Pack Animals

So I really like the idea of Pack Animals, and I bought a few from the stretch goal store.

But this got me thinking, why would someone need or want a pack animal? Backpacks are really huge and seem to carry A LOT. So isn't having a pack animal a little overboard? Obviously, we don't really know the answer to these questions yet, but I thought I'd attempt to outline how I'd like it to work...

1) Pack Animals should have the ability to cross terrain more effectively than players and regular mounts. This means mountains, swamps, desert sands...all these places that will generally slow down people and mounts should not slow down pack animals. This would make having a pack animal the most efficient way to travel a harsh landscape.

2) Pack Animals should have the ability to carry special items that can't normally be carried by players or regular mounts. This would give added incentive to use pack animals in certain situations. For example, I can see having "camps" or "siege weapons" being carried by pack animals.

3) Pack Animals should offer a "slight" bonus to gathering skills. This would make them extra beneficial while also reducing the risk of being attacked and slain and losing "extra" stuff.

 

Just at thought - they don't yet seem to have implemented weight considerations. Right now you can happily carry almost infinite quantities of stuff in your backpack - that will probably change as the release gets closer. Suddenly you're overloaded and can't move!
Enter the faithful pack animal - just the shot for carrying all that extra stuff

 

Well, we currently have no understanding of encumbrance, other than the devs have mentioned it will come into play eventually.

It may not actually be possible to carry a large amount of stuff once that system is implemented.

Though, I like your other ideas as well.

(Edit: Ninja'd by Asclepius )

 

Well encumbrance is scheduled for R9, so I wonder how much of it will be implemented. That is, just weight limits on the bag, or affects your skills too...

 

As I've noted before, the game is basically a big pile of stuff right now. As you start to add motivations and mechanics, then the bonuses for doing certain behaviors make sense.

If you think of an RTS, like say warcraft, your miner walks from the town hall out the the gold mine, gets 10 gold, then walks back, over and over. You could imagine figuring out the cost/benefit of somehow carrying more especially if there's some amount of risk involved.

If you had nodes like this, I could see two PvP scenarios where this gets interesting:
1) The hex is conquered (by your team). So there's say a one hour lockout where you go back and forth gathering as much as you can. You're "safe" from PvP now because you earned it and are incentivized to drain the node as quickly as possible.
2) The zone is not locked and PvP could happen any time. In this case, it's more like an escort quest where you're trying to get the slow, weak NPC through dangerous territory.

Note that, in either case, the "PvP" could be simulated by enemy bandits.

 

Like others have said, encumbrance and carry capacity hasn't been implemented yet. Personally, I hope it will be realistic. Buying a pack animal and taking care of it (feeding it, etc) should be an extra cost, which would justify the advantage. Possibly (no idea if they're planning this) it could get killed, too. Possibly, if realistic, it would slow down travel speed.

 

They said in the original post that the pack animals are non-combat, cannot be attacked. But, if you die, the pack animal dies too. That means you can lose an item on both you and your pack animal (or I think the way it's described, 2 items, maybe that way someone doesn't shift everything to the pack animal or from the pack animal to avoid the loot consequences of having a pack animal.. if you only get to loot 1 from each you end up only getting 1 item because they moved their stuff to 1 "container")

 

I want to equip my llama with lasers and let him fight for FULL L00TZ!

 

A P2W pack horse, the bonus is you can gather more before returning to town.

 

I have one simple request...and that is to have llamas with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads!

 

Is it okay if they're non-dangerous laser beams and just create a nice light show?

 

Only if you're limited to buy pack animals with the same abilities in the stretch goal or add-on store. If you can get the same functionality in game, it's not P2W - it's just pay not to be inconvenienced.

 

Its still unclear to me what the stretch goal store means by "unique items"

 

I'm not entirely sure either. I'm waiting for the devs to decide it's the right time to give us more details.

 

Is that Pay 2 Not Play seems to be a main aspect of the project.

 

Out of all the possible ways you could have responded to that comment, the one you chose probably hurts your argument the most. What exactly is P2W about buying items that are aesthetically different but functionally identical to items that can be obtained in-game? I mean honestly, I can see being upset about the houses thing, but pack animals? Really?

 

The alternative would be a very large subscription fee. Do you have a better idea? Because I've read a lot of your posts like this one and I don't remember any.

 

From OP
3) Pack Animals should offer a "slight" bonus to gathering skills. This would make them extra beneficial while also reducing the risk of being attacked and slain and losing "extra" stuff.

A bonus to gathering skills so maybe they are equipped with picks to save time gathering or they will have extra load capacity they are supposed to be unique so different from in game paid ones.

 

The alternative could have been concentrate on getting episode one finished and if it's any good the sales will pay for the pack animals after release.

 

That's exactly what's happening. The Pack Animals are a stretch goal that's not been met. Even if it's met they're not going to put it in right away. No one's working behind the scenes right now on a stretch goal that isn't even 5% of the way met.

If that's your only beef with this, there's a Wendy's commercial from the 80's I'd like you to google.