Limited animal commanding and more frequent nuzzling

[ethanwdp]

I've found animals to be completely worthless during a raid. I can't command them to go to a specific position, they spread out when following their drafted master (in this example, a melee pawn) and end up getting shot, and I can't tell them to get out of a dangerous area.*
Not only that, but they're worthless as domestic pets as well. Even my cats and Labradors rarely nuzzle and even more rarely bond, despite being around colonists 24/7.*

*As limdood pointed out, zoning avoids these problems.


My idea to help solve this is to up the nuzzle rate, nerf the nuzzle mood bonus to +2 instead of +4 to prevent it from being OP, and* allow limited control of animals.

*As GarettZriwin pointed out, small pets such as Yorkies have high nuzzle rates as is. Combined with Limdood's argument, raising the nuzzle rate would make them even more overpowered.

To command pets, I propose having two new training options. One of which is to move to a specific place, and the other would be to attack. There'd be a limited radius from where they could move, in which the center of the radius is the master.
To further emphasize the idea of a colonist commanding the animal (rather than it psychically knowing what exactly the master wants), there could numerous training "levels" for both of the new commands, directly affecting the chance of the animal listening and/or going to the correct location.


I think that being able to command an animal to rescue a certain pawn, provided that it's within the master's command radius, would be a nice addition too.


This way, pets would be more useful in combat situation while not replacing melee colonists. Pets will not be able to be commanded to haul a specific stack of items, to prevent them from becoming too useful. The radius would be medium-sized, perhaps the range of a rifle, so that the master would have to be nearby. Furthermore, animals currently have pitiful DPS, so they would continue being a supplement to a dedicated melee pawn rather than a full replacement. Also, unlike a melee pawn, they still wouldn't be able to use shields nor armor. As domestic buddies, a smaller nuzzle bonus and a higher nuzzle rate would balance out their food consumption. Because this would make animals bond faster, it would result in it being risky to lose a pet as their bonded pawn would have a soured mood (and potential tantrum spirals) for weeks.
Also, as a little detail, perhaps pet-like animals could tend to wander inside their master's radius? I always found it a bit odd that my dogs didn't actually spend more time with the people that they were bonded/loyal to. (To rephrase this, I find it odd that my dogs don't actually 'follow' their master around or stay near them. IRL dogs tend to hang out around their owners, why not in Rimworld? It'd be a cute detail.)

[Limdood]

you can currently use zoning to solve several of your problems.

You can easily have animals vacate any dangerous area.  Set up another zone (be proactive and have a shelter zone set up ahead of time!) and restrict animals to that zone.  Animals will complete their current tasks (for most of them, that will be wandering a few steps or munching some grass, but haulers will be slower to get to safety, just like pawns on long trips) and then move to the restricted zone.  This does not work at night while animals are sleeping, which frankly is a problem, but it DOES work otherwise (it might be possible to have animals trained in obedience wake up to follow their master, then turn off "follow master" and set the zone restriction)

Same goes for animal nuzzling.  Labs don't nuzzle much.  If you want mucho nuzzling, use cats and yorkies.  Set their restricted zones to high traffic hallways and workrooms (ONLY next to "saved progress" workstations, like smith table, machining, tailoring, research...not butchering, cooking, stonecutting, etc where interrupted work restarts the task).  This will maximize the number of pawns moving near the pets, while keeping them out of places like bedrooms, where they can disturb sleep.  Extended periods of time wandering around outside the base or hunting for food will drastically RESTRICT the amount of time that pets will nuzzle.

[GarettZriwin]

Yorks were nuzzle machines in A14, probably still are cuz they eat little so you can have more of them.

[ethanwdp]

you can currently use zoning to solve several of your problems.

You can easily have animals vacate any dangerous area.  Set up another zone (be proactive and have a shelter zone set up ahead of time!) and restrict animals to that zone.  Animals will complete their current tasks (for most of them, that will be wandering a few steps or munching some grass, but haulers will be slower to get to safety, just like pawns on long trips) and then move to the restricted zone.  This does not work at night while animals are sleeping, which frankly is a problem, but it DOES work otherwise (it might be possible to have animals trained in obedience wake up to follow their master, then turn off "follow master" and set the zone restriction)

Same goes for animal nuzzling.  Labs don't nuzzle much.  If you want mucho nuzzling, use cats and yorkies.  Set their restricted zones to high traffic hallways and workrooms (ONLY next to "saved progress" workstations, like smith table, machining, tailoring, research...not butchering, cooking, stonecutting, etc where interrupted work restarts the task).  This will maximize the number of pawns moving near the pets, while keeping them out of places like bedrooms, where they can disturb sleep.  Extended periods of time wandering around outside the base or hunting for food will drastically RESTRICT the amount of time that pets will nuzzle.

I actually hadn't thought of that, you've made a very good point. The nuzzle and safety concerns that I've brought up in the OP aren't as much of an issue as I originally had thought, but rather an issue of my own inexperience with the already present zoning system.

As GarettZriwin pointed out, some pets that nuzzle a lot, such as yorkies, require very little food. My original suggestion of bumping nuzzle rates would most likely be even more overpowered, as having a couple of yorkies restricted to high-traffic areas would cause a ridiculous amount of nuzzling.

[GarettZriwin]

As GarettZriwin pointed out, some pets that nuzzle a lot, such as yorkies, require very little food. My original suggestion of bumping nuzzle rates would most likely be even more overpowered, as having a couple of yorkies restricted to high-traffic areas would cause a ridiculous amount of nuzzling.

Haha, with proper York-nuzzle stations in right places with enough of them you can keep colonists 100% happy to get 25% working bonus and mental break immunity.

When colonists enters such zone all Yorks are like nuzzling him like manhunter wargs gangbang colonist when they spawn near him. This kinda calls for artwork in our Rimworld meme thread... 

[TheMeInTeam]

Raids at night have some limitations with zoning.  If you make animals follow master, they will not be very viable and put themselves at risk.  If you draft their master but don't make them follow, they will go to an assigned zone...then sleep there instead of fighting. 

If you then re-draft the master, it will wake them but they won't attack adjacent enemies unless attacked...even with "release" activated they will go back to sleep.  If you re-check "follow master" and leave release on, they will STILL ignore adjacent enemies and move away.

This makes them a very spotty tool for holding chokes.  They are easy enough to get to safety, but when you "release" and attack enemies, they really shouldn't ignore threats immediately in front of them.  I'm not sure they should ignore zone restrictions when set to follow master either, considering "unrestricted" would suffice there.

[FreyaMaluk]

I've found animals to be completely worthless during a raid. I can't command them to go to a specific position, they spread out when following their drafted master (in this example, a melee pawn) and end up getting shot, and I can't tell them to get out of a dangerous area.*
Not only that, but they're worthless as domestic pets as well. Even my cats and Labradors rarely nuzzle and even more rarely bond, despite being around colonists 24/7.*

*As limdood pointed out, zoning avoids these problems.


My idea to help solve this is to up the nuzzle rate, nerf the nuzzle mood bonus to +2 instead of +4 to prevent it from being OP, and* allow limited control of animals.

*As GarettZriwin pointed out, small pets such as Yorkies have high nuzzle rates as is. Combined with Limdood's argument, raising the nuzzle rate would make them even more overpowered.

To command pets, I propose having two new training options. One of which is to move to a specific place, and the other would be to attack. There'd be a limited radius from where they could move, in which the center of the radius is the master.
To further emphasize the idea of a colonist commanding the animal (rather than it psychically knowing what exactly the master wants), there could numerous training "levels" for both of the new commands, directly affecting the chance of the animal listening and/or going to the correct location.


I think that being able to command an animal to rescue a certain pawn, provided that it's within the master's command radius, would be a nice addition too.


This way, pets would be more useful in combat situation while not replacing melee colonists. Pets will not be able to be commanded to haul a specific stack of items, to prevent them from becoming too useful. The radius would be medium-sized, perhaps the range of a rifle, so that the master would have to be nearby. Furthermore, animals currently have pitiful DPS, so they would continue being a supplement to a dedicated melee pawn rather than a full replacement. Also, unlike a melee pawn, they still wouldn't be able to use shields nor armor. As domestic buddies, a smaller nuzzle bonus and a higher nuzzle rate would balance out their food consumption. Because this would make animals bond faster, it would result in it being risky to lose a pet as their bonded pawn would have a soured mood (and potential tantrum spirals) for weeks.
Also, as a little detail, perhaps pet-like animals could tend to wander inside their master's radius? I always found it a bit odd that my dogs didn't actually spend more time with the people that they were bonded/loyal to. (To rephrase this, I find it odd that my dogs don't actually 'follow' their master around or stay near them. IRL dogs tend to hang out around their owners, why not in Rimworld? It'd be a cute detail.)

some thoughts:
- I do support the idea of more nuzzling for other animals... and yes.. please nerf yorkies nuzzling rate for balancing purposes. I really like to be able to name all my dear alpacas and dromedaries, which have been so greatly useful.
- Combat positioning for animal units need reworking... In fact combat positions in general does... The game really needs some kind of remembering combat formations: you could include a straight line and other default positions... This could applied as well to animals.
I hate when you are going for a hunt and your animals decide to place themselves in front of the line of fire... Just dumb... 
- The animal tab need some additions as well... A way of remembering incident policies with the pawns in their restricted areas (basically "better pawns control" + "animal tab" mods)... This manual clicking of pawns restricting them in areas is what makes me just give up having larger amounts of animals and the corresponding lag, of course...
- and I really don't get why can't we just have some kind of animal armor... nothing fancy really... just some kind body protection would do... some restrictions could apply: only for dog-like animals perhaps?