Suggestions

I understand breeding needs some random elements to maintain a challenge and not turn into Build-A-Dragon where players breed any random dragon and then fully customize it with scrolls and vials.

But we already had random elements in male/female. And players could choose more on top of that with wide color ranges and gene rarities.

We knew that. That's what we signed on for.
No one signed on for a less than 1% breeding chance. That's a HUGE leap from the way this game was introduced to us and has been for five years.

@Sokkratees
Random chance would be more fair than grinding and buying if the vials were still obtainable for everyone. As it is, the only people who currently have the vials are those who ground for them during the event, or bought them from the Auction House for increasingly inflated prices.

The hatchling situation would be fine, except it explicitly locks out old dragons and progens from getting the new eyes on creation. Newbies are still going to have progens they're going to want new eyes on, or Lore-related breeding projects.

Ultimately it comes down to if the eye update is justified by the Lore, in which case the Lore could've just been written differently to be more inclusive to other types of players instead of just those who already had perfect nest projects ready to profit from.

To add to what Illiobillium said: we're not asking for it to be removed from the breeding, just allowing us to have more control over it, and to make it easier to obtain the eyes we'd like to have without the potential risk

To take my light rep for example, I'd love to have light primal on him BUT:

I'd have to find a female dragon with the same colors (or at least close in range) and the same genes or genes that make the one on my light rep have bigger odds. If therequired female dragon is being sold, which for laughs I just checked and nope. no goldenrod/goldenrod/lemon girls for sale

since I'm not in light I'd either have to move to light, which once you've used your free move, moving to the other flights can be a costly rather quickly not mentioning the 6 months cool down.

Or I can lend my dragons to a light player which is risky, because might that person decide not to give me back the dragons I'm outta luck because the staff can't help me since I'd have given that person my dragons willingly and therefore they can't do anything.

My light rep is also an imp which overall in a year can only breed 12 times, given the fact primal eyes only have a very low chance of appearing this could mean it could take up to YEARS just to breed for the dragon I want.

Then there's also the fact that if I can't find a female with the same genes/colors I have to account for that too and of course the 50/50 male-female split.

That is a lot of effort just for one dragon, And then I'd have to rinse and repeat the process for my other reps too, including my light rep I have 3 other imps who are reps.

I get FR is all about breeding that one perfect dragon but honestly if it has to take years that sucks the fun out of the entire process.

And to add to what Apocalyptichorse said, I'd love Lightning Primal for my random progen. I can't breed him again, period. My only chance of ever getting him Primal eyes has come and gone, with me wasting over 70 vials on him with nothing to show for it. I really wish I would've given up sooner and sold more vials since it's not like the chances were in any way acceptable.

I feel the same about my progen, I would love multi for her because she's a mutant in my lore, but that ain't gonna happen at this rate :(

Also, if we need a “Lore” reason to give pre-update dragons the new Natural eye types:

“Studious dragons have discovered how to harness the surging energies from Bounty of the Elements, and have infused these energies into vials!”
or
“Due to the surging energies brought about by Bounty of the Elements, older dragons have also begun to display a variation of eye shades and types!”

Both make sense with the “hatchling eyes turn weird because Energy” lore we were given. Plus, the Vial of Scattersight exists as well— that changes dragons’ eyes, too, and there’s no lore behind it. Not everything needs to be “because Lore (tm)”, especially since lore has never been forced on everyone until now. Lore has largely been a “take it or leave it” thing, ever since the site started.

By all means, keeping the new eyes in the hatch pool is fine! But it would be nice if there was some way to also get the new eyes on older dragons. People can’t “re-breed” progens, G1s, or beloved sentimental dragons, and locking everyone out of getting the new eyes on projects, progens, and pre-update favorites “because Lore”/“newbies and casual players will profit! :)” is... shortsighted and, frankly, a silly excuse on the devs’ end.

Completely random chance is gambling, full stop. It's true that there has always been a small element of chance in breeding, but you could control for everything except sex. And that was a 50/50 chance. These eyes are completely random, and 3 of the new types (Faceted, Multi and Primal) can drastically change the look of a dragon.

That would be fine if I signed up for a gambling game, but to be frank, gambling games bore me. There's no progression, there's no sense of accomplishment, everything you do is meaningless because you're not the one who did it, RNG was.

The eyes should remain a random element in breeding so that they are obtainable by newbies. But "fairness" in a video game is a sticky concept. If the person who only logs in to incubate their nests and feed their dragons has the same chance of getting their dream dragon as the person who spends hours on the site, (Coli-ing, buying and selling on the AH, playing the Fairgrounds etc) then who would be the guy who spends hours here? We all have other things going on in our lives. If the site truly became "fair" it would be a ghost town.

Fully support! You basically summed up everything that's been discussed very nicely!