New Chameleon Mounts Report

I know was keeping silence for quite some time, but it looks like I’m back, at least for now.

Markets and merchants have been checked and the table with chameleon mounts prices is updated. It looks like prices went up a little bit, but it can be a sign of inflation — other prices raised a bit, too. What worries me and at the same time makes our own future brighter is the low number of chameleons on sale. Either people stopped breeding as soon as they gained the mounts they wanted for themselves or breeding became low profitable.

Since we don’t have much time breeding is still the most profitable activity in our case. But I’m not so sure about that, cra was able to collect some money in a short time with the help of professions we have.

Anyway prices on mounts go up and the quantity of mounts on sale goes down. I guess this is good news for me and bad for the buyers.

 

Something Unexpected

We were sick for a couple of weeks. But everything looked pretty good:  our houses still were where they were supposed to be, birds were happy, pets were fed, and even enu had no will to grumble… until today.

We returned to our regular routine two-three days ago. Yesterday cra even managed to train about a dozen of birds and soul three archmonsters. Dragoturkeys were placed to the sheds and paddocks and we went to our beds.

Today sram went to her guild paddock and found some guildmate toying with her breeding equipment. It wasn’t nice of that person, but it was bearable enough according to sram. What really surprised her was the absence of five birds. The person who was near the paddock claimed there were only five birds when she arrived. I have no idea whether it is truth or not. Sram doesn’t know that person and can’t say anything. But she really disliked the fact that someone was touching her birds and equipment without asking.

It’s not a money issue. The missing birds aren’t very expensive or impossible to breed: a three purebred goldens (one is load bearer) and two ebony and crimson with capacities (not sure which ones, but not chameleons). These birds are cheap, so there is no much sense in stealing them… unless someone wanted to free room for breeding their own birds.

It is a very unpleasant incident. Sram even started to think about quitting that guild.

Chameleon Prices Guide Update

Finally, I managed to update it.

Dragoturkeys Breeding Basics: Part I

I just realised how much I write about breeding. But I’ve never written about the basics of breeding. I’m going to make amends for this negligence.

Part I. Obtaining the First Pair

Old Realm

Obtaining the first pair of birds in an old realm is pretty easy — just go to the pet sellrooms and find two non neutered dragoturkeys of desired colour. Of course, some breeds can be harder to find than others, and purebred dragoturkeys can be rare and a bit more expensive than the ones with the mixed trees. However regular market check usually results in finding a desired bird.

New Realm

Things are a bit more complicated in a new realms. Breeding is either non-existent or monopolised by a small group of people. All dragoturkeys on sale (if any) are neutered, overpriced, and belong to low generations. Pretty much the only way to obtain a breedable pair is to tame some wild dragoturkeys.

Learning a Taming Spell

Taming is not as easy as it may sound and requires some preparation. First of all, kaliptus flowers and leaves should be collected, 50 of each. Oshar Marif will be glad to teach you a mount taming spell in exchange for this plants, which he needs for his herbal tea. I have no idea why he wants others to bring the ingredients for this tea. He lives in the Koolich’s estate and should have access to them. I guess he is as lazy as one sadida I know… Anyway, in order to talk with Oshar the would-be breeder should go through the caves full of cave gobbals (a special breed of these fluffy creatures, much more dangerous and unpleasant than their relatives in Taneila), encounter various koalaks and Koolich himself. And, of course, before it all becomes possible the adventures must find their way through Wild Canyon, which can be incredibly annoying if they can’t dodge aggressive monsters.

Koolich is not that hard to defeat if the team is able to deal with cave gobbals fast, when buffed by their master these creatures can run fast and hit hard. It’s also important to avoid being linear to old smoker as he can attract the victim and transform her into a gobkool (unfortunately harmless).

I believe the best strategy for this dungeon is to rely on my favourite immobilisation. It can be done two ways: real immobilisation using spells (sadida and cra will be the best for this task) or blocking the movements by surrounding Koolich with summons. As Koolich can’t deal damage (I heard he was a pacifist) any summon will do. The former method is still better, as nothing will be blocking the sight and everyone will be able to hit Mr. Pacifist. However, the second method works pretty good if the team relies on 3-4 heavy hitter.

Capturing a Wild Dragoturkey

When the taming spell is aquired it is time to capture some birds. Wild dragoturkeys live on Koalak Mountain and in Amakna, Scaraleaf Plain. Scaraleaf plain seems more accessible, but golden dragoturkeys can’t be found there and any breeder will won’t (and need) to have them.

Taming spell is not the only condition to capture a wild mount. A caster should also have simple capturing net equipped (it is easily obtainable — Smakko, near Breeder’s Village zaap sells nets for reasonable 10 kamas). Also the caster should not have any mount following, i.e. each captured dragoturkey should be placed to a shed before attempting to tame another one.

Wild ginger and almond dragoturkeys aren’t a real challenge. It is not so for wild golden dragoturkey. This mount is a local boss, it’s faster than the others, has much more stamina and agility. Immobilising with spells is impossible (even with the all sadida team), and the only way to do it is to surround it. Surrounding is the best tactics, as dragoturkeys can unbewitch spells increasing range and tend to run away.

Needless to say that taming spell doesn’t guarantee mount’s capture from the first try. Several attempts may be needed to achieve a result. Therefore it is better to attack big dragoturkeys groups and have as many people with the spell and nets as possible — the chances to tame a mount significantly will be significantly higher.

The more mounts are captured the faster breeding will go, so I would recommend not to stop after 2-3 captured mounts. It is also important to remember that wild dragoturkeys, unlike domesticated ones, can be mated only once. One more moment to consider is inability to determine the dragoturkey’s gender prior to its taming. A beginner breeder should be prepared to spend quite some time fighting birds.

Chameleon Breeding Strategies

Chameleon mounts

The question about chameleons breeding is quite popular one. No wonder it is: chameleons are still pretty rare, especially the ones of high generation.

So, how to build your own chameleon mount flock?

Obtaining the very first chameleon

Chameleon capacity unlike others can’t appear randomly, therefore first of all at least one mount with this capacity is needed. At the moment it’s not hard to buy a breedable chameleon in Bonta sellrooms. I would recommend to get a low generation, preferably male, one. There are several reasons why at the initial stage low generation (for example, ginger) mounts are better:

• they are cheap;
• they are much faster to train;
• male mounts are better than female because they don’t have to wait for the next mating till their chickens hatch;
• low generation mounts can be comfortably bred in public paddocks.

Laying the foundation

The next step is fast increase of chameleon mounts number. At this stage the quantity is much more important than quality, i.e. specific breed or purity of the line. The best available option are ginger and almond mounts: they have the shortest pregnancy time, do not require expensive machines to train, and can be made fertile in a couple of days of lazy breeding in public paddocks.

The end of this phase depends on the size of the flock in whole (chameleons and non-chameleons), breeding plans, and number of available breeding slots. However, I believe it is better to have at least five ginger or almond female chameleons before moving further.

For those who do not purify the lines and mate mounts randomly it may be a good idea to mate low generation female chameleons with higher generation mounts right from the beginning. And male chameleons in this case should be mated with low generation females for the faster results.

Chameleon rainbow

With five-ten female chameleons the foundation of the chameleon flock is solid enough to proceed to the next stage — obtaining chameleons of the desired colours. There is not much to say about it, the process is the same as for regular mounts, except the chances to succeed are much lower.

Here the breeder may choose one of two ways: to purify chameleons or not to. Both ways have their pros and cons.

Pure breeds

Pros:

• guaranteed colour of the chickens
• higher sale price if sold breedable even for low generation breeds
• eaiser to breed for capacities if the lines are already purified

Cons:

• hard to obtain (purebred mounts are rarely sold on the market and usually have to be obtained by breeding)
• require more time for breeding as can be mated only with other purebred mounts
• very hard to breed for capacities at the initial stages when purifying is required
• high time and effort investments needed
• private paddocks are required for commercial breeding of high generation mounts

“Interesting” pedigree

Pros:

• faster to breed as can be mate with whatever partner is ready
• can be mated with low generation females who have shorter pregnancy period

Cons:

• no control over the colour of the chickens — breeding becomes a gamble
• lower sale prices on breedable mounts
• extremely low probability to obtain a mount with certain capacity and colour
• high number of low profit mounts

Purified lines give more reliable and predictable results, but require much more time and effort. Mounts with mixed ancestor trees provide faster results, but tend to surprise the breeder.

It’s up to a breeder to choose the strategy that suits the best.

Some Stray Thoughts about Chameleons

I thought I would never say it. But it looks like we got too many chameleons: they don’t help with breeding and use too much shed space… Perhaps sadi should start to seriously consider selling all chameleons with bad trees.

Another Update on Chameleon Mounts Prices

Finally I found time to update the table with prices on chameleons.

There are three main trends on chameleon market:

• prices go down for all breeds;
• low generation mounts disappear from  sellrooms;
• majority of chameleon breeders focus on X generation mounts (plum and emerald stripes).

In other words nothing unexpected has happened.

Lucky Brood

Despite our inability to tend to birds for almost a week the damage was relatively insignificant: only about 15 eggs didn’t hatch. We were expecting heavier losses, but we were lucky.

Amusingly we didn’t run out of luck when almost all chickens hatched and got two absolutely new chameleon breeds: almond (male and female chickens!) and ivory and ebony (only one chicken, but half purebred). Moreover with this brood the purifying of three breeds had been finished as well.

This is a huge progress. However, it’s still not enough to open fully functional chameleon pre-order business. But we’ll be there one day, no doubts!

Purchase

Our new guild paddock.

It’s not big — only 10 mounts can be trained simultaneously. However, it’s near the Bonta gates, the neighbours seem to be nice, and the price was almost right. Well, the price for paddocks is never right unless you buy them from government, but it doesn’t happen often.

Cra is happy. And this is the most important thing. Moreover, this purchase won’t affect me as dragoturkeys trainer, as cra prefers to train her chickens herself. So, I guess, I’m happy, too.

A Fly in the Ointment

Breeding can be frustrating. Breeding for capacities is frustrating. Breeding chameleons is frustration itself. You can wait months for the particular results and get nothing. And I mean it, nothing.

Chameleon capacity unlike others can be only inherited from parents, it doesn’t appear randomly. Therefore if one is unlucky enough to fail all 20 attempts of obtaining a chameleon baby, there is no other way but to get another chameleon mount. The latter can be tricky if we are talking about unpopular and high generation dragoturkeys.

I shouldn’t be complaining: chameleons breeding prospers. Nonetheless, I feel cheated and frustrated. Six months of works was required to obtain purebred turquoise chameleon. Six long months, even we got almost purebred turquoise chameleon and mated it only with other purebred mounts. Of course, now all of us are happy, but there is a quiet voice at the back of my head asking how much time will pass before we achieve our breeding goals, two, three, four years more?