Horses' courses

[DocRailgun]

Even when citing a source that says just that?

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

It's a bit rude to respond to any question with, "It doesn't matter."

[simply Nathan]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

You allow barbarians that weigh over 800 lbs?

Barbarian. ST 17-30, SM+1.

Horse. ST 20-25, SM+1.

I don't see where the weight figures into the equation, since a 100-lb SM 0 human and a 300-lb SM 0 human both eat $6 worth of rations in a day.

I'm just saying to apply the same level of abstraction to both humans and animals in terms of food consumption. If you never bother with human rations, never bother with animal rations. If you don't scale human feed upward for gigantism then don't charge more to feed the horse.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by DocRailgun

Even when citing a source that says just that?

Kromm clarifies authors' intentions, not reality. And if I asked a question on how to do something, answering, "It doesn't matter." is in effect saying that my desire doesn't matter. It's rude.
I understand that you probably meant OP may not really need or enjoy the added detail. You just hit a nerve.
I've probably been coming off a bit more aggressive than usual in the last day or two. Housemates won't shut up when I'm trying to sleep, among other things.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Kenneth Latrans

Barbarian. ST 17-30, SM+1.

Horse. ST 20-25, SM+1.

I don't see where the weight figures into the equation, since a 100-lb SM 0 human and a 300-lb SM 0 human both eat $6 worth of rations in a day.

I'm just saying to apply the same level of abstraction to both humans and animals in terms of food consumption. If you never bother with human rations, never bother with animal rations. If you don't scale human feed upward for gigantism then don't charge more to feed the horse.

Eating like a horse is hyperbole, never remotely real. Human Giants barely approach SM+1, and even then mostly as it relates to combat hit bonuses.
Average human 150 lbs; giant humans 400 tops; mules up to 1000 lbs. That's a big difference.
I thought gigantism included double armor and supply weight which should include food.

[tshiggins]

Originally Posted by Rasputin

There's a little guidance in DF16:



This indicates that food for beasts is to be glossed over. But for a more precise answer, Google-fu gives me a carriage works that feeds its beasts "approximately 10-12 pounds of feed and about 1/3 of a bale of hay each day." Another page notes that "[g]ood pasture and access to water will probably take care of the needs of all but the hardest-working mules."

So, their mule can eat grass along the way. Now, if you're in the arctic or a desert, the mule is pretty much toast, but then, you sentenced it to death by being so stupid to take a mule into the arctic or a desert to begin with.

I worked through the logistics for a mule caravan, for my old GURPS Harn campaign, once, and this looks about right for a pack animal that will travel 10-15 miles, per day.

You can substitute grazing for the hay, but working animals need the concentrated protein and calorie content, in grain. They also need a lot of water -- so much so that, if they can't drink from streams, they can't travel more than about three days. They can't carry enough water for themselves, for more than that. If they must carry water, after two it's no longer profitable, because they can't carry enough valuable goods to cover the costs.

Equines can work about six hours a day without problems, and can be pushed (under good conditions) out to 8-9 hours. They need to be watered and curried (to hydrate and cool down, and to make them feel good), and spend about 30 minutes eating the grain. After that, they need several hours to graze -- which (on a normal summer day) brings them to about dusk.

Do all that, and they'll allow themselves to be peacefully picketed -- especially if given a nose-bag with a half-pound or so of sweet oats they can nibble.

By contrast, oxen work no more than about six hours a day, and require another four to six hours to graze and chew cud, because they eat about 20-30 percent more grass or hay (IIRC). Grain doesn't help reduce that time, all that much. They're also much slower, and can make eight miles per day, or 10 at the most.

A properly shod, fed and collared draft horse can accomplish about 75 percent more work, in a day, than an ox, but requires 40-50 percent more resources to care for and feed. The up-front cost of a good draft-horse or mule was also prohibitive, for most people.

(A healthy horse or mule gave a good return on the initial investment, but one had to be able to make that investment in the first place, and most people couldn't.)

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Kromm clarifies authors' intentions, not reality. And if I asked a question on how to do something, answering, "It doesn't matter." is in effect saying that my desire doesn't matter. It's rude.

It's also pretty obvious that if some one is asking for a specific answer from a game that tends to generalize, that they questioner probably wants the specific.

Specially considering they asked for a secondary specific which is not at all covered in the generalizing game.


PS: In case my sleep dep is clouding it, I'm backing Flyndaran.

[simply Nathan]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Eating like a horse is hyperbole, never remotely real. Human Giants barely approach SM+1, and even then mostly as it relates to combat hit bonuses.
Average human 150 lbs; giant humans 400 tops; mules up to 1000 lbs. That's a big difference.
I thought gigantism included double armor and supply weight which should include food.

GURPS Bio-Tech has rules for up-scaling the food and water needs of larger-SM characters. The basic set doesn't go into any detail beyond a 10% upcharge on normal clothing (yielding $132 outfits rather than $120) while DF1 has a listed doubling for armor and is vague about changing anything other than optionally using larger melee weapons. DF Loadouts expands the rules for enlarging other equipment for larger characters but I can't recall if it actually says giants need to eat more.

A human with Gigantism, in DF terms, counts as a creature of the same size as both an ogre and a horse. In which case if the human barbarian "only" eats twice or four times as much as someone between 4'7" and 6'00", the latter two should have levels of the Increased Consumption disadvantage if they need to eat more for their size.

We don't smoothly scale the weight of armors to the expected body weight of characters and neither do we for rations. It can certainly be done and if you want to get that granular, more power to you.

What I'm saying is that whatever rules you use to scale food requirements for people should be the same ones you use for your animals, from an abstract notion like "it's already part of you Cost of Living" all the way through "$2.00 per meal for every 150 lbs your character weighs, keeping fractions to the hundredth of a dollar".

Size Modifiers are always going to do weird things on edge cases, due to their coarse granularity, and would still do so if they were based on meters as much as they do on yards; the exact cutoff points for the weirdness would just be shifted a little bit.

[Flyndaran]

Size Modifiers are very blocky. I prefer basing food requirements on lean mass scaled to the 2/3 power which is close enough to reality for gaming. With adjustments for activity and muscle-fat ratios and species idiosyncrasies.

Of course very few gamers would want even that much detail.

If we assume SM+0 150 lb human norms need X weight of food, then SM+1 should equate to an equivalent 507 lb giant and 2.25 X.

900 lbs equates to 3.3 X.

SM+2 averages 1200 lbs for 4 X.

Okay, I guess I was overestimating how quickly requirements increase.

Increased Consumption works with factors of 2 which is rather large. Half levels could work for factors of 1.5 allowing more fine tuning.

[shawnhcorey]

Mules are not horses. Seems obvious but it isn't. Mules are more like donkey in the dispositions than like horses. Treat them bad and they'll remember you. And they'll do their best not to have anything to do with you. Mules and donkeys have a higher self-preservation sense than horses. That means they get very stubborn about not doing things they dislike.

Mules are as strong as horses but like a donkey, they can find forage where a horse would starve. That's why the Romans used them instead of horses.

And mules and donkeys would never go underground.

[Peter Knutsen]

GURPS would really benefit from a formally written article that defines the differences between the various "horseoids". What each s good for, is bad for, and when you will or won't want to use it.