Additional variant of breeding: setting pairs

Hello to devs! 

Within the game exists a common problem: male wolves are considered by a lot of users to be "dead end", because a pack can have only one breeding male. Even though male wolves can have roles, they're just not as valuable as female wolves who players can breed.

So here comes the suggestion: allow users to create pairs of wolves, members of which cannot breed with any other wolf.

Of cource, this wouldn't work without some mechanics, perks and constraints applied to it; i tried to come up with them.

1) Members of pairs cannot be bred with single wolves or members of other pairs.

2) Only breeding wolf can breed single female wolves.

3) No member of a pair can be breeding wolf. 

4) Pair can be "split up", but there will be a penalty: large breeding cooldown (20-25 rollovers? maybe more?) for both male and female wolves + similar cooldown to setting new pairs with the member of disbanded pair. This could help to avoid a situation where users split pairs, send wolves to other users, then immediately get them back.

5) But here's the perk: pups bred within a pair may have slightly bigger chance to get markings, pass down "upper tier" bases, or maybe some mutations to appear.

As a dev myself, I understand that this feature could be very long in development, because there probably should be needed some new tables within the database, a lot of code written, it should be tested to be fair for in-game economics, etc., so it's understandable if this suggestion will be rejected; however, as a food for thought, I had to write this post.

Thank you very much for reading!

Edit 1: due to comments and people considering the ability to set pairs as a perk in itself, the fifth point should probably be omitted. Plut the breeding+pairing cooldown should be made larger, probably minimum 2 times of a normal breeding cooldown.

I think this would be really fun for lore players as well! A way to make mated pairs within the pack instead of just writing "mate of ____" in footnotes or whatever!

I actually wouldn't mind for pairs to be bond for life (i.e., cannot be split, or if split cannot form another bond). 

I don't think a 20-25 RO cooldown is enough. Females have a breeding CD of 20 RO and the suggested penalty is not severe enough. 

I also don't think any breeding perks is necessary for the pairing to be a great idea. I honestly don't think devs are willing to implement anything that'll boost breeding chances other than items.

I like this idea though I personally feel that allowing males to breed within the pack (possibly with a cooldown like females) would already allow players to have bonded pairs if they wish to do so, without the need to code other restrictions.

I agree actually with sol that the perks might be too 'good'.

I think this would be enough of a bonus as-is. Like it'd be great for breeding combo marks even without the boost, if you matched up the pair's markings right!

Yeah, I think penatly should probably be bigger... That makes sense.

About perks - I just don't really think people would use that feature too much without some pros. If there's a constraint, there should also be a perk. Maybe there could be some other perks, not exactly on chances, something that would make people consider pros and cons of both breeding through studs and through pairs. I can't really come up with it tbh.

I would love this idea to be implemented if possible - even without the pros mentioned (I would gladly accept the cons). It would be neat to have more reasons for males in the pack <3

I would support having bonded pairs as a way for non-stud males to breed, as opposed to just allowing non-stud males to breed (+ restrictions). In this sense, the bonding itself is enough of a "perk" without any other add-ons.

It doesn’t need perks, the perk is imo being able to breed them.

I kind-of dislike this suggestion, for the simple fact that I'm not monogamous, and the way I have my lore set up means I would want to have trios of bonded wolves and so on, haha

That said, I would support if the penalty was 20-24 days cooldown, meaning you could pair up wolves for one of the female's heats, decide they really don't get along and split up, then pair your male to another female within the pack. It would definitely make for some interesting drama!

A definite no to perks though, I don't think that's fair for players who don't want to use the feature.