Hey I played starters orders 5 when it came out but I haven't played for a while so I have decided to start new... As I am a fan off breeding, that is my plan.

Took me 8 tries on the betting but I have now won some money and able to buy things. I have bought some horses to start building with, I have a 7yo stallion rated 77 but his potential is max (jammy sod I thought as cost 45k). Obviously this is the start of a game so there is no way of telling if he ever reached his potential as no history of group wins etc. Also he is 7 so he will be on decline and I will never see it reached.

Question is, if I breed with him, will his potential be inputted into his progeny or will it just be his current realised ability?
I know the horses will not have "by a group 1 winner" but if they get his potential then It doesn't bother me.

The potential of your new horse is usually determined by the peak realized potential (light green) reached by the parents during their lifetime. Hit or miss whether you get a replicated high potential offspring or a sub par potential offspring which is part of the realism of the game. As much as I'd like a Frankel or Zenyatta every year that would seriously diminish the realism.

You can get horses with full realized potential at three and very rarely (I've heard but never seen myself) full realized potential at two. If you want superstars and league quality runners start looking for horses who reach full realized potential as early as possible.

Here are two examples from my current breeding forays. I quick breed from my stockpile of quality horses for the league. These two are good but no world beaters. A keeper 2yo for me is one whose potential bar reaches the beginning of the transfer box icon as I've pointed out in the second picture. Currently I'm trying to work on horses with high Potential, Constitution, Finish Application and Consistency.

Thanks for the info... I remember having a monster racehorse (32g1 off memory) when I played before but when he went to stud, his offspring were rubbish, out of a good 30 horses foaled only 2 won a g1 race as a 3yo.

Here is my horse I got as a 77 rated 7 yo.... he realised 95% of his ability but as soon as he had 2 poor races I put him out to stud as I wanted a yearling from him as a test. He managed to win a g2 and 4 g1s.

The best part about the horse was his battling qualities (4/5 ability), which I was hoping would go into his offspring, but now he has gone to stud, this has diminished. Is that normal?

the links haven't worked so here they are

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/835/k4dz.jpg

http://imageshack.us/f/835/k4dz.jpg/

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/196/lmkv.jpg

http://imageshack.us/f/196/lmkv.jpg/

Pictures dont open? use tinypic.com

To show pics choose "embed this image" option and then copy and paste the URL in the "forum" option on imageshack.

hope this works

the other pic was just showing the group wins

That is definitely a quality specimen there to begin a breeding operation with. He most likely was top potential at his peak and now he is diminishing with age. Some horses have maximum absolute potential and never reach maximum realized potential. They will pass on that quality to their offspring as well. Time will tell if this is the case.

The key is to breed him to multiple group 1 winners in the breeding shed as long as you have the money to shell out. You should get some nice runners and don't be surprised to get many duds. His only drawback I see is his finish application. It's very common to get horses with a full finish application bar. Other than that he is loaded and one I'd surely keep around in my breeding transfer pool.

What about this one?

In his last race he won the 1m2f Breeders Cup Classic, Before then he ran in a 7f race! Think it was his 1st attempt at 1m2f then he went to auction where i bought him for £1,536,650.

looks a good horse that does.... yeah kind of diminished with age.... he was a 7yo at start of game with rating of 77 and less realised potential.... he managed to get 95% after winning g1 races as a 7yo... I sent him to stud in October just to get a tester from him.... as I didn't wanna spend too much money for a tester so I bred with an average listed winner mare I had. got the offspring now and is a top 2yo but wont win behind that unless its potential improves once it goes to a 3 yo (was told potential can improve when it turns 3 but once at 3 its potential will never change)

That isn't true, it can continue to change up until they are 6-7. If the horse had full potential at 7, it's offspring might not mature until they are much older.

so the potential can change right up to that point? that does surprise me...when I am talking about potential I am not talking about its current ability... I know the realised potential (ability) can improve/diminish but I thought once at 3 its max potential (possible ability) will never change.

Only reason I think it realised most of its potential when it was 7 was cos it was the first season and prior to me buying it, the game only showed it had raced once.

Unless it is at the maximum, both bars can still increase past 3 years. Few of mine have max potential at 3, but once they reach 4 or more usually 5 they have max potential; that is the light green and dark green bars are full.

Oh right... can potential dramatically improve then after 3yo or is it just a slight improvement. Cos my idea, and what ive done previously, was sell horses once they turn 3 if their potential is still not good enough to win group races.

Would you say it is always worth keeping them til 4yo and maybe even 5yo.

Well it depends really. I have bred for horses who are late maturing, by using parents who were late to mature. But if you've concentrated on breeding for early types who are out of parents who matured early then it might not be worth it. If they have less than 75-80% max potential then I'd bin them. But it might be worth hanging onto some of them a little longer; particularly if one, or both, of the parents was better with age.