Chapter 4:Advanced Knowledge
Chapter 1: You and Your Creature
Despite many players only taking a passing interest in the creature it's actually one of the main features of the game and can be an invaluable tool. Perfect for basic maintenance of towns, crops and villagers. To ignore the titan is just asking for a tougher game. The creatures will also provide a perfect method of taking over distant towns without you dipping into your mana reservoir to conjure up a fireball or storm to pass over the town to impress them. But your creature should always be your right-hand man in your plans for world domination. J
Depending on how you want to play the game the titan's role may vary. You may want it to simply be a workhorse for looking after towns; then again you may want to have it off impressing distant villages while you deal with town management. The uses and flexibility of the creatures are nearly unlimited once fully trained.
It takes time and dedication to create a truly great creature but that care and attention will pay off when you find that your noble beast is taking care of most of the work for you. The AI in the game is adaptive and a skilled trainer can mould the titan's mind in whatever way they want. One thing to remember that a creature has it's own personality and that it needs a greater understanding than other artificial life programs like the Tamagochi or Norms. It's possible to turn a creature into a mental wreck if it's exposed to enough punishment and mistreatment. Sometimes trauma caused during its early years can have a lasting effect. If you severely beat a titan who's eating too much when they are young then it may end up never wanting to feed itself later. And in the most severe of cases the condition is final and cannot be reversed. To avoid this problem it best to not punish a creature to 100% or reward to 100% all the time. In most cases the reward or punishment should be directly related to the event and frequency. It should NEVER be a case of 100% reward for good things or 100% punishment for bad since you don't want to make a titan's mind a simple case of Yes or No regarding matters. A healthy creature mind should be able to define that an action is only good or bad in certain circumstances. This detailed reward/punishment system will be covered in the intermediate section.
This guide is going to be broken into skill levels. Basic training will cover the absolute basics for working with your titan. With this information you will be able to play the game without paying attention to the early tutorials on island 1. Intermediate training will cover the more generalised knowledge that you'll accumulate from playing the game and will help you to mould the creature into whatever you want. It'll also cover the complex issues of titan learning and growth. The advanced section is going to be where the groundbreaking discoveries will be made. It'll cover specific areas of the game that won't be required to complete the game but will be helpful in perfecting your titan training abilities. The advanced area will be where the majority of updates will be made once the Basic and Intermediate sections are complete. At the end of each section will be a general knowledge chapter covering smaller facts that don't warrant a chapter of their own due to the simplicity or because they are merely quick facts.
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Chapter 2: Welcome to Bootcamp
In Island 1 you learn the basics of using your titan, this section is going to review what you learned and look a bit deeper into using the leashes.
First off you need to know that each species of titan will have different attributes from others, this difference is negligible and the final choice really comes down to the appearance of the titan and your tastes. However some players like a titans to learn quickly so they opt for the smarter ones like the Chimp, Ape or Mandrill. But saying that some people want a good and strong fighting creature like the Tiger, Lion or Bear. Below is a chart of the estimated creature attribute provided by Bwcenter.com
*f.strength is the time in minutes to recover from being killed
- Green
= Creature�s best stat(s)
- Blue
= 2nd best over all stat
- Red
= 1st best overall stat
- Grey =
worst overall stat
- Underlined = The creature�s best but also something
else
Disclaimer
:These stats are from BWCenter.com and are not (in my opinion)
totally accurate. Project CREED will be compiling a data chart
similar to this at a later date. I would suggest using this
information only as a loose guide .
Now that you've decided on a titan, let's get on with some basic training for both you and him.
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Chap. 2 - Section A: Eating Habits
There are many types of edible things in Eden and not all of them are good
for your titan's stomach. In fact some are quite hazardous if you want to avoid
certain side effects (more on that later) Teaching a titan to eat certain food
is simple. You simply pick up something like a cow, some grain or a rock and
then give it to your titan. You can then encourage him to eat it by rewarding
him. This will make him eat it. It's wise not to reward to much for handing
him the food cause this can lead to a titan only accepting food that you give
him and not learning to hunt for food himself. Simply rewarding up to 10% is
enough to give him the idea. Once he's eaten then reward him on a scale of 10%
to 100% depending on how often you want your creature to choose to eat that
kind of food. When you first start off it's best to reward to 50% on most occasions
so that your creature doesn't turn down other types of food that you offer him.
If your titan eats something that you don't want him to develop a taste for
then smack him. Depending on what the object is this should be around 20% to
100%. If you are playing as a good god then you should avoid smacking your beast
to 100% on the first few occasion cause you may make your titan scared of going
near humans causing some problems later if you need his help. Naturally your
titan will slowly learn what to do and not do with each item in the game. Be
wary of how much to punish and reward your titan since eating habits can reach
a point where they are nearly irreversible later on in the titan life.
Once your titan starts feeding himself then you should reward him the most so that he understands that feeding himself is better than having you giving him food. Making a creature independent will save you much time and grief later. More in depth information on creature eating habits will be covered later.
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Chap. 2 - Section B: Leashes and
Commanding
The tutorial that Sable gives in the game
is basic to say the least. The leashes are more useful than simply
encouraging violent or peaceful behaviour and focusing your titans
attention. The more advanced tactics are covered later. The basics
are simple and this will help you get early training done faster
for certain things.
The Fluffy Leash
Of Compassion will encourage your titan to simply be peaceful
when he's on it. This is helpful to reduce the chance of a titan
destroying something or to help ignore an enemy titan who's
taunting your creature. Using the fluffy leash and attaching it to
certain item will cause specific default actions. Attaching it to
the town centre will cause your titan to try and help the town in
general and defend it against attacks and fires. Naturally your
titan will need some encouragement in these areas when they are
young. Once your titan knows the food and wood spells then you can
set about provoking precise actions. Attaching to the store itself
will encourage the titan to deal with the town's desires. Teach
him to be able to turn villagers into breeders by doing it your
self while letting him watch. Soon he'll catch on. You can get
exact responses by attaching the leash to each flag on the town
store as well. While this will lead to the titan having default
knowledge of certain ones like Food or wood he will however need
training to respond properly to defence desire and offspring
desire. Given time a patience you can get your titan to use the
wood desire flag to even water trees and put wood directly into
the workshops or buildings that are under construction. When a
titan is holding an item then clicking somewhere with the fluffy
leash will make him put it down on that spot. If you want your
titan to sleep in his pen then clicking inside it with this fluffy
leash will help him to get to sleep.
The Aggression
Leash does exactly as it says. Any building or object that you
click on with this leash will cause the titan to be hostile
towards it. Given more advanced training you can provoke specific
forms of violence. If you want your creature to throw the current
item that he's holding then you use the Aggression leash and click
where you want him to throw it. Aside from these the Aggression
leash only has one other use that will be covered later.
The Leash Of
Learning is used to focus your titan's attention. If he's on
the leash while you perform certain actions yourself then the
titan will learn faster because he's paying attention to you. You
can also use this leash to teach your titan to JUST pick up
objects rather than perform some other action. If you have a
peaceful creature then using the Fluffy leash on a sheep you want
him to pick up could lead him to heal it instead if that's
something that you taught him to do. This leash can also be used
in a similar way as the leash of compassion in that most titans
will put carried item on the floor if you use this leash to click
on an area. This leash also helps to just tie your titan to an
object without him trying to destroy it. It can also be used to
get a titan to drink from water if you click on it.
Despite all these predefined conditions
that the leashes provoke it's still possible to get a titan to
behave in a totally opposite way to what the leash is supposed to
do, with enough training it's possible to get a titan to be
destructive on the leash of compassion and vice versa. But all
these leashes can be used to tie a creature to an object and get
them to move to a fixed area. Although I didn't mention that the
aggression leash would make a titan sleep in an area you direct
him to there's still the possibility that he might settle down
once he arrives there. But from experience this rarely happens
unless it's something that you taught your titan to do, like I
said, the predefined behaviours can be overwritten to an
extent.
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Chap
2. Section C: Combat and Strength
Fighting is one of the more skilled areas
of the game and is almost detailed enough to become a section unto
itself. In this chapter we'll just cover the bare bones of what
you need to know. Creatures will fight when both are provoked into
combat. This can be forced by the players who use the aggression
leash and clicks on another titan or attaches it to one. It's
possible to make a creature ignore the taunts if you are working
on making your creature 100% good however by using the leash
you'll make him fight no matter what he's learnt. During the
taunting phase the two titan's will square up and start insulting
each other and generally making a lot of bold gestures in an
attempt to get the other titan to fight. Titan's who have been
encouraged to show their feelings will sometimes start to cry if
they're feelings are hurt, thus stopping the fight from starting
in some cases.
Once both titans decide to fight a glowing
ring will appear in a suitable place that's dictated by one of the
titan's. This titan is the one whose alignment will drop the most
because they started the fight. The fight will start and the
player's will move to the side of the ring and see the titan's
health bars in the top of their screens. Underneath the health bar
is the energy meter, this is used for knowing if you titan can do
a miracle attack like a fireball or weakening miracle. When this
bar is full you can get about 2 to 3 miracles out of it before
having to wait for it to recharge. Click on the opposing titan
will make your creature strike at that area. Clicking on your
creature will make them block. One thing you must remember is to
only click on your titan ONCE, clicking several times will make
him defend several times and possibly let strikes through his
defence. Once the energy bar of one titan reaches zero then the
fight end with the titan that's still standing being the victor.
That's a basic's of fighting, for more detailed information and
learning how to fight better please read the Intermediate
guide.
A titan's physical and mental state will
effect how well it fights, a titan who's very tired will move a
bit slower and not string together attacks very well plus they
might collapse from exhaustion during the fight and thus forfeit
the match. Strength and fatness are the 2 key factors in the arena
since fatness increases how much damage your titan can take and
strength increases the amount that he can cause. However these two
factors also effect the 3rd factor
that is speed. A fat creature naturally will move slower and thus
not be able to string together attacks easily. But weak titans
will also move slightly faster as well to compensate for their
lack of strength. For a player who's building a good fighter they
will want to fight a good balance between speed, strength and
fatness to suit they're combat style.
Building up strength is simple; just have
the creature run around with something in his hand like a large
rock or tree. If the object is heavy for your titan then his
strength will increase. A young titan's strength will be tough to
increase and sustain at that level since it can't carry very heavy
object and the strength drops quite rapidly when he stops. A
creature's whose about half way towards maturity will be able to
build muscle a lot faster since the body isn't growing as fast as
a younger titan. The strength of a titan varies from one species
to another so some will naturally be better for fighting than
other. The tiger and Lion are among the fastest and strongest
fighters in B&W but there are alternatives. The quality of the
fighter comes down to how well the titan is trained and how good
the player is at commanding him during a fight.
Fatness is by far the simplest factor to
build up. Just make sure that your creature eats even when he's
not very hungry. Because the energy level of a titan is related to
the hunger meter it's easy to tell when to feed him. If the titan
is at 10% hunger then his energy level is at 90%, so 90% of the
energy from the food will be converted into stored energy as
called fat. Good sources of fat energy are cows, pigs and sheep.
But really any meat item is ideal. Grain and fish will still cause
an increase in fat although the energy that's converted in fat
won't be as high.
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Chap 3 Section D: A Blessing Or A
Curse
The heart of B&W is the alignments.
This is a very simple thing to explain but we still get folks who
are new to the game asking how they can lower or raise a creatures
alignment. Plus there are some things that effect alignment which
you wouldn't expect. First of all let's look at good.
Getting a good creature is actually quite
simple. Just have them running around healing villagers, gathering
crops, putting villagers to bed at night, dancing for them and
general making them happy. In regards to a good creature capturing
a village then it's a case of using a combination of impression
tactics like telling stories, dancing and posing. And the
impressive miracles themselves. Flock of Flying animals is a very
impressive trick and will get over 100 belief points upon it's
first casting. Then there's tending to the needs of a town and
using things like miracle wood and food to help with that. If a
town is being damaged or attacked then getting him to put a shield
around the vulnerable buildings would be wise and putting out
fires is a must.
You have to be very careful what a good
creature eats. He won't be able to eat fish since this is classed
as stealing since the villagers claim fish store for themselves
even if they aren't using them. The only way around it is to find
an unclaimed school of fish. The same goes for claimed cattle and
grain. If a creature eats a cow that's being attended or is close
enough to a villager for them to own it then you can't do that.
Even eating meat can be considered evil since your creature is
killing something. But in most cases anything that has 2 or more
than 2 legs is out of the question. Taking grain from the store or
the field is also wrong, the way around this is fro you to take
the food to the creature yourself, that way it's you who is
stealing and not your titan.
He also can't be allowed to get into
fights or be aggressive in any way. Just like you he needs to be
totally peaceful. Don't teach a good creature any hostile miracles
so that he won't be tempted to use them.
On the flipside we have the fun bit, were
your creature needs to become the personification of evil itself.
Let it eat whatever it wants but encourage them to eat villagers.
These don't provide much nutrition so it may take 2 or 3 to
satisfy the creatures hunger if it's high. But the more killing
the better. Encourage him to randomly attack buildings but not so
much that you spend your time rebuilding the,. Get him to cause a
decent amount of carnage by throwing rocks at the cr�che. That's
another thing, killing kids is totally sadistic......do it as much
as possible. :)
For impressing towns you want things like
thunderstorms, fireballs and packs of wolves. You will probably
end up killing a towns population before you impress them so try
to leave as many buildings as possible intact for when it's
finally yours. A good trick is to set fire to things and then put
the out with miracle shower. This will keep your creature's
alignment balanced. A good way to win over a town with an evil
titan is to stage fight near the village. The winner will always
get a lot of respect and belief. Just to make sure that you don't
lose........cheat. When the fight is about to start you should
soften up your creature's opponent with a few attacks of your own.
When it starts you should have your creature set fire to the other
creature.
It's really as simple as that. With evil
creatures you need to control the amount of damage he causes or
risk losing because you have no buildings left or no one to
worship you. Being good you will need to avoid anything hostile
and feed your creature on miracle grain that you make (I suggest
have a food pile near the temple just for him) or feed him by hand
which unfortunately makes him dependent on you.
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Basic General
Information
To reward or punish or your titan you hold
down the action button when your hand is over your creature. You
will then be able to slap or stroke him to reward or punish for
behaviour. Quick movements of the mouse will slap while smooth
movement will stroke. It is important to reward or punish the
creature immediately after the action it has performed to
encourage or discourage it to do or not do that action more.
Getting a titan to drink requires some
encouragement since young titans will not always drink naturally.
Using the leashes you should click as far into a body of water as
possible. Your titan will then move to that spot and hopefully
drink by it's own accord, however some rewarding while the titan
is standing in the water may be required. But remember that a
titan has it's own mind and may not ant to drink even if it is
seriously dehydrated.
Tattoo's can be applied to creature in the
creature cave or through the player options menu. These can be
accesses via your temple, the start menu or by pressing F5 while
in the game.
For details on how to make your own
tattoos then please check the "HOW TO..." section at the end of
this guide.
To change your creature into another
species/animal you will need to use either the creature trainer
who can be found on Islands 1 and 4 or use one of the many
external utilities. The trainer can be found in the northwest of
the island just beyond the large gates in a small glen with a
single hut. The finer point of exchanging titans will be covered
at a later date.
Despite all the so-called 'Official
advice', creature poo has no beneficial properties to crops or
plants in general. It also doesn't bother villages or other titans
which its presence. This means that it's pointless encouraging a
titan to poo by or on fields or trees since it won't increase the
plants growth or a crops final yield. But it's advisable to make
sure that your titan goes regularly to avoid complications that
will be explained later.
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Chapter 3: Intermediate
Knowledge
Now that we have the bare bones of the
creatures covered, let's move onto the real meat of the game. Now
we'll look at the sort of thing you will encounter in the game on
a regular basis and learning to get your creature conditioned to
the sort of behaviour you expect of it.
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Chap 3 Section A: It's a
Miracle
Obviously you will want your titan to
learn to cast certain miracles throughout the game, this is where
the creature intelligence becomes obvious since learning miracles
will give you a direct indication of how well the creature is
learning the current spell by having a lightbulb appear above
their head with the percentage of that miracle they currently
know. This increases as you cast the spell more while the creature
is looking or when you hand them a one-shot miracle bubble. A
creature can however cast a miracle when it doesn�t know the
miracle to 100% as strange as it seems the creature only really
needs to know it to about 80% to use the miracle. This does
however increase the chance that he�ll mess it up.
There are two types of miracles in the
game. Aggressive and Passive. Each time you or your creature uses
a miracle then your (or his) alignment will be effected. Spells
like Fireball and Xlightning will naturally cause the alignment of
the user to drop, Food and Spiritual Shield will raise the
alignment. One thing to remember is that while the Regular Storm
miracle simply waters crops it is still classed as an aggressive
spell.
When teaching a titan a certain spell it�s
a good idea to have them on the leash of learning so that they pay
attention. The creature need to also be looking at where you are
casting the spell meaning that he must be in close proximity. Now
creature like the Ape will pick up on miracles very quickly but
titans like the Tiger will take a bit longer. A perfect example of
this would be the MegaBlast miracle that takes the longest time of
all to learn. It is known that a Tiger needs to be shown the
miracle 7 times before it�s learned it another 1%, the Ape however
can learn this in half the time or better. The best trick however
allows you to teach your creature a miracle without spending any
mana whatsoever casting it. Simply find 2 one-shots and then hand
the first one to your creature. Then before he can cast it you
must hand him the second one. He�ll throw the first one over his
shoulder having not used it yet and take the new one. You need to
then grab the old bubble and hand that one t him before he uses
the second one that you handed him. The nice thing about this
method is that his knowledge of the miracle will rise but he won�t
become tired from casting it and you won�t be using any mana to
create the miracle yourself. That�s the very crude way of doing it
cause your titan will be learning the spell but not knowing who or
what to cast it one like he would if you were showing him. So in a
certain way it may save time to use the traditional method. The
best place to do this sort of training is in a Skirmish map or
Playground where other Gods and their titans won�t disturb you.
The best ones are user-made maps which have a large number of
miracle dispensers that give you quick and easy access to the
spells.
Creature miracles are another matter
entirely since some of them need to be cast on another titan for
your creature to learn them. Spells like �Freeze� will only ever
be learnt if your creature sees you cast them on another creature
or if another creature is present to cast on. However, �Strength�
and �Weakening� can be cast on your own titan and he�ll still
learn them. Getting a creature to cast a miracle like �Expansion�
on themselves is by far the toughest task to manage since he will
have learnt to only cast it on another creature.
Getting your creature to use a certain
spell is no different than teaching them anything else. You simply
put them on the learning leash and have them watch you as you cast
the spell on or at the desired object. Given time the creature
will soon catch on and then you reward or punish them depending on
what results you are trying to achieve. Advanced techniques in
getting a titan to perform specific spells on certain targets will
be covered in the Advanced Section.
One thing o remember is that certain
miracles will become available in fights. Things like Heal and
Lightning can be very handy in tipping the balance I your favour.
However, a titan need to know a spell to 100% to effectively use
it in a fight since it�s much more fast paced than being out of
the ring.
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Chap
3 Section B: Creature Growth and Development
If there was one set of questions that get
asked the most then this is it. The number of people who ask about
titan growth or how to get your new beast to become the strongest
in the land is amazing. So here are the facts.
Robert Hale, AKA SchizoSlayer, wrote the
first article about titan growth. And took a very biological look into the
factors in creature growth. The article is fairly long and if you
want to read the full article, you'll have to wait until the next
release, in which I'll include the link. I will however break in
down into the main points and explain in detail how you can
achieve this in game.
Rob�s article says that a titan could
reach its full size by 18. I find this doubtful for a number of
reasons. The first is that each titan has it�s own unique maximum
growth rate. The Cow being among the slowest and the Ape being
among the fastest. So there�s the first piece of fact since you
will be greatly effected by this factor. The next is that age and
growth are measured differently. Age is measured using the PC�s
internal clock while the growth of a titan is related to the
number of Frame per second have passed. This means that by running
at double speed (alt+2) then your titan will be growing faster in
one year then if you had the game running at normal speed. In
double speed it takes roughly 45 minutes for a titan to age
one-year, the same applies for normal speed. So if you ran the
game like this then you might be able to get a fully-grown titan
at 18 but only if you raised him perfectly.
Growth in the game depends on energy
levels and how exhausted your creature is. Fatness is also a
factor in the growth process. It�s know that when a titan�s energy
level drops to around 40% then the titan�s body will start to dig
into the fat to supply itself with energy. The drawback being that
fat is used for the titan�s growth. A titan who is at 0% fatness
will not have the extra energy needed to grow properly. In fact,
it�s best to keep your creature at around 50% for the best
results. You also need to be wary of the titan�s energy level,
which is directly related to the hunger meter. The energy is part
of what helps a titan to grow but not as large a factor as the
fat. The trick is to basically make sure that your creatures
hunger doesn�t exceed 50% and that he gets his rest also at around
50% tiredness. A damaged titan will also take longer to grow since
the body is busy repairing itself and not growing as it should due
to the energy being focused elsewhere. This is why you shouldn�t
let your creature be seriously hurt or neglect it. The more times
that a creature is killed and then resurrected in the pen then the
slower it will grow. Miracles are also a sore point in regards to
growth since they dip straight into the energy and tiredness
reserve of your titan each time that one is cast.
If your creature is skinny or recovering
from a certain occurrence in the single player game then it�s time
to start rehabilitation. While strength isn�t an issue it�s still
a good idea to make sure that your creature doesn�t become over
weight from doing this. It�s not currently known if obesity
effects growth in a negative way but that�ll be one thing that
Project CREED will be looking into later. Meat from villagers,
pigs, cattle, wolves etc. are the best source of fat. One animal
like a cow can bring a titan�s hunger down to 0% in one go. This
is however effected by the size of him. It�ll be easier to make a
small titan fatness rise than it will be for one who�s half grown.
Grain should be your titans staple food once you have his fatness
at around 50% since it satisfies hunger but doesn�t cause much of
an increase in fat. Fish is somewhere in the middle between
livestock and grain in terms of it fat content.
Healing your titan is imperative. A titan
who is healing while sleeping will not be putting that energy into
growing so make sure that you creature gets healed whenever he�s
hurt. It�s best to teach him to do this himself.
That�s growth covered so onto
strength.
So you want your creature to be buff but
are having trouble keeping him at that nice 1.00 strength rating.
It nice to see your titan looking in good shape when your opponent
is I pretty bad shape because of neglect. One thing to remember is
that strength is only really a bearing if your titan gets into a
lot of fights or doing more physical actions like throwing
boulders around.
The key issue here is regular exertion. A
titan who is working out regularly isn�t going to be growing at
his best so moderation between this and a growth regime is needed.
Getting a titan to carry rocks around is the best method. Get him
to pick up a large boulder or hand him one and send him on a walk
to the furthest part of the island and then back again while
carrying it. It�s annoying but you aren�t going to be able to
teach your titan to carry around a rock all the time. This is
because if you reward him while holding the rock then he�ll eat
it. L You can however get him
into the habit of bringing home rocks or throwing large boulders
at neutral or enemy towns. That way he�ll pick up rocks and carry
them around anyway while getting to his desired
destination.
The idea is to get them to carry the largest
rocks possible, there will be a limit on what they can physically
carry but there�s also a minimum where titans will be able to
carry the object without straining themselves. The effect can also
be achieved with any object that can be carried, only to a lesser
extent. One of the glitches in the game involve abusing the
�Expansion� miracle to make your titan full size and then handing
getting them to carry the largest possible object. When they
return to normal then they will still be carrying the object that
is way to big for them and their strength will rapidly rise�.their
tiredness will also rapidly rise because of the exertion. A funny
side effect of this is that I some cases the creature mesh will
become distorted. For instance, a cow how�s very young and
carrying a rock the same size as him will move at triple speed and
have his ears stretch so that he almost looks like a rabbit
because of the speed he�s moving at with the ears flapping out
behind him. J
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Chap
3 Section C: Stepping Into the Arena
Following on from strength and growth
we�ll be looking into the art of creature combat and tactics.
Despite what some may think there�s just
as much chance of a strong titan losing as a fat or skinny one. As
long as the titan is skilled then a skinny and weak titan can
still beat a strong and well built one. It�s just a mater of
tactics. The main ways to tip the balance I the fight is miracles.
But first we�ll be covering the non-spell casting ways to gain the
advantage but also create a disadvantage.
Fatness is actually a wild card in the
arena. While it allows the titan to take more damage it will also
effect the speed of his movements and attacks. So the trade off is
justified. Strength will also have a minor effect on speed cause
of that extra muscle mass. However it�s still preferable cause the
drop is negligible. Having a skinny titan will mean that he�s fast
as hell so you�ll be able to lay into your opponent with impunity
but beware since you will take more damage per hit. Size is still
a factor in fights. While in v1.0 it was possible for two titans
to have to much of a difference in height to fight and normally
resulted in the largest one simply stamping on the little one and
killing him out right. With V1.10 that�s been remedied so that the
largest one will shrink down to the maximum size that the smallest
one can fight. So while losing the massive advantage you will
still be larger. Big titan�s can take more damage, quite a bit
more actually and they also dish out more punishment. The draw
back being that such a large target is tough to miss so they�ll
not be able to dodge quite as well.
Now for the miracles. Something of a tough
issue for some, who consider it a cheesy tactic used by the llamas
in the MP community. Naturally setting fire to the opponent is the
best option sine they will continually lose health and can�t put
themselves out easily unless there�s some water nearby or it
starts raining. This can be achieved by lightning or the ever
handy fireball spells. Heal is naturally handy in fights but once
again some people find that a player, who constantly heals their
titan during a fight, damn annoying The weakening miracle is
hardly used yet still very handy since it instantly takes a chunk
out of the opponents energy. That�s the main miracles that are
used in fights and they are just that little bit extra.
Fighting tactics are at the heart of the
arena experience. A player who has taken their titan through many
fights may feel confident enough in the titan�s own skills to let
his fight without help. This can prove to be most beneficial since
a titan can string together attacks much better then any player
who�s commanding them can. But that require experience at fighting
by themselves which means that you will need to sit back through
many fights to let your creature learn. After a successful fight
it's imperative to reward them depending on how well they didn�t.
This needs to be done right after the fight when the creature is
standing there thinking about the fight. It�s normally followed by
some sort of action like posing or pooping on the loser. A bad
fight should be punished with a light slap. Depending on your
titan and style you will have your own tactics that work well for
you and him. But here�s some friendly advice;
- Dodging can be very helpful against
human opponents but isn�t really needed against the Ai. However
it best to click about 3 times to make sure that you move far
enough and not simply take a step to one side which will not
normally be enough to dodge an attack.
- A counter attack is perfect if timed
well with a dodge. Side stepping an attack just in time and then
laying into the opponent�s side allows you to set up a string of
uninterrupted attacks. It�s also good to have a special attack
to guarantee a hit with it.
- Remember that blocking will only work
if you don�t command the titan to do anything afterwards. Click
on your titan ONCE for them to start blocking. Clicking several
times will result in several short blocks that attacks can
easily get through.
- Fool the opponent into attacking you
with a sustained block. During the attack you should strike out
with a few hit of your own or let lose a special attack when
they are between attacks and recovering. The player will have
lined up a long succession of attacks and won�t be ready for an
attack.
- Skinny creatures need to make use of
their speed. Dodging and blocking are essential. Hit and run
tactics hold true since you won�t be able to take much
punishment. Using a succession of attacks you will need to chip
away at the opponents health.
- Fat creatures or slow titans will need
t be more defensive to win. Blocking attacks and then countering
with one of your own is the only option since dodging will be
near impossible. A fat creature MUST be strong since you won�t
be fast enough to string together attacks very well. Single
powerful strikes are your best option.
When in an intense fight you need to
remember to always leave enough energy to perform a heal spell.
Hit the opponent and then back away to heal while they are
recoiling. Miracles are good to use in a fight but remember that
you don�t have an unlimited number of them cause your titan needs
to recover the energy.
Lastly you must remember to have your
titan in a good enough state to fight. If your creature is near to
dropping from exhaustion or hunger then try to avoid fights. If
you see a fight starting then direct the creature away by using
the leash and either clicking on the ground elsewhere or on an
object. If a fight seems inevitable then soften up the opponent
with some attacks yourself. The last thing you want is to have
your creature lose a fight cause he dropped dead from a lack of
food. Of special note is the effect of a fight in a populated
area. The fight will naturally draw a lot of attention and it�s
sometimes beneficial to set up a fight near a town you are trying
to win over cause nothing increases the villagers� belief in you
like your titan kicking another creature�s butt.
[ index ]
Chap
3 Section D: The Learning Dynamic
Now to get a little bit technical on you.
We�ll be looking at HOW the creature learns so that you can better
train your creature. This was going to be an Advanced topic but
this kind knowledge is best in the Intermediate section because
it�s a requirement of the game to understand how your creature
thinks.
In the creature�s mind, everything in Eden
has a class, alignment and value. Everything from trees to
villagers will have these values and it�s all understood when a
creature learns something new. There are 3 prime factors in the
creature mind:
The Environment, Itself and the Leashes.
The Environment is naturally the outside
world and something that you as the player don�t have any direct
control over when it comes to what the creature interacts with.
This is the wildcard in the learning process since you can�t
define what is involved when your titan learns something. The
creature itself, or rather its current state is partially under
your control. When a creature learns something its current state
is also remembered. This includes things like it�s hunger; it�s
energy level and other things that appear in the creature cave
stats. Finally there is the leashes. Earlier in the article I
mentioned that these have a special function as another factor in
the learning process. This is the only part that you can totally
control and allows you to get a creature to perform 3 different
variants on a fixed condition.
Let�s take a scene from B&W as an
example to explain in better detail.
Island 1, we all been there so you should
know it�s layout like the back of your hand. We�re looking over at
the second village, which you currently don�t own; your creature
is standing a short distance away and attacks a hut in the middle
using Xlightning. The lighting spreads out across the village
setting fire to nearby people, piles of wood, the towns� store and
other things. You reward the titan for being so vicious so that
he�ll attack neutral towns more often using that spell.
So to the average player you�d then
think that your creature is now trained to attacks towns with
Xlightning. He does this several more times and you reward him to
100%. Later on when he�s wandering around by himself you notice
that he�s attacking trees and cattle with impunity. You have
taught him to not do this so it puzzles you.
Here�s why he�s doing that.
The lightning naturally spread out and
hits other objects. In that town on Island 1 there�s several trees
and sometimes some cattle nearby. Now although he wasn�t attacking
them directly it was harming them. But because he did this several
times and got rewarded a lot for it then in the titans mind this
was allowed. What was also noted by the titan was the distance
from the target he was standing, his current status, and the
status of the target. Everything. If there was a bird flying over
and the lightning hit it then you might find your creature is
attacking the bats/birds that are flying around your temple spire.
It all goes into his memory. This means that you have to careful
when rewarding or punishing your creature cause there�s a lot of
information that they take in.
With this in mind it�s possible to get a
creature to switch between spells and attacks depending of the
circumstances. Let�s say that he�s attacking a village but is very
tired with low energy levels. It�d be wise to switch to physical
attacks like throwing object at buildings or simply kicking them
over. To achieve this you will need a very careful reward and
punishment system.
To trick to getting complex actions like
this from a creature is never do something to excess unless you
want the end result to be in excess. If you constantly reward or
punish to 100% then a creature will only understand a situation as
either yes or no. The trick is making the creature understand that
in some cases something is acceptable and in other is isn�t. This
is done by making the punishment or reward fit the instance. If a
creature were eating your villagers then you would probably smack
them all the way to 100% to stop them quickly. This would work but
your creature has just learnt not to even touch your villagers for
fear of being smacked again. Punishing to 50% is probably better
since it may take longer but your creature will still be inclined
to pick them up. In most cases you should only reward to 100% on
the very first time a creature does something. He�ll then do it
again so you reward to 80%, and again he�ll repeat it. Depending
on how often you want him to do something then you may reward
again at 80% or move down to a lower reward. The trick is trail
off the rewards relative to what result you want. The same applies
to punishment.
Occasional reminders are needed since a
creature will slowly forget, but even then a reminder should only
be about 20%.
Fine tuning something is what takes time.
If you want your creature to like a certain attack over another
then you�ll need to be very careful. One of the common questions
is why a titan won�t use the Increased or Extreme version of a
spell. It because he�s received a lot of rewards for the standard
version or from the version he learnt first. When he knows the
next version then you�ll need to encourage him to use it by
punishing him slightly for using the regular miracle. A little
slap to 10% will discourage him from using it but not enough to
stop him from trying to accomplish his goal. If a town needs
healing for instance then you don�t want him to never do it again
because you hit him to hard. You want him to heal it using the
Increased Heal. When he gets it right then reward him to something
like 70%.
The point I�m trying make is that the
creature mind is very specific. It�s possible to teach a creature
to only throw fully-grown trees because that item has a value that
the creature can recognise. The same applies for many, if not all
objects. You can teach them to only attack enemy towns because
alignment is also read. The sort of behaviours can you can promote
is nearly unlimited, as long as you are careful with your
training. One thing to remember as well is that the first 10 years
of a creature life will pretty much determine his personality and
inclinations. If you spend his early years teaching him to be
destructive then when left to his own devices he will behave like
that. Even with a lot of training you may never remove that
underlying spirit.
Finally I�ll say a little about the
leashes. These are the final prime factors in the creature mind.
Like I said, you can have complete control over their presence to
you have the ability to fine tune a reaction to 3 possible out
comes (4 if you include �without leash�). This also requires
careful training but given time you can crate something as complex
as �Pick up rock� with one leash, �Attack rock with fireball� with
another leash and �break rock in two� with a final one. It�s best
to define these action using the correct leash like the compassion
leash for simply picking it up and Aggression for attacking
it.
[ index ]
Chap 3 Section E: The Priority
Scales
One of the more common questions that
arises is to do with counteracting obsessive behavior or breaking
a habit that your creature has. These can occur from training or
some trait that your creature was given at the start of the game.
As you know, the creature mind is randomly created at the start of
the game with base stats and desires. Some maybe naturally lazy,
others might over eat. This is because there is more to a
creatures needs than what the game shows you. Lets take an
example:
Your creature's stats are reading as -
Hunger: 50% Tiredness: 50% Damage: 50% Poop: 50% and Dehydration:
50%
From this you can see that he's needing
everything quite badly, but without the priorities this might
confuse the AI. The priorities will dictate which of these has
preference over another. If you have taught you creature to eat at
50% by rewarding him to 100% a hell of a lot of times then that
conditioning will be added to the overall value. As you reward and
punish the creature you are adding and removing priority points
from it's mind. Let's say that 100% reward is +5 points, and 100%
punishment is -5. Using the stats above the creature priorities
might look like this.
Hunger: 50pts * Tiredness: 20pts * Damage:
40pts * Poop: 20pts * Dehydration: 5pts
So by looking at this you can see that the
creature will deal with his hunger first, his damage 2nd,
Tiredness or Poop 3rd and Dehydration 4th. Now this can be
effected by your training. If he's at 50% damage then he's quite
badly hurt and in need of healing. The trouble being that he will
think satisfying his hunger is more important so he'll go looking
for food before dealing with his injuries. You may want him to
heal himself first however.
You have 2 options, first you could let him
eat first. He'll then he will heal himself some how. You reward
him to 100% for doing this, his stats then will appear like
this.
Hunger: 50pts * Tiredness: 20pts * Damage:
45pts * Poop: 20pts * Dehydration: 5pts
So even after that, he'll still want to eat
first if the need is high enough. The titan's mind will compare
the current percentage need with the priority points to decide
what gets preference but from your training the priority may be
further modified. If we look at the Hunger priority in more detail
then you'll see what I mean:
Hunger: 99% : 50pts
Hunger: 89% : 20pts
Hunger: 79% : 35pts
Hunger: 69% : 70pts
Hunger: 59% : 72pts
Hunger: 49% : 30pts
Hunger: 39% : 30pts
Hunger: 29% : 15%
Hunger: 19% : -5pts
Hunger: 09% : 5pts
Now it gets more complicated. From your
training the creature has a number of priorities for each
percentage of hunger it has. Now of course it'll be far more
detailed than this. It will be set at every percentage with a
points value assigned. Here you can see that he'll have a higher
priority for eating at 59% because you've encouraged him to eat
when it hit's this level. So from all your rewarding to 100% he's
learnt to he needs to eat sooner rather then later. However, if he
get above this point then his training has been neglected. Since
he's rarely reached the higher levels he hasn't got such a high
priority for them. No doubt a good trainer will have the creature
damage priority extremely high if his damage is at the 80-90%
mark. So it's read something like maybe 80pts. So he'll then heal
himself before eating no matter how hungry he is. In relation to
the Hunger priorities here, if it was at 70pts for Damage then
he'd only eat if his hunger was at 59% or 69%. That would mean
that he could be at 99% hunger and ready to drop but he still
would want to heal himself first. Not an ideal
situation.
One thing to note is that the hunger at 19%
is -5pts. This means that he'll NEVER eat at this level unless
something else drops even lower. This is how you can get an
irreversible condition, or nearly irreversible anyway cause you
would have to drop ALL priorities into negative numbers to get him
eating that soon. Naturally this would take an eternity since you
would have to re-teach him everything.
Now looking back at the simple scales we
shall work on changing two values to benefit the
player.
Hunger 50% : 40pts * Sleep 50% : 20pts
Both values are at the needy level. You are
trying to get your creature to sleep more because you want him to
grow faster. The trouble is that he keeps wanting to eat before
sleeping. The obvious thing would be to reward him when he finally
sleeps. So lets say that he sleeps and you reward him for that at
100%.
Hunger 50% : 40pts * Sleep 50%:
25pts
You would have to reward this action
(sleeping in this case) 4 more times before he stopped waking up
at 50% hunger to get something to eat. This is an ineffective use
of time. You will need to bring one value up as you bring the
other down. So if you punish him for wanting to eat at 50% Hunger
by smacking him up to 100% in punishment ( -5 pts) then you would
get him trained much faster because you wouldn't be waiting for
the creature to sleep to effect these values. You would have one
priority rising and another falling so that they change
sooner.
Using this explains many things that can
happen in the game. But there's more to the priorities than the
statistics you can see. Behavior like wanting to be helpful or
destructive will also have priorities. If your creature keeps
wanting to kill something when he should really be eating then you
need to alter the values quickly by rewarding a lot for eating and
punishing a lot for being destructive. Now of course this should
ONLY be done when he's in desperate need of food, but is tearing
up some village. You would smack him for doing that and then send
him to pick up some food. Then reward him. His priorities will be
changed to reflect this. But with no way tell how long it could
take to break such a habit then all you can do is persevere and
keep at it. So the next time he's being stubborn, think about what
you would prefer him to be doing, rather than what you don't want
him to be doing.
[ index ]
Chap 3 Section F: Creature
Miracles
This section is for the specific creature
miracles. Some people may have trouble getting your creature to
learn these but this will also include methods to get it to
work.
FREEZE : A very
simple miracle to use. Simply cast it on the creature to have them
frozen to the spot. The duration of this spell will be shortened
by the size of the creature you are casting it on. The creature's
version of this miracle lasts only a very short time
unfortunately. Best used if an enemy creature is attacking your
town or if you need time without the creatures interference. More
of the defensive spell. A good tactic is to freeze the enemy
continually and let your creature attack it. Must be cast on
another creature for yours to learn it.
The icon appears as a bottle that's freezes
over.
Mana Cost: 8000
SHRINK/REDUCTION
: Make the creature that you cast it on shrink down to just
below an age 0 size. This can be helpful to limit the creature's
impressing abilities and to slow the damage that it causes to your
buildings. In version one this would have been more helpful since
your much larger creature could kill the little one by stamping on
it. Now it's slightly useless. Needs to be cast on another
creature for yours to learn it.
Icon appears as a bottle that
shrinks.
Mana Cost: 6000
GROW/EXPANSION :
The opposite of the above. Gain the advantage by enlarging your
creature. Causes and increased impression rating, greater strength
and allow for the trick whereby you enlarge your creature to carry
objects that it wouldn't normally be able to. Must be cast on
another creature for yours to learn it.
Icon appears as a bottle that
grows.
Note: At this point there doesn't seem to be
any way for your creature to cat this miracle on itself. This
cannot be correct but may require specialist training. Project
CREED will be looking into this problem in the near
future.
Mana Cost: 7000
STRENGTH : Handy
if used on a weak creature just prior to a fight as it puts them
straight to 100% strength for a limited period. Cannot be used
during a fight however which makes it's usefulness questionable.
Can be cast on your creature for him to learn it.
Icon appears as a bottle with muscular
arms.
Mana Cost: 8000
INVISIBILITY:
Kinda obvious really, make your creature invisible for short
period of time allowing him to pass through heavily guarded areas.
Ideal for sneaking past a God who isn't watching closely enough.
Your position with be given away if your creature casts any
miracles or move objects so be warned. The main drawback being
that like growth, the creature doesn't seem to be able to cast
this on themselves. As mentioned we'll be looking into this
shortly. Must be cast on another creature for yours to learn
it.
Icon appears as a vanishing
bottle.
Mana Cost: 9000
COMPASSION: A greatly underestimated
defensive miracle. The effected creature is incapable or anything
negative like attacking or harming anything of any kind. Ideal to
stop a rampaging enemy titan dead in their tracks. Very handy if
you are the ultimate good god. Must be cast on another creature
for yours to learn it.
Icon appears as a bottle releasing
hearts.
Mana Cost: 6000
AGGRESSION: Compassion's alternate
miracle. Turns any titan into a walking engine of mass
destruction. Can be used to enhance your own creature's aggressive
nature or to make an enemy god's own creature tear up the town it
was only seconds ago helping to care for. Definitely an offensive
miracle. Must be cast on another creature for yours to learn
it.
Bottle with a angry label on the side (can be
hard to recognize)
Mana Cost: 6000
HOLY FLIES: Not so much an attack on
the creature but more of a way to lower is impressiveness and make
him useless to villagers. They see the huge flies around the
creature and run like hell and keep their distance. Also distracts
the creature itself. Must be cast on another creature for yours to
learn it.
Icon appears as a bottle with flies buzzing
around it.
Mana Cost: 8000
WEAKENING: Turn the other creature
into a weak and pathetic shadow of it's former self. Completely
drains the creatures strength. In a fight this can be used to take
a chunk out of the opponents health bar. More useful than it seems
but most definitely a miracle suited to the arena or just prior to
it. Can be cast on your creature for them to learn it.
Icon appears as a bottle with thin
arms.
Mana Cost: 8000
In version 1.0 and v1.10beta of B&W there
was a bug whereby you perform a multi-click in much the same way
as the wood or food multiclick that was in v1.0 but was removed
afterwards. It allows you to cast the miracle on the creature many
times over without any extra cost of mana. This means that you can
freeze an enemy creature for a whole game or make your own
creature into a giant for a very long time. When you cast the
miracle your hand needs to be over the creature's body. You'll
click one and your hand will start pouring the miracles bottle.
However, your cursor is still in the same place it was originally.
If you click again and again then the miracle will repeat over and
over. You will know if your hand has moved away from being over
the creature because a red cross will appear along with a noise
meaning that you can't cast that their. Using the crosses as a
guide line you can move the invisible cursor over the creature
again and continue.
[ index ]
Intermediate General
Information
There is discussion as to the matter of
certain mushrooms causing titans to grow faster. From certain
sources and experiments we know that the Tall Purple mushrooms
will only act as a narcotic to certain creature and cause strange
behaviour. Toadstools have no effect except to poison food stores
so at this point I would advise NOT giving them to your creature.
The small White mushrooms are however a possible source of
increased titan growth however this is just rumour and
speculation. Project CREED will be investigating the effects of
mushrooms in detail at a later date.
The full size that a creature can reach is
roughly the same size as the creature on island 1 who is known as
the guide. Using the Expansion miracle is also an indication of
your creature�s maximum size. A good indication of your creature�s
current size is the sound of his footsteps. A fully-grown creature
makes large booming thuds as they walk.
Creatures can eat anything. A tiger isn�t
restricted to meat and cows are not restricted to grain. There is
currently no evidence of certain foods having a negative effect on
some titans but we will be looking into this. However things that
they throw up after swallowing naturally aren�t good for them.
Creatures will slowly forget things over
time. They will need their memory jogging from time to time.
Forgetting how to fish after 100 years is understandable.
Your titans cannot die. No matter what you are told
it is impossible for your creature to suffer any kind of permanent
death.
Scars are permanent unless removed by
third party software. If you don�t want a scarred creature then
don�t get into fights and avoid letting him become severely
injured. However scars are more likely to occur to a creature that
has been in a lot of fights regardless of the fact that they won
or loss.
There�s strong evidence that the Single
player maps have a limit of the creature�s growth. It has been
shown that his height and growth will not increase after a certain
point on some maps in the game. This might be something by
Lionhead to encourage the player to progress further into the
game. Again, this will be something we�ll be investigating.
It is possible to transfer the creature
from one PC to another. There are a pair of files in the
�Scripts/creaturemind� directory which start with the prefix �C4�
one is the mind file while the other is the physical reference
file. However it will be up to you to work out which file is which
titan. It�s possible to copy the file and rename it to something
like "MyTitanCreature" and use it in a custom playground
script.You can quickly file the name of the file by using the
'regedit' command by typing it into the 'Run' start menu program.
This will bring up the registry editor. I would suggest that you
back up the files since messing around with this could ruin your
pc settings. Follow this path to get to the correct directory:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Lionhead Studios
Ltd\Black & White\LHMultiplayer\Profiles .
Find the name of the profile that you want to back up or copy.
Inside will be the name of the mindfile meaning that you just look
for that name on the 2 files in the 'creaturemind'
folder.
[ index ]
Advanced Knowledge
This is the section that will be covering
late breaking facts that you will find invaluable if you want to
fully understand the Creatures in B&W, this section will be
receiving the greatest number of updates and will be essential
reading for any good Creature trainer. Our first article is on a
very special part of the game, the mushrooms. There has been
debate for some time about the nature and effects caused by
feeding these fungi to your creature. There is obvious proof that
the tall purple mushrooms behave like a narcotic and that the
toadstools can be used to poison a food store, but there was much
speculation on the effects of the short white/grey mushrooms found
on maps like Bombardment and found on Island 1. Now for the first
time we bring you the solid facts and figures about these strange
white mushrooms.
[ index ]
The Dreamers and Accelerated creature
growth
Following on from the Intermediate
section's introduction to growth we now look at ways to accelerate
this to the maximum possible extent by forcing a very lazy
lifestyle and a specific eating habit onto your creature.
Our test subject was Newton, a new Ape who
was about to break records in creature growth. Using KOng (a cheat
program with a very handy way to check your creature's current
height compared to his maximum) and the in-game statistics, we
monitored his growth over a period of 5 years. The base height for
the Ape is 11%, this is roughly the same for all creatures when
they are 0 years old. The default negative value that appears in
your stats when your creature is in his pen was at -2.72. However,
this value should not be used directly as a value to measure
growth by since it reaches about -75.0 when the creature is 50%
grown. This means that it will appear to the person who's using
this to monitor growth that the titan's growth rate is slowing.
The best in-game measurement of growth is the value seen in the
stats when the creature is out of the pen. This value shows by how
much your titan has grown since he entered the map. It uses the
creature height upon loading the map to read on how much he's
grown from that point on. This way you can tell if his growth is
increasing or decreasing.
Before giving you the results I should
explain how you achieve the maximum growth, if you came to this
chapter from the Intermediate section then you will already know
how effective this method is. But for you who are just reading
this I'll explain what this can do. Using these methods you can
have a fully grown creature by the age of 10. Now this will of
course vary slightly from one species to another, this was after
all tested on the Ape but the difference in the natural grow rates
of different species will mean that you certainly manage it by the
time the creature is 15.
Now, the first word
of warning.
By doing this your creature will not have
time to learn anything special, you'll be creating a creature
who's sole purpose will be to sleep, drink and eat. Once your
creature is fully grown it will be up to you to reverse this
conditioning. I hold no responsibility if you end up with a
creature who can't help but be lazy because of what he learned
earlier in his life. You should know by now that creatures can be
severely effected during the first 20 years of their lives and
that their overall personality will default to how they were
originally trained. This should not be attempted by the casual
player since you will need to put a lot of work into creating this
rapidly growing creature and then undoing it again once they are
matured.
The trick first of all is to teach your
creature to OVERSLEEP. He needs to learn to sleep for extended
lengths of time even if his tiredness rating is at 0%. You will
also need to keep him comfortable by making sure that he doesn't
become dehydrated. You will also need to keep his energy levels
high and maintain his fatness at the 50% mark. At one point during
the test his fatness hit 80% and there was a drop in growth, now
this might have been caused by some other things as well, but it's
best to steer to the side of caution since we have yet to
investigate the effects of fatness on creatures in better detail.
To get them to oversleep they will need to
be conditioned by using a very delicate system of punishment and
reward. I'd suggest reading through the earlier sections if you
aren't too familiar with how the punishment and reward system
works in the creature mind. On the first occasion you creature
will probably sleep for an extra 4 seconds over the 0% limit. This
can be measured by his snoring. He will snore once every 2
seconds. Putting the game into double speed will help with his
growth because you can get more happening in one year of his life
so he's essentially getting an extra 30 minutes worth into a
single year. When he wakes up after oversleeping you need to
reward him to 100% on the first two times. After each reward he'll
go back to sleep for exactly the same length of time. You will be
telling him that over sleeping is good. Next, you will need to
trail off the rewards. This will depend on your own understanding
of how well your creature learns things like this . But you will
need to hit the 10% mark quite soon for speed purposes. The first
time that you'll do this your creature will probably get hungry
cause it takes about 15 minutes on the first time but this will
vary. But keep reading since we'll cover what he needs to eat
later. Once you've rewarded at the 10% mark about twice you will
then need to start punishment. A light smack to 10% when they wake
up after over sleeping will often result in them going back to
sleep again ( that is if there is nothing else the creature needs
to do or feels is important to do). If the creature tries to
wander off looking for food or water when you don't feel he needs
to then a light smack or two will have him running back to his pen
for a nap. Keep punishment up at the 10% mark only, going over
will result in your creature not wanting to sleep. After a while
he'll sleep for an extra 2 seconds, 1 snore more. Keep this
training going for as long as you feel is needed. The more he over
sleeps the better and he'll always increase in steps of one more
snore. If you do it correctly you can have him over sleeping by a
full minute by the time he's 4 years old.
Always make him sleep in the pen, why you
ask? Well you knew that it increased growth, but by how much you
never knew. Until now. In the pen he'll grow at 3 times the speed
when he's awake. If he sleeps outside the pen then it's about
times 2. That means that you are missing a huge increase by
letting him sleep outside in the open. If he does that then give
him a quick slap and drag him into his pen.
So what do you feed him? You feed him
nothing but the White mushrooms which we are now calling Dreamers
( which will become clear later), this means that you will need a
special map with a plentiful supply of these handy fungi. But you
can find some of Island 1 in the swamp, on the Skirmish map
Bombardment o the mega-blast mountain and on Island 2 around the
guru's mountain. The Dreamers have the effect of boosting the
growth by 0.01% so 5 mushrooms will result in a boost of 0.05%
when he eats them. The average mushroom is worth around 16 point
of hunger for a medium sized creature so they are a fairly poor
source of nutrition. For some reason, Dreamers don't appear as
mushrooms in the creature cave. No matter how many you eat the
stats will always stay 0. Now the best use of these is to feed
them to your creature before they sleep. Because the boost lasts
about 4 seconds you can feed one to a creature just before they go
to sleep then you will benefit from the effects they cause. In the
test, Newton grew by 0.20% in 30 seconds while asleep in his pen.
By feeding him a mushroom this was upped to 0.28%. So the effect
of the pen also increased the mushrooms affect by eight.
That's basically all you need to do. Now
of course this means that you get a weak, lazy and unskilled yet
massive creature, but for some the effort of retraining them is
worth it. Now this is proven to be the single best method. Before
now some folks recommended that you over work your creature to
have them sleep more. Naturally this not only means that they
aren't sleeping as much cause they are awake while you are wearing
them out but also because they won't benefit from the sleep until
they have recovered from their tiredness. So don't wear them out
cause you will also have to feed them more to recover the lost
energy. If you follow the guidelines laid out above then you can
squeeze a full 10% out of your creature towards their full height.
So in 10 years he'll be fully grown.
For your information, here's the data from
Newton's 5 years:
The following section is as follows, The
first value is the age, the value in the [ ] brackets is the
percentage of the creature maximum height they were at. The ( )
brackets contain the negative value from the B&W stats.
Age: 0 [11%] (-2.72)
Age: 1 [20%] (43.72)
Age : 2 [29%] (62.06)
Age: 3 [35%] (68.12) - the year where his
fatness hit 80% and he spent more time drinking due to
dehydration
Age: 4 [45%] (75.38)
Age: 5 [55%] (n/a)
How to perform these
tests yourself
You will need a
stopwatch or something to measure the time in seconds. Something
to log the note in and of course the game. You may use a current
creature or create a new profile creature as we did.
The first test is
getting the regular growth rate out of the pen, this should be
measured over 30 seconds. But what ever time you use, it must be
the same all experiments in this test session. Check the creature
current amount of growth using the game's stats. If you just
started on the map it should say 0.00% or a bit more depending on
how long after starting the you checked it. Start the stopwatch as
soon as you leave he pause menu. Then again pause the game and
check the stats after 30 seconds has passed. Not the amount it's
at and work out the amount that he's grown. Repeat if you feel the
need.
Next you repeat it for
sleeping in the pen. The same as above only this time you will
need to check the growth of them out of the pen. Once you have
that you will then need to quickly get them into the pen and
sleeping. Wake them up at 29 seconds and lead them out of the pen
to get the reading. There will be a discrepancy but by waking him
up early you can remove some of this.
Repeat this with feeding them mushrooms
outside of the pen and monitoring the growth, fr the sleep test
with mushrooms you will need to do as before only as quickly as
possible to catch the mushroom's effect in action. For that you
MUST check the growth AFTER they eat the mushroom since it'll
increase the growth by the normal 0.01% when they eat it. You just
want the effect cause while asleep and under it's
influence.
Compare the readings with our own to see
if we or you did it right. We appreciate all data you can supply
us with to create a creature database regarding these findings.
All submissions will be checked for validation and your name will
be mentioned in our credits. Do not
falsify data since we will check the findings
ourselves.
