New release Feedback

[Syphoneira]

I think this question - which, to me, is a rhetorical one - nails the issue with releases.

 

Lately, we've had way too many uncommon/rare dragons being released: blusangs, tsunamis (although they should be common), golden wyverns, coppers (in three different varieties, no less), bloodscales, blacktips (which, I think, were supposed to be common, too), probably even bleeding moons (which are pretty rare, but not that rare)...

 

So, yes, we do get the feeling that, unless we manage to grab them now, we won't get a chance anytime soon. I remember the trio release. I was there, but pretty new - and thought that, eventually, people would get enough of them so I'd be able to grab some CBs. Guess what? It took me 8 months to get one my first CB trio. And guess what else? I'm not going to assume anything will be getting easier to catch with time ever again.

 

These new releases - with the old breeds mixing in way too quickly - remind me horribly of the Mod Mayhem release where everyone was scrambling to get any of the new eggs - and many of them were traded for metals (which hardly bred anything way back then as we were in the middle of the worst metal draught in DC history). Yes, a CB nebula easily traded for a low-gen metal. And even CB hellfires, sunsongs or BBWs could get you higher-gen metals back then.

 

Many of us didn't like it then, and we don't like the same thing happening now.

 

 

 

And even beyond that worry that new breeds will Blusang into increasing unavailability with time, the mere fact of not being able to catch your own (especially of particularly beautiful) ZOMG NEW DRAGONS at the time of Release prevents people from sharing the community fun of following the thread while they grow toward hatching on (sentence-reconstruction-fail-edit: their) scrolls.

 

Then the prospect of potentially spending weeks, months, even years of futile effort trying and failing to get them doesn't seem very amusing either...

 

I know I don't look forward to the Releases in the same manner I would if I was assured of being able to catch my own during the event, and I'm lucky enough to have had generous gifters so far, something not everyone is fortunate enough to be able to say.

 

But people do want to be able to hunt and catch themselves.

 

Being cut out of an integral part of the game because unable to afford faster equipment/connections or having physical disabilities kinda sucks in this sort of over-all slow-paced collecting/breeding scenario.

 

 

And because we have such a need for variety in regular Cave Drops, I'm surprised that we're not seeing more commons being added in to help break up the Blocker situation in the Cave - I'll bet there are a lot of gorgeous sprites intended to be common waiting for Release...

 

 

Edit: if we'd all had the opportunity to load up on these dragons in a proper Flood when they'd first come out, and to get more in an unblocked Cave, with a decent number dropping in better proportion to the population seeking them for at least a week following the Release, we'd also be able to focus on other things, whether on or off DC, rather than either giving up on catching them, as so many have done, or spending so many futile, wasted hours refreshing Blockers or waiting for unwanted eggs intentionally picked up to typically reveal more/misclicks to become droppable 5 hours later, in trying for them...

Edited August 13, 2013 by Syphoneira

[dragonpuck]

I don't mind the monthly release, but having new release dragons mixed with old almost IMMEDIATELY is absurd .

 

We should be able to get new releases in "real time" I am fortunate enough to be in mountain time . I feel really bad for anyone outside the continental US/Canada time zones.

At LEAST 24 hours before mixture and then another 24 with minimal mixing- give everyone a chance ! PLEASE

 

Even if a species is going to be "uncommon"( read RARE) 24 hours of mass drop can't be all that bad.

 

I'd be happy to give up getting bred eggs for a few months, if I could get my 2 CB pairs at the time of release! It would give me some time to decide on a lineage

 

 

[Cecona]

I was incapable of grabbing any of the opals during the release, and ended up having my friend gift me one of her extra greys. I'm still on the search for a CB green opal but I haven't seen ANY and it's very frustrating. I've almost made the assumption that they are not dropping anymore, but I'm still not sure. I started my search on the day of the release, at 11 am EST. All I was seeing were the normal cave blockers and a few of the new eggs which I was too slow to grab. I even tried going to the less populated coast and jungle but the cave blockers made it pretty much impossible for new eggs to drop. The solid release definitely needs to be much longer so that those like me can get a chance.

[r0botmind]

I think 2 dragons a month is a bit much especially if they become rare as soon as they're released. I'd appreciate if the first full day were dedicated to only dropping the new eggs. Not the first few hours (midnight) for a mass drop, then mixing them in with old eggs during the day. Not enough time for the eggs to be circulated and everyone doesn't get a chance to be around for the mass drop. Not all of us live in a different country or are up around midnight to attend the only mass drop. The breeds need to be more common. The "uncommon" breeds are turning up as mega rares and that's not good.

 

Thankfully in-cave time is around 10pm for me, so I can hang around and catch the new releases, but if I'm not around, forget it. I couldn't catch the new opals this time 'round. Had to trade for mine. :| The new eggs mixed in too quickly.

Edited August 13, 2013 by Devyn Star

[Zodivan]

Honestly, I wouldn't mind monthly releases if the cave wasn't always blocked. I had to go to the AP just to find a CB White dragon, which is completely absurd. The fact that I had better luck finding two of them there than I did in the cave is both hilarious and frustrating. I took a break from DC around three years ago, when Guardians (which I adore) were cave blockers, and they still are!

 

If we're going to have monthly releases something needs to change, as things stand it's almost impossible to get the CBs I want and they're all older Common/Uncommon dragons. As things are I'm not even bothering with the new releases because I simply don't have the time necessary to camp the cave.

[Syphoneira]

I believe that most of us were ecstatic when we found out that regular, monthly New Releases were to be scheduled - but they're only fun if you can hunt for the new eggs with a reasonable expectation of catching them within a reasonable length of time.

 

The endless hours many of us are putting into trying for these new dragons also represents time we aren't doing RL things, often for time-wasting fail attempts that nobody can (or wants to) keep up forever and some can't do at all.

 

This is supposed to be a spare time, fun/stress-relieving, recreational thing we do to get away from RL suckiness when we can, not an extension of the ongoing can't-hunt-because-the-Cave's-Blocked thing which also leads into the can't-breed-lineages-without-CBs-we-can't-hunt-for-because-the-Cave's-Blocked thing and anyway, the odds are that it's affected by the whatever-you-need-is-supposed-to-be-common/uncommon-but-is-practically-extinct, probably in part because of the-Cave's-Blocked thing, so that they're buried under Blockers...

 

 

This seems to me to be a sad waste of what's basically an extraordinarily appealing and addictive family-type collecting game that's currently set up in a manner that impedes the actual playing of it...

[prpldrgnfr]

I think 2/month, 3 if a hybrid is great. However, I would also like to see the new ones flood for at least 12, preferably 24, hours. This mixing a few hours in is *ridiculous*, and I live in one of the best time zones relative to DC! New releases are supposed to be fun and a *tiny* bit challenging, not stress inducing, hair pulling, table flipping nightmares.

[HeatherMarie]

I believe that most of us were ecstatic when we found out that regular, monthly New Releases were to be scheduled - but they're only fun if you can hunt for the new eggs with a reasonable expectation of catching them within a reasonable length of time.

This, basically.

 

Now, in the past I've said, multiple times, variations of "they are permanent, don't worry so much!"..... But that was when people would freak out AND THEY WERE MASS-DROPPING ALL DAY.

 

I remember way back when (... that makes me sound old, lol), even if a new species wasn't supposed to be super-common, you'd SEE them around the cave fairly constantly for awhile after the new release. Which made the whole experience a LOT less stressful and a LOT more fun because hey, I can actually go in and click-click-click and have a good chance of getting one of those new eggs!

 

Nowadays? Nope. A kindhearted forumer gave me the only Opal I have so far. Coppers were NOT supposed to be rare, according to the spriter, and yet heck if I can find any anywhere (and the couple I do have don't breed true!). The two-headed release, I came online FOUR HOURS after the release started and they were already mixed with commons. That's simply not even FUN when it gets to that point.

 

I was on the fence about the whole "more releases" in the first place, and now that the mass-drop is SO short, I'm starting to hate the entire concept of new releases.

[Lastalda]

I agree that reliable once-a-month releases are great, and 1-2 breeds (max. 3 if one is a hybrid) are nice (although I would count breeds with several alts as the number of their alts; so the Two-headed Lindwurms should have had a Release to themselves, as should the Coppers).

 

I also agree that the short mass drops are ruining the whole DC experience. Mass drops, without any other breed mingling in, should last 24 hours at the very least. I would prefer them to actually last 48 hours, so that people who can't get online on weekends (because their family life doesn't allow it or they don't have a computer at home) also have a good chance to catch the new releases.

 

Because, as others have pointed out, we don't know if we'll have any chance to catch them later. With the coppers, I was somewhat relaxed, assuming they'd come around once the frenzy died down. But they're still traded for CB metals, and I haven't seen one in the cave since the day they were released. This is highly frustrating and maddening.

 

I don't care about rares, I don't need to have a lot of them. I just want 2 (or at least 1) CB pairs per breed to use for lineages. Spending 2 weeks after a release on the computer, every time I get off cooldown, and still not managing at least one pair per breed is so highly frustrating that it makes me want to leave DC. (Especially because I really don't have the time to do this, and if it comes with no succes anyway, then why even bother?) The only thing that's keeping me is the fact that I've been working on that scroll since 2008, and I'd hate to lose the names, especially since people have offspring from my lineages; and the lineage community here on the forums.

 

So, monthly releases with 1-2 breeds (plus hybrids) that massdrop for at least 24, better 48 hours? Yes, please!

 

Releases like the last few? I'd rather have no new releases at all!

Edited August 14, 2013 by Lastalda

[olympe]

In the end, what it all boils down to is ratios. The ratios of blocker breeds are too high to be (willingly) sustained by the environment (= player base). And, as long as there are a couple of blocker breeds in each biome, DC has a problem.

 

What we need isn't the fixed ratios we've had since the beginning of DC, but ratios that offer solutions to several problems there are right now:

• New releases: We need a solid 24 hours for new releases where there are no other breeds mixed in so everyone has a fair chance of grabbing their own new release eggs.
• Blockers: We need a way to deal with blocker breeds. I've been playing for nearly 4 years now, and since then, some breeds have been blockers and will stay blockers. Sure, some other breeds cycle - like seasonals - but not all of them do. What we need is a system that takes care of this problem of its own - without TJ having to intervene on a semi-regular basis. I know I proposed some kind of self-adjusting ratio system with details on how it would work on more than one occasion, and I still think it is at least a good part of a solution to our dilemma.
• Extreme rarity: Consider Blusangs or Coppers. They shouldn't be rare, merely uncommon. Yet they're harder to find in the cave than metallics, which are true rares. I suspect that this has to do with the fact that, in their original drop, these dragons dropped at a ratio so high that the ratios went out of whack almost immediately. Which could be solved if we didn't consider the dragons on people's scrolls, but only what is currently being dropped. This would also stop the awful breeding sprees followed by even longer breeding draughts that we've seen for some breeds.

[pinkgothic]

Since I see a lot of people mention timezones, I just want to add that Dragon Cave's midnight is six in the morning for me. Since I regularly shoot my sleep schedule to hell on weekends, anyway (which makes Monday workdays go as smoothly as you might expect but alas, I'm nocturnal, and it's very difficult to ditch the habit), on release weekends, I push myself a little more.

 

The first time I did that, it was because I was doing things anyway. Since then? Yep, habit. Not a healthy habit by a long shot, of course, but by the time I'd wake up normally, I'd be six to eight hours into the release, which is apparently no longer sufficient to catch new releases.

 

I thankfully don't get upset easily, so it's just mild disappointment for me, but anyone else in my timezone is getting shafted.

 

Someone mentioned Guardians as caveblockers, which brings me to what I feel might be an interesting observation: As far as I can tell, caveblockers have been significantly more stable in their value niche than rares. Granted, I don't revise the League caveblocker list as much as I could be doing, but all in all, even through the metal boom and other ratio upheavals... the caveblockers have roughly stayed the same.

 

I have no idea what that implies, but I figured I'd throw it into the ring for perusal.

[ZzelaBusya]

In all honesty, I hate those releases. I mean, the dragons are nice and everything, but it's so difficult to collect them all the time. For me at least, it takes loads of time and leaves little opportunity to collect what I like, and it's so annoying.

 

It was wonderful when we had very few releases here and there, there was enough time to do what one likes to do, be it lineages, collecting dragons of a certain breed or anything else. Now it takes me the whole month to catch up with everything and get my 6 pairs of each (+ 3 hatchies of each), it's too stressful.

 

To be short, I wish there were fewer releases. I realise that there may not be many people like me, but since it's a feedback thread, I feel like I need to mention it anyway. Personally I like it when things are calm and quiet, new dragons all the time are no good in my book.

 

The only reason that New Releases are frustrating and collecting the dragons is so time-consuming is that we aren't getting Floods and increased Drop rates of new dragons following these as we used to - virtually everyone wants to fill up on nothing but new eggs (duh, lol) while the Cave is routinely at a stand-still with waaaaay too many of some types of dragons being produced for the environment (us) to support them.

*shrugs* By me, it's the other way around actually. I have no problem at all getting most of the new eggs, even if they are rare I can catch them most of the time. But I actually really dislike having to fill up with new dragons while I have my own goals to complete. I must not be a part of your "everyone", it seems... x3

 

That's one of the reasons I started breeding dragons I usually leave unbred - my CB Metals, for instance - and exchanging 2nd gens for new releases, simply because I don't want to fill my scroll with eggs just because they've recently been released.

 

I've been thinking I should lower the amount of pairs I need of each breed (I keep 6 m/f pairs, one m/f hatchling pair and an ungendered hatchling), but I don't want to release so many dragons, and I like it when a collection is more or less even.

 

But then again, there seem not to be that many people who share my views, and I'm not saying my playing style is right. Just shared what I think, that's all

[MysticTiger]

I like the larger releases. Why? Because they're easier to get. When you only have one or two new dragons, one or both tend to be really hard to get for a while. In this new release, that would be the Two-Headed Lindwurms. When it was the 7 day release, I ended up getting a ton of Black Tea, Blacktip and Imperials only a few days after their release. That's because everyone else was focused on Coppers, which I had already gotten my fill of.

 

I think the WAY the releases are done needs to change. You shouldn't have to be up at midnight to have better shot at getting a dragon. The first day, they should always drop like Holiday drops. Nothing but those dragons in the cave. That way, everyone gets their share, breeding second gens are easier and there's a lot less inflation in the trades.

[Moonlightelf]

I absolutely adore the current 2-3 releases. But like many have said in this thread, the flood of the release should be at least 24 hours. I myself would be happy for 12-hour long flood even, but having things mix in such a short time feels like a punishment to those, who don't live in US and don't have great computers/connection speed/clicking finger.

[Bodecia]

I would hope for less. I like to collect 7 of each, and when you have 2 or more breeds, especially following the recent release that was supposed to be 7 breeds, but was actually 10 sprites (and I still have no Coppers at this point), it sucks. I can't keep up, and I have been doing this a while. 2 new ones a month, but maybe do the second mid month......I also think the flood releases should last 48 hours. There are folks around the world playing, it would give more time for folks to just check in and go, oh, new eggs, best get to the cave.

Edited August 14, 2013 by Bodecia

[danegrrrl]

I like the *pace* of new releases right now.... but the timespan of the mass-drops are frankly ridiculous.

 

When I come online FOUR HOURS after new breeds are released, and they are ALREADY mixing with commons to the point where I end up nearly scroll-locked with mis-clicked commons instead of the new releases? Four hours? I don't think that's fair to ANYONE.

 

I'd say the mass-drop should be at LEAST 12 hours.

I agree with this SO much. I'm asleep when they first drop at midnight. Staying up til midnight (just to deal with lag anyways..) isn't plausible. I have to be up at 5:30 every morning.

 

By the time I get on for an hourly drop (usually 6 am), they are already mixing with commons. My tiny window for possibly catching anything other than a common new release is already closed.

 

 

 

 

[Ashywolf]

2 is fine, the issue is not the amount of dragons but the amount of people that have to be fought away to get anything.

[dragonpuck]

2 is fine, the issue is not the amount of dragons but the amount of people that have to be fought away to get anything.

Which is another good reason to have 24- 48 hour drops.

There are a lot more people playing.

 

With new releases in specific Biomes, cave hunters have the other biomes to hunt in, and if they catch a full scroll of new release ,they will be locked for two days anyway.

[LittleSatCat]

As for me, monthly releases are boring. No thrill at all, no fun, no "omg omg new eggs!", when no one knows the time of the next release. And with that bunch of species it's really hard to get them later, even if they should be quite common. And 1-2 new species are better than a huge amount of them and no chance to get them in time... and no real chance of getting them after the release - and this situation is really annoying.

[lincoln6echo]

I prefer small releases (1-2), as it is getting difficult to catch the new eggs even during release day. In the past the new eggs kept dropping almost exclusively for a whole day and then were very common for several days afterward.

 

Now (see the Opals), they were mixed with the other cave-blocking breeds midway release day and uncommon in the next days. I've not seen a single one in days.

 

And let's not talk about the Coppers! I've not seen a single CB in the drops since release day in May!

 

I've to say that nowadays a lot of breeds can be considered "uncommon/rare" (even if they aren't considered so) simply because, due to the sheer numbers of cave-blocking breeds, it is difficult to see them in the drops.

 

I guess this isn't a problem for players able to spend a lot of time hunting, but for people like me, with a busy real life, it is very annoying.

[Cecona]

I've still been unable to obtain any opals on my own! the green opal egg I have was given to me, but it's 2nd gen and I need a CB so I can give it to someone in exchange for my final shimmer. this is just utterly ridiculous!! I've never had this kind of problem before with getting new release.

[BlitzDrake]

Well I think the September release was PERFECT! The straight flooding til Lunch made my day. I was so upset that I wouldnt even get to catch anything this time (was on my phone). I ragequit after the 2nd initial hour and went to bed. I came back online around 8, was shocked to see there was still a flood going (very minimal blockers) and actually caught and locked myself on my PHONE. Best release in a long time.

[rumor33]

Two breeds are perfect. Any more and a throphy-less scroll wouldn't be able to pick up a pair on release night.

[Fuzzbucket]

Two breeds are perfect. Any more and a throphy-less scroll wouldn't be able to pick up a pair on release night.

This. The seven day thing was - terrifying - and I have a gold !

[LibbyLishly]

Well I think the September release was PERFECT! The straight flooding til Lunch made my day. I was so upset that I wouldnt even get to catch anything this time (was on my phone). I ragequit after the 2nd initial hour and went to bed. I came back online around 8, was shocked to see there was still a flood going (very minimal blockers) and actually caught and locked myself on my PHONE. Best release in a long time.

Same here. Catching was stress-free, two breeds is the perfect number, and I could sit back and enjoy talking about the release with everyone else without freaking out over not being able to grab. This is how hunting should ALWAYS be.