I started recently a new character where I completly abandon fast travelling.

Now after roughly 25 hours playing time I've encountered only 5 dragons so far.
The first story dragon,
3 in dragon lairs,
and just one(!) random encounter.

With my former char I, with whom i quite often fast travelled i had always 5+ dragon soul and i ran away from them sometimes bc they were so annoying.
Now i dont have nearly enough to unlock all my shouts.

So my question, is it just bad luck, or do have other players the same perception?

I'm using deadly dragons by the way, but that shouldnt change the spawn rate i think.

I've had a similar experience. Dragons don't randomly show up that often for me. 60 hours in, I'd be surprised if I have more than a dozen dragon souls, and a good number of those have come from dragon lairs.

When i played i had plenty of souls. then again i didnt unlock every shout soon as i got it. i only unlocked the ones i liked. i also actively went out to the walls and hunted down dragons. i was rarely attacked in the open.

Is the mod updated to what ever patch you are running? That is the first thing to check, or to run the game without the mod. It will take 73 game hours for scripts to settle down.

However, that being said, want less dragons, don't fast travel is the rule of thumb. I do get attacked, but not as often as when I am fast traveling. Also, the game will tend to throw a dragon at you right at first if you fast travel. So, you might reboot the game, and load up the save and fast travel to a geographically advantageous place and run around a bit. If it does not show up within a minute or two, fast travel to a place or three more and more than likely some dragon will want to come play. So, don't jump to a settlement while doing this.

160 hours and 7 random encounters. I rage every time I see people complain about dragons being the new cliffracers - I'd really want to see this in my game, but apparently the whole idea of random dragons was planned with fast travel in mind.

you encounter dragons when you leave dungeons .
make sure to look around plus you will hear their shouts , and when you hear the shouts you will find them around killing bandits/wild animals .
and follow the guards advice .. watch the sky ..
i don't use fast travel , and now i have 19 dragon soul (level 48)

This sounds like my experience. Fast travel is definitely the key to dragon spawns.

and why is this a bad thing OP? Mo more oversized cliffracers is a good thing. Having to think about which shout to unlock first is a good thing. All NPC alive is a good thing. Dragons being a rare and epic encounter is a good thing.