Colin, Ive had the "rubble pile cleared for some time now, am still getting tablet pieces, although, they are only the Tablet peices I need, so keep looking over there, they will appear...

Yes. The missing tablet pieces will still appear but very, very infrequently. I found all of mine without the Chief's pointing.

Yes, Lurkily, that's it.
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To the rest of the PEOPLE! I DO NOT dislike Lurkily's smilies, they are both funny and sweet. Like the one she placed in her quote made me LOL.

She? <Looks left, looks right>

Maybe Lurkily isn't big and manly, or have enough muscles to be masculine? Well, if it helps, I used to go by Lurker, the name of a character I once played, back when I was roleplaying. Hey, it was a free-form role-playing channel, and it was my favorite character from pen-and-paper AD&D. Lurkily was an old in-joke from back then, and 'Lurker' is slang for non-participant, which I obviously do not intend to be.

Lady Ronin's the girl in this couple, (She goes by that alias wherever she goes,) and a sweet little woman she is. I got the blue, and she got the pink plushie. I'm quite proud of that sig image, (if that's the one you mean) though it's a cut-down version of a larger image; it's my own work, with source material used by permission from Lola at "Stuffies Will Kill", an online comic. Unfortunately, I can't post the link here, but it should be easy to find from a search engine.

Also, anybody wanting a link to the full-size images and animations with those characters can PM me. Yes, even knowing that my photoshop skills are only so-so, I'm quite ready to show off, I know. Blame it on the eternal war my bloated ego wages against my sense of humility.

Edit:Though not all of those images are E for everyone, I can at least post the higher-res source image for the one in my sig. I worked pretty long on trying to make blue look protective of pink.

I've also had tablet pieces appear after the rubble is cleared, but I did find most of the pieces while the villagers were clearing it.

Another thing you can keep an eye out for are the "bubbles" that appear with the collectibles, I guess as a little "hey, here I am in case you missed me". They don't bubble the whole time but the fact that they bubble at all has been particularly helpful to me when they appear behind a fruit tree, under the tree by the beach (where some take shelter from the rain) and when the color of the collectible is close to the color of the landscape where it's appearing.

Hope this helps!

Do you mean the 'sparkles'? They're not too helpful; the ocean sparkles already, so it's useless for those. They're also difficult to see around areas that are lightly colored; something more eye-catching would be nice.

Heck, I'd probably pay money just to get my children to automatically pick up collectibles, even if it's only when the game is open, and only when they're close to one. Or if "Searching for mushrooms" and "Looking for collectibles" actually made them go pick one up. Even with such an uncommon action, which may not occur when any collectibles are present, it'd be enough for me. I don't need it to be easy; I just don't want it to be monotonous.

Yes, I mean the sparkles. I think the sparkles are helpful because they sparkle in rapid succession, if you will, while the ocean sparkles occur randomly and mostly one at a time.

I'm with you on the easy vs. monotonous bit. I would like it if some children were born with preferences for shells, coral, feathers &/or rocks/slate, and then those children would automatically pick up the collectibles that correspond to their likes.

Lurkily, it's too bad you don't enjoy FanFic; you write so well!

I got a kid who disliked Corals!! Each time a coral appeared I tried to chose another kid but it was not easy every time. When I had to took him to collect a coral he did it without any reaction!! Nice kid!!

It's already been suggested for VV4 that things like butterfly nets and bug-cages and such be a researchable or unlock-able category in VV4; I like the idea.

My way with words is not matched by a knack for building a plot, unfortunately. I can work with existing material, but I'm terrible at story-crafting without a starting point.

I'll keep a look out for one of those kids, Laurence! That's funny, and too bad for collecting I suppose...

Thanks for the info Lurkily; I haven't made time to read the suggestions for VV4. FanFic fan or foe, I enjoy reading your posts. : ) Well, I'm off to scoop up some collectibles two at a time.