Explain about Breeds with Limited Availability

[Ruby Eyes]

2 hours ago, Fuzzbucket said:

This is true. It should say in the encyclopaedia under each holiday one: "can only be found at x time of year." (The seasonals are kind of self-explanatory.) As to GoNs and hybrids saying simply: 

• Found in: Unknown

I'm not sure that's enough info for people with no knowledge. Then again, they probably wouldn't have unlocked them so can't access that stuff anyway.

If they haven't unlocked these, then these breeds won't show up in the drop-down anyway, would they?

Like, if you unlocked the egg sprite, you have the Encyclopedia link AND the hub drop down option.

(Unlocking the egg sprite for holiday eggs may be a tad difficult outside of holidays.)

 

If you unlocked the hatchling or adult sprite only, you still wouldn't have the drop down option in the hub, but you'd have access to the Encyclopedia page via the breed name link on a creature's view page.

(Just thinking that misleading hub options in the drop down may not be the source of misunderstandings for newbies - they see stuff on other people's scrolls and want the same, that's all)

[Fuzzbucket]

1 hour ago, Ruby Eyes said:

If they haven't unlocked these, then these breeds won't show up in the drop-down anyway, would they?

Like, if you unlocked the egg sprite, you have the Encyclopedia link AND the hub drop down option.

(Unlocking the egg sprite for holiday eggs may be a tad difficult outside of holidays.)

 

If you unlocked the hatchling or adult sprite only, you still wouldn't have the drop down option in the hub, but you'd have access to the Encyclopedia page via the breed name link on a creature's view page.

(Just thinking that misleading hub options in the drop down may not be the source of misunderstandings for newbies - they see stuff on other people's scrolls and want the same, that's all)

 

Very true.

[UnicornMaiden]

While I agree that having the info on the encyclopedia page would be a good idea I also think it would be really helpful to have a page in the Help section. That way the info would be available to even the most newbie users.

[UnicornMaiden]

Going through the Trading Hub I keep seeing trades posted with people asking for male/female swaps of their holiday dragons. From a quick glance at Encyclopedia entries it looks like Wrappingwings are the only one whose info says anything about being male-only.

[HeatherMarie]

44 minutes ago, UnicornMaiden said:

Going through the Trading Hub I keep seeing trades posted with people asking for male/female swaps of their holiday dragons. From a quick glance at Encyclopedia entries it looks like Wrappingwings are the only one whose info says anything about being male-only.

 

Yeah, I've seen a lot of trades like that this season, I've even double-checked the wiki to make sure I wasn't misremembering how the breeds work because I kept seeing people asking for things I could've sworn weren't possible. And we can't even let them know that what they are asking for isn't possible (unless they happen to be active on the forum). At this point I don't really care how/where it's done, but I really think this sort of thing *should* be stated *somewhere* in the actual game.

[0x08]

Support.

 

It must be more than a little disheartening to ask for e.g. a female Glystere and then find out that no such a thing exists...

Perhaps a new field could be added for event dragons, after the elements field, something like "Special notes", where the limited-time nature and one-genderedness of a breed is indicated in plain text.

Edited December 28, 2021 by 0x08

[Fuzzbucket]

It still won't stop people asking for them - just as people still ask for CB alt blacks and vines, and spriters' alts (and that's what they MEAN) when it can't happen.

[UnicornMaiden]

I think people ask for them because they don't know that what they're asking for isn't possible. If they knew that there is no such thing as, for example, a female Glystere then they wouldn't ask for it. Since most breeds are available as both male and female it probably wouldn't occur to someone that some breeds happen to come in only one sex.

[Guillotine]

Yeah, this is a reasonable thing to not realize--similarly if you see a CB alt or hybrid in a line, if you're new you may not realize that they aren't rare, they just straight up don't exist anymore and weren't intended to exist in the first place. It should be stated in-game somewhere.

Edited December 28, 2021 by Guillotine

[Fuzzbucket]

But how do you alert them - I bet very many of the people posting in the hub never look at the forum or the encyclopedia. It doesn't matter what you state in game - people still won't see it. Where could you put "this is only available as male" to be seen when someone posts a trade ? You'd have to look it up first - somewhere.

When I see such a trade and can contact people on forum, I do - but very few people asking for a male solstice or a CB blue one and the like show up on a search here.

[ShorahNagi]

3 hours ago, Fuzzbucket said:

But how do you alert them - I bet very many of the people posting in the hub never look at the forum or the encyclopedia. 

I've often thought about catching a random holiday and putting it up for trade with a note in the wants section stating a fact that's only in forums/wiki. For example:

 

*puts a bred Solstice egg up for trade*

 

Wants: CB Blue Wing Solstice are NOT possible

 

Or *puts Snow Angel egg up for trade*

 

Wants: Scrolls are coded to only have ONE color of Snow Angel wings and can NOT be changed

 

Then, players searching for CB Blue wings, or different Snow Angel wings see the notes.

 

That aside, I do think there should be a bit more information on site about certain things (ex. Holiday/Valentine's dragons being only male/female*, some dragons being breed only, etc.)

[Fuzzbucket]

On site info is great - but won't get past the "if they don't look, they won't see" side of it all.

[Seriva Senkalora]

Well, we have the encyclopedia.

Would be the perfect place to add notes like this.

 

 

[Fuzzbucket]

Sure. That would be good. But still, then when people don't look at it - as many don't - nothing will change. We already have for Wrapping wings, for instance:

• Only males of this breed seem to appear.

(I realise there's nothing where there's no description). And I've seen someone ask for a female WW.

[UnicornMaiden]

5 hours ago, Fuzzbucket said:

But how do you alert them - I bet very many of the people posting in the hub never look at the forum or the encyclopedia. It doesn't matter what you state in game - people still won't see it. Where could you put "this is only available as male" to be seen when someone posts a trade ? You'd have to look it up first - somewhere.

When I see such a trade and can contact people on forum, I do - but very few people asking for a male solstice or a CB blue one and the like show up on a search here.

 

On 4/16/2021 at 4:24 PM, UnicornMaiden said:

I suggest there should be a page in the Help section which explains breed availability fully. There should also be a link to that page which is shown when setting up trades with a message telling to people to check there before saying what they want.

 

Certainly there will be some people who won't bother to look at the information, but just because some people won't look is no reason to not have the information readily available for those who need it.

[HeatherMarie]

10 minutes ago, UnicornMaiden said:

 

 

Certainly there will be some people who won't bother to look at the information, but just because some people won't look is no reason to not have the information readily available for those who need it.

 

This. 'People may not look' is never a good enough reason to *not* have information clearly stated in the game. Of course not everyone will look, just as not everyone actually reads the Terms when they sign up. But right now this sort of thing isn't stated *anywhere* in-game, so it doesn't matter if people look or not, it's not there. It should be there, to help the people who do look. 

 

2 hours ago, ShorahNagi said:

I've often thought about catching a random holiday and putting it up for trade with a note in the wants section stating a fact that's only in forums/wiki. For example:

 

 

I've been tempted to do that myself a few times, but that's the sort of thing that will get you warned/banned from the hub. That sort of 'trying to get information to other users without actually stating what you want' is against the rules. 

Edited December 29, 2021 by HeatherMarie

[UnicornMaiden]

Again, I'm seeing trades in the hub asking for male/female swaps of various holiday dragons. And there's no way to let people know that it's not possible to get a male Ribbondancer or female Glystere or other such things.

[KageSora]

It'd be useful to have that info on-site.

 

And, honestly?  If we already have the breed limits page that only shows the holidays during their season, it should be possible to make a special banner for the trading hub during winter and Valentines (and up to 2 weeks after when the last of them would have had to grow up) to alert "Most of the holiday dragons are only available in one gender, for the list of each breed's gender and other special restrictions click here" and then a link that takes you to a page that explains about which dragons have gender locks, or which have color locks, etc.

 

Or, like.  Just have a banner there year round that takes you to a page that lists hybrids and breed-only colors and explains "these are only obtainable by breeding", lists anything gender-locked or color-locked, explain alt colors like Nebs and stuff, etc.  (For hybrids/colors that are bred-only it wouldn't tell you how you do it, people can look for that info if they want to, but it would at least let people know "oh, Shallow Waters can't be obtained as a CB" and "Greed stripes need to be bred from White stripes" and such)

[ACDragonMaster]

This information definitely should be added, or at least something indicating that such things exist.  As has already been pointed out, not all users necessarily use the forum, or know the wiki exists.  Plus, there seems to be a good argument for including information rather than keeping it a secret to surprise users, just because of the sheer NUMBER of dragons available.  Even users who've been here from the start don't necessarily have all the biomes and times for all the breeds memorized, a new player will just be completely lost.

 

And while it's fine to retain some element of surprise for a user's first dragons, it stops being fun once they've accumulated a good number and are trying to get the stuff they're missing.  In general, the encyclopedia entries are frankly quite useless.  They're basically trivia repositories, about the only useful information they have is the biomes dragons can be found in (and the elements for meeting the monthly raffle criteria).  I think it would make sense for actual, practical, game-relevant information to be added and kept there, so that once a person's unlocked a breed via owning it or viewing enough of it (which is also a valid way of playing the game) they can actually use that as a resource without being reliant on the forums and fansites.

[KageSora]

1 hour ago, ACDragonMaster said:

And while it's fine to retain some element of surprise for a user's first dragons, it stops being fun once they've accumulated a good number and are trying to get the stuff they're missing.

 

I feel like it's also pretty easy to retain that mystery--if somebody does not want that information, they simply don't have to look it up on the site!  Don't just shove it right out there in front of everyone, but putting it on a page or page(s) that people can access if they're trying to figure something out is very helpful.

 

Heck, for something like this, you could just fold the info under the existing BSA info for Influence in the help section--just include a line about "Some eggs cannot be influenced as the breed has a fixed gender".  (Actually, now that I'm looking--there's also no section for the Bite BSA at all it seems, and there should be as well...  But I suspect that might be a separate suggestion)  ((To be fair that wouldn't help everybody who might be wondering, only those who tried to Influence and saw they couldn't but it'd be something))

Edited December 27, 2022 by KageSora

[Fuzzbucket]

I wish there were some way that people trying to trade single-sex dragons for "gender swap" would get some kind of auto note that it can't happen. Maybe at the top of the trade page it could carry a note about it when such dragons are in season ?