HGG Community Forums

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AntarcticPhantom August 2016
This is going to sound more frustrated than I really am because I know there's always next season, but I'm just trying to get it all out there because maybe you all can guide me (and maybe some other new players) further:

I'm still early game...am I just breeding/playing poorly? I joined in May, this was my first season of gen 3s. I'd say around 2/3 of my foals either get altered by GA/MA/SMA and/or are second and third gen with PTs of less than 10. My 3rd generations were extremely disappointing this year, I got a PT of 9.2 on one of them, and none of them were over 10 (is this disappointing? It seems to be from what I'm reading on the forum, but I really don't know).

I know that the PT cull is not a hard and fast rule, and I'm not culling SMA-passing fillies with PTs above 9 without reason. I was culling colts 9.5 or below during my previous seasons. Almost all my 2g colts were 9.5+, and I couldn't keep all of them, and altering a good looking foal with good breeding potential to be a show horse is just frustrating for me. It's so hard to turn down auctioning altered foals off. I could sit and wait for "years" for them to get points to factor into my show bonus, or be like, "It's my money and I need it now" at the auction.

I have no idea what is good in terms of points for age either, so I am having a hard time telling duds from quality - all of my point values are so low, there's discrepancies between my group of like-year olds, but usually only by 20-odd points at the most. Is that a lot when it comes to single digit aged horses? Should I use some of my high alter rate foundation mares that I want to cull to purpose breed uneven show lines instead?

I just blow through funds in the breeding season, get distracted by cool herd helpers in week 3, and am finally at the point of recovery when the next season hits! I will admit I just put most of my cull auction money to IVs which probably wasn't brilliant, but if something cool that's IV only comes out in September and only September, I want a piece. Mainly because as a player who joined in May, the special HH in June really killed me and I sold almost everything I had to get all 5 of them. I don't want that to happen again, so now I have IVs and enough $ for a few new creates and to sustain my show week.
Every month I have so many regrets in either what I did, what I got rid of, or how I recorded items because I'm still figuring out how to play. My August regret is culling most of my "show herd", even though they weren't very good (most PT around 9.4, I kept anything 9.9 or above).

I guess I'm seeking further advice. How do you balance showing and breeding in early game? To try to answer Ammit (like a pawn to royalty), I don't want to be breeding to throw most of them away, but it at least seems as though I can't afford to keep every sub-par "show horse" at the moment, and am struggling to define who is worth keeping. Should I cull down my breeding herd to make it smaller and easier to get by in terms of $$ in breeding season? I would love to keep everything, and right now I technically have the space, just not the funds...I know I need to show to breed, but my show string as of now (I guess we'll say as of a week ago when I actually had a show string) isn't enough to support pasture breeding + testing.
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kintara August 2016
Just be patient, keep what you can as space allows and slowly build up that show herd/showing points. It doesn't happen quickly but put as many of those IV's as you can towards barns, then you can keep more horses in barns to show. Uneven horses aren't better show horses, any horse could be a good show horse, altered horses train better so just keep a nice range of them. The higher PT's just take longer to train up and win points, but can make a lot more if doing well. You don't know if a horse is going to be a good show horse until they are, so just keep as many as you can! The lower PT's will make some money sooner, but if by 9yo they only have 20 points and have leveled off to be in the last half of their classes, get rid of them!!

Remember it's only a game, don't feel bad about getting rid of those sub-par horses!! Better to get rid of them than taking up valuable barn space! Pasture breeding is good if you are starting off and want to build up to valued/quality generation higher PT breeding line. If I was starting now from scratch 1'd start with a heap of foundation mares in the colours/type you like. Put them all in a pasture for the 30+ days if you can, but you should still get some keeper foals even without it. Put them with a foundation stallion or two. To find your best foals just use the email, take the best one out and run it again. Keep say your best colt or two, and a handful of mares. Auction all the rest, and the mares too if you wanted.

If you have the funds you could PT them all, and keep the ones with PT's above roughly 10 for show horses. Once funds back from selling mares/foals do it again if you wanted to get more foals. Do it for a couple of years with different stallions so you could have two unrelated stallions to go back to the fillies when of age. It's also a good way to make money buy/create a heap of foundation mares at cost, breed them and auction both the mares and foals, you can do it multiple times in one year. If you keep the pasture best then your foal PT's will certainly start to improve on your breeding lines. I don't cull after foundations/gen2, as I like to paper mares, keep for show horses etc but play it however suits you. Buy in someone else s discards from the sales for show horses until your own herds are producing useful horses, that have already been PT'd, hey I'd have a heap I could give you! Hope some of that helped!
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Beadingterri August 2016
My biggest problem has been concentrating on breeding instead of showing. I have done a complete turn around and started concentrating on building a good showing stable. I still breed my horses, but I am auctioning off a lot of the second to fourth generations and concentrating on seeing where my lines are going. It does take time to build a good show herd, but it is well worth it. I really wish that I had learned that sooner
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AntarcticPhantom August 2016
I am not really sure what I'm breeding for. If I had to say now, I'd say breeding ability and color, since I love my June special HH mares? Also if I'm committed to breeding to sell later on, people in the game seem attracted to chrome, no matter how much it would sometimes help us not to be. Due to the way my lines are right now and how I picked HH as I learned more and more about the game, I'd say I have a focus or I'd like to focus more on rabicano, splash, and paint (right now it's a lotta chestnuts too haha). Not sure if that's too many. I figure if I can get good breeders, I will get around 1/2 and 1/2 good breeders and good showers (those who can't breed, show). You're always going to get some duds, and that's ok.

I almost wish this game split into breeding and showing - ie: designating yourself as a breeding farm and maybe getting a breeding bonus each week (sacrifice your weekly show bonus and get a weekly breeding bonus instead - wouldn't work as well on HJ1 though I don't think), or keeping yourself as a show barn the way it seems to be now. It's not that I dislike the showing aspect of the game, I am just much more interested in the breeding and genetics, but it's unsustainable early game without a good show herd.
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