Flight Rising Discussion

Lately, I've been hitting a bunch of roadblocks and difficulties with some breeding projects of mine and I find myself quite frustrated. Pairs not giving me what I anticipated, feeling forced to modify the original scries just to push the project forward... pure bad luck sometimes (looking at you, nest full of female gaolers when literally the only trait I was breeding for was a male hatchling lol) I've even finished one of my earliest breeding projects, [url=https://www1.flightrising.com/dragon/106636358]a Guardian based on Alduin[/url], but it's been such a difficult road (considering my lack of experience - especially early on) and I've had to convince myself to tweak the original scry to progress so many times, that right now that it's here... I don't even really feel satisfied with it. So I'm curious: What were some difficulties, changes, obstacles and roadblocks y'all have had to deal with in your breeding projects? How did you go about it? What new knowledge did you emerge with? Some smaller questions I was wondering about were also: How long (time-wise and generation amount-wise) do your projects usually take? Do you give yourselves any specific guidelines/limits of how much you're willing to invest into or change your original plan of the project? Share stories of your journeys and challenges with me; ones that ended well, badly or plain weirdly! Frustrations shared are halved and lessons shared are invaluable [emoji=familiar heart size=1]

imperial breeding project for a very rare color range (raspberry/cornflower/cream) when none of the scant few existing imps with the colors I wanted were in active lairs.

after several months of failures not only did I have to adjust my scry several times, in the end I tried to line up a nest hatching to my birthday and I got wegged/that one egg had a 50/50 shot of also being a nocturne. when it hatched as an imp I chucked him in my hibden and resigned to just shelling out to make a custom skin to FORCE him to look how I wanted because I was done.
the whole thing put me off of imp breeding projects entirely so now if I need an imp in a certain color range and that range does not exist in any readily available capacity I just give up immediately. never again.

I've barely started the scene of breeding projects, mainly because I try really hard to just find something as close as possible to the original scry and slap a billion different genes on them, but I've had one successful breeding project, and that was for this guy, it surprisingly didn't take long, but I did keep getting wegged and two egged by them

my current breeding project (found in this guy's bio), I just changed out the mother in favor of having a guarenteed breed, primary, and tertiary for less chance of getting the correct secondary. Before, I was running the risk of the baby being a Wildclaw and having to buy a Coatl breed change, so I think this path is a lot better. We'll have to see how they treat me in a couple days when they're able to breed.

As for geneing projects.. shudders. I have a lot of money saved up, but justifying purchasing genes for my dragons right now is hard, even when I made a whole dedicated bank to justify purchases LOL

I have a WC breeding project in which the elements of the parents matter to me, and the only WC/Coatl parent combination in the right color range + with the elements I want are either forever homed or on inactive accounts. This is a very boring answer, but to overcome this roadblock I'm most likely looking at working with other breeds and shelling out for a WC scroll... unless I can find a Noc/Imp that makes a REALLY tight color range with a WC, and I wait for the 1.5% or less chance (3% chance of WC, 50/50 chance of correct sex). I'm actually am willing to wait years to make this project a reality (especially if I can avoid burning 2,000g), so maybe it's time to actually start entertaining the latter route, just to see...

I do imp breeding projects and I never learn. often it is on odge to find just a single imp just to start (atm I do have one project where I don't have any but I am not rushing). I keep having 5-6 pairs per single project to increase odds... but lately I am tryna cut off offspring more than keeping them "just in case I manage ANOTHER pair" simply because my lair can't handle it. I told myself I will stop but I just keep getting back at it a ha. maybe these 4 projects I have curently will be indeed last....

Ah yess breeding projects. Heres some stuff ive learned!


Keep lots of potential parents! Sometimes youll find a bunch of close parents but theyre all female. Keeping anyone you think is close may give you more pair options, even if theres more than you need.

CHECK THE BLOOD LINE OF EVERYONE. I have a sandsurge project with some very specific colors, Eldritch/Eldritch/Peridot, and the sandsurges with similar colors are just about all related. Even if its the great-great granparents, check the bloodline.

Very specific colors take a ton of time. One of my projects started around the end of 2024. And its not finished yet. Im quite close but ive definitely got several months to go.

Be open to alternative genes, especially if you want gem genes.

Dont make a breeding project with a brand new ancient breed. Your not gonna find a dragon of the breed with your colors, so youll have to buy every single gene. If its rare colors, thats gonna be even harder.

Lastly, write stuff down. I have some dragons in my project tab and i have no idea why i got them.

Warning: long!

Firstly, if you're interested, I started a Breeding Project Hub that isn't very active, but it's accumulated some stories over time so you might enjoy perusing the backlog.

For my breeding projects, I generally don't compromise on my initial plan. I will compromise on eye type - I don't like trusting my dragons to a stranger so most of my breeding projects will have my flight's eyes (Nature).

But I definitely approach different projects differently depending on what the goal is. If the goal is something similar to what's already popular, then maybe I'll breed for genes or species. But usually, I'll breed for colors and gender only and buy all the scrolls. That's one hard lesson - it'd be nice and fun and possibly preferred for lore reasons to have your project inherit genes from their parents, but usually the time cost is not worth it. So I let go of the idea of inheriting genes and just focus on colors.

(I don't like the look of the silhouette scroll symbol so I also don't compromise on gender, but that's my preference.)

The second hard lesson is that sometimes you have to invest a lot of money into dragons that will end up being useless to you. If your color combo is rare, it's worthwhile to set up multiple pairs, even bad ones, to increase your chances. Especially for an Imp breeding project, where I cannot buy an Imp scroll, I prioritize buying tons of breeder dragons to make a bunch of pairs, and use Noc scrolls to increase my odds of Imps. I might start with only a single Imp, but as long as I can pair it with someone and produce more, I can set up essentially infinite Imp-Noc pairs. Remember, a near-miss is a potential additional pair! And by the end of it, I might have a bunch of dragons I used Noc scrolls on that I'll end up exalting. But that's the price of a "fast" Imp breeding project.

(A bonus tip for Imp breeding projects - dragons five generations apart can breed with each other. So you might start with only one Imp bloodline, but if you breed down the generations far enough, you could get yourself a viable Imp-Imp pair.)

In terms of what cost I'm willing to put into my dragons:
* I will buy any scrolls necessary for the final dragon. Which means yes, I've paid 3900g to fully gem-gene a modern before. I've done it a couple times, I think.
* I will spend Noc scrolls on Imp breeding projects. I won't generally buy Coatl/Wildclaw scrolls just for an Imp project, though.
* I will buy up almost every dragon with similar colors to my target. I've got dragon searches bookmarked with my desired ranges, and I'll buy up babies as they're born. You'll need enough lair/hibden space to support this, so I'm also willing to spend money on that.

My longest project was seven months. Which is not that long at all in my opinion.

Some illustrative examples:
* In my 7-month project, I was breeding for Iridescent/Shimmer. That limited which dragons I could use as breeders, but the colors I wanted were pretty popular, so I decided it was reasonable. Reverie
* I had a project for an Imp with rarer colors. I approached that one with multiple breeding pairs and multiple Noc scrolls. I ended up with over 10 pairs breeding. It took me 5 months to get my target. Matahari
* I had a Cirrus project, and I wanted to try saving money by not buying the Cirrus scroll. I bought up every Cirrus with close colors and set up a few pairs. I got lucky and the dragon I wanted hatched quickly, in 2 months I think, and I ended up having bought some dragons that didn't get used at all. Angkasa

Pardon the long post, but I wanted to share as much information as I had! Best of luck with your projects!

Just today, I finally bred a double midnight, cyan from my project pair. Yay! But then I realized its male. I need a female. This pair has given me quite a few double obs and double eldritch, but this is the first double midnight. I feel like this project is never going to end. LOL So far there have been 33 offspring. [url=https://www1.flightrising.com/dragon/107522952][img]https://www1.flightrising.com/rendern/avatars/1075230/107522952.png[/img][/url]

As a total noob, the two things I've learned so far are the importance of starting with a good base and (this one is a half joke) to stick to breeds with shorter cooldowns to stay motivated lol (audhd).

The first one seems to make the biggest difference in my trials so far. I.e. If my goal is an XXY I would try to start with the closest XXY pair possible. I'm sure this is like the most basic breeding advice on the site, but you asked ^p^ maybe my newbie-ness can re-inspire you lol. I'm obsessed with breeding XXY soaps atm, trying to create as many unique/uncommon combos as I can!