Removing/Reworking Sickness

[Lurhstaap]

This started in the Ways to Reduce Viewbombing thread, which mostly focuses on fansites and API-related patches. I split the thread so it could be discussed on its own without being buried within the other thread.

 

IMO the solution to viewbombing is very simple - remove sickness from the game. Period. It adds nothing fun to the game and creates a method for people to attack each other.

 

Basically, a game's features need to add something to the game. What value does sickness add? At this point in the game's development, as far as I can tell, absolutely nothing positive and a very significant negative. Sickness needs to go.

 

I wouldn't be averse to sickness in its current form being removed and being replaced by some OTHER form of sickness that couldn't be abused and would still add a bit of challenge the way sickness was originally supposed to, but I would honestly prefer sickness to just stop existing. It almost never happens under normal circumstances - I routinely drop 7d0h eggs into hatcheries and do just fine. Sickness basically is just code for "you're being viewbombed" most of the time at this point at least for me.

Edited November 23, 2015 by SockPuppet Strangler

[TJ09]

IMO the solution to viewbombing is very simple - remove sickness from the game. Period. It adds nothing fun to the game and creates a method for people to attack each other.

 

Basically, a game's features need to add something to the game. What value does sickness add? At this point in the game's development, as far as I can tell, absolutely nothing positive and a very significant negative. Sickness needs to go.

It stops the game from being absolutely pointless.

 

My eggs are immune to dying from sickness (all of them, not just new releases). You know what happens when I get gifted an egg? I put it in a hatchery, and proceed to absolutely forget about it. There is no reason for me to ever look at its growth beyond obtaining it and providing it with a source of views. I suspect that many of those eggs probably would have died from sickness were they not impervious to it.

 

The threat of losing an egg is something that should always be there. Maybe not in the exact form it currently is, but I don't believe it's interesting to have raising eggs be trivialized.

[Fuzzbucket]

It stops the game from being absolutely pointless.

 

My eggs are immune to dying from sickness (all of them, not just new releases). You know what happens when I get gifted an egg? I put it in a hatchery, and proceed to absolutely forget about it. There is no reason for me to ever look at its growth beyond obtaining it and providing it with a source of views. I suspect that many of those eggs probably would have died from sickness were they not impervious to it.

 

The threat of losing an egg is something that should always be there. Maybe not in the exact form it currently is, but I don't believe it's interesting to have raising eggs be trivialized.

QFT.

 

I absolutely agree with tj. I think I need to lie down now.

 

And yes I have been viewbombed in my time, but I still prefer to keep the mechanism.

[dragongrrl]

It stops the game from being absolutely pointless.

 

My eggs are immune to dying from sickness (all of them, not just new releases). You know what happens when I get gifted an egg? I put it in a hatchery, and proceed to absolutely forget about it. There is no reason for me to ever look at its growth beyond obtaining it and providing it with a source of views. I suspect that many of those eggs probably would have died from sickness were they not impervious to it.

 

The threat of losing an egg is something that should always be there. Maybe not in the exact form it currently is, but I don't believe it's interesting to have raising eggs be trivialized.

While your eggs are immune, ours aren't.

 

Everyone should be watching out for their eggs, but this is getting to the point where it's like having a mass murderer loose in the community. I am very careful with my babies but when some players are getting 40000 views, killing their eggs, that goes way beyond normal care to protect from someone with malicious intent.

 

Something needs to change, since reasonable care is no longer enough to protect anyone's eggs.

Edited September 24, 2015 by dragongrrl

[KuroYukia]

There's currently someone running around adding scrolls to Valley Sherwood and EATW, I was bombed and so was a friend, been seeing it on others as well

 

Though I play other clicksite style games that don't have sickness, I still play it everyday and even check on them.

 

Just because my eggs won't get sick or die doesn't mean I won't play them, it's just one hassle I can do without

[Obscure_Trash]

It stops the game from being absolutely pointless.

 

My eggs are immune to dying from sickness (all of them, not just new releases). You know what happens when I get gifted an egg? I put it in a hatchery, and proceed to absolutely forget about it. There is no reason for me to ever look at its growth beyond obtaining it and providing it with a source of views. I suspect that many of those eggs probably would have died from sickness were they not impervious to it.

 

The threat of losing an egg is something that should always be there. Maybe not in the exact form it currently is, but I don't believe it's interesting to have raising eggs be trivialized.

I don't feel like removing sickness would change my involvement any. I already stick them into hatcheries and leave their growth alone. I keep checking back because I want to see when I'm open to grab or breed more eggs.

 

Sickness doesn't keep me on my toes now. In the past year, I think three things have gotten sick. One was a cb thunder I managed to grab, which I suspect somebody stuck in a fansite before I put it in fansites. One was my birthday summon, which is not unexpected since GoNs usually get sick when stuck in ERs. The last was the only cb silver I've managed to grab in all my years here, which was for sure viewbombed as a new egg. Luckily, I was still on and noticed and managed to fog it in time to save it.

 

I usually have 21 growing things on my scroll. I incubate everything. So that's about five days to grow each thing. I can do that 73 times a year. That means I raise roughly 1500 dragons a year.

 

So three sick things out of 1500 dragons I raise in a year. Plus or minus a few sick things I may have forgotten here or there. Let's say that's 15 sick things total - that's 1% of the things I raise that, theoretically, keep me on my toes.

 

Only sickness doesn't really keep me on my toes. I fog the egg and unfog it a day later (if I bother to fog it at all).

 

I check in because I like this game and want to raise as many dragons as I can. I do not expect my eggs to get sick. I rarely check for that. I look at its growth so I know when I can grab more dragons. ^^

 

In any case, if sickness needs to stay, I'm all for changing the mechanism. Either up the views needed for a dragon to get sick or perhaps lock the stats if people are gaining too much too quickly - so if stats are being gained whatever is determined as too fast a rate, the stats lock up for an hour (only problem here is neglected experiments will be negatively impacted by a rate limit).

 

Another possibility (and I know this will see opposition from no-click growers - sorry, guys! Just bringing it up as an option) would be to make clicks a more necessary part of the growing process, which would involve people a little more in the growth of their dragons (something that really went down when we went from posting on forums to simply sticking in fansites).

[Syphoneira]

No, it's not. It's really not; it's so far from that, statistically. Sickness is almost the least common reason for egg death (second to last, as it happens). I'd say that "murderers" account for less than half of all sickness deaths. This puts intentional killing via egg sickness in far, far last place as far as egg deaths are concerned.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hi, TJ!

 

It's very true that most people do catch eggs in time to save them from dying of Sickness - often right when it starts - but it certainly would make things at least easier if it were to be possible for us to have a multi-Fog/UnFog option and some form of optional Teleport protection. (Hint, lol.)

 

 

 

The Flash: hello!

 

Just to mention, even if you take the DC fansites right out of the equation, there are high-traffic sites elsewhere and other means of Viewbombing eggs which have been used in the past and which are likely being used for the super-fast increases noticed in some cases.

 

DC fansites, at least the six I've been using, only ever seem to give fast rates of high Views on ER eggs, not on new eggs, although EATW does seem to have problems of that nature and was certainly popular with Viewbombers for that reason a while back.

 

 

 

 

Edit: Hi, Tawanda001!

 

You're having eggs Viewbombed which are not publicly posted anywhere, just privately on offers, where only the person you make the offer to can see it?

 

Is this because your whole scroll is targeted but the rest have been Fogged?

Edited September 24, 2015 by Syphoneira

[Lurhstaap]

It stops the game from being absolutely pointless.

 

My eggs are immune to dying from sickness (all of them, not just new releases). You know what happens when I get gifted an egg? I put it in a hatchery, and proceed to absolutely forget about it. There is no reason for me to ever look at its growth beyond obtaining it and providing it with a source of views. I suspect that many of those eggs probably would have died from sickness were they not impervious to it.

 

The threat of losing an egg is something that should always be there. Maybe not in the exact form it currently is, but I don't believe it's interesting to have raising eggs be trivialized.

 

TJ, TBH, that's about how I play too. Sickness almost never crops up for me at all. I routinely throw 7 day 0 hour eggs in a single hatchery and forget about them. They hatch within two or three days with Incubate just like those of people who wait a while and then throw their eggs in a bunch of hatcheries. To be perfectly honest, the only times I've had sickness crop up were the very rare occasions I have accidentally used more than one hatchery at a time, or when I was being viewbombed. So basically sickness for me means I'm either under attack or made a mistake. It's a very minor annoyance that doesn't exist for me 99% of the time but then may randomly crop up at any time to destroy something I can't replace just because someone else got jealous or mad at me for something unrelated. I'm just saying, that's not the profile of a useful feature, man. If it's meaningful it should appear more often than as a signpost saying either, "Hey, you made a once-a-year-oops, fix it," or else "Hey, someone hates you today, have fun with it! " Because right now, for me at least, that's all sickness is. And I can only discuss my own experience/perspective, so I know others may have more of an issue with it, but from what I've read I'm not the only one whose experience of sickness is just that - a rare annoyance that mostly means someone decided to try to wreck your day.

 

IMO the fact that my eggs could potentially die of sickness doesn't make the game more pointful, just more stressful. To be brutally honest, I don't keep an eye on my scroll because I'm worried about sickness in itself - I keep an eye on it because if I see sickness it means I'm being bombed and I have to take action against -that-. That's it. If I didn't feel the need to worry about viewbombing sickness would never cross my mind because it just plain almost never happens in any other situation. Even prizes and other stubborn/high-food-need species just don't get sick much for me. They take more time to hatch but that's about it.

 

If there must be a sickness mechanic, perhaps it should be independent from actual views/UVs/clicks, then. Maybe based on how often the person logs in to check their scroll or something. We are different game designers and think differently about this issue, obviously, but I really do think you should revisit this idea. I hear that you think the risk of death needs to be a thing, and whether I agree with you or not on that point is irrelevant. My issue at the moment is that the way that is currently being accomplished is simply not a good idea IMO. If you disagree, that's fair enough. But I felt a need to say it. Thanks for replying personally, I do appreciate that.

 

EDIT: I want to add that removing sickness does not at all remove the threat of death from eggs. You could still fail to get them enough food and have them starve to death. I thought THAT was the basic idea. (Not to mention the various user-triggered causes of death, deliberate and otherwise - the Kill action, failed Vampire bites, Earthquake oopses... ) If the problem is people feeding too fast, then perhaps a Full mechanic would be a better idea? Eggs/hatchies might simply stop getting new views/UVs/clicks for a time if they get too much too soon. There are a lot of ways to handle the underlying issues besides the way we're currently doing it and I really think one of them must be a better way, is all I'm really trying to say.

Edited September 24, 2015 by Lurhstaap

[olympe]

It stops the game from being absolutely pointless.

 

My eggs are immune to dying from sickness (all of them, not just new releases). You know what happens when I get gifted an egg? I put it in a hatchery, and proceed to absolutely forget about it. There is no reason for me to ever look at its growth beyond obtaining it and providing it with a source of views. I suspect that many of those eggs probably would have died from sickness were they not impervious to it.

 

The threat of losing an egg is something that should always be there. Maybe not in the exact form it currently is, but I don't believe it's interesting to have raising eggs be trivialized.

Well, it might seem pointless, I don't know. Personally, I remember only one occasion where I might have been viewbombed, and I only get sickness if I put my eggs into too many hatcheries too soon. So, about 95% of the time, sickness is not an issue for me, and I don't check for it. However, I like to look at my growing dragons to see how far they are, and when I can expect them to hatch/grow up so I can get more.

 

We still need a way to protect our eggs. Especially those in teleports because they cannot be fogged. A protecting BSA for our special eggs would also help tremendously, not to mention a mass fogging feature. (Would it be against the rules to use a mass-fogging script, btw? Not that I have one, as I don't know squat about scripting, but maybe someone could come up with one.)

[Fiona]

First of all, the only way to stop malicious people from view bombing is to remove the incentive to view bomb other people's dragons. They do it to upset people, to cause distress. If the risk of death were taken away there would be no distress, so no incentive to view bomb.

 

However, TJ's point it fairly valid. Sure, my eggs and hatchlings are very rarely sick. But the risk of sickness and death affects how I add them to hatcheries. Even though once added I rarely have to think about them again, I still have to have a method for adding them to hatcheries that works for me. If death from sickness is removed without replacing it with something else requiring some thought and a method we could all just stick all our new eggs in every hatchery we know and walk away.

 

So, if we were to remove the threat of death from sickness but replace that with something else requiring thought and a method, what sort of things can we think of?

 

There was an idea earlier but I can't recall the details. One thing I thought of, (but haven't weighed through yet) is the idea that being sick stops the growing dragon's timer. That is, if still an egg it doesn't tick down to hatching time while sick. It could theoretically stay an egg forever if you constantly kept it sick. That would take some effort though, and thought. There's probably a host of things wrong with that idea, but it could be a starting point or trigger a better idea from someone else.

[NotBambi]

There was an idea earlier but I can't recall the details. One thing I thought of, (but haven't weighed through yet) is the idea that being sick stops the growing dragon's timer. That is, if still an egg it doesn't tick down to hatching time while sick. It could theoretically stay an egg forever if you constantly kept it sick. That would take some effort though, and thought. There's probably a host of things wrong with that idea, but it could be a starting point or trigger a better idea from someone else.

Considering that we must take care of our eggs, once the egg didn't hatch in 7 days (sick or not) shouldn't it die?

 

Edit: OK I guess I came across as blood-thirsty but if I catch and fog some eggs and do not log on to unfog and put them in hatcheries, I must expect that they would die. Should sick eggs be an exception? In particular since there is no distinction between viewbombing or carelessness putting them too young in hatcheries or just in too many hatcheries.

Edited September 26, 2015 by NotBambi

[Fiona]

Well, yes, you're right. (I did say there were probably a ton of things I hadn't thought of) But how do we stop the timer from hatching them and still have them run out of time and die?

 

The way I see it, what we have now is a balancing act. We must get them views and unique views so they'll hatch, but we can't overfeed them or that's bad too. What I have in mind is a way that overfeeding is still bad but doesn't kill them. Only running out of time would kill them. And if you totally neglect your eggs and they get completely obese from overfeeding they could run out of time before they get well enough to hatch, or grow up in the case of hatchlings. But hatchlings are much strudier than eggs and don't get sick easily.

 

and it did occur to me that TJ's new release eggs would still have to be immune. We need them to still hatch on time so we can see what's coming. Isn't there something one of you clever people can think of that TJ's eggs wouldn't have to be immune to but would still require us to care for our eggs?

[NotBambi]

Well, yes, you're right. (I did say there were probably a ton of things I hadn't thought of) But how do we stop the timer from hatching them and still have them run out of time and die?

 

The way I see it, what we have now is a balancing act. We must get them views and unique views so they'll hatch, but we can't overfeed them or that's bad too. What I have in mind is a way that overfeeding is still bad but doesn't kill them. Only running out of time would kill them. And if you totally neglect your eggs and they get completely obese from overfeeding they could run out of time before they get well enough to hatch, or grow up in the case of hatchlings. But hatchlings are much strudier than eggs and don't get sick easily.

 

and it did occur to me that TJ's new release eggs would still have to be immune. We need them to still hatch on time so we can see what's coming. Isn't there something one of you clever people can think of that TJ's eggs wouldn't have to be immune to but would still require us to care for our eggs?

Let's assume that an egg is "overfed" - I like the mental picture .

- 1st scenario: if catcher/breeder does not log on and/or does not stop the views before the 7 days are over, the egg dies.

- 2nd scenario: if catcher/breeder logs on and stops the views but the egg is still sick by the time the 7 days are over, egg hatches as a sick hatchling.

- 3rd scenario: catcher/breeder logs on and stops the views, egg hatches once it is not sick anymore and is at least at 4d, as a healthy hatchling.

For what concerns TJ's eggs, I do not worry, probably because I'm not clever enough. TJ can. As is... his eggs will just behave on whatever way he wants them to.

Edit: because I can't write

Edited September 26, 2015 by NotBambi

[KuroYukia]

My scroll is currently hidden because of a viewbomber. Still like the idea of getting rid of sickness though, but if it's needed can we just change how sick they are before they die?

 

Could always make a good suggestions about a dragon that cures sickness or if your hatchy dies should make a nercomancer dragon that revives them within a few hours, which has a chance to fail as well.

[Obscure_Trash]

@ Sock - Our stats are pretty similar as far as incubating and numbers growing on our scrolls, and I probably only see sickness once or twice a year, usually with a prize in the ER to hatch, although I did pickup an AP Sunset egg that was sick with very high numbers, https://dragcave.net/lineage/6B1XQ. I only unfogged it to hatch and to grow up. I never needed to add another view.

 

As far as clicks or no clicks, I probably spend more time working with my eggs in order to avoid clicks than most people who are trying to get clicks. Hide/unhide fills my action log most of the time!

In response to the bold - lol, yeah, I have no doubt you do pay more attention to your dragons than most of the rest of us do!

 

If clicks were required, it'd require all of us to spend more time in hatcheries, anyway. Which would solve the supposed issue of "not checking dragon growth" and the problem of people not returning views to fansites. xP

[Stellaluna22]

As much as I hate sickness, I also like it.

 

Its a good thing because it balances the system. Without sickness, wouldn't hatcheries be overwhelmed with eggs and not enough viewers? All the 7d fresh eggs are instantly popped into the system. I don't think removing sickness would be a good idea in my opinion.

[VixenDra]

I think that 'hide growing' just like we have 'hide adults' is sth the game lacks.

 

Relatign to what TJ said, I don't agree... I rarely get sick eggs and I'm not loging in to check on sickness at all...

I'm loging in either 'just because, no reason' or to check breeding cooldowns or to actually get an egg or to trade or to whatever other than checking on sickness.

I mostly use the game when I'm not locked, when a dragon hatches or grows up (to name them, to breed the new pair etc.), and I'm most active around new releases. It's the new releases that keep me playing actively to checking the game regularly.

I was in the point of having my scroll's goal nearly finished, but I decided to replace the couples (I collect just one per breed/alt, exept BSAs as they're helpful) for better lineages (PBs or at least not messies) so I'm still having some work to do between releases.

But I'll nearly finish again quite soon, and new releases will be the only reason to come back: to grab the pair per breed or alt and to breed 3 frozens from each couple, which usually takes the period between releases. OFC forgetting the entire Haloween to Valentine's period as there are no true releases all this time.

If new releases keep coming relatively scheduled(still on weekends!), once every month, and with 24h exclusive floods, I'll be just perfect and busy at a just right level.

 

I think that we should be able to have an option to block chosen sites from posting our eggs.

Like login to your DC, go to options and go to 'block a site from accessing your eggs/hatchlings', type the main address of the site, confirm and now nobody can successively add your things to the given site, even you unless you remove it from your blacklist from your DC's settings.

This way one desn't have to confirm each single adding attempt of their own, and noone can add to more sites than the owner allows. This way only chosen fan/click/hatch sites can be used for dragons of the given user, reducing the view gainign speed

Let's say you use EATW and Silver's Lair only. You block all other hatcheries' addresses and noone can add your stuff anywhere besides those you haven't blocked. And if you leave like 2 unblocked, your eggs almost can't die, or at least won't die overnight, which the worst. And you don't have to fog everything everytime.

 

 

I personally wasn't viewbombed to the extend that would kill my eggs. But I can recall a situation, esp. last Haloween, when I had several ER Haloweens for trade, put them on the market as a 'last opportunity to get CB Desipises' and sb made them all hatch within minutes or sth :/ Like if they wanted to ruin my offer, I wanted to keep those Desipises ungrown as long as possible without them dying, I bet there would be sb interested, I think mine were the last so-far-from-growing-up CB Desipises put on trades... and that sb was envy.

Also, lately I've also noticed my eggs were posted on sites I haven't put them into... And these weren't just some old commons.

 

Perhaps there could be some protection for dragons that are put on trade?

Or some way to let the dragon/egg be visible(so anyone could see the sprite & lineage and know you really have what you're offering) but unable to gain views? Some halfway between hiding behind a fog and not hiding at all? So some trading-important info would still be accessible for others.

Well, could be the breed's name showing up, instead of the sprite, BUT new releases' names are unknown till TJ's grow up...

But this would be helpful.

 

 

I personally rarely fog my eggs, seems I don't have an enemy yet, but what keeps happening in general is just unacceptable...

I strongly believe that sickness and death should be always all the fault of the owner, not of some other people being hostile or dumb.

Perhaps there should be some protection period, measured in HOURS?

Like your egg gets sick at e.g. 1am DC time, gets even the malicious 40k views but can't die until e.g. 20h pass from the point of the egg getting sick, no matter how many view it gains, here it wouldn't be able to die until 9pm. It could need much more time to recover from sickness but it shouldn't die whilie you're asleep and at work/school... (not that many people can check on game in the morning... that's why I think 20h is fine: it gives some time for evening bathroom(1h)+8h sleep+morning bathroom+getting to school/work+8-9h of school'work+way back home. If the egg/hatchling gets bombed and sick at the pont one left the game to start the evening bathroom stuff, one still can save it after their workday and lose it only if they didn't check on the game within 20h.)

This way perhaps the malicious viewbombers will loose the point of viewbombing as it would have almost no chance to kill the egg while the owner is sleeping and working but still regularly active? This would only kill eggs if one doesn't check on DC everyday. So still some eggs would die but this time because the owner didn't check, not because the owner had a life and couldn't check...

[Syphoneira]

As much as I hate sickness, I also like it.

 

Its a good thing because it balances the system. Without sickness, wouldn't hatcheries be overwhelmed with eggs and not enough viewers? All the 7d fresh eggs are instantly popped into the system. I don't think removing sickness would be a good idea in my opinion.

 

 

Well, if most people formed a habit of regularly running Viewers from the fansites they're using for even an hour or so every time they use them, it'd work out great, exactly the way it was intended to and the only way it can.

 

As it stands, eggs can hatch and hatchies grow up hours late even with thousands of Views because the U Views are so low and out of whack with such a small group of typically the same people generally running Viewers - but if we were all giving Views (and the U Views we can each give growing dragons only once) back to the fansites we use, we'd need to use fewer sites and far fewer actual Views to have all growing stages occur on time.

 

I always put new eggs into DDF and Silvi's to start and add in more fansites later - but I watch my eggs and Fog when I can't and it's pretty unusual for me not to be running fansites in the background, since it's no hassle at all to do, assuming that your system is up to it.

 

Getting steady Views (or as steady as you can manage, as overnight Fogging obviously reduces the time spent gaining them) helps to maximize the U Views you can possibly get, whereas ERing is certain to provide minimal numbers, slowing the growing processes down.

 

We are an essential part of the fansite system because we are the only ones which can provide the Views/Unique Views our dragons need, and the system is already unbalanced because not enough people understand this.

 

But the point of Sickness is to make us attend to our growing dragons and help raise them, not just hide and ignore them until ER and hope we remember to do that in time, or count on others to provide fansite (especially Unique) Views we then don't have enough of.

 

 

[Obscure_Trash]

Bump because I'm interested in seeing more opinions on this.

[Dragon_Arbock]

Did not know there was a thread for this.. but if TJ has already said it's not going to happen, then.. it's not going to happen.

I personally still think it's not needed and not a fun part of the game, however. There is already threat of an egg dying from running out of time, and if someone decides to view bomb you, there's nothing you can do to stop it if you're at school/work/asleep/whatever and don't see it happening.

I think it's not a fun mechanic when the very thing you need for your egg to survive can also kill it.

 

Edit- is there any chance limited releases could at least be made immune to sickness? Everything else is at least replaceable.

Edited January 11, 2017 by Dragon_Arbock

[Obscure_Trash]

Bump, as we're brainstorming this in another thread. I have some thoughts I can add later. Not enough energy or cohesion at the moment though. ^^;;

[silver_tiger]

Personally, the only times I've had sick eggs are just like most people here: I either made a mistake (like incubating a Tinsel/Shimmerscale) or someone has added my eggs to a hatchery without my permission. I usually don't add my eggs to hatcheries until they're off cooldown, and while yes that is because I don't want them to get sick, I am of the opinion that viewbombers have become such a problem it's worth considering getting rid of it all together. Or maybe for new releases, at least? Because I can replace, idk, a Deep Sea very easily, but new releases are a lot harder. It's even worse if I got all done hunting and I come back from sleeping to find I have to hunt all over again...after a day, of course, since I'm now locked with dead eggs.

 

I'm lucky that this hasn't yet happened to me, but this way of thinking is what makes me keep my rarer eggs hidden until they're incuhatchable. And frankly that isn't what keeps me coming back to this game; sickness adds nothing for me, it's a pointless annoyance. The thing that keeps me coming back is my scroll goals and obsessively organizing my dragons (which I haven't done for a while, shakes fist at my work).

[Pokemonfan13]

To me it's a bit of a catch 22. Yes, you can basically add your eggs places with no worries if you wait a few hours before adding them to one hatchery, or a day before adding them to multiple. But that's still more work than being able to just chuck your eggs places immediately, and there's a delicate balance between getting enough views to hatch at 4 days and getting too many views and getting sick eggs. You have to remember to get back on and add them later in the day or the next day. Removing sickness removes that need to think about when and where you add your eggs to hatcheries. It could even lead to people adding their eggs to far more hatcheries than they need just because they want to make 100% sure that those eggs hatch the instant they hit 4 hours. That could put an unnecessary strain on the site.

 

Probably the best option I've seen is to replace sickness death with a sickness hatching delay. Just like if your egg doesn't have enough views, if it has too many views it won't hatch as quickly. Viewbombers could still cause annoyance, maybe making an egg drop to a day left before it can hatch, but the new sickness mechanic would have to be balanced so that it can't push an egg all the way to never being able to hatch. It still requires people to keep an eye on their eggs if they want them to hatch on time, but it deosn't give viewbombers as much power.

 

I would hope that it would be cumulative views, so only an egg still sick at 4 days would have the hatching time pushed back. It is quite easy to have a temporary sickness early in the egg's life, and the site should only punish you if you don't take the appropriate measures to reduce the views.

 

The situation would also have to take into account the odd sickness that prizes etc can undergo as ER eggs. Maybe that odd sensitivity would simply have to be removed. Have them more sensitive to sickness before they are ER, but once they are ER they are allowed to be ERed and hatch. Because it can already be infuriating to try to get those to hatch in a timely manner, it would be even worse if just trying to ER them pushed the hatching time back further.

Edited March 26, 2017 by Pokemonfan13

[Bison]

I think its well past time to stop rewarding trolls.

 

Random people should not be able to have any impact on our dragons - be it killing them or forcing them to take much longer to hatch. Regular users should not be at the mercy of jerks just to "make it harder"... that's honestly just not good game design. Older players might just say "tough luck, get over it, that's the game" but newbies aren't necessarily going to stick around if their eggs are killed by someone else. Its not fun. Its not enjoyable. It adds nothing to the game except troll bait.

 

Dragon Cave is already a "grab/breed eggs and be unable to do anything for days" game. There's a hard limit (egg/hatchling slots + timers) to what you can actually do before you're forced to stop playing. Personally, I think its a flimsy excuse to say removing sickness makes the game too easy because imo, it doesn't. DC is not a hard or time-intensive game; its extremely casual and very easy at its core. All you do is catch or breed eggs, add them to a separate hatching website, wait days, name them, wait days, they become breedable, repeat. The goals you make for yourself are what make it have any difficulty.

 

All that removing sickness would do is help the vast majority of players by allowing us to gain control of our own dragons and what happens to them. Viewbombers could still mess up stats if you're going for something specific but that's nowhere near as bad as being able to kill/delay hatching of your eggs.

[Pokemonfan13]

As long as it is physically possible for other people to affect the views your dragons get, trolls will always find a way. Two simple ones I mentioned on the other thread involve them removing your scroll from fansites and adding eggs you're keeping at low views for trading purposes to fansites. (specifically trading because you can't fog to prevent) I know about them because both have happened to me. And both can be just as seriously annoying as viewbombing delayed hatching/growing would be. (I say can be because not everyone has a routine that causes them to look in fansites as often as I do. My dragons being removed is more a "huh, that's odd" than a "OH NO!" thing)

 

So no, removing death from viewbombing will not magically make DC immune to trolling. And since it wouldn't defeat trolls, you might as well keep sickness as a control for people not paying attention to their dragons and getting too many views, just not with a death consequence.

Edited March 26, 2017 by Pokemonfan13