ANSWERED:Make Almandines /slightly/ more common

[Fuzzbucket]

Thalassus do breed well... But not nearly as well as Chronos, Gaias, or other Xenos! Everything is relative. I tend to get about 50% eggs from Thalassus, with some Silvers, when I breed them, but I get all Chronos or Gaias when I breed them to metals.

 

Alpine has far more breeds in it than Volcano, so that might be why it moves "faster"... its cycling through the same dozen breeds, whereas Volcano has only a couple breeds it cycles through.

 

The problem with anecdotal evidence, even mine, is that humans are very fallible and its very easy to remember things wrong / draw wrong conclusions from the data.

I wish.

 

I am building a line where I NEED them to give Gaias - and they are giving me Thalassas almost every time. Except when they give Mageias.

 

The problem with anecdotal evidence is that everyone has different anecdotes. Which was exactly my point !

[Cleo]

I support this, its really unfair.

I have been hunting for almandines since their release time and until now all I have is only 1 cb almandine.... And its not only I see gold more than almandines and I havent seen a single one since their release time but its also that I cant even trade for them bcuz nobody sells them in trading threads...

[bob_jones]

Well, I don't see how the fun is ruined by hard-to-find dragons no matter what you use them for, whether you make lineages out of them or just let them sit there. Why should the satisfaction of finding a rare be ruined just because you're making a lineage with it? Honestly, that's silly and illogical. Should golds suddenly be made extremely common just because you want to make a lineage and you're frustrated the cave isn't spitting eggs at you on command? Nah. Not in my opinion.

 

If it's really a bug or a problem, sure, make Pyralspites more common. But if it turns out the whole problem is just people who are mad they're having a hard time catching one, then, no, I don't believe they should be made more common for that reason.

Edited March 23, 2016 by bob_jones

[angelicdragonpuppy]

Well, I don't see how the fun is ruined by hard-to-find dragons no matter what you use them for, whether you make lineages out of them or just let them sit there. Why should the satisfaction of finding a rare be ruined just because you're making a lineage with it? Honestly, that's silly and illogical. Should golds suddenly be made extremely common just because you want to make a lineage and you're frustrated the cave isn't spitting eggs at you on command? Nah. Not in my opinion.

 

If it's really a bug or a problem, sure, make Pyralspites more common. But if it turns out the whole problem is just people who are mad they're having a hard time catching one, then, no, I don't believe they should be made more common for that reason.

Even if Almandines are meant to be rare, I don't think they should be harder to find than golds. You're right that getting rares without a challenge isn't very satisfying, but conversely, having rares that people are unable to find after years and years of trying and trading isn't very satisfying either. And since people already struggle that way with CB Golds, making something even rarer than them doesn't sound like a good idea to me.

 

So, if it ISN'T a glitch, I hope TJ still makes them a bit more available... even if "a bit more available" is still as scarce as CB Metals are.

[dragonstar]

Well, I don't know about you, but I wouldn't find it fun at all if the game was just "Oh, I want a gold today, I'll go pick one up." Part of the reason why I play is because of the satisfaction of owning something rare and of breeding and trading rarities. If every single thing was common and easy to grab, the game would have been over for me probably a week after it began and I would have left long ago. Possibly there are some people out there who don't find it fun to actually hunt for what you want, but I'm not one of them.

Sounds to me like you just saw "increase frequency they're dropped" and didn't read anything else. Where did anyone say golds were being common? Where did anyone say any dragon was going to be common and easy to get? Literally the suggestion is making them as rare as CB silvers, not rarer THAN golds. If you think CB silvers are easy to get then, well, I'm jealous.

[Starscream]

I have never caught a gold in cave, there is no big deal there for me. I have traded for the few I got. CB silvers on the other wing (mind you this was back when the ratios were borked.) I got close to 5 in one week.

 

I find ratios get shuffled around a bit when there are new releases. I get a strong feeling these new sapphires are a rare - or at least an uncommon. Considering they are found across all biomes.

 

I would never support make rares easier to get. I don't care how many days I spend in the cave looking to catch my own gold. thats part of the fun/frustration.

Edited March 23, 2016 by Starscream

[angelicdragonpuppy]

I have never caught a gold in cave, there is no big deal there for me. I have traded for the few I got.

 

I find ratios get shuffled around a bit when there are new releases. I get a strong feeling these new sapphires are a rare - or at least an uncommon. Considering they are found across all biomes.

 

I would never support make rares easier to get. I don't care how many days I spend in the cave looking to catch my own gold. thats part of the fun/frustration.

Even if Almandines are meant to be rare, I don't think they should be harder to find than golds. You're right that getting rares without a challenge isn't very satisfying, but conversely, having rares that people are unable to find after years and years of trying and trading isn't very satisfying either. And since people already struggle that way with CB Golds, making something even rarer than them doesn't sound like a good idea to me.

 

So, if it ISN'T a glitch, I hope TJ still makes them a bit more available... even if "a bit more available" is still as scarce as CB Metals are.

[Starscream]

there are elements, stones and minerals a lot rarer than gold in existence. I do not feel they should be less rare than gold. why can't something be more rare than gold?

[angelicdragonpuppy]

there are elements, stones and minerals a lot rarer than gold in existence. I do not feel they should be less rare than gold. why can't something be more rare than gold?

e___e I already explained why. This has nothing to do with "there are no elements rarer than gold!1!!" It has to do with that I know many long term, devoted players who have never caught a CB Gold despite years of trying. Why on earth would we want to add something even rarer than that to the game?

[Fuzzbucket]

I support this, its really unfair.

I have been hunting for almandines since their release time and until now all I have is only 1 cb almandine.... And its not only I see gold more than almandines and I havent seen a single one since their release time but its also that I cant even trade for them bcuz nobody sells them in trading threads...

Actually people were posting the other day that no-one was offering trades on their almandines....

 

Starscream - I do think you are missing the point. No-one is suggesting making anything EASY to get. Just not impossible !

[Twinstar]

Actually people were posting the other day that no-one was offering trades on their almandines....

Odd because I've been trying to get Almandines for a very long time now and either no one offered to trade for what I had or my offer was declined. The best I can do is something like 2Gen Golds or 4th Gen prize. I never see rares in the cave to even try to catch to trade. So it makes it pretty much impossible.

 

It makes it almost impossible to get them now because they don't show up enough and people just don't have anything "good enough" to trade for them. Just like with this month's new release.

 

Sorry to say but I don't find it fun at all to try for so long to get something and never succeed.

[angelicdragonpuppy]

Actually people were posting the other day that no-one was offering trades on their almandines....

 

Starscream - I do think you are missing the point. No-one is suggesting making anything EASY to get. Just not impossible !

If that's true (although I haven't seen it myself yet--usually the opposite!), it could be one of two things:

 

1) since many people think something odd is going on with almandines (they breed like commons, drop like ultra mega rares--why??), people might not be willing to invest heavily in trading for them out of fear they'll someday be more common. Most of us can trust the rarities of things like golds, silvers, trios, and even coppers and blusangs and xenos to not fluctuate too much; the same assurance isn't present with almandines yet. Sure, they've been mega rare for a weirdly long time...

but blacks and seasonals have disappeared at times, too.

 

2) conversely, some people might not bother offering because they believe nothing they have is worth it. I rarely offer directly on super rare dragons in teleports, preferring PM, because otherwise the odds are good that I'll waste my time on hold for hours before finding out my offer was unsurprisingly rejected. That's time and slots wasted I could use for something else. Even if someone is trading an almandine for something easy like "multiple storm hatchies," it's easy to believe someone more profitable than oneself has already offered an IOU for huge numbers of them that you can never match.

 

 

[cyradis4]

Actually people were posting the other day that no-one was offering trades on their almandines....

 

Starscream - I do think you are missing the point. No-one is suggesting making anything EASY to get. Just not impossible !

I have to agree with Fuzz, on this. There's a huge difference between "easy" to get (like TriHorns or even Trios) and being the 2nd or 3rd rarest thing available in the Cave.

 

Having said that, I still think the argument is moot.... Because I'm almost certain that there's a bug in Almandines. Almandines are *not* like Golds and Silvers where people collect huge amounts of them because "SHINY rares!" They are not, and have *never been*, considered by the user-base to be a True Rare in the same sense as Golds and Silvers. They breed worse than rabbits!

 

So I'll reiterate: ALL other True Rares breed poorly and always have (except when bugged), and all other *user* driven rares that I've experienced had poor breeding in their rare periods.... *except* Almandines. And yet... Almandines have been getting progressively *more* rare over time! That's.... very odd behavior, in my experience.

 

So how about everybody stop with the argument over "should they be rare" and focus on getting TJ to tell us if they are *meant* to be a true rare.

 

Personally, I have no horse in this race. I've had all of my Almandines, all 16 of them, since a month or two after they were released, and I do not like the sprite so neither use them nor breed them nor intend to get more. So to me, its an academic question.

 

Cheers!

C4.

 

 

[Kirono]

Biome flow, and the linked ratios. Now, how I think the Cave works is, each hour a certain number of eggs of each breed is generated. Then, they go to the Biomes where they turn up (or don't) as the Cave cycles. This means that, as Volcano moves far faster than Alpine, far, far more of the Pyropes turn up than Almandines... Which gives the Almandines the appearance of being rare when their *ratios* don't think them rare (as we see via breeding).

 

So yes, this strikes me as a *bug*, or an unintended consequence. It would be nice to have TJ look into it, and see what if anything can be done.

Cheers!

C4.

This!

 

I think that if the three types are linked to the same ratio, it should be changed so that they all have their own "ratio". (This is going off the idea that if you link the 3 dragons to 1 ratio you get something like c4 described. Ofc, I don't actually know exactly how they work)

 

I think it's ridiculous that, as far as I saw, when they were released they were all of the same rarity. And now one of them is rarer than golds, and the pyopes are just another common. So, at the very least, it'd be nice is TJ could come out and be like "durr, alamandines are uber-rare. pyropes are common. Deal with it" so that we know it's not some weird bug.

 

I also don't think that saying. "No. don't make stuff easier to get" contributes anything... not really. I'd love for them to go back to uncommon or even rare status, if there was some sort of word-from-god about why one variety barely exists, and too many pyropes exist.

[Nightwalkerkey]

Given how the ratios work and how the individual biomes work, the Almandine going extremely rare was *predictable* given that the three seem to use the same ratios. Its also why they *breed* at the same rates as each other. Lemme see if I can explain (not enough coffee yet so bear with me):

 

If Almandines were a user-driven rare per the ratios, then they'd breed poorly... Just like Blusangs, GWs, Blacks, and Stripes did when *they* were driven rare. However, they breed really well, so the ratios consider them "common", on par with the other Pyrals. Ero, we can assume with a fair level of confidence that all three Pyrals use the same ratios.

 

However, the Almandines are indisputably brutal to get from the Biomes, then the Spessartines, and the Pyropes are dead easy to get. Why, you ask?

 

Biome flow, and the linked ratios. Now, how I think the Cave works is, each hour a certain number of eggs of each breed is generated. Then, they go to the Biomes where they turn up (or don't) as the Cave cycles. This means that, as Volcano moves far faster than Alpine, far, far more of the Pyropes turn up than Almandines... Which gives the Almandines the appearance of being rare when their *ratios* don't think them rare (as we see via breeding).

 

So yes, this strikes me as a *bug*, or an unintended consequence. It would be nice to have TJ look into it, and see what if anything can be done.

 

Has anyone noticed the same thing with Xenos? Given that Thalassus breed far worse than the others, I think Xenos use separate ratios. But that's just my feeling.

 

Cheers!

C4.

In terms of Xenos, I bred my thalassa's with terrae males earlier and got 2/3 eggs thalassa, last one terrae.

 

 

Like ADP stated, there's the two problems in trading right there- either think it'll be worth less later (or maybe think it is now, depending what people ask) or just don't think they have enough so don't offer.

 

Whatever the issue, I hope it's more of a bug and not set like this... The fact that they do breed pretty well shows me that they shouldn't be this so so rare in the cave.

[bob_jones]

Sounds to me like you just saw "increase frequency they're dropped" and didn't read anything else. Where did anyone say golds were being common? Where did anyone say any dragon was going to be common and easy to get? Literally the suggestion is making them as rare as CB silvers, not rarer THAN golds. If you think CB silvers are easy to get then, well, I'm jealous.

Sounds to me like you didn't read my post which is one or two above yours. In case you haven't, I'll quote: "If it's really a bug or a problem, sure, make Pyralspites more common." I'm perfectly aware of the nature of the percieved issue, but it's my belief that this problem is probably just the frustration of being unable to catch a rare dragon (and two varieties of pyralspites are rare). And as for golds, I think the nature of the comparison I'm trying to make was unclear. All I meant was that golds are very rare and pyralspites are rare. I'm comparing the two, using one in place of the other to make a point, as golds are the most desired dragon in the cave. That's all I'm saying.

 

Anyway, it's still my opinion that unless this does actually turn out to be a bug, the rarity of any dragon, be it pyralspite or gold, shouldn't be changed just because somebody is frustrated by its rarity. Pyralspites are rare. They are hard to get. That's part of the game. CB Silvers are not easy to get, and after five years of play I still haven't caught one of my own. I have, however, spotted several pyralspites of all breeds, so I think the problem is that of those who percieve it, not a problem of the cave.

Edited March 23, 2016 by bob_jones

[AGYK]

Actually people were posting the other day that no-one was offering trades on their almandines....

Odd because I've been trying to get Almandines for a very long time now and either no one offered to trade for what I had or my offer was declined. The best I can do is something like 2Gen Golds or 4th Gen prize. I never see rares in the cave to even try to catch to trade. So it makes it pretty much impossible.

^^^

 

This is what's in play. For any given trade, one of three things will happen:

1) Asker wants something that nobody has (CB metal, 2g prize). The people who want to trade can't, and complain.

2) Asker wants something nobody has (CB metal, 2g prize). People offer whatever they have in desperation. Asker declines and complains. (This works in inverse, too, where people offer something low-value and ask for Almandines, can't get it, and complain.)

3) Asker wants something nobody has (CB metal, 2g prize). Someone has that and trades it. Nobody notices because nobody complains.

 

2/3 of those outcomes will lead to visible complaining and the perception of something being wrong. It's not unlike the drama with the releases right now, where people are in the release thread yelling at each other about requesting CB metals in trade.

 

I'm perfectly aware of the nature of the percieved issue, but it's my belief that this problem is probably just the frustration of being unable to catch a rare dragon (and two varieties of pyralspites are rare).

 

<snip>

 

Anyway, it's still my opinion that unless this does actually turn out to be a bug, the rarity of any dragon, be it pyralspite or gold, shouldn't be changed just because somebody is frustrated by its rarity. Pyralspites are rare. They are hard to get. That's part of the game. CB Silvers are not easy to get, and after five years of play I still haven't caught one of my own. I have, however, spotted several pyralspites of all breeds, so I think the problem is that of those who percieve it, not a problem of the cave.

Agree with this. Let the ratios shift and handle this naturally. Heck, even CB metals have had windows where they were relatively common. Back when I first started playing actively, for a long time people complained that they couldn't get any metals, bred or CB, to save their lives. Then there was one window, for about a week, in early 2012 where people were reeling in metals like there wasn't going to be a tomorrow. It seemed like half the playerbase had multiple CB metals on scroll at all times. It was ridiculous.

 

If there's a bug, of course fix the bug. But I strongly argue there is not a bug and that we're just in a ratio form particularly unfavorable to 2/3 Pyrals.

[olympe]

But aren't the pyrals supposed to be uncommon? Right now, two out of three pyralspites seem to be super-rare, maybe even rarer than CB golds. That doesn't sound like uncommon, does it?

 

So, yes, I'm all for TJ looking things up and maybe even change them.

[angelicdragonpuppy]

Agree with this. Let the ratios shift and handle this naturally. Heck, even CB metals have had windows where they were relatively common. Back when I first started playing actively, for a long time people complained that they couldn't get any metals, bred or CB, to save their lives. Then there was one window, for about a week, in early 2012 where people were reeling in metals like there wasn't going to be a tomorrow. It seemed like half the playerbase had multiple CB metals on scroll at all times. It was ridiculous.

 

If there's a bug, of course fix the bug. But I strongly argue there is not a bug and that we're just in a ratio form particularly unfavorable to 2/3 Pyrals.

If they hadn't been so unbelievably scarce for so long, I could believe it. However, it's been a year and a half since their release and they've never even wavered below "extremely uncommon." I remember the black, stripe, and winter seasonal difficulties, but none of those were as intense or long as this has been--blacks and stripes were rare for quite a long time, but they were still always visible, and while winters almost disappeared they did so for a relatively short time, just a few months. Which suggests something is broken here.

 

'Course, no way for any of us peons to know for sure until / unless TJ comments.

[stagazer_7]

If Almadine's rarity is indeed a glitch, I'd love to see it fixed, it's very strange that a dragon such as this would be scarcer then Metallics. After missing the pyrals release I've only seen a single Almadine in the Cave and unsurprisingly I haven't managed to snag that one.

[Ashywolf]

The "best" solution to any of this rarity stuff is removing ratios and having a relative rarity system. So if an uncommon is 1 in 10 eggs, every 10 eggs or so will be generated as an uncommon, irrelevant of how many have been breed, received, obtained, whatever.

 

If we make them more common then more people will grab them, and I think the rarity will remain as rare as it is.

[SullenCat]

The "best" solution to any of this rarity stuff is removing ratios and having a relative rarity system. So if an uncommon is 1 in 10 eggs, every 10 eggs or so will be generated as an uncommon, irrelevant of how many have been breed, received, obtained, whatever.

I completely agree with you there. Actually I think I posted the same concept previously and got beaten up

Edited March 23, 2016 by SullenCat

[cyradis4]

Its back in Suggestions..... Did I miss a post saying why?

 

Cheers!

C4.

[Vhale]

As far as trades, when I was trying to get bloodswaps for my 2g and 3g Almandine x heartstealing checkers I was very surprised someone offered a CB male Almandine on one. I snatched that puppy up.

 

I know I don't seek out trades for them as I feel like their rarity is glitchy. Especially after seeing spessartines "flood" for a bit.

[Lurhstaap]

Personally I want golds to be the rarest because, well... there are people who have been playing for years and still not caught a single one. Do we REALLY want to add something even rarer than that? That's almost as cruel as shiny pokemon chances, except even worse, you have to fight other people for them >__<

 

Aside from that, the rarity still feels an awful lot like a weird side effect of biome distribution than anything. Was anyone really anticipating almandines to come out of left field as the new ultra mega rare? Rare like trios or blusangs, sure, but their current level of rarity feels so impossible that it's hard to believe it was intended. And if it WAS intended, I point to my statement above. There are already several extremely rare breeds in the game that some people haven't been able to get despite years of trying. Adding something even rarer purposefully would push things in a bad direction, I think, especially when suggestions like the shop have been gaining popularity as a way to make things more accessible to the many players who have invested long years of playing, but don't necessarily have the fast internet or reflexes needed to compete with others for highly limited eggs.

This basically says what I would have said so instead of being my usual excessively verbose self I'm just going to ditto.