Wiki - Pet Care
Owning a pet in UO is a challenging, yet rewarding, endeavor. Here are some things to keep in mind should you decide to do so.
Have the Skills Required
Taming a pet, and controlling it are not the same thing. To tame a pet requires Animal Taming. The amount required can be seen on the Tamable Creatures table.
Controlling a pet is far more complicated.
Control Chance Calculation
1. Taming Bonus = Difficulty Modifier * (taming skill – required taming skill)
2. Lore Bonus = Difficulty Modifier * (creature lore skill – required taming skill)
3. Skill Bonus= (Taming Bonus + Lore Bonus) / 2
Final control chance % = 70 + skillBonus;
The difficulty Modifier above depends on the difference between your skill and the pet’s difficulty. The difficulty modifier is applied independently to each skill and then that result is averaged. Thus more importance is given to taming than lore, while still requiring you to have a significant investment in both skills to control high level pets. The way that modifiers are picked is as follows:
Difficulty Modifiers:
6 – if (taming/lore skill – pet difficulty) is positive (i.e. if taming/lore skill is greater than the pet’s difficulty)
28 – if (taming skill – pet difficulty) is negative (i.e. if your taming is less than the pet’s difficulty)
14 – if (lore skill – pet difficulty) is negative (i.e. if your lore is less than the pet’s difficulty)
Keep Your Pet Fed
When you give a command to a pet it will either listen to the command, or not, depending on your Control Chance (see above). If the pet listens then it's loyalty level goes up. If it doesn't, it goes down. The further down the list a pet reaches the more penalty their master has in controlling them. To ensure good chance of maintaining a pet, it is suggested you raise both Animal Taming and Creature Lore over the required amount.
Loyalty Levels
Wonderfully Happy
Extremely Happy
Very Happy
Rather Happy
Happy
Content
Content, I suppose
Unhappy
Rather Unhappy
Extremely Unhappy
Confused-Danger of Going Wild
The best way to restore loyalty level is by feeding your pet it's preferred food, which can be seen in the Creature Lore gump in game.
A pets mood remains the same as it was before being shrunk. Shrinking a pet doesn't replace the need to feed them. Conversely, when a pet is stabled they are fed by the Animal Trainer and are always returned to you well fed.
Bonding Your Pet
Bonding a pet should be done before taking it out to train or fight. Bonding potions are craftable in the Taming Craft system, and can be purchased from the Vote Token stone in the LoS Store, under custom on the world omni-porter. Bonding a pet will give the following benefits.
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The pet will recall with the owner and will not need to be lead through a gate
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Should the pet die, a pet ghost will remain which may be resurrected by a tamer with the required level of Creature Lore and Veterinary skill, by an npc veterinarian, through use of a ‘elixir of rebirth‘ potion, or through the use of pet resurrection stones, which are in many areas for convenience.
Healing Your Pet
Use the Veterinary skill, with bandages, to heal your pets. The higher the skill, the more success you will have keeping your pets alive.
Heal Speed Calculation
Vet Skill < 120 = 3 Seconds
Vet Skill => 120 = 2 Seconds
Vet Skill => 130 = 1 Second
Amount Healed Calculation
Minimum = Creature Lore/5 + Veterinary/5 +3
Maximum = Creature Lore/5 + Veterinary/2 +10
Total Amount Healed = Minimum to Maximum + Pet's Total HP/100
Curing Poison Possible at 60 Veterinary and Creature Lore
Resurrection Possible at 80 Veterinary and Creature Lore
You can also use spells to add to your ability to keep your pet alive. Cleric Spells are particulary good here.
Resurrecting Your Pet
Near most dungeons and scattered in key locations around the world are Pet Resurrection Crystals. At any of these players may bring their pets back to life for 20k gold. The crystal inside the entrance of the new player dungeon is free.
The other alternative is to train Veterinary Skill to at least 80 to be able to resurrect your pets yourself.
Other Considerations
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Pets slowly lose loyalty, but more quickly if a pet loses sight of their owner. Don't expect them to handle it well if they're left without you for hours.
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Bonding does not prevent a pet from going wild.
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If a pet has items in it's pack it will not log out with it's owner even if it's bonded unless it is mounted.
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Similarly, a pet with items in it's pack will not be able to be stabled. If an action occurs that would normally place such a pet into the stable then it will be physically be moved to the Britain Stables (the ones at the north end of town) but will not actually be stabled. These pets will stand and wait for their owner to fetch them, and will lose loyalty until they either go wild or are rescued.
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If a character has bound pets free in the world then they will be summoned to the character on log in. This allows those who physically misplace their pets to find them by logging out and back in again.