Animals/cows eat too much thread no 8934

[Onep]

Yeah, I've never bothered much with livestock for this reason. I usually keep like 4 sheep and 2 horses. They simply eat waaay too much.

[Beezer12Washingbeard]

I only just now started taming animals, so I don't know what eating rates are like yet, but from my time living on a horse farm (doing chores to pay for my room) I can say that the eating rates described in this thread are astronomical. I used to help harvest & bale hay every month or so, we'd get about 250-ish bales of hay for around 20 horses for the month, and there'd usually be a bit of a surplus from that, so.

In any case, realism should take a backseat to fun in a game. Even the most realistic games are, at best, aiming to model reality as best they can. If the model is too tedious (as it seems from this thread), botting seems to be an inevitable outcome. After all, it was too tedious IRL, so we invented tractors and other farm equipment to help us automate various parts of it. Since we can't invent tractors in the game, players do the next best thing: automate via bots.

It seems the farming model could use some serious tweaking.

[shubla]

I agree that amount they eat should be decreased.
It's just crazy how big fields you need for few animals of each. I think that you should be able to have at least 2 pairs of all animals with relatively small farms.

[MadNomad]

I usually keep like 4 sheep and 2 horses.

This. that much wool is definetly enough for stuffed bears for small group, and everyone can have their personal sheep or two instead of farming hours for more unnecessary wool.

[shubla]

I usually keep like 4 sheep and 2 horses.

This. that much wool is definetly enough for stuffed bears for small group, and everyone can have their personal sheep or two instead of farming hours for more unnecessary wool.

maybe just increase the units of food certain food item gives in troughs 10 times? to make cheese production better

But the fact is that you need a few production animals. And probably you want to raise quality as well.
So you need at least 4 of each animal. (One male, one or two females, one or two small ones)
And if you have horses, pigs, sheeps, cows. This is a lot of mouths to feed.

[MadNomad]

but seems like dividing food consuption by 10 would be better cuz its better to fill troughs longer but rarely instead of filling faster and having to babysit it

[Fierce_Deity]

I used to help harvest & bale hay every month or so, we'd get about 250-ish bales of hay for around 20 horses for the month, and there'd usually be a bit of a surplus from that, so.

To stay on topic, yeah animals eat too much, so +1
Now then, I sure hope you mean 200 horses, because otherwise I can't believe a single thing from your post. I help raise about 10 cows and they eat a couple bales of hay a week. Hard for me to believe 20 horses some how consume anything more than 5 bales a week, and thats overshooting. Even if they have no access to grass they shouldn't be eating more than that.

[Kaios]

To stay on topic, yeah animals eat too much, so +1
Now then, I sure hope you mean 200 horses, because otherwise I can't believe a single thing from your post. I help raise about 10 cows and they eat a couple bales of hay a week. Hard for me to believe 20 horses some how consume anything more than 5 bales a week, and thats overshooting. Even if they have no access to grass they shouldn't be eating more than that.

It depends on a few factors, are they on pasture in addition to the hay bales, breed, size, metabolism. I'd say a horse could eat a single bale in one day but that also depends on the weight of the hay bale since some are small at 40-60 lbs or larger at 70-80. It's not hard to believe 20 horses could eat 250 in a month.

[shubla]

Devs should halve food consumption on all animals. And then see what happens.

[Fierce_Deity]

It depends on a few factors, are they on pasture in addition to the hay bales, breed, size, metabolism. I'd say a horse could eat a single bale in one day but that also depends on the weight of the hay bale since some are small at 40-60 lbs or larger at 70-80. It's not hard to believe 20 horses could eat 250 in a month.

Hm fair enough. Another thing I did not consider, was which type of bales he was referring to. He may mean square bales, and not the massive round bales I had in mind.