What was it like when you first joined?

[DigitalGarden]

As a newbie, I had a lot of problems with sickness and soft shell effect. A lot of my eggs died because I kept forgetting to fog them before I went to sleep ._.

[coltzen]

I only picked up one bright pink And I didn't know about fansites, so I joined lots of different forums to get enough views for my eggs to hatch.

[_Dragoness_]

I only picked up one bright pink

Me too. I didn't like them in the beginning so I only got one when I heared they were going to be retired. Now I really regret that I didn't get at least a second one (and never tried to get a CB one at all).

 

At first I didn't understand the difference between the Cave and the AP. I preferred the AP because I never could remember which egg description belonged to which egg.

The result is that most of my early dragons are inbreed. And I didn't understand what that meant for quite a long time.

[Obscure_Trash]

Lol, you guys make me feel DC-old, listing not using fansites as a mistake when you were new. Fansites for raising eggs weren't even around when I joined. XD

 

(And I still never lost an egg until I went on a surprise vacay after I had just grabbed eggs and wasn't able to spam them places.)

 

As for newbie mistakes - I had read everything, but the whole tone of DC was kind of different and everyone thought you needed tons of clicks. So I freaked out with a bunch of others on gaia because it felt like there was only a small group of us clicking back and it made it really hard to raise our eggs.

Yeah, if you look back you'll see those dragons I raised that way? All ones with hundreds of clicks. I'm lucky to get 15 clicks now. XD

Not really a mistake, I think, but I do regret not grabbing more black and vine alts back when you could tell by egg alone. I hated keeping what I bred, but I can't catch them in the AP, so I bred myself one of each and quit there. I haven't done too badly with vine alts but I have horrid luck with black alts nowadays. I have three and they've all ended up the same gender. >_>

I also regret that my original goal was to grab one and only one of each dragon (splits were an exception since they could only be bred together). I ended up with only one cb yule and VDay '09. That ended up okay, though, since I'm happy with the the lineaged ones I've ended up with. And besides, thanks to me missing for almost a year none of my pumpkins, sweetlings, or snow angels are cb, either. :3

 

Aaaaaand the biggest regret I have on DC (which has lessened now that they are permanently dropping) is not grabbing a leetle tree when they first came out. I was on right when they started. It was really late my time, though, and I was tired and frustrated. I stupidly assumed they'd be around when I got up, so I convinced myself to go to bed and get some rest. I should have realized that no news thread on them had to have meant something. I was kicking myself so bad when I woke up.

I have one now, though, so didn't end up too badly. :3

[inlaterdays]

I didn't have too much trouble when I joined, but there were fewer dragon breeds and no fansites. I heard about the game from a friend on Livejournal, and she pretty much told me how to play. I signed up, started collecting dragons, and joined a couple of LJ communities where you clicked each other's dragons.

 

Basically, what Socky said, except with LJ instead of Gaia.

[aquamarine84]

The thing is I had already been addicted to DC when I joined. I'm more of a forum lurker; I don't have all that much to say most of the time. So I admired those pretty dragons in so many people's siggies - but until I found out about fan sites, I never joined.

 

So I had a pretty good idea of how to play the game already and think I've done pretty well for myself, considering all the breaks I've had to take.

[Anke]

Eh, I just wish I'd picked up at least one CB Bright Pink when I first joined. (And at least a male CB Black, and male CB Frill when they were still around.)

 

And up until last Christmas I managed to ALWAYS forget about holiday events.

Edited February 22, 2012 by Anke

[Yliah]

I knew fansites because the friend who told me about DC had already lost some eggs, so never lost any.

 

Joined in the ends of 2009 and I thought bright pinks were rare stripes. Just figured that they didn't drop after moths. But I did catched two CB frills ^^.

 

Also I used to freak out when I 'found' an striper's alt. I thought it was a rare dragon, gifted by the glitch gods and always expected that "that" could happen to my dragons too.

Edited February 22, 2012 by Yliah

[StormWizard212]

I actually had little to no problems. I have a nearly obsessive habit of thoroughly researching something before getting into it.

Yeah I'm the same. I read the FAQ like five times when I first joined so I understood things. I never let an egg die because it ran out of time. I had a couple of eggs die early on from getting too many views (when I didn't know to fog them overnight) but that was all really. One was a messy-lineaged tinsel and the other was a black. Everything else was pretty smooth sailing.

Edited February 22, 2012 by StormWizard212

[Quinney]

I got a few eggs blindly before I found out about the 'Which egg is which' page. Wish I'd have known about it from day one.

[GiratinaOF]

I also didn't use fansites (I really only put them in my signature in other forums!), didn't know anything about rarity as there was no DCwikia (at least I don't think so) and didn't really care for the lineage. And I only picked them up in the AP. I was then beginning to use the old fansites like "eggs will be dragons", SotiDragon and others. I believe there wasn't even a "Forums" button on top of the page when I joined!

[SolarCat]

I joined during the Fog, so there was a lot of time to read the forums before picking up eggs, since the cave wasn't dropping any.

I put my first set on Gaia until they had an issue over there with outside images causing issues/viruses/I don't remember for members. After that I still used Gaia after joining the DragCave group there. When fansites were invented, I switched to those.

 

I do wish I'd picked up some CB bright pinks when I joined. (I do have bred ones, as lineages weren't as important back then, since you couldn't even see them. The only indication of CB versus caveborn was the "Stolen On"/"Bred On" line for an egg's birthday.)

I also named my female gray "Gregory" because before the Fog grays were only male and suddenly the all-male breeds could be females, too. I know I can change names now, but it's grown on me, so I kept it.

[Imposibibble]

I was a member of a fairly-active forum and I easily hatched things without problems (not even softshell when I started).

 

Then I thought "the more and faster I get views and stuff, the faster they will hatch." So I stuck my eggs in my forum sig, then I learned of the existence of fan sites and I stuck my eggs into maybe 3-4 of them at once. Needless to say, that was my first experience with soft shell and egg death.

[Keith Perchello]

I didn't collect frills, that haunts me to this day. Back then, I thought that two of every breed would be satisfactory. I'm kicking myself in the butt for this. Same thing with bright pinks.

 

I regret not catching more Vampires when they were first released on Halloween '08.

 

I never ever ever caught a CB Black, I always used to pick them up off the AP. And because of that, I still don't have a CB black to this day!

Edited February 22, 2012 by Keith Perchello

[diannethegeek]

I joined just before the Pumpkins dropped but barely even tried to catch one because I assumed they'd be around for a while. Needless to say, I had to wait and get 2nd gens a year later. Fortunately I discovered my mistake and the forums before Christmas came around.

[matya]

I thought I could hatch my eggs by looking at them myself over and over. Fortunately, I only murdered two that way! Then I discovered the forums and the FAQ and some VERY helpful people, and I never killed one that way again! (I did kill a bred Silver and a bred Water later, because I went on vacation and completely forgot about them. Um...oops? I was horrified when I found the poor broken wee eggshells on my scroll when I did log back in.)

 

I'm very grateful for these forums, that's for sure!!

[Quinney]

I didn't collect frills, that haunts me to this day.

Same here. I have just one, sadly.

[HawktalonOfRiverClan]

I had some friends on another forum who basically raised my eggs for me until I discovered fansites (which happened pretty quickly after joining the forum), so luckily I never had an egg die from lack of views. If there's one thing I could kick myself for, it's hoarding AP Blacks and reabandoning them when they didn't alt. Well, that, and the fact that I didn't really understand the concept of Holiday Drops until the day after Halloween. And by that point it was too late to grab any CB Black Marrows, which I'd missed because I didn't know what the adults looked like and figured I'd grab some once someone else's grew up. But I've got two now, both purebred so I'm kinda glad my newbieness made me miss out on the CB ones.

Edited February 22, 2012 by HawktalonOfRiverClan

[Guest]

I caught a gold egg (CB!) and abandoned it without knowing it's rarity. And I didn't know about fansites.

 

And then I became aware of the Wiki by just googling 'dragcave.net wiki' and then I started to understand everything.

I still hate myself for abandoning that gold :C

[Sundew]

I had all my eggs die for a couple days/weeks before I quit for about a month since I didn't know about fansites. Came back when I clicked an egg in someone's signature or something like that. :3 By some miracle I caught him as a gendered hatchling in the AP. I was amazed when it matured.

[Wurdesh]

I managed okay when I first joined, mostly because a friend of mine introduced me to the site and gave me a run-down of the basics. But I remember it took me ages to figure out that hatchlings didn't count towards being egg-locked, and that I could grab more eggs after my first four hatched rather than waiting for them all to grow up into adults.

[CatCreature]

I actually had little to no problems. I have a nearly obsessive habit of thoroughly researching something before getting into it.

Me too! I visited the forum around a week prior to creating my scroll, reading about fansites, soft shell, sickness and what members where asking in the Help section.

 

My only regrets:

 

1/ Creating a scroll on Halloween -08 but NOT catching any of the original Vampires. I only caught four eggs in the AP to practice on.

 

2/ Not getting/breeding more Silvers during the Metallic Glitch.

[AlternateMew]

I had a CB Nebula gender wrong (Had no pinks, already had a male neb), so I abandoned him. Also, I abandoned a Magi as soon as I got a shorter-lined one. Little newbie already cared about lineages!

 

Luckily, my lurking habits brought me to the forums early, which also led me to the Wiki early, and led me to fansites asap. None of my eggs died. To this day, the only deaths on my scroll have been semi on-purpose (Halloween disintegrated, failed NDs and bites). And I am very, very thankful for that. And I never made one of those spam click me topics/posted eggs in my sig. Actually, the former is me hating making topics. I still won't unless there's no other outlet for what I want/need or it's a bit bigger than a "tiny little question" (Like my auto-abandoned Yule that kept his name in the wilderness, or when a Red Dino replaced one of my badges). I also realized about ratios early and read adult descriptions, spawning my Mint obsession. Easy to collect and no one will call me a bad person for doing so.

 

Overall, I'd say I was a pretty decent newbie. No one is perfect, of course, but at least I don't feel like I came in as a burden to anyone.

[Alasse]

I'm not so old. I started to play when bright pink was already discontinued, I was able to get 2 frilled . But I think that should be good to see old DC, maybe for few hours on 1st April for joke

[kleptomaniac]

I don't remember way back when I first joined... nothing really special happened at the time - and I didn't join the forums til some time after.

The first release I was here for was the Skywing, I think.

 

I do definitely remember the mass-breeding event though. It seemed like the cave was blocked for days...