We’re excited to share a sneak peek at the next big update for IdleMMO and everything that’s coming with it.
So let’s jump right in.
Pets
Let’s kick things off with pets. A lot has changed here. We’ve always wanted pets to feel like an important part of IdleMMO, but the current system has some clear problems that needed attention. Before we get into what’s new, let’s take a quick look at what hasn’t been working.
Pet Loot
The biggest issue has been loot from pet battles. At first glance, pets don’t look too strong here. You send a pet off to battle, it comes back with a small amount of loot, and most players probably don’t notice any real problem.
The problem is that pets aren't tied to the same concurrency limits as characters. Since they're treated as separate entities, players could send pets from every character into battle at the same time. That meant some players were running 50 pets in battles at once, which of course led to a ridiculous amount of loot piling up.
To be fair, it takes a considerable effort to reach that point. You’d need to hit level 100 in Pet Mastery, train your pets to battle in the same area, and collect enough strong pets to send out together. But even with that effort, the payoff was far beyond what we ever intended.
As game developers, one of the hardest challenges we face is making sure everything feels natural. Limits certainly need to exist, but they should flow into the game in a way that makes sense, without players feeling like they’ve hit a hard stop unless there are no reasonable alternatives. Mechanics should work together, not clash. Getting this balance right is tricky, and it often comes down to carefully considering how the different systems overlap and where their boundaries really are.
With pets, this has been especially difficult. Pets function as completely separate entities from characters, so it never made sense to simply apply the same rules to them. We could have done something like “you can’t use pets on more than three characters at once,” but that creates its own mess. It doesn’t feel natural, and it leads to questions like: what if the pets belong to characters that aren’t actively doing anything? Is that a violation? Do we only allow pets from characters who are currently active? That ends up confusing and clunky.
We’ve held back from enforcing a quick fix because we’ve always wanted pets to be more than just a side feature. Pets should feel powerful and worthwhile if you put the effort into raising them. And while it’s true the current system rewards that effort, we think the barrier to entry could be set higher, and the limits could be introduced in a way that feels natural rather than forced. That’s the balance we’re aiming for, and we’ll go into the solution later in this section.
No Pet Rotation
Right now, there’s almost no reason to keep more pets in your inventory beyond the ones you send into battle and the one you have equipped. Anything beyond that is basically just for collection. That’s not great. In most games, even if you have a “main” set of literally anything (pets, skills, card decks, etc), there’s usually some kind of rotation or variety in play. In IdleMMO, since actions all run concurrently, there’s no need to rotate between pets at all.
Happiness And Hunger
Let’s be real, it’s a pointless mechanic. The idea was that it would create some sense of connection or interaction between pets and players, but it never really landed. There’s not much more to say here. It doesn’t add anything meaningful, and in practice it’s just a waste of time and resources.
What we're changing with pets
Pet Hunting
We're (re)introducting pet hunting! It’s pretty straightforward and works just like battles. Your pet goes out on a hunt, and when it returns, you’ll have stacks of enemies waiting for you. This should help reduce the repetitive nature of hunting on your own, which many agree is one of the more tedious mechanics right now. It also adds a more dynamic layer to gameplay, since you’ll be free to take other actions while your pets are out hunting.
Just like battles, you’ll be able to send up to 10 pets at once. The more pets you send, the more enemies you’ll have waiting at the end. This limit isn't enforced alongside battling either, it's a seperate limit. Meaning you'll be able to have 10 pets battling, and another 10 hunting.
That said, don’t expect pet hunting to match manual hunting. Hunting yourself will always yield better rewards.
The effectiveness of pet hunting will depend on two stats: movement speed and agility. Agile pets will bring back better results than slower ones.
Pet Status Rework
We’ve completely removed hunger and happiness from the pet system and replaced them with a new fatigue system.
“oh no! an energy system! The devil!!”
Wait... wait... hear us out first.
Fatigue isn’t here to create hard caps or drain resources. It’s been added as a natural alternative to limiting how many pets you can send on battles or hunts at once. On that front, nothing has really changed. Pets will still work the same, but fatigue gives us a way to naturally control how much loot pets can bring in.
After completing a certain number of cycles (a cycle is one full battle or hunt), a pet will need to rest. During that time, you can either wait for it to recover or rotate in another pet.
This solves a few problems we talked about earlier. It creates a natural restriction on loot without relying on hard rules. It breaks up the rate at which loot can be gathered, but it doesn’t remove the possibility of pushing further if you’ve invested in enough pets to rotate through while others recover. In other words, the system actually gives a real reason to have a wider pool of pets rather than just a handful.
Stamina can only be recovered through rest. There are no items, no gold sinks, no premium shortcuts. The only way to recover stamina is by letting your pets sleep which takes time.
But, do not worry. It won’t be too obtrusive. We don't want the stamina system to turn into another annoyance. Pets will be able to complete plenty of battles or hunts before reaching zero stamina. But once they do, they’ll be out of action for a while.
Fatigue is based on a pet’s level and quality. The higher the level and the better the quality, the longer they’ll last before needing rest. That means Mythic pets in particular will stand out even more, giving players a stronger incentive to chase the very best.
Pet Sleeping
Sleeping is an idle action that lets your pets recover both health and stamina over time. The recovery rate depends on the quality of the pet, so higher-quality pets bounce back faster. For example, an epic pet will recover much more quickly than a standard one.
Pet Evolution
When a pet reaches level 100, you’ll be able to evolve it. Evolving gives the pet a 5% boost to every stat but resets it back to level 1. A pet can be evolved up to five times, allowing for a maximum bonus of 25% across all stats, including important ones like movement and fatigue.
Don’t worry about losing your EXP. The total amount of experience your pet has earned is saved when it evolves, so no progress is wasted.
Pet Effects
We’ve reworked the system so that pets can now gain effects, just like characters. It works in a very similar way. At launch there won’t be many ways to give your pet effects, but this opens the door for future additions. Maybe even pet potions down the line.
We’ve also reworked patting your pet. Instead of boosting happiness to stop stats from dropping, patting now gives a modest 5% boost.
Pet Exchange
You’ll be able to sell pets by listing them on the Companion Exchange. We’ve gone back and forth on this feature for a long time. There are a few concerns we want to avoid, like making alt trading even more powerful, creating “pet loaning” systems, or making it too easy to grab top-tier pets at high levels. Pets should always come with a real cost.
To make sure of that, every pet will have a minimum listing value. You won’t be able to put a pet up for less than that amount, and the numbers will be especially high for higher-tier pets. This system is mainly intended for trading high-value pets, such as those that have already been trained or even evolved. For example, it could allow players to buy an evolved Mythic pet.
There are a few caveats. First, as mentioned, the minimum values will be high. Second, campaign pets will have extremely high values attached to them, to the point where listing them may not even be worth it unless they’ve reached a very high level. With the shard merchant now in place to buy campaign pets, we don’t want this system to undercut that. And finally, certain unique pets will remain untradeable. These are the pets given directly by the developers under very special circumstances. That doesn’t mean all unique pets will always be locked, though. In the future, we’re considering special events, challenges, or giveaways that could allow unique pets to be obtained and traded normally. The restriction only applies to pets handed out personally so we don’t accidentally give away something worth millions of gold.
Shard Mythic Pets
Since we first introduced shards through the dungeon system, we’ve been eager to expand on them. Shards are in a unique spot right now. They’re a rare, gameplay-only currency that can’t be traded or purchased. The only way to get them is by playing - whether through leaderboards, dungeons, or soon, quests (hint, hint). On top of that, they’re really only accessible in meaningful amounts at higher levels, which makes them a late-game goal. That gives us room to experiment with new ways to use them.
With this update, we’re introducing the very first Mythic shard pet. This is a brand new Mythic pet that can only be obtained with shards. The catch is that it won’t come cheap. We’re talking expensive. Really expensive. So be prepared to work for it.
Mythic pets are meant to feel like god-tier assets, and that’s why they’ve always been so rare. We know there are concerns about them being too RNG-dependent, so this gives you a different path to get one. It won’t be easy, but it’s absolutely achievable if you save up and stop burning all your shards on dragon soul stones.
Want a teaser? Here it is. Our artist really went all out on this one.
Quality of Life
We’ve reworked the pet inventory system from the ground up. It’s easier to use, smoother to navigate, and you can now select multiple pets at once to send them on actions. I won’t go into every detail here. I'll let you pick the details shown in the screenshot.
Overview
This update brings new ways for pets to interact with the game. They can now hunt enemies on your behalf, making hunting less repetitive, while also addressing concerns around loot balance and the lack of reasons to rotate through pets.
We’ve got more ideas for where we want to take pets next. They’re one of our favorite features, so you can expect more exciting additions in the future. This update is about strengthening the foundation and building on that groundwork.
Quests
Quests are a brand new feature in IdleMMO that let you dive deeper into the lore, interact with NPCs, and take on different challenges.
One of our main goals with quests is to give items more purpose. Right now, many items feel a little scattered in terms of their uses. Quests give us a flexible way to fix that. If an item feels pointless, we can design a quest around it and instantly give it meaning.
The quest system itself is simple. You open the quest list, which will show quests based on your current location, and then choose the one you want to take on.
After choosing a quest, you’ll go through a short dialogue before it begins. You’ll need to complete the dialogue to start the quest. These dialogues vary in tone, ranging from funny to over the top to more serious. The idea is to give each quest a bit of personality and add some extra flavor to the game.
Once you’ve finished talking to the NPC, you’ll see an overview page that shows exactly what you need to collect for the quest.
When you finish a quest, you just turn it in to receive your rewards, and the required items will be removed from your inventory. Quests will range from easy to difficult, depending on where you are in the world. For example, quests in Bluebell Hollow will be on the easier side, while quests in The Citadel will demand much more effort.
We’ve also used quests as a way to expand on the lore. The dialogue often ties into existing stories and characters. For instance, there’s a quest where an archivist is investigating the witch Isadora, one of the world bosses.
Some quests can also form chains, meaning you can unlock a new quest after completing the previous one if it’s part of that chain.
At launch, there will be 100 quests. They vary in dialogue tone, difficulty, and rewards. Some will give gold, while the more challenging ones will reward shards.
For now, quests are simple in concept. You’re given a task to obtain an item, and once you turn it in, you get the reward. It’s a straightforward system by design, but we’ve built it to be expandable. This means we’ll be able to add more creative and complex elements to quests in the future.
Parties
Parties work just as you’d expect. You can team up with other players, with each party holding up to four characters. You’ll be able to invite others to your party or join ones that are open.
For this update, parties will have a single purpose, which is tied to leagues. In the future, though, we plan to expand parties with more features and uses.
Leagues
Leagues let you compete against other players in parties. Each league focuses on a specific skill, and they run for different lengths of time. For example, there might be a Woodcutting League that lasts 14 days, where every party in that league competes to earn the most experience in woodcutting. Rewards are still being finalized, but they’ll range from unique items to shards.
Leagues can last for a few days, two weeks, or even a full month. Each one is different.
There are a few rules to keep in mind:
- The party leader has the option to withdraw the party from a league.
- Once your party joins a league, no new members can be added.
- You can join multiple leagues at once, but you can’t change your party until a league has ended.
- You’re free to leave a party at any time, but you won’t be able to rejoin until that league has finished.
When will this be released?
We’re still deep in development, and features like Parties and Leagues are very much a work in progress, which is why we don’t have screenshots to show just yet. Our goal is to have everything finished, tested, and ready for release by the end of October. Ideally, in time for the Eve of Shadows campaign, but we cannot guarentee this. Maybe if the stars align.
This is one of the biggest updates we’ve ever worked on, and we want to make sure it’s done right. The scope just keeps growing. There’s still a lot we haven’t even touched on, and with more than 100 quests to prepare, the workload is massive.
We know we’ve said before that we were moving away from huge updates, but the truth is we just can’t help ourselves. Working on bigger updates like this makes us more productive than constantly pushing out small tweaks. Instead of drip-feeding content, we can focus on adding exciting new features - and this time, that means things like leagues and quests.
Disclaimer
As with all our blog posts, everything here is subject to change. This is just a preview to show what we’ve been working on and to reassure you that things haven’t gone quiet. Development is still in full swing, and some of these plans could shift as we go. Only time will tell.
Let us know what you think in the comments below!