Ranchers! 🤠
Update 0.7.02 brings a new way to find breeding stock. Back at the ranch, you can make room for a fourth wagon. Open its panel on the pasture to adjust branding priorities, check which animal the crew is working on, and see how long each brand takes.
New Event – The Bull Trader
A new recurring event introduces a cattle trader who offers bulls for sale. After you buy, decline, or let the offer expire, his next offer comes few days later.
Listen to how the trader describes the bull. If he says the bull stayed healthy while the rest of his herd fell ill, he’s hinting at the Hardy trait. Each offer gives you a clue about one trait. You’ll discover the rest once the bull is in your pen.
A bull can have up to five hereditary traits. The asking price depends on how many he has, their levels, and his age.
If you buy the bull, the trader brings him to your Cow Pen himself a few in-game hours later. You can follow the delivery in your quest tracker.
Breeding and Herd Management
The extra risk of Poor Genetics now depends on how closely related the calf’s parents are. For example, it’s 25% if the parents are full siblings, 12.5% if they’re half siblings, and 6.25% if they’re first cousins. When cattle have a choice, they now favor a less closely related mate.
Pregnancies last longer, calves take more time to mature, and adult cattle reach old age sooner at the default settings. When starting a new game, you can adjust all three timings separately or turn off adult aging.
Barns, Wagons and Branding
Expand the Barn from two wagon bays to three, then four. Each extra bay gives you room to keep another wagon.
Each working wagon brands four head of cattle per in-game day before crew bonuses. When two wagons are branding on the same pasture, the cowboys divide the work. Open a wagon’s panel to see who’s helping and how much speed each cowboy adds.
Set separate priorities for cows, bulls, heifer calves, and bull calves on each wagon. Set a group to 4 to brand it first, or 0 to skip it. You can put one wagon on calves while the other works through the adults.
The wagon panel keeps cargo visible until unloading finishes. You can also jump from the panel to the pasture or the animal being branded.
Cowboys, Horses and Ranch Traffic
Cowboys find their way out of the corral more easily. Returning riders keep their distance at the gate and head straight for their own stalls.
Horses pick up speed gradually after leaving the corral and slow down smoothly as they approach the gate.
Reduced jerky movement for cowboys on foot and on horseback. Wagons turn more smoothly and enter and leave the Barn without jolting. Only wagons use the wagon shed.
Fixed Saloon trips ending before the rider arrived. After a cattle drive or a fight, cowboys now return to their posts before taking another job.
Improved the veterinarian’s navigation so he can reach sick cattle and complete his visits more reliably.
Interface and Quality of Life
Hold Alt to see pregnancy and branding progress, along with your cowboys’ energy, morale, and satiety. In Interface settings you can choose which bars stay visible when you release the key.
The cowboy wage setting now applies the selected rate, with a minimum of $1 per cowboy per day.
Thank you to everyone who reported riders bunching up at the gate or a wagon jolting on its way into the Barn. Those details helped me track down what was happening. See you on the range! 🤠