Ingress Alternative Universe Festival .... an idea
Ingress Alternative Universe Festival a month long purple/pink ingress running alongside everyday blue/green ingress.
* In a different plane of existance. Gear can't travel between. Different scanner instance, yet same game play
*everything starts grey ...
*randomly assigned team smurfs and frogs on same teams. Xfac relations impove (.... though in some places implode? Oh dear .... it can happen but the net good)
*Have to pay to play ( different price points i.e. pay to get inventory, pay get AP earned back into your everyday account) ethically weighted to local average wage. Would be interesting if the profit could run ingress blue/green.
*retired players come back for the month in reasonable numbers.
And Dear Niantic if this idea works may i ask two boons
1) please keep ingress free to play (though will pay for the app skins)
2) invite me to come to your offices and see the data .... i love data ... can sign confidentiality forms
Comments
Oh frequency yearly or twice a year....
Hmmm....
Interesting idea, though kinda odd to have a paid to play service force you on random teams even if the concept of random teams itself for an event sounds interesting to me.
I'd recommend more variation on gameplay though for this type of event:
*Portals decay at a much faster rate.
*New portal mods introduced that augment portals in such a way that if the source and target portal both have the mod, then they can link to one another regardless if an opposing faction link is in the way in which case said opposing link will instead be destroyed unless both portals of that link also have the same mod. Think Link Amp, but actually more useful, in which it literally amps the link's strength to break through other links, the cavet though is that it greatly decreases the link range for every Link Amp+ mod added. So a set of two portals, each with one Link Amp+ each, is able to break through non Link Amped+ links, but at the cost of 50% decrease in portal link range. Two portals with two Link Amps+ each is able to break through links from both portals with one link amp+ each and portals without link amps+, but at the cost of 65% decreased range, and so on. Range would be decreased by 50%, 65%, 75%, and 80% per Link Amp+ (decrease in range amount subject to discussion).
This would add a new dynamic to gameplay unique to this event that would allow players to strategize building and taking down fields based on if links are Link Amp+ or not. A solo agent could in theory take down a non Link Amp+ (known as a Link +0) or single Link Amp+ link (known as a link +1) with a x2 Link Amp+ link (known as a link +2) without ever venturing to the opposing link anchors but instead linking through their link, but it would be impossible for them to take down a ×2 Link Amp+ link on their own as their own ×2 Link Amp+ link cannot cross an equivalently powered link. They would need to recruit a second faction member to add more Link Amp+ mods to their portals, or be forced to travel to one of the opposing link's portals and destroy the portal anchor directly to take the link down before traveling back to cast their link.
Also introduce a Link Amp- that functions like the current Link Amp, in which link range is increased with no cavets other than the fact it occupies one of the four mods slots. In this way, a single agent can mod two portals with both a Link Amp- and a Link Amp+ to make the link +1 stronger in strength and ability to destroy +0 opposing Links, but with no reduction in range. So one could create a Link +2 with no decrease range penalities by equipping x2 Link Amp + and ×2 Link Amp - to the portal.
So, does an agent want an overpowered but short link that can destroy most all links in their way (and respectively be able to block most links up to Link +3) but sacrifice direct portal defense by having no shields/turrets? Or do they want a standard or long link that is weak but the ability to bolster portal defense directly?
Also note, if ×3 Link Amp+ links are connected to generate an Amp Field+, that field generates MU proportional to field strength x current Ingress algorithm involving census data and area covered. So, a Amp Field+, despite likely being a smaller field, or if the portals are close, the same size field as a field created by non-link amp+ links, it actually generates more MUs because the field itself is being amplified by the amplified links compromising it. One can in theory then generate more MUs from a smaller amplified field compared to a larger non-amplified field, etc.
Also, one can upgrade existing field portal anchors with Link Amp+ mods after the field has been casted even if it was casted by another player if the there are mod slots still available, in doing so, they will be awarded MUs equivalent to upgraded field strength minus- the original field strength.
Well this idea of mine grew quite quickly in retrospect... I may actually end up requesting this to be implimented in actual Ingress gameplay and not just for this event...
TL;DR
Introduce new mods:
Link Amp+
Link Amp-
Link Amp+ adds value of +1 per portal mod slot equipped with this mod to link strength when portal is linked to another portal with equivalent or higher amount of Link Amp+ slotted.
A link between two portals with one Link Amp+ each is boosted to a Link +1; however, range of link from source portal is decreased by 50%. A Link +1 can cross and destroy a Link +0, but cannot cross or destroy another Link +1, a Link +2 can cross and destory a Link +1 or Link +0, but cannot cross or destroy a Link +2 or higher, etc.
A Link Amp- (or Link Down) increases a link range without effecting Link strength, it just takes up a mod slot is all. This can be used to offset the link distance penalty of slotting a Link Amp+.
A field generated by three Link +1 or higher links generates MU proportional to the link strength × current Ingress algorithm of census data and total area field covers.
A player can upgrade anchor portals with Link Amp+ to make links and repsectively the field regardless of current field owner (so long as same faction), stronger, and be awared MU equivalent to upgraded MU generation minus- previous MU generation.
The Red faction:
Each cycle, agents have a 15% chance to turn into the red team and play for them, depending on the amount of Dark XM that may contaminated their scanners for unkown reasons. Due to the Dark XM amplification, their actions will grant them 50% extra AP and any control field they may create will count twice towards the scores due to the Dark XM agressive action in human minds.
Pros: extra gameplay. Cons: random XF effort (yes, this is clearly a con).