CLOK BBS

A mysterious GM asked for a thread about horses.

Racehorses ("Hotbloods")
"'Hot blooded' breeds include 'oriental horses' such as the Akhal-Teke, Arabian horse, Barb and now-extinct Turkoman horse, as well as the Thoroughbred, a breed developed in England from the older oriental breeds. Hot bloods tend to be spirited, bold, and learn quickly. They are bred for agility and speed. They tend to be physically refined—thin-skinned, slim, and long-legged. The original oriental breeds were brought to Europe from the Middle East and North Africa when European breeders wished to infuse these traits into racing and light cavalry horses."

I'd recommend these horses have a shorter moving roundtime (perhaps with an increase on hills or in forests since they are bred for flat racing), less endurance (for sprints), and a flighty temperament that doesn't tolerate combat, gunfire, loud noises, scary shadows, or anything else well. I'd say they require a higher Riding skill to effectively manage and keep them from bolting or even getting carried away and just galloping for a while. They are as much for show as they are for racing and would be a status symbol in the Lost Lands.

Riding Horses ("Warmbloods")
"'Warmblood' breeds, such as the Trakehner or Hanoverian, developed when European carriage and war horses were crossed with Arabians or Thoroughbreds, producing a riding horse with more refinement than a draft horse, but greater size and milder temperament than a lighter breed. Certain pony breeds with warmblood characteristics have been developed for smaller riders. Warmbloods are considered a 'light horse' or 'riding horse.'"

These are your traditional, standard riding horse. Average speed, average endurance, with a more forgiving temperament for new riders. They'll still run from combat and not like gunshots gunshots, since horses are prey animals and their reaction to danger is flight, but they're also less likely to run amok. I'd say they are one of the most common types of horses in the Lost Lands.

Draft horses ("Coldbloods")
"Muscular, heavy draft horses are known as 'cold bloods,' as they are bred not only for strength, but also to have the calm, patient temperament needed to pull a plow or a heavy carriage full of people. They are sometimes nicknamed "gentle giants". Well-known draft breeds include the Belgian and the Clydesdale. Some, like the Percheron, are lighter and livelier, developed to pull carriages or to plow large fields in drier climates. Others, such as the Shire, are slower and more powerful, bred to plow fields with heavy, clay-based soils. The cold-blooded group also includes some pony breeds."

These are really the only horses that should be pulling wagons, and would be one of the most common types of horse in the Lost Lands for that reason. They'd have longer roundtimes, inexhaustible endurance (which is why they can drag and pull things), and a really forgiving temperament in that they'll still flee from combat but might not bolt if a gunshot or something else startles them. They'd require the least Riding skill to effectively manage.

(Light/Heavy) Warhorses
Warhorses are less a breed than a special kind of training. Light cavalry would use Hotbloods and heavy cavalry would use Warmbloods. Coldbloods weren't used except for pulling wagons and siege engines, and the modern idea of knights on Clydesdales is a falsehood perpetuated by Hollywood and Renaissance Fairs since they look more impressive. If we don't want to break warhorses into light and heavy, I'd model them after Warmbloods in terms of speed and endurance. The difference is in the training.

It takes a lot of work to turn prey animals aggressive, and you have to maintain that conditioning. Warhorses would only be ridden to patrol the grounds or to battle so that the animal knew that anytime it was saddled there might be a fight. You'd never ride a warhorse on a joyride and you'd never tell it to pull a load. They're conditioned to strike with the front hooves, kick with the rear hooves, stamp on prone enemies, trample, and even bite and shake people until something broke. They were highly intelligent too and drilled to walk sideways or backwards, turn in place, and even wait for their rider to crawl out from underneath them before rolling to get back up after falling (which spares the rider shattered legs).

So I'd make warhorses have average speed and endurance, but make them aggressive in combat, relatively fearless, and require a really high Riding skill to properly control. Otherwise you might find your horse charging into the fray when you don't want it to, or attacking the wrong target (namely anything nearby that is smaller than it, which is why they aren't suitable for pleasure riding). They'd absolutely refuse to pull anything and would break free of the harness and damage the wagon.

Firearms
If you code in things like bolting, you might want there to be an option for training or special sorts of "cavalry" horses that aren't frightened by gunshots but aren't fully trained warhorses.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horse#Temperament
I can confirm most of this from experience or other research, but the write-ups were pretty good for a quick intro to the different temperaments.

EDIT: I felt I should point out that the GM asked for a thread to discuss the issue and that what is written above are simply my suggestions. Please chime in with your own ideas and suggestions.

I agree with your ideas, except maybe the riding skill choices. I do agree that warhorses should require a higher riding skill than your average horse, and I imagine a requirement of 50 or 100 in the skill would be reasonable. For the other breeds, though, I think they should be available from the moment you have 1 in riding. The reason I say this is because by requiring a certain amount of riding skill for each breed, you're practically forcing people to start with one horse, then work their way up to getting the horse they actually wanted. Since horses cannot be sold, and they cost so much to buy, this is not a good idea. Would it reduce the realism a bit? Yes, maybe for those who have been around horses in their life. But most people don't want two or three horses that they never ride and keep in the stables all the time, and honestly, if someone has never been around horses before or doesn't know much about them, I doubt they would even realize that IRL different breeds require a different amount of skill and knowledge to handle and ride.

I was thinking less that you couldn't ride a horse without a certain amount of skill, but that it would be more difficult to keep the horse from doing what it wants. So you could clamber on to a hotblood with 1 riding skill, but if you take it somewhere and it spooks, it is going to take you for a ride before you get it calmed down enough to go where you want instead of where it wants. If you mount a warhorse with 1 skill and ride it into battle, it is going to decide what needs to be squished, not you. And that could mean it doesn't retreat when you want it to or that it tries to squish a couple of your friends. For that matter, even a warmblood or a coldblood can still get away from you if you have insufficient skill, so there'd be no perfect starter horse.

I think I should like to see renting horses becoming a thing. It could even work out like handcarts, and could dull the costs of training a bit.

Tack! (because horses are pretty and should be dressed up, plus it makes riding them a lot easier)
I remember a documentary I saw on jousting where they said that Western riding and saddles were the most similar to a knight's equipment. That'd make even more sense in CLOK were the riding would be mostly work-related.

Saddle Pad: You'll put this on first.

Saddle Blanket: Then you'll put this on. These show up under the saddle so they can be decorative.

Saddle: Kind of important. I'd assume our saddles come with breast collars because of the riding we do.

There's two options for headgear.

Halter: For leading a horse, but not riding it. It doesn't have a bit.

Bridle: This has a bit, so you'd ride a horse with one of these, though there is nothing stopping you from leading a horse with a bridle.

And then you'd put a harness on your horse if you want it to pull carts or wagons, or saddlebags if you want a riding horse to have some carrying capacity. If you want your horse to carry a lot of things, you'd put a pack saddle on it instead of a riding saddle. Some horses could wear armor.

Grooming!
You'd want a clean horse before you put tack on it, otherwise you'd just grind the filth into the horse's coat and skin and make life miserable. In addition to the usual 'clean'ing, we could look at actual horse grooming. You'd need a curry comb, a hard brush, a soft brush, a mane comb/brush, and a hoof pick. Failing to groom your horse could result in it being 'disheveled' or 'filthy.' Maybe if it is kept clean it is 'groomed' like some people are walking around being 'fragrant.'

Then again, I'm wary of making what should be an RP point (how do you treat your horses?) becoming something people grind. There was a horse "bonding" system in Dragonrealms, and we saw a lot of that with people petting, feeding, and grooming horses just to get the stat boost and less because they loved their mounts.

Again, these are just ideas. I know the GMs are busy with a ton of other things, but since they asked for ideas I'm throwing them out there.