To mount or not to mount, that is the question...of the week!

Conan Exiles General Discussion
44

Thanks @Ignasi for the poll. I was really curious to see a summary of what I was seeing in my thread about the use of horses. I was really curious, because I was so excited for them at first, then just realized after a while I was just using them for decoration and ambient sounds.

I have one “tied up” to my small well, right where I log in each day. I love seeing it there, taking a drink.

After admiring it and seeing my beautiful stables on the ground level below, with a few more horses grazing outside on the grass, I grab my thrall and run off to start my day.

I still love horses. I just have no practical interactions with them, because they are too restrictive to my game play. Can’t interact with anything mounted. Trying to interact with the horse makes me mount and my thrall to stop following (yes, I need to get used to long press to avoid mounting, but that is different than all other interaction). Terrain objects are frustrating when riding. Archery is limited while mounted. Thrall hunting is a pain. Encumbrence builds useless when mounted. Horse gets in the way when following and a battle starts. Horse clipping into me all the time when following. Super dangerous around cliffs and even small drops that would normally be super easy to jump off safely, without grabbing the cliff: eg: falling damage is much worse when mounted.

So they are a wonderful decoration for me. I hope this is helpful :slight_smile:

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45

funny how some only talk of nerfing thralls, fix them then let us see how useful they are before we just nerf them. Again not all of us take thralls every where and again not all of us have power thralls. I as a player engage all the time, again fix thralls not nerf them.

46

I went with Horses are really only to sit at my base and be a decoration. I do not enjoy riding them most times. They are slow to get around most of the areas unless you are in newbie area, get stuck on the smallest of rocks and branches. They follow way to close if you have to get off them oh which you do every 2 mins as you can not loot on a horse, you can not thrall on a horse, you can not do bosses unless they are outside a dungeon.

Oh and of course you can not take your thrall with you, if I want to farm I use a bearer if I want to have company on my adventures a thrall is better use and is not sniffing my butt every time I am not sitting on it.

My first horse died to a purge of Cultists on the newbie river, my second one died to a band of wolves up north, 3rd to a saber cat, 4th, 5th and 6th sitting in a stable safe and sound, pretty and proud of their new stables.

I will be honest never wanted horses, map is way to small for them and they just are in my way. I would sooner adventure with a thrall or bf, horses just making playing harder and with all the issues at moment just not worth my hard earned time in game but they sure are pretty to look at.

2 Likes
47

We use our horses for quick map scouting (been playing since EA and STILL haven’t explored the whole map) and to get between our main settlements and outposts. I also use them for corpse runs, taking advantage of their “return home” function once I get back to where I was.

TBH I rarely use them for combat, owing mostly to my preference for daggers, which I cannot use while mounted. I would be open to seeing more combat options while mounted. I would also love to see Elephants and Rhinos added as riding options. If I could bind a button to activate a “mount” attack, I’d love that too (press kick/ctrl to have the mount rear up to kick/stomp/etc). Forgive me if that’s already in-game though, it just shows how much I actually use them.

Of course, the biggest wants I have are the ability to have a follower with me along with the mount and the ability to drag bound thralls while mounted. Then I’d use the dang thing all the time!

1 Like
48

I’d be down for this if it meant being able to take my favorite Thrall with me.

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49

If horses had the ability to travel at their standard speed while the player was over encumbered then i would use them.

I prefer staying away from horses in pvp, an archery build can melt a horse rider, plus u just make them run into some rocks or a tree.

Even when scouting i still do it on foot so i can carry a foundation to see land claim.

So for me to use horses…

  1. remove their speed restrictions when overweight.
  2. allow building placement when on the back of them
    EDITED
  3. Allow thralls to be dragged from horseback

@Ignasi

2 Likes
50

You know, its fairly hard to say, they shouldn’t have done this, they should have done that, when it comes to very different aspects of the game and what Funcom can add. I wont even begin to pretend to know the complications of adding mounts to the game vs. adding new areas of the map and such.

But, I have to agree with you in some sense.

Mounts, as fun as they were, seemed like such a weird, awkward side project of Conan Exiles that really served no purpose, had no real place, and after implementation, further proved it didn’t really have any place or logical application to the game.

When on the flip side, new biomes to explore and build in, more survival aspects, more dungeons. There are so many things that could have got labor thrown at it that would have been so exciting and expanding on the game.

And instead… we got mounts… Because a small handful of people too used to common mmo’s ‘thought’ we needed mounts, because prolonged travel on foot across the land in a survival game was to daunting…

Obviously the mounts couldn’t trivialize the survival aspect of the game so they were built with restrictions and arn’t a terribly great means of transportation, and we got exactly what this recipe built up to:

Mounts that are in a game that don’t need mounts. A fun mechanic, and admittedly well designed mount movement, but out of place and serves no purpose. There are so many more ideas that would have fit and expanded the Conan Exiles game play so much further… and we got some weird out of place, tacked on addition that lost its novelty in the first couple of weeks.

I dunno. The whole thrall leveling system, horses, and follower changes really dragged my motivation for the game through the mud a bit and currently on a bit of break. It is what it is and sorry if I sound a little bitter. It just seemed like mounts were a unnecessary addition that only got traction because people whining for their inclusion, and due to that, we have this uninspired addition that really serves no purpose other then to handicap the servers and game in other areas.

3 Likes
51

Why is this not positiv? Only half of the server (private and official) are PvP server? So they wasted their time for PvP related stuff?

52

Rather than drag a thrall with a rope the thrall should be converted into an inventory item (on the horse) and shown as a bound rider behind the owner.

Red Dead Redemption 2 does this well.

5 Likes
53

This is the solution.
Never played RDR2 or 1 but that would make the most sense to me. Plus you cut down on the physics bombing out. I honestly feel this is the route they should take.

I also thought if I drag an unconscious or conscious person behind a horse for even a short distance, there will be very little left to enslave… :rofl: :joy: :rofl: :joy:

:metal: :smiling_imp:

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54

I’d believe that this would make horses more attractive to a player that does not see their use at the moment (what little of use there is at the moment, admittedly).

55

PvP still uses the same combat mechansim you have everywhere else in the game…

So what is only made for PvP only?

And again: in other games, you dont barely use a mount… you use it most of the time.

And If Funcom would change the mount to be a mount, even I would use it most of the time.

And not never or barely.

56

All the processes for nerfing stuff are mostly PvP related. All the time FC put into the game to prevent undermeshing. All siege the siege stuff. All processes to balance new stuff.
I don’t say this is only for PvP but they invest a lot of time to balance PvP.

I have played other games with mounts (WoW, ESO, Skyrim, Witcher, etc.) and I have not used them the most time, I used them when ever it made sense.

I accept your point of view as your personal experience, but I do not accept that you try to make your personal experience as the only right or true point of view.

What’s o.k. to you is a offence for some one else and vice versa.
We should try to accept that there is always another way to look at particular things.
The game at all and all the upcoming stuff is always a compromise of the developer to hundreds of different ways to play this game.
And even it is a compromise not every decision will keep all players happy.

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57

I have used the horses only to decorate the base.

A gazelle is more ‘useful’ for the load it can carry for me.

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58

I see it from an economical viewpoint & developer viewpoint.

Normaly a company dont invest time (=money) in a feature, which is barely used by anyone. Hence, why i see this voting as NOT sth positive.

We get a thrall limit, because 12% of player are happy with mounts in the current state.
46% dont need or want them and another 42% barely uses them.

Thats NOT GOOD. Instead FC could have bug-fixed the game more or made the gods working again or added the last dungeon or or (its not like the game has no bugs or is 100% finished)…
Instead we got something, which was barely asked anymore and is barely used and on top, we get a thrall limit (which no one really asked for).

And thats why this voting is for FC NOT positive. Imaging investing time, money and manpower in sth which is barely used.

PS.: I am not offended by your viewpoint or statement or whatsoever (or from anyone else). And if you get offended from my statement, then dont read anymore from me.

PPS.: As a developer & part product owner, I also have to make decisions which features are coming and which not. And if only 1 customer ask for a feature, where we would need a massive load of time, we will not make it.

PPPS.: As I and many others wrote, change the mount to be a mount. Like many other games have it… Then more people will use it and the voting poll would look different. I really hope that Funcom reads this thread with the complains and will turn mounts into real mounts.
And you didnt use your horse in Skyrim to travel to unknown places? Ok…

2 Likes
59

More than once ive thought about creating a herd of feral gazelles and placing them in some highly traffic’d area…

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60
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61

Personally I do love riding the horse. I like that they level up along with the thralls and pets as well.(some say it’s pointless or tedious…I don’t care, I prefer the option be there than not)
Now I really try to find ways and reasons to take a horse out and play the game with them because they are very enjoyable to ride. It really feels like I’m controlling a horse. It doesn’t feel video gamey in any way.(other than the odd pebble stutter)
They seem very well made and I do have fun doing mounted combat when possible.
That being said, I just end up taking a regular thrall most of the time so I can engage in combat in dungeons or when out for loot runs. As the horse is not really good for dungeons or for consistent combat.
If I’m out to capture thralls, I also take a regular thrall as a horse cannot help in knocking out other thralls. Nor can I drag a thrall on a horse either.
And finally when I’m out to farm, I got my encumbrance to 40 max for the momentum perk, and I FARM BIG! Which means I farm for a long time and fill my inventory up well. And we all know you can’t ride the horse then.

Now I still love that they are in the game as they are incredibly well handled, and feel great to ride and use.
I certainly would hate to see them be stripped out due to uselessness.
But they do need some purpose.

  1. Maybe allow riding a horse with 40 encumbrance/momentum perk for farming purposes. If you don’t have the momentum perk, the horse and you work as always. But if you have the 40 points in encumbrance with the momentum perk you burn stamina as you would when running with max encumbrance. Seems pretty fair if you got 40 points in encumbrance.
    OR simply make a saddle that allows for Bearer level carrying space or better. I mean a 40 slot saddle would be pretty nice as well.
    Now the horse is usable for farming

2.Allow for using the truncheon as well as dragging thralls while you ride.
Now the horse is usable for farming thralls.

3.Finally, If you could somehow allow players to have a thrall or pet to follow behind as we ride a horse. It would make a world of difference in using horses more often.
Now if having a follower behind a player riding a horse is too hard to program, maybe figure a way to allow players to have a human thrall mount the horse with the player? It wouldn’t be that out of place to have 2 people on a horse.
Either way you could technically make it where you don’t actually ever have 2 thralls following you. As long as you are on the horse, you and the horse are one unit, and then you have the one follower like normal. As soon as you dismount, the horse could just go into guard or scout mode, and all the single follower rule still applies.
Being able to ride a horse AND take another thrall with you when you go out and about be incredibly useful.
Any one of these would certainly make the horse more usable for me.
I cannot speak for others. But I would really like to see more reasons to use the horse within the context of the game.
As it is, even as much as I enjoy riding the horse, my horses mostly just chill at my base. And I do really try to figure ways to make riding the horse part of my gaming experience. I truly enjoy riding the horse. Sadly it ends up being mostly for very casual things, like searching for spots to build, or for some very specific and super light farming tasks (like getting puffball mushrooms)
Inevitably I just end up taking regular thralls majority of the time.

P.S. It would be very helpful if I could open up the large gate doors while I’m mounted on a horse.
As it is, whenever I come home to my base riding a horse, I have to stop, get off my horse, so I can open the gates. It would be a nice to be able to open gates while mounted and ride into my base.

Aloha,
Aaron

4 Likes
62

The gate point is very well put. I noticed this as I assumed I could just ride thru and was surprised that I couldnt when I hit square (ps4… guilty as charged).

Reading this thread has motivated me to get back on the horse!

1 Like
63

I love to mount but i love to farm more. I spent 95% of my game full encumbrance, so taking a horse with me is a problem. If at least my horse could carry me over encumbered, maybe, i would use it more. I love the idea of horses, i don’t want to play the game without them, i love to have stable in my house and most of all i love to listen to them when i do my things inside my base. Even if the horse thing stays the way it is, i am ok with that. I wish however their role in my game was more practical. Thank you

2 Likes