Breeding Limits Discussion
Posted by Mat on 2 Nov 2016, 6:08 pm
It's no mystery from looking at the Giving Tree and the User Shops that many common and uncommon animals have lost their value due to overbreeding. In animal husbandry, players should still be able to sell their common animals and make money from their breeding. It appears that exponential growth of animals, overbreeding, and unlimited breeding charges have devastated the value of animals, and will continue to do so as more players join animal husbandry and continue breeding.
So, the question is, how do we curb overbreeding to reduce the amount of animals entering the economy? There are a couple of good suggestions that have popped up over the last weeks and months which can be boiled down into the following:
1) Using the breeding charges. Some may have already noticed that the contest prize animals have breeding charges. This feature is built into all animals, and limited breeding charges ensure that animals cycle out of the economy and do not continue to produce more animals indefinitely. Common animals should have low breeding charges (say, 2-5) so they cycle out fast, while rarer animals should have more (upwards of 100 for Super Rare animals) so they can be used for a long time, as they took a while to be earned.
2) Stable Limits. It's been suggested that stable limits would help with the economy as players would no longer be able to farm animals of every type, and instead would be encouraged to focus on their favorite animals. This encourages trading as players focusing on one type of animal would trade with another player focusing on another, as both players cannot focus on all animals. Disrupting the massive breeding farms ensures that there isn't a large amount of commons being born and devaluing animals as well. One common suggestion has been limiting each villager to 50 Stables.
3) Account-wide breeding limits. Another suggestion has been simply to limit the amount of breedings a single account can perform per day. One common number has been 50-100 breedings per day. Similar to stable limits, this helps disrupt large breeding farms and limits the amount of animals entering the economy, while also encouraging players to focus on their favorite animals.
Our opinion is that some combination of #1 #2 and #3 would help the value of animals immensely. What would you change to ensure that common/uncommon animals retain their value?
Another idea: revamp the Breeding Potion to be required to breed a pair of animals. This would give Alchemy a good new kick in value. The Breeding Potion could use some adjustments like making the ingredient list simpler, but it would add a dimension of complexity to breeding and connect Animal Husbandry to Alchemy.
Thank you so, so much for actually asking us for our opinions first. This is very much a step in the right direction and it helps us feel as if we actually have a voice in things.
I'm inclined to agree that a combination of al 3 discussed ideas would be the most helpful. Keep people from having massive breeding harems that churn out mostly common and uncommon colors by limiting the amount of stables people can have and breeding limits per day. I'm a bit less inclined towards the breeding charges per animal, because I feel that some people who aren't so interested in breeding (like myself) might get and keep a pair of animals just for the sake of collection and not breed them and this would quickly lead to a Flight Rising style situation where because only a limited amount of items were introduced and then ended up in dead accounts that aren't being cleared so those items aren't being cycled back in and with a growing user base wanting these items they're becoming more and more expensive as fewer and fewer people are willing to sell and it's nearly impossible to get them.
I also like the idea of revamping the breeding potions to actually be required. It would make alchemists much more useful as well, since I don't use mine at all right now.
I like the breeding potion idea.
also Luckyclaw 's idea http://www.furvilla.com/forums/thread/27435-new-career-animal-exchangespecialism
If you are going to implement any of these changes please remove the workers cap, at least then we could still manage the stables effectively.
i don't support any of these ideas until you lower the color rarities. at least you're trying.
I definitely DONT think the Breeding Potion should be required to breed. Even if members focus on only breeding one species, they still want to breed more than a few at a time and even with the Breed Potion ingredients twerked, it'd still be tedious, if not near impossible, for some people to get enough potions
Honestly, one seems the most logical to me. Keep the breeding charges of common animals at 10, and increase it as the rarity of the animal increases?
Limiting stables doesn't seem fair as maybe some people use extra stables to store their animals when they no longer have inventory or storage space, but do have stables to spare. Account-wide breeding limits could work as well, maybe 100 every 12 hours? 50-100 a day seems far too low honestly.
BUT THATS JUST MY OPINION
http://www.furvilla.com/forums/thread/29795-anyone-else-feeling-overwhelmed-by-ah-right-now
Oh on that note, I'd just like to point out that AH was originally a "starter" class due to its independence regarding other professions (though having a Carpenter does help if you wanna expand), but if you make 0-star job dependent ona 3-star job such as alchemy, it effectively becomes the next tier, a 4-star job since it depends on Alchemy which depends on Herbalism which depends on Exploring.
Considering the cost of breeding potions I would not be in favour of that last one, for common animals, even if the price were too go up it would never cover the cost of a breeding potion.
I think 2 or 3 would be a good idea though.
I like the idea of breeding charges. As long as the animal doesn't just disappear after it's charges run out. Like a house or stable, you could sell it back tot he game or, it could still be adopted by a villager as a pet once it's breeding use has run out.
The potions could work, but honestly please let us use more than 10 villagers at a time if you're gonna nuke a all the professions