Posts by froglady

Yes, the "pedigree" is still in development. Exterminans posted the link to the prototype so we could see what it currently looks like. It's a teaser, but it will eventually be linked from your plant's page.

I hate abandoning plants, because I just know that the ones I abandon will be the colors I don't have already. I give away all my duplicates (except those needed for holiday plants) in the giveaway thread. So I don't hate giving away plants I don't want, I just hate dumping plants I might want once they're grown up while they're still seeds because I need the pot space for event plants.

I'm not so much impatient as curious. I just know that the minute I fill up my flowerpots, Murphy's Law will kick in and the event will launch. Then I'll be caught with my slots full, and I hate abandoning plants. So if we had a time frame, we could plan when to have our pots empty. I think the place is deserted because everyone just jumps on to see if the event has started or there's been an announcement, then goes away and waits some more with empty pots and no reason to play games or do anything.

I expect to see it over the Labor Day weekend (next weekend, for those not in the US) or even the weekend after that. It'll be wonderful no matter when it is.

Lavandula officinalis is the old name. The new specific name is angustifolia. And being the most common and widely-grown type of lavender, it's also the target of most hybridizers. The varieties come in many colors and sizes now. The white, pink and darker lavender colors were actually originally found as recessive color morphs, but have been bred into garden varieties, much as "chocolate" Labrador retrievers (which are technically "liver" colored) were once just rare occurrences in "normal" litters of black and yellow. They caught public fancy and suddenly breeders were actively making matches of parents to maximize their chances of getting chocolates in the litter.

The gardens around the facility where I work have all different kinds of lavender. Dark, light, pink, white, tall and leggy, short and shrubby...lavender is actually a whole genus of related plants, somewhere around 30 if I remember correctly. I also seem to recall seeing a yellow form somewhere, if it's not just my senile imagination.

How about "The Rose" by the Divine Miss M (Bette Midler, for those of you unfamiliar with the nickname)?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR6okRuOLc8

But everyone can already see all the variations in the thread in the forum if they wish. Perhaps we could have instead of the compendium a "wish list" that everyone could see. That would have the advantage that we could list the number of each we'd like as well (some people want two or three of each color variation of each plant, for instance). And us independent types that want the challenge of collecting all ourselves could leave our wishlist blank.

Ich spreche Deutsch. At least enough to probably translate. English is my first language, so I could proofread as well. I'll be off this weekend, so let me know.

I joined as froglady. Not quite sure it's my cup of tea. I like these games like Flowergame where I can stop in just a few minutes a day and a bit longer once or twice a week, and only if I have time. I quit a bunch of time-consuming games already, as my life is too hectic to keep up with them. We'll see.

I've now got three bred roses, after having raised six parentless seeds to breeding age. Here they are:

pink x orange:

red x red:

lilac x yellow:

Can't wait to see them grow up, even if they're all just duplicates. The waiting is exciting, anyway!

Elery, the roses are permanent, like tulips and geraniums. You will be able to get them any time. So you have plenty of time to collect all, not like marvel fern. They are called "July's plant" because that's the new permanent plant added for July (we get one every month--how lucky are we to have something new to look forward to twelve times a year plus holidays).

I had a blue one from last year. I now have 6 blue and 2 red with one left to sprout. I managed to breed 4 plants 1 blue 2 red 1 unknown so far. Well, must have goal for next year.

Well, I now have a whole army of blue marvel ferns. *Sigh*. I still have 3 seeds and two sprouts, so still clinging to some hope for another color. Even my bred seeds have been blue. Ah, well, a goal for next year, like the burning Christmas tree.

I like the option of changing the color of a plant. I wouldn't use it, because part of the fun for me is trying to get them all myself. I don't like the "crystal ball" thing, though. I think it will cause more plants being picked up and abandoned in search of a particular color. If you can change the color once it's grown, there's no need to find out what the color is before it's grown.
The endless watering can is a nice idea, though I think it would be better to just reduce the rate of decrease of sun and water on the garden instead. Then you still have to water, just not as much a day, maybe even little enough that you could play the games to rain on the garden a couple of times instead of having to use the watering can at all.
The description/sign is an OK idea. Lots of people like that sort of thing.
I see a bump in the road with wiping plant histories. #1 Why is it even necessary if the players here are really just out to relax and there's no status attached to "parentless" plants in your garden? #2 What about the offspring history of the parents? Would that plant disappear from them, too? Players who are keeping track of breeding statistics would have their whole project messed up by someone wiping the history of a gift plant to increase their status, especially if the "pedigrees" are expanded, as was hinted at once before.
I suggested that the extra seed slot be a "landing spot" for bred seeds mainly for 2 reasons: not many people breed their plants, as they only want parentless plants and it would be mainly useful during holidays, when you could pick up 3 seeds from the garden and still breed your last years' plants to try to get a bred-only color. So it would probably yield only one or two extra event plants per holiday, according to whether you had a pair from last year to breed or not. A permanent extra seed spot for wild garden seeds would, indeed, increase your plant production quite a bit.

My meaning exactly. If someone new came in and had a bigger variety of flowers in their garden in a months' time than people who had been here 2-3 years, it would be discouraging to those loyal players who have progressed through their own patience and perserverance. Especially if the game currency had such powerful perks associated with it that it became something people would trade even their only event plant from last year for. A power player who had money to throw around could have every variety of every plant very quickly if the purchased advantages were too great.
I do understand the need for paying players. Hosting a game isn't cheap. I just worry about too much power attending to the payment. I had another friend recently revamp her game and move it totally to another layout with a different domain name and change the perks to affect only one "pet", with a limited number useable on each one because her game got so out of whack. Things she thought would be small advantages were abused by unscrupulous players to "rule" the game. Again, it took the defection of about half her 5-year-long players to wake her up. In her case, the cash shop had been there since the beginning, but the power players discovered the game and figured out ways to use the paid perks that no one else had even imagined (they are good at that).
Hence my suggestion that only small perks attend to the paying player. Still valuable, but not so powerful that other players feel they are deprived of the same gameplay as paying players. It would be enough for me to subscribe to have my plants watered and my sunshine bright for twice as long, have my choice of minigames when I click, have an extra seed slot for a bred seed, have more plant spaces in my display cases and have no ads. But giving people the option to buy every variety of every plant or raise them up in 30 minutes (given enough money) instead of 8 days would seem a bit much to me. The cash shop seems to work best when it's little extras for paid subscriptions instead of individual items that can be bought to do specific things. Just my two cents' from a browser game player with 10+ years experience and probably 100+ game accounts over that time.

Too bad about Idril's vacation. I hope it turns out to not be the week of the event (or the event is long enough to catch the beginning or end). We'll know more when the surprise is ready and the date is announced.
I wish Nephele could make her crystal ball a bit larger It certainly does look like a fairy-tale setting.

I just had a good friend close his game after 9 years on the web because he opened up a cash shop 2 years ago. Immediately you had the "whales" troop in and swamp everyone else. There were 3 young men with more money than brains who swept onto the site, threw a couple thousand dollars real US money each at it trying to outdo each other and became the top 3 players on the game. No one could even compete, not even the players that had been in since the beginning. So the "oldies" got discouraged and quit. Then the moneybags players got bored, having conquered the game and proved their manliness by running off all the most loyal old players, so they set off in search of another game to buy their way to the top in.
I've seen cash shops work, but only when they were set up to allow small gameplay "perks" like no ads or slower emptying of water and sun or more slots in your display cases (Wintergarden, Atrium, etc.) One extra pot might not be too bad, either, but I'd really be against anything that allowed you to get a seed from the garden and make it grow faster. Some folks with bottomless pockets would be having 30-40 adult event plants the first day.
I'm on the fence about having the currency be transferrable. There are good and bad points to that. Good: anyone can buy the coins from another player for game money. Bad: you have to have game money to buy them with (which we don't). Otherwise, you've got people trading plants for the coins, and the coin sellers would only be willing to do that if the plants can't be gotten any other way (limited edition).

My favorite flowers in the garden in July have always been Tiger Lilies and Acidanthera (also called Peacock Orchids, though they are really a small gladiolus). In my home area of Appalachia, Chicory also blooms in midsummer. I think it's a bit too similar to Cornflower, which we already have. But the big late July/August/September show along the roadsides in marshy places is the Rose Mallow. It's a hardy form of Hibiscus that volunteers itself year after year to make Ohio and West Virginia country ditches look like Hawaii. They grow in huge groups with big showy blooms in either mid-pink with darker veins running through the petals or velvety deep red or snowy white with or without a bright red "eye" in the center. Gorgeous. The hybridizers have had a field day concocting more flashy colors than you find in the wild, but I still like the native colors best.

Oh, so you mean that it's more like the Tulip X Dahlia gets you either a Tulip or a Dahlia, but not a new species? I don't really see the sense in that, as you can catch those seeds year round from the Wild Garden. Unless, like you said, people want to breed 100 generations of plants just as a hobby. I think that rather unlikely, as folks are always so fussy/picky here about whether their plants have parents or not. Plus we're always hearing about how perturbed everyone is to have all their slots locked up when an event hits. I guess it would be something to add value to the game for those who have all plants in all varieties.

I wonder what the OP had in mind when it was posted?