Competitions

[Hazel]

Hey darling. ^^ We've been geeking out about training and breeding for ages, but I'm interested in the competitions and what they will look like. What details can you provide?

[larissar]

This is a big topic! I'll give a summary answer but feel free to expand into other specific questions.

There are over 13 different disciplines if I remember correctly. Each discipline is broken down into levels and rankings. High level events are more prestigious with bigger money rewards and better prizes. Rankings are to separate good competitors from not quite as good competitors. Every horse will have a level they should be competing at, but they are free to enter any event at that level or higher. They cannot enter events below their level/rank. So if you have a very well bred young horse who will be entered in events for the first time you'll enter low level but higher rank events. Whereas a young horse from less talented breeding will be allowed to compete in the lower rank events. This is designed to help balance out the performance of horses to give everyone a chance to win.

Each event looks at specific athletic stats of the horse, which are influenced by the horses physical stats. So for example a super fast shetland pony likely won't ever outrun a super fast Thoroughbred.

You can enter events all day long but every event will cost you time, so unless you hire a rider to compete on the horse for you then you will be limited in how many events you can enter per virtual day. Some events are quite quick, but others take much more time.

Horses and riders both earn experience points depending how well they do in the events. These points are used for End of the Year Awards, and other daily rankings.

When you enter an event your horses score is determined at that moment in time, so if you enter an event, and then train you horse, you won't get any extra bonus from training done after entering the event. You won't know your horses score until after the event is judged. I'm debating giving some kind of feedback to hint at your horses score though.

In the old game events were judged when there was 10 entries, or if it was an unpopular event then the host could judge the event at any point as long as there was at least 4 entries. We will likely continue with this in the new game but that is up for debate in alpha testing.

Players with the necessary skills host the events. You are limited in how many events you can host per day based on the Show Management skills.

I think that covers a big section of competitions, but ask away if you've got more questions

[Hazel]

Sounds like there's gonna be some special shows, in addition to the regular ones. Can you tell us more about those?

What other rewards and benefits will be had from competing?

[larissar]

There will be combined traing shows like 3-Day Eventing and occasional big events run by the game similar to the Triple Crown in horse racing. The rewards for these will be a very large purse (prize money) and probably a trophy and rare item.

Entering in competitions is a great way to earn experience, win money and items, and most importantly to prove the ability of your horses.

[GeayVarrey]

First of all, everything I've seen and read about the game makes me incredibly excited to see it being finished

I was just wondering how does the competitions mesh with the turn based game-play otherwise? I'm guessing that even though time for competition will be taken out of the players' days, the competition won't run until the designated number of entries has been filled. Does that mean you might end up having a competition 'hanging' for a while until the numbers are filled? Also, you mentioned that suitably skilled players may host shows, will there be admin generated and hosted shows as well?

[larissar]

I'm always thrilled to hear when someone is excited for the game

Yes there could be instances where a competition will hang for a while. If a show hangs for too long it will automatically be cancelled and entry fees returned. Although I don't see it being a big issue because an event needs only a minimum of 4 entries to run.

Yes there will be automatically generated events to fill holes where player created events are missing. This will be an automated process.