PenPosts

PenPosts

Build your pens side by side and every one keeps breeding: write "Pen" on a sign, and the animals inside its fence only count each other.

At a glance

• A breeding cap per pen, not per radius. Animals in the next pen, behind the barn wall or out in the wild don't count against yours.
• Caps written on the sign: Pen 10 Boar 8 Lox 4 caps boars at 8 and lox at 4 in that pen.
• See the pen: look at the sign and a glowing band traces the fence, the floor is tinted, and the hover text lists the cap and the animals inside.
• Animals stay in. Escapees are put back on the pen's floor, young are born on the right side of the fence, and animals that fall through the floor are caught.
• No wasted food. Animals in a full pen, and young still growing, leave food alone until they can use it.
• Cave pens in caves dug with Hearth Below: the rock walls and roof hold the herd in.
• A one-hit Butcher knife: 100,000 damage, still only for tamed animals.

Every player needs PenPosts, with the same 1 - Pens settings. No other mods needed.

Features

Pens

• Pens follow the fence. The pen is the area inside the fence, walls or rock around the sign. Gates count as shut, even when open.
• Caps per pen or per kind. One cap for the whole pen, or one for each kind of animal, written on the sign.
• Young count, eggs don't. Chicks and asksvin hatchlings count towards the cap like piglets, cubs and calves; eggs lying in the pen do not.
• See the pen. A pen sign shows the pen's area, cap and animals, and draws its edge as a glowing band, faintly visible through walls and cave rock, with a light tint over the pen's floor.

Finding a mate, and breeding outside every pen, follow the game's own rules.

Keeping animals in

• Escapees go back. A tame animal that gets out of a fenced pen (an open gate, a slip through a wall or rock) is put back where it last stood on the pen's floor, and one that sinks into the floor is lifted back up.
• Born on the right side. Young come out on their mother's side of the fence or cave wall, on the floor, also the young of flying animals; one born outside anyway is put in.
• Free to go. Animals that follow someone, carry a rider or are on a leash (led or tied up with PackBeasts) are left alone.
• No tug of war. An animal put back more than 4 times in 2 minutes, or straight back where it was taken from 3 times in a row, is left alone for 10 minutes, and the log says where it is and why.
• Falling animals are caught. A tame animal that falls through the ground or a floor, in a pen or not, is put back where it last stood.
• Flyers on a leash. A tame drake can fly up to 10 m past the edge of any pen, then turns back; only one that ends up 40 m beyond that, and is not fighting, is brought back.

Cave pens

• The cave is the fence. In a cave dug with Hearth Below, the pen is measured on the cave's floor, and its rock walls count as a fence.
• The rock is the roof. An animal that glitches up through the rock, or that the game lifts out onto the land above the cave, is put back on the pen's floor. Walking up a ramp or stairs is not stopped.
• Drakes stay down. A drake in a cave pen flies low over the pen's floor instead of up at the rock, is kept from being pushed up through the roof, and is put back if it gets out.
• Basement pens (optional, off by default). A pen dug down into the ground under a built ceiling can get the same roof with a setting. A loft, deck or wide ramp inside such a pen can count as its ceiling, so fence any stairs off from the pen before turning it on.

Feeding

• No food wasted. Tamed animals eat only when it does them some good: when they are hurt, can still breed, have a yield a herd bell can still collect, or wear a saddle or riding handle (food refills a mount's stamina). Animals in a full pen, crowded animals outside pens, growing young and tame kinds that never breed leave food alone until that changes. Wild animals being tamed eat as usual.

Butcher knife

• One cut is enough. The game's knife does 1000 damage, too little for big or starred animals (a 2-star lox has 3000 health). PenPosts raises it to 100,000; it still only hurts tamed animals.

How to use

1. Fence in the animals.
2. Put a sign inside the pen, or on its fence, and write Pen 10 Boar 8.
3. Look at the sign. A green band along the edge means the fence closes the pen; the hover text lists the cap and the animals inside.

In Pen 10 Boar 8, Pen makes the sign a pen. 10 is the radius in metres, used only when no closed fence is found; it can be left out. Boar 8: boars in this pen stop breeding at 8.

| Sign text | What it does | |---|---| | Pen | Every animal uses its own breeding cap | | Pen 10 Boar 8 Lox 4 | A cap for each kind named | | Pen 10 Seeker Soldier 6 | A two-word name works as the game shows it | | Pen 10 SeekerBrute EyelessOne 6 | Names one after another share the number: both stop at 6 | | Pen 10 cap 8 | A cap of 8 for every kind (max 8 or Pen 10 8 work too) | | Pen 10 Boars | A word without a number is the pen's name | | Pen 10 round | Always a circle with a 10 m radius (circle works too) | | Pen 10 square | Always a 20 m square, turned the way the sign faces (box works too) |