Suggestions

[b]EDIT: When I wrote this, I wasn't exactly thinking about how unethical this all sounds and feels, and how a reward system for some dark cosmetics would be kind of weird. I didn't think of it as sacrificing limbs to the gods, but I guess I did say it was an exalting like system, so that misunderstanding is on me. I'd like to support what many people pointed out, apparel to make it look like they are replacing lost wings and limbs, instead of my own idea of chopping off limbs just for lore and looks. So no support on my end either. You can ignore this now, but read on if your curiosity so desires! XD Find another suggestion forum suggesting prosthetics instead or something, because if you give support to a new idea here, then there might be confusion. (I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one with wacky Flight Rising Dreams though. XD)[/b] ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ So, I had this wonky dream last night about Flight rising and stuff, and I was on the website in a roleplay forum with MULTIPLE people there. I'm not going to go over the whole roleplaying dream part, but there was a little conversation that caught my attention. I know there are skins that already do this, but my dream pointed out this really cool idea called [i]"Dusting"[/i] that involved removing dragon body parts to gain a specific look. [i]I'm not here to give solid solutions as to how this might work, so I want opinions on it first before people start to say "no support" right away. It's just a dream idea that I have had for like thirty minutes. So please, I would rather have a constructive discussion rather than a "no support" and one-liner saying they don't like it. Please and thank you. [emoji=familiar heart size=1][/i] [size=4][b]Dusting[/b][/size] What Dusting does is it allows you to remove the limbs of your dragons. In the dream, it worked a lot like exalting where your dragon grows up and you level it and exalt it for money, but instead of exalting the entire dragon, you can remove one or more of the physical limbs on your dragon and receive no more than 500 treasure for doing so. I mainly saw wings being removed in the dream, but limbs might also count. Of course, when dusting, there can be an undo button (maybe you pay a little more than what you received to make it fair, since lore can always change, but exalting cannot, and you are most likely keeping the dragon anyways). If they do exalt a dusted dragon, the amount they received from dusting is subtracted from their exalting rewards so they aren't cheating the system out of its cash. Maybe when dusting they can choose whether to have the removed limbs be marked with scars or just be gone all together. That allows people to choose whether the dragon looks like it was born without limbs or it lost them in battle. (Maybe have it be so the dragon must be at a certain coli level to be able to have the scar option open, since the lore is that they lost that limb in battle. Maybe level ten because that time they are more seasoned warriors and what not). You can dust however many limbs you want (as long as they aren't chopping off every limb to make them completely stubby. Then it's just sad and we don't want that. So only one leg can be removed per dragon) or just one or two limbs, depending on how they want to go about it. To help you understand by what I mean by restricting how many limbs can be removed, I made a list of how many limbs can be removed per body section. [LIST] [*]Tail - cannot remove whole tail, but can remove the tip or half of it. [*]Head - maybe an ear(s) or horn(s), eye might not be removed because flight color reasons [*]Limbs - one out four limbs may be removed (spiral is on the table since they have two sets of arms that look like wings, and I honestly can't tell which is which at times). [*]Wings - both can be removed, especially if born without wings (except for banescales and dragons like them) [/LIST] And most importantly about this feature, is that I want you to be able to pick which side of the dragon's body is having their parts removed. The left leg is going to be in a different place then the right leg, so remember that. Of course apparel and skins can still work for the dragon. Some apparel and skins might make the missing limb look like it was replaced with prosthetics. (like the raven apparel you can get from Joxar looks like it could do a good job of that, and there are the mecha skins too). They have apparel items that make the dragon's body invisible already, so it would be following the same principles of course. Just make one part invisible and there you have it! [size=4][b]Why exalting based system and not scrolls?[/b][/size] The only reason I don't say it should be scrolls is because I feel like there might be too much value being put into scrolls these days. I find a lot of suggestions centering their functions around scrolls, and then I look at the scrolls to find not many of them are easy to access for just about anybody. Even experienced players might have a hard time getting them, and so if I were to suggest it to be a scroll type feature, I would say it should cost no more than a renaming scroll, simply because you are taking [i]AWAY[/i] from your dragon, not [i]ADDING[/i] to it. Same goes for vials. They just have that feeling that they might tip the game's virtual economy overboard into one direction and limit the players more and more as more is added onto the vial and scroll market over time. I don't like the idea of having everything rely on those two specific types of items. So being able to dust in an exalting like manner and be able to pay extra to put things back feels more logical than scrolls do, for both lore and game experience. [size=4][b]But what about other features that change the dragon's looks? What about breeding and their offspring?[/b][/size] Now, I know the newer features, like the Silhouettes and the breed changes, to be coded into this feature and have it work properly will be a pain in the tail, but I just had to get this idea out there while I still had it fresh in my head. So here are MY opinions on what I think are the most important features that might affect the dusting process or vice versa. [u]Silhouette Scrolls[/u] I am still a little uncertain on how those scrolls work, so I can't say for certain what I think. If someone could clarify as to how the scroll works (does it need the opposite gender to swap with or can the dragon's position just change and the gender stays the same????) that would be greatly appreciated. Until I know how it works and gets some opinions on it, I say it's up for debate on my part. [i]But[/i] from I can tell, it just changes the position of the dragon, not the actual ID, profile, and gender of the dragon. So it's just putting them in a new pose. So if that is the case, then I don't think the scrolls will clash all that much? Maybe depending on what limbs you chose to remove (right vs. left), then you might want to be careful with what you are doing? [u]Breed Changes[/u] I think the scrolls should still be used on dusted dragons. Simply because those too are also known to be used for lore after their usage. I've seen many bios include the fact that they were once another dragon breed, and now live as another breed. And since technically the scroll is changing the dna they already have into a different kind of dna, it would make sense they are only altering what is still there, so they shouldn't be able to regrow limbs or take away limbs. So I don't see too much of a problem there lore wise. [u]Breeding[/u] I do not think the absence of limbs should affect the offspring. This feature is mainly for looks and lore, NOT GENETICS. I have tried to describe the system in a way that allows it to be used on any dragon without taking away from the game experience at all. SO ALL LIMBS WILL BE ON THE BABY. Only gown ups can be affected by this feature, and I'm pushing for this feature to toggle-able at any time. Yes, it works like exalting, but no, it does not give you a deadline for you to change your mind by and then leaves you with your dragon stuck like that forever. [u]Auctioning[/u] Like how the silhouette scrolls announcement said, I think it would be a good idea to prohibit dusted dragons from being sold until they are restored to their default mode. So that means all limbs must be restored in order to sell, trade, or gift. It cheats the buyer out of their hard earned cash because they want to restore the dragon's limbs, but didn't get the money from the dusting in the first place. The seller would have taken the dusting money and then sold it, meaning the buyer would have to pay even more than before just to restore the dragon to how they want it to be. And that isn't fair to the buyer. [u]Gene Scrolls and Eye Type Vials[/u] Gene scrolls and eye type vials should still be able to be used on dusted dragons, as long as there is a warning for it before you can click use, and no way to turn this warning off, because people are forgetful. Simply because if you accidentally gene the wrong dragon that has limbs missing, you would have to restore the limbs again in order to see it. (I'm mainly talking about secondary genes on dragons with both wings missing, or glowtails on dragons with short tails). So there should definitely be a warning saying what part of the dragon you are changing and what parts of the dragon have been dusted that might hurt your desired affects. Maybe even show what the dragon will look like if you put the gene change on before you actually put it on! That would be helpful! [u]Scrying Workshop[/u] I'm still unsure on how that might work. At first I thought it would just show the dragon without the dusting, but then I realized people would want to see the dusting when preparing to use the scrolls to change their dragon's appearance and such. So, maybe they have a toggle feature, or better yet, a dressing room feature where they save the scry and then go to the dressing room and remove the limbs there before deciding on a set look? Because I know that looks are practically everything in this game when it comes to people and their dream dragons, so there are many ways this can be achieved or gone about. But I would definitely like a feature to plan ahead for dusted dragons as well. If y'all are willing to discuss it with me about your own opinions or ask mine on features I might be completely forgetting about, please do comment. You read all this way down, so thank you for even getting to this point. That means a lot to me. I am subscribed, so you don't have to ping me, but do ping me if you're talking more directly to me and you want to make sure you are heard. It helps on both ends.

Ethics and the entire mental image of chopping up dragons aside..

How would this work? It sound like you'd need entire redraws for every single gene and breed. It's not that easy to just make things disappear. You remove the front leg on a male snapper, now the image for the obscured hindleg must be drawn. Front facing wing covering hind wing means the entire hindwing must be drawn.

as usual when suggestions like this come up, I recommend just creating or commissioning a UMA to achieve this for the dragons you want to have this look, rather than asking the site artists to re-draw every dragon/pose with slight adjustments

The artwork labor to make this happen would be more than adding an entire new ancient breed. You'd have to redraw the breed poses multiple times to split up the image into layers, along with redraw every gene to do the same, just to remove your dragon's... leg. For 500t. I think most users would probably rather have a new breed if the artists have to go through all that work.

That said, FR dreams are my absolute favorites. I too have had my fair share of oddball FR dreams. This one's absolutely wild, and probably should stay a dream, but thank you for sharing regardless. I will be thinking about this post for the rest of my life.

[quote name="krondar" date="2021-03-06 13:04:49" ] as usual when suggestions like this come up, I recommend just creating or commissioning a UMA to achieve this for the dragons you want to have this look, rather than asking the site artists to re-draw every dragon/pose with slight adjustments [/quote] ^This. But damn that was a wild dream, thank you for sharing it. I've also had some weird FR-related dreams, like the time I dreamt I was a Ridgeback and my snoot honked like a car horn and I could use it to pick locks and stuff. I enjoy knowing I'm not alone in having cracked-out FR dreams.

This is both hilarious and well thought out and I respect that. Unfortunately though the backlash that would come from removing limbs from people's precious dragons they sold unnamed for 3kt would be so, so much worse than exalting drama and wouldn't be worth it just for that even if it wasn't for the art workload and having to figure out how to handle apparel. Modern breeds have "limb rules" that they have to follow for apparel to fit properly.

I'm ngl the 'receive t for getting rid of a bodypart' thing makes me uncomfortable as it brings to mind a certain black market trade... :/

This is really really really gross. I feel like it encourages gore and other messed up stuff to be thrown in dragon bios and the image of that is... ...Absolutely not.

Yeah no support..

Lore wise, makes sense, but it's not.. Yeah.

Selling dragon body parts to the gods is something I think doesn't align with the feel of the site. Any changes like this would require lineart redraws and editing where shading is applied, at minimum, and gene redraws at most. I would support apparel that simulates amputation, but because of the base edits, I don't think that's feasible (given that apparel is just layered on top of the images), and it would need to be extremely limited, like one limb per species/breed, in order to avoid removing parts that would require new lineart/gene redraws after the part is removed.

Also not a fan of making amputation a fancy deity-related thing. It doesn't feel like a respectful way to implement that into the game.