Breeds - Appaloosa

The Appaloosa is best known as a stock horse and is used in a number of western riding disciplines. It is known for its distictive leopard spotted coat and originates from the USA. They are one of the original breeds on Howrse.

-Species: Horse
-Size: from 14.2 hands to 15.2 hands

ALLOWED COATS

Chestnut Blanket 14 %
Bay Blanket 9 %
Dun Blanket 3 %
Black Blanket 9 %
Palomino Blanket 6 %
Few Spots 1 %
Chestnut Leopard 9 %
Black Leopard 12 %
Chestnut Snowflake 3 %
Bay Snowflake 4 %
Black Snowflake 1 %
Chestnut Spotted Blanket 11 %
Bay Spotted Blanket 10 %
Isabelle Spotted Blanket 2 %
Black Spotted Blanket 3 %
Palomino Spotted Blanket 2 %
Black 1 %

Top 3 skills: Speed, Galloping and Dressage

Best competitions: Barrel Races and Galloping Races

Lucy

Breeds - Hanoverian

Hanoverian's are Warmblood horses originating from Germany. They are known for their good temperament, athleticism, beauty, and grace. On Howrse they are a very popular breed and regularly top the Showjumping elite.

-Species: Horse
-Size: from 15.0 hands to 16.3 hands

ALLOWED COATS

Chestnut 19 %
Bay 12 %
Cherry bay 9 %
Strawberry roan 1 %
Flaxen Chestnut 9 %
Black 7 %
Liver chestnut 12 %
Dark Bay 14 %
Light Grey 5 %
Dapple Grey 9 %
Mousey Grey 1 %
Roan 2 %

Top 3 skills: Showjumping, Speed and Galloping

Best competitions: Showjumping, Galloping Races and Barrel Races

Lucy

Where is the Notebook? Objective 32

The latest round of Objectives have thrown up quite a few questions which players have had a fair a bit of trouble with. The Secret Page question, which we have already written about here on Ultimate Howrse, has prompted a great deal of interest.

But we've noticed that Objective number 32 'Where is the Notebook' seems a current favourite.

So where is it? Well, as you'll see from the screen shot above (click to enlarge), it can be found on your Mail page and is the fourth tab along, above your list of emails.

The Notebook is really useful as you can keep details of trades you've done, contacts you've made or to keep track of horses you may be following in the auctions.

So now you know where it is, you can happily say "Objective 32 completed!"

Patsy

Archimedes

Archimedes is a Special horse and we don't just mean his breed. So, yes, firstly, Archimedes' are Special horses. The other breeds of Special horse are Harlequins and Falabellas. Now Archimdedes' is unique because players can win aging points from him. Players can get an aging point from one Archimedes each day, by visiting his page and answering a question correctly. It's as simple as that.

When a player answers a question correctly - the Archimedes gains intelligence. If you look at an Archimedes' page, you'll see a bar (like the ones for health, morale and energy) that show his intelligence. When players answer a question correctly, his intelligence increases. If they get the answer wrong, his intelligence decreases.

Archimedes' also look rather grand as they wear a special blanket and a mortar board, which is a special sort of hat that people wear when they have gained a degree at University. Archimedes is indeed a very clever fellow. Which brings us to the fact that, just like all Divine and Special horses - they are all male and cannot breed. He also has a rather low GP of just 350, so won't win you many races.

This breed of Special horse first appeared when Howrse closed down it's quiz site which was a separate site from the main game. Archimedes' didn't exist at this point. They were created and handed out by Howrse to people who had completed 100 challenges on the 'Howrse Quiz' site. There are 1,117 Archimedes' in the game although this figure may change as players leave the game.

So now you know about him, you can go and start getting those free ageing points!

Patsy

Birthday Unicorns

The latest special event from Howrse is happening now. To celebrate Owlient’s 5^th birthday, Howrse are releasing a ‘herd of Unicorns’ into the game. This is exciting stuff as there will be quite a few new Unicorn breeds that have never existed before.

In the last year or two, Uni’s have been rather overshadowed by all the Divine and Special horses. But Unicorns (formerly called Unicowrns) are really magical, pretty and fun to breed. Basically, apart from the wonderful horn on their head, Uni’s are pretty much the same as ordinary horses, but with one big difference.

Breeding.

When you breed two Unicorns together, you do not automatically get a Unicorn foal. Five times out of six (on average) you will just get an ordinary horse – a ‘non-Uni’. It’s down to luck and percentages. LucyLou once tried to breed a Unicorn 24 times to produce a Unicorn foal without success! However other players have managed to produce a Unicorn foal in two successive breedings. But the average is around 1 in 6.

Now, there’s also something VERY important to know about Unicorn breeding. You MUST breed your Unicorns at exactly 6.23am or 6.23pm GMT. This is also known as ‘Game Time’. If you cover your mare just 1 second outside of this minute, you will never produce a Unicorn. Harsh but true.

So that’s what you need to know about Unicorns. All you need to do now, to get one of these ‘Birthday Unicorns’ is buy 10 (must be 10 or multiples of 10) passes from Howrse! There’s always a little catch isn’t there?

Patsy

Howrse Training Methods - the basics

A lot of people often ask 'How do I train my horse'?

Now, there are lots of methods out there for training your horses. All are different and many depend on what you want to get out of your horses - do you want to breed from them or skill them to be elites or win competitions with them or something else that I haven't even thought of?

I have my preferred methods which I will share on this blog - but you may have a different way which works for you - that's fine too! I tend to skill elite horses rather than breed for the GP race so that's the plan I'll outline. I've owned several top 10 elites over the years so my methods can't be too bad!

For starters though let's go through some basic facts.

A horse is only as good as it's genetics. You can't 'make' a 1000 skiller from any horse - it has to be born to be one.

If you do no lessons:
A horse's total skills = The horse's GP + The horse's inborn skills

If you do lessons every day, you can add another 50+ skills on top of this calculation (depending on how good the EC you board them in is) and with WoY another 100+. So it's well worth always doing 2 lessons a day with every horse you train. Not only do you get extra skills but you make money as well - what could be better?

A day in the life of one of my horses...

1 and 1/2 hours pasture, salt stone, groom, lesson x 2, turnip, carrot (if bunny in box), feed, training (we'll go into more details in later posts), stroke, carrot, water.

As long as you keep and eye on the time and your horses energy levels then this basic outline should allow you to do maximum training with your horse each day and still get him to bed at 22:00 and with 20% energy.

Lucy

Snow Horses

Snow horses are another type of Divine within Howrse. Snow horses came about in a rather exciting way. On Christmas day, 2009, if you bought 30 passes Howrse awarded you a Snow horse. It was as simple as that.

Now there are five different Snow horses - one for each of the races. So, each type of Snow horse excells in different skills.

Howrse describes it like this:

* Blue indicates a specialist in cross-country.
* Red is for show jumping specialists.
* Green designates trotters.
* Purple is for horses specialized in gallop.
* Orange indicates a barrel-racing expert.

The Snow horses themselves are all the same colour, but their name 'Snow' is written in the same colour as their best skill - as shown above. All Snow's have 1500 skills, 1000 GP and 46 stars. Like all Divine horses, they are male and cannot breed. Unlike all other Divines so far (apart from the solo 'Cowbra') they cannot be sold. So you cannot buy them.

We love our Snow's but just wonder what this Christmas may bring...

Patsy