Please understand this is only a theory about the pass change I know nothing!

This is mostly for the players who has kindly informed us about the pass change who has experienced it on their server, have anyone on your servers thought about the possibility that maybe you don't start at 0 each day and then have to gain 10 points in the loyal pass player system?

My theory is that perhaps you can actually start at minus.

When you log in each day a checksum is run on your account perhaps that doesn't only calculate if you qualified for 10 points yesterday but also if you can start at zero today.

For example the check system could run to check if your brought passes with in the last 30 days (Howrse is found of 30 days which is why I use that as an example) if not your -1 from the start of the day.

A second one could be do you have VIP?
and have you spent passes recently within the last five days or something like that?

The reason I started thinking about this is because the numbers there is being reported is so random that it seems unlikely that you all start at 0 and then have to roughly do the same things, Howrse is not that big a game with so many different options for everyone to do each day that nobody can hit consistency

The other thing I'm wondering about with this is if these checksums if they are true in fact stops you from getting 10 for example if you don't have VIP you will never get 10 points only nine, and if you haven't brought passes within the last 30 days you will only ever get 8?

This is a total theory I know nothing about how it actually works, but I do know it would be possible to program into the game Howrse runs on what is called Java script at least that's what it says in the HTML (right click and choose show source code) and those run checksum systems.

Again please this is only a theory with absolutely no proof or experience with the new pass system

It is something we definetly should check out by testing. Can happen there is a fault in the code who makes one start at minus instead of 0.

with the coding as it seems fairly random half the time what I get on the CZ server, though I've had a consistent 3-4 points for the past 6 days I've recorded points and actions.

The fault in the pass buying/VIP theory is that(and I'd have to look back at the CZ forums to be sure)there were some VIPs and pass buyers who reported not getting 10 points on days they bought passes. Even when I used the passes I earned in game it never seemed to boost my points. I suppose one could argue it's because I didn't buy them, but unless there is something in the code attached to each pass letting the system know how it was earned it couldn't tell the difference. And that type of code sounds difficult and server intensive to implement.

I think the only pattern I could say I have noticed is that sometimes I did x actions one day and get 6 points, then I'll do the same x actions, with a few variations, the very next day and get less points. As if it recognized I did repeat actions and penalized me for that. But then I would turn around the next day and try to do loads of different stuff and I'd get the same points I got the day before. Figuring out how to earn points is even more confusing than my programming class was. And that was merely introductory

Interesting hypothesis. Shouldn't be too hard to set up some nice experimental design to figure this out. Maybe we can't pinpoint exactly what it is that you need to get to start at 0, but you should certainly see right away if there is one or several factors that play a role into the final result.

But also, those of you that have tested, have you spent *exactly* the same amount of time online each day? Have you logged in roughly the same time each day? It seems to me though that the easiest thing one could do to randomize number of points given each day and ruin our way of figuring out what we need to do each day to gain 10 points is to build in a randomization factor of some kind, for example that just by chance you could lose out on one or more points.

during the morning, the day, at night and spent various amounts of time logged in. I spent a consistent 30 minutes playing one time (I only have a handful of horses so there isn't much to do unless I'm blupping a horse), which is the longest I've played on that server in one session. I've even logged in multiple times throughout the day as well.

What annoys me is how it's so obvious that it's designed to make us get as few passes as possible while still attempting to make it sound like it's 'fair' to us. Which it isn't. At all!

Now we can get 31 free passes each month. Pass horses are expensive? Well you could breed them yourself, then they're free. It really doesn't take any effort, take this from someone who's taken care of 1000 horses every day for 1,5 years.

The new change? Well not only do they take away the 30 pass horses, which I think would be .. somewhat fair? Only 10 of the passhorses guarantee passes, the rest are more luck. So not too big of a loss. But 'conveniently' they just happen to merge it with the old equus-pass. So down from 31 to just 10 passes each month.

But 10 a month with almost no effort seems nice though! Lots of more players will get those passes and can use them in the game. Or well. The game say "oh you'll get 1 pass every 3 days!" The 10 points each day aren't that hard to get. Great, right!

No! They make the points harder to get and don't tell us what to do to get our 10 points.

Not only that.. The meter only goes up to 30... But you're a super active player, right? But you miss 1 point one day.. So you have 29 after 3 days. Next day? You get 10 points. Does it matter? NOPE, only 1 matter. The rest of them (9(!) points!) are lost. Realistically the most active players will take 4 days per pass, meaning they'll get 7-8 passes each month, not the promised 10. This is probably what annoys me the most. I hope they change it so that either the points carry over OR they make the meter 300 and that you can get a pass for every 30 you collect so that it's a much lesser risk that points are lost.

Plus you have to remember to get the pass.. Otherwise you'll not get any points the next day because the meter is already full.

Sounds like a great idea! But wait, you'll get a divine!! Which does nothing... Meaning it's 100% useless. I'm sorry but I have enough of those.

1. The divine, dubbed "broccoli", doesn't even look good. Some people might think he doesn't look too hideous, but as an artist, I don't even want to look at it. And the amount of points isn't that much, so if you're lucky you'll get 5 passes a month.

Maybe it's not VIP and pass buying that count against you, it could be the items you won the day before.
Like if you got a diamond from one of your divines -1 point
Won a black-market item in the promo and maybe -1 for the item or maybe minus whatever it's worth in passes?

Could be that the items you get from your divines the day before counts against you in the loyal pass player system the next day.

If that is in any way true, I'm glad I only have one divine (and he's useless at that)

Now, I liked your theory at first, it has it's holes, but they can be confirmed or debunked. But this is honestly unlikely, that if you win a diamond, you get -1. I believe a bug is possible, that something makes everyone start at -1 or -3 or whatever, depending on possibly ranking, number of horses, actions done yesterday etc, or just a general bug. I doubt winnings are relevant to that, simply because that doesn't make any sense, while starting at a minus because of a bug/number of actions done the day before does. If this is the case, you'd also get -1 for every pass used on a bmi, which is even more unlikely with money-hungry Ubisoft.

Yep, it's confirmed there's going to be an objective with an orange seed tomorrow. It's one of the ones that you need to have your equus reserve end in a certain number, so not too bad at all

... Now we can get 31 free passes each month. ...

How? I thought that the max amount of free passes each month is 11 - 1 from points system and 10 from sending 30yo horses to heaven. How I can get extra 20 passes?

The first 10 in a month are 100%, but the next 20 are 1/3 chance of a pass and 2/3 item, plus the 1 pass you can get every 300 points.

You can get 31 passes a month by the loyal player pass (1 pass), the first 10 horses you send to heaven a month get you 10 passes, and after you send 10, you have a 1 in 3 chance of getting a pass and 2/3 chance of getting a bonus/BM item until you get 30 passes. Once you get 30 passes this way you won't receive anything from pass horses. So far this month it's taken me 50 horses to get 23 passes. This is also written down in section 1.7 of the breeder's manual.

The future new free pass method will only make it possible to get 10 passes a month. It will be similar to the loyal player pass we have now, except the meter caps at 30 instead of 300, meaning in theory you could get a pass every 3 days. But there are currently some major point distribution issues on the servers with this system (4 servers have it right now, the CZ, IT, BG and RU servers) and it's really rare for anyone to get 10 points any day, let alone 10 points 3 days in a row. The Howrse team tried updating it to make it easier to get points, but it somehow got worse and many players are getting about 6 points or less a day. I haven't gotten more than 4 since they updated it. If Howrse doesn't change their mind about implementing this here, hopefully they will at least get the point system fixed before they do.

Admin has told us the change will be coming here and there has been no date announced yet, but we will be warned in advance. The other servers were given about a month's warning I think. So the information we have about how it works is what has been brought over by players who have played on these other servers.

My point calculations were best case-scenario calculations, we all know ~5 passes is what we'll get. Totally the same as the 31 we get not /s