Mounts

Status: Planned

Mounts are one of the signature systems of ChonkyCraft.

This page exists because mounts are not a side feature. They are a major progression pillar.

Design Goals

• Make travel exciting for the entire game
• Give each progression band a new mount or meaningful tack upgrade
• Support combat, traversal, gathering, and exploration roles
• Keep mounts readable and useful in co-op
• Make some mounts feel tied to Minecraft ecology and some feel tied to bosses or breaches
• Include a few must-have fantasy rides that players immediately understand and want

Core Rules

• Standard mounts unlock permanently through Bond Sigils
• Only one active mount at a time
• Quick summon must be reliable
• Mounts should be useful in combat only where it is clearly supported
• Dismounting should not feel clumsy or punish normal play
• Tack should keep older mounts relevant longer
• Companion mounts can exist as exceptions when they grow naturally from vanilla creature behavior
• The roster should mix grounded fauna with a few iconic fantasy rides such as broomsticks, slimes, and dragons

Role Categories

Chargers

Fast land mounts with strong sprint and dash identity.

Examples:

• Mossback Doe
• Steppe Runner
• Frost Prowler

Hoppers

Mounts built around jump arcs, landing utility, and terrain traversal.

Examples:

• Rime Ram
• Sporeback

Skimmers

Mounts that excel on water, marsh, sand, or unstable terrain.

Examples:

• Bog Skater
• Dune Skipper
• Tiderail Skiff

Climbers

Mounts or tack branches that handle cliffs, roots, vines, or wall-biased movement.

Examples:

• Lantern Stag with climbing tack

Flyers

Late mounts with hover, gliding, or true flight.

Examples:

• Ashwing
• Grave Bat
• Skyray
• Void Skiff

Must-Have Mount Fantasies

These are not optional flavor wishes. They are target fantasies the project should satisfy.

Witch Broomstick

Target identity:

• Precise low-altitude hover ride
• Excellent control in vertical routes, rooftops, ruins, and sky paths
• More agile than a heavy flyer, but not the fastest endgame flight option
• Strong fit for witch, storm, grave, or outpost-contract progression

Rideable Slime

Target identity:

• Bouncy hopper mount with high jump personality
• Strong fall forgiveness and landing comfort
• Good fit for slime zones, marshes, unstable ground, or impact-based traversal
• Should feel funny and useful, not like a joke item you abandon instantly

Rideable Dragon

Target identity:

• Apex late-game flying mount fantasy
• Strong sense of earned power
• Real flight presence without deleting all route-based play too early
• Should arrive late enough to feel climactic, not routine

Companion Mount Exception

Not every mount needs to enter through the main biome ladder.

The first planned exception is the chonky cat line:

• Tamed vanilla cats can enter a feeding-based progression path
• Repeated feeding should push the cat through visible Chonk Stages
• At the final stage the cat becomes rideable by one player
• The cat should keep its vanilla coat identity and pet readability
• This line should be funny, useful, and optional, not required for progression

Chonky Cat Rules

• Growth should happen across several readable stages, not instant ballooning from one stack of fish
• Feeding should feel generous and legible, not like a hidden tamagotchi spreadsheet
• The final rideable stage should be earned early enough that players actually use it
• Chonky cats should be slower than major progression mounts, but unusually comfortable and reliable
• They should feel best in forests, villages, rooftops, and short-range exploration loops
• They should not replace the main mount ladder for deserts, marshes, deep caves, or flight

Suggested ride identity:

• Stable low-speed ground travel
• Strong step height and soft landing feel
• Tight turning and good home-base utility
• Light comfort or luck utility instead of war-mount damage identity

System boundary:

• Chonky cats should use a trimmed-down upgrade path, not the full tack suite used by war or travel mounts
• The feature should stay readable enough that players understand it just from feeding and using their cat

Current implemented baseline:

• Chonky cats now use 4, 8, and 12 feed thresholds
• Any tamed vanilla cat can enter the line through repeated cat food feeding by its owner
• The final 12-feed stage unlocks riding for the owner
• Secondary use keeps sit or unsit behavior available without sacrificing ride access
• The current prototype makes them slower than the Mossback Doe, but sturdier and better at short-step terrain

Special Mount Lines

Not every required mount fantasy needs to sit on the main ladder as the only traversal unlock of its phase.

Current direction:

• Witch Broomstick: required fantasy, likely delivered as a side-line precision hover mount in the mid-to-late ladder
• Slime Mount: required fantasy, likely delivered as a side-line bounce mount with strong fall and jump utility
• Dragon Mount: late-game or endgame earned flyer, whether as a direct mount line or an evolution of an earlier flying line

Mount Ladder

Phase	Unlock	Role	Notes
01	Mossback Doe	Charger	Stable early travel and forest routing
02	Rime Ram	Hopper	Better vertical navigation and snow combat control
04	Steppe Runner	Charger	Open-biome speed and pursuit utility
05	Bog Skater	Skimmer	Marsh movement and poison-zone traversal
06	Dune Skipper	Skimmer	Sand-biased speed and glide support
07	Tiderail Skiff	Skimmer	Coastal and pirate-zone travel, first Worldshift milestone
08	Lantern Stag tack	Climber	Keeps an older mount relevant in new terrain
09	Frost Prowler	Charger	Deep-biome speed under pressure
11	Sporeback	Hopper	Stable deep-swamp traversal and impact play
12	Ashwing	Flyer	First major airborne mount, potentially the first dragon-line step
14	Grave Bat	Flyer	Event or breach mobility
15	Skyray	Flyer	High-tier hover and combat positioning
16	Void Skiff	Flyer	Endgame traversal capstone

Tack System

Tack is how the game avoids replacing every old mount outright.

Tack families:

• Spurs: speed, acceleration, drift handling
• Harnesses: carry or utility bonuses
• Plating: survivability and impact resistance
• Charm tack: region or weather utility
• Siege tack: mounted combat support where appropriate

Rules:

• A mount should usually have 1-3 viable tack identities
• Tack should come from bosses, elites, field-guide rewards, and stormfronts
• Tack should not become a spreadsheet mini-game

Combat Rules

Mounted combat should exist, but carefully.

Keep:

• Charge attacks
• Momentum-based dodging
• Select mounted spell or ranged stability bonuses
• Contact or landing effects on specific mounts

Avoid:

• Every boss requiring a mount
• Turning all combat into mounted strafing
• Making ground combat obsolete

Co-op Rules

• Mount unlocks should be co-op safe
• Rare mounts should have fair reacquisition paths
• The stable should be visible and understandable for both players
• Shared outposts should have mount utility stations

Minecraft Integration Rule

Whenever possible, mounts should relate to recognizable Minecraft ecology:

• Deer-like forest runners
• Ram or goat-like snow jumpers
• Marsh skimmers
• Desert lizards or gliders
• Spectral late-game fliers

This is usually stronger than importing a random fantasy animal with no biome fit.