Skill Cap Imbalance

[Devils keeper]

(Greater dragon NOT included)
Its seems that pets with skill caps of 100 have a strong adavantage over pets with higher than GM skill caps.

IMO they need to make it so ALL pets cant gain skills past there pre tamed lev OR let ALL pets reach there max skill cap what ever it might be.

Example if a CU has 90 wrestling pre tame it shouldnt be able to EVER be trained past 90.
Much like how Reptalons are now.

Now im not actually advocating lowering the skill cap of CUs or any other pet that has skill cap of 100.
I'm just using that to make a point that pets that have the potential of skills over 100 should also be able to gain up to there max cap.

Three pets would benefit from this change the most. Reptalion Hiryu Lesser Hiryu and Fire Steed without overpowering them in any way IMO.

One pet I have mixed feelings about with this...the rune beetle allowing the rune bettle to reach there max skills might push this pet out of the 3 slot bracket and into the 4 slot as far as over all power. (maybe make the rune beetle immune to this change?)

There is no question that the greater drag would need to be excluded from this change.(its allready too powerful imo)

 

[Wenchkin]

I don't really agree that there's need for pets with over GM skill to be given the ability to gain to the max caps. I think we need to accept that fire steeds and reptalons need love they're unlikely to get. It's not about skill caps IMO, they deserve to be either properly fixed or have their skill requirements lowered and possibly get a special move or something that brings them up to a reasonable level.

To put it another way, if the skills were all trainable to the max, all we'd need to look at are stats and resists, so it would become much easier to get the top level pets. Fair enough you say, because all tamers want good pets. And yeah, I've been cursing my finds as trawl through spawns trying to find a keeper. We all do. But where is the satisfaction if something is increasingly easier to achieve? In the long term life of a tamer in UO, what do you think you'll do for challenges? Killing hard monsters? Then what? If you get more up front as a tamer, you're also asking to reduce the long term objectives for yourself.

I've tamed for 9 years and there aren't so many absorbing challenges after you've been taming for a while. You work your skills up, then it's finding and training pets. Training pets is an entirely optional challenge, now tamers don't have to learn what to hunt and when, or learn what one pet can handle compared to another. They park them at a shadow ele and watch a few movies while it trains. So that just leaves taming the perfect pets. Which is why I think it should be kept as it is, not made easier. Unless we want "I'm bored" to be posted here as often as it appears in UHall

Apologies for the long post, but I know some tamers here will tantrum if I suggest keeping the challenge in taming without explaining why

Wenchy

 

[Devils keeper]

To put it another way, if the skills were all trainable to the max, all we'd need to look at are stats and resists, so it would become much easier to get the top level pets.
Wenchy

95% of all tamable pets that is indeed ALL you need to look at .. and it is toughenough finding that uber pet without having that extra variables in there (skills).

would a reptalion with 120 wrestling 110 tactics be over powered given the rest of the possable stats? I dont think so

See I thik pets like the reptalion were balanced with there max skills in mind. the problem is its never to impossable to get one with 120 wrestling and half way good HPs/resist.

Thats why I compaired them to CUs not being able to gain over there pre tamed skills. (evan if thats under 100)

 

[Wenchkin]

The problem is, you're talking about a change to all pets, rather than just the reptalon. And with pets like the cu sidhe that heal and greater dragons and dread mares, the reptalon needs more than a higher skill cap to compete as a 4 slot pet with such a high taming requirement. It'd help for sure, but I can't see tamers add them to their stables just because of that.

I think reptalons miss having a particular purpose or cool ability, more than a skill cap. Unicorns for example are deemed a niche pet, but they're great for poisonous foes when a mare would be curing all the time. I love using mine with a runey and they look wonderful in KR. Fire steeds can't cure which is more of an issue than their magic resist, by a long way. That used to be the only thing I had issue with on them. They have more of a niche than reptalons, but need some love to justify the skill requirement.

I just think that skill caps are a huge thing to change to boost a few pets, especially as that's not IMO the best solution to helping said pets. Not given the repercussions of that change to taming in general.

Wenchy

 

[Devils keeper]

This would be a small change ide think fairly easy to impliment.
I dont think it would hurt anything.. tho I do question if a fully capped rune beetle would be over powered or not.. any imput on this would be apperciated

but for sure the Hiryus reptalion and fire steed would most definatly not be overpowered.

so I just dont see the harm in applying this to those pets.

As for balancing the reptalion.. Maybe give it deadly poison instead of the almost usless para attack. boost its HPs and STR to the same as the CU (1225 max STR) change the dmg type to 50% fire 50%energy. Perhaps keeping the fire breath attack (and of corse allow for achiement of max skill cap no matter what they were tamed with. Resist caps would be something like..

65 phy
85 fire or 65 fire 85 poison and change the dmg type to 50% poison 50% energy
45 cold
65 poison
85 energy

and *POW* you now have a viable 4 slot pet that has its nitches and a nice counter to the CU

 

[5% Luck]

Well for one I dont like a major change to pets but..

It would make for a more scrutinizing eye when farming for good pets.

 

[Hinotori]

It would limit one slot pets even farther than they are. It would also cripple unicorns and the other pets that start with a skill in the 40s. Would encourage even more use of cu sidhe and greater dragons. Only a handful of pets start with higher skills, and most of those are newer high end pets.

 

[Devils keeper]

It would limit one slot pets even farther than they are. It would also cripple unicorns and the other pets that start with a skill in the 40s. Would encourage even more use of cu sidhe and greater dragons. Only a handful of pets start with higher skills, and most of those are newer high end pets.

hehe I dont actually want all creatures to have a hard skill cap of what they were pre tame. I was just using that notion to compair with pets that can only gain skills up to what they had pre tame.

 

[Wenchkin]

This would be a small change ide think fairly easy to impliment.
I dont think it would hurt anything.. tho I do question if a fully capped rune beetle would be over powered or not.. any imput on this would be apperciated

but for sure the Hiryus reptalion and fire steed would most definatly not be overpowered.

so I just dont see the harm in applying this to those pets.

I just don't think that's enough for tamers to suddenly love those pets. We don't have enough stable slots to store the luxury of a slightly boosted reptalon etc. I'd still have my steeds if I had room, but I wanted my pack more. Resist didn't do enough to help them stay alive, so I wouldn't boot a pet from the stables if that was maxed out. More HPs, maybe a special move, and higher poison resist would help. Hiryu are fine already, they're just out of fashion now the cu's and greaters are around, but they're still tough pets. I'm not sure why you think they need more power.

A standard maxed out runey would be a real menace, anywhere. Seriously, we've forgotten how good those babies are now greaters are around, or at least some tamers have. They don't need a boost at all. They were fine in their heyday and they're just as fine now. Let's not have the cu and greater drag cloud our view of what is a good or bad pet, or set the marker below which pets aren't good enough. Overpowered pets shouldn't set the standard for anything.

As for balancing the reptalion.. Maybe give it deadly poison instead of the almost usless para attack. boost its HPs and STR to the same as the CU (1225 max STR) change the dmg type to 50% fire 50%energy. Perhaps keeping the fire breath attack (and of corse allow for achiement of max skill cap no matter what they were tamed with. Resist caps would be something like..

65 phy
85 fire or 65 fire 85 poison and change the dmg type to 50% poison 50% energy
45 cold
65 poison
85 energy

and *POW* you now have a viable 4 slot pet that has its nitches and a nice counter to the CU

This is a better idea than simply looking at the skill cap. But I'm not sure a max cap is necessary if you fix a pet up in other areas. Remember, tamers have to recall all the different exceptions to this and that cap rule these days. I'm not keen to add another exception when simply boosting other aspects of a pet would work as well.

Wenchy