I was inspired to post this by reading another user's frustrations with Leopard Orchids, and it got me thinking about the autoclaim feature. The ability to automatically claim an NCL is rather expensive for a lot of players. Outside of, I don't know, 1/8(?) of the playerbase with a decent amount of GB stocked up, 2 GB is certainly nothing to scoff at. I've seen plenty of players upset over the fact that they had to give up a really beautiful NCL because they didn't have the GB or Leopard Orchid to guarantee the claim. On the flip side, I've also seen a lot of people upset when they accidentally press the autoclaim button on a plain NCL and are now 2 GB poorer with nothing of value to show for it.

I have a couple suggestions within this post - not all of them would necessarily be implemented together, but it leaves options for which one(s) might be more balanced for the game. In my own opinion, the list is in order starting from the least potentially controversial and ending with the most potentially controversial.


Add Leopard Orchids to an event shop closer to the middle of the year. Possibly remove it from the February shop.

I wasn't sure whether to separate these two, but I decided to put them both together, as they're kind of the same idea. Right now Leopard Orchids are only available in the January and February event shops. To put it simply, having them available consecutively like that doesn't make any sense. Thematically it makes sense to have them in February, the love month.

However, most anyone who wants them will typically only buy them during January, not February. Why? Because literally any other damn item in February is a better investment, whether it's breeding items, apps, decor, or stat items. Buffalo Scrotums, triple the Orchid's event price, sell for around 30 GB at their peak. Base and marking apps can go decently high as well. Yet orchids sell at 2 GB at the most (which is the autoclaim price, so it shouldn't ever sell for more than that unless the buyer is new to the game). Plus, fresh out of January, everyone's stock of them is still pretty much full from the previous month.

I think a good thematically-fitting month to put Leopard Orchids in would be May. Well, at least for V'Kai. (I never side with Vash, so I guess I don't really know his deal!) An extremely small part of the playerbase actually enjoys the May apps while many players simply refuse to have lions with Brawl or Rumble in their pride. I can't think of any other marking that has such a strong dislike attached to it. So it kind of sucks to have 200 reputation at the end of the event and have the choice of getting 40 MB from it or a selection of 20 apps that'll probably be a pain to get rid of.

Ultimately I'm not sure whether it would be a better idea to toss em in each Reputation shop, or if the Champion shop would be more balanced. I'd like the option to get some Orchids without sacrificing Lion Scrotums, but having it tied to Reputation means there's a maximum that can be bought by one player. If it's the Reputation route, should it go in both shops to give every player the option to buy them no matter which side they chose? Or should it just go in V'Kai's to make it more thematically accurate? Vash could maybe get a stat item in his shop instead. Something small, like Camel Toes, as April was just last month.


Change autoclaim fee from a flat 2 GB fee to one that scales. Either exponentially (1 GB > 2 GB > 4 GB, 8 GB, etc.) or linearly (1 GB > 2 GB > 3 GB > 4 GB, etc.) It resets back to 1 after every rollover.

I think, given the typical quality of an average chased NCL, 2 GB is a fairly hefty price to pay for one. Not many players chase high-BO, multi-rosette, bold colorbomb, etc. lions very often. Not to say it isn't a treat to find one, on the rare occasion that it occurs! But, most chased NCLs will be project rejects that have breed-only eyes and two or three good markings, or low opacity colorbombs, or an occasional single-rosette lioness. Not really worth the 2 GB. I'd feel a little better about spending only 1 GB on a nice looking NCL - I like her, but not enough to pay 2 whole GB. The next pretty NCL I see I'll be a bit more selective. And so on. Not a lot of players see more than one or two chased NCLs per day, so the method of cost growth beyond the second is less relevant. But it should prevent too much abuse of the autoclaim button, I guess?


Show the lioness's attributes - base, markings, eyes, etc. right on the claiming screen.

Ok, before you throw me off a cliff - desktop users can already look this up. F12, and Ctrl+F "marking" babyyyyy.

Anyway, yeah. I haven't figured out if it's possible on mobile, but I don't think it is. That means, if we assume 50% of players are primarily mobile users and the other 50% use mostly desktop, half of the playerbase doesn't have the same access to some potentially game-changing information. How many NCLs have you walked away from that might've had a borderline-invisible rosette?

I think it would be a nice improvement to have her appearance information available right on the interface. Some possible ideas:

Somewhat similar to the raffle lioness page. Though, I can see this being problematic if it makes the raffle lioness page look less special by comparison.

Available by tapping the picture of the lioness on mobile. On desktop, available by hovering over her with your cursor. Not sure if this would be a coding nightmare or if it would be relatively simple. I don't have coding experience, unfortunately!

Replace or add a functionality to the "?! Spray Scent" option in the claim screen, which will then reveal her appearance. But, will it piss her off? Possible rename could be "Inspect". It has a chance to add a fair bit of annoyance to keep it balanced. I also think the icon being unique compared to the others is kind of interesting. With this functionality, you can assess the risk factor without having to pay the price - one way or another. Autoclaim a really pretty lioness and risk it having only a few bold markings that didn't justify the GB spent? Or try claiming her for free and risk losing her in case she's actually a special base or something?


I guess that's it, then! I'd love to hear some opinions - whether agreement or disagreement :)

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My other suggestions:
Masterpost here