Board Thread:Suggestions forum/@comment-31507215-20170710234637/@comment-31507215-20170713150949

HonoringElbereth wrote: Under a system like this, you'd definitely need to offer the option of "Train" for players to use on their horses. "Train" could be used, as you've said, to accustom a horse to fearful things (it would be awesome if it would also enable a horse to fight). I think a corollary to it would be a "Loyalty" option: regular love from the owner, done with pats and feeding treats like apples, carrots, and/or sugar, would form a bond between horse and rider. The Loyalty rating would also affect whether or not a horse/pony will bolt: think of Samwise and Bill the pony: Bill faced a lot of scary things because he loved Sam; it took the Watcher in the Water at Moria to overcome Bill's loyalty and make him flee in terror... too, Sam wasn't holding onto Bill at that point, but it's pretty clear in the book that the Watcher was just too big of a terror for Bill to face, even with his love for Sam.

So, Train would grant Bravery through training aimed specifically to inure a horse to scary foes; Loyalty would grant Bravery through the owner treating the horse well (treats, pats, etc.). Both could be combined to raise a horse's bravery even higher.

Side note: given that a rider's health gets subsumed into the horse's health (which is why horse armor is important), it would make sense too if horses could be trained to fight. Perhaps one could equip a horse with Battle Horseshoes, which would grant a random chance that the horse would paw or kick in a fight, doing damage to the enemy in front of you---and the odds it will do so go up, if you've Trained your horse.This could be further affected by material used for the Battle Horseshoes, perhaps using 3 grades: iron, faction steel, mithril (or some such system, doesn't have to be those three materials), with the better material translating to increase in damage from a paw/kick.

Addendum: "Loyalty" should be gained by a once per day action that adds an increment to the Loyalty. I think if it was just "how many times I can give a treat/pat," players would use that to dump a ton of apples, etc. on the horse and max the Loyalty rating. Instead, you can only do it once per LotR day... so that it would take many days (doesn't have to be consecutive) to build Loyalty to a high rating. Loyalty would stay at the rating... but if you hit your horse, it drops the Loyalty a point for every hit. Those are interesting ideas - here is my take on them:

For the first part:  I was already thinking about being able to train them, (see the post right before yours) but through more manual methods, as opposed to just clicking a button. (If that is not what you were thinking, then I apologize.)  As for the loyalty concept, that is a good idea, but I don't know how well that would work. I will, however, add a link to it in my main post when I edit it next, because it is worth considering.

For the side note:  I don't quite understand what you are talking about about health. It sounds like you are saying that the horse's health becomes the rider's health. If that is what you mean, I don't think that that is correct. As for the horseshoes and kicking, it is a good concept, but has been suggested many times before.

For the Addendum:  That makes your first proposal work a little better, but I'm still not sure.

I appreciate the suggestions, though!