Odd trend in breeding

[Highroller]

Well today I had 2 gen 3 White Wyrms fail to cross. Too advanced...say what? Not as silly granted as the pair of gen 2 rune beetles that failed a few days ago. Neither of these had been back bred they were just bred up from gen 1 out of the wild. This beat down on breeding still at same time you can get imprisoned pets from Lady Mel and Shimmering E. faster than you can max out a breed. Sure they don't have many hit points but a pack of 5 of them without any ointments can outdo any other pack of pets in game.

This continuing effort to make it even more impossible to breed pets led to me stopping breeding for profit months ago, Just breeding for fun now. Of course with the fail/sterile rate its REAL limited fun. I already got hosed by a sterile rune beetle and lost a couple gens worth of work.

Why is so much effort being invested in making breeding pets harder when its easier to get imprisoned pets that are better? Now granted I haven't tried to get any pets in crystal lately. The drop rate may have been made a lot more rare? I know I got my first 5 imprisoned using a pack of ostards. Took me maybe 2 weeks. Lot faster than I can max a pet breed.

It just doesn't add up for me. If breeding is made harder and harder to maintain balance as advertised then bloody imprisoned pets shouldn't even exist in name of balance.

[TheWatcher]

+1

I long ago gave up breeding for this reason. Started off for me with mules and gave up after early failures gen 2 and 3 with one backbreed.

Considering you can now get imps for as low as 500k, no one is going to buy a maxed Cu for more than 100k. The amount of time it takes to get it maxed is far too long to make it profitable. I decided to breed white wyrms and rune beetles to give to newer players who can't quite afford a PS yet, but the fail rate is worse than mules. Considering when I first started mules went for the 250-400k mark and I now see them selling for 100k, when during that time everything else has gone up, I now see breeding as a hobby.

I wonder if it might be easier to oint a fresh tame to maxed and start breeding. I know I can collect pints pretty quickly.

[anarchy]

i stopped breeding long ago do to failures. 2 per 6 hours and i can only attempt to breed 2 times a day. once before work and once after work. failed 2 times a day. ugh. ah well on the other hand imps are cheaper and allows new players a chance to grow, get cash, and have fun on the shard. just wish breeding was easier. wouldn't mind seeing someone run around with maxed out chickens, or maxed out something.

[Licos]

I stopped breeding pets back when people were commonly running around with the Nightmare + Cu Sidhe combo. Once I got introduced to maxed mules, then nobles, I never looked back.

Anyway...I agree that the introduction of imprisoned pets has nearly killed the breeding economy. The investment of time and patience to raise any other pet to a competitive level, doesn't match their current market value. When this happens, you will see a complete drop in fresh pets available for the younger players coming in and looking for pets they can afford. Most players just starting out cannot afford to drop 500k-1.5mil per imprisoned pet. Even if they could, the imprisoned pets in their raw, freshly obtained state wouldn't survive for any significant amount of time due to their low hit points and the newer player's ability to quickly heal them. However...They don't lose stat points...so I suppose that eliminates the danger. Still doesn't make them as useful to the youngins.

I've been investing thousands of ointments into my squirrels, and I still think they need to be nerfed a bit. Perhaps a combination of a slight nerfing and an update to the current pets? Maybe limiting their hit points to 500? Having them lose considerably more skill points upon death? Maybe some kind of system where when they die, they transform back into crystals and have a timed delay before they can be brought back out?

[Nelapsi]

Maybe some kind of system where when they die, they transform back into crystals and have a timed delay before they can be brought back out?

Good idea.

I also suggested to +C changing the follower slot system to be linked to animal taming skill. Skill of 100 will give you 3 pet slots, 110 4 follower slots and 120 you will get all 5 of the follower slots. I think this will help with growing, rather then in 2 days you are running around with 5 maxed pets heading to prism of light. As for imps, my suggestion is simple.. do not allow them to be ointed. This will allow for a difference between the two kind of pets with imp pets being overly powered.

[Whiskey Jack]

Breeding isnt a cheap hobby, nor fast. I bred a pack of icehounds up, and they were deadly. They were really good with the paralyze attack. And did good damage, as good as the imps but the occasional death and stat loss made them impractical. Bred up cu sidhes too they weren't as expensive but a few deaths and wasted money. So now I just save my oints and apply them daily to the squirrels I have acquired. Frenzied ostard pack was good too but if not for stat loss being so harsh I would use ice hounds over imprisoned pets.

[Highroller]

Yup. I maxed out mules, ostards, rabbits, ferrets, swamp dragons, hell hounds, ice hounds, cu sidhes, emerald cats, acid snakes, nobles and scorpions, had a good start on dragons, savage ridgebacks and hell cats. I even had mules, nobles, cus and ostards built up to breeding at 1100 hits.

The only way I can see breeding to be viable again is if imprisoned pets are made much rarer or if the sterile/fail rate goes back to something like it used to be or both.

As is even 5 imprisoned pets with zero ointments are better against anything in game except stuff that drains life like grizzle or netopir than any bred up pet. As a general rule you need to give them more hit points for them to be effective against grizzle and such.

I mean taking away the top hit points of existing imprisoned pets is hardly fair. You have to invest 10's of millions worth of ointments to max out an imprisoned pet. Making NEW imprisoned pets a LOT more expensive by making them a LOT more rare grandfathers the existing ones but makes it a lot harder for people to have such a deadly pack.

[Whiskey Jack]

Out of all that breeding which one was your favorite as a pack, or individually?

[Highroller]

Probably favorite individual was cu sidhe. It has 200% damage its a pack animal and it has bleed attack. Favorite pack it depends on what I am fighting. When lowest resist is physical like Lady Mel I like ostards as an example. Scorpions are nice because their poison finishes off stuff that normally wanders off. Mules are immune to poison so it all depends. Ferrets and rabbits have the cute factor ) Ice hounds and hell hounds have pack instinct with imprisoned pets so they are good to group with 1 or 2 imprisoned when building a full pack of imprisoned.

[Rock]

First of all, I must take this chance to thank NELAPSI who help me a lot for breeding.

Unfortunately, I give up the breeding because it is very time consuming and expensive. In fact, I can buy a really good pet in the market at a lower price.

Meanwhile, I agree with NELAPSI that we should consider to stop to put the ointment to the IMP because it is very strong. However, for the animal lots, I will suggest 4 lots for 100 taming, (otherwise, it is too hard for new players. For 3 lots, they cannot breed a pairs of 2 lots pets.) 5 lots for 110 and 6 lots for 115 or higher (As I understanding, the success breed rate will increase if it is breeder by one owner)

When a pets die, I also support to change it into a CRSTAL and revive in days. (My pets die recently and loss 50 point on strength and 3 on resist. I have no way but abandon it because it really expensive to inject the ointments to recover the loss.)

[Highroller]

I think the discussion was about imprisoned pets being put back in a crystal when they died but I would rather see bred pets fo in a crystal for a day or whatever vice getting stat losses.

Well I have now had 3 straight failures on that pair of gen 3 White Wyrms. Not even close to maxed but they are failing a lot.

As for the taming slots I dont think breeding 2 slot pets is really a consideration. Very few people breed 2 slot pets. No reason to, they don't breed up any higher than 1 slot pets but you can have only 1/2 as many )

[Highroller]

Well 4th time was the charm on the pair of gen 3 white wyrms. So now I wait on gen 4 and see how many times I fail on them. Still will be nowhere close to maxed of course...

[anarchy]

i like the crystal idea the only problem i see about this is the ice wyrm. (even though he can be killed without imprisoned). people depend on having pet's to res and throw back into the fight. i still like the idea though.

[Kaiana]

I swear every time something becomes popular people shout nerf...I love my doggies and have had them for a long time...instead of trying to get changes made to ruin the millions of gold in oints I have put into my dogs, why not suggest changes to make breeding better or bred pets stronger to compensate? This topic went straight from being about breeding to being yet another topic complaining about imprisoned pets. Yes, they're strong. They take a LOT of gold to make worth it, too. You can say that a pack of five fresh ones can deal more damage, but they sure won't last long in a fight until you oint the crap out of them. Jack laid it out very well in a recent post - I am too tired to find it for you right now but maybe in the morning :p

For the record though, I do think squirrels and ferrets need to be rarer. Dogs on the other hand are rare enough :p I can camp travesty all day for keys and still burn through all the sets and come up empty-handed.

[Ruewyn]

I don't like the idea of changing things into a crystal or not allowing imps to use ointments. That's the way it is, it would be too disruptive to the community, and why move backwards, not forwards? It is about time for some new improvements to normal breeding though. Months ago I suggested having a scroll for sale on token stones to reduce the number of slots a pet takes, down to minimum of 1 slot. This isn't going to make imp pets go away. It is going to give people more things to breed and to hunt with for fun. It is in no way going to overpower the shard.
Let's think of more ways to improve things and not try to break them.