Animal Poll

[Doug R.]

You told me you supported animal migration and broad terrain allowances, so this is exactly what you want. There's nothing to fix. The hawks are there, just not in the towns. If you want to hunt them, move onto the road.

Unless, of course, you are wrong and their migration chances need to be reduced, which I would be happy to consider if you consider cutting the sarcasm.

[sanchez]

Doug, your poll makes it sound like we want to pull meat from the ground as the only alternative to extinction. You know it's misleading. The hawks are not fixed. Not in EZ, and not in PZ. What makes you think I advocate more migration? I do think it's important to consider which terrain types abut one another in the regions that are especially problematic, such as Western Treefeather, before you repopulate and blame players for the outcome.

I also think there should be more consensus on what 'fixed' actually looks like. RD will have to compensate in designing more objects and foods without the assumption of access to animals. This should have been done long ago perhaps, due to the shortages in PZ. But, that is not the short-term answer.

[Cantryjczyk]

In polish island situation is still far from good or fair. Almost everythere is the same what was before. Hunting is baned and it is normal. Most chars and even players get used to that, becose we never had luxuse of free hunting.

And even with bans still they are places that year after yera have less and less animals. Last time I check one good city I know from about 25 cantr years (all the time hunting bans) there were 3 animals (1+2). Every year there is less of them, and they are protected, in nearly places too. They die from old age and from to much traveling I belive. Chars cant do anything to more protect them or make them stay and grow in numbers.

And we have island full of animals, hawks, elephants, many kinds and many in every kind, like 70 elefhants. It is not orgianlly island in polish zone, just colonized.

Not mention that one we have just to few animals and to few kinds. And not becose of hunting. Just becose even with all chars help and protection they just die. We noticed few changes in smallest oldest isles, it can help in long terms, but there is still much to do. Animals just are there and sometime we can talk that it is nice to have few and it is all, there is usually less animals than chars in cities.

[sem]

I don't know western Treefeather, but in northern Treefeather hawks and tortoises are about the only animals my character's used to seeing. My character on Cantr island hunts hawks when there are more than half a dozen, which is around once a week. They aren't the most common of animals, but they're a long way from extinct as far as those characters can see.

[Doug R.]

We noticed few changes in smallest oldest isles, it can help in long terms, but there is still much to do. Animals just are there and sometime we can talk that it is nice to have few and it is all, there is usually less animals than chars in cities.

These islands were the only ones I added animals to, as they are by far the most populated of the Polish islands. I've halted any new animal seeding projects due to both the server lag and a lack of time in real life.

[Missy]

To say that lowering an outrageous population of animals is impossible is untrue. I've seen it done. Baaak Hills South. Right, I know the old tale of how if there's no building, "how do you expect anyone to survive long enough to do anything abuot it?" Well, the people there did with mere bone weaponry and shields and today they've got steel and iron. And yes, we are talking 100's of animals.

True enough, the people on the english islands didn't have this problem in the beginning because animals were introduced long after people had a chance to begin building societies and thus buildings therefor safe-havens from getting pecked to death or stampeded twice a day by cows. ---On the other hand, I've been on Omeo. We were making a dent in t he animals until some idiot came to town and locked everyone up and killed most of the people but for their own crew members. Okay, so....If I can make a dent in the animal population, why is it so damn impossible for others? Of course it meant hiding in a building and coming out every day to hunt. Stay out for long enough to start a farming project and farm for a couple turns and then go indoors. Repeat it the next day. So what you're saying is, "I don't want to die getting pecked by a bird?" Sorry it's just the way the game goes, though not very popular it is nothing new. People have died by animal attacks ever since animals have been implemented.


There are en ough people out on boats travelling from island to island, but you rarely see anyone say, "Hey, you got animal parts to trade?" So people must not be in dire need of t hem. Truth be told, if I hear one more time that there's going to be an implementation in order to "stimulate trade," I'll vomitt. If there is no trade now, how would you stimulate trade by changing anything? It just doesn't make any sense. Trade's already possible, obviously needed according to some who say there aren't enough animals in their area, yet it doesn't occurr. So you think some programming/resource tweaking will make a flying difference?




Things are fine the way they are.

There aren't animals in Siom. I go out of town to hunt. *Shrugs.*

[Doug R.]

I was wrong, I read the report backwards. Hawks are declining. I've boosted their reproduction rate, along with other animals facing steep declines.

[sanchez]

Thanks.

[Cantryjczyk]

In polish zone I know many cities with sea akces, where you can sell animals raws for many good things, like prepared food, healing food, iron, wood etc. Not mentions raw resources avaiable in that cities. And we have island usually with very low animals numbers and hunting bans. But also few places with more animals. Trade in game exist.

Just it is depresiv when you protect animals for 25 years and in result number of animals drop to 3 (2 kinds) from 20-25 (5 kinds) at start.

We even must long time ago sail blind in to the sea, search animals, to enter steel age, when we had iron. (no bellows, no steel, no needle (bone or steel), no good weapons (steel) etc.). Chars returning with hide ware heroes.


Edit: and new players recently ague, that game isnt good, becose everythere all is banned. They dont have akcess to easy animals resources, resource slots are limited and often need permission to use that. Players often just stop playing after realizing that old players have everything and it is only way to do something, fom old chars. They dont have chances to create even very, very simple item just by own work. And when try hunt animals for small bones and hide, they are in troubles.

[Racetyme]

I was wrong, I read the report backwards. Hawks are declining. I've boosted their reproduction rate, along with other animals facing steep declines.

Thank you so much. I just wish there was an easy way to equalize it. Is there? Is it possible with the current code to have a variable reproduction rate depending on current population?

[Frits]

What's the problem? Make them all multiply like rabbits in RL and put caps on the total number that can exist in any one location. Do nót make animals migrate when that cap is reached but delete them.
*shrugs*
One odd thing about hunting though, you can only hunt one of each species, for instance on K-island you might find 1 turkey, 2 horses and 70 buffalo. If the limit was set in a different way and i got 8 attacks per day i could effectively bring down the buffalopopulation. Too bad i see a slight problem with the lay-out on the hunt-page.

[Arlequin]

I know the poll is already won by 2nd option, but I voted first.

I don't think the current system adds anything really critical, over a well thought static one, to the actual purpose of Cantr, which is roleplay.

Any slight advantage it may have it's countered by the extra lag and the extra development time.

So basically I would like all animals to be resources, like the tea leaves. But also, that all resources had a meter to record how exhausted they are, and a constant value to set how fast they regenerate. Gathering would slow down as the resource becomes exhausted.

Regeneration wouldn't be lineal. It would be slower when the resource is almost exhaust (meaning you need extra effort to get it back to productive levels).

Some resources (animals, plants), could be set to zero regeneration when they have been exploited to extinction, then they would need to be reseeded again.

They could be tamed in the same way herbs are farmed, too.

Also, gathering of animals as resources should return objects, not grams. So after a fixed project you gather one sheep, or one elephant, and then you use your butcher knife or whatever else to turn it into meat, bones, etc. Those objects would decay fast and wouldn't be repairable.

Some machines, like irrigation systems, could increase the regeneration rate.

[Nakranoth]

Bah! You take away the animals and you loose animal attacks. They keep a sense of danger in the background... keeps me from becomeing immensely bored... heck, in places, animal attacks are the soul reason to play... I've even got one charrie a bit mentally screwy from almost dieing of scarabs. Reducing animals to "resources" would deduct quite a bit present and future from the already somewhat lacking livelyness.

[sanchez]

Nobody is suggesting changing them to resources! They Are resources. Mobile ones. Unbelievable nobody can read.

[formerly known as hf]

I like the current style of the animal system, even though the migration and reproduction cycles seem a little broken. I don't know the ins-and-outs, but it seems that the system has been developed from its starting point to address IG issues, rather than, from the start, attempting to simulate a real-life model (predators, prey, territory and food etc.). It's one of the many things in Cantr which cold do with a re-write from scratch, but I'm sure the over-burdended ProgD are more than aware of that, and many other things...

I would vote, however, that some resources produced by animals should be available as resources.

Being able to gather wool, eggs and milk (among others) without killing the animal needs to be made possible. Domestication would also be very welcomed.