Horse Variety V7.0

Adds much more breed and coat variety to ambient horses across the world while still using Rockstar’s native population and spawning system.
Includes an optional configurator for custom breed, coat and population settings, plus an optional Stable Bridge for Red Dead Online horses.

Overview
Ever been sick of seeing the exact same Morgans, Kentucky Saddlers and Tennessee Walkers over and over when there are so many to choose from? Horse Variety broadens those population pools so many more of the game’s horse breeds and coats can appear naturally throughout the world. This mod changes the horse population data that Rockstar uses when selecting which horse models can appear.
The mod does not replace horses after they spawn and does not run a custom runtime spawning system.
A request by ex0ud.

Breed weighting
For general ambient horse populations, the default setup is designed around equal breed probability, rather than equal probability for every individual coat. This matters because some breeds have many more coat options than others.
For example:

Breed A
6 coats

Breed B
2 coats

If every coat had the same probability, Breed A would appear roughly three times as often simply because it has more coats. Horse Variety instead gives each breed roughly the same total share, then divides that share between the breed’s available coats. So a breed with more coat options gets a smaller probability per coat, while a breed with fewer coats gets a larger probability per coat.
The result is much better breed variety without automatically favoring breeds that happen to have more coat versions.
Known wealthy/posh rider populations are an exception to this general weighting. By default, these populations have a 20% Arabian and 20% Turkoman chance, while ordinary rider populations exclude those two breeds. This makes high-value horses more likely to appear on wealthier NPCs without making them common throughout the entire world.

Horse Variety Configurator
An optional standalone configurator is included for anyone who wants more control.
With it you can:
» Edit breed totals directly and automatically distribute changes across population contexts
» Switch between direct breed-total editing and manual per-context editing
» Enable or disable individual breeds
» Adjust the coat distribution within each breed
» Equalize all breeds automatically
» Normalize breed percentages to 100%
» Equalize coat probabilities within a breed
» See current, target and generated percentages before applying changes
» Choose whether wild horse populations should remain vanilla or use expanded variety
» Enable expanded light wagon and cart variety or restore Rockstar’s original pools
» Enable expanded heavy wagon and coach variety or restore Rockstar’s original pools
» Customize breed probabilities independently for supported population contexts
» Enable or disable wealth-based NPC rider horse pools
» Adjust Arabian and Turkoman chances for wealthy riders
» Enable or disable Red Dead Online horse breeds and coats
» Include unused / extra horse coats
» Include all optional horses
» Include special / Story horses in ambient population pools
When expanded wagon variety is enabled, the breed percentages for that context remain fully editable. When it is disabled, the configurator restores Rockstar’s original wagon horse groups instead of simply leaving the previously generated values in place.
The configurator safely generates the required population files for you, so there is no need to manually edit META or YMT files. If RDR2 is currently running, changes are not written immediately. They are queued and applied after the game exits.
The configurator is self-contained and can be placed anywhere. It does not need to be inside the RDR2 directory.

Red Dead Online horses
Horse Variety can optionally add horse breeds and coats that normally only exist in Red Dead Online to Story Mode’s ambient horse populations.
This includes the Online-only:
» Breton
» Criollo
» Gypsy Cob
» Kladruber
» Norfolk Roadster
It also includes additional Online-only coats for several breeds that already exist in Story Mode.
These horses are added to the same native population system as the rest of Horse Variety. They are not spawned manually by a script and are not replacements for existing Story Mode horses. When enabled, Rockstar can select them naturally from the expanded population pools just like any other ambient horse.
Online horses are disabled by default and can be enabled from the Horse Variety Configurator.
Normally, Story Mode’s stable system does not properly recognize many Red Dead Online horse models. A stolen Online horse can occupy a stable slot without actually becoming a usable stored horse. The main Horse Variety archive therefore also includes an optional Stable Bridge for Online horses. When an Online horse is stored, the bridge temporarily gives the stable a compatible Story Mode horse identity so Rockstar’s normal stable system can handle the slot correctly. The original Online horse information and appearance are preserved separately, then restored when the horse is retrieved. This does not globally replace a Story Mode horse model. The surrogate identity only exists internally while the horse is being handled by Story Mode’s stable system. The Stable Bridge requires ScriptHookRDR2 V2.

What it affects
Horse Variety expands the horse model pools used by several parts of Rockstar’s population system, including:
» Ambient mounted horses
» Road and town horse populations
» Hitched horses
» Corral horses
» Light wagons and carts
» Heavier wagons and coaches
» Wealth-based NPC rider populations
» Wild horse populations, if enabled
Light wagons and carts use a much wider selection of breeds rather than repeatedly drawing from the same small Rockstar pool. Heavier wagons and coaches use more conservative defaults, but both wagon contexts can be customized freely through the configurator when expanded variety is enabled.
The default rich-rider distribution gives 20% to Arabians and 20% to Turkomans. Because these wealthy mounted NPC populations are themselves relatively uncommon except in Saint Denis, the breeds can remain special without becoming almost impossible to encounter.
Wild horse populations are left untouched by default, preserving Rockstar’s original wild horse setup. The configurator includes an option to expand them as well if you prefer.
Unused / extra coats, additional optional horses and special / Story horses are also excluded from the normal ambient pools by default and can be enabled separately from the configurator.

What it does not do
The mod does not simply throw every horse model into every possible context by default. Different population types still use their own distributions and defaults.
Light carts and smaller wagons have broader default variety, while heavier wagons use more conservative defaults. If expanded wagon variety is enabled, however, the configurator allows those breed distributions to be customized manually. Disabling expanded variety restores Rockstar’s original wagon pools.
Likewise, valuable breeds are not simply scattered equally across every NPC rider. By default, Arabians and Turkomans are reserved for the game’s known wealthy/posh rider populations rather than ordinary riders.
Story and gang companion horses are excluded from the normal ambient pools by default. They can be included deliberately through the configurator if you want them to appear naturally.
Ambient horse spawning itself remains entirely controlled by Rockstar’s native population system. The optional Stable Bridge only exists to make Red Dead Online horses compatible with Story Mode’s stable system and does not control which horses spawn in the world.
The mod is intended to expand natural variety without turning every horse spawn into a completely random model swap.

Installation
Drop the Sauvy folder in LML. If you use the configurator, simply select your RDR2 folder and press Apply. The generated LML files will be written automatically.
The configurator is optional and can be placed anywhere. It does not need to be inside the RDR2 directory.
The main archive also includes the optional Horse Variety Stable Bridge ASI. If you enable Red Dead Online horses and want to store them normally in Story Mode stables, place the ASI in your RDR2 game directory. The Stable Bridge requires ScriptHookRDR2 V2.

Compatibility
Horse Variety edits:

update:/common/data/ai/ambientpedmodelsets.meta
update:/common/data/ai/popgroups.ymt

If another LML mod also replaces either of these files, Horse Variety can detect them and directly patch only the horse population data inside those files. This means the unrelated changes made by those mods are left intact.

Credits / Research
I can’t take full credit for the research that went into figuring out how RDR2 handles horse population variety. I used Super Ultimate Horse Overhaul as a reference and examined the population files included with that mod. That helped point me toward the parts of Rockstar’s population system that actually control ambient horse variety, particularly the relationship between the different population files.
Horse Variety does not redistribute files from Super Ultimate Horse Overhaul. The population edits, balancing, configurator and implementation used by this mod were made separately for Horse Variety. Still, using their work as a reference saved me a considerable amount of research, so credit where it’s due.

Requires:
Horse Bridle Bug Fix – Optional – Highly recommend if you pay attention to NPC horses though
Online Content Unlocker – For online horses
ScriptHookRDR2 V2
Lenny’s Mod Loader RDR

Credits:

sauvy11