We Need New Drop Mechanics. It's Just A Fact.

[Fuzzbucket]

5 hours ago, KageSora said:

 

To be fair they're both distinct issues--it's just solving one doesn't necessarily make the other better, and rares will always be hard to get anyway.  If they started being too easy to get with 6 slots I'd imagine ratios would get tweaked to drive their appearance rate down.

 

There's also the issue with mobile where you may not even be able to fully see the description of the bottom row unless the the page layout got altered so having those 3 extra slots wouldn't be helpful for mobile users without other changes anyway.

 

 

Personally, I remain unconvinced that this would actually lead to a variety of commons and not just the same handful of blocker breeds taking up all 6 slots.

 

You'd need something else in place to limit the number of identical breeds that could show up at once, maybe.

 

A ratio tweak would be needed on top of an additional row of eggs if you want a genuine variety of commons showing up.

 

I rather agree with all this. And I don't even play on mobile. Taking in, as instantly as one must, SIX descriptions would probably mean by the time you'd made sure that there wasn't a stat as well as a gold, you'd have missed both. And the same group of commons would still sit and sit.

[Silverwatermist]

Personally, I'm not fussed about finding more rares (even though, yes, I want some). The part of the suggestion I like (that suggestion being, 6 eggs being visible instead of 3) is that instead of 1-3 common "blockers" being visible at a time in a biome, we'd be potentially seeing up to 6 different ones, or with occasional doubles visible, maybe 3-6 different ones at any given time. With the increase in dragons on the site, it makes it harder for a given person to find the common dragon they want, never mind rares. Having more commons potentially visible will make it easier to find the majority of the regular dragons on this site that any of us might be searching for.

This comment isn't meant to ignore the great points people are bringing up about the layout on mobile, or how this might affect rare dragons appearing. But I feel like the conversation is focusing a lot on seeing/finding rares while the commons people hunt day in and out are being a bit lost in the shuffle. To me, that'd be the main reason to implement this: to have more different common "blockers" visible at a given time, since the more that are visible, the more likely someone is to find the one they want to grab.

[KageSora]

The thing is, though, they're blockers for a reason.  Having 6 different blockers won't automatically mean people will be able to find the commons they want.

 

While every blocker is a common, not every common is a blocker.  So unless something specifically is done to prevent blockers from, well, blocking adding more slots just won't fix the problem.

[Silverwatermist]

Personally, I've noticed tons of different common (and sometimes uncommon) dragons "blocking" the cave for minutes on end, only for what appears to me to be a random one of the three get taken a few minutes into the refresh. What counts as a "blocker" to one person doesn't necessarily to another and might be the exact egg someone else is looking for. So the more different "blockers" that are visible, the more likely someone is to see one they actually want and grab it, whether that's because of the breed itself or the code.

That's my take on it, so I support this suggestion as well as many of the other ideas in this long thread! I think several solutions need to be implemented in order to fix these issues, but showing more eggs per biome seems like a future inevitability as long as more dragons are continuously added to this game.

[jellystualy]

Now this will imply changing the layout of Biomes completely in every way possible, but as someone on "team" alt/sub-biome, and as someone who enjoys the worldbuilding of DC, after reading some posts here and some of the points I've thought of separating the Biomes in different pages with their own sub-biome areas called something like "Ocean" and "Beach" for Coast or "Mountaintop/Peak/Summit" and "Base" for Alpine, for example. They'd all be their own separate pages and have their own separate dragon quota (not including the dragons already found in every Biome, I think those should stay the same as they are) which, if I understood right, might make things fair for everyone given certain dragons would spawn in certain locations within the Biome (e.g. Ice Dragons would show up at the Summit given that high altitudes have an increase in frigid temperatures).

 

As a mobile player with ADHD and fatigue issues I prefer the current 3-egg layout (easier to navigate personally) therefore I don't like the idea of adding more egg rows, but the biomes being reworked was the best thing that came to my mind as a way to try and combine the points I've seen in this topic thread and attempted to ""refine"" them. Just throwing my shot in the dark if you will 

 

Would it resolve the issue with ratios and cave blockers? Probably, or most likely, not, but at least it'd (Probably) give dragons a more better chance at spawning in different locations... at the cost of reworking everything about how the biomes and how dragons spawn (their locations, I mean, but thinking about it it'd affect how ratios work as well if rationing the quota for various Biome subtypes) which would 100% take a lot of time to map out and code and I'm aware it could be harder to implement than changing the ratios outright or coming up with less time consuming changes

[KageSora]

3 hours ago, Silverwatermist said:

Personally, I've noticed tons of different common (and sometimes uncommon) dragons "blocking" the cave for minutes on end, only for what appears to me to be a random one of the three get taken a few minutes into the refresh. What counts as a "blocker" to one person doesn't necessarily to another and might be the exact egg someone else is looking for. So the more different "blockers" that are visible, the more likely someone is to see one they actually want and grab it, whether that's because of the breed itself or the code.

 

Just to mention, that doesn't actually always mean somebody found the common they want, though--sometimes people grab them to try and cycle the biome and see what's behind then dump them in the AP later.  The end result for the biome is the same in that there's a new egg now (well, you can't always tell since sometimes it's replaced with an identical breed), but the motive is different.

 

I don't think, necessarily, that showing more eggs would entice people to cycle the cave more, so if it doesn't end up showing eggs people want then, again, it will end in stagnation the same way we have now.

 

Also, again, make the game completely biased against mobile users who will have very little chance compared to PC users to grab anything in that second row since the descriptions will likely be at least partially cut-off on many eggs unless the pagd layout is changed for mobile.  (And, actually, I don't see that happening--maybe the layout being changed entirely regardless of device, but I don't think TJ would remove or change the location of the biome flavor text on mobile only)

[dracornithologist]

As another voice towards sub-biomes, and as someone returning to dragcave to see a map where a map hadn't been before, I think breaking each biome into regions make a lot of sense! Every single biome is already broken up into pieces on the map. It doesn't track that we would all be grabbing the same three eggs at the same coast when the map shows us three different coastlines, five separate mountain ranges, two different deserts, forests and jungle divided across separate landmasses by water, and a few different volcanos. I think it would be neat to be able to go to "Coast (of x island)" or "Desert (of x name)" and have at least two different links to choose from beneath each biome to look for eggs. 

 

I'm seeing the concern that it would be just as stagnating, but even if there are still blockers, I for one would be motivated to cycle through the caves more often if there were more of them. 

[jellystualy]

15 minutes ago, dracornithologist said:

It doesn't track that we would all be grabbing the same three eggs at the same coast when the map shows us three different coastlines, five separate mountain ranges, two different deserts, forests and jungle divided across separate landmasses by water, and a few different volcanos. I think it would be neat to be able to go to "Coast (of x island)" or "Desert (of x name)" and have at least two different links to choose from beneath each biome to look for eggs. 

Exactly!!! Maybe there could be some “hot spots” of where to find dragons which adventurers have agreed upon or rumored of (at least in a lore way rather than a gameplay way) and therefore there'd be different Biome areas to go to which would have more dragon quota differences given how many dragons have their lore describe travelling or migrating as a basis of their behavior—in fact the Encyclopedia literally lists each dragon's Habitat preferences. Like going to Coast of X for a specific dragon breed but going to Coast Y for another dragon breed; both would spawn in "Coast", but in different ones to promote a wee bit more variety instead of going between the same Biome over and over

 

It could also introduce mechanic drops like Stellarum Wyvern's hourly rotations but with certain dragons changing between availability based on "travel" or season-based migrations, although I feel that'd overcomplicate things for something supposed to increase the presence of most commons, but at least that promotes the use of already existing mechanics (e.g. the Seasonal Dragons) in my opinion. There's a lot of drop mechanics that aren't really utilized to their maximum and thus result in blocking the cave (going back to my previous example, I've seen Stellarum Wyrms block a certain biome they're spawning in during the hour more times than I can count)

 

Breaking things up into different regions would definitely spice things up overall at the very least 100% and would perhaps make hunting more enjoyable and open more opportunities for hunting in various areas

[blinkdog]

Theres a lot of interesting ideas being thrown around here - would anyone object if I made a new suggestion thread to just have ideas about sub biomes? i think at this point it deserves its own topic.

[jellystualy]

7 minutes ago, blinkdog said:

Theres a lot of interesting ideas being thrown around here - would anyone object if I made a new suggestion thread to just have ideas about sub biomes? i think at this point it deserves its own topic.

By all means - if you want to, do it! I'd love to see an actual topic for it; I considered making a separate topic myself potentially but I don't really have neither the time nor energy to, so you have my personal go ahead  thought it'd still fit under this topic but I figure these are solutions that can be elaborated onto separately

[blinkdog]

I'm going to start drafting up a new topic specifically for the addition of new biomes, then! Look forward to seeing that later today~

[FuecocoBoi09]

maybe we just need better mechanics, for example no running out of eggs, just staying, and if a egg has been untouched for 1 minute, it is deleted

[KageSora]

1 hour ago, FuecocoBoi09 said:

maybe we just need better mechanics, for example no running out of eggs, just staying, and if a egg has been untouched for 1 minute, it is deleted

 

I feel like 1 minute is too fast, a 2-3 refresh would be a bit better, though o agree the current 5min ones seem a bit long at this point

[huskyhiccups]

Support. I'm a returning player from 2012, I didn't have many dragons from when I first started playing.

I tried for weeks on and off to get a red dragon from the cave before asking someone on another forum site to gift me one. I'm now struggling to get a magma. I work overnights in the US, so not many people are refreshing the caves (usually the page says 2-11) and I'm still having this issue.
I don't know exactly how to fix this issue, but I wish players with those dragons already would leave them in the cave for players like myself to have a chance. It makes me feel small having to ask others to help me out. I just don't see how this is fun or okay for a game to do, sorry to be harsh

 

Maybe they could add another "biome" with dragon eggs you don't already own? (excluding the tree, dinos, chicken, holidays, etc.).  This biome could even be exclusive to new players; it goes away once you own 50 dragons (the bronze trophy) or once your account is a month old? The only issue I see with this is that players could make alt accounts to give themselves sought after breeds...

[aori]

Hello, fellow returning player here, this time from 2008. Everything looks exactly the same since back then (with the exception of new site layouts and updated dragon sprites)and the 3 eggs per biome mechanic is still, well, here/not updated after 15 years. I agree that a sub-biome in each area would be a great addition, especially since the rare eggs and uncommons are snatched up so quickly. Personally, I still haven't found a silver/gold/dino/cheese/other rares without asking or finding them in AP.

 

Also the suggestion for a timer that deletes blockers after a certain amount of time was something I wanted to suggest here too, but instead of outright deleting, they can go to AP or something similar to AP.  I personal prefer the timer, since I can't camp in the biomes all day due to a hectic schedule and such. 

[KageSora]

4 hours ago, aori said:

Also the suggestion for a timer that deletes blockers after a certain amount of time was something I wanted to suggest here too, but instead of outright deleting, they can go to AP or something similar to AP.  I personal prefer the timer, since I can't camp in the biomes all day due to a hectic schedule and such. 

 

I believe that's already how it works?  That is, ever 5 minutes the eggs available refresh as well as every hour.  (The issue is that sometimes they'll refresh...  With the same breed of blockers, but if you check the links you can see the codes are different).  I think the eggs that aren't picked up are just deleted presently.

 

I'd rather avoid seeing them dumped to the AP because I like being able to Influence eggs I grab and the amount of eggs that would be dumped (especially if it was the entire queue rather than just the displayed eggs) probably means that everything would be so low-time you couldn't use Influence on it and could quite possibly mean everything in the AP is constantly dying due to volume outpacing what users are able or interested in taking.  (You'd run into a similar problem, most likely, with a secondary "AP" style page--things being low-time alone isn't enough to entice people to grab them if they're too common, after all)

 

A slightly faster refresh rate has been suggested though, might help make things feel less sluggish.  Or if there were some way to prevent the same breeds of eggs taking the place of the previous ones so that even if it cycled between blockers you'd know on sight that it's refreshed and it's different breeds.

[pinkgothic]

9 hours ago, KageSora said:

I believe that's already how it works?  That is, ever 5 minutes the eggs available refresh as well as every hour.  (The issue is that sometimes they'll refresh...  With the same breed of blockers, but if you check the links you can see the codes are different).  I think the eggs that aren't picked up are just deleted presently.

AFAIK, the five minute drop is actually just a shuffle (although to be fair, it's no longer possible to check that, since /view/ pages for cave drop eggs that haven't been picked up yet have been disabled, so it might have changed, but I think not). At the top of the hour, a bunch of new eggs are generated, but only three are shown; then at the five minute shuffle, a different random set of three eggs is picked from the eggs that weren't picked up yet. If you camp in the cave a lot, you should be able to occasionally spot a code staying / reappearing, because the randomiser just happened to pick it again, but it's a fairly rare event given the number of eggs the cave generates (especially during peak activity), so it might take a long time to spot it happen. Basically, currently,  AFAIK only the hourly drop destroys eggs. (Granted, my practical experience is necessarily frozen at some months ago, but I don't think it's changed since.)

 

I think stuff getting yeeted to the AP might work, though, since people do hoard common species and already like picking up cave borns from the AP, specifically because there's no cooldown they need to worry about in case they change their mind, and the egg is lower-time. Whether that scales is another question, of course. It might not! But I think this would only work out to a max of 33 eggs being yeeted to the AP in a given hour (3 every five minutes, with destruction instead of yeeting at the end of the hour), which should be doable? 🤔 And it might help the ratios. Just thinking out loud, though, feel free to disregard.

[KageSora]

I just assumed it was a new batch since, if all the eggs are taken during a 5min drop, new ones are generated for the next 5min drop rather than the biome being totally empty for the rest of the hour from what I've seen?  Unless at the hour it generates a queue and then only a set portion of that is shown ever 5 minutes with the rest being held back for the subsequent 5min drops?

 

For codes recurring, though--are the on the exact same breed of egg?  Because if an egg was deleted without being picked up and the code recycled that would also allow for it to reappear (and if it was from a blocker species its not impossible for it to end up re-used for the same type of egg)

 

Suppose that's a TJ thing to confirm or deny, though.

 

My bigger concern about the AP is that if too many eggs go there (and there's a reason they become blockers--I've seen CB blockers sit in the AP for a while before I grabbed them and discovered they were CB) you'll stop being able to influence anything which means picking lineaged eggs up will become less enticing.  Which could slow the AP down further.

[Fuzzbucket]

20 hours ago, pinkgothic said:

AFAIK, the five minute drop is actually just a shuffle (although to be fair, it's no longer possible to check that, since /view/ pages for cave drop eggs that haven't been picked up yet have been disabled, so it might have changed, but I think not).

 

ACTUALLY if you hover over an egg in the biomes you can see its code, so if anyone has the patience to check that over a few hours. I am not that person.

[blah]

During Halloween the same eggs popped right back up at the next 5 minute shuffle. I was code hunting and the cave was constantly blocked so I noticed. Or at least the same codes. I want to say they stayed on the same breed and I’m reasonably sure but I wouldn’t swear on it. 

[Moriaty]

I'm fairly certain 5 minute refresh is shuffle because i personally have seen the same egg (same code) appear after 5 minutes. I wasn't really taking note of the breed though - am a code hunter and usually don't care about the breed when hunting codes. But I also don't think the "old code get recycled" possibility works in these cases...like, there're probably millions of codes available, if it's all total random, I don't see how a code can appear now, get reshuffled, and magically appears on another breed just a few minutes later. It'll be an astronomically coincidence for this code to be recycled then appear again within that short of a timeframe

 

And from what I remember, you can grab an egg after a 5 minute shuffle, but on hourly it's gone. Eg, if I have a biome page opened with a code abcde sitting in the center at xx:14 and now is xx:16, even though if I refresh the biome the code will be gone (hidden behind other eggs after reshuffle) I can click on the egg on this old page and get it. However if I have this page opened on xx:59 and try to click that egg on xx:02, the egg wouldn't exist, and that's why I believe hourly refresh actually refresh in new eggs and 5 minute refresh just reshuffle things around

Edited December 7, 2023 by Moriaty

[inghelene]

From my understanding, 5min shuffle is a shuffle where some new eggs are added in. 
Thus you will get codes reappearing, but also some new eggs. Meaning that if all eggs are taken, a small batch can still be grabbed at the next 5 min mark. (Like we see for NR)

[Fuzzbucket]

On 12/6/2023 at 4:50 PM, Fuzzbucket said:

 

ACTUALLY if you hover over an egg in the biomes you can see its code, so if anyone has the patience to check that over a few hours. I am not that person.

 

And following on from that - I have been tracking a code I saw there - and after the shuffle the code comes up as Dragon Not Found. I have been tracking for days since I tested in case someone had hidden it (it was a z code) - but nothing.