Bring back skill loss on bonded pets

Great point, you've convinced me I've been wrong this whole time.

The equation was unbalanced as soon as pet bonding was added. Stat loss won't bring it back into balance, it'll just affect incentives in a way that doesn't do the shard any good.

I agree. More stat loss isn't really the answer. A more fitting answer would be to reduce the amount of dragons a player could have. IE make a dragon/wyrm take 5 follower slots and a mare take 3. The tamer is an iconic and traditionally powerful class in UO. But it's currently worth atleast two of any other character in it's damage over time, tanking ability, and risk/efficiency. With one less pet it would still be way stronger than any other class.

Unfortunately I don't really think staff cares that much about class balance and would rather coddle generations of trammie tamers that they are afraid will threaten to quit the server.

If all templates can make good money then all templates should have the same risk. The only thing you should lose on death are resources, considering the leniency ALREADY applied on the shard. By all means, take it all away and I'll be a lot more on board with that but as Mes just said, making people quit would be the real result. Might as well balance it up by spreading that Trammie love around and let the people who hate balance and fair application of leniency, quit.

"A straw man is a common form of argument and is an informal fallacy based on giving the impression of refuting an opponent's argument, while actually refuting an argument which was not advanced by that opponent.[1]"
I'm refuting your exact argument by stating the glaringly obvious that 2.5% loss is practically nothing compared to full 100% unrecoverable loss of another template's primary weapon. I'm not refuting anything unsaid by you, but hey, way to throw out a statement you clearly don't fucking understand the meaning of.

More risk IS better because that's what everyone else suffers. Balance is part of History Perfected and if there's no balance for templates and everyone has to run one template (lol stun mage PvP and Tamer PvM) to stay on par, then shit is broken.

Blaise, re-read your post. I quote: "Yes, because the original 10% 'damage' risk is way too much for the impoverished tamers of the shard to handle. It's not nearly as easy to replace as a 500,000g slayer weapon. Right?" You rhetorically suggest that I am arguing that (1) tamers are impoverished; (2) re-training 10% skill lost "costs" more than a slayer worth 500k. Not only have I not made these arguments, I've agreed with the opposite -- tamers do enjoy disproportionate PvM benefits at costs comparable to those of a bard or mage. My argument is that encouraging tamers to partake in risky gameplay is good for the shard, and that higher skill loss incentivizes the opposite.

hint: arguing with blaise is a trap.

I've always thought 2 drags + a mare was too much, when I first joined the server it was balanced by the fact we could only bond one pet. Now with the tamer quest everyone can bond what they want pretty easily. I'd propose that once a pet that takes over 90 skill to tame is bonded it consumes an additional control slot. This would make tamers who run with unbonded animals still able to run their mare+2 drags combo while tamers who run with bonded pets can only use a mare+1 drag then a 1 slot critter. This would also allow tamers that do silly things like running a pack of 8 ostards still able to do that.

By all means this isn't a perfect solution, a mare+dragon is still a pretty damn powerful combination but it would open up a bit more risk for people wanting the extra firepower of more dragons. I find % statloss isn't a great solution, if peoples pets die they can just run a bandage macro lure a shadow elemental into their house and retrain the pets with hardly any drawbacks. It should of course be reinstated once Telamon feels were stable but in the long run I just don't think it does enough to dissuade tamers being by and far the strongest PvE template.

The assertion that PETS should have been granted relief from skill loss as well is unconvincing. As far as I can tell, PET skill loss is largely non-existent on this shard. Even the most active PETS tend to have just a few skill percentages to gain at any one time, which are quickly worked up. PET skill loss is effectively optional and apparently easily avoided on this shard. (Just keep 'em stabled eh?) In my opinion, the scales are already tipped in favor of tamers and their PETS.

I'll quote the home page again, "UO:Renaissance is an Ultima Online free-shard, based on Renaissance era mechanics, without the influences of Trammel."

P.S. A comment to a line in the quoted post: More generally, what are we trying to disincentivize with dragon stat loss? The current grace period has had two effects on me: (1) I'm more willing to fight back against PKs; and (2) I'm more willing to take my dragons into clusterfuck situations in which they're likely to die (e.g., champ spawns). Is there a good reason to try to discourage these things? READ: Oh noes, my pets might die in a clusterfuck situation! Whatever will I do?!?! God forbid that I'd have to actively use that taming skill again!

Meh, I don't think it works. In any event I agree that granting relief from pet skill loss was very (maybe too) generous.

UO is about risk management. In the sand box environment, you are allowed to piece together the tools and skills you'll use to mitigate risks to a level of your choosing. Invariably, everyone agrees that tamers are overpowered and given greater benefits. But, very few on the tamer side ever state that the template should face the same level of risk. Sure, training a pet takes time but so does equipping any other template. But somehow the risk is just too much for a tamer. Why? Most times it boils down to "that's just the way it is" or "as long as its them and not me" as the final refute. Ever hear of not in my backyard? I think NIMBY Is the tamer slogan.

At the economic level, if nothing ever broke, decayed or somehow lost, there would be little reason to do anything, the economy would stagnate, and gold inflation would skyrocket. Crafters would hit market saturation for non-consumables and tamers wouldn't have a reason to sell shiny slayers to the warrior who just lost all his gear from a great mishap. I suppose from that perspective we need to keep tamers protected so that warriors can continue to feed gold to the tamers!

This is a good idea.

That is a considerably larger pain in the butt than purchasing another 400g instrument, like a bard. Also, once resist sinks low enough, you would likely have to hold a private resist session. I think that is a fair enough death penalty compared to other templates, as long as the % reduction is large enough to matter.

Like I said in the other thread, I really think we have two seperate issues at hand. One is that there is no risk right now. The other is tamers are far and away the most powerful pvm template, regardless of bonding.

All this would be moot if the real problem was addressed; tamers do too much damage.

Once a high level tame is acquired(Dragon/WW/Nightmare), it could take a damage nerf against monsters(lets not talk about PvP, it's always different). You wouldn't even need stat loss. If the obscene damage tamers can do was balanced, nobody would care enough to want to punish tamers with stat loss.

The risk would be that when you die, you have to spend the time running and collecting your dead pets, and taking the several minutes it takes to ressurect them and heal them up afterwards and the bandages spent. This is roughly equivalent to the time it takes a bard to go buy or craft a new instrument. If you can't nerf tamer's damage, then bards need a buff to match tamers. The same goes for dexxers but dexxers are clearly a different story as the risk they take is way out of balance as well, and deserving of a whole other discussion thread.

I'm not arguing one way or the other on stat loss here, please keep that in mind. Personally, I think 2.5% is fine. My point is that if the damage tamers did was appropriate, arguing for stat loss on pets would be like arguing for mages to lose a couple spells out of their spellbook when they die. It's just a nuisance that doesn't do anything effective. A small amount of stat loss, like the 2.5% is fine, this just all seems like a pointless argument because the real problem isn't being addressed; their damage.

Reducing the damage Dragons, WWs and Nightmares do would also increase the variety of tamers out there because things like frenzied armies or scorpions with GM poisoning and other interesting and fun builds would be relatively better.


Thanks for reading.

They did already get nerfed actually, quite a long time ago.

Good, they can do it again, then. It's obviously still too much damage. Hopefully it would be just a nerf to Dragons, WWs and Nightmares, though. Nobody wants to nerf Keza

I'm sorry but "collecting your dead pets" is not risk, if you think that is "risk" then you're totally living in your own little world. Also, being able to res your dead pets and have them up and running at the cost of some bandages and a few minutes is not the same as replacing a slayer or super slayer instrument for a bard.

You can always just summon them to your house with the summoning ball, res them up and retrain them before you even leave the house.

Erm no, bards need to have the slayer instruments to be a fraction of effective as tamer. Those things cost money too.

What's the most expensive slayer instrument you've ever seen.

When you reply, my reply will be "case closed" because none are even remotely as expensive as medium tier slayer weapon.

To be fair, a slayer instrument is also not nearly as effective as a slayer weapon. A dexer can use GM weapons and have the same hit rate on a Balron, but a bard cannot have the same effective barding rate with non-slayer instruments.