Send Biome Blockers to the AP

[Xasora]

I am slightly against this idea because I do not see it as actually solving the issue. It's just shifting it over so it "disappears" or becomes someone else's problem to deal with. I've seen people state that commons are more likely to be adopted at lower times (and yes, I do that on the AP, too), and that does have some merit, but does that not become an issue of having your cake and eating it too?

 

I'd love to see the main cave coded in a way where eggs don't just appear at :00 and every five minutes, where they can rotate randomly, or even in a way where users A and B see 3 eggs, and users X and Y see 3 completely different eggs. Or where refreshes have the possibility of rotating out the selection even if an egg hasn't been taken. These ideas would make it a little more fair to all players, and not just those with the fastest computers able to refresh quicker.

[cyradis4]

I am slightly against this idea because I do not see it as actually solving the issue. It's just shifting it over so it "disappears" or becomes someone else's problem to deal with. I've seen people state that commons are more likely to be adopted at lower times (and yes, I do that on the AP, too), and that does have some merit, but does that not become an issue of having your cake and eating it too?

 

I'd love to see the main cave coded in a way where eggs don't just appear at :00 and every five minutes, where they can rotate randomly, or even in a way where users A and B see 3 eggs, and users X and Y see 3 completely different eggs. Or where refreshes have the possibility of rotating out the selection even if an egg hasn't been taken. These ideas would make it a little more fair to all players, and not just those with the fastest computers able to refresh quicker.

The ratios are, at bottom, the reason the Cave is stale. The Cave is trying to produce more of certain commons than the userbase is willing to pick up at that time. So, there are a couple of ways to fix that:

1. Make the Cave produce less of those eggs.

- This is something TJ has shown himself to be disinclined to do.

 

2. Make the eggs produced more interesting to the userbase

- This encourages the userbase to raise more of the most common blockers. BSAs won't cut it for all the breeds, because you can't give them all BSAs.

- More blockers reaching adults = better ratios = less produced in the cave = biomes move better as "less common" commons aren't being blocked out

 

For 2, there are a couple of ways to do that:

 

- Contests on the forum: It can work on a targeted breed, but there are too many breeds to be effective Cave wide. The Cave needs a built-in way to deal with it.

 

- Mossy eggs and similar suggestions: These make the full time eggs more valuable without sending them to the AP. I'm not sure how well these would work. A lot would depend on just how valuable they made the blockers, because those same full-time blockers are competing against the projects people want to do. Unless the MSA or whatever is VERY valuable, I will only get a certain number.... And not grab anymore. There are a LOT of blockers produced.

 

- Send the CB blockers to the AP: this would reduce them to much-lower time, where more people would be willing to pick them up and raise them. Hatchie slots are generally less valuable than egg slots, because we have more of them. So people would be willing to fill up those extra hatchie slots. How we send the CBs to the AP is what this suggestion is about.

 

 

Nothing that causes the eggs to rotate will solve the fundamental problem: the ratios being out of balance. The Cave will always, always, produce more of the ones coded to be very common than those coded to be rare. And the more the commons are under-populated, the less rares / uncommons will be able to be seen. But if all of the most-common are collected enough, then they will be driven into uncommon-ish status. Which will let a lot more uncommons / rares to show up. Ratios are all about balance: The more commons are raised, the more rares will turn up.

 

Cheers!

C4.

[Fuzzbucket]

There are already loads of such contests.

 

And "commons breeding projects" and the like.

 

And in the days that the EG thread wasn't full of metallic checkers and prizes, there were many many more common lineages running. I have several myself, but rarely go to the thread for them, as almost no-one wants them.

 

Just saying

[aussieJJDude]

Probably going to sound like a whiner... But who cares?

I really prefered how it was a few years back, where the cave was controlled by the AP. I noticed a lot more variety, both in the AP and cave. Now, I turned into a mostly AP hunter looking for CB's - when not breeding my own eggs for my lineages. Which is impossible (now), as i noticed an influx of messy lineages or just lineaged dragons to begin with!

I would like an option to "fix" this, whether the AP "splits". Maybe there is a mini AP where the cave blockers go - the ones that got knocked out of the nest or the one where the dragon tamers have "knocked" and became abandoned or something...

 

Dunno, but I feel like my playing experience has changed drastically, and personally, like it how it was before - when it made sense IMO...

 

[urusta]

Can eggs in the biomes...disappear? What about a 'disappear' BSA? You snag a misclick...you use the 'disappear' BSA of your dragon and POOF!, it's like the misclick never even existed. It goes without saying that it wouldn't work every time, or even most times. But even if it worked a few times now and again, that's at least something. Or what about a 'Morph' BSA? You grab a misclick...you don't want it. You use the 'Morph' BSA and it turns it into another, random type of egg. You might get a mint. You might get a Blusang. You might even get a Gold. Or it just doesn't work and you're stuck. ha ha

I don't know if that was mentioned yet, but earthquake used to be a bit like that. The dead eggs did not block your scroll, so you could just kill them and pick up more "ugly" AP eggs and kill them. It was changed some time ago, which I still think is sad. Gave earthquake a usefulness for some time.

[cyradis4]

Fiona had a good suggestion in another thread that is related to this, so bumping this.

 

It was:

At the end of the hour, punt eggs that weren't picked up to the AP

 

A modification of it:

Since many eggs never end up getting viewed in the Biomes, have it be only eggs that actually showed up in the Biomes for pickup are punted to the AP.

 

The eggs so punted would have been deleted anyway.

 

Cheers!

C4.

Edited March 20, 2015 by cyradis4

[Syphoneira]

Fiona had a good suggestion in another thread that is related to this, so bumping this.

 

It was:

At the end of the hour, punt eggs that weren't picked up to the AP

 

A modification of it:

Since many eggs never end up getting viewed in the Biomes, have it be only eggs that actually showed up in the Biomes for pickup are punted to the AP.

 

The eggs so punted would have been deleted anyway.

 

Cheers!

C4.

 

 

 

That's interesting!

 

Wouldn't affect the actual movement in the biomes, of course, but it would at least help!

[rabbithaver]

Yes this!

[Fiona]

I think it would eventually affect the movement in the biomes. One of the reasons the biomes don't move is because the code is generating so many eggs of the breeds people aren't as interested in, particularly as 7 day eggs. If those eggs, instead of being deleted, are punted to the AP where they will eventually be picked up and raised, then the code will be under less pressure to make more of them. The ratios should even out and there should be a greater variety available. More variety equals more interesting hunting, which should work out to more people being interested in hunting.

 

I wasn't thinking just the eggs that had been shuffled back into the queue being punted because you never know what might have been lurking behind the ones that didn't move. With the 5 minute egg shuffle most of the eggs should have been exposed but there could still be a few gems lurking there. The very small chance of finding a cb rare or uncommon in the ap would make for interesting hunting there.

[cyradis4]

For movement in the Biomes, the shuffle takes care of that already.

 

My concern with sending every egg in the backlog to the AP is how clogged, quickly, the AP could get. We don't know how many eggs are generated each hour, so its very possible we could end up with 100+ eggs from each Biome being dumped there. And having CB rares tossed to the AP would actually be counter-productive, because it would guarantee that each rare egg generated each hour was handed out that hour, so it would put more rares into circulation, which would make them rarer, which..... would not be good.

 

It all would depend on just how many eggs are generated each hour, and whether or not they shuffle back into Biomes after being shuffled out. I personally think, from what I've seen, that so many eggs are generated each hour (and more are generated every x time) that they don't come back. Which means, there are still a lot of eggs in the "background".

 

And there's no reason to put CB rares into the AP. The need for this is to increase the desirability of blockers, by making them available at lower time, so we can get more into the ratios. There's no need to increase the desirability of rares, they are already super desirable.

 

Also..... It could potentially hamstring the Biomes. If people expect to see CB rares turn up in the AP, then why hunt in the Biomes? Why try to get an egg at full time from the Biomes when you can get it at much lower time from the AP? This wouldn't just be rares.... It'd also be the uncommons and less-commons and commons. You might as well just reduce the time to hatch eggs.

 

So....

 

tl;dr

I personally think that any egg that is sent from the Biomes to the AP first must be offered in the Biomes, so someone who really wants that egg can get it at full time. Otherwise, this suggestion would undercut the whole purpose of having the Biomes and 7 day eggs.

 

Otherwise, sending them at the end of the hour vs after 5 minutes is 6 of one, half dozen of the other.

 

Cheers!

C4.

[Syphoneira]

I think it would eventually affect the movement in the biomes. One of the reasons the biomes don't move is because the code is generating so many eggs of the breeds people aren't as interested in, particularly as 7 day eggs. If those eggs, instead of being deleted, are punted to the AP where they will eventually be picked up and raised, then the code will be under less pressure to make more of them. The ratios should even out and  there should be a greater variety available. More variety equals more interesting hunting, which should work out to more people being interested in hunting.

 

I wasn't thinking just the eggs that had been shuffled back into the queue being punted because you never know what might have been lurking behind the ones that didn't move. With the 5 minute egg shuffle most of the eggs should have been exposed but there could still be a few gems lurking there. The very small chance of finding a cb rare or uncommon in the ap would make for interesting hunting there.

 

 

 

 

Sorry, that was badly phrased, lol.

 

I meant but failed to specify *as an immediate result for those in the biomes at the time of blockage* as with another suggestion, but it would indeed help enormously overall, and I couldn't agree more with your post.

 

 

Edit: also, (as usual) good points, cyradis4.

 

Although as matters currently stand, I don't think the 5 minute shuffle does enough - but with Fi's suggestion, the combination would seem to cover the situation rather nicely over time.

Edited March 20, 2015 by Syphoneira

[Doodle_Leetle_Trees]

I can see why this would be good, I do wish that the cave would rotate faster, but isn't there a new egg drop every five minutes already? Not only that, but if there were mainly CB eggs in the AP, that could get rather annoying. Sure, it could help with CB Neglecteds and low time hatches, but I know I'm not the only one who prizes the AP for the fantastic lineages that can be found there...

 

Reading Fiona's post just now, I can agree, finding a rare in the AP would be nice...and somewhat funny as well, lots of lag from the spam *chuckles evilly*. But it would almost seem to defeat the purpose of the biomes somewhat, most people would probably be in the AP, waiting every five minutes for the new ones to be abandoned, instead of the biomes.

 

(If the lineages I posted count as spam for whatever reason, I had not meant for it to be spam, I was just putting some of my own dragon's that I had found in the AP to make a point. I don't think it would be spam, but I thought I might as well mention. )

[Fiona]

The fantastic lineages you find there could still be found there. I don't think it would be dominated by cb eggs punted from the caves, even at first. Most of the cb eggs that would show up would be the same breeds as people now pick up to abandon 5 hours later.

 

What happens now, as far as we know, is less that new eggs are generated every 5 minutes (though during holidays and new releases if all the eggs from the biomes are gone on the 5 minute mark it generates more) and more about the queue of eggs that already exist are reshuffled. That results in the more desirable eggs gradually being picked out and the less popular eggs being left at the top of the hour when new eggs are generated. The result of this shuffle is that the leftover eggs are never catching up to their more popular brothers, so the cave keeps trying to make more of those to bring the numbers up. Which end up deleted at the top of the hour, resulting in more of those breeds being generated, which are less popular so people don't pick them up, which... uh, you get the picture I'm sure. The problem is that while the shuffle is good to bring eggs to the top that people want, there's no mechanic in place that helps the less popular eggs get their populations up to what the code thinks they should have, so it endlessly makes more of them, and then deletes them when they don't get picked up during their hour.

 

The chances of a rare or uncommon lurking in that mess are low but not zero. So hunting the AP specifically for cb rares or uncommons would be a rather futile undertaking. Mostly what people would find there are lineaged eggs and cb blockers. The blockers would be more desirable than those being dropped in the cave because they have less time before they can hatch.

 

My concern is if the punted cb eggs would be too many for the ap to clear. Only TJ knows for sure.

[Zeditha]

As far as the rares are concerned, they are already garunteed to be picked up anyway. Who would see a CB Metal in a biome and not click it? And with the new mechanics more people will be browsing the biomes anyway, so every single rare will be collected. If I had a CB rare, I'd bet it that this would happen.

 

However, if it really is a problem, just tell the computer 'this one rare. No puntey.' Therefore, metals and Seasonals and unbreedables wouldn't be punted, and they wouldn't 'get rarer'. Or whichever breeds TJ chooses to tell the cave not to punt.

 

I definitely agree with the second-ap idea, though. Perhaps there is a small list, and in the 'pile of eggs' page (dragcave.net/abandoned) there would be new text: 'As you approach the pile, you see that it seems more like __ than one. Which one do you head to?' (__ is how many APs there are.) And there are simple links, to APs 1, 2, 3 or more, with codes dragcave.net/abandoned/X for clicking on number X. Eggs are sent randomly to each one.

The beautiful thing about this is that it shouldn't be any significant amount harder to code ten than two APs, and the more there are, the lower the backlog in each. An bit of experimental twiddling to find the perfect number where there is always an AP egg to replace the one just taken, but none (or very few) are lost, and we have the cave at its best. (Plus, how much code will TJ have to add in? I wager that most of it will be copying, and most of the rest will be a random-number-generator to ensure the eggs go to a random AP.)

 

I'd definitely stalk the biomes if this was implemented. Definitely. Plus the APs. Stalking...

[Doodle_Leetle_Trees]

Oh, I hadn't noticed someone had said something about a second AP. I really like that idea, actually. I don't think it would take very long to code it, definitely not. Copy, paste, and slight adjustments.

I don't necessarily think all the lineaged dragons would disappear, I just think that they would be less frequent. It already annoys me when I pick up a CB egg in the AP, because I like lineages, so the second AP would be great in my opinion. Though I'm not sure how that would be layed out on the sight. I'd almost say, instead of eggs being sent to random ones, one pile would be for the eggs from the cave, and the other just for 'regular' abandons, like auto-abandons, purposeful abandons, etc. Just an idea?

Edited March 20, 2015 by Doodle_Leetle_Trees

[Zeditha]

I think we all internally considered the biome-blockers having their own AP, and dismissed it. I know I did, and it was because that would spoil the randomness of it. The game is supposed to be frustrating, to keep you playing. What's the point if there isn't some challenge to it? An 'I win' button isn't fun.

I like lineages as much as the next person, and sometimes I search for CBs. For example, right now I'm trying to begin my first EG lineage, a Royal Blue x Terrae checker, and I can't find any CBs of either. -.- It would make my life easier if I could just see the Blues and Terraes and know they were CB, but it would spoil the challenge and ruin the point of DC for me.

 

For that reason, I'm out. *pretends to be on dragon's den rather than dragon cave*

[Ribombee]

I don't necessarily agree with a second AP. Yes, there is a backlog of undesirable eggs, but that is in large part due to the extra day that is added when they are abandoned. When a lot of eggs are in the AP, time goes down because people can't pick them all up as soon as they are even remotely low enough time to be worthwhile. Adding a second AP would only split the two and increase times, not decrease them. On of the positives of dumping biome blockers into the AP would be that it might decrease egg times due to the sheer number of eggs. Adding a second AP would strip away that benefit.

 

The high AP egg times likely also have an effect on the biome movements. If you pick up 6+ day eggs from the AP, you can pick up overall less eggs than you can if you are finding 4-5 day eggs that can be incuhatched. When people find these eggs, even if they are common or messy, they tend to go fairly quickly because they won't leave a person egg-locked. This both influences the ratios (i.e. more commons moving so that the number of rares needs to increase in order to keep the ratio) and encourages people to pick up more eggs from the biomes overall. If I get close to filling up my scroll space with AP finds, I'm much more inclined to grab a couple 7 day eggs from the biomes, since I have to wait for the hatchies to grow up before I have overall scroll space, anyway. Waiting a bit for the eggs to hatch gives the hatchies time to move through, then I can repeat the process.

 

Edited for grammar.

Edited March 20, 2015 by harlequinraven

[Syphoneira]

I'd think that one of the advantages to having unclaimed CBs added to the current AP would be the reduced times on AP eggs, because Incuhatchable CB Commons get snapped up, and ERs tend to be almost blurs as they disappear onto people's scrolls to be insta-hatched and kept - filling out the ratios and allowing more dragons in other categories to actually appear.

 

A separate, 'Biome-Drop' AP would split the number of members generally on the current AP, (the typical number of whom is frequently sufficient to cause more movement there than on the individual biomes, especially as the eggs can be checked and dropped back immediately if unsuitable,) and I'd suspect that if this were to be implemented, the eggs on both APs would more likely predominately boringly sit until Incuhatch status arrived and eggs snapped up until back to 'too-long-a-wait-to-be-worth-while' status - assuming people looking for either nice lineages or lower-time CBs even bothered to go to another biome limited to CB Commons only.

 

 

Many people do not find endless refreshing over unmoving unwanted eggs to be challenging, just boring and pointless to where a number of people rarely bother to hunt the biomes except during Releases.

 

If they move, at least one can stay awake and hope that something useful comes up and that perhaps they'll get it, especially if it's simply a Common that's been buried for perhaps hours under more prevalent other Commons.

 

 

The 5 minute shuffle has helped, but the vast numbers of excess eggs of so many sprites which the site considers to be underpopulated while many players feel they have enough of them for now - at least when tying up preciousssss egg spaces - sit in biomes which may often have literally only a few players present, perhaps with one or two egg spaces reserved for whatever they're seeking.

 

We need a sustainable system, and Fi's suggestion certainly sounds helpful to me.

 

I see that harlequinraven has already covered this, but will post my support, at any rate.

 

 

Edit: shifted a sentence, lol.

 

Re-edit: and another - needz moar sleep...

Edited March 20, 2015 by Syphoneira

[Fiona]

I think harlequinraven has expressed very well my issues with the idea of a 2nd ap. It rather defeats some of the benefits of punting eggs to the ap. Lower times in the ap = more desire for those eggs regardless of breed.

 

I don't know coding, but I'd expect excluding certain breeds from being punted would be doable. Metals, trios, blusangs... and might possibly be a good idea.

[cyradis4]

I think harlequinraven has expressed very well my issues with the idea of a 2nd ap. It rather defeats some of the benefits of punting eggs to the ap. Lower times in the ap = more desire for those eggs regardless of breed.

 

I don't know coding, but I'd expect excluding certain breeds from being punted would be doable. Metals, trios, blusangs... and might possibly be a good idea.

Its much simpler than that. Only put eggs that were visible for x amount of time, say 3 to 5 minutes. No uncommon or rare egg will sit for more than a minute, which was why I was suggesting the eggs be punted after sitting for 5 minutes. It happens that I *am* a programmer of sorts, and I can tell you.... Anything with lists that need to be checked against is a pain, but a simple timer of "been there x time, ok punt" is much easier, and its self-modifying: if something in the ratios shifts to be uncommon, then that former blocker that was being punted will now be picked up instead of punted. A timer is, from all I've done, much more efficient than any sort of list.

 

By having eggs that sit for x time punted, you guarantee that the eggs aren't in high demand, because people got to sit there looking at them for 5 minutes.... and didn't take them. And remember, it'll move a lot faster than those 3 minutes indicate..... Because the eggs in biome slots 1 and 2 have already lost time while waiting for 3 to go.

 

That also means you don't have to keep a list of what's "rare", which is something TJ has expressed in the past is user-determined.

 

Cheers!

C4.

[Fiona]

Your idea though is that as soon as it's sat there for 5 minutes it's punted. My idea was if it's going to be deleted for the hourly egg gen, punt. I wasn't thinking of a changeable list, but for TJ to list certain breeds that are code determined to be less available and exclude them. Metals certainly fall in that category. I was thinking in terms of including blusangs and trios in that list. (Coppers are a metal, btw.) Probably all holiday drops should be excluded as well.

 

However, if a list of "don't punt" breeds is more unwieldy code-wise, simply punt everything just before rolling up new eggs on the hour. Some have sat there for awhile, some would have but rotated out before they could sit there for awhile. Maybe a small few would have been grabbed but they never managed to rotate to the top of the pile.

[cyradis4]

*Tilts head*

 

Is there a particular reason you dislike the "boot after 5 minutes"? I'm trying to understand.

 

To me, having the eggs punted after sitting for 5 minutes instead of shuffling means that the biomes will be moving in a more unpredictable manner. So instead of having all 3 eggs change every 5 minutes, you'll see one leave at a time, which will end up being staggered (so that you might have one leave at x:05 after the hour, another leave at x:07, another leave at x:08, depending on when the "wanted" eggs were grabbed).

 

Basically, it would add an unpredictable shifting element to the Biomes, whereas now you pretty much have to be there on the 5 minute shuffle or it fills with the same ol blockers.

 

Also, booting them at the end of the hour would result in a large glut of eggs into the AP at one point in time, so during that "glut", people would see all CBs, then when the glut passes, it'll be lineaged eggs again. I personally prefer a more mixed system.

 

ETA: Also, TJ has said in the past he doesn't like exclusions as a general principle. So..... I'd bet that he'd refuse to have an exclusion list for this, too.

 

Cheers!

C4.

Edited March 20, 2015 by cyradis4

[Elzapeth]

Something everyone seems to be overlooking is Hatchlings lock your scroll as well. If you hit the max number of hatchies you can have, you can't pick up any more. Even with this idea you can's go out and pick up x number of eggs per day and still have space to pick up that many again the next day. You still have to wait for hatchies to grow up. I've run into this problem multiple times during holiday madness.

[Obscure_Trash]

I'm all for punting to the AP after a reasonable time. I am not for an exclusion list. If an egg sits there, it sits there. Punt it. Let it tick down time in the AP and become more desirable.

 

Since rarities are user-based, an exclusion list doesn't make sense based on that. It'll still get picked up if it goes to the AP. I do agree, however, that this perhaps shouldn't be implemented for holiday drops.

[Fiona]

Well, the whole point of my alternate idea was instead of kicking things that sit for 5 minutes (which... they get shuffled every 5 minutes, so it gets refreshed anyway. ) was that eggs that are about to get deleted because hour drop would benefit the ap more, where they'll help with ratios. Punting after 5 minutes also helps the ratios but he'd have to have a timer on every egg in the queue because they aren't going to sit for five minutes without changing because shuffle.

 

If TJ likes the "5 minutes and you're out" better than "punt, don't delete" that's fine.

 

The only reason I mentioned an exclusion list was because of a comment about rares being punted. I don't think that's really much of a concern.

 

and I wasn't talking about an exclusion list based on user created rarities, but code based.