Question - Breeding Changes - Difficulty 4.0 to 5.0

[Cymas]

This is a question for breeders on 5.0 difficulty.

Our unofficial is voting to go from 4.0 to 5.0; currently the decision is a unanimous yes, so it seems fairly well assured at this point.

I'm not new to breeding or anything, just trying to decide on my next plan of action. Through research I have determined that a "40 point build" is the practical maximum for most animals--that is, breeding an animal with 40 points in each stat, making it a base 240 (6 stats x 40 pts each). I would like to know if the "extra" 30 levels from the difficulty 5.0 increase changes this in any significant way. I'm personally inclined to say no, as those 30 points still need to be spread over 6 different stats (and the 7th wasted one for wilds) and that at best it makes it easier to achieve this goal. Obviously, I'm also not accounting for statistical outliers, just a general threshold.

I ask because I have completed the "colors" half of my current project and am now working on breeding in my high stats, and I'm wondering if it's even worth it currently or if I should wait for our server to increase difficulty before worrying about it.

[Jim359]

I do not understand the math in breeding when you start talking the probabilities of getting certain stats etc.  I do understand that 30 extra wild levels is going to give huge increases to stats.  When you find that 150 wild where all 30 new levels went into melee or hp, shooweeeeeeee, Katy bar the door.

[Cymas]

In breeding you have a 70% chance to inherit the highest stats from both parents. So if you have a theoretical animal with 40 points in stamina and another one with 40 points in melee, you have a 70% chance, if you breed them together, to get a baby with 40 points in stamina *and* 40 points in melee, making it that much stronger than either parent.

I've read research that taming a wild animal with 40 points in one stat post-tame, is the highest practical value you can expect. Obviously it's possible to get much, much higher, just not very likely. So the goal here is to get a bunch of these wild-born tames with 40+ point rolls in different stats and breed them all together to make one super animal.

My goal is to breed animals with very high stats in all categories, hence what I call the 40 point build. Each stat point is represented by a level, so the baby animal would, at the end of the project, be around level 240 when hatched, if it averaged 40 points in each stat. I know some are less important and sometimes called "glamour" or "show" levels, but RNG being what it is you can't pick and choose what stats you get out of wild tames, and I might as well incorporate every high roll I get into my builds, not just the ones I think are important to have.

However, the research I'm relying on uses difficulty 4.0 as the metric, because that's been the standard for a long time on The Island, which is the map I currently play and breed on. So I'm interested in finding out if I should be aiming even higher than I already am.

[Nim]

I tame and breed (or used to) pteras almost religiously on the Island. My highest point achievement was 37 in health, with other stats ranging from 34 to 36. My highest level achieved was a 218; she possessed like 4 out of 6 highest stats and inherited the melee so my highest level possible would probably be around 220-225.

With that said, I tamed a 145 ptera on the Center with well rounded stats across the board, and it was just about as good as the 218 on the Island. It is definitely without a doubt worth taming the 150s and, as much as I hate to say it, the 120s are now all worthless. If your bred 120 kids have a higher stat than some 150 tames, great! But once you get a good roll on a 150, you'll see that the 120s don't compare. It sucks.

[Cymas]

Yeah, my highest high roll right now is 35, which is respectable but not ideal. And actually, I wasn't accounting for the extra bonus levels, which on my server gives a whooping 45 total over a perfect tamed 120. So I would need to breed a base 224 animal just to compete, never mind outclass. Looks like I can probably retire my stat breeding animals for now and wait for our difficulty increase.

I honestly didn't think of that at all until you mentioned the 145 ptera for some reason, lol. It did seem off, I just couldn't figure out why.

[Kallor]

5 hours ago, Cymas said:

In breeding you have a 70% chance to inherit the highest stats from both parents. So if you have a theoretical animal with 40 points in stamina and another one with 40 points in melee, you have a 70% chance, if you breed them together, to get a baby with 40 points in stamina *and* 40 points in melee, making it that much stronger than either parent.

The baby has a 70% chance of inheriting the stronger stat from either parent, for each stat.  ie, 70% chance it will get the higher of the two possible hp stats, 70% to get the higher of the two stamina stats, etc for oxy, food, weight, melee and speed.

For your example there is a 70% chance it would get the 40 stamina, a 70% chance of getting 40 point melee and a 49% (0.7 * 0.7) chance of getting both 40 stam and 40 melee.

[Cymas]

Yes, that is basically what I meant, only I worded it poorly.

[waterKeeper]

6 hours ago, Cymas said:

I'm personally inclined to say no, as those 30 points still need to be spread over 6 different stats (and the 7th wasted one for wilds) and that at best it makes it easier to achieve this goal. Obviously, I'm also not accounting for statistical outliers, just a general threshold.

30 points plus taming bonus is more like 40 additional levels. 

[Cymas]

As I noted later on in this very thread, I forgot to account for the extra taming bonus levels and that's why my math was coming up short.