Anyone else think we should be able to command our horse to follow us or to stay put? I mean if the horse was trained it's not unfeasible, and it would allow you to go places with your horse without having to be on it the whole time (meaning no picking up items) or you could stop them from wandering off by themselves.

Definitely. Good idea.

Well, I don't want a "realistic" inventory. Just not completely wacked out either. I like the idea of a horse being able to offload some of my encumbrance. Not realistic of course, but I'd like any horse, wagon, or companion to be marked on the map. If the horse dies, at least you can find the loot. A died horse or companion should place a "user marker" on the map (we should be able to place as many as we want), which we can delete when we feel for it.

But you should be able to buy upgrades for the horse:
* Expanded saddle bags - upgrades from 50 lbs to 200 lbs worth of equipment. Doesn't slow down the horse.
* Double saddles - allows you to have a secondary companion on the same horse. Only 50 lbs in the normal bags, also no slowdown. Companion can carry stuff too.
* Wagon mount - allows you to connect a wagon/cart to the horse, which carries 300 lbs to 500 lbs of equipment. Companion can't ride with you, and also slows down horse.

So you choose what kind of upgrade you want to have (not all at the same time), forcing the player to make a choice on what suits him best. Allows different play styles. The above is just the outline of an idea, take everything with a pint of salt

we have concept art of a pack horse carrying loads of stuff... this might be how caravans work, dunno

Well if companions get some kind of companion wheel, ala NV, cant see why the horse cant have one too.

see... now this is a good idea. the whistling for your horse, ok, but how far can your whistle go??? infinite like in Red Dead? i agree to disagree with that one.

The issue with Oblivion was that there were mods to fix anything you didn't like anyway, probably will be the same again on the PC, but, thats why i might get it for PS3 instead, so i can just play the game and not spend my whole time modding.

:huh:

I always wondered why in games with extensive loot table, companions and horses why the functionability of them was limited. A horse to carry stuff sounds like a good idea possible to define the idea a bit how about?

Horses come in three different types fast, normal and slow. To better understand what i am thinking i will use car anologies.

Fast, like a Porshe 911 which sacrifices carry capacity for speed. So a fast horse might be able to carry say 250 lbs in passengers, gear or a combination.

Medium, like a BMW 750il series, more storage the ability to carry up to 400 lbs of weight.

Slow like a Range Rover, it goes anywhere and can be loaded up to carry say 700 pounds of gear or passangers.

Now each character would be say 160 lbs and then what ever gear they are wearing or carrying would be additional weight pretty much like it is now where a character load is the total of all gear worn or in inventory. A bonus i would like to add then would be the option to load up the horse with it max carrying capacity of weight and the player could then lead the loaded mount back, or ditch the weight and ride the horse back to town. You would not be able to fast travel while leading the mount but you would be able to return to town with more loot. So for example due to build my PC can carry a maximum of 250 lbs of loot worn or carried. I also have a medium mount so i could get gear back to town by riding or leading. One way would be to ride back into town on my meduim mount which has a carry weight of 400lbs, so rider is 250 leaving me 140 more that could be loaded on the mount, and i could still fast travel. If i decided that i did not want to leave anything behind i could load up my PC to 250, then load 400 more pounds on the horse and then walk back to town, in this circumstance i could not fast travel and would have to travel the entire distance.

Anyway just a thought for your thought.
Asai

I totally agree.

( a ) I think TES allows the player to have TOO BIG an inventory. Seven axes, 5 swords, three shields, 200 potions, 14 books, ten suits of clothes and 18 dwemer artifacts is TOO FREAKING MUCH for a guy to carry on his person, and by MILES.

( b ) Your inventory should be VASTLY reduced, but having a horse should allow you to increase it.

( c ) Weighing down your horse too much should result in tiring him. A tradeoff. Do I really need that third sword? Or shall I have Stalwart carry it for me until I reach town?





As for WHY: IMMERSION.

When physics works in the game like it does in real life, it adds a level of realism, sometimes one that is only truly appreciated on the subconscious level. Sure, there should be fantastical elements (it IS fantasy, after all), but fantasy is always grounded in realism. That's why we humans relate to it so much. Having a MORTAL inventory size adds to it. Allowing a HORSE to do what horses do (besides being vehicles) adds EVEN MORE.

This could definitely be a problem, but I really like the idea of having a horse carry some of the loot if this could be fixed somehow. Especially because I always found it sort of ridiculous being able to carry 4 warhammers and 2 full sets of armour around in your pocket! :no:

Along the same lines of TC's idea, I'd like to see "beasts of burden" in Skyrim, as there's been countless times in Oblivion where I find a lot of epic, heavy loot and have to toggle godmode on just because it's 15-20 lbs over my max carrying weight.

i never used a horse because i always walked and leveled up my illusion and conjuration skills because you cant do that on a horse..which svcked

I think the majority of us are forgetting something here.

No matter how many good idea's (such as this one) get pumped out into the forums here. None will be placed into the vanilla Skyrim.

Why?, Simply because Beth has its drawing board they have idea's they are implementing & do not have time to explore other options now that they have announnced a release date.

Ha ha! You should see how fast my vampire Mage runs!

Back to the topic though, it is a great idea. But as mentioned a few issues with the behaviour would need to be sorted first. Also the whistle worked with Assassins Creed, so why not.

Oh,
But i beg to differ!



Not relevant to our divergence. But not true either. The essence of RPG is choice & consequence.



Why, that would force to acquire a backpack or some other form of inventory expansion container beforehand, wouldn't it? Or you could stash some of the loote in a safe place,much like wild animals do in real life. Meaning, you would have to *CHOOSE* and would face up the *CONSEQUENCES*.



Answered above.



Yup hammer space has been around for a while now. On the other hand, realistic inventory space would be an improvement upon that. It would make the game more tactical,with more meaningful choices and nothing would be inexorably lost, as you could hide your loote in what you'd deem a safe place or carry some with you on your backpack. Nothing in your explanation seems to challenge these points.

Horse! Be my slave and attack and cast spells!
Wait, what?

Seriously, I want a donkey to carry my stuff.

I like the idea of the ordering the horse to stay put or follow you.
The idea of been able to attack on your horse is also a good idea, casting spells firing bows ect.

I dont wanna bring to much of reality into this, but it would take rather much training to get a horse to not totaly freak out if someone started throwing fire/lightning whilst riding it.
From my experience (my family has horses so im not just making [censored] up here) horses tend to freak out about much anything. Be it plastic bags, weirdly coloured things and most things that move and/or make sounds.

Im not saying its impossible, horses were trained to not freak out about gunfire not to long a time ago, but your average horse breeder in Skyrim probably wouldnt train their horses for this. With actual warhorses however it would make perfect sense.

Personally, I think it would be better if horses were essential, just ran away when combat gets initiated and come back when it is over. As for mounted combat, I wouldnt hold my breath exactly. The only game that has done mounted combat well is mount&blade IMO and I hope Bethesda choses to spend their time with other more important things.

I like the saddle bag idea, as it's helpful and realistic. They could fix the problem with the horses wandering off--like if they do, perhaps they'll just end up wandering home (wherever that is), like to some sort of home base where you find them again, with all your loot still there. And as I saw mentioned above, if the horse dies, you can loot it like any other creature.

Yeah searching the corpse of your horse is great so then you have to keep coming back and forth maybe bringing back memories.

Sure, it would be nice to have your horse carrying some petty but heavy stuff for you. It would be also cool to have the ability to rob npc's in the wilderness and steal valuable stuff from their saddle bag.

I Hate When you cant carry anymore on oblivion especially when you have awesome armour and weapons then you find more and your inventory gets full...

Yeah the idea of stealing other NPC's items inside there saddle is good haha they better be some great easter eggs on this game aswell "/ that are really hard to find