As someone who doesn't like nor own Vorpas this is sure something...
It's quite hard for new players to afford the breeding fee and they probably don't own 6vis vorpas or 6c vorpas at all, so this seems to only aim for players that played quite a while?

You need female Sylvorpas and not only one but a whole stable, just to even try for any kind of prize pool.

If you try to get to the lowest prize pool you'll have to have a minimum of 12 breedings with 5 visible traits on the outcome, so this would mean a breeding fee of 80.000 Gold if you're 100% lucky every time.
Since nobody is that lucky you'd rather add another 80.000 to that, where you're at 160k Gold and even that's a very lucky case. This only counts 12 female sylvorpas and one round of breedings of course, so going for even more within the given time you'd spend half a fortune on something that is purely luck / percentage based and has nothing to do with actual player interaction besides clicking the button "breed".
(I'm not including the lucky case of an actual 6vis here.)

One Mystery Sculpting Catalyst is ~5.000 Gold, a map is something like 90k, just looking at the lowest prize pool. It would be easier - again, only for the lowest pool since I don't even own enough vorpas to aim for a higher one - to just buy the items from the broker instead of hoping to pay a little less with the help of this forum game.

It doesn't really feel rewarding to enter this without having 50-60 vorpas with a lot of carries or visibles and without having a lot of Gold to even pay the fee.
Getting to the top prize tier with 100% luck would "only" need 4 6visible offsprings, but that'll probably not be the case at all.
Otherwise you'll have to breed 72 5 visibles or 90 4 visibles or 120 3 visibles ooor 180 2 visibles... All that within 5 breeding rounds.

Some math about what I stated above:

(This has been created by @Tigress, who I've talked to about posting this thread in the first place.)

Data from a previous fest has been collected by Tigress, the post can be found here.
They also started to add up the money they've payed for this round and I'd like to include that one too, can be found here.
The amount of money you have to pay and the amount of unwanted pets that only have been breed for this purpose won't probably be that high due to the high breeding fee, but it's still something I'd like to mention at this point, since I myself will not keep any of the pets I breed during the game itself.

I didn't own any Sylvorpa and I had to buy some to participate, ofc non of the bought ones were 6Visibles or 6Carried, which reduces the chance to actually get a 6vis outcome significally.
I've made a little list of what I've paid so far as someone whos account isn't a year old and didn't own a single Sylvorpa before:



Also:
The Fest has been running for quite a while now, the demand and worth of the prizes that are listed (not including the chance on the avatar dragon) has dropped significantly and most people have already completed the sculptures they wanted to create, have completed the fundle and / or are simply not looking for more things to grow or to buy.
If this Game would've been held earlier than close to the end of the fest it would've been way more engaging to enter and participate in it.

I'd love to participate in more forum games, but this feels like a gamble where you're getting barely half the worth back of what you've put into it and it would be nice to have games like this start earlier and to make it more accessible for all players, not only those with a mountain of gold and those who have had Sylvorpa in the first place.

(I'm also sorry for grammar or general mistakes, english isn't my first language.)

I agree with all the points made! I'm personally only participating for the avvie item offered in the High Stakes breeding but even then I don't feel I'll be able to win it bc of the low chances of breeding a 6v. I only have one suitable female vorp (5v 1c) that I snagged off the AS when the game first dropped. That vorp was the cheapest at 200k and last I checked the only similar female left was priced at 1mil. So newer players also have that barrier of entry ahead of them since they likely don't have a good vorp already.


The way the points are given in High Stakes are rather odd to me too. A 6v is always 100 points but everything under 6 is 1v = 1 point. So a 5v is only 5 points? A much better point system imo would be 1v = 10 points. It feels much more fair and wouldn't require so much mass breeding.

To add to this point, I've been a player for less than a year (1 year anniversary coming up in Sept!) and while I do have some breeding projects with Sylvorpa, I do not possess a 6vis pet yet. So I'm not even bothering to enter, my chances of winning or even getting close to the lowest tier prizes is non-existent and I certainly have no shot at 6vis since I only have a few female vorpas with 5 traits (vis and carried).

The takeaway I had from this game is: No newbies, please.

Felt bad.

Maybe a nice way to keep the game concept but make it more newbie friendly would be to change up the two game types more. Atm both games are geared toward older players. Perhaps having the High Stakes be geared toward older players and the normal version geared towards newbies (lower vis/carry requirements) would be a good way to mitigate this.

Link: https://www.sylestia.com/forums/?thread=103700&page=1#4 Author: Everlost Time Posted: 8/30/2022 at 10:01 AM Maybe a nice way to keep the game concept but make it more newbie friendly would be to change up the two game types more. Atm both games are geared toward older players. Perhaps having the High Stakes be geared toward older players and the normal version geared towards newbies (lower vis/carry requirements) would be a good way to mitigate this.

I would also suggest more than one possible pet. The last game was only Luffox, I didn't even have a Luffox breed project going yet. This time it's only Sylvorpa, which I do have two projects that are in progress but I'm no where near 6 traits yet.

But I /do/ have several other pets with 6 traits (including my very first 6vis pet!). Faelora, Nixi, Qitari, Ferrikki, and Lupora. Maybe rather than have just one type of pet, have two or three. Can even restrict it to 'pick one breed of pet' if preferred to avoid people entering with all three pets.

For example, if this one had included, say, Sylvorpa and Qitari, I could have easily entered on Qitari.

Exactly that, Everlost.

I myself didn't own a single Sylvorpa before and thus I had to buy some and the prices went trough the roof within a few hours. Nothing I didn't expect, tho. Some people do profit from having a ton of Sylvorpas in two ways during this game, which makes it even more of a "Meh :/" moment for me.

To try to get to the top tier prizes requires like 1million in breeding fee alone if you're unlucky and getting a 6v from a 6v and 6c is already a gamble on itself :'D

10pts for 1v would allow newbies to try for the pools, since that would mean you could even enter with your 2c vorpa lady and could score 20 pts if lucky. Still needs a lot of luck to get to the prizes, but it'll be less of a money sink and less frustrating.

Thank you for the input <3

Sadly have to agree to this, yes.

My 1 year will be in October and while I breed a ton of pets myself, I didn't manage to get a single 6vis by my own, yet alone a Sylvorpa.

Maybe it'll help to talk about that in this thread, maybe it doesn't... But we probably only know after giving it a try. :'D

We may be new but we're also enthusiastic and enjoy the game, too. Feels bad to be excluded from content, no reason not to speak our minds on the matter. :)

^ I agree with this

Honestly, even as someone who adores sylvorpa and has many of them, I only have 3 with 6vis. I have others that are able to join, but even from the last event where I had numerous things I could breed, I only ended up with (I think) 20 points or so from the ones I bred. I only really enter for the participation prizes and the chance of getting offspring I will use in the future--for someone who doesn't want either, the game is something to ignore completely.

I like the idea of having more options, but it honestly will just make more work for you guys and will have the same problem of such a low chance of getting 6vis that you'd have to spend a small fortune just to win any prize.

I think the solution proposed above for one specifically aimed at newer folks who can't spend a fortune is worth a shot. But I also think that the point system should be reworked a little, because even as an older player with a pretty sustainable amount of gold, I still can't spend a fortune trying to participate more than a handful of times. 1 point per visible trait is a fair way to judge, but it's hard to want to participate when I need 60 just for the lowest guaranteed prize.

Agreeing-

On the points, it IS definitely strange that it's "1 point per vis unless you somehow manage jackpot and get 6v", given that that does mean you'd almost 100% require a lot of breeding to even hit the lowest tier of prize (and plenty of people would- and do- have zero chance at getting a 6v because they just plain don't have any of the breeding species that have at least a carry in all slots, and sales get cleared out basically entirely really fast.
I just spent 400k to buy one 5v1c vorp because anything cheaper that had all slots filled was already cleared out of AS by the time I saw the game/contest drop because the highest vis female vorp I even own other than that is a single 3v (the rest are all 2v or 1v2c or less))

So, definitely think the points system need a rework- maybe 5 per vis with 6v remaining 'jackpot' points rather than 1 point per 1 vis? (making 5v 25 points, and 6v still being 100?)
Then you'd only need to get lucky and roll three 4-5vs to get the lowest tier prize, or four 3v, rather than twelve 5v or twenty 3v.
Even raising the points to just 2 per vis would be better than 1=1

As it is, it uh. Definitely feels VERY biased against newbies as people have said. Newbies are a) unlikely to have any vorps with most or all trait slots filled, b) unlikely to have the gold to participate many times, which compound together to make c) definitely don't have the funds to breed enough low-vis vorps in order to get enough points to get any of the prizes (which leaves them with the low chance of getting the raffle draw)

Like, I assume this is developed with the intent of being a gold sink or something but still. Need a balance of "you need to spend gold to achieve" and "newbies can reasonably participate" in the prize tier zone, I think? Have it so a newbie can at least have a decent chance at low points prizes, while people who have more resources can spend bonkers amounts aiming for the high points prizes

(also, so many offspring lying around after. Release Boards Every Fest Is A Good Idea Actually?)


Maybe if there's going to be breeding games with only one species, it should be announced like, a month ahead? That way there's space for at least one generation of breeding/preparation.