Member Feedback: Hunting

Hello all! The admin team has been discussing some updates to the systems before we reopen them (soon!) and we would love member feedback! We will be posting a series of discussion threads as we do this and encourage all members to post on these threads for ease of review. Discussion of these changes out of their threads may be missed-- so please keep them in the proper threads if you can!

Our first subject is: Hunting!

Are there any aspects of the hunting game mechanic that you would like to see change? Anything you love or dislike? Are regions too much? Are big game hunts confusing? Would you like drops/ items simplified (medium pelt instead of "zebra" pelt, for example)? Please let us know below! 

New Questions to consider:
Right now, you have a high outcome of returning with items associated with what you are hunting, but you also have a chance to return with items not associated with what you're hunting. Ex, you hunt a deer and you return with berries. Or you hunt berries and return with meat.  Would you still like this random chance of not bringing back an item specific to what you're hunting or would you prefer these things to be completely seperate?
Is there anthing more you would like to see for foraging drops? Any other kind of drops?
How do you feel about what you can hunt is locked behind type of ballator, region, and rank?

This thread will close on January 1st 2021 so please post your thoughts before then! Thank you so much! <3

Okay this is my hot take on the hunting system.

Right now as it sits to me the hunting system is boring. It's plain and simple. Draw or write this and get it rolled and get this or that. It's simple and easy and not very interactive. I've played online games like wolvden and lioden. They have rather unique hunting game mechanics.
My idea is more interactive, with multiple art pieces.
You start your hunt by having your ballator drawn or Witten starting a hunt, you send it in, admin responds your ballator has caught 2 scent trails, left or right, the player choses(more art or lit), oh the player chooses the left path, as your ballator continues on it doesn't find the animal it was hunting but instead catches a field mouse, or a platypus.
This is just an idea to make hunts feel more inclusive and drawn out with more detail and interaction.

Okay this is my hot take on the hunting system.

Right now as it sits to me the hunting system is boring. It's plain and simple. Draw or write this and get it rolled and get this or that. It's simple and easy and not very interactive. I've played online games like wolvden and lioden. They have rather unique hunting game mechanics.
My idea is more interactive, with multiple art pieces.
You start your hunt by having your ballator drawn or Witten starting a hunt, you send it in, admin responds your ballator has caught 2 scent trails, left or right, the player choses(more art or lit), oh the player chooses the left path, as your ballator continues on it doesn't find the animal it was hunting but instead catches a field mouse, or a platypus.
This is just an idea to make hunts feel more inclusive and drawn out with more detail and interaction.

I kind of agree with you that hunting can be boring, however to do something like on Lioden would ask a lot more from our already strained admin team. Unless there was some sort of AI based system like Lioden has I don't think it would work too well. From personal preference I can say that I would rather not have hunts drawn out into several pieces. Working on the Big Game Hunts requires several images with the low success rates of capturing the big game item and I know it isn't supposed to be easy but it does get a little frustrating or annoying having to do so many images to hunt one creature in some cases.

I don't think I'd really change the hunting system at all. I like having the different regions for the different breeds to hunt in, it makes the group unique and provides a link to the ballator types through the activity. It might be easier to go back to the simplified Lg Pelt, Sm Pelt system instead of having to keep track of a ton of different pelt types but the way it now works. I don't see a need to fix something that functions and doesn't really seem to be broken but perhaps I've overlooked something and not realized it.

Okay this is my hot take on the hunting system.

Right now as it sits to me the hunting system is boring. It's plain and simple. Draw or write this and get it rolled and get this or that. It's simple and easy and not very interactive. I've played online games like wolvden and lioden. They have rather unique hunting game mechanics.
My idea is more interactive, with multiple art pieces.
You start your hunt by having your ballator drawn or Witten starting a hunt, you send it in, admin responds your ballator has caught 2 scent trails, left or right, the player choses(more art or lit), oh the player chooses the left path, as your ballator continues on it doesn't find the animal it was hunting but instead catches a field mouse, or a platypus.
This is just an idea to make hunts feel more inclusive and drawn out with more detail and interaction.

I kind of agree with you that hunting can be boring, however to do something like on Lioden would ask a lot more from our already strained admin team. Unless there was some sort of AI based system like Lioden has I don't think it would work too well. From personal preference I can say that I would rather not have hunts drawn out into several pieces. Working on the Big Game Hunts requires several images with the low success rates of capturing the big game item and I know it isn't supposed to be easy but it does get a little frustrating or annoying having to do so many images to hunt one creature in some cases.

I don't think I'd really change the hunting system at all. I like having the different regions for the different breeds to hunt in, it makes the group unique and provides a link to the ballator types through the activity. It might be easier to go back to the simplified Lg Pelt, Sm Pelt system instead of having to keep track of a ton of different pelt types but the way it now works. I don't see a need to fix something that functions and doesn't really seem to be broken but perhaps I've overlooked something and not realized it.

I was only using those games as a reference.

Keeping the hunting simple will be boring, being more extravagant and descriptive would be more interactive. The hunting system can be better, with a way to ensure no one goes away empty handed, because I do agree you do all this work with what to show for it if your eb always comes back empty handed. Finding a way to make the hunts more interactive would be better. 
But I disagree.
Finding a way to expand the hunting system and making ig fun would be the best route for the team. Again not exactly the way I described but just making hunting fun.

I think I like the hunting system as it is.
I do think it would be cool being able to hunt more extinct creatures and creatures that don't necessarily exist, but it's not something super needed either. I just love doing crossovers between EBs and Prehistoria. Either way I think it's just fine.

Hello all! The admin team has been discussing some updates to the systems before we reopen them (soon!) and we would love member feedback! We will be posting a series of discussion threads as we do this and encourage all members to post on these threads for ease of review. Discussion of these changes out of their threads may be missed-- so please keep them in the proper threads if you can!

Our first subject is: Hunting!

Are there any aspects of the hunting game mechanic that you would like to see change? Anything you love or dislike? Are regions too much? Are big game hunts confusing? Would you like drops/ items simplified (medium pelt instead of "zebra" pelt, for example)? Please let us know below! 

This thread will close one month from now (December 14th, 2021) so please post your thoughts before then! Thank you so much! <3

I think the one thing I would like to see changed is probably to bring back more simplification to the system, in that the prey lists are currently quite large and don't overlap between ballator types. An example of this would be when I first used the new hunting system in that I had a piece with a mountain and Desert hunting a red fox in the Americas and in the end couldn't submit for the desert to hunt because deserts cannot hunt red foxes. To me it would make more sense to have prey lists by region and then rank that match. For example 1. rookie types hunting in the Americas have the same prey selection 2. Venator types hunting in Africa have the same prey selection. I think keeping the size/complexity of the prey restricted to rank is a good idea, just that the current system of having each rank of regional prey list change with each type is too extensive, and I think that this would make it easier for the admins checking it as well because they would only have to look at one list of prey for each rank in a region as opposed to each prey of each rank of multiple types. (Not sure if I'm making sense here so please let me know if elaboration is needed xD). I think big game hunts are a good idea, as is with the concept of having infamous animals to go around and find. Rereading it now I was slightly confused at first as to why they had to be hunted natively and then realised that you only have to hunt one to get the season pass. 

A concept I do like the look of is applying the multiple-choice scenarios and events that beastgraveyard mentioned - could there be a possibility of limiting these RP type multiple event scenarios just to the big game hunts? (both to save admin time and member effort as well as make the BGHs stand out). So that instead of multiple attempts with low success rates, the participant receives back one of a many possible automated replies that lead them on a multiple-piece journey through tracking, seeing and then hunting the big game animal? It would make it more interactive in a way because the member cannot confirm exactly how the big game animal will act, and it might also give them a springboard to go from when creating their art and lit. (something like for example 'the wind direction changes and big game animal x smells your ballator's approach and decides to flee'  or 'as your ballator advances, big game animal x 's fight instinct kicks in and they land a successful kick/bite on your ballator) - how does your ballator react?. The member can take this response and then choose how their ballator would react which encourages thinking more creatively about the activity.

Hello all! The admin team has been discussing some updates to the systems before we reopen them (soon!) and we would love member feedback! We will be posting a series of discussion threads as we do this and encourage all members to post on these threads for ease of review. Discussion of these changes out of their threads may be missed-- so please keep them in the proper threads if you can!

Our first subject is: Hunting!

Are there any aspects of the hunting game mechanic that you would like to see change? Anything you love or dislike? Are regions too much? Are big game hunts confusing? Would you like drops/ items simplified (medium pelt instead of "zebra" pelt, for example)? Please let us know below! 

This thread will close one month from now (December 14th, 2021) so please post your thoughts before then! Thank you so much! <3

I think the one thing I would like to see changed is probably to bring back more simplification to the system, in that the prey lists are currently quite large and don't overlap between ballator types. An example of this would be when I first used the new hunting system in that I had a piece with a mountain and Desert hunting a red fox in the Americas and in the end couldn't submit for the desert to hunt because deserts cannot hunt red foxes. To me it would make more sense to have prey lists by region and then rank that match. For example 1. rookie types hunting in the Americas have the same prey selection 2. Venator types hunting in Africa have the same prey selection. I think keeping the size/complexity of the prey restricted to rank is a good idea, just that the current system of having each rank of regional prey list change with each type is too extensive, and I think that this would make it easier for the admins checking it as well because they would only have to look at one list of prey for each rank in a region as opposed to each prey of each rank of multiple types. (Not sure if I'm making sense here so please let me know if elaboration is needed xD). I think big game hunts are a good idea, as is with the concept of having infamous animals to go around and find. Rereading it now I was slightly confused at first as to why they had to be hunted natively and then realised that you only have to hunt one to get the season pass. 

A concept I do like the look of is applying the multiple-choice scenarios and events that beastgraveyard mentioned - could there be a possibility of limiting these RP type multiple event scenarios just to the big game hunts? (both to save admin time and member effort as well as make the BGHs stand out). So that instead of multiple attempts with low success rates, the participant receives back one of a many possible automated replies that lead them on a multiple-piece journey through tracking, seeing and then hunting the big game animal? It would make it more interactive in a way because the member cannot confirm exactly how the big game animal will act, and it might also give them a springboard to go from when creating their art and lit. (something like for example 'the wind direction changes and big game animal x smells your ballator's approach and decides to flee'  or 'as your ballator advances, big game animal x 's fight instinct kicks in and they land a successful kick/bite on your ballator) - how does your ballator react?. The member can take this response and then choose how their ballator would react which encourages thinking more creatively about the activity.

I do like the idea of adding the scenarios to the big game hunts, honestly that would inspire me more than just knowing I'd have to potentially make 4 or 5 pieces because I didn't roll the right rng number to win the first round. Would make for some interesting stories too.

for me hunting doesn't feel rewarding enough. i know its supposed to be a system you work with, but it just feels like its a lot as is for the little payout you get.(and yes i know rng plays a big part in that, but it just feels super difficult to get what you're specifically after)

i agree with beast in that something a bit more interactive would probably spark the fire in me to give it another shot, but as it is the system feels a bit cold compared to the other activities in the group. i understand that with such a small team its stressful to have another big system added to the game, just giving my two cents >.<"

going off of that though, a hunting event(perhaps similar in set up to how the realmwars was done) every once in a while with a mystical creature could be a good addition? something like a unicorn or dragon hunt with a one time big payout for anyone who completes it sounds like something i'd be game for personally.
it could even be implemented like the wild ballators, with it being discovered at random by members hunting.

in short i feel like the current system is just boring with a hunt, turn in, rinse, and repeat vibe and i cant really think of any way it could be improved other than condensing it down a bit and having a bit more interaction to it.

I like the hunting system but I think it could be easier to lower the number of required hunts for each level since 45 hunts to reach Venator level is quite a lot. By changing the number of required hunts, more members could access the Big Game Hunts. So I'm proposing that each of the required hunts for each level is lowered. I also like the previous ideas of adding in mythical creature hunts and the possibility of finding wild ballators/lost foals in the region you're hunting in. 

Rookie - None
Medial -  5 Hunts
Elitist - 15 Hunts
Venator - 25 Hunts

Another idea I had was for groups of ballators 2-3 in a hunt would have the opportunity to hunt bigger prey such as a Giraffe/Hippo in Africa, Moose in North America, Sun Bears in Asia, and so on and so forth.

Starting off I do like the hunting system, I like the separated regions with unique prey but after a while it gets a bit boring; draw/write a scenario, roll the hunt, get some random items or nothing, and repeat. Like how a few others have said adding some interaction might help, especially when you get to the higher levels/ big game hunts. Or adding unique hunts (such as fantasy or prehistoric creatures) either randomly, group event, or your ballator found a scent/track and unlocks the ability to hunt for it next time.
Maybe even adding more random items to potentially find during a hunt; Such as finding a lost/wild companion, a old piece of armor, or a lost foal.