same here DREAMER -- real life comes first -- and that means I pay the bills first

This does not suggest in any fashion needing to use passes. The Employees are, as stated 'bonus' if you happen to have extra to put into it. I am sure some will look to keep all 11 (yikes on that, for VIP that would be 21 a month) but I do not see any indication the more 'casual' or 'pennypinching' lot of us should need to worry about it.

Does this make ECs much more complex? Yes. Will everyone bother with them? No. Each to their own.

I am liking that 'base' resources will be set at a base price from what I am understanding. It also looks like those who placed their ECs on the beach/forest will have a nice bonus on production since the higher end items require an awful lot of sand/wood. Curious to where linen (lin) is coming from to make the cloth items.

Also, I bet Western ECs are cheering that their calves will a bonus bit of leather for them each month!

Well the only thing I even understand, and see no problem with is missions and lessons, troughs and cows.

The rest just blew right over the top of my blonde locks.

It is a lot to absorb and the English test server is not open yet ( expect it will later this next week).

I'm really Not feeling the cost added into the ECs. Passes aren't all that easy to come by and I've worked VERY hard with my EC to have one of the top ones that offers 60e lessons, (Almost) max comp bonus, high prestige, etc. If I'm understanding correctly, in order to keep it where it is I'll need to either start spending passes or my diamonds on it. Don't care for this aspect one bit. I've already been using the diamonds from my Gemstones to upgrade and purchase new boxes since before all the changes hit, I preferred having a smaller EC and had to work on adding 60+ boxes to get the max prestige. I didn't mind doing that because I saw an end in sight (I would eventually get to where I needed to be with the boxes) and then I could go back to using my diamonds for either A) more coat purchases or B) upgrading all of my regular Helio's Ray on my existing coats to the unlimited rays (Which is what I had decided I wanted them to go to from the start) Now it seems in order to keep my EC where it is, I'll need to keep spending them if not add spending passes to that. NOT cool.
I'm already at a disadvantage because in order to keep my lessons at 60e I have to board mostly divines, who on average don't do any kind of lessons with only one or two top skillers. Unless I suddenly start skilling like crazy (again, spending even more passes to be able to do so, Not possible.) then I won't be able to take much advantage of many of the resources the other ECs will have access to. ECs with 32e lessons, but that have over 200-300 horses boarded will be loaded as far as resources go and ones like mine that work more towards lesson price and prestige will fall way behind in this area. Doesn't seem to even to me.
For the most part I've loved the way the changes have went and the direction they've taken. Not sure that I care too much about some of these though... Anxious to see how it all plays out

Hold up. So what I am gathering here is that hOWrse got rid of employees just so that they could bring them back with a fee? I'm sorry but I think that is ridiculous. I personally think Howrse is quite successful, so why they keep bringing 'new' stuff that has a pricey tag on it makes no sense to me.
I've been playing howrse for a while now, not really doing much, just hangin' and taking care of my Ec. I was pretty close to being in the top 100 before all the changes happened. And don't get me wrong, the changes are good, it's nice to see howrse expand their base and see what they come up with. But I'm getting a little tedious with all of these... updates I guess.
I don't buy passes nor do I really spend them, so there is a problem I don't really have to deal with (the urge to spend on them or on other items), but Eq is another matter. I just reached 1 mil. Eq, I have been trying really hard to get to one million. Thankfully I did it, but with all these new expenses I don't think those big bucks will stay around.
Changes are good, I believe that, didn't we just get over a huge recycle though? I hope this will be the last for a while (until the summer maybe?) I don't know if I will be able to keep up with all these new things. Like Cyberhorses said, it is a lot to absorb, and I bet everything will work out for everyone in the end. For now though, I'm not so sure.

I haven't been on here save the past few days.

Before that I took a 6 month hiatus from the game. The changes are a slap in the virtual face for me. A lot to take in and figure out before I can get back on track with my goals again.

I think I may just ditch the EC until I catch up with some trophies and such. I really do not like the combining of funds at all. I like it separated.

I would cautiously point out reserving judgement on 'employees' We only have two of the possible eleven listed it seems. But it sounds like they are not required for prestige in any fashion based on those two, rather they are 'bonuses' rather like divine perks as an example.

For example, Rain gives +5% on crops grown.and if you are in possession of the farmer 'bonus' your greenhouses will award an extra 25% production. Easier to have all these bonuses in play at once? Sure, just like it is easier to have the VIP perk of being able to blup before age 10, get a 25% on unicorns, have Pixiu and his bonus to breed a unicorn 6 months after she gives birth and all the other perks that are not really game breaking.

Obviously the new changes are going to require some money being thrown in to actually get the full benefit of all the changes. . . but the long run game looks like it will allow players to be incredibly versatile in their game play and be able to play around with what really works for them and their own game.

Like, not everyone is going to care about getting the coach, because not everyone is really going to care about whether a comp is less prestigious or more since maybe they are running rookies, or specific comps for species reasons.

I kinda wonder what these EC Ufos are going to be >.> I imagine just iron/wood/sand and such (and if it is z1. . .with some of those amounts that will be annoying) but it used to be ,and I do not know if you can still, that occasionally you could find a Hop Ufo floating around, what if you could rarely find a shower floating around? or a trough?

I think you hit the nail on the head there.

I believe ( now that I can see more of the full range of changes) that this was the end result Howrse was aiming for. Although I took pretty good care of my EC it was of secondary importance.

Howrse just wants it to have a more prominent place in the game.

Remember that this whole series of changes has been in the works for over a year now. They are all linked, and are being implemented in stages to ensure everything works. So yes, we did just get what seemed like a massive amount of change but imagine if all the EC changes (removing employees, merging reserves, new crops, providing equipment/food, etc.) had happened all at once... now THAT would be a lot of change.

I was shocked and humored to realize that my EC actually has done a lot better with the changes. I was lucky to get 35-7e lessons before, now I'm sitting happily at 52e. One heck of a bump in my books. I actually hope they are almost done messing around with it pretty soon here, I'm starting to get a headache trying to work my way around the new changes on the first day.

However, as I have said before, that's one of the better things about us human beings, we can adjust to changes swiftly. When I try and remember all the changes that have been around since I first started playing about 3 1/2 years ago it's mind boggling.

Give it time, don't worry over the first few things. That's all we can do, is wait for a more complete picture.

Half of that was lumped in one for me since it occurred while I was gone, and I was totally lost for a few weeks. If they'd tried to implement it all at once... sheesh.

More info regarding resources ( greenhouses and repairing) them and how...



Also..



All of the above translated from the French server.

Interesting set of changes!

I will say, I don't like the fact that you can apparently change your EC's location as many times as you want for the first 30 days: it's disadvantageous for people who board their horses at an EC for the purposes of getting that doubled skill advantage. Now, if only you could cancel boarding at any EC for those 30 days... That would help.

Here is the translated version of what the workers do.

Thanks for posting these Cyber, I can already see there are really only one or two that interest me.

Also >.> 6 Large Greenhouses at once >.. Wheat, is totally becomng a winter crop if cows do not take a full month to be 'grown' into leather. So, if/when anyone gets information on cow production time, let us know!

Wow - lots of new features to figure out! I assume that one of the "grooms" will be translated into something else before it's introduced. Also, it mentions resource regeneration - which I can only assume means we won't be able to endlessly harvest wood/sand/iron - we will have to wait between harvests. That's going to be interesting!

@Aly37 - You are right, I guess I just feel like maybe the time frame or amount of updates has sort of been a little out of place? I'm not exactly sure. And your right again on your latter statement, could you imagine the explosion that would have happened?

@Hallaloth - I must agree with you, after reconsidering all the positions and wide option base I can see where many players could find that their account really fits to their opinions and personal preference. I could even see a growth in personal participation and interaction.

@Cyberhorse - Thank you for providing all this information for us! I don't know how you do it or stay on top of everything but it's fantastic. (:

This is the French version but will be what the hire an employee page will look like.

So now that I see the original and did a new translational the groom translation I did earlier I think it should be this for having a groom.

Important GOOD info for those wondering about draft horses--

More images.

More--

[spoiler][/spoilrt]

Can you fix the above. It should have come up as a spoiler..sorry.

Here you go Cyber...

Right?