Indicator for pairs that aren't very interested

[High Lord November]

Please please can we have some kind of indicator for pairs of dragons that aren't very interested in each other? If it's already saved in the database surely there's got to be some way to just italicize the name of the dragon who isn't interested in the mate. 

 

I just lost more than half of my breeding chances to pairs that weren't very interested in one another, and keeping track on my end would be complex since they aren't 'exclusive' and the list continues to grow (I'm breeding for name codes). 

 

[HeatherMarie]

What exactly would you like? What kind of 'indicator', and where? A pairing giving the 'not interested' message doesn't mean it won't give an egg at a later breeding, only outright refusals mean that. Those breeding chances you 'lost' could very well give you an egg next week. So I'm not sure why an indicator for 'no interest' would be helpful, unless it's only applied to pairings that *keep* giving 'no interest' through a handful of breedings.

[purplehaze]

I have to agree with HeatherMarie. Just because a pair shows no interest once, doesn't mean they always will, or even that they are more likely to. I have kept extensive records of breeding in the past, and one "no interest" result means very little. Some pairs will repeatedly show no interest, of course, and those might be worth marking, but a single result doesn't really indicate problems in the future.

 

4 hours ago, High Lord November said:

If it's already saved in the database

I'm not sure this is actually true. Refusals definitely are, but no interests actually don't seem to be.

 

I don't really object to this suggestion, I guess, if it is just a matter of putting the mate's name in italics in the breeding list. I just don't think it is necessary or particularly helpful.

[DragonLady86]

My first female silver was very picky, she refused or gave no interest to every mate for the first year i owned her. But I dont think an indicator would have helped. It was just her. And outside that extreme outlier I've never really seen no interest being a reoccurring problem enough to warrant an indication. Sometimes one dragon just "has a headache" and doesn't want to breed. 

[Shadowdrake]

A single no-interest from a pair isn't usually a problem, but multiple no-interests over several weeks can mean the dragons are almost incompatible with each other. Dragon pairs have different levels of compatibility more specific than "refuse/didn't refuse" including a chance to have some or even a lot of "no interest" (source: site help), so this isn't an impossible request.

 

However, the fact that compatibility levels aren't viewable probably means TJ doesn't want them known automatically. Perhaps a BSA that temporarily allows you to see compatibility when you open a dragon's breeding page, like an icon to the side of each potential mate's name, would be a decent compromise?

[HeatherMarie]

1 hour ago, Shadowdrake said:

A single no-interest from a pair isn't usually a problem, but multiple no-interests over several weeks can mean the dragons are almost incompatible with each other. Dragon pairs have different levels of compatibility more specific than "refuse/didn't refuse" including a chance to have some or even a lot of "no interest" (source: site help), so this isn't an impossible request.

 

However, the fact that compatibility levels aren't viewable probably means TJ doesn't want them known automatically. Perhaps a BSA that temporarily allows you to see compatibility when you open a dragon's breeding page, like an icon to the side of each potential mate's name, would be a decent compromise?

 

This is why I said a suggestion like this might be helpful if it only noted repeated no-interest results. Since the site help says "Note that there is a “spectrum” of compatibility; most pairings will occasionally show no interest, but it might occur more frequently for some pairs than others." and if 'most pairings' will sometimes give no-interest it's not going to be very helpful to put an indicator next to every single mate that's ever given that result. But the pairings where it 'occurs more frequently' may be helpful to mark.

 

I'm not sure what you mean with the BSA idea, when you say 'an icon to the side of each potential mate's name' do you mean only the mates that have already been bred to the dragon before? So if there are a few mates who have given frequent no-interests the BSA-action would temporarily allow that to be seen? The way it's worded makes it sound like maybe you mean *all* potential mates, but I can't imagine that would even be possible since I don't think breed-compatibility is 'dice-rolled' until a breeding actually happens. 

 

Edited October 5, 2021 by HeatherMarie

[Shadowdrake]

35 minutes ago, HeatherMarie said:

This is why I said a suggestion like this might be helpful if it only noted repeated no-interest results.

The game doesn't need to track no-interest results if it already has compatibility levels built in. All it needs to know is something like "does this pair have a <25% chance, 25%-50% chance, or 50%+ chance of no-interest" and it can relate that to us. Easy. An inherent larger chance of no-interests is clearly being drawn from somewhere.

 

42 minutes ago, HeatherMarie said:

I don't think breed-compatibility is 'dice-rolled' until a breeding actually happens. 

I mean, that's pure speculation, but in op's particular case even revealing just prior mate compatibility would be a boon.

[Dragon Mage]

Simply being able to see what prior mate capability was would be very useful. I have no inclination to make many and extensive spreadsheets tracking each prior compatibility for every dragon to every potential mate. The numbers and scope of such a task is absolutely staggering. Especially since the number of dragons is constantly growing, tracking such exhaustive information is impossible to catch up on. A simple indicator of what the result of a prior breeding was would be immediate and incredibly helpful. I can't tell you how many times I've accidentally bred to a 'not interested' mate. It's very frustrating. Since no interest is more likely to crop up repeatedly (the greater or lower likelihood of it being a repeated result is beside the point; once it happens, it remains a potential wasted breeding attempt every time) if I knew what mates had been no interest before, I could simply move to select another mate. Mix it up to maximize my successful results.

Edited October 10, 2021 by Dragon Mage

[DragonLady86]

Except mates that bred fine the first time can still give no interest. Even if they've given lots of eggs before 

[HeatherMarie]

1 hour ago, DragonLady86 said:

Except mates that bred fine the first time can still give no interest. Even if they've given lots of eggs before 

 

This. Yes.

 

Again, I'm not against this suggestion necessarily, I just honestly don't get why it would really be helpful. 'No interest' can happen at any time, even a really great pair that breeds really well together can give 'no interest' once in awhile. Marking every single dragon that has ever shown 'no interest' with a particular mate doesn't actually seem very helpful because it doesn't actually give any indication of the pairings actual compatibility. And in fact it might be misleading to users who don't know exactly what 'no interest' does and doesn't mean, if a pairing is marked as a 'no interest' pair they might assume that pair will just never work, which isn't true at all.

 

Now, what *could* be really helpful would be showing some sort of general compatibility-scale that doesn't tie directly to any specific breeding outcome (like no interest or no egg). If we could see, for instance, that Dragon A and Dragon B had a compatibility-rating of 4 out of 10 (just tossing out examples here), that could be useful in seeing that the pairing isn't very compatible and you might want to stick with breeding Dragon A with a different dragon that might have a rating of 7 or 8.  .... Not that I hold much hope TJ would ever give us *that* much 'inside info', I'm just pointing out something that would actually be indicative of compatibility.

[purplehaze]

12 hours ago, Dragon Mage said:

Simply being able to see what prior mate capability was would be very useful. I have no inclination to make many and extensive spreadsheets tracking each prior compatibility for every dragon to every potential mate. The numbers and scope of such a task is absolutely staggering. Especially since the number of dragons is constantly growing, tracking such exhaustive information is impossible to catch up on. A simple indicator of what the result of a prior breeding was would be immediate and incredibly helpful. I can't tell you how many times I've accidentally bred to a 'not interested' mate. It's very frustrating. Since no interest is more likely to crop up repeatedly (the greater or lower likelihood of it being a repeated result is beside the point; once it happens, it remains a potential wasted breeding attempt every time) if I knew what mates had been no interest before, I could simply move to select another mate. Mix it up to maximize my successful results.

I agree very much with HeatherMarie here. A single 'no interest' really is no indicator of compatibility. If you do a lot of breeding you would likely end up with most of your mates marked as bad matches. I no longer keep records of breeding because it is very tedious, but I did for years and that was enough for me to know that 'no interest' results do not mean as much for future breeding as people seem to think -- unless you get that result repeatedly from a pair. Just because you get that result the first time you breed them doesn't mean that they won't go on to produce many babies together.

 

7 hours ago, HeatherMarie said:

Now, what *could* be really helpful would be showing some sort of general compatibility-scale that doesn't tie directly to any specific breeding outcome (like no interest or no egg). If we could see, for instance, that Dragon A and Dragon B had a compatibility-rating of 4 out of 10 (just tossing out examples here), that could be useful in seeing that the pairing isn't very compatible and you might want to stick with breeding Dragon A with a different dragon that might have a rating of 7 or 8.  .... Not that I hold much hope TJ would ever give us *that* much 'inside info', I'm just pointing out something that would actually be indicative of compatibility.

This. But don't count on TJ offering us anything like that. It would take too much of the 'mystery' out of the game.

[Dragon Mage]

On 10/11/2021 at 8:02 AM, purplehaze said:

I agree very much with HeatherMarie here. A single 'no interest' really is no indicator of compatibility. If you do a lot of breeding you would likely end up with most of your mates marked as bad matches. I no longer keep records of breeding because it is very tedious, but I did for years and that was enough for me to know that 'no interest' results do not mean as much for future breeding as people seem to think -- unless you get that result repeatedly from a pair.

 

Heck.

 

I just learned this, then. I do get that result very often, repeatedly, from pairs, however. Particularly between my Truffles and Lihnseyre. God only knows why.  It's the repeated no interest ones that cause despair in breeding, honestly. It's just... wearisome. 

[purplehaze]

17 minutes ago, Dragon Mage said:

It's the repeated no interest ones that cause despair in breeding, honestly. It's just... wearisome. 

Definitely! The ones I seem to have the most trouble with are my Splits. Purebred Split pairs seem to very often give no interest repeatedly.

So, I could support somehow indicating mates that have repeatedly failed, but not just after one no interest result.

[HeatherMarie]

I can definitely see the use in marking mates that have repeatedly given 'no interest,' maybe with some sort of criteria like '2 or more 'no interest' results within the last 4 breeding attempts' or something (simply because if you have mates you breed together often it's not only likely you'll get a 'no interest' eventually, it's also likely you'll get multiple 'no interest' results over the course of 30+ breedings, for example, and yet that pairing can still be plenty compatible).  Marking every pairing that ever gives a no-interest result is not helpful, but I can see how it could be helpful to see what pairs *repeatedly* give that result.

Edited October 23, 2021 by HeatherMarie

[Melusina]

Could be interesting, to take a slightly different tack, to have a matchmaker BSA.  Would be really hilarious for a new release around Valentine's Day, especially in association with that year's game/story.  If there's a consistent stat that will make random breeding attempt results skew higher or lower (is there? idk!) for any given pairing, it could show you a top ten most likely to find a given dragon's overtures attractive list, or something.  Or maybe even have options for that dragons best matches of a certain breed or among CBs, say.  

 

That said, I recognize that this too could create as many headaches as it addressed.  But... consider the RPing hooks?

[Dragon Mage]

On 10/22/2021 at 10:42 PM, purplehaze said:

Definitely! The ones I seem to have the most trouble with are my Splits. Purebred Split pairs seem to very often give no interest repeatedly.

So, I could support somehow indicating mates that have repeatedly failed, but not just after one no interest result.

 

Then we are in agreement that an indicator would absolutely be useful! We should set a requirement, though. For example if the 'no interest' happens 2 out of 3 (or 4 out of 5, or 7 out of 10, however the ratio is best represented - I defer on that to the people who know the system and numbers better than I) then you could get a 'no interest' indicator, showing that your results are more likely to be empty. That way instead of wasting years or several month's worth of attempts, only a few weeks are blown to reveal a pattern that's simply.... not in the breeders favor. I can tell you I'd happily breed more dragons, more often, if I could avoid that repeated no interest frustration. =(