Topic
Ponies as a Resource Sink
Two subjects that come up fairly frequently in Global Chat are the addition of Ponies to the game and the addition of an endgame resource sink. Here is my idea for the implementation of both. Ponies could be potentially hazardous territory, intellectual property laws and all, so feel free to replace "Ponies" with another beast suitable to the ecology of Ur (such as Ostrich, Riding Ram, or Buffalo) if necessary.
One of the many things I like about this game is how it is accessible to players of all levels. While designed with endgame in mind, Ponies could still be new player friendly. It would depend on how and when the Player chooses to spend their resources.
Pony Island:
Off the coast of the Miscellaneous Islands lies the Pony Island. Players can venture here at any time to appreciate the Island's inhabitants. Pony Island is home to various resources, but the only animals that live here are Ponies.
Ponies:
The Island is home to Basic Ponies. Basic Ponies all share the same graphic. When clicked, they provide the following interactions: Pet, Feed, Capture. Petting a Pony functions the same as petting a Pig. Feeding a Pony improves the Pony's Mood - as a tree.
If a player has learned Herdkeeping & Animal Kinship V they can attempt to Capture a Pony.
Capturing:
In order to Capture a Pony, you must first improve its mood. This can be done by feeding it Carrot Cake. Carrot Cake is not sold by vendors, and must be produced by a Player. If the Player does not have the sufficient cooking skills to make Carrot Cake it can be traded from another player. After feeding the Carrot Cake, a dice roll is made to see if the Capture was successful. If the Capture wasn't successful, another Carrot Cake must be fed and the Player must try again.
Suggested Carrot Cake Requirements: 10 flour, 1 milk, 2 eggs, 1 butter, 15 carrots, 1 cinnamon. Recipe unlocked with Master Chef I.
Captured Ponies can't be sold to vendors, auctions, or other players. Wild Ponies have a maximum population size of 3 per public street. After all the Ponies on a street have been captured, the population will replenish at a rate of 1 pony per 1 game-day.
The Stable:
Once a Pony is captured, it needs a place to live. The Player must have a Stable on their property, either front yard or back, to house the Pony. The Stable takes up as much space as a Tower. The Stable can be entered, like a house or tower, and both the interior and exterior can be decorated and upgraded.
Suggested Stable Building Requirements: 1 General Building Permit, 30 Urth Blocks, 225 Snails, 30 Breaking Ground Work Units (with a Shovel). 5 Girders, 20 Wall Segments, 25 Construction Work Units (With a Construction Tool).
The Basic Stable can house 1 Pony. The Stable can be upgraded 2 times, and each upgrade allows another Pony, for a total of 3.
At this time the player can also name their pony. Wild ponies can't be named.
Cosmetic Upgrades:
Wild, and newly captured, Ponies all share the same "basic" graphic. Once a Pony is captured and placed in a Stable it can be cosmetically upgraded. Some upgrades will be free, some will be free for subscribers, and some must be purchased with credits.
The style of the Pony's Face, Mane, Tail, and Feet can all be upgraded and customized. The color of the Pony's Body, Tail, and Mane can also be changed.
Caring for the Pony:
The Pony must have a food supply, and a water supply. Players can purchase food & water troughs from an Animal Goods Vendor. Ponies can be also be hand-fed, which improves their mood, but has no other affect.
Food Troughs can only be filled with Oats. Water Troughs must be filled manually, with a Watering Can.
Ponies & Death:
The Pony's default lifetime is 1 game-year. This can be extended with either iMG upgrades (to follow) or Potions of Animal Youth. Potions of Animal Youth would add 1 month to the lifespan of the Pony.
If and when a Pony dies, the owner will receive a notification alerting them that their Pony has gone to Hell. The Owner must then retrieve the Pony from Hell's Bartender, who is going to turn the Pony into Glue. Ponies can stay at Hell's Bartender indefinitely, but once the Player enters the instance they must interact with the Pony. They have the option of trading one Drink Ticket for the Pony's Return - if the trade is turned down (there will be 1-3 Are You Sure? warnings) the Bartender keeps the Pony and gives the Player one Glue.
After retrieving a Pony from Hell, the Pony's lifespan resets to zero.
Ponies as Mounts:
Players can purchase the Equestrian iMG upgrade card which unlocks the ability to Ride ponies. After this ability is unlocked, the player must outfit their Pony with a Saddle and 4 Horseshoes.
The Saddle can be constructed with Fiber Arts II. The Horseshoes can be constructed with Metalworking. If the player doesn't have these skills they can purchase the goods from other players. Each item has a durability rating and will need to be repaired with a Tinkertool after taking too much wear. Both Saddles and Horseshoes can be cosmetically upgraded at a cost of credits.
The basic Pony-mount speed is the same as an non-upgraded Glitch. While riding a Pony the Player can't interact with Production items, or other items in the World, with the exception of Trees. While riding a Pony, if the player clicks a tree, an Eat option appears, allowing the Pony to eat the fruit on the tree - if any. Occasionally the Pony will plop out a bean-tree seed of the type of fruit it was eating, but this is rare.
iMG Upgrade Cards:
Eternal Pony I - Adds 1 game-month to the life span of your domestic ponies.
Eternal Pony II - Adds 1 game-month to the life span of your domestic ponies.
Eternal Pony III - Adds 1 game-month to the life span of your domestic ponies.
Eternal Pony IV - Adds 1 game-month to the life span of your domestic ponies.
Satiated Beast I - Your Pony Consumes 10% Less Feed & Water.
Satiated Beast II - Your Pony Consumes 10% Less Feed & Water.
Bountiful Trough - Troughs can contain an additional 10% Feed & Water.
Lucky Wrangler I - Adds a 10% Bonus to the Success of Capturing a Pony.
Lucky Wrangler II - Adds a 10% Bonus to the Success of Capturing a Pony.
Equestrian - Allows you to Ride a Pony.
Pony Walk Speed I - Increases the Pony's Riding Speed
Pony Walk Speed II - Increases the Pony's Riding Speed
Pony Walk Speed III - Increases the Pony's Riding Speed
Pony Walk Speed IV - Increases the Pony's Riding Speed
Pony Jumper I - Increases the height of the Pony's Jumps
Pony Jumper II - Increases the height of the Pony's Jumps
Pony Jumper III - Increases the height of the Pony's Jumps
Pegasus Wings - Allows you to feed your Pony Helium, enabling them to fly for 1 second per Helium.
Lucky Horseshoes - Increases the durability of Horseshoes by 10%.
Lucky Saddle - Increases the durability of Saddles by 10%.
Replies
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I like it!
I've always wanted a pony. And Santa never came through. - Friendship is magic!
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It *HAS* to have sparklies, or its not worth it.
Also, why have developers fix bugs or make things load faster when this (and only this) will make the game complete and then everyone will want to play?
Im seriously enjoying Fallout 3....till I took a bullet to the knee... -
Okay: Godiva likes ponies.
I get it.
Damn.
Can get get the narwhal, er, unicorn upgrade too? -
Wow, this is really well thought-out!
+1 -
I suppose I can't speak for Global, but most of the time on the internet, when someone says "I want ponies," they mean "I want something very specific and special for me, because I want it"
So I kind of read this post as incredibly ironic. - I want them too nom nom nom
- Why is this so awesome?
- I feel like I have had a curious epiphany *stumbles off to find some rum*
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-1 Meh, ponies seriously?
-1 for mounts, they are not really needed once you have walk speed upgrades you can get through a zone very quickly - and what about zones that are mostly tree's and have ladders that you need to climb?
-1 for each of the other idea's I am not personally keen on any of them -
+1! I like it, and, as usual, a well-thought out description from Godiva! The glue thing made me laugh. ;)
I think Riding should be a skill, not an upgrade, though. Perhaps a prereq could be a quest where you actually capture a pony.
And Master Bean - you have no soul, with your pony hate. :( - Ponies!
- Wow. This is super well thought out. I like it!
- I love all the thought that has gone into this, especially re: ponies & death. :D Also, I like this idea, as long as I can outfit my pony with a unicorn horn and wings. Maybe a comet tail of sparklies.
- -1 While this is well thought out, ponies?...er...First mounts are kinda pointless in Gltich, and i just don't think it suits it,also id much rather have more wild animals in game that gave us one of the items still only at vendors, or if it had to be another domestic it wouldn't be a pet, and also would be uncommon animals in general.
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It could be fun to have mounts; those below level 8 or so...they could be forced to give the higher level players rides on horsieback until they are deemed worthy to be set free.
they could also let out glittery trails of sparklies and tiny rainbows (made of marshmallow, moonbeams, angel kisses, and burrito bites) as they prance from street to street.
occasionally we get to eat one as a lesson to all the others. -
Thanks for all the replies! Here are some additional thoughts:
- Ponies are more of a Companion/Sidekick, like Yoshi in Super Mario World.
- Ponies aren't meant to be a method of fast travel, but a sink for credits/img/currants. Being able to ride them is just gravy.
- Some maps in the game aren't conducive to riding a Pony, and that's ok. As for maps with obstacles like ladders, there is an iMG upgrade idea at the end of the list where Ponies can "fly" for a short while after ingesting helium.
- There could be 2 Skills associated with Ponies: Equestrian Knowledge & Equestrian Lore. Equestrian Knowledge could be required to interact with ponies instead of needing Herdkeeping & Animal Kinship V, but perhaps have Herdkeeping as a requirement to learn. This could spawn the quest to capture a Pony. Equestrian Lore could enable players to sell Ponies to other Players, or perhaps release them back into the World. - Ahahahaha. I love the pony going to hell and being turned into glue. might be too cruel though
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Godiva! Yes, like Yoshi! I was thinking the same thing as I read your post!
okay maybe not ponies cos they really are overdone. Why not flying alpacas? That you have to fly on to get to a mountainy area peak thingie and they can give us, I dunno, metal tooth fillings to make small furniture or something. - +1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1 =^-^=
- +1 Very well thought out, great idea!
- Just, wow.
- PONIES! I LOVE PONIES~ PLEASE PLEASE MAKE PONIES TS!! PLEASE
- I love this idea, very well thought out :D
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+!!!!!!!!!!!!1
Nice idea! I like how you basically thought of everything. You obviously really put a lot of time and effort into this idea. I hope this happen in Ur!!!! - -1 No ponies!
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+1 to Ostriches! This is incredibly well thought out, and while I have no particular desire for the thing described, it looks like there are people who do! Though, definitely not actual ponies (I like equines, but only as much as I like most other animals).
Only thing is, this doesn't solve the "end-game" resource sink "problem" at all. Unless, of course, the upgrades are meant to cost in the hundreds of thousands of imagination. - I kind of love the idea of having a stable with animals that are more customizable than pigs and chickens, but only if I could dress them up like these Yaks: http://bit.ly/VvX92c
- +1 for more things to do, but hopefully TS can come up with something more creative than a "pony" as a mount. Well thought-out post, though.
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I still insist it would be far more fun to ride lower level folks around Ur, especially if they can be whipped with riding crops and also made to cough up giant rainbow sparklies when we want.
This will make Glitch so popular it will take over the world. -
I'd like to ride a hippo. One that lives in a new jungle marshy area.
oooh! or a bear. - I don't care about having a "mount" but a lot of the other ideas about ponies here are very creative and also tempting. Credit sinks are good, and surely there will be a limited number of times TS can introduce new rare items full of edgy hahahah scribbled-on-brokenness.
- WOW. Its a +1billion for someone who thought it out as much as you did :)
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I feel like I inspired this, so +1. :D
Yay, ponies! - Very good!! I for one would love to see how this can be implemented into the game.
- Godiva rode a horse, but only engineers notice that.
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@ Zoo: an armoured bear!
Very well thought out, and I love ponies and it would be great to have them - but I don't think they fit very well into the Ur/Glitch world/philosophy. Which is a shame, of course. I'd definitely get a pony or three if we could have ponies. - ponies forever! +1million
- This is really well thought out. I love this idea!
- Ponies are unnecessary unless they're being sold as meat!
- ++++1. I love this idea and it is so well thought out. <3
- I really, really want ponies.. and unicorns. +1
- I agree that a non-pony animal (I like the alpaca idea) as a companion rather than as a mount would be fun. You could ride it around in the world, simply as a way to show it off rather than as a practical way to get anywhere. And yeah, making a lot of that stuff cost WAY more would be just fine, since it wouldn't make the game any less fun than it is now (seeing as we are enjoying it plenty without those animals at the moment!) for newer users who can't get them yet.
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I like Yaks, Ostriches, and Buffalo if Ponies were too unpopular. I think if they were going to implement something like this they could always have a vote and let the players decide which animal it would be.
The Ponies alone wouldn't be a solution to the End Game Resource Sink issue, but it would help. I don't think any game feature alone can provide enough interest to single handedly solve that isssue - in any game.
If, conservatively speaking, each of the suggested iMG upgrades only cost 50k img, that adds up to 1 milllion iMG total spent on Pony Upgrade Cards. Players at level 60, and who have been level 60 for some time, have more than 1 million spare iMG, but since this feature would be available at any level - provided the player invested the time to learn the necessary skills - it would postpone reaching the point of having nothing to spend iMG on.
Current end-game players could buy up all the Pony & Pony related upgrades/features right out of the box but new and future players would have to decide if they want to - say - buy Pony walk speed upgrades or Brain Capacity, or Quoin mulitiplier, etc., -
+1 I like the idea of an end game resources sink [or more likely sinks, since there'd need to more than ponies probably], and something like this would [essentially] be cosmetic so it wouldn't have a strong impact on the actual game play beyond looks/eating resources. This is also really well thought out.
-1 Why just ponies? Since it's a cosmetic thing, why not have multiple types of mounts? That way someone whose not as into ponies but could get behind the idea or having/riding say...an Ostrich would have a reason to do it as well, and that would [potentially] increase it's ability to be a sink. [It would also take more time to implement because of that, but it could be worth it.]
I think it would be an interesting idea, and it could be fun but...I'm not sure how well it would work with how the game world is set up. -
I love the tree part.
Unicorns maybe?
I'm also very impressed with the thought that was put into this. - Hmm... Very well thought out idea. I would prefer it not to be restricted to just ponies, however.