First I will say I hope to keep this constructive whether you love the changes or are less than pleased. I really don't want to start another thread that will go off the rails and get locked.

That said I am curious about others thoughts and opinions. I started to put mine into the announcement thread but that didn't seem like the right place. I started to do a suggestion thread but again, that didn't seem right since it was *my* feelings about the changes so General is where this landed.

I will start by saying I can see this as a good way to gather resources no doubt about that. Thank you to the mods for listening to players who had issues about the time needed to gather large quantities of resources/food.

However, I am finding it very difficult to progress with my pets. Realistically speaking, I have to either skip the hard pets for fear of losing 1 energy or take the chance and lose that energy if/when I lose.

What that means is if I am exploring to progress I am only getting in ONE explore on almost all my pets. You have to either, as I said skip the tougher pets and go to the next island only taking on pets you know you can beat or have an exceptional explorer in order to use your 2 full explores with no losses.

My thoughts are that either the energy needs to be set slightly higher to make up for those losses and allow for actual progression or increase the regeneration rate of energy.

Personally, I really enjoy explore and the fact that I can *barely* do it now really saddens me.

Honestly, I like the new explore. The ONLY thing I feel like they could do to improve it is drop the cost from 5 to 4. Because as you've said, lose to 1 monster and you can't explore twice. If it was 4 energy to explore and 1 per loss, you could take a LITTLE risk while exploring, lose ONCE and still be able to get a second explore in.

Plus it seems like most of the things average to 2 times multiplier (over the old explore system).

Other than that, I'm loving the fact it takes less time to explore!

I agree with all three of you. I'm exited about the fountain too- that's pretty nice :)

It's hard to say if this new system is better or worse than the old one, numbers-wise. From an exp perspective the fights are doubled per battle - which is good - but with only one, *maybe* two islands to explore on average it seems like we may experience a slight experience loss in the long haul. Though, we may see something interesting with the new fountain buildings...with a hugely increased chance for buildings it could at least be possible to daisy-chain from island to island, since the islands restore 5 energy a pop.

From a resources perspective I have to say that I'm liking it so far at least. Running across a rarer resource like ruby or adamantine feels more rewarding because it's no longer necessarily one at a time. I'm rather cautious about what this will do for the vermillion markets, however. If that remains the same or if it will further inflate as it has been doing. I actually did have a market appear for me while i was exploring and it's good to see that the quantities are adjusted in the market offers to reflect the exploration change (was offered 9 clay for 9 stone). I guess you could say I'm in a watch and wait mode.

One thing that I'm really not sure about is how my energy budget for my creatures is looking with the new change. I can either explore twice, craft once or explore once, breed and have to wait an hour or two to regen. Definitely not used to watching my pets sit at four energy when before that was two exploration attempts. I personally like the fact that you can simply take an energy hit instead of getting kicked off the island - so many encounters, thanks to the rock-paper-scissors combat, are so random it's nice to have a chance to take a second go, at the very least.

Edit: Had another thought about fountains too. If you have one on your map, you could collect what goodies you could without fighting and just leave with 10 energy. Seems legit. >.>

I love everything about it, except the new losing penalty. Honestly I'd rather be booted from the island because it would mean I could explore the islands twice in a row, instead of having to wait.

I do think that we'll be gaining exp slower now, because even though the exp gain per monster was doubled, the number of monsters you could run into is about a fifth of what it was before, on average. (That and if you lose a battle or three you'd only be able to explore once or twice.) 

I was thinking, maybe it might work better to change the cost per island to 3 energy, if you do end up staying on the islands and losing energy after a loss instead of being booted. That way, you'd have a sort of buffer, and you would be able to explore twice on average, thrice if you're lucky, and once if you're unlucky, and you'd have 1 energy left over to breed your pet or something.

I love being able to stay on the islands after a loss!  One of the things I always hated before was having to go around monsters that I was afraid of losing to.  I actually prefer being able to defeat more guardians and get their treasure chests on the first island to leaving the island and starting all over on another one.

You silly guardian. What are you trying to accomplish by standing in that odd place?

oh, I had that on my map as well, made me laugh XD

As for the new explore - I like that losing takes an energy point, this way I dont have to suffer from "what if" feeling when I lose a battle and manage to clear map completely most of the time (that includes guardians). Considering the amount of pets I have (46 atm with babies), I do not feel bad about having a singlle explore for a pet if I lose energy points. 

Moreover the new system allows to potentially get more than 2 explores per pet if you are lucky to get a fountain building on a map (from what I saw it restores 5 energy points, not sure if it's a fixed amount or not, cause the pet I was using when I saw it several times always had 5 energy).

On the other hand that double amount of items is not applied to "premium" items from chests or scripts or magic shop, so I feel like i m getting less of those :/ (which might be a good thing for site anyways).

Dont know, leveling up actually seems faster to me now.

I think it's much, much, better.
Before the update I'd nearly stopped exploring it had gotten so dull and even when I did I was completely unable to get nearly enough vermillion, even using the geneticist, to see if the babies had gotten the genes I wanted.

I've actually tested the experience too, I'm getting at least as much in one trip, if not more, than I was in 5 trips before. I think the big difference is being able to defeat those guardians in a couple attempts when you would just loose before.

I was getting nearly half way to the next level on my level 40 pets with all 5 and I'm still getting that with just one trip if I can the island. (And thanks to the new system, I usually can.)
Actually since I used the leftover energy to battle I was able to get a level 46 pet 70% to the next level on 10 energy without finding that experience-giving building.

So everything has been better for me really.

A tip: If you are nearly out of energy while on island and still want to beat it without risking of getting kicked, leave your pet on island and wait till energy recovers. This way you have higher chances of clearing maps completely, since you wont get kicked unless you hit 0 and lose.

'm still not sure about the explore updates... If I take one pet out and it gets defeated 3-4 times, because I usually play at night, I'll be asleep when it reaches 5 energy again, which gives that pet a grand total of one exploration! Instead of getting 5x the resources of one island, that pet gets 2x (and if I get defeated that much, I probably haven't found many treasure chests).So, I think we should either 5 en per explore, or staying on the island. Also, think about real life. If a pet was hurt, we'd have to get it off the island to patch it up before it could go back out. Also, about the exp gains... if I defeated a lvl 1 each explore on the ol system, I'd get 10 exp. If I defeat a lvl 1 each explore now, provided I can explore twice, I I'd get 8 exp. While this seems small, imagine it with a higher leveled monster- or what if it was the last drops of exp you needed to get your pet to level 50? And about not upping the amount of resources- on the old system, about twice I would get through the whole map without being defeated, and collect everything on it. The other times, I'd get maybe a few resources. Now, I would just get the full two, maybe not even. Also, if you're a newbie with 4-6 pets- that may at worst be 4-6 explorations. That's not enough, even if you find a vermillion each time to half-fully research a pet. The point of this, I assume was to make exploring take less time, which it has, but to not decrease resource gains, which it hasn't, for me at least.

(e) Now that I've gone exploring and seen the changes in action, it seems ok. My only concerns are for people with limited time and newbies. I'll give it a fair trial, and if, in a week or two, I decide it's not an improvement, I'll complain, but it deserves an unbiased test, first.