Re: Temporary in-game changes made to Ingress

Thanks for making these changes, I am sure they will help many in trying circumstances.


if we could add one more, please consider a server side change to reduce the decay rate.


it is hard to get cubes, and farms are out of the question. Many areas are already grey as agents must prioritize which portals to keep alive. The danger is that if we lose difficult to reach portals, we will lose players, and some may never be recovered.

Comments

  • kiloecholimakiloecholima ✭✭✭✭✭

    Good move on the sojourner medal. The other measures are good too, but don't really help people who can't leave their home and lack a couch portal.

  • NikaKorNikaKor ✭✭✭

    Thank you for the change, but it's only gonna make me go out and play more and go to the farms with my friends. Lol 😅

  • The sojourner modification came too late for me as lockdowns were announced a few days ago ... Niantic should have froze the counter or just Roll it back to what it was one week ago ...

    @NianticBrian I asked for support but couldn't get help sadly :'(

  • EvilSuperHerosEvilSuperHeros ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited March 2020

    This is great! Thanks @NianticBrian ! Thinking that if possible, you might want to roll back a bit, as I'm guessing many lost their sojo streaks that were likely in the 4 digits (or those who were lower but keeping it going).

    • For the Sojourner medal, a Portal recharge counts as a Portal hack. Going forward, Agents can hack or recharge a Portal in consecutive 24-hour periods for daily credit towards the Sojourner medal.


    These options? Only make me want to go out and play when I know I likely shouldn't really be doing so. (I'm not (yet) in a shelter in place order area)

    • High-level Agents can deploy two Level 7 and two Level 8 Resonators per Portal.
    • Portal cool down reduced to 90 seconds.
    • Portal hacks before burnout increased to 16 hacks.


    Better option(s)?

    • Ability to drop a temp portal at your location (once only). If possible, modify it so it doesn't give out keys. (idea behind this, is it's a temp portal, we won't be getting keys from others to link to it ect).
    • A glyph to request more cubes (or in the future, a mod or paid mod to do so (I'd pay for a mod that outputs more cubes))
    • Ability to drop a temp portal at your location (once only, no keys) but limit it to 4 hacks per day, but it pays out say, 20 L8 cubes, or something of the like. (similar to a restock portal as in having a modified output that is only xx times)


    Then with the above hacking options, you'd be able to at least load up a L6 portal solo to gain some cubes to recharge any portals you might own or keys you may have. Also, get to work on your glyphing skills as a L6 would be 4 glyphs...and a badge too!


    But just my thoughts / ideas.

    Feel free to s-h-o-o-t holes in them, disagree with my post or whatever. 😋

  • kiloecholimakiloecholima ✭✭✭✭✭

    Only concern I'd have with the temporary couch portal idea is over privacy. If other players can see the portal and any actions you take on it, it will give away home location. If it can be done in a way that other players can't see it, then it could work.

  • I don't think the changes other than to soujurner were a good idea. They encourage going out. My wife and I went for our morning walk today and upgraded about 30 portals to P8. I'm sure that's going to cause some Enlightened to come out and try to flip them given that anything P8 here doesn't last 24 hours.

  • DSktrDSktr ✭✭✭✭

    So if i got VRMH on some portal,it should be 16+12 = 28 hacks? Or it will remain the same 4+12 = 16?

  • It's worth noting that in most lock down areas, people aren't being told to stay indoors permanently. People are allowed to go to shops for essentials or leave the house for a walk. Players should have the common sense to only take advantage of the changes made today when they are going out anyway.

  • mortuusmortuus ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited March 2020

    I disagree, who asked for double r8 when many countries are in total lockdown? this isnt the time to encourage teamplay really as they canceled all events yet give us a bonus like we are supposed to go out more and play when local goverments around the world adivisng not to go out more then needed for food and medcine.. it seems one step forwards and 2 steps back with this bonus thing during corona times.....


    Also people living not close to a portal has zero benefits to this temp bonus changes...


    IMO the best changes would be 50% less decay rate and increased power cubes from hacks.. thats it... not needed anything more...

  • @NianticBrian Please thank the team for offering power cubes through the store. That goes a long way towards alleviating the problem.

    i still believe that lowering the decay rate would help during these difficult times, and would be unlikely to interfere with the sojourner changes.

  • MrNateJoMrNateJo ✭✭✭

    Dropping the decay rate would have a massive impact on the sojourner changes.

    For example if I have recharged every portal I have a key for to the maximum today and tomorrow they change it so that a portal decays once every 48hrs then I won't have anything available to charge tomorrow and my streak will be gone.

  • KarM3LKarM3L ✭✭✭✭

    well then, dont recharge every portal, just the ones that are getting low,

    also decay is daily, from deploy time,

  • TheKingEngineTheKingEngine ✭✭✭✭✭

    For any one intersted in how the hacking speed would be in this case...I've made a chart FYR. Corrections welcomed.

    I wouldn't say it's incredible but, it's incredible...

  • Some of these critiques are not reality-based: merely leaving your house does not reasonably enhance your risk of either catching or spreading coronavirus. Nor is doing so forbidden in most locales, even for many if not most of those allegedly "locked down." (I'm in one right now, for instance.) Indeed, outdoor exercise is on average a positive from a public health standpoint, so long as folks aren't (1) touching objects (or each other) and spreading the virus through contact, or (2) being close enough to each other to transfer droplets (6ft being frequently cited as a fairly safe distance). By contrast, sitting idle indoors is not great for your pulmonary health. So there's nothing particularly problematic from a public health standpoint about promoting individual exercise, so long as social distancing is observed. (It might pose a legal problem for some people depending on where they are, but that's not a worldwide issue.)

  • bbulkowbbulkow ✭✭
    edited March 2020

    Regarding COVID-19, in my area, my public health official yesterday has explicitly stated that one may only leave one's house for essential services. Exercise can always be done near one's home and must be under current law.

    Quote:

    " As for outdoor exercise, people certainly need to get out, but do this in your own immediate neighborhoods. Do not drive except to provide or obtain an essential service. Do not go into other neighborhoods for recreation. This increases the risk of virus spread.  "

    I see someone here stating that's not correct from a public health standpoint. This is frankly a justification not borne out by even moderate thought. Being out-of-neighborhood, or travelling in your car which might break down or require a fill-up of gas eventually, increases risk, where exercising in your local neighborhood does not. One can only dispute that the increased risk is minor, at which point we will discuss how many fractions of a life will be lost due to an online game, and whether they would add up to a whole life. In any case, it appears that the law - as interpreted by a seasoned and experienced public health official - is written to bad travel, except for essential services.

    I see on the intel map there are quite a few players out. I know their play area, I see them travelling between neighborhoods, within the county which I quoted. I see them in areas where there is no plausible essential service provided or consumed.

    While this is a problem in my specific county, and California ( the original home of ingress ) in particular, I am to the point where I see Ingress, or at least Ingressers, behaving poorly. Not all, of course, but some.

    Many parts of the world do not have these restrictions, but the world is changing daily. Some will almost certainly never need such restrictions.

    Right now, there are extra incentives to visit portals, although perhaps for less time.

    I believe the best action is to "black out" individual portals. You know the legal maps, you know some collection of county, state, country, I believe the time has come to simply take out regions of ingress. I don't love this because we could create the incentive for some very large triangles, which could be irresistible to some agents.

    Another option would be to create serious game dis-incentives, and do so for all regions. Removing all AP tracking from the game, and removing the global MU game, and disabling Intel. Or send an alert to all players that violating local shelter-in-place will be a bannable offense. Perhaps you can think of other options.

    Please take action quickly, so I don't end up hating a game which I have loved.

    Thank you for your consideration.

  • EvilSuperHerosEvilSuperHeros ✭✭✭✭✭

    Days I wish I had a home portal....but then again, by pogo standards, I could I guess. Maybe I should go sub it this morning? I mean a bench with or without a plaque does = a portal these days, along with many, many things that really shouldn't be portals, but are.

  • sojourner change was good but the 2xres and cool down change.. **** where niantic thinking about there?

    It only benefits couch portal owners and it generates MORE gameplay than before...

    people havent played this much in months now... this should be reverted asap since it has a counter effect on the entire covid-19 issue all over the world.

  • mortuusmortuus ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited March 2020

    Yeah people play for sure more, this changes only encourages people to go out and not sit home... please revert the double ap and less cooldowns with more hacks without hackmods - not a good balance imo to encourage people to sit home.

    But keep the recharge for sojourner even though freeze it for everyone until further notice would be better choice.

  • MirthmakerMirthmaker ✭✭✭✭

    Where some of us are it's tougher to get the activity without stumbling around or doing when there is much less foot traffic Where I am it is soft lock down - essentials only open - and the house IS the workplace so it makes it VERY easy to put the scanner on hold for days at a time.

  • JeroenixJeroenix ✭✭✭

    I would not read too much truth in one or two of the statements of naiadpam; if people want to know exactly how the virus spreads and what the progress of a vaccine is, check out your country's public health services or trusted news sites.

    I do agree with the opinion on the measures NIA took with Ingress - they are counter productive, people are way more often outside because of them.

  • The worst infection in the Covid-19 with augmented reality is the distance between players in the farming area.

    The limited distance eventually brings people to a specific point for overlapping farming.

    When the number of people gathers, the chance of infection increases

    It is especially dangerous if it is concentrated indoors.

    Therefore, the surest way to solve this problem is to increase the portal radius to n-fold.

    If the portal radius is doubled, the area will quadruple.

    In other words, the density between players will be reduced to 25 percent.

    The chances of infection decrease when social distance is maintained.

  • TheAuraStormTheAuraStorm ✭✭✭✭

    Agree, more or less, letting recharging count for Sojourner is a fantastic gesture of good will and I commend Niantic for it.

    The hacking bonuses weren’t needed but I imagine are very helpful for those that aren’t on lockdown, they might be counter productive in encouraging people to play rather than social isolating, but the cool down means agents don’t have to be out for so long to hack a few Power Cubes. I suppose it just requires some common sense.

    I don’t think the decay rate should be changed as that could limit what agents have to recharge, if they have limited keys or what keys they have were charged to 100% by another agent.

    I hope recharging counting for Sojourner stays a permanent thing, this will really help agents during times of illness, travel or anything unprecedented.

  • Thanks for addressing this today.

Sign In or Register to comment.