Index: src/applications/drydock/blueprint/DrydockAmazonEC2HostBlueprintImplementation.php
===================================================================
--- src/applications/drydock/blueprint/DrydockAmazonEC2HostBlueprintImplementation.php
+++ src/applications/drydock/blueprint/DrydockAmazonEC2HostBlueprintImplementation.php
@@ -727,8 +727,12 @@
       pht('Waiting for successful %s connection', $protocol_name));
     $resource->save();
 
+    $last_attempt = PhabricatorTime::getNow();
+
     while (true) {
       try {
+        $last_attempt = PhabricatorTime::getNow();
+
         $this->log(pht(
           'Attempting to connect to \'%s\' via %s',
           $instance_id,
@@ -808,6 +812,16 @@
           throw new Exception(
             'Allocated instance, but ended up in unexpected state \''.
             $instance_state.'\'!');
+        } else {
+          $check_time = PhabricatorTime::getNow() - $last_attempt;
+          if ($check_time < 60) {
+            $this->log(pht(
+              '%s connection returned too quickly, manually sleeping '.
+              'for %d seconds to avoid a large number of AWS calls.',
+              $protocol_name,
+              60 - $check_time));
+            sleep(60 - $check_time);
+          }
         }
 
         continue;
@@ -925,8 +939,8 @@
                   '%s connection returned too quickly, manually sleeping '.
                   'for %d seconds to avoid a large number of AWS calls.',
                   $protocol_name,
-                  $check_time));
-                sleep($check_time);
+                  60 - $check_time));
+                sleep(60 - $check_time);
               }
             }