Pregnant Female Leads and Energy Loss

I made this thread to talk about something I caught today and wanted to have a discussion about.

Honestly, I love this game and have not seen issue with many things. In fact, I love the difficulty.
Pups dying because you aren't focusing your resources on them? I'll make sure the pups I want are safe.
Illnesses, some that can kill your wolves if you fail to treat them? Amazing, and a great way to keep the economy flowing.
SC is fairly difficult to come across? Hunts are difficult? Can't scout that last biome? Bring on the challenge!

The thing that made me go "that doesn't seem quite right" was the energy loss my lead experienced when she was pregnant.
She lost out on 2% energy per regen cycle (20% of what would be regained every 7.5 minutes), forcing me to buy a Instant Birth Feather to avoid the penalty. That severe of an energy loss feels like a punishment for having a female lead.

In contrast with a breeding male:

If 15 females takes an average of 4 tries, it takes 120 energy.
It takes 75 minutes for a lead to get a full energy bar. 90 for pregnant female leads.
Every hour, a female lead loses 16% energy over a non-pregnant lead. If my math is correct...

In approximately 7.5 hours, she loses out on the 120% energy just referenced. (Or, roughly, 1 full energy bar every 6 hours and 15 minutes)

Which realistically, is a bit less than the max number of hours I can be on Wolvden in a day (this varies, with some days being more and some being way less). Please remember, however, a pregnant lead is pregnant for 3 days (I believe, the guide says 4 rollovers). That is close to four full energy bars during her pregnancy. (Of course, that is assuming that you breed very early in the day, some of this can be mitigated by breeding after you are done exploring for the day.)

Even if you account for the female only being breed-able every 24 days...
If a breeding male loses out on 120% energy per week (you manage to get 15 requests, averaging 4 tries, and you don't buy more stud slots), he misses out on 3*120 which is 360% energy.

If my math is correct, the two numbers are fairly close, however, there is a glaring problem.
The energy loss from the pregnancy is guaranteed, as opposed to the energy loss for the male which is based on demand. The average player is unlikely to hit 15 requests per week. In addition, it is fully optional to lose the 2% energy, so if you need the energy for something else you can choose not to breed. If you don't breed your female lead, you miss out on puppies (also optional, but then, why have a female lead?). The energy loss for breeding males is typically spread out a bit more across the week, which also makes it more manageable.

If this never gets addressed, that would be fine. I do not think it is horrifically unbalanced. However, I, personally, will not have a female lead again unless this is adjusted. Especially with events being planned for "soon".

What are your thoughts? Do you think it is balanced? Would you change anything?

tldr;
Female leads receive a 20% energy regen penalty while pregnant. Seems to be a bit harsh, but I could be wrong.

I haven't really made my mind up yet.

For now, I think it's fair that it affects all female wolves the same; it would be weird for have a special type of pregnancy for your lead. And it would disincentive people from having male leads since your female has less energy loss during pregnancies and "cheaper" investment, breeding wise.

I guess it's the trade-off to having a male lead (not studded) that has the same energy regeneration and gives you more time to explore/battle but is not usable for breeding. You either deal with preggo energy for 4 days or you have to use your energy to stud or you get all your energy to yourself but cannot breed.

And dont forget that breeding your own girls costs you energy, too, so the loss for your stud might be more than just 15 slots averaging at 4 tries

Personally, it's not a big deal for me. I'm not constantly on the site using up my explore energy exactly as it fills up anyway. I explore maybe three times a day: once before work, sometimes once during my lunch break, and once after work. I actually think the energy bar in general fills up a little too fast for my lead (even while she's pregnant or even sick, because she always has diarrhea, lol), and I haven't been that active on lioden to see how it compares. 

As far as comparing it to male leads, well it's realistic, lol. Pregnant females certainly don't have as much energy as males. To me it just boils down to do I want a lady leading the pack or a dude leading it? You can still breed and get puppies whichever way you do it.  As far as being "forced" to buy IBFs and being "punished" for your choices? Come on now, it's not that serious. If you hate it that much, then just have a male lead. Or if you can't fathom NOT having a female lead but also think you're being unfairly punished, then just don't play. 

I like that nested females can't do their job. If you're that worried stalling your females gains, you don't have to nest them until after they've done their job on the last day of the pregnancy. 

The current system does not dissuade me from having either males or females in my pack. 

I feel like this is a bunch of thoughts mushed together but I hope you get what my point is xD 

It is one of the disadvantages to having a female lead. There are disadvantages to males as well and advantages to females. Females don't go out of commission from nesting as other females would. Males expend energy on every breeding they do if they are also the breeding male and if they aren't they can't breed at all. You could just not breed the female lead but at least it is always an option. It is also only a few days. Most people aren't on all hours of the day. You can always plan for females to get bred when you are not going to be on as much such as during the work/school week.

@ Kali

Yeah. I can agree that there should be an energy penalty because then it would incentivize female leads instead. It's more the question of: Is a 20% penalty the right number? It feels a bit high to me, especially because it is non-stop for the full pregnancy. I could absolutely be wrong, though.

You are right; There is a bit of energy to be gained for having a lead be a non-breeding male/female. However, that comes with the caveat of levels and stats typically being higher in leads. Which may actually incentivize breeding males being leads even more (with studs with higher stats being in higher demand).

I didn't account for breeding your own females, which is true. If you have a low or very low fertility female it would increase the energy cost astronomically for the breeding male. I've heard horror stories of the VLF lionesses.

I guess it feels unbalanced because it is every pregnancy, and you don't have a choice (if you want to breed your lead at all)? You also can't "give the energy cost" to someone else by studding out the pregnancy (as funny as that sounds).

@Pixality

That is true, they don't go out of commission with nesting which means you can nest them asap. Female wolves only go out of commission once they are nested, though, so you can always wait until the last day (...as long as you don't forget, like I did last night. Haha.) You have some very valid points: the less you play, the less this matters, the more you play the more it matters.

The real complaint, I think, is that I absolutely would have picked a male main had I known all of this before sign up. Now I either pay GC or wait. Which is fine; it doesn't really matter at the end of the day.

I don't really have a problem with it, but it could be communicated better. Lead wolves are exempt from a lot of things like pack roles and death from illness, but the main place to get information on that is from other players or by experiencing it yourself. A slower energy regen is something that should be made explicit at the very least thru the official help channels. Or even just a mention of something like "being pregnant is a lot of work so it takes a little longer for them to get things done". Like....it should probably be mentioned in an official capacity beyond a banner on the wolf's page that only exists for four days? At least in the Help section.

Edit: thought of this while I was in the shower, but since there's no way for a player to make an informed decision about energy mechanics when they're creating their acct this is a punishing mechanic, not a challenging one. There's no way for a player to know this in advance of getting a female lead wolf pregnant aside from breeding a different female first. Which, again, there's enough things that lead wolves are exempt from that assuming they won't have an energy penalty while pregnant is not unreasonable. Obviously this can be fixed by the time they're ready for their next lead, but that is either almost a month of gameplay, real money or a plain NBW which doesn't exactly decrease frustration.

It is stated in the breeding tutorial that while other wolves are nested, you lead can still explore of course. The energy loss is expected slightly with a pregnant wolf. Along with having to feed more. To me, it is a challenge because you have to work with it.

I remember it being mentioned in one of the tutorials. I want to say it was the breeding one. I feel like some parts of the tutorials are missing.

Honestly, the energy penalty was adjusted in testing. I agree with Pixality. It allows for both sexes to basically be even as lead instead of one being arguably, "better," than the other.