Arabica, Qahir, Hellebore, and many more combos, even after existing in the game for years, all have less than 300 lions onsite. Despite their rarity they don't sell for anything at all, pretty much collecting dust in TC or being remarkably low value. In fact, people find combo bases so undesirable that out of the 35 combo bases in the game, not including Basalt, 23 of them are below 750 lions. That's almost 70% of combo bases! It's a sign of significant imbalance.

The reason for this is because they're incredibly difficult to breed: With the low passrate of combos and lack of bases on most of these, you can only get a chance to breed it and have it pass from a lioness every few days or weeks rather than every single breeding, which just isn't fair. Assuming all your lionesses have 1 or 2 cubs, you would have to breed 25-50 of them to match a combo's flat 2% (1 in 50) passrate to get a SINGLE one- imagine trying to breed high quality ones or do a project with one. The max non GB territory size is also only 40, so you might not be able to have more than 40 lionesses on hand to do that with. For bases like Cloudburst where you have to sync these lionesses up to wet season, or Squall where getting 40 Unholy lionesses is just utterly cruel, breeding them is resultingly very difficult.

Also, with hundreds of bases in the game and many new rares and applicable specials having no actual use- just one base added after another- it's unreasonable that a combo should have only 1-3 bases on each side, hence this topic. I will be tending to tack specials on on the opposite side of lots of commons/uncommons/rares because most kings are special rarity and can enjoy collecting lots of factors, creating good synergy. Lastly, I like when the genetics of factors match the resulting combo, especially in situations like with Citrine (good combo base example) where Kimanjano/Fulvous x Citrine can easily fail to another Fulvous factor to use. All of these traits work together to create a good breedable combo.

Basically; some combo bases are really hard to breed and kinda suck. Olive base is included in this but in a separate pre-existing post and so is at the bottom of the topic, please don't forget about it!

ARABICA

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: I kept the milk/coffee theme with the cream side with Almond and Hazelnut and also added Butternut since the name matches. The black side is just visually similar bases. I've always associated 'murk' with coffee but it turns out no one else does or understands that so YMMV but a special being in there makes everything much easier.

ASIATIC

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: Dove Gray, Gunmetal Gray, and Silver Gray are both super similar to gray in both looks and name which I thought was cute. Additionally light cream and cream lighter are both a middle in between cream and white which makes logistical sense. The general vibe is still there, it's just more commons are available so it's less difficult. Optionally, add Ivory to the cream side for being another pale light cream.

BASALT

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: Metals just like Flint, Opal, and Sterling. Flint and Opal were already in a combo, but these metal-themed bases are not in anything, with Gunmetal Gray as a new applicable uncommon and Platinum as a new rare being the most important one IMO.

BLACK ROSE

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: Orchid, Wild Rose, and Dusty Rose, Blush Rose are all solid reds that keep the flower theme of Black Rose. I was always confused as to why Wild Rose. Dusty Rose, and Blush Rose weren't included in the first place. On the other side Titanium was added because it's the only common/uncommon in that base group not included other than Chestnut, which isn't the color black is why I left it out. Optionally, add Fuchsia and Hibiscus to the 'flower' side- six factors isn't THAT many, plenty of December combos have that or more, and those specials aren't in any other combo, so they would fit in really nicely if the extra space was allowed.

CELSIAN

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: Celsian is a clear mineral, so I added Clear White alongside Glass to match that themeing. It can also be white, off-white, or yellow, so White is there to represent that color as well. Howlite is there because it's another mineral like the original three factors, and more importantly has that orangeish-cream tone on Celsian that came out of nowhere- it's sort of the missing link. I just kind of slapped Platinum on, but I think that a rare on that side is good since it's otherwise nothing BO/lower rarity, and it could be replaced with anything else- Silver, Slate, ETC- if disliked, but I mostly picked it for the color match.

CLOUDBURST

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: Similarly to Smog and Majivu, any seasonally restricted combo base is very difficult to breed, and so deserves more factors. Stratosphere is the blue cloud layer of the sky, and Slate is the only black countershaded rare/uncommon with a cool blue tone that was initially left out. Lastly, I debated as to adding Clear White and White on the Albino side, but decided not to just because the x Albino only is a bit iconic for Cloudburst and Smog, as well as a lot of other seasonal combos. However, adding those two on the Albino side for both Cloudburst and Smog would differentiate them from the December-added combo bases, as well as the Albino challenge. Ultimately it's up to staff to decide whether that's a good idea.

EMBER

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: Ashen just fits the theme, and Willow and Aspen are both new relatively unused uncommons without much fanfare to them that just like Flint read as fire-kindling (wood types), and are also black bases. Inferno and Brimstone are obvious, and Ochre is there because it's a very red Gold Dark CS, and Ember is infamously a gold dark base despite having red x black factors and looking pretty red. I really hate this base but my ingrained duty to improve game design overpowers all else.

HELLEBORE

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: I added extra random gold rares + oatmeal. I found goldenrod was a plant and Udara was a fruit so I tried to keep that theme a little bit but generally it just seems to be Lilac X soft golds is what the staff was originally going for I'm not sure that themeing was intentional. Also Nacarat is a very old base but still isn't in any combo. Lastly, Water Hyacinth could be added to the Lilac side since it's also a purple flower.

MAJIVU

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: I thought Phantom just visually matched, and Smog matches the theme-naming for droughts and is a little cool and unique. The reason this isn't overpowered here is because being a season-exclusive base adds an extreme amount of difficulty that all these factors will most certainly not circumvent. Also, Gold Lights are relatively unpopular already. Trust me when I say this is one of the hardest bases to breed ingame. 'Ukame' means 'drought', so I added Solaris, another maneater-recolored sun-themed base, and Sundust, Sunshine, and Sunspot representing that dry season weather. Most importantly, none of my added bases are already in any existing combo. Funnily enough, the creator of this base also recommends a factor expansion. I'm not sure anybody really breeds this base but it's real cool.

MUDSTONE

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: ._.

NADIR

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: OK so basically I just took blue, pink, black, ETC like the original base had, but I put Noctis because it's in nothing and Ebony is in 3 things, and Korat because it's dark blue and matches Nadir decently well. On the other side the reason I added Dawn is because Dawn X Noctis (night) equaling Nadir, a dark blue base which has a name derived from astronomy/night themes made like a lot of thematic and logical sense to me. Also Ardor and Rhodonite are already on there, so I thought staff was favoring pink/blue/purple gradient factors for that one. This base doesn't really look that much like its existing factors, LOL. Optionally, Interstellar could be added on the Ardor/Rhodonite side, but that's only because it's the only other base that's really bright blue like Nadir is.

SMOG

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: Ignore that I accidentally wrote 'Russet' as 'Blonde'. The base is Russet. I just added a few more visually matching bases to round it out, and give it an applicable special. Optionally, add Argent and Flaxen to the cream side as well, since they're not in anything yet.

SQUALL

Original factors:


Updated factors:


Reasoning: Okay, so I actually did not pick random bases for this. Windfall and Solaris are both storm/sky/atmosphere related with the specific theme of brown/red/orange/cream, and Wicked matches Unholy's genetics and name themeing. Stratosphere and Skyward are both black countershaded bases with atmosphere or storm themes as well. I added Korat and Maltese to tie it more to Cloudburst because it doesn't make sense to me that they don't share additional factors since they have such similar appearances. I know this was supposed to be exclusively x Cloudburst only, but the fact is 0 people breed this base SDHAJKASGDHFFDSHGJH. For real this is the combo with the least amount of lions ingame, I think, excluding Basalt since that one's new. Serruria outpaces it by triple. ALREADY.

And that's all for combo expansions. Olive was posted ages ago: LINK LINK LINK Other than that, it's all good. The reason I didn't expand bases with not-so-many factors like Elysian and Soul is because their vast popularity and the power of Ice/Ebony outpaces the lack of factors and so keeps them quite alive. Of the bases like Madagascar and Citrine with a 4x4 grid of factors, I think 4 is still too few given the number of bases ingame, but I think that they're still pretty well established and so don't necessarily 'need' a buff. ...I do have ideas though. I have ideas. Specifically I would But that last bit isn't necessary for the expansion topic.