*Breeding for height, and this affecting art

I brought this up a while back as a comment on a related suggestion, but it got a bit buried since it was just a comment, so I thought I'd revive it as its own topic to see how people feel about it.

My suggestion is firstly for horses to have different heights which you can breed for, and secondly for the art to reflect this. This would add a little bit more customisability to horses, but would not affect anything else, such a show performance or conformation, so if you wanted to breed your herd to be really tall or really small, you could, but if you wanted to ignore it entirely you wouldn't be in any way penalised for it.

Although this would affect art, it would not actually involve modifying any art files as you could achieve these modifications entirely with code, so it would be relatively simple to implement that side of things. I put together a coded mock-up which shows what this would look like. The screenshot is below, showing a small, normal-sized, and large gypsy, respectively. (This is an extreme example; the potential variations in height don't necessarily have to be this pronounced.)

Click for full size.

My coded version uses very similar code to existing horse images, so probably could be readily integrated without many changes. It also scales all images by the same amount, so you won't get markings not lining up or similar. It can also offset things automatically, so they always get placed in the horizontal centre of the image and at the bottom. It may be reasonable to cap the height values, so they always stay within a certain range for certain breeds, otherwise the art could potentially appear distorted or produce unrealistic results.

Last edited on 2017-08-10 at 10:59:15 by River

I support, but only to a point, because well different sizes would be nice, but too much size differences could be a bad thing, just because I don't want a huge mini, or a tiny Clydesdale.

Yes, I definitely think limitations would be wise. Perhaps something that limits it to the sort of variation normally found within the real-life breed.

I support this. I don't see why not, and it would be fun to breed tiny draft horses, let's be real :')

I really want a line of gypsy ponies now. ♥

I support so long as the height limitations mirror real life breed guidelines.I would love that lirtle realistic touch of knowing the height of my horses.

That seems sensible.

Yes! Maybe there could be something that made it harder to get a bigger mini or a smaller draft horse than realistic sizes, but it could still be possible.
I personally think tiny clydesdales would be hilarious.

I want this to be added so I can breed tiny clydesdales.

I think as long as the height variations fit what's possible in the breed, the art is scaled such that the largest horses don't overwhelm the background art, and adding height into the breeding coding isn't too difficult, this could be fun to have.

Seems like an okay idea. Like someone above though, I would prefer it to adhere to real life height variations. Although, for those wanting tiny Clydesdales, there are real life folks breeding miniature draft horses these days. Could be entertaining.

I would love to have a huge Shetland! I support! lol

I think as well though you should allow there to be the occasional 'larger' horse that goes over breed standards - the only problem with a breed like GVs is that they can be as small as 12hh without that being 'rare', and I know I saw a Clyde for sale that was only 15.2hh. Some warmbloods can also be near the 18hh mark.

Also, with Welsh ponies, it entirely depends on what type of Welsh pony you're using. If it's a sec A, they only go up to about 12hh, sec Bs are up to 13.2, sec Cs are up to 14.2 and sec Ds are 14-14.2hh plus. The pony artwork we have atm looks like it could possibly be a sec A or B, but it would have to be decided. and you do get the occasional pony that's overheight too, across all breeds and types.

I think a good rule for the limitations of a horse's breed height would be the range of accepted heights within the breed being typical, with the absolute maximum/minimum depending on the sort of extremes seen in the breed.

For example, the clydesdale is on average 17.1 hands high, with typical height ranging between 16 and 18 hands, but some individuals getting as large as 20 hands, so EV's clydes should perhaps range between 15 and 20 hands, with those typical heights (16-18 hands) being most common in store horses.
The gypsy vanner, by comparison, comes in a much larger range of heights (13-16.2 hands, average of 15), with those as small as 11 or 12 hands becoming more common, and some as small as 9 also being observed (although that's really rare), so EV's gypsies should maybe be something like 10 - 17 hands?

i think this is an awesome idea O: 
i would love different heights for my welshies so i can pretend to have a cob xD