Animal husbandry

Main / Skills / Nature / Animal husbandry

Description

Animal husbandry allows for the production (breeding) of new creatures, sometimes with increased quality, without the need to wait for new spawns.

Characteristics gained

Soul / Soul depth

Method

• Both of the animals you wish to breed must be not hungry. One must be a male and the other one a female. Lead one of them with a rope (note that some animals must be tamed to be led) and move it close to the other one. Right-click on the animal you are not leading and select the "Breed" option.
• Grooming also gives animal husbandry skill gains. Activate a grooming brush and select groom while right-clicking on a groomable creature. You can groom animals once per hour.

Notes

• Animals must be of the same species.
• If breeding fails, you will receive a message that the male "shys away and interrupts the action".
• If breeding fails or is successful and you attempt to breed again, the male animal will show that he's "not in the mood" until 45 real life minutes pass.
• Females will not breed while they are pregnant. Once the female gives birth, the animal can breed again.
• Animals do not have to be "fat" to breed, only "no longer interested in food" (when trying to feed them). Grass eaters will typically be in this state after a minute or 2 on grass or crops.
• Age is a factor in breeding: calves or foals will not breed, neither will young/early adolescence animals.
• Breeding increases a player's soul depth.
• Pregnancy times varies from 5-11 wurm weeks, regardless of species.
• Animals can have a miscarriage.
• If too hungry or low on fat animals can die when giving birth.
• Breeding animals with characteristics such as Champion will provide a chance that the offspring will also have that characteristic. This chance is dramatically increased when breeding two characteristics of the same type together. (Two Champions for example.)
  • The same applies to Traits as well.
• Longer blood lines will support more traits. (For example: A 4th generation dog can have up to 6 or so traits where a 1st generation dog (the first offspring from wild dogs) usually only have 0-3 traits.)
• The name is determined at birth, the traits are determined at breeding (noticed on a server revert on 2011-03-01)

Traits

Bred animals have a chance of having traits.(Enhancement/Deformity). Animals can have multiple traits. Examining an animal will show traits, if one has the required skill level:

• 0 skill: Horse's color is considered a trait.
• 20 skill: "It will fight fiercely." (High fighting skill?)
• 21 skill: "It has fleeter movement than normal." (Minor speed boost)
• 22 skill: "It is a tough bugger." (Withstands more damage)
• 23 skill: "It has a strong body." (Improved body strength?)
• 24 skill: "It has lightning movement." (Randomly increases speed for a short duration)
• 25 skill: "It can carry more than average." (Less penalty to speed due to high load)
• 26 skill: "It has very strong leg muscles." (Less penalty to speed due to slope? Does not currently do this.)
• 27 skill: "It has keen senses." (Increased agro range or possibly harder to tame?)
• 28 skill: "It has malformed hindlegs." (Minor speed penalty)*
• 29 skill: "The legs are of different length." (Major speed penalty)*
• 30 skill: "It seems overly aggressive." (Goes into frenzy when attacked)*
• 31 skill: "It looks very unmotivated." (Seldom uses speed boosts?)*
• 32 skill: "It is unusually strong willed." (Randomly refuses to follow)*
• 33 skill: "It has some illness." (Usually unridable. Penalty to body strength)*
• 34 skill: "It looks constantly hungry." (is twice as fast hungry again)*
• 39 skill: "It looks feeble and unhealthy." (Prone to disease)*
• 40 skill: "It looks unusually strong and healthy." (Has a higher resistance to disease)
• 41 skill: "It has a certain spark in its eyes." (Affects breeding? Will not die of old age? Disproved, see talk.)

(All "?" are unconfirmed, traits with a * are removed by a Genesis cast)

How traits are passed is explained on the forums

Inbreeding

With a recent change inbreeding is supposed to have a negative effect. It adds extra negative traits that don't count against the regular traits pool.

Inbreeding is mating with the father or mother or when the two animals have the same father or mother. Basically if you only can find two horses you'll be ok in three generations. But it might be better to mate with your neighbours horses.

See Rolfs forum post for details.

Caring

To prevent venerable animals from dying of old age you can care for them. To start caring stand next to the animal, right click the animal and select Care for. If you start caring for that animal you'll get the message:

You now care specially for Aged fat Tearbabe, to ensure longevity. You may care for 1 more creatures.

The amount of animals you can care for is limited by the animal husbandry skill of the player. If you can't care for more animals you'll get the message

You may not care for any more creatures right now. You are already caring for 1 creatures.

You can care for 1 animal and 1 extra animal for every 10 skill in animal husbandry. So at 40 Animal husbandry skill you can care for 5 animals.

To stop caring for all cared animals type the command /stopcaring in the chat window. You'll get the message

You no longer care for the one creature you used to.

To stop caring for a specific animal, you will need to right click the animal and 'care for' again.

Titles

• Drover at 50 skill
• Granger at 70 skill