We have lost a pack of herd animal : get them back, we will reward you.

[NeverPire]

I propose to create a world map event which will be proposed by tribal factions.
It will appear on the world map as a slowly moving event running away from a tribal base to yours or as an immobile one if the previous proposition is too complicated to integrate.

First, you will receive this kind of message :
"Dear friends, we have a problem, one of our herd has escaped and is leading toward you. Could you overtake it and bring it back to us ? We will reward you with some of our animals (or any other reward)."

Second, when you reach it, a map will open where you will need to catch them (as it is usually done to gather animals for caravans) before recreating a caravan to bring them back to the requester.

Third, tribals will reward you.

Variations  :
- a "named" (to be easily identified)  manhunter pack leader need to be killed to make the herd obey
- pirates have stolen the herd, you need to afford them before gathering animals (in this situation some tribals responsible for following the thieves and waiting for help can join the battle to help you and if they survive bring back themselves the herd to their village)

[doomdrvk]

How exactly would you be able to keep track of animals heading in a certain direction, seems like they would probably wander off instead of following a straight path. And if the event isn't moving I doubt the animals would stay in one place as well.

Though I do see a way this could work if there was a device making them stay in the area, the event would be a bit different, instead of them escaping they decided to head towards this psychic phenomenon. Manhunter predators would also be attracted to this device (the difficulty of the mission). The one problem I see with the suggestion I just made is that it would have to be close enough to a base while also not being close enough for it to make sense for your animals to move towards it as well.

[patoka]

How exactly would you be able to keep track of animals heading in a certain direction, seems like they would probably wander off instead of following a straight path. And if the event isn't moving I doubt the animals would stay in one place as well.

Though I do see a way this could work if there was a device making them stay in the area, the event would be a bit different, instead of them escaping they decided to head towards this psychic phenomenon. Manhunter predators would also be attracted to this device (the difficulty of the mission). The one problem I see with the suggestion I just made is that it would have to be close enough to a base while also not being close enough for it to make sense for your animals to move towards it as well.

and also you couldnt bring your own pets or you'd lose control over them aswell, i assume.
but i do like the idea of having one or more manhunters among these animals which you have to eliminate without shooting the friendly animals. i guess your reward would be dependant on how many and how healthy animals you bring back to them? that way only permanently injured animals and other, slowly healing and very deep wounds would be an issue (and death of course)

[NeverPire]

It could work too.

And what do you think about this version :
A pack of dangerous carnivorous are pursuing the herd. When you reach the encounter map, the herd is around the center of the map, fleeing and you and the carnivorous pack appear on opposite side. These carnivorous would have the specificity to not be manhunter directly but "herdhunter" (they hunt only animals of the herd) and to turn  manhunter if you begin to attack them.

The reward dependant of the health of animals could work too for this situation.

[patoka]

i guess the main problem is that it is hard to implement, dont you think?
herds of animals fighting eachother is already quite janky, just think of the last time you tried to counter manhunter groups with your own army of warbeasts

[NeverPire]

It depends. Some versions seem easy to implement for me.
As i don't know the code used for Rimworld, I can't calculate what is the most harder to implement.