This thread is to share experience with the hoard mechanic. If you feel like hoards can be improved, I'm glad to hear your suggestions here!

I think the base potions should give more common items unless you pair it with rarity excluder potion. For exemple the special ingredient potion tend to give low rarity potions which are supposed to be at 10% rarity or less and hard to get instead of 90% rarity items like green mushrroms , vanilla pods and oatmeals .

I'm here to say that I agree with Takkju's solution of removing rarity excluders altogether from the game and keeping them as potential prizes so they feel special, and work as originally intended. I feel like if we tried this out, the game may see some interesting balance changes, and if it's not what you're looking for, then we can put them back!

When I originally read the update that nerfed potions I wasn't super happy about it, but @Jelly explained the rational behind it and it makes more sense! My input on this is-

1. Rarity Excluders

I'm not a big fan of them just being straight nerfed. For regular players that make them on occasion (ie for me, when my one voxel plant produces) I think they're fairly balanced since I usually get a starter egg or a non-legendary. I think they'd work even better if the game gets more pixpets that are 30% rarity or lower in the future. Also I think they work just fine with decoration potions.

I like the idea of them being a prize! My only issue with that is I think it would be a huge bummer to get one as a prize for a contest or event, and to get a starter egg, since those seem pretty common even without any potions. Maybe the rates could be adjusted so you're at least finding something like an Owluck or something around that rarity and lower? This would only be with the idea that it's an event/prize only item and cannot be made.

I also like @Chicken_Raptor 's idea of splitting up rarity excluders for what they effect. Maybe this could be combined with the prize idea? Players can make rarity excluders that would still work for decorations, and only the event/prize excluders effect eggs. Would suggest a rename on the event/prize potion, tho.

My other idea would be that the potion requires a very rare item that can only be found on hoards. So it continues to be a valuable item, but not one that is extremely easy to obtain if you've planned out your plants in a certain way. I think this would work better with my suggestion down below about PPT and SPC so one can't spam hoards endlessly to get it.

2. Other Hoard Improvements

[li]I've mentioned this before in the suggestion thread, but I think it's a bummer that you can only get one decorative capsule per hoard as your pet gets to the upper levels and takes longer to come back/rest. Maybe this could (reasonably) increase either per a pixpet's level or with higher grade decoration potions? This amplifies I think if rarity excluders are permanently nerfed, sending a pet on a 2 day hoard and getting a common item you don't need is a bummer!

I think part of the issue with legendary pets seeming too common is in part due the SPC system. As much as I love being super impatient and blowing my PC on instant hoard return potions, I think being able to do this (and specifically being able to turn PPT into SPC) escalated the issue of an overabundance of legend eggs. I think it would be healthy for the game to not allow instant hoard returns and rest potions to be obtained with IRL money aka PPT (or to allow PPT to be traded for items as you can spend money to buy instant returns, and food basically).

For later game players I feel like hoard times get to be a bit overwhelming. I'm super cool with sending all my pets on hoard (especially now that I have a big house) and coming back to check on them later, but at this point almost all of my pets take 15+ hours to return and I'd like more to do. I am completely fine with sending things on hoard and only visiting the site semi-regularly but I have to start stressing about my plants AND I wanna be on the site more!

I also kinda wish there was incentive to hatch and "train" (aka send on hoard) pixpets that you may already have hatched previously, besides to get different colours. At this point I think there are enough pets that cover the colour ranges (and especially going forward when more pets are added) that it isn't a necessity to really hatch much after you've already hatched one of a pet. Unless you're collecting, but I'm referring to the general player base.

Random but I wish you could evolve a pet while it's resting, this is a very small thing but when my pet comes back from hoard and is fiiiiiinnalllyy high enough I wanna evolve it asap, and having to wait another 12+ hours is a bit of a sad trumpet noise.

EDIT: Thought about this after I posted! Another idea regarding PPT and SPC - If we don't want to completely disallow the purchase of instant return/rest potions with PPT (because PPT can be converted to SPC), perhaps there can be a limit on how many you can buy within a certain time period? To discourage the ability to spend IRL money on endless hoarding or legend hunting.

Hoard time could be reduced some more.

Also, I think the rarity excluder potion is fine? It's just that there aren't enough pixpets on the site, making it seem too effective when it probably won't be if they add more pixpets.
Out of the 25 pets you can hoard, only 15 are 30%< rarity. That's already a really low amount. They're also separated by color, which makes it even easier to find depending on the color. You just gotta pick the color with the least pets in it, like red or orange.

I agree with @valtien that the potion should have an extremely rare item needed to make it. That should decrease the amount of legends being found.

About the Rarity Excluders:
Yes I suggested to remove them altogether and make them only available for event rewards. I’m also aware that they sometimes backfire and bring you a non legendary thanks to the RNG.
For the events price they’ll be obviously given out as neutral potions (just to clarify it now) and in larger quantities, not only one, depending on the placement (so that the 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranked get those, if the type of the event allows it)
If they should stay, they should get nerfed again, since they basically destroy one of the mechanics, PixPet Rarity, which kinda makes those rareness more common than rare pets. And that... kinda defeats the purpose of rare pets.