Flight Rising Discussion

@wardmir

You're very welcome; it's my favourite skin to never be printed, honestly. The moment I saw you post it again, I was like "THIS BETTER BE THE YEAR." Haha. I would love for it to have the honour of being an official festival skin, but I worry if it's been passed over for a couple of years, it might be that way for a while..

I hope you can generate enough interest! I have quite a chunk of gems saved up, so if not enough people sign up for it, I think I'll just buy out the rest of the slots because I'd be happy to have multiple copies. It's just so gorgeous and works so beautifully with all sorts of different colours and genes, and I'll just forever have my eyes on this one.. Definitely let me know how it goes. If you need those 4 slots filled, my offer stands to buy them out. ;u;

@wardmir As it pertains to contest "rules" I don't know if it'd actually be permitted as a suggestion, which is a shame. Would love to have an open discussion with the community about it/get a read on ppl's opinions.

I might put in a concern through "contact us" but I feel like that's about as good as shouting in the middle of a barren desert and hoping someone hears ya lmao

I guess it just boils down to personal opinion, but to know that all these gorgeous entries were individually looked at and still no issue was seen with selecting a design that was previously implemented is...disappointing.

Nonetheless, all the winners did a great job. Hopefully there'll be more variety next time!

[quote name="Recallback" date="2021-11-21 14:28:49" ] Yeah a lot of them are just.... rocks on body? What if dragon made of rock? :0 And there is just so, so little use I can get from these skins without having a legion of dragon statues, they are so niche and kinda bland conceptually :/ (Not art-wise, they all look genuinely great and the artists have put a lot of hard work into the art clearly, especially the gemstone themed entries.) I'm happy for the people who won and they did put in the effort to win quite clearly, but I do just wish we could get some different representation for Earth than just "dragon is rock :O" That really colorful clay painter one is a perfect example of an Earth themed skin that goes outside the conventional themes, I would have bought a dragon just for that if it had won. It's sad we don't get more variety, feels like that with a good few fests- Ice has the same problem of just... "what if dragon made of ice and snow????" Hope none of that sounds rude towards the artists, it's not meant to be directed to them but more-so staff choosing multiple skins of the same idea and theme, resulting in our selection being sorta boiled down to one theme by staff design. [/quote] [quote name="Mkalyss" date="2021-11-21 14:54:35" ] Was going through the new Rockbreaker skins and someone brought up that the Spiral skin was p much a genderbent copy of a previous win from 2018. [item=Accent: Bumblebee Frieze][item=Accent: Fumarole Frieze] At first I thought "Well, ok. That was probably a one time thing." But then another user brought up this was [i]also[/i] done for the 2021 Wavecrest with a win from 2017 [item=Skin: Ancient leviathan][skin=39213] ^ These two even have the same name + I think the preview won't show? So apologies if the male version is buggy To which my first thought was: I find it incredibly hard to believe among all the entries submitted, no other skin could have possibly been a better, more original choice both times. Now to be clear this is [b]not[/b] meant as an attack to either artist, and the issue I have does not at all lie in the skins themselves. They're great designs! And if these "copies" were just user-made (not a contest win) on the site I'd have no issue. I just find it incredibly discouraging to other artists, and a little...narrow? On the staffs part to select the same skin twice multiple times when there are a large array of entries to choose from. Was considering putting a post mentioning this as a suggestion in the "suggestion" forum about it but I'm honestly not sure. Just know it doesn't sit right [/quote] ^^^ this!! You two have summed up my feelings perfectly. I have nothing against the art or the artists, and in fact think they're all really talented! But what wins is starting to feel very same-y and not very unique, especially when we've gotten the same skins *twice*. Not even on different breeds, which I would feel a little better about, but on the same breed, just the other gender :/

man i just really want the bismuth one- it's always been one of my favourite gemstones, so much so that a small chunk was my entire birthday + christmas present that year. It's also the reason m favourite number is 83. I really need to do up a scry.

honestly, I'm kind of...distressed at the unequal treatment some elements seem to receive. entries that take a more "out there" approach to the fest's element get chosen in a lot of other elements; take nature's [gamedb item=26646], for instance. and these skins are really popular! ice and earth get it the worst, with skins that aren't mostly Snow and Rock getting rejected. people do well with the concept (I really love the snapper m entry this year, I was hoping it would win! soon I will have an army of snappers with open hearts), but it is kind of disheartening that some elements are encouraged to think outside of the box, and in some elements, The Box Is The Law. and yes, I love clay creator too; I was one of the first people to sign up for a slot. GREAT skin, and I'm okay that it didn't win because the artist gets to make huge profit off it and they deserve it. not that that's optimal, but silver lining [emoji=gaoler happy size=1]

I looked at the entries, and just felt like I wanted to see what won. And, glad I didn't enter anything. I think I'd have lost based on what they picked. And, honestly, it makes no sense why, to me. There are far better skins to pick and ways to go than they seem to. Same when I look at old festival skins on AH, etc. There's nothing "Wow!" about most of them.

just a gentle reminder to pls be considerate when discussing which skins did/didn't win! it's totally cool to say something like "aw i wish this entry won", but it's kind of impolite to say something along the lines of "how did these skins win, they're all the same, other entries were way better!" that implies that the winners didn't deserve to win when they absolutely did.

personally, my (minor) grievance isn't that the skins chosen aren't good enough or aren't creative, the skins are beautiful and they all deserved to win! i think most disappointment comes from the fact that the amount of winning skins is sooo small compared to all the new breeds and high number of entries, plus the fact that staff seems to generally play it very safe with which skins are the most literal representations of the flight. and that's not at all the fault of skin artists.

just putting that out there, because i know if a skin i created were to win and everyone responded with disappointment, i would be very very sad :(

[quote name="Callistephus" date="2021-11-21 15:57:39" ] [quote name="Recallback" date="2021-11-21 14:28:49" ] Yeah a lot of them are just.... rocks on body? What if dragon made of rock? :0 And there is just so, so little use I can get from these skins without having a legion of dragon statues, they are so niche and kinda bland conceptually :/ (Not art-wise, they all look genuinely great and the artists have put a lot of hard work into the art clearly, especially the gemstone themed entries.) I'm happy for the people who won and they did put in the effort to win quite clearly, but I do just wish we could get some different representation for Earth than just "dragon is rock :O" That really colorful clay painter one is a perfect example of an Earth themed skin that goes outside the conventional themes, I would have bought a dragon just for that if it had won. It's sad we don't get more variety, feels like that with a good few fests- Ice has the same problem of just... "what if dragon made of ice and snow????" Hope none of that sounds rude towards the artists, it's not meant to be directed to them but more-so staff choosing multiple skins of the same idea and theme, resulting in our selection being sorta boiled down to one theme by staff design. [/quote] [quote name="Mkalyss" date="2021-11-21 14:54:35" ] Was going through the new Rockbreaker skins and someone brought up that the Spiral skin was p much a genderbent copy of a previous win from 2018. [item=Accent: Bumblebee Frieze][item=Accent: Fumarole Frieze] At first I thought "Well, ok. That was probably a one time thing." But then another user brought up this was [i]also[/i] done for the 2021 Wavecrest with a win from 2017 [item=Skin: Ancient leviathan][skin=39213] ^ These two even have the same name + I think the preview won't show? So apologies if the male version is buggy To which my first thought was: I find it incredibly hard to believe among all the entries submitted, no other skin could have possibly been a better, more original choice both times. Now to be clear this is [b]not[/b] meant as an attack to either artist, and the issue I have does not at all lie in the skins themselves. They're great designs! And if these "copies" were just user-made (not a contest win) on the site I'd have no issue. I just find it incredibly discouraging to other artists, and a little...narrow? On the staffs part to select the same skin twice multiple times when there are a large array of entries to choose from. Was considering putting a post mentioning this as a suggestion in the "suggestion" forum about it but I'm honestly not sure. Just know it doesn't sit right [/quote] ^^^ this!! You two have summed up my feelings perfectly. I have nothing against the art or the artists, and in fact think they're all really talented! But what wins is starting to feel very same-y and not very unique, especially when we've gotten the same skins *twice*. Not even on different breeds, which I would feel a little better about, but on the same breed, just the other gender :/ [/quote] I didn't realize this happened again, that's why it looks familiar. It's nice to have alternate versions of these skins but when there's limited slots it's frustrating that this happens, although I know the people picking the winners can't possibly remember every single fest skin ever when judging. If they just added more winners to each contest it wouldn't be as frustrating, because then skins that went with more different themes could have more of a chance.

I’ve had in my mind for awhile that maybe the most popular entries are often not chosen as to encourage people to make/purchase them as umas
Would be cool in future to see the earth aesthetic move more towards the fossils/bones, desert kind of route (edit: also the bazaars/Colonnades of Antiquity from the map update .. super cool things you could do with that) No matter how well made they are I very rarely see the rock themed accents from rockbreakers utilised in any lairs

[quote name="SCB" date="2021-11-21 06:55:24" ] I would just love to see something more, I guess. We had a long conversation about this about two weeks ago. Earth should be more than "covered in some sort of rock" [/quote] @SCB totally get why people feel that way, but I'm a total rockhound and joined Earth because I love pretty rocks! My gem & mineral collection is getting absurd and I love making skins based off of them :D