Frozen Eggs Biome

[CNR4806]

Well, rarity or not I do think that there needs to be a limit on the collection of these things, preferrably by breed.

 

After all, this is Dragon Cave and the main aim should be collecting actual living dragons instead of rocks resembling eggs or <insert non-living frozen egg suggestion>. Of course the limit can be a little more generous than leetle trees (1), brand-new holidays (2) and GoNs (3), but letting people create a massive hoard of 1000 frozen "eggs" every breed seems to be against the main aim of the site.

[Fiona]

Why limit by breed when it would be so much simpler to use frozen limits similar to frozen hatchlings? That would be less limiting on individual choices while imposing a limit on speed of collecting these. Let's K.I.S.S. and stay close to the original idea, which is a biome filled with rocks painted like the dragon eggs we'd like to collect. The biome would hopefully show the sprite instead of the mystery egg image, so we'd know what rock we were clicking on. Limits would be imposed by a frozen limit, and we could have as many of any particular rock as we wanted. They'd freeze the instant they hit our scroll, like leetle trees do now, so not tradeable.

 

I don't think you'd have to worry about this taking away from the main game. They wouldn't be tradeable, breedable or abandonable, so it's "click the rock you like, go on with your game". I think we should have a way to toss them aside if we decide we don't want that rock after all, but I agree they wouldn't need an abandoned page. As for symbols that indicate it's a rock and not an egg, we already have a perfectly serviceable one - the snowflake that shows us which are frozen hatchlings. It's already used for leetle trees, which count as a frozen egg.

 

You see, we already have all the mechanics for this in place, except we'd like them in their own biome instead of mixed with the real eggs as leetle trees are. It's a pretty complete suggestion. As far as I can see we'd just want to debate rarity and whether holiday rocks are available out of season.

[LibbyLishly]

I love this suggestion so much that I want to hug it.

 

For my part, I would actually love to see completely equal ratios of the rock-eggs. No rares, no 'blockers'. After all, they're nothing but rocks. Why would they have ratios that matched the dragon breeds?

 

I'd like to see holiday eggs only show up during their proper seasons, though.

[Meg_752]

Yeah, well, the thing is a lot of people don't like having to "kill" the potential hatchling inside the egg for the egg sprite. I believe that's why the initial "just freeze a bred/caught egg" has never been implemented.

 

Maybe the rocks are painted that way to deter other dragons that prey on eggs from getting the real egg. Like vampires. I can sort of imagine them biting on the, uhm, egg colored rock and then getting frustrated enough to just go away.

 

In that sense it would make a sensible explanation as to why they exist in the first place AND can be caught without some players feeling guilty.

 

Also there is already a "recreate egg from broken shells" thread. You could perhaps post there.

 

ETA: I don't like catching random rocks from the cave. I'm expecting eggs, not rocks. If there is a separate biome for rocks that is fine. But not in the main cave itself.

That sounds like a good explanation. And the rocks will have their own biome, entirely separate from the main cave.

[Meg_752]

Why limit by breed when it would be so much simpler to use frozen limits similar to frozen hatchlings? That would be less limiting on individual choices while imposing a limit on speed of collecting these. Let's K.I.S.S. and stay close to the original idea, which is a biome filled with rocks painted like the dragon eggs we'd like to collect. The biome would hopefully show the sprite instead of the mystery egg image, so we'd know what rock we were clicking on. Limits would be imposed by a frozen limit, and we could have as many of any particular rock as we wanted. They'd freeze the instant they hit our scroll, like leetle trees do now, so not tradeable.

 

I don't think you'd have to worry about this taking away from the main game. They wouldn't be tradeable, breedable or abandonable, so it's "click the rock you like, go on with your game". I think we should have a way to toss them aside if we decide we don't want that rock after all, but I agree they wouldn't need an abandoned page. As for symbols that indicate it's a rock and not an egg, we already have a perfectly serviceable one - the snowflake that shows us which are frozen hatchlings. It's already used for leetle trees, which count as a frozen egg.

 

You see, we already have all the mechanics for this in place, except we'd like them in their own biome instead of mixed with the real eggs as leetle trees are. It's a pretty complete suggestion. As far as I can see we'd just want to debate rarity and whether holiday rocks are available out of season.

Exactly.

I'm thinking either all the stones have the same rarity and will stay that way, or all the stones have the rarity that, in a perfect world, the dragons would be.

 

As for holiday rocks?

I believe either they drop out of season with same rarity as all the other stones (if all the rarities are the same), drop with a much lower rarity (if all the stones have different rarities), or do not drop at all (in the holiday season, only holidays would drop).

 

IMHO, these are the only options. But I might not be considering everything. All the options are still up for debate.

[Meg_752]

The simplest solution to new release eggs is not to have them drop in the frozen biome until after TJ's grow up.

 

I think Cinnamins's idea wouldn't be a bad idea even if the frozen biome is not available until bronze trophy. In fact, with her idea perhaps the frozen biome would be not-confusing enough that newbies could have access too. Plus, it would give them some information about the breeds they're finding that they might like to know.

Actually, remember when everyone got the "Congratulations on obtaining an egg" message?

Maybe the description of eggs that cannot be found in cave could show like that?

 

Would it show to everyone?

[DragonLady86]

Actually, remember when everyone got the "Congratulations on obtaining an egg" message?

Maybe the description of eggs that cannot be found in cave could show like that?

 

Would it show to everyone?

I think that would over complicate things. The message would have to be set for "eggs" every time there was a release and then changed to the real message later. It's much simpler to just have new release rocks not show up for a week or two after the dragons. Give the mysterious painters time to study the eggs and practice the new design.

[Meg_752]

I think that would over complicate things. The message would have to be set for "eggs" every time there was a release and then changed to the real message later. It's much simpler to just have new release rocks not show up for a week or two after the dragons. Give the mysterious painters time to study the eggs and practice the new design.

I was thinking that message could be for old holidays, Prizes, and Hybrids.

[DragonLady86]

I was thinking that message could be for old holidays, Prizes, and Hybrids.

If they have the message(s) discussed earlier about each one looking like X dragon egg wouldn't the holidays/prizes have the same? They all have names too.

[Meg_752]

If they have the message(s) discussed earlier about each one looking like X dragon egg wouldn't the holidays/prizes have the same? They all have names too.

I guess so. It would be like the breed descriptions on the adults.

[Sundew]

I remember it being suggested by someone that the biome show egg sprites and not descriptions, similar to the AP. I think this would be a good way to avoid confusion about eggs sharing descriptions.

 

I still think that holiday dragons should only be available during holiday breeding time. It would cut down confusion about where people can get these eggs in cave.

 

Would egg descriptions need to be changed at all? "This egg" wouldn't apply to the painted rocks, and "is almost too hot to touch" wouldn't really make sense when all you're touching is a painted rock. (Another reason for eggs sprites to be visible instead of descriptions, but still a question when viewing the /view/ page.)

 

Would this affect encyclopedia cataloging at all? Would it count as observing/owning eggs or not?

[Oasis]

I like the idea, but I have a couple of suggestions: (not sure if these have been said)

 

Suggestion 1: Instead of having them be rocks (why would someone put so much effort into painting a rock?) how about they were actual frozen eggs? You would walk into an icy cave and the message could be like this:

"As you walk across the icy tundra, you notice a cave that seems like it was abandoned long, long ago. You approach it and notice that there are several eggs inside, frozen as hard as rocks.

 

You don't want to venture too far into the cave, as it seems to be even colder near the back, but some of the eggs are far enough away that you could steal one. Three of the eggs catch your eye. Which do you take?"

 

Suggestion 2: I think that the eggs should not count toward your total scroll count of dragons, since you didn't spend the time raising them, like why TJ won't let us "adopt" wilderness dragons.

 

Suggestion 3: They should be limited to one per breed per scroll. This is so that no one with an insanely fast internet can just stalk the cave, hoarding 100 gold eggs while no one else can get one.

 

I also have a question, does anyone have an idea what trading these would be like, or if they should be tradeable? [EDIT] Nevermind I saw that this has been answered.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Oasis

[CNR4806]

I like the idea, but I have a couple of suggestions: (not sure if these have been said)

 

Suggestion 1: Instead of having them be rocks (why would someone put so much effort into painting a rock?) how about they were actual frozen eggs? You would walk into an icy cave and the message could be like this:

"As you walk across the icy tundra, you notice a cave that seems like it was abandoned long, long ago. You approach it and notice that there are several eggs inside, frozen as hard as rocks.

 

You don't want to venture too far into the cave, as it seems to be even colder near the back, but some of the eggs are far enough away that you could steal one. Three of the eggs catch your eye. Which do you take?"

 

Suggestion 2: I think that the eggs should not count toward your total scroll count of dragons, since you didn't spend the time raising them, like why TJ won't let us "adopt" wilderness dragons.

 

Suggestion 3: They should be limited to one per breed per scroll. This is so that no one with an insanely fast internet can just stalk the cave, hoarding 100 gold eggs while no one else can get one.

 

I also have a question, does anyone have an idea what trading these would be like, or if they should be tradeable? [EDIT] Nevermind I saw that this has been answered.

The reason that the "rocks that look like eggs" suggestion even exists is that people want Rainbow Cave and do not want to deal with the ethics behind killing a baby dragon or forever trapping it in its egg to get a "frozen" egg.

 

What you're suggesting is basically a cave full of eggs abandoned by unknown entities and subsequently frozen to death, and I don't really think that will go well with the people I just mentioned.

 

 

But yes, I agree that there needs to be a limit, as frozen eggs serve no purpose in the cave other than allowing "collecting the sprite" for the completionists. The "not counting toward trophy" suggestion is also reasonable and has my support.

[Meg_752]

Why limit by breed when it would be so much simpler to use frozen limits similar to frozen hatchlings? That would be less limiting on individual choices while imposing a limit on speed of collecting these.

 

 

 

This is my idea exactly for limits. I also agree that they should not count towards trophies.

[Meg_752]

I remember it being suggested by someone that the biome show egg sprites and not descriptions, similar to the AP. I think this would be a good way to avoid confusion about eggs sharing descriptions.

 

I still think that holiday dragons should only be available during holiday breeding time. It would cut down confusion about where people can get these eggs in cave.

 

Would egg descriptions need to be changed at all? "This egg" wouldn't apply to the painted rocks, and "is almost too hot to touch" wouldn't really make sense when all you're touching is a painted rock. (Another reason for eggs sprites to be visible instead of descriptions, but still a question when viewing the /view/ page.)

 

Would this affect encyclopedia cataloging at all? Would it count as observing/owning eggs or not?

Yes, he biome will show the real sprites, rather than the mystery eggs.

 

Holiday eggs would be mixed between years, but that will be all that will drop in the biome. (However, this is just my opinion right now, all of the options I thought of are in the OP.).

 

Someone mentioned an egg-painting dragon earlier, and if a dragon made the rocks, the dragon could use small magic to make the eggs hot, cold, etc. I liked the explanation of them being made to trick Vampires or people, so I think that realism would be important. On the view page, what if we had the description about not hatching and a breed description like someone mentioned?

 

The egg unlocks in the Encyclopedia don't seem to tell you much about the dragon, so counting as one owned would probably be fine, right?

[Fiona]

Ok, opinion here, but I'd like to address some of the questions above.

 

1. Egg sprites instead of mystery egg sprite in the biome - because we have so many eggs that share descriptions, and if freezes are limited, as suggested, it would be frustrating to use one up and find out you didn't get the egg sprite you were hoping for. For the cave, for eggs we can raise and trade, it's not so much of an issue to get the wrong one.

 

2. Tradeable/not tradeable - leetle trees freeze instantly when they hit your scroll. That was the suggestion for these too. You have to have an empty egg slot to pick one up but as soon as it hits your scroll you get your egg slot back. No, not tradeable.

 

3. Limit by breed - Meg answered that. Plus, if the ratios are flattened as suggested earlier, it won't be a problem if someone wants to grab a bunch of the rarer ones. They will only be able to grab so many before they hit their freeze limit anyway. By flattened ratios, I mean that if 10 normal common eggs drop for every gold, perhaps the egg-rock ratios could be something along the lines of 4 or 5 common egg-rocks for every gold egg-rock. Or perhaps the ratios for each would be 1:1. That would make all the different eggs drop roughly equally. (disclaimer - any stated ratios have no relation to any real ratios. Just an example)

 

4. I don't think these should count toward dragon encyclopedia observations or owning either, in addition to not counting toward scroll trophies.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Fiona BlueFire

[Wahya]

I like the idea, but I have a couple of suggestions: (not sure if these have been said)

 

Suggestion 1: Instead of having them be rocks (why would someone put so much effort into painting a rock?) how about they were actual frozen eggs? You would walk into an icy cave and the message could be like this:

"As you walk across the icy tundra, you notice a cave that seems like it was abandoned long, long ago. You approach it and notice that there are several eggs inside, frozen as hard as rocks.

 

You don't want to venture too far into the cave, as it seems to be even colder near the back, but some of the eggs are far enough away that you could steal one. Three of the eggs catch your eye. Which do you take?"

 

Suggestion 2: I think that the eggs should not count toward your total scroll count of dragons, since you didn't spend the time raising them, like why TJ won't let us "adopt" wilderness dragons.

 

Suggestion 3: They should be limited to one per breed per scroll. This is so that no one with an insanely fast internet can just stalk the cave, hoarding 100 gold eggs while no one else can get one.

 

I also have a question, does anyone have an idea what trading these would be like, or if they should be tradeable? [EDIT] Nevermind I saw that this has been answered.

I like this. It's very well thought out, and very eloquently addresses potential issues.

 

I do understand that some people have issues with freezing and killing, but those are both mechanisms of the game, and the latter is just an unfortunate reality of life. I understand that this isn't the real world, so the rules here don't have to follow suit and what not, but you can kill dragons and dragons can die permanently, just like in the real world [permanent death of things]. So to me, it just makes sense to incorporate that bit into this.

 

So I support the over all idea, with tweaks such as those mentioned by Oasis.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Wahya

[Imzadi]

I see no reason for having frozen dead dragon embryos when a painted rock will do just as well. Maybe some dragons like painting rocks. Wild ones, with nothing else to do

 

Also if they are painted rocks, there is not need for them to be in the encyclopedia, IMO. It's a rock, it's painted. End of story

Edited November 2, 2014 by ainisarie

[DragonLady86]

I like the idea, but I have a couple of suggestions: (not sure if these have been said)

 

Suggestion 1: Instead of having them be rocks (why would someone put so much effort into painting a rock?) how about they were actual frozen eggs? You would walk into an icy cave and the message could be like this:

"As you walk across the icy tundra, you notice a cave that seems like it was abandoned long, long ago. You approach it and notice that there are several eggs inside, frozen as hard as rocks.

 

You don't want to venture too far into the cave, as it seems to be even colder near the back, but some of the eggs are far enough away that you could steal one. Three of the eggs catch your eye. Which do you take?"

 

Suggestion 2: I think that the eggs should not count toward your total scroll count of dragons, since you didn't spend the time raising them, like why TJ won't let us "adopt" wilderness dragons.

 

Suggestion 3: They should be limited to one per breed per scroll. This is so that no one with an insanely fast internet can just stalk the cave, hoarding 100 gold eggs while no one else can get one.

 

I also have a question, does anyone have an idea what trading these would be like, or if they should be tradeable? [EDIT] Nevermind I saw that this has been answered.

The never hatching egg/dead hatchling inside has to date killed every suggestion for frozen eggs ever suggested. Which is honestly why I support the idea of rocks. I, personally, do not feel bad for freezing or even killing dragons (my ever growing zombie hoard attests to that) but I want to collect the egg sprites and rocks navigate around the biggest "no" reason better than anything I've seen.

 

Add the RP reason of using it to trick Vampires and likely Ourselves (given we have to be the worst of the egg thieves) and now it even has an interesting reason for why their are painted rocks. Obviously, if they end up in a separate biome then it won't do them much good against all us hoarders, but "Oh well, at least you tried" lol.

[MessengerDragon]

Suggestion 3: They should be limited to one per breed per scroll. This is so that no one with an insanely fast internet can just stalk the cave, hoarding 100 gold eggs while no one else can get one.

Please no. People might want to get multiples of an egg they like, and I wouldn't think there is a need for this. And what you mentioned about a person with fast internet, well, they'll have an advantage anyway, so I don't think that's a valid excuse.

 

I prefer painted rocks to dead eggs.

[AnanoKimi]

I believe they should be able to be traded like normal eggs would. With dragons now showing what biomes now visible on a dragons page, it should mention said rock egg biome. This should limit confusion. This way unlucky players who have a terrifying slow internet connection or simply no time or luck to catch anything rare can still obtain them from others in case these rock eggs are given similar rarities as their hatchable counter parts. We could even make certain breeds like stone dragons be the ones to trade these eggs to avoid the use of magis and further separate them from their hatachable counter parts. A dragon closely related to earth or stones could be used in the trading of these rock eggs so that scams do not occur.

 

If they are equal opportunity and there will be no difference in how rare one is from the other then trading should probably not be allowed since there will be equal chance of obtaining such eggs.

[Torkie10]

Well then either your dragons have SERIOUS medical issues (if they regularly pass stones) or this suggestion is just not for you

 

Seriously I LOVE this idea as it is fresh and new and very cute.

 

Someone mentioned somewhere higher up that there could be a dragon breed associated with painting rocks to look like dragon eggs (maybe to better hide their own eggs, or to appease/deceive  those mysterious mammals who always come and steal their young...) which even would EXPLAIN the egg-stone cave.

 

And if I really feel the need to bind those stones to my scroll emotionally I'll describe a couple of MY dragons so they are the artists behind these little beauties

This made me laugh. Yeah, gall stones are a bad thing. Poor dragons.

 

~Anyway~

 

Bullet-point style summary of thoughts:

 

—Rock or Egg?: Definitely rock. It might be fun to find rocks painted at different stages, too, for those special cracking sequences. 8V

 

—Breed limit?: I'd like to be able to collect multiple of each rock, please and thank you. The rolling limit of 15/fortnight is fine with me, as long as it's on a separate counter from the freezing limit.

 

—Date-based Holidays?: I think if we're going to do that, we should do it the way stores do it, where they set up decs for Halloween, Christmas, and Valentines WAAAAAAAAAY early and it sticks around forever, because yes, they're painted rocks. It's not like they're eggs that are being bred. Someone's making holiday decorations plenty in advance.

 

—Visible as its breed when viewing the Biome?: Yes please.

 

—Tradeable?: No thanks.

 

—Encyclopedia?: Uhhhh well I'm not sure what to think. I don't particularly care one way or another for most breeds, but…

 

As it is, either the egg requirements for Frills and Bright Pinks need to be rid of, orrrr we might be able to use the rocks instead. (Unless, you know, they get rereleased at some point, one can dream.)

 

—Trophy?: It's not a dragon. :B *Shrug* I'm going to go with "nope" on this one.

Edited November 3, 2014 by Torkie10

[Fuzzbucket]

I see no reason for having frozen dead dragon embryos when a painted rock will do just as well. Maybe some dragons like painting rocks. Wild ones, with nothing else to do

 

Also if they are painted rocks, there is not need for them to be in the encyclopedia, IMO. It's a rock, it's painted. End of story

ALSO ratios needn't count because whoever painted them can - paint any colour rock they like, no ? If the artist likes silver and paints all the rocks silver for a week - big deal ! It's paint, is all.

[Prince_Xanthius]

I like this idea very much! It's a really good way around the major frozen egg problems.

 

I think there should be some rarity, but unconnected to ratios. So say 1 in 20 rocks are 'rare breed', 5 are 'uncommon', and the 16 remaining are 'common' with classifications set at what the dragon theoretically is. If it happens that a common breed eggs such as black becomes rare in the cave (as they use to be - I still reflex click them ), it should not affect the rocks at all.

 

I agree that there should be a limit. I'd kinda like to up the freezing limit to 20-25 total and include rocks and hatchlings in that. If just rocks then I think 10/fortnight, though I know other people will think that's too low. Either way I think you need to see the sprites not the mystery egg so people don't waste their slots on things they don't want. Holidays I think should flood during the 2 weeks centred on their respective holidays, and be unobtainable at other times. Or possibly have them considered a 'ultra rare' (idk 1 in 100 or something) rock year round, and common during their holiday period.

 

Also, I was thinking it could look more like the AP page, as in have more than 3 eggs (say 20) on view at any one time. When people kick an egg, it goes back into this pool, but the pool is deleted and recreated at the hour as is the case in the cave. I don't think there is any point in deleting the egg immediately it is kicked off someones scroll - it's not like there are going to be lineages so all eggs in the pool will be equal. You might as well give some one else the chance to pick it up.

 

Definitely want them untradeable. I don't think they'd have much value any way after the first rush, and I'd rather they were something you got yourself.

 

The other though I had was in regard to naming/labelling. I would like this option, but if I chose not to label them, I want them to show up as blank like eggs currently do, not with their code or 'unnamed'. I think it would make them nicer as scroll dividers, among other things.

 

I also don't see why they can't just be labelled as 'Rock' in the scroll and not bother calling them 'Egg(*) '. Do people really need them to show up as 'Egg'? I assume most people are collecting the sprite anyway and wouldn't mind the egg sprites being labelled as rocks?

 

[DragonLady86]

I was also thinking an AP-like page would be nice, with multiple rocks. Yes to visible sprites too, too many shared descriptions.

 

I think we would need TJ's opinion on whether they could be listed as "rock" or if they would need to stay "egg" much like Leetle Trees. If they can be classed as "rock" naming shouldn't be a problem; but if they need to be listed as "Egg" and perma-frozen then naming is unlikely to happen as anything classed as "Egg" is not nameable.

 

I do think limits of some kind should be in place, but if it has to be tied to the frozen hatchling limit, I would like to see that total limit upped some. I already run into far more than I like because I prefer to collect hatchlings.