Idea: Multi-Game Version of Trusted Reporters.
First off, I don't mean Trusted Reporters in the sense it's been used for cheaters. That said:
With Ingress adapting over time from a standalone game to one which influences PoGo/HPWU, players know the mechanics behind s2 cells and how Ingress influences which portals become what in PoGo (perhaps even HPWU). Thanks to this people playing all Niantic games can have a positive overall influence, or likewise, a group of Ingress-only players can cause negative effects in the other games, even unintentionally.
The main observation here is how gyms/fortresses (especially raids) influence large gatherings of people. These locations are selected by an automated algorithm that doesn't account for what is safe or best suited to minimize invasive behavior. For example, 30 people meeting up at a park is not intrusive. 30 people standing around the mural at a small business's entrance IS.
To help avoid nuisance complaints/removal requests, I would recommend a way for select people engaged in the communities of all 3 Niantic games to submit priority reports for portals turned gyms/fortress. The idea being that a gym/fortress could be removed (turned back into a pokéstop/Inn) with an alternative stop/inn from the same s2 cell becoming the gym/fortress instead.
This would allow the community to play Niantic games without hurting the Niantic image, and improve safety for the players too. Of course, guidelines would need to be in place to keep people from moving things just to have them where they'd like it better, but it should be limited enough that Niantic could review these things manually, or require consensus of a number of local trusted reporters.
Thoughts, Niantic?
Comments
What about all those ex raid locations that Starbucks pretty much paid for?
I can't see how those would make sense to move (at least here where.I live). Again, the idea is for very limited use to decrease nuisances to people who don't play, while increasing safety for those who do.
Example: I've got an s2 cell here with only 2 portals, so 1 is a gym in pokemon Go. The gym is at a trail marker that runs right next to a person's house, right off a busy street you can't park on, and without a great stopping place nearby, so often people will park where they shouldn't in order to stop there without walking far. Bad choice-making aside, large raid groups at the narrow sidewalk in front of a person's house is not ideal for the people living there, the people playing, or Niantic - who loses potential revenue because people likely will find better areas to raid, albeit a perfectly fine portal or pokestop for individual fast use.
The other portal? A church a few blocks away with a decent-sized parking lot that is only occupied during services. It is significantly safer for multiple players, less intrusive to the community, and for both those reasons, better profit potential for Niantic
That's the idea for what kind of situation I mean. It's purely an idea to improve safety/nuisance issues for portals in places not suited for GROUPS of people, because unlike Ingress, the other games determine at which portals people should gather in masses, and even the time frames, indiscriminately off of algorithms.
You talking about other things than INGRESS.
This is INGRESS COMMUNITY FORUMS. 😊
No, I'm talking about Niantic recruiting players familiar with ALL 3 games. Considering the other 2 are populated with POIs almost entirely based on Ingress, Ingress is clearly the most important of the 3 for this idea.
I'm not surprised that Niantic fully automated the process of converting portals into other games, but automated processes always require human intervention. I'm honestly surprised they haven't already had this idea already considering it's been 2 years since the start of raids (the reason dozens of PoGo players swarm to individual portals at a time).
You're unhappy with Pokemon aren't you.
Those two games have a mechanic that Ingress does not. Therefore it's not relevant to Ingress and should be discussed between those two products. No-one in Ingress cares which portal is which, because there's no differentiation between them.
1) I barely play PoGo (anymore) and barely looked at HPWU. I learned about Ingress as a result of playing PoGo, though, so I'm pretty well-versed about the issues I've stated. My only purpose here is to improve player safety and decrease nuisances created by the automation in Niantic's other games.
2) As this is something regarding the direct relationship between Ingress and the other 2 games (which are both tied to Ingress, but not each other), and, afaik, this is the only community forum run by Niantic, where would you suggest I propose an improvement to rectify bad results of their automated processes? I'm not aware of any all-inclusive places for discussions that involve multiple products.
3) You're correct, portals aren't drawing in dozens of people at a time on a daily basis, but they do in the other games. The ones which do in inappropriate places lead to issues that result in portal removals or frivolous lawsuits Niantic has to deal with. If local agents can help prevent this, why would you oppose it?
why would you oppose it?
Because you're handing tactical advantage to specific players. Which portals are gyms and not can be easily gamed to provide benefits or remove benefits. TR's were about stopping spoofers and didn't have any actual control.
My opening statement was that this idea was NOT the traditional sense of TRs. I merely lacked a better name.
I'm not sure how familiar you are with the s2 cell sizes that the game uses to determine gyms/fortresses, but it wouldn't be difficult for Niantic to see right through a rogue attempt to move one that is perfectly fine as-is rather than an honest attempt to improve gameplay for everyone. That said, Niantic could easily require that multiple local agents agree on the same move changes before making them, like a smaller-scale OPR.
Yeah because OPR is completely free of local bias. There's a reason we almost never get portals within 25kms of where we play.
Agreed, which is why I suggested Niantic select trusted players in a much smaller scale.
I really hope you saw the sarcasm instead of agreeing with the statement in simplistic form.
And if you have less reviewers for your adjustments, it nullifies your local player aspect. How am I to know the situation on a street corner in Backwoods, Nebraska? What makes a player any better than a Niantic staffer at an unknown area.
Sarcasm was obvious yes. But unlike OPR/portal nominations, these people would be helping resolve issues in a small scale and hopefully rarely needed after an initial startup (like when new POIs create bad placements in other games).
Also, OPR requires level 12 and passing as competent on a test. The scrutiny is barely there. As trusted helpers (eh?), these players would be expected to uphold a higher caliber of responsibility with their actions. "Trusted" emphasizes that less of them should be needed to monitor a 20-50km radius locally. So if they want the multiplayer failsafe of minimum numbers, they could easily manage areas with 3-10 players, and have JUST those players work together to agree on problematic POIs and also agree on which alternative is a proper solution.
My comparison to OPR was only meant for a possible format of processing data, but would be much more confined to players' location, and only populated by players who are in this trusted program. Obviously they would communicate to each other when they're working on a fix, and would submit it themselves based on personal/community feedback.
OPR-style example: Let's call it OSA. Player A marks a problem portal and specifies for which game (PoGo/HPWU). It queues the local players' OSA to view the s2 cell in question, decide if they agree on necessity to move, and pick which eligible portal they think is safer. If votes on the best alternative portal aren't a clear majority, it would re-enter the queue like edits do now, having OSA pick between the top 2 alternatives based on votes, until one wins.
Leave Niantic to decide player minimums and percentages for votes, etc., but clearly a lower number of players would be ideal. They should also have a way to communicate with each other (player names would probably suffice for the players to figure out discord/telegram themselves), so they can discuss nominations/votes before making them.
It's a lot of player authority Niantic would be offering, so those who are offered would be incentivized to work responsibly together or risk getting the boot. Between community and OSA members monitoring each other, Niantic *shouldn't* have to monitor much they do directly once they had a good group established.