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Genders & Reproduction [WIP]

Overview

SWEM horses have a basic vanilla breeding system in place for V1, including custom SWEM foals.

Breeding does not include any genders prior to 1.18.2-TBC. This update will not be backported to 1.16.5.

Genders

On birth or spawning all horses will be allocated a random gender between male (stallion) or female (mare). 

Mare / Filly
On birth or spawning, there is 50% chance a horse will be a female. A female foal would be a Filly and an adult a Mare.
Mares become fertile on reaching adulthood and are able to gestate and give birth to foals if bred to a stallion. Unlike stallions, mares cannot be made infertile, however a maximum number of births (breedings) can be specified via configs. Once this has been reached, the horse will no longer be able to breed unless the cap is increased or removed.

Stallion / Colt
On birth or spawning, there is 50% chance a horse will be a male. A male foal would be a Colt and an adult a Stallion.
Stallions become fertile on reaching adulthood and are able to offer covers to a fertile Mare, or they can be made permanently infertile via command or an Infertility Potion. Additionally, a maximum number of covers (breedings) can be specified via configs. Once this has been reached, the horse will remain a stallion but will no longer be able to breed unless the cap is increased or removed.

Gelding
Geldings cannot be born or spawned and are only obtained using command or an Infertility Potion on a stallion.
Geldings are permanently infertile and therefore cannot breed with mares. They will accept breeding items like Rose Feed, but will not be in 'love mode' to search for a partner. Attempting to use a breeding token on a gelding will be rejected with gray "meh" particles. 

Breeding (Love Mode)

Only the owner or OP player can initiate love mode - this is to prevent accidental or unpermitted breeding on MP servers.

Rose Feed will be disabled (feed item only) if breeding tokens are enabled via config. 

Right-clicking each parent with an open bag of Rose Feed to enable 'love mode'. Horses must satisfy the following criteria:

  • Must be tamed
  • Must be an adult
  • Must be fertile male / female - not a gelding OR have reached the maximum number of births / covers.
  • Must not be on cooldown or pregnant - readiness is indicated by a small green pixel next to the gender icon.
  • Must have or locate a suitable partner that meets the same criteria - opposite gender OR any horse prior to 1.18.2-TBC.

Love mode prior to 1.18.2-TBC has a limited duration - if two compatible horses are not able to path to one another or a compatible partner cannot be found, it will expire without a breeding or birth. As of 1.18.2-TBC the duration for love mode can be set via config per gender for duration OR enabling permanent love mode. Permanent love mode means a horse will remain actively in love mode until a compatible partner (opposite gender also in love mode) is located and a breeding occurs, after which they will go into cooldown and love mode will be disabled. This means MP servers where breeding items might be rare and expensive are not wasted if a delay occurs and being able to factor in realistic or RRP features of caution when mixing stallions and mares.

Gestation 1.18.2-TBC+

Gestation is the period of delay between breeding and birth (pregnancy). By default, this is 1800 seconds (30 minutes) but can be increased or decreased via config to extend or shorten the gestation period.

Following a successful breeding, mares will immediately become pregnant. On reaching 25% of their total pregnancy duration, a gestation timer will be visible under the gender icon in their GUI. It will increase gradually in increments of 25% until the bar becomes full at 100%. When full, birth is imminent and a foal will soon appear near the mare, dropping a small amount of XP. There is a very small (configurable) chance that mares will birth twin foals, by default only 1/1000 births will result in twins. 

Cooldown

Both Mares and Stallions experience a configurable breeding cooldown, during which they cannot enable 'love mode'. 

  • Mares: The default cooldown is 1800 seconds (30 minutes) and occurs after birth.
  • Stallions: The default cooldown is 900 seconds (15 minutes) and occurs after offering a cover (breeding).

The cooldown status can be seen by the red or green indicator next to the Inventory GUI gender icon.
Red means a horse is currently in cooldown and cannot breed, green means they are ready to breed again. 

Red - Cooldown Green - No Cooldown Gelding - Cannot breed
Genders_C.png

Genders_NC.png

 Genders_G.png

 The cooldown indicator appearing green may still occur if the max breeding cap has been reached!

Foals

Appearance
Foals have a smaller build with skinny foal-like proportions; long legs and slim bodies. They are born with one of a limited number of base coats that are selected from based on the general color of the parents. On becoming an adult, the foals 'roll' again from all adult coats that correspond to their foal color - excluding any secret coats.

Behavior
Foals will follow a random nearby adult horse when born. They will not wander away unless find or get to an adult horse. They can be led using a lead, and hitched to fences and hitching posts as normal.

Growth
Foals do not physically grow and remain the same size until they become an adult. By default, foals take 30 minutes to age up; the growth time can be adjusted in server configs. Sweet feed can be given to speed up the ageing process.

Needs
Foals cannot miss meals or drinks but will seek to obtain food and drink points like tamed horses. They will not sleep, pee or poop and cannot be ridden or tacked (including halters). 

Lineage 1.18.2-TBC+

This information only displays in the vet bag, it does not update in the lineage tab of the tack box.

There is a simple lineage system - this is purely data and foals receive no exact genetics or skills from their parents. On right-click it will display the name(s) of the direct parents - or SWEM Horse if unnamed. A newly spawned horse with no lineage data would state 'Unknown'. Any advanced tracking of further breeding lines would need to be logged by the player, obtained manually by checking the progressive ancestry of each generation, or via the horsedata.json file. Access to the horse data file would require a player to be the owner of a SP world, or have console access on a MP server.

Lineage is purely data - foals receive no advanced genetics or skills from their parents.

Secret Coats

Secret coats do not produce secret coat foals if bred. The offspring of secret coats will chosen randomly from all foal coat colors and the foal color will influence adult coat selection as normal. 

Future Features

For V2, a comprehensive system with in-depth genetics is planned, including:

  • Base coats with various genetic expressions (dilutions)
  • Overlay markings (facial, body, legs etc)
  • Genetic skills and affinities

This is not yet implemented and will not be ready for some time.

Known Issues

If you find an issue, please report it to our bugs channel on Discord. We ask that you look to see if your issue was reported first!

  • [~] Horses in love mode can get stuck trying to path from either side of walls/fences - won't breed or divert until a path is cleared for them.
  • [~] Foals can suffocate in walls on growing up. This occurs most in small stall spaces where they might be pushed into a wall by another horse. It is less likely to occur in larger stalls, and pastures.
  • [~] Foals cannot be led or name-tagged in multiplayer unless the player holds an enhanced key.

Changelog

View Changes

This is not a complete list of version changes / fixes. It is a changelog of relevant wiki-related version information.

MC Version Release Notes
1.18.2
 1.18.2-TBC

Genders Update:
Breeding requires a stallion and mare to breed (requires breeding item).

Breeding has a gestation period (pregnancy / delay) before a foal is born.
Breeding has a config for cooldown between breeding / births.

Simple lineage dispayed via the Vet Bag.
1.18.2-1.3.0 Foals will eat but cannot miss meals or drinks.
1.18.2-1.2.3
 SWEM Horses are now bred with Rose Feed instead. Sweet feed is a requirement in the feed system (for fully fed) - prevents constantly in love mode if handfed.
[Bug Fix] Foals and horses no longer kick on feeding and hurt one another.

[NOTES TO DO]

  • GESTATION TIMER
  • ICONS
  • LINEAGE
  • FOAL 
  • COMMANDS
  • Gender can be seen by right-clicking a horse with a vet bag in hand.
  • Gender can be seen by naming a horse with a nametag to display a small  icon by their name.
  • Genders are given to all horses: foals, wild (untamed) and tamed horses.
  • Genders cannot be changed except via command (requiring OP or permissions). ???
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