Taming skill vs. Tamed Animal

Questions arise from the balance between Summons and Tamed companions. @Chris stated that Summons would not get more powerful, just cost less in reagents and focus with more skill. This is to keep the power levels balanced. Yet taming allows a powerful tamer to stick ferocious beast onto a whistle and just give it away to anyone (hopefully who pays, but not necessary) for use. The taming level of 1 is all that is necessary to use this new beast who will do all the killing for you.

Suggestion: Taming involves control and skill. A tamed beast is subdued, and should follow commands for one who tamed it ~99% of the time. Someone new using the whistle... the beast should also follow, but only to a certain extent. I believe this extent should be determined by two things: the skill of the tamer and the skill of the user.

For example: A mid-skill tamer (~50) tames a polar bear. Now the whistle goes to low skill tamer (1). The bear will and should obey for a bit, but due the mid-level skill of the taming the bear might "test" the new owner at certain times or under circumstances. The test might be to turn on the owner, or to run away if commands to fight to the death (just examples). Now the skill of the user must overcome the doubts of the beast. A level 1 tamer should have no chance with a big wild animal.

This is to add balance, not to "make the game harder again" as some might complain.
A new avatar has no business with a giant beast given by the guildmates, you need some level of training in taming before you can handle what you are given.

So in brief, and these are just placeholder numbers:

High end
Tamed by -----Summoned by-----Turn chance-----Re-subdue chance
80-100---------80-100--------------<5%---------------->95%
80-100---------60-80----------------5-15%---------------80-95%
80-100---------40-60----------------15-30%-------------65-80%
80-100---------20-40----------------30-60%-------------30-65%
80-100---------1-20------------------60-90%-------------65-95%

Low end
Tamed by -----Summoned by-----Turn chance-----Re-subdue chance
20-40-----------80-100--------------15-30%---------------->95%
20-40-----------60-80----------------30-60%----------------80-95%
20-40-----------40-60----------------60-90%----------------65-80%
20-40-----------20-40----------------90-99%----------------30-65%
20-40-----------1-20------------------99-100%---------------0-30%

So the turn chance is triggered at certain events or certain timers also dependent upon the initial taming skill at the point of being subdued.
Also the level of the beast could/should be a modifier.

There should be a happy medium ground where it is easy to give away timber wolves and the like and have relatively low tamers hold onto them. That is the balance point. As the beast gets harder, both the skill of the tamer and the skill of the summoner should matter... sometimes with dire consequences.

These are my thoughts. I have not tamed this last go around since this really is not a good testing environment *, but I did tame several wipes ago and have read the latest views on the forum.

*-I will not grind the time away just to test everything, true QA testers have tools to test multiple scenarios through character stat manipulation. But that is not for this post.

 

What you said! Also....!@#$ing summons.... /sigh >.<#

 

I think what high level tamers get is better control, better pet heals, and pet rezz.
I know my 1 skill ability with the Founder Mimic, means if I tell it to attack a target 99% of the time I get the message "pet ignored my command".
However it's kinda irrelevant, when you talking about pets that are so big and bad that all you need to do is set them on aggressive and they can do all the killing for you, no commands needed, or just set them on defensive and then have a mob attack you. (no control needed pet does what you want it to, no real problem)

However not being able to rezz the pet meant pets were disposable, they died you bought another.
Now however if they die, you zone, they come back to life again. (at the start of R30 it was working this way again, haven't checked lately)
Taming collars are out of balance again.
Sure a real Tamer, should be able use a ferrious spider, and Obsidian bear but a starting tamer trying to use the same pet should have just as much chance of having the pet kill for them as they do of having the pet kill them.
(just like a Dragon would turn on an owner with poor control in UO, and those that had less control needed to constantly feed them to maintain control. High end Tamed Creatures should pose more risk and less benefit to unskilled tamers.)

 

@Rofo I think you are agreeing with me, but not 100% sure.

 

I see the same problems as you @GreyMouser2 but I think your concept to solve them goes in the totally wrong direction.

First off all we have to make a difference between taming and using a pet. Taming is the progress to make a wild animal into a useful weapon. Nothing more. If you have tamed a animal it doesn't mean you can control it. In the chat we called the skills that are used to control the pet beast master skills, I like that. Taming a pet and the related skill collar recovery shouldn't be related to the use of pets. Never. I would even request to rename the skill tree from taming into beast mastery and taming is one part of it.

Combat pets are at the moment totally unbalanced and overpowered. I think this is the result of not balanced skills to control the pet and that they are not treated like weapons.

1)
Why do summoning whistles not work like the every other equipment that influence combat? At the moment I could notice any durability loss on the whistles nor do they stop to work when they are broken (bug of r30). You can still call your pet and use it. On the other hand you can crit those whistles (+50 durability) but not enchant them or put masterwork on them. Makes no sense to me and it is confusing that it stands out like this. We use combat pets as weapons so they should lose durability with every attack of the pet (half speed of weapon durability loss because whistles have half of the durability of a weapon). This way a pet is not a once in a lifetime investment. Because a beast master can use a weapon parallel to the pet, the pet can die and you need a seperate skill to rez it. I think this already a good balancing for not using one weapon slot.

2)
To summon a combat you need only the summoning skill on lvl 1 and enough focus to cover the focus decrease.

A starter char has already 100 focus which is enough middle strong combat pets. I'm a lvl 50 char and I can call a ferocious spider without issues, the little focus decrease of 220 doesn't really hurt. I still have plenty of focus left for my other attacks that need focus. I think the focus costs for calling a combat pet needs to be doubled. This sets the hurdle to use high lvl combat pets already higher. On the other hand the skill concentration is to strong. On lvl 40 I reduce the focus drain by 35.8%. I think on lvl 100 the concentration skill should only reduce by 50%. So only 40 I should have only a reduction by 20%. This makes the use of a pet more balanced.

Stays the summoning skill without any influence on the combat pet. Ancev brought up the idea that you need the summoning skill so the combat pet doesn't goes against you. I really like this idea. So on lvl 1 you have a 50% chance that the small spider will attack you instead of the mobs. Each summoning skill level will reduce this chance by 5%. So on lvl 25 you 100% control over this spider. Each higher pet starts with a lower chance, just like taming. So you can be really lucky on lvl 1 and have control over a hig lvl combat pet but having a higher skill helps much. This way no starter char can use high lvl pets right from the start.

3)
The combat pets have their own combat mode. If they stop attacking they get out of combat mode and heal really quick. I think this is wrong. The combat mode should be bound to the attack mode and the player mode. If you set the pet on passive it should go out of combat mode as soon as it stops attacking. If it is set on defensive it should be in the same mode as the owner. If the owner goes out of the combat mode, the pet should follow. If you set it on aggresive it is always in combat mode. This way healing the pet gets more important and you can reduce afk farming on aggresive mode because it doesn't heal itself.

4)
The skill tree for taming is a mess. I need to learn taming to be able to summon a pet. Summoning a pet should be the basic and be lvl 10 for all starter chars. From this root skill there should be 2 leaf skills, taming and obedience. Taming should have the leaf collar recovery and only this, because it is the only skill that is really related to taming. Every other skill should grow from summoning. From obedience we should be able to learn Healing pet, which is stays the root for rezzing a pet, Refresh, which becomes the root of Concentration, and basic combat training, which leads to advanced combat training. Basic combat training should raise HP and Focus of the pet. Advanced combat training should raise crits, healing and focus regeneration, damage avoidance or reduction.


The second positive effect would be, that we have finally tier 4 skills and need the taming master trainer for learning them. So far he has no use because every trainer can teach up to tier 3 skills.

5)
The skill obedience is useless at the moment. The combat pet only runs out of combat if it HP go lower than 10%. This means for a ferocious spider to go under 50 HP or less. It is really seldom that my pet goes under 10%, mostly it is killed before it is has the chance to run away. Reducing the 50 HP makes even less sense, it is a waste of XP. I think to make this skill useful and to make a pet less powerfull it should already run out of combat, not combat mode, when 75% HP is left. On lvl 100 it should be when it is under 10% HP. This way you really train the pet into a combat pet.

6)
Every pet has focus but doesn't use it. Most higher lvl pets have special attacks, like root from spiders or knockdown from crocodiles, the double bite of wolfs, the strong poison of corpions. These attacks should drain the focus of the pets. If they used up their focus they can't use them anymore and they fall back on their basic attacks. This way they lose their power over the time and it makes sense to skill combat training to make them more powerful and last longer. To fill up their focus you have to take them out of combat, so you need to use the attack modes more as a player. This way you have to use your pet much more actively than just a passive DPS dealer.

7)
Skilling combat training should reflect much more on the pet than now. At the moment the only difference I see between combat training lvl 1 and lvl 40 are 12 HP which is a big joke. I know it should also influence STR and DEX and such, but it is not noticeable at all. I think to make combat training useful it should work a bit more like the basic combat skill. You start with malus which you reduce to zero with lvl 40 and raise them when you get higher. And you should see a difference much often, not only every 10 lvls.

Overall combat pets are at the moment overpowered because you can easily use high lvl pets and it requires zero effort to use them at their full power. They don't fall under durability like everything else we use in combat and stay at full power without using any ressources. I hope I could bring out some thoughts so we get them more balanced then they are now. @Bzus

 

Given the gating mechanism, this is all moot. It's great to see the theorycrafting, but as long as the mining gate exists, then I want the system to stay as is.
In other words, I want my colossal reward for the colossal pain in the ass factor that is currently taming. (yeah, 500 collars to get to 100 skill? I think the way it is is just fine with that little nugget of wisdom)

If Portalarium is willing to make the mining gate reasonable by returning taming to the way it was (when it was awesome, and only consumed collars on a successful tame) then sure, innovate away.

 

@Sindariya Thank you for your thoughts. Very insightful as expected. I am not wedded to my solutions, just know there is a real problem and wanted to get more conversation going.
I will reply more when the kids are asleep and I'm of the mobile phone.

 

I really like the mining gate because it makes taming special and a profession just like black smithing. Not everyone should be a power tamer but everyone can be a beast master if he trains. I don't want a system where a beast master must also be a taming master. Than every plate armor user should also be a master in blacksmithing.

 

@agra yes, more balance. I think overall balance though, so the amount of mining to get collars is too high.

 

Yes there is a huge problem and I'm not sure if should ask Berek to move this into feedback thread because it can be easily buried here.

 

Well, every person I've ever explained the mining gate to has said: That's ridiculous, I'm not doing that, forget Taming.
So, I guess, mission accomplished if Portalariums design goal is no-one (or less than 1% of the players) uses the system.

And for the record, I'm fine with gates, and would even support a wide variety of gating mechanisms like the mining gate for taming. However, given this is the only skill I've seen in the past 20 years like this? And it's overly punitive? Not a fan.

 

Perhaps I'm already happy that it is not like it was at the beginning. To get to lvl 100 I needed only 300 collars, perhaps even less now and I think I could reduce it even more. It is a bit tactic needed. So it is not a big gate for me. How much mining do you need to get blacksmithing to 100 and what do you get out of it? Can't you compare it? And as I say, high taming is not required to use a combat pet.

 

I think Riya is spot on the money there. There is no reason why taming should be the dedicated primary skill. Not everyone who uses pets is going to tame them (or it completely kills the taming market).

Separate it out so that summoning and taming are NOT tied to each other and the skills fall under the appropriate mastery.

 

@Sindariya
Riya,
So maybe the numbers of collars is ok, but the amount of silver ore for 500 collars is way out there crazy then.

4) Taming vs. Obedience. I see your thoughts, they make sense. I also see that my concept would work within this framework. Now in the chart, the two things that matter are the Taming skill of the person doing the taming and the Obedience skill of the summoner. We already track the name of the crafter of the whistle, so it is just a simple data tag to capture the Taming skill of the tamer.

2) and 5) I guess I missed this part from @Ancev , so we'll just have to go with a good idea can have multiple independent sources.
I think Obedience should be tied the pet turning, and balanced by how good of a tamer tamed your animal.

1) My summoning whistle broke during melee combat, but it still works fine even though it is broke. Obvious bug, but the breaking either came from getting hit or something weird in the patches actually. But it definitely broke.

@Berek Do you think this thread should be in feedback instead?

 

I have been preaching pet control and taming for ages, and they have not given one peep about it . . .
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...-have-some-adjustments-for-pet-control.43369/

Something has to be done for pet strength and pet control.

No way should a new player with zero skills be able to purchase a Ferocious Red Spider and be able to take it out to play.

I am sorry but having it turn sound like a good ide but all they will do is dismiss it and try and over time learn how to control it. Sorry but there needs to be a point (something skill related) at which point any pet has any chance at even being summoned.

Sorry to point back to UO but the inability to control a pet of strength required a combination of so many skill points to be able to control it Taming / Lore / Vet this is a simple metric that if not implemented tames will rule the game until they fix it. It will be the equivalent of running around with 6 dragons in the days of old.

 

A turned pet cannot be dismissed. It is now a wild animal in front of you.

[I thought you were ignoring me, but cool, glad you joined the conversation. ]

 

Ah so it is not turned it basically releases itself Ill buy that just like UO.

I agree that this is one of the MAJOR things they need to work on.

 

Perhaps I'm blind but why should a starter not be able to buy a high lvl pet? He can buy the best armor and weapon, so why not a high lvl pet?
Same goes to train skills? Why should he need to get a low lvl pet to train summoning or something else to be able to call the high lvl pet?

 

Sorry but I totally dislike this idea. You complain about the amount of collars needed to tame but on the other hand you easily want to set free pets if you can't control them? If they turn against you, you can immediately dismiss it, but you need to wait to summon it again. And you can't call any other pet in the mean time. I think this is punishment enough or?

 

I agree with @Sindariya 's points.

I don't want the UO way of taming or control. In have my current 18+ UO active account for that.

The silver mining gate makes sense to me as taming becomes more of a speciality that everyone is doing it.