Suggestion: Retheming riding for animal-friendliness

I have a soft spot for animals. Using skills which utilize my horse's anxiety for my own gain feels exploitative, and makes me feel stressed and uncomfortable. This is especially true for the skill Coax, which uses a whip as an icon. It's just not the vibe I've come to expect from PG, and is part of the reason I've been mostly inactive over the past couple of weeks.

Fantasy horseback riding, for me, would involve me treating my horse more as a partner than a tool. Riding together into dangerous areas, working together to overcome challenges.

Some concrete suggestions:

- Choose a new icon for Coax.

- Consider adding more positive interactions with your horse (feeding, grooming, etc.) outside of riding.

- Consider removing skills which increase anxiety, or reducing their anxiety cost to 0. If needed, add a new resource such as endurance to limit those skills.

- Consider retheming all skills to be about riding in general, rather than riding horses specifically, leaving open the possibility for other kinds of mounts in the future.


I don't know whether I'm just personally very sensitive to this sort of thing, or whether others have felt the same way. I'm curious and hope to hear in the comments.