Egg Laying for Habitat Birds and Reptiles

[AlexSea]

I think most of us can agree that one of the most unrealistic things in Planet Zoo is that birds and reptiles give birth to live offspring, instead of laying eggs. Here is my proposal on how an egg-laying system could work.

1: A male and female bird or reptile mate with each other as normal.
2: When the gestation period ends, instead of giving birth, the female creates a nest and lays one or more eggs, equal to how many offspring they would have given birth to.
3: After a period of several in-game months, the eggs hatch, and the babies are born.

Of course, this is just my idea. When/if egg laying is added, it might function differently than I described. What do you think? Let me know.

 

[arafan]

I get the point why they aren't included but I also think that nests could work.
I think it would be specially interesting for the African penguins, as they do brood in little holes/caves. If you provide the habitat with enough nests, this would mean you get a lot of penguins. This can also work to some extent with the flamingo, but on the other hand wouldn't really work for King penguin, peafowl or the ratites.
For reptiles, something similar can be done. Females generally lay their eggs in sand. I think it would be great to have an enrichment item that would be needed to be placed in the habitat, if you don't place it, the female can die of egg binding.

 

[Anthracite_Impreza]

I'd love for it to be added, but I understand the reasons against too. Ultimately if we get our flying birds pack though there will have to be some sort of nesting behaviour, even if it's just a user placed nest where chicks sit and complain they're hungry until fledging.

 

[XT]

I think they've discussed before that adding a new life cycle model isn't going to happen (ie: nest bound chicks, etc) - they don't want to develop models for what would be a very short period of time in game.

I would be perfectly happy with an enrichment item that was a nest (a few variants for the various types of egglaying critters) and the juveniles spawned from there instead of near their mother. That doesn't seem like it would change the base function of the game much, nor require new models or behaviors.

 

[Mjmannella]

I don't see why "nest-bound" chicks are necessary. The main thing people want is for the mother reptile to spawn an egg underneath her instead of a juvenile reptile. Then said egg would eventually become a juvenile reptile after sitting for enough time (or if you want to get extra, require the eggs to be set to an incubation facility for controlled hatching).

 

[Anthracite_Impreza]

It would be necessary for bird species that are hatched bald and helpless. You really can't have such pitiful little creatures sat on the floor of a habitat crying, it'd be awful.

 

[NZFanatic]

Eggs as a life stage would add literally nothing to the game except more waiting time between "pregnant" and "newborn".

 

[Mjmannella]

It would further the unique behaviour of several animals. In fact, more animals would be impacted by the addition of eggs than animals that would make use of the new burrows being added

 

[XT]

I think the point some folks are trying to get at - at least I am - is that it's not terribly likely that Frontier will develop any new unique behaviors for existing species that relate to life cycle issues, particularly a behavior that is limited to, at the moment, a hand full of reptiles and two bird species. Especially since, for example, the nest structure of a flamingo and a peacock are very different, requiring different models (and, crocodilians, turtles and monitor type lizards also have very different nesting styles). Creating new behaviors is relatively complex. Asking for a mother to lay an egg, (including a behavior that involves laying it an appropriate spot), then the egg hatching to juvenile is a new life stage. A work around, in my opinion, is to simply create an assortment of appropriate nest styles as enrichment items and, when they're in the habitat, the existing juvenile models spawn from there instead of near the mother allows us to at least have nests at all, with minimal changes to existing programming.

If they do a full aviary expansion, including free flying birds, they might create a nest experience as well but until -and if - then, I'd be quite surprised to see a new life stage for any animal.

 

[NZFanatic]

appropriate nest styles as enrichment items

I'd take them as scenery items, but enrichment could be neat even if they weren't functional for eggs or babies or whatever. It would be fun to place, say, a little pebble nest, and then have our penguins go out and find more pebbles to add to it.

 

[Aramar]

You got eggs!

 

[Mjmannella]

I think the point some folks are trying to get at - at least I am - is that it's not terribly likely that Frontier will develop any new unique behaviors for existing species that relate to life cycle issues, particularly a behavior that is limited to, at the moment, a hand full of reptiles and two bird species. Especially since, for example, the nest structure of a flamingo and a peacock are very different, requiring different models (and, crocodilians, turtles and monitor type lizards also have very different nesting styles). Creating new behaviors is relatively complex. Asking for a mother to lay an egg, (including a behavior that involves laying it an appropriate spot), then the egg hatching to juvenile is a new life stage. A work around, in my opinion, is to simply create an assortment of appropriate nest styles as enrichment items and, when they're in the habitat, the existing juvenile models spawn from there instead of near the mother allows us to at least have nests at all, with minimal changes to existing programming.

If they do a full aviary expansion, including free flying birds, they might create a nest experience as well but until -and if - then, I'd be quite surprised to see a new life stage for any animal.

We have 14 reptiles as of now (2 varanids, 2 tortoises, 4 crocodilians, and 6 birds). They’d all make use of egg-laying.

I don’t think anyone’s asking for egg-laying animations. I think just having the mother spawn an egg underneath her instead of a juvenile animal Would be more than enough. The egg doesn’t even have to hatch into a form younger than juvenile. It shouldn’t be that hard to go from egg to juvenile to adult.