While KTT has done their fair share of Taming Quests, we would like to toss some feedback to it to make it better. I, as co-gm of KTT, have spoke with many members of our guild, and most agree that they would be interested in seeing some of these ideas thrown into game. 1. Tracking changes As of now, tracking gives you one screen worth of items that you are tracking. If possible, we would like an option to scroll through screens so we can see more items in our area and range of tracking or We would like characters that have GM Tracking and GM Animal Taming to have an option to track Quest Animals 2. While the Taming Quest was intended for new tamers to spawn rare animals while they tame, many of us across the server (not only KTT) are killing the animals to spawn the quest animals elsewhere in the world. Knowing that killing a grizzly bear in spot A might spawn a grizzly bear in spot X, it makes it quite boring sometime to kill those animals. What we propose is the possibility of spawning something at spot A. Our first suggestion would be a different type of rare animal: Example: If you are killing grizzly bears outside of Covetous entrance, killing 10+ gives a chance to spawn a Lethal Grizzly Bear. A grizzly bear that has higher hit points, higher strength, and can poison you if he bites you. Not asking for green meat or statue, but a higher chance than normal for a plat would be nice. Lets say, 1 in 25 or so. Our second suggestions would be an aggressive pack of those animals: Example: If you are killing Polar Bears on Dagger Isle and you kill 20+ or so, 5 aggressive Polar Bears spawn near you and immediately attack you, with a chance of a magical weapon on one of them. We believe this will create an adventure and add to the enjoyment of the taming quest for people who are killing the animals, and not taming them.
I disagree. Scrolling tracking windows would make the skill more OP than it already is. It's nice enough to have a selection of Player vs NPC. Let's not get too crazy with that. I don't think anyone should have any advantage to tracking the quest mobs, at all. The quest was designed to be challenging and adding the ability to track only those mobs would make it so easy it would be bad. It is already far too easy as it is. Also disagree on more rare animals but I would like to see the 'special' variants of these mobs be highly aggressive. If a raging grizzly spawns, it should be beast and maim the crap out of anyone in the area. This will ensure that they aren't being farmed by 50/50 newb alts.
I'm glad you disagree Blaise. How many of these taming quests have you and your guys completed? The last time I checked, it is KTT who is leading the way on this taming quest patch. While I appreciate your love of the server, your dedication to trolling the forums, and your constant negative attitude; I must interject that KTT has a larger amount of time and energy invested in the taming quest than A^T does. I would further like to point out that the Taming Quest is something that our entire guild enjoys on a daily basis. We have people who spend hours a day locating quest animals, and that leads me to believe our feedback should carry more weight than your obvious negative trolling. Now, that being said, something to increase the interest level would be nice. I did like your idea about quest tames being a little more difficult, but Telamon told me this quest was not supposed to be limited to GM Tamers, but to allow new characters a chance to find these mobs. That being the case, I think a difficulty level should be added to the event itself. Possibly give people the option of selecting Easy Mode (no chance at rare items, but they can get bonding spots pretty easily), Medium Mode (how it is currently, easily done by 10 people with a chance at rare paintings, statues, plat, green meat, taming mask, etc), and then a Hard Mode (throw in some shadow wyrms, maybe a POD, etc with a chance at vanq weapon drops, higher plat chances, green meat... etc)
I've advocated for the expansion of the Tracking gump to give more than 12 results since well before the taming quest. Back in the day, it was a scrolling list, I believe, that would show a lot more than just the 12 closest. I don't think there's any need to add a special category for these special animals, though. That seems overpowered and ruins the spirit of the quest a bit IMO.
I must concur, Mes, that I do believe it was Blaise and his friends that did the first one. And if I remember, there was a video of it, and we did learn quite a bit from watching that video. Furthermore, I do thank Blaise for leading the way and giving everyone a heads up on what to expect in the event. But lets be honest for a moment, since then, KTT has done more of them than anyone else. Since the first one went down, it has been KTT who has done the most. Day in and day out you'll find us out in the wild looking for these animals. I am not asking that to get easier. It is easy enough. I am asking for it to be more entertaining. If you scroll up, as Blaise only half read, I would like more of a challenge. Give us some aggressive monsters that spawn wile we farm grizzlys or dire wolves...
Blaise, please go get a better job. This jealousy of my money bit is getting old. You seem to bring up my RL money every time you get a chance, and it has gotten out of hand. If you can't concentrate on your money, then obviously you need to seek better employment. If you need, I can give you some suggestions and even provide you with references. I don't mind. Also, while I did purchase an item or two on the UOSA server, to this date, I have not purchased a single item on this server. I suspect there have been some people around me buying things, but not enough proof to go to Telamon with. As far as my profession, I am a writer/editor/ghost writer for my full time work and I do tech support for Foxpro/Visual Basic/Quickbooks for my part time employment. Now, if you would please, go troll someone else; I am quite sure Telamon would prefer if this area of posts stay conducive with ideas about the server itself. Thank you.
Changing tracking to include more than 12 targets: Absolutely. I don't see a problem with this. Changing tracking to include only the special animals: I think the problem with this is then where do you stop with the new categories? I'm sure people would like to have an Easter Bunny filter too. Or a pilgrim filter. Or a dark elf filter. If we're going to go all custom mode on this system, then lets just put a search box in there. You then type in 'bear' and your character will just be on the hunt for bears. (Or characters named Bear Grylls.) Special spawn out there to make things more interesting: Eh, I dunno. The wilds of Britannia are already getting pretty fruity with all of this custom stuff.
Easter Bunny... what is that, 3 days a year? Dark elf? another 2-3 days a year? Taming quest animals are there every day. Not a good comparison. Sea monsters are currently a tracking option, and that compares better to what I am asking. There are somethings out there that are a bit fruity, I agree, but this would add a whole level of excitement to hunting down quest tames. And yes Blaise, your tone is negative on your original post.
Specifically where? I disagreed and did not insult anyone directly. I said it's too easy as it is and let's not get too crazy. You took offense to that? Or just didn't like it because I'm not patting your back about it? Seriously, that wasn't so hard.
Okay, as two civilized people then: If tracking at GM gives you 5 screens in every direction (for argument sake, not real number), then why should you be limited to only that one screen of info. If there are 100 NPCs in your trackable area, why not have it where you can scroll and see them all? Seems legit enough to me. I am not saying increase the range you track, but merely being able to scroll through everything you have tracked. Not really over powered. My guild tracks down these tames pretty easy. We have 2 scrolls completed that we intend to run later this week and 7 more that are well over 3/4 of the way done and about 15 more that are between 1/4 and 1/2 the way done. We no longer care about the bonding spots, per se, except for a few of us have alt tamers, but the chance at the Mask of the Wilds is driving us. But it has gotten a bit boring. I am looking for either a shortened time spent, or a more exciting time spent, and that is all. I do believe the ideas I am suggesting are easily put in place. Maybe I am wrong though, which is always possible. I remember running a private RunUO server back when it was a new thing, and me and a few friends played on it, but we didn't do anything as complicated as Telamon has done.
Well, I could imagine that there would be increased load on the server, from people running tracking in congested areas, as one potential negative impact. Not saying I know for sure, but a wild guess. The scrolling possible in prior eras was shit anyway because it also lumped players in with NPCs. All told, I would not be opposed completely to available 'pages' of the report. For example (presently it is 100 tiles in all directions at GM) at 50 Tracking, you get a bonus page, then another at 75, and a fourth page, max, at GM. If there's no drastic impact to the server, I could get behind that. However, the ability to avoid being tracked by running into a highly crowded area, would be completely nerfed by this. Whether we like it or not, this is a valid tactic when attempting to avoid a pursuit. The fact that we have this little flashing arrow and the ability to discern between players and NPCs already makes Tracking very powerful. So much so, that people think Mes is ghosting dungeons when in reality, all his PKs have Tracking. lol I still do not want finding these tames to be any easier. When Tel was building this thing, I was getting the impression that it would take a month or so for even one of these quests to occur. However, instead we had multiple runs in the first week, which to me screams WAY TOO EASY. I know you're driven for your goals like the super rare mask and more slots for other folks is always nice. However, I don't see this as something that should be run constantly by any means. It should take a lot of time and effort to get through it and so much so that the incentive to do so is not worth it once you have a comfortable number of bonding slots. It's not that I don't understand you, I just don't want anything easier. Sort of like the AMiBs which are great, but seem too easy now after we've all been through them a dozen times or so. This taming quest was supposed to be immensely challenging and aside from a few slips here and there, it has not been too much.
A scrolling list of tracked creatures/people would be nice. I've been thinking about this for a while. Sometimes you try to track what's in your current floor of a dungeon, but half the results page is monsters from a completely different dungeon or floor. Then you end up not actually noticing the boss monster which spawned two screens away because it was result number 13 or 14. Same with tracking animals to tame when training taming. Even though you can track several screens away, you often only ever see stuff that's right by you. If a dragon is a screen and a half away, I don't want my ability to see it blocked by the fact that I'm surrounded by rats or snakes. I'd even rather have a shorter range but be able see EVERYTHING in that range than have this current really long range but only see the first 12 results. The former tells you about your surroundings, is a useful for all player types, and is a "realistic" function that matches a new players expectations. The latter is kinda goofy and unpredictable unless you're using it to track players in uncrowded areas. AKA dungeon PK-ing. Not that I am anti-pk or anything. I love you all. Being able to specifically track quest tames, on the other hand, doesn't seem so appealing to me. It would make the quest insanely easy for people with GM tracking and nearly impossible for lone players without tracking who want to slowly find them while also enjoying other aspects of being a tamer. And knowing how people are, somebody will find a good way to run a macro that recalls all over the map on multiple accounts tracking the quest tames.
I can agree with you that it is fairly easy, which is why I proposed having some kind of something else with these animals in order to create a bit more challenge.
As to the difficulty of the event itself and wanting a hard-mode, isn't there a 2-man ironman challenge for it? I recall reading about it in the patch notes when it first came out.
The tracking gump in UOR was not well designed, it actually collects all the results, but then only displays the first 12 or 16 of them. I've not been a fan of that and would like to address it at some point. And yes there is a two man ironman system built into the Zookeepers/Wild Tamers event. It requires that only two people enter the gate and defeat the three bosses and loot the three chests. The reward for that accomplishment is a 10 and 8 platinum value trophy. Due to the difficulty of the event, we can arrange for a few players to test this on a development server to make sure it works properly, or alternatively you can request that a staff member monitor the Ironman Attempt to make sure everything goes smoothly
I think people need more time to learn the monster mechanics before they attempt that. The one quest attempt I've been in so far was almost a lost cause, and we had something like 9 people with a couple of dragons each
