#auraboa is fine

[judithan-fr]

The fr auraboa situation feels like the most concentrated level of bad faith and virtue signalling I've seen in recent years. The idea that any level of non-european or non-asian inspiration has to go through a vetting process lest it be deemed problematic is just... Idk it feels silly. "You have to remove it because it vaguely looks like something native american" as if we don't have things in fr based on Chinese, Irish, Japanese, etc cultures that staff (probably) isn't a part of and has been at one point or another a persecuted people.

Like the whole thing too of "the story feels condescending that they're so alienated and 'exotic' and removed from civilization" like that's the whole thing with ancient breeds. That's the whole point. They're removed from society because Undel is still drawing them and concepting them into existence. You can't just pretend that the fictional part is the whole story and act like it is. I get it's an imagination simulator but there's real people behind the veil. Real people that can't know everything.

Yeah they should probably hire some kind of sensitivity hr staff but that's also under the assumption that that staff member would be a completely worldly historian who knows every conflict about everything ever and can expertly navigate them away from anything remotely wrong on the writing table.

Like this all feels like a huge expectation from people who have no accountability for their claims.

[dumpsterf11re]

i promise i will be normal about them soon but for now i made a couple fun seasonal scries

[a-ridgeback]

thinking about that forum post that was like "its ok that the ancients are boring and dont push boundaries because the terts make up for it😃" i think having to use a cool tert to make a dragon interesting to look at and identifiable as an ancient means that the design is kinda bad. people harp on the fact that staff didnt say that every ancient was gonna push boundaries but literally what is the point of an ancient if its just gonna be basically a modern but worse.

"we're bringing you dragons that DONT have to follow the rules!!! heres a dragon with four limbs and wings. heres a dragon with four limbs and wings. heres a dragon with-"

[rhythmantics]

more ancient+'s (first set here), this time featuring aethers, sandsurges, banescales (a second time), and dusthides

For the aether, I just wanted to really lean into the mothiness... and make a hatchling that doesn't hide its extra pair of legs. seriously, why does the actual aether hatchling hide its extra pair of legs... that's like, the Whole Point. I also thought it'd be fun to play with primary/secondary placement, so the aether's wings actually use its primary

Sandsurges, uhhh.... this is the most radical departure from the canon, because I kind of can't justify anything about the canon sandsurges. If they're supposed to be burrowers, why do they have cheetah bodies? Or the big clunky horns? And if they're supposed to be sand sharks, why do they have TWO sails when one would sell the shark-ness more? So this version features big mole mitts and monitor bod, with a single really BIG sail.

Banescale (2) - just trying to lean into (what i think) was the theme of the banescales, which is that they're "demonic" dragons compared to coatls being "angelic". So made the tail more obviously a trident and gave it crazy little grabby hands on its wings, and tore them up like aberrations. it turned out looking a lot like a man. sorry.

Dusthides... I'm not really sure... what's going on with the canon dusthides? they look like they're trying to be isopods and pangolins and armadillos. So here's my take on that. The armor plates are prehensile and can fold upwards. this is pretty much just a vestigial feature of them originally being wings because it's not like they can fly with them lol. again experimenting with secondary placement by having the armored legs, head, and tail tip be the secondary. it doesn't curl up into a perfect ball, but neither do pangolins. i also made it fluffy because i like fluffy dragons. it can't wear clothes anyway. it ended up turning out kind of centipede-y

i feel like auraboas and aberrations are like... fine. Any changes i would make to them would be pretty minimal (mostly I just want shrinkage on the auraboa wings and more exciting prim/sec placement on the abes) so i'm probably not going to do ancient+'s of them

[aquilegiaformosa]

okay, i’m gonna say it:

i’m pretty sure staff dropped Dusties with a smaller gene pool to minimize errors, whether that be through “less genes = less mistakes = shorter cleanup” or they had less genes and therefor could pay more attention to the ones they dropped and so they dropped with less errors in general. pretty sure more will be coming soon (probably after the Aether expansion). but y’all forgot you wanted to complain about eight hundred gene errors, and decided to complain that they scaled back

a modern could not have that tail. or those claws. please stop with the “this could have been a modern—” well it’s not a modern, and it’s totally fine for staff to choose to make it an ancient. and also you’re annoying

i’m putting the term “brachycephalic” on the high shelf until y’all learn how to use it correctly

wasn’t everybody JUST crying about how too many dragons were fluffy? yeah? i’m fucking tired

“everything sucks lately” make your own website then. you’ll soon learn how expensive and time-consuming and exhausting and thankless it is. and how impossible it is to please everyone

some of you are so mean actually. “i’d rather wait five years for a modern than be given this slop” GO MAKE UR OWN DAMN SITE THEN SO THE NORMAL PEOPLE CAN CONTINUE HAVING FUN IN PEACE. “SLOP”???? DO YOU EVEN READ YOUR OWN WORDS

no you don’t have to love everything. but you could stop being an entitled ass at any time!

“no lore??” well. you shat all over the last couple lore drops and nitpicked a bunch of stuff (with only the Auraboa fiasco deserving of any of it, and y’all were still pissed as hell after it was fixed). and you also went and nitpicked the breed page for Dusties and kept hounding on it, again, even after it was fixed. so yeah. no fuckin lore for you

after today i literally would not be surprised if staff gave up on the site within the next year. the loud portions of the userbase are the rudest, most ungrateful, childish, and entitled humans i’ve seen outside of working at a fucking Starbucks, and guess what? i loved myself and quit working at Starbucks

thanks for dragging the day down, you bratty assholes

[dramarising-replacement]

Can we appreciate Fathoms now? Don't get me wrong I feel like they looked pretty different in the event and the npc art, but they're so cute and all the "oh they're just a mix of other breeds" thing never felt right to me, considering how many other(especially recent, hello auraboa) dragons feel that way. Literally the only thing I can think of besides the inevitable gene issues(which do suck don't get me wrong but I'm talking bout the dragons designs themselves) is that they look kinda like undertides in the male pose which, I mean, duh. There's absolutely issues with staff stuff RN and how they're pumping stuff out, but the design itself is fine. Most complaints about designs tend to boil down to "don't make sense/just look like this mixed with this" in general which. Isn't much of a reasonable complaint in any way when you aren't happy with the designs you are getting and are clamoring for new, better ones, but also want the devs to slow down. I dunno I'm just tired of seeing the stupidest takes in the tags ig. 

[saltminerising]

seeing the drama go down about the auraboa lore has made me super anxious. as a writer and also an autistic person, it can be hard to fully know and prepare for every single issue ahead of time, and it worries me that i’ll accidentally write something problematic into my own lore on flight rising without realizing it. (also i don’t have the funds to personally hire a sensitivity reader for all my flight rising lore.) it makes me wonder if one day i’ll write something and get cancelled and called racist for something i didn’t intend for it to come across that way at all, despite my best efforts to be cognizant of such things.

i’m not saying people shouldn’t call out these things. as a writer, there’s a lot of pressure to perform, but also the responsibility to get things right, to not spread misinformation or perpetuate harmful stereotypes. but i really think some compassion should be extended to the other side too, that people are human and they do make mistakes, unintentionally causing hurt. should flight rising hire sensitivity readers? absolutely. should they fix and change the issues present within the lore? absolutely. but i also don’t think they intended to belittle or dehumanize a group of people with their recent lore, either.

i know i’ve certainly taken the time to rewrite entire chunks of my own lore when something just felt… off to me for whatever reason. and i think that’s something that no author should be afraid to do. but the sheer hostility that comes from some people can be really daunting and anxiety-inducing. discouraging, even. to some extent, it makes me personally wonder if i should even try to tell stories when people try to find as much fault as possible in them, and aggressively tear them down rather than offering constructive criticism. it creates an environment of hostility rather than a learning space where we can all be better people.

i’m not talking about the folks who have valid criticisms, and voiced those things politely and with respect, who have brought up real concerns. that should by all means get discussed and acknowledged. i’m talking about the ones who are going overboard and getting angry at staff and just straight up calling them extremely racist. not that i’m defending racism. of course not. just that i think being that as accusatory as possible doesn’t get us anywhere other than high tension and mob mentality.

i also think there are definitely people who are being dismissive of these concerns as well, and those folks need to back down too. (especially that individual who posted a baby image as a reply to what an individual stated. that’s such a childish thing to do. please be better than that.) i’m just sad to see some people can’t remain civil about these topics, i guess. i feel like, we’re all people here, we all bleed the same, we all make mistakes. perhaps a little bit of empathy would go a long way from both sides of the equation.

on another note. for the folks who are being equally dismissive of the phobias that genes like medusa and scuttle trigger: people are people, and what bothers one person might not upset another. expecting everyone to feel the same way, and to not have a certain trigger because it doesn’t personally bother you is a very narrow-minded way of thinking. let people exist in the way that they do without making them feel unheard and unseen, as though they are ridiculous or foolish. they’re not.

i love these genes myself, but i can understand if someone else was unnerved by them, because the world is a larger place than my own narrow perception of it. again, compassion and empathy go a long way. please don’t be unkind to the folks who may be dealing with things you are not. wouldn’t you appreciate it if someone was as understanding about the things that upset you?

anyways. sorry for rambling. i’m sure most of you will think this is too much to read, and that’s fine too. i can understand that. regardless of whether you did or not, i hope you all have a good week. rest, hydrate, and take care of yourselves.

[cosmologicalrising]

thoughts on the breed + poses under the cut! some positive, some negative, just my opinions

overall, i'm kind of... eh. i think it hasn't really set in for me yet that these are moderns. i got so used to ancients getting released that i forgot how huge of a deal it is to get a new modern LMAO

so, while i'm trying to kick my habit of judging new breeds based on the new line-breaking terts they get, i think i like these guys! as of right now i like imperials more, and imps aren't really at the top of my favorites list, so they're not at the bottom but they're definitely not at the top.

i'm kind of disappointed with the m pose. the ears don't stick out of the silhouette, and neither do the back legs, so trying to put apparel on either of those two places kind of ends up with a mess. i know the pose is swimming (which i do like), but it also kind of looks to me like the males are all stuck in a glue trap :'D though i WILL say i love how you can see the segmented wings in this pose better. the wings are one of the best parts about this breed imo

BUT the F pose though..... IT'S REALLY GOOD!!!!!! the ears stick out of the silhouette, the wings are folded with some perspective but you can still use apparel on them fine, and all of the legs are visible and sticking out. i like that their mouths are open, too. AND seraph looks FANTASTIC on this pose!!! i noticed the m pose makes seraph look a little less feathery.

hatchling pose is fucking adorable and i love it. ALTHOUGH the silhouette again is like.... hoo boy. it took me a solid minute to figure out what parts of the dragon were attached where when looking at the hatchling pose. it's kind of suffering from the same issue as auraboas, where there's just so much Stuff going on that it all gets squished together and hard to parse. also, if you don't register their head as being lower than their neck, it looks like they have a dialga head that sticks waaaaay back lol

i think i'll warm up to this breed more as i see more and more of them with good outfits and such. we're kind of in the first day stage where everyone has gen1s with funky colors, so i'm looking forward to seeing whether or not they'll grow on me and at least be on the level of pearlcatchers for me (i.e. pretty dang good)

[enteragoodnamehere]

(Plum Boa/Watermelon Current/Nightshade Greenskeeper w/ Faded Nature eyes + Carmine Flaunt/Thicket Diamondback/Crimson Greenskeeper w/ Innocent Plague eyes)

okay fine auraboas can have one (1) W. Greenskeeper is kind of a banger tbh

[dadboat-fr]

ppl had issues w the auraboas bcuz their lore had a lot of weird racist tropes (specifically anti native stereotypes) which is why the devs have been redoing it, idk why ppl would want them completely deleted from the site tho their designs r (generally) fine. the lore did turn a lot of people off from them though

i remembered the lore bit, ig the response to that (that i saw, anyway!) wasn't "delete them from the site i never want to have one ever", it was definitely "i'm glad they're reworking the lore bc that was a mess!" so seeing several of the wishes posts involving never having one or wanting them gone entirely seemed intense! ig i may never know!

[ruitethewingedfox]

id is #83972880, i'd prefer if alternate scries had the primal eye type to fit with the lore of how he became a Auraboa but if it works with the scry it's fine if you make it something different as that's not even his original eye type.

[modifiedyincision]

I don't hate the new dragon breed. i really dont. but i mean.. they're kinda samey. ? Bland? not sure what the word would be. auraboas have only wings and are noodley, undertides are sea serpents, abbies have two heads, banescales are wyverns, gaolers follow the 'basic' four legs two wings body but they LOOK ancient, veils give me vibes of fairies/fae and they have bug wings (i can see them as an ancient breed), sandsurges have those big sail fins, and well. aethers have bug wings and legs, just extra limbs out the wazoo lol

I get why other people say some of the breeds dont feel like ancients, but imo the others FEEL convincingly 'ancient-y' enough. not every ancient needs to be a banescale or auraboa. i am fine with gaolers and veilspuns being ancient.

it's not even that i think dusties should be moderns, because I don't, exactly, I wouldn't want to have the team spending the time to make apparel work on these guys. they're just... hm. hmm. i dunno. fatten them up. more armor. or make them more bald and scaleless looking. bigger digging arms idk man...

they are far from being my least favorite breed, but they do rank below probably snappers/ridgies/most other ancients.

[zenmai--jikake--no--komoriuta]

wowwwwww so FR is going to be a dumpsterfire again tomorrow morning because they finally changed Auraboa Paisley........ I don't mind if they alter or fix genes for consistency within the first month of release, I've been heavily on the side of "this is fine" under those circumstances given how fuckin buggy the last few breeds have been and all but making visibly major adjustments nearly 4 months after release is legitimately annoying for everyone involved (I don't want to say it but like... jesus christ do they not do a consistency pass before releasing anything, for a game that prides itself on its quality artwork they've really been dropping the ball straight through the floor the past year or two)

ANYWAY I'm not here to bitch and moan but I would like to lament the cool projects I was working towards-- here is my graveyard for these bastards:

and these others who don't have a before and after anymore but were equally dicked around by changes well after the fact:

(that aqua-iris-teal one holds the record: I had to rescry it 4 separate times with every subsequent adjustment, a real F in that chat because it was the only time I've seen topcoat look remotely decent)

fr though thank god I deliberately held off on breed changing or collecting the genes for them for this exact reason, I am a little mad at the lost potential but more than that hot damn I think I'm honestly sick of these Controversy Snakes™, this is the last time I'm rescrying these bastards but I'm of half a mind to scrap my plans and not bother at all now lmao

[dramarising-replacement]

Baby auraboa look rly dumb

no I don't mean the design or the art, thats fine, I just think they look really head empty, like actually brainless, not a single neuron firing in that head, absolute bafoons and fools all of them i'll take 20

[saltminerising]

So crazy story; a few months back I asked if someone's g1 was for sale because it was in their unsorted/fodder tab, they said no which I was totally fine with-- but an Insane coincedence happened. I hatched one of my Auraboa eggs and it was almost exactly the same colors AND was the same element as that g1!? I decided to keep him an Auraboa because the slight color differences actually made him look prettier as one. I'm so happy about that! My projects done now!! I'm still in disbelief!!!

[saltminerising]

Based on the progress so far, two ancients per year seems like a good compromise? One per year sounds a bit overkill, they're not gonna need an entire 12 months for one single dragon without the burden of apparel. 6 months is already more than enough, with roughly 4 in development and 2 to document/fix gene errors.

We got 4 ancients last year and although by the end of it auraboas were clearly rushed, the previous 3 were fine for the most part. I'd argue that sandsurges came out great, even. Plus we got a few gene expansions alongside them. So honestly I think they could maybe even handle 3 a year. Just not 4; that's when it evidently starts becoming too many.

❄️