Suggestions

I actually suggested this idea in an 'economic fix' thread, and figured I'd give it its own topic. Essentially if dragons have a purpose beyond breeding, it may help reduce the number of dragons being bred thus reduce the supply of unwanted dragons. It would also give more options for game play. This is essentially a few linked suggestions. The first part is to give dragons more things to do other than breed. The second part would change the breeding cooldown into recovery cooldown. Whenever a dragon is in recovery cooldown it can't participate in any of the roles that will cause a recovery cooldown. Different tasks would have different cooldowns and some tasks could have variable cooldowns that the player selects however breeding would keep the same cooldown based upon rarity that already exists. There are two ways to approach the cooldown for hatchlings: --Cooldown lasts as long as they are a hatchling however they can not breed until they reach sexual maturity which is equal to their current breeding coolown --Hatchling cooldown is equal to current breeding cooldown and represents the dragons learning everything they need to know. Of the two options for hatchling cooldown I prefer the first one (it lasts to adulthood however the sexual maturity is equal to the current breeding cooldown) since it would allow players who cannot use coli to train dragons the same opportunity that coli users have to earn extra money when exalting from exalt-bait dragons [b]Some ideas that could cause a recovery cooldown:[/b] [LIST] [*]Breeding [*]Adventuring (whenever adventure mode is added) could have a day long cooldown per dragon used in adventuring. [*]A quest could have various results. The ultimate reward could be a new breed change scroll (only available through questing) although this would be quite low. Some quests would result in the dragon returning empty handed. Sometimes they might come back with a treasure chest and a random selection of items [*]Intensive training could net rewards similar to the coliseum (experience points, extra stats to distribute, perhaps a few training specific apparel). For those who can't use the coli it would be allow players to level their dragons although it would take longer thus they too would be able to benefit from the level bonuses from exalting. For those that use the coli, a dragon in intensive training cannot also fight in the coli however when its not in intensive training it can fight as normal. [*]Mission - The length of the cooldown could be chosen by the player. Some missions could be similar to some of the gathering options (Hunter, Fishing, Foraging, Insect Collecting) however the dragons would send back a certain minimum number of food points a day (either as the points themselves or as items worth that point) Others could be like Scavenging (send back a random selection of items), Trading (send back a random amount of treasure), etc [/LIST] Just to be clear, Cooldowns shouldn't be added to existing features as it's a waste of coding adding it to already existing features and adding a cooldown to things that do not have a cooldown would upset players; but cooldowns should be added to new features (like adventure) and only where appropriate. ---------------------- Another thing that might be nice to add would be a way to give individual dragons jobs. What follows was brainstormed in a different thread requesting jobs/professions for dragons and Jemadar's comments and opinions helped develop it into its current form. It might be hard to tie into the cooldown aspect of the suggestion as the suggested bonuses are tied to features that do not lend themselves well to a cooldown but it would add more options to game play and could allow players to have their dragons better reflect their lore. Players could choose a particular 'profession' bonus for a dragon based upon what they want that dragon to do. There could be a text box to enter an optional job title/description that would appear next to the selected bonus and if something was written in the box, that would be displayed instead of the profession however if the box was left blank, the selected profession bonus was displayed. Regardless of if a title was added or not there would be a symbol associated with the chosen bonus so someone could tell what bonus a dragon gets irregardless of whatever title was used. The bonuses themselves could be rather broad. [img]https://i.imgur.com/DArtKiM.png[/img] Above is a quick mock up of how it could work. You'd click on the little pencil to change the title. You probably don't need the profession and title subtitles, but I've included it for ease of understanding my little sketch. The profession section reflects the bonus you've selected for a dragon. In this case I gave a dragon 'Alchemy' bonus and in my clan that dragon acts as the potion maker, so I put 'Potion Maker' in the field so it displayed correctly. We can still level up a skill as a clan, but we can also level up individual dragons in a skill, and if we use a dragon with a particular level in that skill there could be a chance at a bonus. Using alchemy as an example, my clan level is currently maxed so I can access any of the recipes when I visit Baldwin. Lets say I also have three dragons trained in alchemy; if I chose to have one of these dragons to tend the cauldron I'd have a small chance of getting two reagents when melting things down (exact percentage dependent on the dragon's level). I could also decide not to choose a particular dragon to tend the cauldron and it would proceed exactly like it currently does. Your first bonus choice should probably be free, but if you want to change it after that you should probably have to pay a small fee to change it (and changing it would reset your level). A scroll could probably be the mechanism to change the bonus, similar to how you use a rename scroll to change a dragon's name. Below are some bonus possibilities. These are based on existing options within the game[LIST] [*]Gathering - Chance at getting an extra roll while gathering [*]Coliseum - Stat increase [*]Alchemy - Possible extra reagent when transmuting [*]Trader - Chance at a refund of some of Swipp materials [*]Collector - Chance at an extra payout when visiting Crim or chance at getting two items when visiting Pinkerton [*]Researcher - Chance at an extra payout when playing Tomo[/list] Fortunately most game features have a natural limit--so for alchemy for example you'd only be able to choose one dragon at a time to tend the cauldron so even if you had ten alchemists--only one could benefit at a time. The same could be applied to gathering tasks--you'd only be able to select one dragon per gather turn so without any well-fed or dominance bonuses--only a maximum of ten dragons could benefit. This will prevent stacking bonuses and such (by assigning every dragon the gathering bonus for example) and if a player chose not to select a dragon in the drop down then no bonus would be applied.

@Dragonsage

with the recovery cooldown would it add to the breeding cooldown? ex: a quest takes 5 days the breeding CD is 20 when the dragon returns it still had a 20 day CD or would it be 15?

Breeding cooldown would be replaced by the recovery cooldown, there wouldn't be two different timers. So whenever you chose to breed a dragon the recovery cooldown would start at 15, 20, 25, 30 or 35 days depending on the rarity level. While it's on cooldown none of the cooldown options would be available.

The cooldown for the different activities would be up to the admins, but some of them [quest, job, etc] I could see having different lengths of time the player could choose (for example a week, two weeks, a month); with longer cooldowns having better rewards or increasing the likely hood of the ultimate reward (in the case of a quest)

For intensive training, its intended primarially to be an alternative for those who cannot use the coli. I'm suggesting that if a dragon is intensive training, that during its cooldown it wouldn't be able to be used in the coli. Once the cooldown is over though it could go right back into the coli

Dragons can already fight in the Coliseum in addition to breeding.

Adventuring would really be helpful, but that probably won't happen until almost a year after registration re-opens; at least that's the sense I get from what they've said about it.

Extending a dragon's cooldown when it gets killed in the Coliseum - and having dragons barred from the Coliseum while they're on cooldown - sounds like an interesting idea.

I wouldn't have thought of discouraging breeding that way, though, because I think that unless breeding is pretty useless - as in a really tanked economy - that's more likely to discourage fighting in the Coliseum than it is to discourage breeding.

A separate short recovery cooldown that keeps a dragon out of the Coliseum (in addition to possibly preventing breeding) so that dragons on breeding cooldown can still fight is something that would make the stakes higher when fighting; I felt that something like that might be what happens when a dragon is "killed" during Adventure (which is "real") rather than the Coliseum (which is practice).

Just dug this thing up again as players are once again complaining about the dragon economy. [quote name="9r7g5h" date="2013-12-09 20:10:23"]Hmmm... I'm not sure. I do and don't like this idea, because the main way I make treasure is by training to exalt.[/quote] You'd still be able to do this since the coli doesn't have a cooldown. The intensive training option is an alternative to the coli for those that either can't use the coli or who'd rather sacrifice a cooldown period to avoid grinding in the coli. The only time you wouldn't be able to use the coli with a dragon on cooldown is if you chose to set that dragon on intensive training [quote name="9r7g5h" date="2013-12-09 20:10:23"]This would make cool downs longer, but no so long that breeding becomes impossible. I still want to breed my dragons and train the hatchlings for exalting, but during the weeks when every nest is full, half my lair is ready to breed, and I have no more room for hatchlings until my current set grows up and is ready to be exalted? Yeah, something like this would help a LOT. And it'd give dragons something else they could do instead of sit and look pretty. So, something like this ^ I'd support. But other wise, not really, no. Breeding is a big part of the game, and taking it out like that doesn't sit right with me.[/quote]This idea wouldn't make breeding impossible or difficult. Whenever a cooldown ends a player would be able to choose what it does: be it breed, go adventuring, go on a quest or mission, etc. If you want to breed; you can breed. If you are short of nests you could send some dragons on a quest or you could just leave them off cooldown until you choose what to do with them.

Support!