Narrative Tools Horse Mount

## A rideable horse that behaves like part of the framework

**NP_HorseMount** is a complete rideable mount for Narrative Pro: mounting and dismounting from any approach angle, four gaits with real acceleration curves, jumping, slope handling, a purpose-built riding camera, and a rider layer that keeps your character's upper body free for combat, torches, bows or dialogue.

It is not a vehicle with a horse mesh bolted on, and it is not a standalone system parked next to Narrative Pro. The mount is a Narrative Pro character with its own movement tuning and gait state machine, it is mounted through the framework's interaction module, and its state is written into the framework's existing save slots.

## Riding

- **Four gaits** - walk, trot, canter and gallop - with distinct acceleration, turn rate, brake distance and camera behaviour. Gait changes are animation-driven, so the horse does not teleport between speeds. - **Stamina and sprint.** A configurable stamina pool drains at gallop and regenerates at rest, exposed as a Narrative Pro attribute so the UI module's bars and your own abilities can read it directly. - **Jumping and terrain.** Jump-over-obstacle with Motion Warping to the ledge, slope-limited climbs, water entry and exit, and a fall-safe recovery so a bad landing does not fling the rider into orbit. - **Mount from anywhere.** Left side, right side, from a ledge, from a standstill or at a trot. The system picks and warps the correct montage and synchronises rider and mount frame-accurately. - **Rider layer.** The rider keeps an additive upper-body pose, so aiming, attacking, holding a lantern and playing dialogue animations all work while mounted. One boolean locks it down to a fixed riding pose.

## Camera, control and feel

A dedicated spring-arm rig that lengthens with speed, eases lag while turning and drops behind the horse's head at gallop, plus a soft look-at mode for cinematic riding. Every curve is a data asset, so tuning the feel does not mean editing Blueprints.

## Call, follow and persistence

- **Call the horse.** A whistle ability summons the mount from off-screen; it navmesh-paths to the nearest reachable point and idles until mounted. - **Idle behaviour.** Graze, shake, stamp and look-around activities authored the way the NPC module authors activities, plus a follow mode that keeps the horse a configurable distance behind the player. - **Persistence.** Mount position, stamina, customisation and whether the horse was stabled all survive save, load and level travel through the framework's own save system.