ANSWERED:Make Almandines /slightly/ more common

[Lurhstaap]

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.

Also agree with this. I am not overly into Almandines so this debate really doesn't affect me in terms of my own personal scroll priorities. I have exactly one CB Almandine (thank you, NotBambi <3) and while I'd like to have a male, too, if I never do get another one, well, I'll be okay with that. So anyone who's thinking that this is all just people being whiny because they want something they haven't been able to get - nope. Perhaps for some, but speaking for myself, I couldn't care less from that perspective.

 

But I DO agree that the behavior of Almandines is darned odd and quite frankly appears to be bugged or at least not calibrated correctly and therefore I would like to see this either fixed, or confirmed by TJ as intentional.

Edited March 24, 2016 by Lurhstaap

[Alchemy]

I will add a comment as a relatively new player.

I have seen (not caught) at least 2 gold eggs and several silvers but have never seen this Almandines. I hunt all the biomes fairly often so it seems odd to me. It seems to me they are rarer than silvers.

I thought maybe it was a seasonal thing.

[Saami]

I've never seen almandines in the cave. Of course I've never seen golds in the cave either in all the years I've played this game, so make of that what you will.

Edited March 24, 2016 by Saami

[Obscure_Trash]

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

 

Cheers!

C4.

No, you didn't. I moved it back rather than clean out the two and a half pages of thoughtfully made posts treating it as a suggestion rather than a bug report. That way it doesn't hide questions in the Help section. I figured if TJ found it was a bug, he would move it back to help.

[_Sin_]

I've been reading your posts and I'm almost afraid of saying that I've been lucky enough to catch Almandines. I spend a lot of time in the Alpine and I focus, almost exclusively, on Almandines. I must agree with the perception that Almandines share the ratios with the other Pyropes and that their rarity has something to do with the fact that the Alpine has a high number of sprites. By the time that all those other sprites cycle around, a bunch of Pyropes already cycled in the Volcano.

[djengis]

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

 

Yeah thats probably because not Everyone can breed 2nd gen prizes, because thats what most are asking sadly.

[olympe]

Or CB golds, which not everybody can catch, either. 2nd gens from spriter's alts or CB hybrids. Which only a very small number of players can breed. 2nd gen Thuweds, which one would have to be crazy to trade. And so on. :/

[_Sin_]

I did post a trade offering two CB Almandines to check if the rarity and, consequently, perceived value suggested in the "Question about a trade" thread aligned with the trading market value. I did not get any offer reflecting the rarity, deleted the trade and gifted the eggs. Funny enough, days later, I gifted more CB Almandines to a friend, she offered two for a second gen prize and the offer was accepted. At this point, I'm even more confused about their value.

[Tango]

I did post a trade offering two CB Almandines to check if the rarity and, consequently, perceived value suggested in the "Question about a trade" thread aligned with the trading market value. I did not get any offer reflecting the rarity, deleted the trade and gifted the eggs. Funny enough, days later, I gifted more CB Almandines to a friend, she offered two for a second gen prize and the offer was accepted. At this point, I'm even more confused about their value.

What were you asking for? 2G prize? I only see people trading almandines for 2g prizes or golds - which people don't usually have readily available.

[Eos]

I did post a trade offering two CB Almandines to check if the rarity and, consequently, perceived value suggested in the "Question about a trade" thread aligned with the trading market value. I did not get any offer reflecting the rarity, deleted the trade and gifted the eggs. Funny enough, days later, I gifted more CB Almandines to a friend, she offered two for a second gen prize and the offer was accepted. At this point, I'm even more confused about their value.

I think your friend just happened to make an offer at the right time. Timing is everything. It's likely that the right people just didn't see your offer / didn't have what you wanted on hand at the time.

[Tawanda001]

Well, just to add to the confusion I was recently offered an ND for a cb almandine so they 'can' fetch higher prices, suggesting they are very difficult to catch. (my catch was a total fluke, a glitch at the top of the hour, lol)

[AGYK]

Well, just to add to the confusion I was recently offered an ND for a cb almandine so they 'can' fetch higher prices, suggesting they are very difficult to catch. (my catch was a total fluke, a glitch at the top of the hour, lol)

Yep, I've paid a ND for an Almandine. I'm pretty sure this is where prices are at right now, and poorer offers just reflect what people have on hand.

[The_Bucket]

tl;dr: this problem is a symptom of a deeper issue.

 

So here's what's happening, as best as can be observed without breaking the ToS: When eggs are generated, let's say 10 of every breed is created. Obviously completely inaccurate, but it works for this example. The cave distributes biome-specific dragons, such as Frostbites, to their respective biomes. Once the biome-specific dragons are generated, the multiple-biome dragons are distributed. The cave attempts to reach equilibrium, with each biome having a roughly equal number of eggs. Let's put some hypothetical (and totally inaccurate, especially considering the earlier supposed numbers) distribution of biome-specific dragons are as follows:

30 in Alpine

20 in Coast

5 in Desert

10 in Forest

15 in Jungle

5 in Volcano

Alpine is significantly more crowded than the other biomes. So when an every-biome breed, let's say Whites, are generated, they are statistically dropped more often in less populated biomes such as Desert and Volcano, and less often in more populated biomes such as Alpine and Coast.

 

So why is this relevant? Pyralspites are likely generated all as 'Pyralspites' and not separately for the three colors. Since Volcano is underpopulated compared to Alpine and Coast, a likely hypothetical distribution would be 0 in Alpine, 1 in Coast, 9 in Volcano. When a Pyralspite is picked up from the Volcano, it is a Pyrope. When it is picked up from Alpine, it is an Almandine.

 

There are numerous solid pieces evidence supporting this, although the primary piece that I feel would be safe to cite is the Lunar Herald release. This new common (initially) semi-biome-specific breed dropped in Alpine and Volcano, but not Coast. This sharply increased the rarity of Pyropes (from common to rare, for a while), made the already mythical Almandines virtually extinct (too small a data sample to measure), and most noticeably caused a flood of Spessartines. For weeks after that release, Spessartines flooded the Coast, with easily the regularity of Pyropes before the release.

 

As a final piece of clarification, this is certainly not the way Xenowyrms work. Astrapis, Thalassas and Pyros definitely have roughly the same drop rates. In the case of Xenowyrms, rather than being 10 Xenowyrms generated and distributed among the less populated biomes, there might be 2 Astrapi, 1 Thalassa, 2 Mageia, 1 Gaia, 2 Chrono, and 2 Pyro.

 

Apologies for the long post, but I felt this needed to be explained.

 

A slightly longer tl;dr: Volcano is less populated than Coast and especially Alpine, so the majority of the Pyralspites that are generated are forced into the Volcano.

Edited March 25, 2016 by The_Bucket

[Fuzzbucket]

That would hold up better if someone hadn't posted yesterday that Volcano moves FASTER than most biomes...

[The_Bucket]

That would hold up better if someone hadn't posted yesterday that Volcano moves FASTER than most biomes...

Doesn't matter. It has nothing to do with the activity of the biomes, it has to do with the number of unique breeds. If 10 Pyropes spawn in Volcano and 0 Almandines in Alpine, then it doesn't matter if all 10 Pyropes are picked up. The fact is, no Almandines spawned.

[Diame]

Doesn't matter. It has nothing to do with the activity of the biomes, it has to do with the number of unique breeds. If 10 Pyropes spawn in Volcano and 0 Almandines in Alpine, then it doesn't matter if all 10 Pyropes are picked up. The fact is, no Almandines spawned.

That's the problem I was thinking right there. It doesn't matter if the they're all the same "rarity" or not, there's just too many commons and such that are being left there with no interest, which I think effects the rate greatly. Like, are people going to pick up those misleading "It's bright, and pink!" eggs that are in the coast? No, because they're not the BSA's, so they'll just sit there. Overall, I just think there's too many common eggs around now that they're really starting to mess with the ratios, making rares and such even harder to get.

[olympe]

I think that, at the very least, we need separate ratios for each breed of pyralspites. I guess we all can agree on that, can't we? (Unless pyropes are supposed to be about 100 times more common than the other two variants, in which case I'd like to hit the artist/conceptor with whatever I have in reach. )

[VixenDra]

And they're not if you look at how they breed... And seems they breed equally

(while my PB Pyrals' progenies suggest Spessartines are the most common and Pyropes and Almandines nearly equal to each other and much rarer than Spessartines)

 

 

I also believe it's all the matter of all 3 Pyrals counting as 1 breed combined with the issue of much different numbers of species spawning in each biome respectively (too many in Alpine, too few in Volcano - PS dragon suggesters, take that into account when creating new dragon concepts enough of Alpine breeds ).

Breeding definitely points out that Almanines are NOT rare, and Pyropes seem not more common than Almandines.

 

So really, if all Pyrals were separated and each of the 3 was coded as a separate, let's say 'subbreed' like Xenowyrms, these 3 would more or less even out as CBs or at least would reach their intended ratios in relation to other Pyral variants.

 

Seems everything points to that...

Edited March 27, 2016 by VixenDra

[The_Bucket]

I think that, at the very least, we need separate ratios for each breed of pyralspites. I guess we all can agree on that, can't we? (Unless pyropes are supposed to be about 100 times more common than the other two variants, in which case I'd like to hit the artist/conceptor with whatever I have in reach. )

I would agree. Pyralspites should work like Xenowyrms, dropping equally and separately in each biome. Pyropes clearly were not intended to be the most common, as observable during the Lunar Herald release: Spessartines were the common one for a while (although they were grabbed fast), and Pyropes were quite rare.

[cyradis4]

I think that, at the very least, we need separate ratios for each breed of pyralspites. I guess we all can agree on that, can't we? (Unless pyropes are supposed to be about 100 times more common than the other two variants, in which case I'd like to hit the artist/conceptor with whatever I have in reach. )

Agreed.

 

CHeers!

C4.

[Hawkster]

Bahh! This thread really should be separated into 2 threads. Really there are 2 issues that should be asked.

1) Is this a bug?

or if not

2) Is this an unintentional consequence?

 

I would tend to think it is more question 2, but really only TJ09 can answer either one of them. It could also be neither. We can discuss this for ever, but realistically all we can do is make guestimates based on observed behaviors. I have already read some interesting ideas here in this thread (as well as in other threads prior) that can easily explain how this might not be bug but merely an unintentional result. Once again only TJ09 will know.

 

While I tend to agree with most peoples assumptions / guestimates already posted, I have heard that bred eggs do not impact CB ratios. IF this is indeed true, everyone assumption based on breeding habits could easily be explained. As that could mean there are two separate % ratios given, one for CB and one for Bred. It could easily just simply be that ratio for CB is much different, when normally my guess would be that most dragons are both set at same or similar %. If this is true, than my guess would be TJ09 intended it to be this way. Merely all speculative of course.

 

For example I can give another what if scenario on how I "think" this game is partly coded which would help explain that this could be neither actual bug or an unintentional result. This would also help explain why breeding habits seem to not reflect what is seen in Cave.

 

Lets just say for example purposes, that all three (Almandine, Pyrope and Spessartine) are all coded as only under one dragon of Pyralspites (like many have already speculatively posted). Let us also just say that Pyralspites have 30% ratio set. This may sound low, but this really would not make it that uncommon or rare. However let us also say that TJ09 than has secondary check which than determines what type of Pyralspite it actually will be. Lets just say IF Pyralspite has been chosen the secondary check (ie IF new_egg="Pyralspite" than run etc command) could be set Pyrope = 75%, Spessartine = 15%, Almandine = 10%.

 

So IF my above paragraph is true. This would mean when creating new eggs in Cave, you will see quite a few Pyraspites, but odds are very high that most of them will result in it being Pyrope. At the same time when going to breed for any and all types (Almandine, Pyrope and Spessartine) it would fall back on the default 30% ratio, or in other words you have in essence a 1 in 3 chance of producing a bred egg for all three types. So breeding you will not see much if any noticeable difference. If you do it would be purely RNG (random number generator) or luck.

 

It could even be worse, for example the secondary check could be 90%, 5% and 5%. We really have no idea on how game is coded or what all percentage amounts are given.

Edited March 28, 2016 by Hawkster

[PewterEyes]

There are numerous solid pieces evidence supporting this, although the primary piece that I feel would be safe to cite is the Lunar Herald release. This new common (initially) semi-biome-specific breed dropped in Alpine and Volcano, but not Coast. This sharply increased the rarity of Pyropes (from common to rare, for a while), made the already mythical Almandines virtually extinct (too small a data sample to measure), and most noticeably caused a flood of Spessartines. For weeks after that release, Spessartines flooded the Coast, with easily the regularity of Pyropes before the release.

Your explanation makes sense. At the same time, I think there is something going on that has to do with the releases, more precisely happening just after the releases. The latest releases dropped on all biomes, but, all of the sudden, we are seeing more Spessartines and Almandines. Any suggestion on why?

 

Edit: I know that Spessartines and Almandines are dropping more than usual. I'm not saying this based only on my own experience and the experience of friends. I do not intend to post a link but I have a pdf with proof that three Spessartines dropped in three hours, that's one per hour.

Edited March 28, 2016 by PewterEyes

[The_Bucket]

Your explanation makes sense. At the same time, I think there is something going on that has to do with the releases, more precisely happening just after the releases. The latest releases dropped on all biomes, but, all of the sudden, we are seeing more Spessartines and Almandines. Any suggestion on why?

 

Edit: I know that Spessartines and Almandines are dropping more than usual. I'm not saying this based only on my own experience and the experience of friends. I do not intend to post a link but I have a pdf with proof that three Spessartines dropped in three hours, that's one per hour.

My explanation for them becoming more common would simply be the biomes are more active due to the new release and the subsequent Festival of Eggs. Ordinarily there are around 12-16 people in Alpine, and 3-10 people in other biomes (higher in Jungle and Coast, lower in Desert and Volcano, and in the middle in Forest), during ordinary hunting hours. A quick check shows 33/18/31/16/16/19, in the order the biome tabs appear. Increased activity means more eggs get picked up means more eggs are revealed.

 

If every egg in Coast has a 0.1% chance of being a Spessartine and on the average drop of the average day, three eggs spawn in and one is picked up, that is four visible eggs, or four 0.1% chances. Currently though, three eggs spawn in, and more like five or ten are picked up. That's more than double the likelihood of seeing a Spessartine in one drop.

 

tl;dr: more activity generated by the new release makes the biomes move faster and reveals more rares

[PewterEyes]

tl;dr: more activity generated by the new release makes the biomes move faster and reveals more rares

And here I was thinking that TJ implemented the OP's suggestion

[Hawkster]

tl;dr: more activity generated by the new release makes the biomes move faster and reveals more rares

I have no question that increased activity in certain biomes can cause seeing more of everything in that biome .. including rares.

 

But I am not following you.

 

You first gave an example of Lunar Heralds. Lunar's initially dropped in Alpine and Coast. Because of the flood of Lunar's, this impacted Pyropes making them seen more rarely simply because hardly anyone was hunting Volcano. (with you so far).

 

You than went on to say that Spessartines seen a dramatic increase because Coast has much higher increase of activity PLUS has less dragons to share with than Alpine. (still with you).

 

The problem is and what I am not understanding. IF Spessartines seen huge increase due to activity in that biome, than how come Almandines in Alpine became virtually extinct as you said? Alpine also seen increase in activity due to people hunting Lunar's there as well. Yes it has more dragons to share with in that biome than Coast (30 vs 20). But still you should have seen same pattern, an increase, maybe a lesser increase but still an increase and not the exact opposite pattern of decrease. You came back with later posted reply about more activity, more people hunting in those biomes, but that does not explain seeing two opposite patterns (decrease in highly active Alpine yet increase in highly active Coast).

 

tl;dr: your conclusion should have seen same results for both Almandines and Spessartines .. yet they were complete opposite.