Horsies!

[hollyfant]

(This is about NWN1 obviously, NWN2 isn't advanced enough to have cool things like ridable horses. )

So my character shelled out for a lemon, and now I have questions.

• No encumbrance boost? I'm fairly sure a horse is a lot stronger than J. Random Bard.
• Do 5 points in Animal Empathy give a synergy bonus to Ride checks?
• Is there any way to make whatever is being held in the off-hand visible?
• Is there any way to make the reins-item in the off-hand invisible?
• Can I haz sadlbag plz? Visually and/or actually. (see also item #1)
• Can we assume the horse to be as it looks, that is complete with gear?

(edit: fixed my horse "smilie")

[JaydeMoon]

So, I recently saw some bad ass horses. It actually had a mount animation, saddlebags, barding, all kinds of shizz.

Was pretty cool.

[Zelknolf]

(This is about NWN1 obviously, NWN2 isn't advanced enough to have cool things like ridable horses. )

So my character shelled out for a lemon, and now I have questions.

• No encumbrance boost? I'm fairly sure a horse is a lot stronger than J. Random Bard.
• Do 5 points in Animal Empathy give a synergy bonus to Ride checks?
• Is there any way to make whatever is being held in the off-hand visible?
• Is there any way to make the reins-item in the off-hand invisible?
• Can I haz sadlbag plz? Visually and/or actually. (see also item #1)
• Can we assume the horse to be as it looks, that is complete with gear?

I can answer these pretty quickly.
1. No. Can't do it in the engine. You're more than welcome to script persistent saddle bags if you'd like.
2. No. You're thinking of handle animal.
3. Yes. Buy a warhorse.
4. Yes. Unequip it.
5. Yes. Script it.
6. Unless you have a reason to think otherwise. People tend to ride horses with saddles.

So, I recently saw some bad ass horses. It actually had a mount animation, saddlebags, barding, all kinds of shizz.

Was pretty cool.

The mount animations conflicted with our existing custom animations. As the apathy from everyone else in ALFA1 is severe enough that I can't get people to agree to have new toys, expecting anyone to agree to content being removed to make way for other content is probably unreasonable.

We have barding, saddle bags (visually), jousting skirts, and nightmares, all of which save persistently and across servers to the horse once it is equipped. My notes for ahp_3.06 said this.

[oldgrayrogue]

While we are on this topic, can I "Stable" my horse? In other words make it "disappear" from my side, or am I limited to "tying" the bugger and having him around at all times.

[psycho_leo]

You can leave him tied in a stable I suppose. Horses don't "disappear" as it is I think, but they certainly don't have to be near you. My PC's horse has been outside her house for weeks IG while I've been running around all over.

[Zelknolf]

While we are on this topic, can I "Stable" my horse? In other words make it "disappear" from my side, or am I limited to "tying" the bugger and having him around at all times.

Yeah, you gotta tie your horse in a stable to stable it.

[oldgrayrogue]

While we are on this topic, can I "Stable" my horse? In other words make it "disappear" from my side, or am I limited to "tying" the bugger and having him around at all times.

Yeah, you gotta tie your horse in a stable to stable it.

Ask a dopey question ......

Thanks.

[dob85y]

Just out of curiosity, for NWN2, could a useable token be made that reskinned the PC to a mounted PC, and gave them a movment increase? You could add in other effects like reduced dex and combat mods and stuff so it wouldnt be abused.

I thought about this after walking all the way from Silvy to RM, thinking could you buy a token that was a horse, that allowd you to run that distance when its aproperate rather than walk.

[Brokenbone]

Not slamming your idea, dob85y, but part of horse systems we've embraced tends to need considering "what happens with the horse when you're not mounted."

This can entail:

(1) Your horse getting damaged, stolen, or killed when separate from your PC. It's the damage part especially that can chip away at healing resources (potions, spells)

(2) Getting thrown off if failing certain ride checks during combat, which means the "mounted phenotype" you started with, ends up with your PC on his keister briefly, possibly damaged and knocked over, as well as the horse now having to worry about its own role in combat, AC-wise, hp-wise, AI-wise, etc., where many horses will panic and get clobbered, warhorses might have the balls to stick around.

(3) Your horse sometimes having to be left in non-strategic spots. Ride through the forest to the dungeon, gotta hitch the beast outside, not just "despawn it into your backpack" and "respawn it when you escape the dungeon, possibly through another exit." That's figurine of wondrous power territory (Stone Horse I believe).

Also on point of running, at least in NWN1, mounted travel gets a slight speed boost at a "walk" rate or a significant speed boost while at "run." Users are encouraged to run sparingly (emergencies or brief bursts), as our map scales are silly anyhow, a couple of screens often suggested to cover miles and miles and miles... even running across one cross country NWN1 screen might represent 50 miles, which'd be more than a galloping horse should be handling at a time. Galloping around in tactical / battle situations though, just dandy, much like if running around on foot.

If someone can come up with a good horse solution, more power to them!

If instead it's "we are now selling 100gp tokens that let you run everywhere", that may be suboptimal.

[AcadiusLost]

In any case, I'm not aware of any "mounted PC" appearance models to use for NWN2, so the closest we could come technically is making your PC look like a horse, with periodic popup text saying "John Doe is riding me", or having the horse just sort of tag along behind you, which also seems a bit silly.

If we get acceptable VFX/models/appearances/animations for PCs on horseback, we should be able to smoothly merge in the same scripts from NWN1.

One thing we could implement in the meantime for NWN2 would be scripted caravans of the sort we made for the rebuild of NWN1-Northern Cormyr, where you can pay to have a seat in a carriage which traverses the distance in a shorter (but still appreciable) amount of time, but you can spend it roleplaying with others in the carriage, or semi-AFK if you're alone. We'd set it so you could work out where along the route you were, and hop off early if you were so inclined. They were a challenge to get working properly, but a nice balance of convenience and continuity.

[dob85y]

I totally agree with what you are saying Brokenbone, i just figgured it may spark some intrest in further developing horses if there was a start. And just imagine all the interest and publicity we would get if we advertised that we had ridable horse system for NWN2.

The other option for TSM is the Riverferry option, at least from Silverymoon to Rivermoot, with a stop at High Hold. Have it cost a fitting amount (just a little more than it pays to walk supplies the distance, or a large sum that is only benifical for a group) and have a delay the same as resting to cover the trip distance (you could lock the door so players could chat but not leave) .

If you created an interior that was the ship, and had a mass portal to transport any inside after a trigger was activated, but these are random ideas from someone wanting to learn scripting, and are prolly in the wrong spot anyway.

[Nalo Jade]

And just imagine all the interest and publicity we would get if we advertised that we had ridable horse system for NWN2.

And imagine the accolades ALFA would receive if it shared that content with the rest of the community.

[Castano]

I totally agree with what you are saying Brokenbone, i just figgured it may spark some intrest in further developing horses if there was a start. And just imagine all the interest and publicity we would get if we advertised that we had ridable horse system for NWN2.

The other option for TSM is the Riverferry option, at least from Silverymoon to Rivermoot, with a stop at High Hold. Have it cost a fitting amount (just a little more than it pays to walk supplies the distance, or a large sum that is only benifical for a group) and have a delay the same as resting to cover the trip distance (you could lock the door so players could chat but not leave) .

If you created an interior that was the ship, and had a mass portal to transport any inside after a trigger was activated, but these are random ideas from someone wanting to learn scripting, and are prolly in the wrong spot anyway.

The ship travel option existed between BG and WD and MI servers...where you could hang out on the ship and then after a given time passed a portal would appear to let you off. We had scripted convos with the ship crew also to let you know when it was nearing land.

[Brokenbone]

Luskan had a remarkable ship travel system, including some kind of bizarre "map of the region, made out of placeables" thing that you could take a gander at after speaking to a navigator NPC. See a little moving flag placeable or similar, to reflect the slow progress of a ship between ports.