Operation: Cepheus

ArwethArweth ✭✭✭
edited October 2020 in SITREPs

September 19, 2020, Northwestern Bohemia, Czech Republic 🇨🇿

Mega Linkstar (successful attempt at the world record)


Video sitrep of the operation is available here: http://bit.ly/CepheusLinkStar


VV Cephei is an eclipsing binary star, its bigger part is currently recognised as one of the largest stars in the known universe. It’s 3000 light years far and almost 2000 times bigger than our Sun. If it was located in place of the Sun, its edge would reach somewhere around Saturn. It’s REALLY big! And it’s located in the constellation of Cepheus.


Cepheus was in the Greek mythology a son of an Egyptian god and a king of Aethiopia. He had a very beautiful, but also very proud wife. For her offensive speeches against Poseidon’s nymphaea, his whole country was punished by a flood and a sea monster. Unenviable position of king-manager and king-husband was also complicated by a position of king-father, for this situation was prophesied to be only possibly remedied by a sacrifice of his beautiful daughter Andromeda… a complicated situation.


Prologue

If we are to build the largest linkstar that Ingress has ever seen, then let’s not be modest and name the operation after one of the largest stars in the known universe. That would probably be a thought of many people.

I was more intrigued by the deep background and resonance of the ancient myth with our current plans when, led by the aforementioned idea, I was looking at how the biggest stars were called. Ancient Greek Myths and Legends, probably my first non-fairy-tale book and first taste of the ancient legacy of the hellenic civilization. For many years, the myths engraved into my memory, including the story of Perseus and Andromeda. In hindsight, I’m perceiving the story from a different perspective and the newfound understanding for the unenviable position of king Cepheus, incomprehensible for children, resonates in my mind in the days following our operation. As the mythical king stood in front of a difficult task and in fact, an insane choice, we also found ourselves facing impossibly difficult choices and tasks: where to find agents for such an enormous operation while not breaking the basic principles of OPSEC? How to face the unpredictable threat of a global pandemic? And we knew that not only this, but also all the other troubles of this operation will require not exactly easy decisions! And as Cepheus, to all his troubles, he also had to face the fact that his wife was by her actions thwarting his efforts in caring for his country and people, we also knew, that our opponents from the Enlightened will try to thwart our efforts anywhere and anytime, especially if they started to suspect anything. 😃💚

Into the roots

It is more than 6 years since Prague agent @gom423 managed to acquire about 30 keys from an extremely unreachable portal. Back then, he didn't think anything better than to hide them away in case some operation would be drawn for it in the future. When the replication capsules came into the game, he put the keys in them. When he replicated lots of them, he found another agent and gave her part of the keys.. and then another agent and another.. and before they knew, they had more keys than they could ever possibly use for a field.. unless.. we’re not going to build a field, we’re gonna build a star. From that point it started like an avalanche, replicating keys, housing them, planning. In the benning, there were too few keys to build a star, then too few people and in the end too few NIA servers.

Research for the biggest linkstar led us to an Enlightened international project that happened in April 2019 in 🇧🇪 Belgium with the cooperation of 🇫🇷 France, 🇳🇱 the Netherlands and 🇬🇧 the United Kingdom ( videoreport ). The only available screenshot of the target portal showed 8403 incoming links and that was pretty much all we knew about it.

Screenshot of the ENL star and available screenshot of the target portal

Because the Czech Resistance has never ventured in the construction of a linkstar in a scale counting thousands of links, we haven’t had a clear idea about the difficulty and the unexpected obstacles of reaching that goal. Some of these we were able to overcome with our abilities and experiences, but some, no harm in admitting, did surprise us uncomfortably.

Preparations for the first time

The founding stone of this operation was laid on the annual Czech Resistance summer camp event, the RESCAMP 2019, where @gom423 presented the CZRES Coordinators group a basic draft of his intention to build a gigantic star. However, the Umbra anomaly was ahead of us and because CZRES has had excellent relations with the Dresden RES for many years, it was more than just our duty to focus now all our powers mainly into providing effective support to our faction. We therefore focused on recruiting agents into teams which in the end created a strong CZRES contingent that did an excellent job in the streets of Dresden.

The first real steps were consequently made after the Dresden victory, in October 2019. An organizational task group was established and the works on executing such an enormous project began. Under the guidance of @gom423 tasks started getting shape and were being assigned to agents offering their skills and contacts. Who will be the point of contact for keys, who for recruiting and who for technical support for agents. How are we going to organize the field preparations, from where are we actually going to be linking, and mainly, what number of links are we aiming and how long it’s going to take us. It was clear that this is going to require a completely different approach than a field planning. In addition to that given the location of the target portal, we counted from the very beginning with international attendance, that means czech language isn’t going to be enough… and more tasks were appearing and the team grew. The operation date was in outlook January / February 2020, we had 40K keys spread in the field and a big dream.

Yes, you are reading correctly, over forty thousand keys! More than five times the largest known linkstar. And we aimed for a sure double of that, possible more! In that time, we wanted to go about 100-150 km from the anchor and focused heavily on the Czech sector. And already in this moment it was clear to us that unless we gather at least a 100 agents, there is no point in even trying.

One of the working drafts, autumn 2019

Oh, and more important thing was missing. The name of our operation:

Results of the vote

The distribution of keys to the target areas began and of course planning of the whole approach in the intel operators group. Christmas and New Year came and went and CZRES in the meanwhile managed to start off 2020 in a big style: a world record in the number of layers of a homogeneous field ( [sitrep] | [videoreport] ). With the coming end of winter, the date of our “starry” operation began to complicate due to circumstances regarding inaccessibility of the portal in the military training grounds. It almost seemed that we were able to overcome even this last one obstacle and were aiming for **the second half of the 2020 March**. The recruitment of the agents began, home and abroad, when a higher power intervened.

Involuntary postponement

The operation was prepared, agents instructed, keys already were at or were getting close to their final destinations, when the Czech government enacted the first restrictive measures in relation to the spreading of the new coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 and its derived disease Covid-19. Also in Germany, our key partner of the whole operation, the restrictions started tightening for the same reason. Long and thorough discussion in the orga team reached the conclusion that we are going to have to bow before vis maior and postpone the operation. As it turned out later, this decision was more than justified and here it is necessary to appreciate the orga team for their responsible approach to the whole situation and taking into account risks of the real life and their influence on the operation readiness of the agents. So.. we are putting the keys on ice and trust that the situation will improve in the following months.

Preparations for the second time

With the coming end of the school year, the restrictions started to ease up and CZRES managed to finish the organization of everything necessary for our next annual national gathering, the RESCAMP 2020 ( report ). The newly eased restrictions allowed our international friends from German and Austrian Resistance to attend as well. And also awoke new energy into resuming our preparation works on our attempt for the second world record of this year!

In the beginning of August, the new date was announced: second half of September 2020. Once again, we had to figure out how to legally send someone to the military training grounds and once again with a huge effort and little bit of luck, we did it! 💪 And there were still 40K keys lying around! World record, beware! If we manage to break the current record, we’re gonna do it in such a way that nobody will try to even imitate us for a long time. Why? Because we’re megalomaniacs! Prague and Dresden / Chemnitz are not enough for us, we added a corridor through Regensburg to Munich and also the longest corridor of the whole operation to Vienna. There are another thousands of portals in these cities and we can get dozens of agents to these places.

In support and keeping of high morale of the recruited agents, we also once again announced a guessing challenge. Of course it was about the number of links that we are going to be able to send. And with the knowledge of how many keys actually are in the field, some very bold numbers started to appear! 😂

Highest guessed numbers of incoming links…

Agents and more and more the operators and organizers of the whole operation believed that this is going to be a monumental success that Ingress has yet to see. Motivation, determination and trust in our abilities to “rock the world” were huge. And on 13th August 2020, they rose even higher when agent @morepepik managed to successfully capture the target portal! As a reward, of course apart from the amazing work done for the Resistance, he also got an honorable place in the CZRES sticker pack. 💪✌️

Documentation of the target portal lit up

Nearly immediately we released in great secrecy a last call for agents with heightened emphasis and effort at involving agents that used to play actively in the past, but haven’t been playing for a while. And our ranks kept growing comfortably. It was obvious that there are enough of us and that we are going for it. No matter what happens, the finale is upon us!

Surprise!

It was 16th August when the organizational team received a… surprise. Through a trusted faction channel an announcement reached us that Berlin is planning a… massive linkstar! And on the same date! And with the same intention, to break the ENL record! They have 10K keys and nearly a hundred agents. Now this is a shock!

Instantly, we sent information to Berlin about our even bigger planned operation. After a prolonged discussion between our two teams, we reached a conclusion that we are going to try to do even crazier thing than both of our teams thought, we are going to build two massive linkstar in one amazing starry night! We wished each other luck and returned to the organization of our respective operations.

It was a great pleasure for us when our Dresden friends quickly confirmed that there are no complications from their side to continue in the operation they have planned with us. Agreements are sacred between friends. They also connected us to another important city - Chemnitz. A great many thanks to Inglourious Bursterds! 💙

As the german capital was considerably far from our target portal and the spirit of faction cooperation is strong between us, the Berlin orga focused their recruitment efforts outside our connected parts of Germany. So the preparation of both linkstars continued and we were very much looking forward to an even more epic night than we could have ever imagined even in our wildest dreams! 💙💙

Recording

We are going for the world record. It wouldn’t be much if only the ones that were attending knew about it.

True, back then we had no idea how strongly and absolutely unpredictably we are going to show our operation live to the whole world! 😅😂🙈

Even to make a couple screenshots wouldn’t be enough. This must be properly documented! So we gathered a whole international recording team in which, apart from our own agents, were also present agents from 🇦🇺 Australia, 🇫🇷 France, 🇮🇹 Italy, 🇩🇪 Germany and 🇦🇹 Austria. This team was ready to make video recordings, intel screenshots and periodical counts of incoming links.

Once again extending our ranks…

Austrian corridor was included in the operation for quite some time, but it was still more of a theory than a real option. But in August it became clear that even :austria: Austria is determined to make the connection of Vienna to the operation possible. Recruiting was unpredictably affected by a “diversion” fact, that there was a 💙 big blue wedding 💙 between agents @instagrem and @darkblueyoda planned in Vienna on the same weekend as our operation, where not only many RES agents were invited, but not too few ENL agents as well. But not only because of this, we started recruiting among Moravian and Slovakian agents and getting together a support expedition to the streets of Vienna. 😃 Even up against the complication related to coronavirus, we managed to get support teams to the Austrian capital from both :czech_republic: Moravia and :slovakia: Slovakia. 💪

However, more and more local groups from the western direction to 🇩🇪 Germany, like Cheb and Hof, were also joining. The western arc began to fill beautifully. The northern Dresden corridor was also extended and it was no longer just a stripe of land across our republic.

The definitive start of the operation at 19:55 was established a couple days before the operation date. Keys, but also recommended inventory and technical & organizational information were flowing to the agents. All the international operators assigned tasks to their teams and everything was prepared as best as possible given the available information. The expected time to open all corridors: at max 10 minutes! This looks sooooo good! ✌️💙

Example of one of the linking plans (Prague), similar plans were made for all the other major link hubs as well.

The star is born

The D-day was here and the tension could be felt in the air, tick, tock…

Agents ready to set out to the field, tick, tock…

Operators diligently inspecting their sectors and fine tuning their plans according to the latest developments. Tick, tock, tick, tock, tick... 19:55!

GO TIME!

Cleaning of the corridors began and nearly instantaneously the first links were incoming. 36, 69, 119, 230… the number grew quickly and comfortably. Some minor troubles appeared and those were quickly resolved, but then a bigger one hit us. And that one was not so quickly fixed.

A local extreme frog appeared in the middle of the Austrian corridor and started crossing it extensively. Although it took nearly an hour of hard work, our dauntless agents guided by a brilliant operator managed to outwit the resourceful frog :frog: and in 20:53 finally linked through, followed by Vienna, which as the last of the major link hubs, started linking in the full extent of the corridor.

[ Listen audio ]

Audio recording of thank yous from one of the 🇸🇰 Slovak teams in the Viennese streets

GO + 30 minutes

In the meantime, thirty minutes and 1K links into the operation, the game is starting to show obvious signs of instability. The outgoing links are not showing on scanners, intel is lagging. To hunt a blocking frog under these conditions was even more challenging a task. 😅

GO + 90 minutes

After an hour and a half, we have approximately 4K incoming links, the scanners are failing. Reboot isn’t helping, “black screen” is spreading and those who are still lucky to play are considerably slowed down. Niantic is aware of the situation and working on resolving it.

GO + 120 minutes

After 2 hours the outages are beginning to be felt all around the world! Report coming from Croatia and other parts of Europe, but also from f.e. Hongkong! We just became world class even before we managed to build at least a half of our minimum target and in a way that definitely wasn’t part of our plans! 😂😅🙈

GO + 150 minutes

After two and a half hours into the operation we are slowly crawling over 5K links, agents are getting in and out of the game according to their luck.

GO + 180 minutes

After three hours, we are still unable to reach another thousand links, we have nearly 5,8K and the whole world is down, scanners and intel are failing disastrously, but finally.. a message comes from Niantic that they have made some changes and the game should be getting better. Indeed, some agents are finally getting back into the game, but many are still out.

GO + 195 minutes

3:15 into the operation. A moment ago, one of the operators came with the idea to stop all the linking. One of the Viennese agents, @donniedago, also proposed a similar idea: to stop most of the linkers and only let one of the corridors to link. A quick organizers meetup and we are going ahead with the Viennese proposal. We are preparing a descriptive and motivational message for agents in the field.

GO + 210 minutes

After 3 and a half hours into the operation we are finally getting over 6K links and are stopping all linking except for the Prague corridor - we must appreciate all the agents for their understanding and discipline - what a great international team.

GO + 225 minutes

We have nearly 4 hours behind us and 6,3K links. The game is slowly coming back online. We are connecting all the able linkers back into the effort.

GO + 240 minutes

Fours hours passed since the beginning and we are on 6,5K links. Berlin operation is launching and they have the first 250 links.

GO + 260 minutes

In the last 20 minutes, we managed to make an incredible 900 links worth leap, currently are on 7,4K links - only missing a last thousand links to the record!

GO + 290 minutes

Approximately 4:50 hours into the operation. We’re reaching 8399 links and the scanners are starting to report “Alignment error. Link failed.”. We reached the top, it’s not getting any higher. We’re not understanding it at first… but then a shock strikes us. After all, we still have over 30K keys in the field! This can’t be true! 😤🤯😭🙁🤐

In the first moment we experienced an immense disappointment over the enormous amount of work and energy invested into the preparations of such a huge operation, that resonated throughout all the channels and teams. But we are professionals! Heads quickly cooled down, the situation gradually calmed down. Afterall, the whole world was watching us. We couldn’t afford to be lashing out, we had to keep our wits about us and approach this situation in cold blood as just another of the many obstacles in our path. We began to realistically examine the situation as the angry emotional reactions of agents that were watching us from afar were flying around the world and also in our direction…

GO + 310 minutes

… However after another 20 minutes the organizational team was slowly preparing for the abort. We are unable to cross 8399 links and Niantic is silent! But in that moment a surprising twist happens! At 0:53 agent @DanPrg managed to make a screenshot with 8400 links! Although it instantly rolled back to 8399, we saw it and managed to capture it!

What? 👀💡😱

We’re not aborting anything, we’re trying further! We have to capture a higher number! This is certainly the way they did it in Belgium. And even if it wasn’t… by simultaneous linking of multiple links we are apparently for a split of a moment able to cross the 8399 threshold. New hope is running through the veins of our agents. We have tons of keys, we keep linking and trying luck!

Soon we manage to capture other screenshots. 8401 comes from the 🇺🇸 United States from agent @CliffM! But that’s still not enough! And then, 5,5 hours into the operation, at 1:25, it happened! 🇨🇭Swiss agent @Godstar0 is the first to bring a screenshot with a number higher than the ENL record! 8405 incoming links!

Record is here! 💙💪

And more screenshots are coming. With a value of 8404 again from 🇺🇸 the US, from Philadelphia agent @thesolo. And we are receiving even higher numbers, ones we are unsure what to think about… we don’t know and don’t understand how and why… we don’t want to speculate much about numbers like 8410, 8412, 8421, 8548 and even more… But here, we delve into the unclear - is it the intel lagging, is it the links ghosting, is it something else? It's probably impossible to determine that for sure and so unless Niantic decides to tell us, it would seem that we will never be absolutely certain where the current world record actually stands at. Nonetheless, the first screenshots that we received and that sent us all into euphoria showed at least 8404 and 8405 and that’s good enough for us, the goal is reached! Once again we managed in the international central-european cooperation under the guidance of CZRES to reach a world record for the second time this year!


🌟And completely unpredictably, the WHOLE WORLD was watching! 🌍️🌏️🌎️

… because it couldn’t do anything else, since we grounded the game! 😜🤷😂🙈


💡 Btw, did you know that the constellation of Cepheus is in our sky at its highest point right in September and October? 😁😈


But the show doesn’t end today! Berlin is still linking and the sister star of the central-european binary system of today’s starry night is steadily brightening above the German capital! You can read more about the Berlin operation, the Endgame Tentacle in its own report…


Thank you to all CEPHEUS

Thank you for 4 years of patience, key replication & distribution, overcoming obstacles, supporting, motivating, connecting, incredible endurance, proactivity, planning, making new and strengthening old friends across nations, the tenacity during hard times, kicking off the second attempt, counting on each other and endless faith in the common cause. Every one of you was, is and will be part of this great puzzle. It was a pleasure to piece this puzzle together into the one full image of Cepheus. Each shard was important and connected not only to the world record, but once again, in the light of the star, ignited the fact that cooperation and endurance is not uncommon for the Resistance!

Thank you all and let’s be proud and let’s look forward to the next events... to be continued…

The central-european binary system of starry night


🧲 Summary

Operation: Cepheus (Mega Linkstar)

At least more than 8700 links were created in the duration of the operation, but due to the maximum number of incoming links, any number over 8400 instantly rolled back to 8399. Intensive effort to capture at least a temporary value higher than this number confirmed the breakage of the record and so we present the result of 8405+ links.

The longest links were made from Vienna, about 330 km. The star began to shine over the area of 3 countries of Central Europe with the anchor in Czechia on the night of 19th September 2020. The whole operation took 5,5 hours and was being documented by 10 agents from 6 countries. More than 236 agents from 4 countries participated on the operation date under the guidance of 20 intel operators and the whole operation had support of dozens more in the preparation phase.

Links increment over time

Approximate numbers of links from link hubs

The sum doesn’t add to 8405+, but is larger. It was impossible to determine at an exact moment which links are valid and which were taken down of the target portal. We don’t even know if they were actually taken down or if there were many more, but Intel was simply unable to display their number.


On the operation date participated…

Head Planner / Operation Leader

@Gom423

POC for Keys

@Waheti

Coordinator

@Nearh

Heads of corridors

Dresden - @DrFiel, @merki81

Chemnitz - @hosimosi

Czechia North - @Ruscha

Hof - @Moertel

Prague - @Gom423

Czechia Southwest - @GooliverGTO

Czechia Southeast - @Arweth

Munich - @amidingsda

Vienna - @woina

Intel Operators

@Acabah, @BelaB, @Egon4711, @ElliOpp, @gimli4711, @JohnyDC, @Skamander, @TajnejHajnej, @TinyHannes, @Vesy23

Field agents

@0D3LL, @0nkelP, @42N3, @Abendrot, @AceZerro, @ADCWCPDJ, @AivenCZ, @Amarona, @AngriestAngel, @Anybeat03, @Ariovis, @Arya254, @atsepicnu, @AZ0815, @BAAR, @BadAssMe, @Bazooo, @Beemwe, @Befagor, @bIbejvtip, @BierLaden, @biggit, @blayen, @Blazska, @BlueFuchur, @Bockmas, @Bollorock, @BornAce, @boss5cz, @Brokenhard, @Bumuruk, @BuPo, @burdyr, @BybosDC, @Carantarus, @Cartman45, @cejn, @cicibu, @cipajs, @cleanhead, @Commander77, @Coudovo, @cowee, @CrimeEdge, @cyswoop, @CzMarw, @cznemo, @D4veEv4d, @Dalekwolf, @DanPrg, @DarkTrinity, @daSchmid, @deckdeck111, @deepbluewater, @deinSchlüssel, @Deluxedosser, @DerMane, @DerRadler, @derReik, @DeSaStroes101, @deschmidin, @DGatekeeper, @dolfi12345, @DongXiaoMiau, @donniedago, @DuanM, @Edudant, @Eisen1stein, @electricblu20vt, @ElFroge0815, @ell2@ElliOpp, @Ellisssa, @elmarto, @ELO147, @ElWooky, @erdax, @ErnstSt, @esage, @Escubarbmx, @fantonmai, @Fausti2183, @FinskaPrincezna, @FireWorksX, @FreakStern, @frtka, @Gaia1337, @GartenHexe, @gaTTlingCZ, @geohoshi, @Gewaldro, @ghost1917, @gigantol, @gizzmodj, @Goakku, @groddo, @Grube375, @Gummma, @HellDriver666, @holzonne, @Hrisna, @hukkv, @CharlesFox, @charliebalck, @ChelseaGirlie, @choose82, @idkfa2517, @IGnore80, @ippali, @janicax, @JanickaRybicka, @JardaGimlik, @Jennifer929496, @jircb27, @Jokerrr83, @K3LLOK3LLO, @kallagan93, @kamikatze07, @karlosici, @karlosik4, @KaterMUC, @KatherinePl, @KatieKello, @KatzeMuc, @KingArthurFirst, @kiwiwoe, @Kokkos, @Kuci2002, @kukurice123, @Kvi7ko, @LaCatrinka, @Lada, @lagrisak, @Laguna120, @LenikDC, @leontinka, @LetzterTyp, @Line, @LordCalf, @LordCanon, @Lorinia, @Lostriss, @ludiwawa, @Luz1, @maeuseteufel, @magicmarkus, @Makulka17, @MaNuWi, @matyasrr, @Max22BE, @MaxTorr, @McFaul, @Mejra, @memit, @meta93, @Metzgerlein, @Micky, @ministrletectvi, @mirotiro, @MissTerioes, @morepepik, @MrWHT, @mrzrag, @MUECHOE80, @mufl0n, @MVFight, @MylaGreen, @MysteryRose, @N4H4R, @Namadings, @Nearh, @nic0815, @Nisulem, @OldRider, @ON254, @ORTHANC00, @ozick, @paripasu, @patomat27, @PBY5, @Pino1350, @Pixelargonaut, @PlasteBeutel, @Porez, @Pouzyyy, @Powerman0815, @PythagorasDC, @Rapadepek, @Raplon, @reiswind, @Rimoraj, @robb2k4, @RotesB, @rubiconcrossed, @Ruhla, @Safetyman4, @Salis4, @SampL, @sarka007, @Scorttatto, @Sensenschwinger, @sheep1, @ShmuuCz, @Shuko, @Schnorschopack, @Schokoflocke, @schotte58, @Skamander, @slasid, @sleia, @Smalgod007, @snow3ear, @Spanel, @Spletti, @Stargi, @staydstay, @StreetWolFCZ, @suddenly4, @Sunthrow, @Supersonicator, @szwergerl4, @TAFKAkloklon, @Tailtiu, @taurus72pv, @thaigrr, @TheRock79, @TheSaker, @thomscarlett, @Tinitsch, @TinyHannes, @todlercz, @Tom733, @tomik2017, @tompalm, @TomTurbo1981, @Trinit91, @Trittvonunten, @Tukisek82, @TUPLACEK, @tvaaroh, @U1982R, @Utaiy, @vampilinchen, @Vesdana, @Viky, @VioIator, @Violejka, @vladkynemori, @VlasyEm, @Vzteklinka, @Widrik, @WitchDC, @Wuschelzahn, @XandraCZ, @xCrusader48x, @xCrystee, @xdrm, @xGrumpyVx, @xwerty, @Yemus, @Yolana, @Zornklinge, @zuzajda.

Recorders

@Arweth, @Dailon, @JohnyDC, @57Cell, @modransti, @Kiwiwoe, @orzino, @Ruscha, @Shooters42, @thomscarlett, @woina.

Notes and acknowledgements

#RESWUEisAwesome

A great thank you belongs to the developer team of the mighty Resistance tool RESWUE for their swift assistance and great support of our operation. RESWUE and its admins are indeed awesome! Don’t forget to use the above mentioned hashtag in your operations to show your appreciation of this wonderful tool.

Controversy of the target portal

We expected that. We weren’t wrong. Yes, it didn’t take long and the first protests and blaming for choosing a portal that is not legitimate - should have been sunsetted a long time ago, etc.. etc.. simply that we don’t play fair. So dear grumblers: portals founded by the rules effective in the time of their foundation are considered legitimate even in the future, when the rules change and so such a portal would not be a legitimate nomination by then. (source: [Krug, AMA]) And be aware, this fact is not a legitimate reason for the portal removal. To quote a czech classic: “You can debate it, you can disagree with it, but that’s about all that you can do about it…” 🤷😉

Thank yous

An international recording team was put together for the purpose of this operation. We want to thank you all, we truly appreciate all your work and support and such a large operation would not be complete without you. 💙

We also very much appreciate our expeditionary forces in the Viennese streets! Two moravian and four slovak agents supported the linking efforts and safely got back to their homes. For the support of our friends, we give thanks to you, friends! 💙

Last, but not least, we would like to give our thanks to Niantic, amongst others for their work on resolving the outage issues and thus allowing us to finish this project and claim the world record! 💙

A specific thank you goes out to our wonderful Resistance Vanguard @Azhreia who stayed online and supporting throughout the difficult night.💙

Congratulations

We would also like to extend our congratulations to the 💙 happy blue couple that got married in Vienna 💙 on the 19th September, @instagrem and @darkblueyoda. We sincerely hope that the light of our great blue star that was shining over your wedding made your day even a little bit more special. All the best to you and may you always have as stellar a life as it was on your wedding day.


This star is dedicated to

all the agents that helped to found and start up the Czech Resistance community, legends that many of us only know from “ancient” stories, but also to all the agents playing now, that may become or may have already become legends to the next generations...


Epilogue

@NianticBrian

The world record is ours, but all records are made to be broken. It’s thus a real pity that we reached a maximum number of incoming links allowed by the game. Debug data and screenshots of the issue were handed over to you, Niantic, and so in the interest of moving this challenge into even more stellar heights, we sincerely hope that in time, you will once again make the sky THE limit…

Written by @Arweth with support from @Nearh , @Ruscha , @cowee

Translated by @Nearh

Post edited by Arweth on

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