. I dont think, a GM could help you with that ... its even doubtfully that they know, where your problem lies or what you are talking about.

Nowadays a character has 5 follower slots. Those slots are filled by pets, summons and other rideables (like ethereals). With two mares out, you already would be at 4 follower slots. I am shure, that you cannot have two pets from one owner logged out with two different chars.

 

[Henderson]

I didn't log out with 2 pets on follow though ever.

Player X logs in, gets off tamed and friended nightmare to feed it, but then can't get back on. Leaves the mare on Moonglow and logs out. The mare stays there about 30 minutes while I log in 5 various characters to see which was the original tamer/owner. 4 of the chars were on nightmares. The tamed nightmare stayed in Moonglow, it was there when each character logged in or gated to that spot.

Player Y finally is the correct original tamer, and is riding the bonded nightmare. I try to take the tamed mare to a town to stable it, but it won't go through a moongate at all no matter what I try. So I finally get off the bonded mare and leave it in the same exact spot the tamed mare was at on Moonglow. I get on the tamed mare, recall next to a stable, stable it, recall back to the bonded mare I left in the same spot and it's gone. It wasn't left more than 60 seconds and was at wonderfully happy. After checking the stable thinking maybe I stabled the wrong mare, I noticed the 4 dragons are now gone also.

So I never logged out with 2 pets on follow.

 

[Silverbird]

'Follower slots' is actually a mistake from me. Those are officially called 'control slots'. While you never had two mares follow your original tamer(owner), that char had two mares with him.

I understand your story, but still hardly can believe it. I NEVER heard of anything similar. I started to play with Third Dawn expansion. It must have been around 9-10 years ago. (Thought i had breaks in between so my main acc is only 6 years old.) It is simply not possible to get a character from the same account friended to a pet that is owned from another character of the same account.

That story must be way older than 6 years. If i interpret your story right, you had 5 chars on nightmares and only one, who was able to tame one. And that one seems to be the owner of the 4 others that your other chars are riding. That doesnt meet any todays requirements to control slots. (A nightmare takes up 2 slots. It doesnt matter where that nightmare is unless it is stabled.)

 

[Henderson]

There was a way at one time to friend your own characters on your account to your house. When you logged out in a house, if quick enough, a "ghost" image of the character would still be there, you could even kill the character if you wanted to. I'm sure it's that same method I used to friend all characters on the same account to all nightmares.

Edit: I actually found my original note about it that I saved in a text file from an original post by Zamboni Driver:

1. have both characters in the house (owner and soon-to-be-friend)

2. log in with owner - bring up friends menu, select "add a friend". When targetting cursor comes up, log off.

3. log in with other character. Target with cursor. Double click on the sign. You're still not a friend yet, hang on. Log off with this character (don't hide).

4. log in with owner. Do a double take - your other character is still visible. Go through normal friending steps, target your other character. Congratulations! You now have a new friend!

I'm not sure that OSI intended things to work this way (seems a little convoluted to me), but it works, so I'm not complaining.

I had my one of my character assassinate another on Test Atlantic.. very cathartic!

The file is dated December '98 to give you an idea how long ago it was. But it was very possible to do and done quite often. I played UO from the very beginning, was also in beta before that. So the account is older than 6 years, I just cancelled the accounts 6 years ago. And as I said, those pets were from just about the beginning of UO. I'm pretty sure I have 1 or 2 of the silver nightmares on an account also that were friended in the same way. But I'm certainly not willing to activate other accounts to find them after this.

 

[Silverbird]

*giggles* A 12-years old exploit and you wonder why it has messed up with your pets ....
Taming has gone through many and very basicly changes from them. Under todays ruleset you had:
- a character (your tamer) with 5 nightmares out of his stables (4 of them ridden by other chars of your account)
- that puts you at 10 filled up control slots (where a character has only 5)
- when you stabled one you had two of them logged in (its not correct: requirements for owning a pet lieing slightly below the taming difficulty but if you want to avoid any problems follow: cant tame - cant own ... and the commands/abilities for friended pets got cut too in the past)
- on stabling, the game usually updates your control slots in use. With 8 your still over what is possible and the game had only access to the bonded mare ... (It probably got deleted or released and guard whacked.)

Your lost dragons are probably another story.

In your last post, you refer to 'silver nightmares'. I also have never heard of them ... unless you are speaking of silver steeds. Owning one of them is bannable. (Those were never available through normal game play.) Your lost dragons werent by any chance ancient wyrms? (Those were tameable at one time but owning one is bannable too and those are getting deleted on sight. If the game deleted those from your stables without a GM showing up, you should feel lucky about.)

 

[Uthar Pendragon]

I thought alot of the above was correct, But I am wondering if his dragons are still there but due to the fact the system tried to put all the mares into his stables bumped his dragons into that grey area. similar to how the taming ring will allow you to have additional slots but if you remove it and look the lower slots number are only availible. Convoluted explanation I know. But it is possible the dragons are still there. Another possibility is to get ahold of some +taming items and bump the taming/lore high enough to make the chars eligible to continue to ride them.
Only way to check it is to clear out all of his stables and see where they lurk. Another possibility (you never mention your original tamers skill levals) is to power scroll up and put on some jewels to see if any additional pets show up in the original tamers stables. Hope some of this bable helped.

Oh and in reference to silver steeds:
Currently extinct creatures that were introduced with the Good/Evil system for Siege Perilous. For a short while these animals also spawned on regular shards.

 

[Wenchkin]

Well, if you've been out of game for years, it's understandable that you could login and be hit by 2010 UO features and not be at fault. UO 12 years ago was very different. We might call things exploits now, but 12 years ago they may not have been. 10 years ago when I started there was a lot of funky stuff happening with low skill tamers owning pets. 0 skill nightmare owner/riders weren't uncommon. Friends of friends had an ancient wyrm they pulled out the stables to show off now and then. Stuff like that wasn't viewed like it is now.

I think it's a real pity if the OP had silver steeds and they went wild - I'd love to see one of those outside the zoo. Tbh I doubt they have stats/skills enough to bother anyone except the rare collectors who couldn't have one

Wenchy

 

[Henderson]

I meant silver steeds, they're nightmares just colored grey. But I've also read GMs don't bother looking for anyone with them anymore and most they'd do is delete them. I would think by now the game mechanics could just delete them on logging them in.

But back to the stabling issue, if having 4 dragons stabled is too much (actually it was 1 drake, 1 brown dragon, 1 red dragon, 1 white wyrm, no ancient wyrms), wouldn't the game have stopped me from restabling them earlier in the day when I got each one out to feed, check and restable? If those 4 took up too many slots, there's no way the game should have let me restable them, it should have popped up the message about not enough space left or whatever the generic message is for that now.

But it really makes no sense that the bonded mare would poof or vanish or go instantly wild when I stabled the tamed mare. Again, if stable slots were full, the game should have given a message to that effect. I don't get the mechanics of that or why at all you think it should have happened. I was riding the tamed mare, gated to Skara, then recalled back to the bonded mare when the other didn't follow through the gate without any issues and it was still there. If there was a problem having 2 nightmares out, the game should have instantly poofed the tamed nightmare when I first logged in with the bonded mare, or at least when I got off the bonded mare, but none of that happened.

 

[Sinister703]

Hi again, henderson,

I knoe those pets may have had sentimental value, but it's very easy to show you a great place to farm nightmares (KiRin passage, one only, and it spans same place and immediately upon the death of the previous one.)

Greater Dragons are far and away better than any other WW, Dragon, etc. They are pretty easy with two tamers working together. Bane dragons are a great 3 slot pet as is the Rune Beetle (Runes are SO easy to tame, and I can get ya a few, or show you how to farm them.)

Though the game has its problems; it is, after all, a pretty bug computer program, it's still pretty fun. I don't really expect the GM's to investigate every case in detail, or the cost would increase substantially. There's a balance with customer service and cost. The cost is pretty damn low for the fun you can get out of this game.

If you want, PM me and I'd be glad to help you in game. Or look for Silas, a tamer on Atlantic.

Have fun!

 

[Henderson]

The original tamer has 100 in taming, as does one other character on the account. The other characters on nightmares had 42 taming, which was probably the exact number at the time required to ride them.

I don't really have a shortage of nightmares, there's still 3 or 4 left on the account and I have the one stabled. And I could probably find another 4 or 5 on 2 other accounts of friends. But thank you for the offer.

I've tried claiming the dragons several times, if they're hidden in there somewhere, there's probably no way I can get them out, at least not without any customer support help, which I think is non-existant in the game at this point.

 

[Uthar Pendragon]

But back to the stabling issue, if having 4 dragons stabled is too much (actually it was 1 drake, 1 brown dragon, 1 red dragon, 1 white wyrm, no ancient wyrms), wouldn't the game have stopped me from restabling them earlier in the day when I got each one out to feed, check and restable? If those 4 took up too many slots, there's no way the game should have let me restable them, it should have popped up the message about not enough space left or whatever the generic message is for that now.

But it really makes no sense that the bonded mare would poof or vanish or go instantly wild when I stabled the tamed mare. Again, if stable slots were full, the game should have given a message to that effect. I don't get the mechanics of that or why at all you think it should have happened. I was riding the tamed mare, gated to Skara, then recalled back to the bonded mare when the other didn't follow through the gate without any issues and it was still there. If there was a problem having 2 nightmares out, the game should have instantly poofed the tamed nightmare when I first logged in with the bonded mare, or at least when I got off the bonded mare, but none of that happened.

Stabling the pets originally would not have been an issue. As you have stated you took them out before you had the second mare out. The problem comes in when you had the original tamer logged in to retrieve the second mare. Under current mechanics pets log out with their owner if not stabled. Now every player you logged in and out to check for ownership of the mare, that was riding a mare that belonged to someone else, (unknown is how many of those mares belonged to the owner of the mare). I would think that the game is putting those mares into the original owners stable (the unseen one used by the auto stable feature). Problem is this caused your stable to overflow pushing the other pets into this gray area. (I cannot remember if you can claim them when they in this gray area). second problem is the game cannot place these pets into the original owners stable because they are still being ridden by the invalid owners. I hope this clears up what I was trying to explain before.

Unfortunately it has been a policy since before I began that gms will not replace lost items. They have closed many of the loopholes like the one you were using. Under current mechanics both taming and lore are required to control pets. (not saying you dont have it, just stating this so you know and dont lose any other pets.) Aside from sentimental value the likelyhood of those pets remaining after you played for a little bit, are small. With the addition of many newer pets since last you played and other features like pack abilities. You would have likely replaced them anyhow as your stables would have become cramped.

While I hope that you continue to give the game a chance and explore the changes that have come while you were gone. I am sorry to see you go if you feel this is not for you.