Cave Blockers and ways to deal with them

[Spelunker]

I agree with Cinnamin Draconna. I'd rather not see any breed block the cave. I think the most viable solution on that list is to have the eggs shuffle with each refresh.

[kerrikins]

I agree with Cinnamin Draconna. I'd rather not see any breed block the cave. I think the most viable solution on that list is to have the eggs shuffle with each refresh.

The trouble with this is that people will just refresh, refresh, refresh, and the blockers will NEVER get picked up.

 

I know that some people love this idea but it doesn't follow along with TJ's idea of ratios, so I don't think it would work...

 

Not to mention that it wouldn't really be fair, either - fast clickers would shuffle through, grab their stuff and then only the blockers would be left.

[Rally Vincent]

Egg shuffle practically means that within the first thre minutes, any "desirable" egg will be gone from the cave due to fifty people shuffle-shuffle-suffling. The other fifty seven minutes will be the same eggs sitting there, but without the slightest chance of something popping up that makes people now hunt the hole hour. Or in other words: take your minimal chance at the hour and leave the cave alone until the next hour drop.

 

I don't see how that state would be preferable to the current state of the cave. Better solution is to make eggs more desirable, not allowing cherry picking. The current influx of 5-day-eggs (similar to the 'cave scroll' suggestion, if someone remembers that), makes me pick up blockers because they don't block my egg slots for longer then four hours after incubating. A much better way in my opinion, and over time those dragons that we pick up in addition to what we would have taken from the cave will have an impact on the ratios.

[Cinnamin Draconna]

It could work if TJ changed how the drops worked. If instead of specific eggs waiting in a queue to be dropped, there was no queue and new eggs were created on refresh. Meaning the eggs wouldn't actually exist UNTIL they were taken. It would mean that eggs would be produced based on a percentage rather than the busted, broken ratio system.

 

It would mean a major change that TJ doesn't want to deal with, even tho it's probably going to be the only thing that will work.

[Syphoneira]

I'm with Rally Vincent - people will take eggs they ordinarily wouldn't if they're low-time and close to Incuhatatchable, which means, problem solved, or at least greatly reduced.

 

Cinnamin Draconna makes a good point, and maybe TJ would now reconsider his previous stand on the ratio system - in fact, I'm wondering if perhaps he already has?

[olympe]

Good question, Syphoneira. I'm wondering about that, too. CB ridgewings seem to be available a dime a dozen, while I've had a hard time getting any during the last few years. Vines, blacks and even stripes are pretty easy to snag at the moment, too. (Maybe because the people who usually snag them are hoping for metals, thanks to the metal spree?)

[Quinney]

(Maybe because the people who usually snag them are hoping for metals, thanks to the metal spree?)

 

I don't know, only that I'm enjoying the abundance of these dragons. Also seen (and caught) a lot more reds.

[astathebroken]

The problem with CBer projects, at least, in my case, is that I don't regularly track my eggs, so at this point, I have no idea which dragons were already used. It's a lot of work to track your eggs, and not everyone has that time. I used to work in an office at a computer, but I have a different job now, so I'm not sitting on my butt staring at a screen all day.

 

Some of the projects also had delayed rewards. Depending on what type of dragon I submit my scroll for, it can take a few weeks to get the dragon that I want. If you take a look at my scroll, it's basically four pages of commons. I think, with the exception of the gold tinsels which I had good luck breeding, all my rares could be counted on my fingers, and, except for the elementals, none are cave-born.

 

I usually clear out an egg from a biosphere when it's blocked and go back to try to get one of the less common eggs that will spring up. I just did that in the Alpine biosphere. I missed out on three uncommons/rares that were picked up before I did.

 

I know it's probably a pain in the ass to code, and way late to get added to the poll, but I'd like to see some sort of site-based (rather than user-based) reward for those who clean out cave-blockers. Perhaps a seventh biosphere that can only be accessed by those who have collected X number of commons in the past month, and this biosphere drops uncommon through rare eggs.

 

Another idea I'd had was that at every X number of Y-breed eggs, you get Z rare. For example, for every 10 Balloon dragons you collect, you are awarded with a Gold Tinsel egg. For every 15 Limestones, you get a Silver egg. Something like this would motivate people to collect commons, because it's an easier way to get a CB rare than taking your chances in the cave.

 

I'll admit that I've gotten a bit frustrated. I've been on DC (though rarely post) for a few years, and, even with a fast internet connection, because I clear out the cave, I'm always too late to come back to get anything good from my "good deed."

[cyradis4]

I'll admit that I've gotten a bit frustrated. I've been on DC (though rarely post) for a few years, and, even with a fast internet connection, because I clear out the cave, I'm always too late to come back to get anything good from my "good deed."

When you clear out blockers, press ctrl+click, it opens the Get Egg page in a new window. That way, you are still in the biom and can have a chance at the egg behind that one.

 

Cheers!

C4.

[Slaskia]

When you clear out blockers, press ctrl+click, it opens the Get Egg page in a new window. That way, you are still in the biom and can have a chance at the egg behind that one.

 

Cheers!

C4.

If you have mouse wheel, those sometimes serve as a third 'button' and do the same function .

[love_HP]

That was discussed once before. TJ had some practical reasons why that wouldn't work. I'd have to hunt to find the quote. It's buried somewhere here in the section.

I am curious what that is.

 

[Fuzzbucket]

You know - not exactly specific to blockers - but I often wonder if it would be good to see an end to the "hourly drop" and so on - see eggs dropping randomly. Then there wouldn't be the same crowd hunting at the same time. I know someone who was LOOKING for canopies and couldn't find enough - if she'd been able to just look at any old time and anything might happen, it might have been easier...

 

The RUSH of people on the hour is one of the things that makes it all so hard for those with slow connections....

[olympe]

When you clear out blockers, press ctrl+click, it opens the Get Egg page in a new window. That way, you are still in the biom and can have a chance at the egg behind that one.

 

Cheers!

C4.

Been there, done that countless times - and never got a rare so far. An uncommon, if I was really, really lucky. But never, ever a rare. Even if it did pop up. Truth to be told, your chances of grabbing an egg that just appeared are higher if you weren't the person who took the blocker.

[love_HP]

You know - not exactly specific to blockers - but I often wonder if it would be good to see an end to the "hourly drop" and so on - see eggs dropping randomly. Then there wouldn't be the same crowd hunting at the same time. I know someone who was LOOKING for canopies and couldn't find enough - if she'd been able to just look at any old time and anything might happen, it might have been easier...

 

The RUSH of people on the hour is one of the things that makes it all so hard for those with slow connections....

How?

As a matter of fact, I am curious where did all the blockers at xx:59 before the hourly drops go. Are they deleted by the system? If so, and the drops are random, I worry about ratios.

Also, this doesn't really solve the problem in the OP. Blockers will stay blockers.

[Syphoneira]

You know - not exactly specific to blockers - but I often wonder if it would be good to see an end to the "hourly drop" and so on - see eggs dropping randomly. Then there wouldn't be the same crowd hunting at the same time. I know someone who was LOOKING for canopies and couldn't find enough - if she'd been able to just look at any old time and anything might happen, it might have been easier...

 

The RUSH of people on the hour is one of the things that makes it all so hard for those with slow connections....

 

 

Not often that I venture to disagree with you on anything, lol, but in this case, if people don't know when to look for eggs, they won't know when to make time/plan to look for eggs, shutting out people with scheduling issues - and if there are too few people on, there's even less movement among the Blockers, which from my viewpoint of one with puter issues is actually worse and a bigger waste of time than merely being outgunned by those with faster systems.

 

The Blockers are arguably the biggest current problem on here, often effectively shutting down play both for those who wait - which serves no one - and those who are forced to waste spaces on them in order to see if something else turns up that someone might want.

 

We seriously need a variety of dragons to be dropped that people might actually want, in response to what we - the environment of the dragons - can willingly support.

[Cymi]

It could work if TJ changed how the drops worked. If instead of specific eggs waiting in a queue to be dropped, there was no queue and new eggs were created on refresh. Meaning the eggs wouldn't actually exist UNTIL they were taken. It would mean that eggs would be produced based on a percentage rather than the busted, broken ratio system.

 

It would mean a major change that TJ doesn't want to deal with, even tho it's probably going to be the only thing that will work.

 

sort of branching off of this idea —

what if the eggs didn't exist until they were picked up, and if a specific egg sat there for more than 5 minutes, it was removed from the page, and sent to the back of a queue, or removed? if sent to the back of a queue more than 3 or so times it could just be tossed. it would most likely be a hassle to code, but it would help clear up cave blockers if it was done.

[Pokemonfan13]

What do you mean by "tossed"? If you mean sent to the AP, sure. If you mean deleted that would kill the ratios unless it also involved tossing out the ratios too.

[Cymi]

What do you mean by "tossed"? If you mean sent to the AP, sure. If you mean deleted that would kill the ratios unless it also involved tossing out the ratios too.

tossed as in sent to the AP, yeah.

[Valera]

I don't like breed retiring because some of us LIKE the cave blocker species. I like collecting things like horses, electrics, daydreams, pygmies, water horses and purple dorsals.

 

As for the refreshing with f5, I believed that was tried before and it just meant people would refresh till all the good eyes were taken and then leave the rest thus making the ratios worse. That would also suck for players with slower internet connections. I normally don't bother with the hourly scramble and instead pick up cave blockers with the hope I uncover something good and get it before anyone has a chance to take it from me.

Edited August 7, 2013 by Valera

[HeatherMarie]

*Definitely* not in favor of getting rid of hourly drops and making it "random". Most users have school or jobs, they can't spend all day refreshing at the cave for whenever a random egg might show up. That's fairly ridiculous.

 

Me, for example, I have work, and then doctor appts in the afternoon, and I have *maybe* 2-3 hours at night where I can actually be on DragonCave. Since those every-five-minute mini-drops go by so fast you can't even *see* them, my only HOPE for catching CBs are those hourly drops. EVERYONE knows how much more difficult it is to grab good eggs on those five-minute drops because there are too few and they go too fast. Literally seconds. It would be even worse if eggs just showed up "randomly" so that we *couldn't plan* when to attempt to catch an egg. Might as well just never biome-hunt again if that happened.

[Nectaris]

*Definitely* not in favor of getting rid of hourly drops and making it "random". Most users have school or jobs, they can't spend all day refreshing at the cave for whenever a random egg might show up. That's fairly ridiculous.

 

Me, for example, I have work, and then doctor appts in the afternoon, and I have *maybe* 2-3 hours at night where I can actually be on DragonCave. Since those every-five-minute mini-drops go by so fast you can't even *see* them, my only HOPE for catching CBs are those hourly drops. EVERYONE knows how much more difficult it is to grab good eggs on those five-minute drops because there are too few and they go too fast. Literally seconds. It would be even worse if eggs just showed up "randomly" so that we *couldn't plan* when to attempt to catch an egg. Might as well just never biome-hunt again if that happened.

While I personally do find it easier to catch on the five minute drops than the hourly(literally, the bloodmoon release every single egg I got was from a five minute drop), I do not want random drops. I already do not hunt the imperial fleshcrownes because of their randomness, I would hate to not be able to rely on when to come on in certain biomes, particularly otherwise slow-moving biomes like forest, jungle or coast.

[Fuzzbucket]

I don't like breed retiring because some of us LIKE the cave blocker species. I like collecting things like horses, electrics, daydreams, pygmies, water horses and purple dorsals.

 

As for the refreshing with f5, I believed that was tried before and it just meant people would refresh till all the good eyes were taken and then leave the rest thus making the ratios worse. That would also suck for players with slower internet connections. I normally don't bother with the hourly scramble and instead pick up cave blockers with the hope I uncover something good and get it before anyone has a chance to take it from me.

Please no more retired breeds....

 

And OK - it was a rubbish idea having random drops.

 

 

[olympe]

I don't like breed retiring because some of us LIKE the cave blocker species. I like collecting things like horses, electrics, daydreams, pygmies, water horses and purple dorsals.

 

As for the refreshing with f5, I believed that was tried before and it just meant people would refresh till all the good eyes were taken and then leave the rest thus making the ratios worse. That would also suck for players with slower internet connections. I normally don't bother with the hourly scramble and instead pick up cave blockers with the hope I uncover something good and get it before anyone has a chance to take it from me.

You say that you collect certain caveblockers. So do I. But I don't collect all of them. If I want to collect a daydream or two or three, I want daydreams. Not skywings, storms or whatever else I might find instead. So, yes, being able to shuffle with a refresh might even help those of us who do pick up blockers. Because we get the blockers we want without having to wait for people to pick the other blockers that block our desired blockers.

 

That being said, I'm still for a self-adjusting ratio system (for commons only). Yes, I know that some breeds tend to cycle, and that blacks and vines and seasonals used to be blockers for a long time. But who wants to wait - literally! - years for a breed to change status?

 

 

[Red Dragonette]

I'd rather go with the random egg shuffle idea, but since it's been rejected before. I'll have to vote for the auto-kick idea. Because then, it'll be easier to find rares and the breeds I want.

[Syphoneira]

Kind of wondering, looking at some suggestions, if everyone understands that the ratios are tied to one another, and that if no or few commons are taken, the uncommons and rares are cut back in proportion?

 

At least, they used to be, and seem to be now, as far as I know.

 

(Not that that's very far, lol.)

 

But it's the ratios that pump out so many more of certain commons than the environment can support/than players want or can use.

 

And that's the source of the Cave Blocker issue.

 

If we had the full variety of dragons showing up in proportion to what people actually want, the biomes would move and people would have a chance of seeing what they want, which would bring back many of the Cave hunters who've given up, or rarely now bother, (apart from Releases now no longer offering most a chance,) as well.

 

None of the 'fixes' ever work because the problem is built into the current system, which was designed at a time when there were both far fewer dragons available and far fewer players than there are now or have been in recent years - at least so far as the numbers of players, while Releases were, for an extended period, few and far between.

 

And back then we had/were given the hope that the Cave-blocking problem, (then centred predominately in the AP blocking the Cave,) would be alleviated once we had enough dragons Released for more variety - something that has failed to materialize, despite even the wonderful changes to the AP which made such a difference in so many respects.

 

Now we get monthly New Releases, but currently ones in which relatively few can catch the new dragons and that require an inordinate amount of time that not everyone has to spare, merely to try for them - along with a ludicrous amount of capacity for the boredom of refreshing on Blocker eggs which otherwise must take up the very spaces needed for the new eggs sought for.

 

Not to mention the frustration of users due to the faster people being unable, as they have in some Releases, to load up quickly and retire from the chase during Floods and high numbers Dropped for a period thereafter, in order to allow others to catch, while even the slower people have opportunity in the large numbers Dropped following the new Release.

 

In recent Releases, (which, granted, have been Uncommons, but which are still far short of the numbers of DC users trying for them) virtually everybody's either hunting continually, or giving up in droves, the latter of which does eliminate some hunters, but only the slower ones with no or few catches with which to justify their time and effort wasted in their 'fun time', while those with the fastest systems and reflexes must spend longer to get their fill, and that proportion takes up a far more noticeable amount of the more limited sprites available, and is done all the more frantically, because there are relatively few new eggs being Dropped at all.

 

The proportionately small number of people who find themselves bored with catching their fill early and 'having nothing left to do' could always handicap themselves for a 'challenge' by downgrading their puters and connections, while the great masses of those already having these slower systems lack the same option and have to deal with a notable lack of success on a regular basis which they typically fail to find 'challenging' - just disappointing and frustrating.

 

Especially since many of the latter group often can't catch the more desirable dragons at all, (barring the odd fluke) apart from in New Release Floods they may take great trouble and/or miss sleep to attend for that purpose, with at least some slim chance of snagging something during heavy post-Flood Drops of new dragons - and not typically otherwise.

 

So the lack of repeated Floods during the first day, and also of heavy initial Dropping for at least a few days following, fouls up the chances of a large segment of DC obtaining the new Releases (unless gifted to them, since the slower group is less likely than the fast group, so easily able to catch their own anyway, to have suitable trade fodder to exchange for desirable new dragons,) for anywhere from from weeks or months to years or never.

 

This also destroys breeding plans, of course, which fouls the slower people up doubly.

 

And while some claim to find the exceedingly boring Blocker Refreshing/collecting a 'challenge' and to enjoy not catching anything they want, that's not why most of us are here.

 

We usually get paid for the boring, repetitive stuff we do, which otherwise we wouldn't, and it's not what we dream of doing to relax and have fun.

 

We come here to collect/breed/gift/trade the dragons we want for whatever purpose, and if we can't do that, we're effectively cut out of the game, no matter how hard we try.