Make Fielding Great Again!
I think Gigafields and BAF's are a huge part of the game that's wasting away. There hasn't been a gigafield of either color over the US in years - and large fields are a primary reason for community and connections within factions.
Coordinating a huge field brings agents from around a region or even an entire country together to work on an operation. There are usually dozens of agents clearing blockers and throwing for multi-state fields. Look through any of the news channels on Telegram at the photos of agents in SITREPS - Look through the photos of agents in SITREPS on this forum - Lots of smiling happy people enjoying the community aspect of the game. They go out to dinner together after an op, they drive hundreds of miles together. They hike together and they communicate through so many different channels to make these amazing fields happen.
But folks who don't like not being able to link under a field gripe. And Niantic has listened. And big fields are dying.
Big fields are dying because spoofers keep getting away with their shenanigans - because the other huge reason for regional communication went away with the **** of guardians - because key duping is gone - and all of this because players who just want to make tiny triangles in their backyard and level up by themselves have, so far, been the ones catered to the most.
Make fielding great again.
Comments
Do it! Organize a giga. Cover half the freaking country. Be the change you want to see in the world.
Players from both factions have had to deal with spoofers for over 10 years and have made magnificently huge fields.
Please, do not give spoofers any attention, report them, and just plan those BAFs
Big fields and being able to field under them can exist at the same time. We still haven't seen a single major fielding op foiled by under-field linking. Change has been more of a positive for game health than a minus.
But with the writing style, it's clear what we're dealing with here.
From your posts, looks like you miss being able to keep Salt Lake City, Utah covered again. Good thing players there can enjoy their game without a few select people ruining it for everyone.
Salt Lake City used to be a single RES permafield. Now, it's much healthier:
Nobody is stopping you from being able to make your fields again, go ahead!
Yeah all those green links from Kings Peak… spoofer. And BTW I’m down in St. George - the south west corner of the state. Closer to Las Vegas than SLC. I’ve thrown the Pony field once. And the biggest reason the Pony field doesn’t get thrown anymore is because the RES agent who lives in Evanston, WY was pretty much driven from the game by trolling spoofers.
This whole argument is based SOLELY on what someone thinks the point of Ingress really is.... Since the only true scoring mechanism is fielding and scoring MU at Checkpoints -I'd say the linking under fields has significantly screwed the game over. The argument you seem to be making is that being able to make a 1MU triangle is the actual purpose of Ingress. You've justified your whole argument with "it's clear what we're dealing with here" ... meaning Utah Pony Riders. So what is the actual purpose of Ingress to you??? There is clearly several ways to play the game... but still only one scoreboard in the game. If you have never been involved in an active OP to throw 1million MU layered fields - you have no idea how complicated it is, nor the energy, manpower and coordination it takes to do it. Linking under fields ruins all of that. We used to throw fields to clear links under the field so we could then throw a bigger field. Bottom line is clearly NIA has little desire to improve the game if they can't also monetize it. The game is dying on the vine.
I know exactly how complicated it is. Done multiple multi-state ops successfully. Oh no, you need to add a couple rails, so hard. Farm a couple extra keys and ask a teammate to loiter for potential cleanup.
The fielding game is different now. And not because of linking under fields or machina. There just simply isn't any interest in large fields anymore. I've done my share of large fields and cleared for dozens upon dozens of others. The numbers of players needed to coordinate are no longer around. I'm just glad to say I played in the height of the fielding game. New players just don't get the same experience now. Will it ever come back? Not sure. We need more players before we even consider trying it again.
I never bought the argument that linking under fields would make the game more fair or fun for agents living in AM01-ECHO-09, AKA Salt Lake City. The fact of the matter is that the size and duration of the BAFs had already started on a downward trend beginning in 2020. Allowing links and fields under the BAF, which started in April 2021, didn't do anything to reverse the trend.
We had a lot of agents who played to zero-out opposition fields under the BAF, and they just aren't as engaged as they used to be. Getting them to plan, clear, or throw big fields is difficult because their favorite part of the game is no longer available.
"We had a lot of agents who played to zero-out opposition"
Yes, this was a toxic playstyle. Sorry other team, you can't play half the game unless you drive out for hours. Honestly it should have been removed much earlier in the game's life. Lots of good people left from lopsided situations, leaving ONLY the "agents who play to zero-out opposition"
I would argue, however, you have more targets to try and zero out now. You can limit your opponents to small 500 meter links, which means they can't build anything of importance. Additionally, it means you have nice densely built targets to farm.
But let's be honest, you're trying to argue for a feature that's not coming back. It was a bad design which had really amplified impacts as the "network effect" of agent population fell.
Maybe one of the other causes is the vr bb use. Now a single player can 'easily' get his onyx illuminator with vr bb (ok need to be lvl 16 and core , or with a core lvl 16 agent as assistance) . In the past, field OPs, the main way to obtain onyx (for multiple agents in 1 OP for example)
I'll copy and paste my comments about this from a previous thread:
niantic has waged a war on fielding for some time now.
They took the "control" out of "Control Field" when they introduced under-field linking. This disincentivized strategic fielding for many agents and likely drove agents away or at least into "casual" play.
Then, niantic took away key duplication when they stole everyone's muffys. Again, more agents likely peeled off forever because there was no program for kinetic key duplication as was mentioned.
If it was such a "toxic playstyle" and the game is SOOOO much healthier now, where did all the players go? Why aren't more people picking up the game and staying with it anymore?
I'll tell you why. People get bored. There's less community to keep them involved because the changes that have been made are skewed towards individual players and away from things that required teamwork.
Guardian hunting - love it or hate it - required teamwork. When the guy you battled with on a regular basis in your hometown went on vacation you had to find an agent to clean up after them. That required teamwork and networking. Teamwork and networking keep people involved and playing the game. When someone from another state contacts you and asks you to go neutralize something, it gives you a reason beyond making tiny triangles to play. Yes, some people found it toxic. Yes, some people hated being hunted. But like I said, love it or hate it, killing guardians was the first nail in the coffin and it drove a lot of people away from the game.
And from there on, as I've said, most of the changes that have been made to Ingress cater to individual, and urban play. Linking under fields, key dupes going away, all of these changes make it easier for individuals to play the game and in no way shape or form increase the requirement for teamwork.
Used to be even anomalies could be influenced by teamwork and fielding over an anomaly site. Now, it's all about battle beacons and shards. And yes there is teamwork involved in beacon and shard anomalies but that's the ONLY time a larger community really influences the game anymore - at least here in the US.
There has not been a single change that makes going to a hard-to-reach low-signal portal more significant. For me, that's the funnest part of the game. Going places I've never been before, having to figure out ways to get a signal in the middle of nowhere. And yeah, no key duping means I have to go back again. But it means I'm going back again and again to the same place if I want to keep using a strategic portal.
I will grant that Quantums made it too easy to dupe keys. And I am all for that aspect of the game being removed. I do however, believe there should be a mechanism that makes it harder to dupe keys but doesn't remove the feature entirely from the game. And kinetics seem to be the perfect answer to that problem.
People have been arguing against large fields for a long time. And you're right, it does seem to be a part of the game that's going away. But to say that the game is better off now that you've gotten your way ignores the reality of the shrinking player base. The game may be less toxic but it's also less fun and less community oriented. And a less toxic game with nobody playing it is the road we continue to travel.
The biggest problem in coordinating a large field is lack of players. If there were more people playing then yes big fields would happen. In most places the large fields enticed people to play, other places large fields ran players off from both sides. It's simply a numbers game with fields. Niantic needs to advertise Ingress like they do Pokemon. Maybe then we would see growth in the game rather than decline. And then we can see if the fielding game comes back.
This game isn't less toxic at all. Agents from the same faction like to force other agents to join their community because they will experience repercussions from that decision if the latter agents don't. This situation explains why there is a shrinking player base because veteran players won't leave newbies and rookies alone, nor do those veteran players respect the Agent Protocol. Making fields under huge fields and scraping the key duplication from QCs do even the playing field specifically for newbies or rookies who are just learning or don't have the resources to travel long distances or afford bots to obtain keys.
If you want to make fielding great, have an anomaly to make extraordinary field arts for a change rather than stick to the usual BAF or giga BAF. Of course, Niantic needs to incorporate the field art anomaly into the storyline of this game. I have not seen a field art made here in the US except this one recently (see below). It's time to field something creative and more exciting through field arts.
"If it was such a "toxic playstyle" and the game is SOOOO much healthier now, where did all the players go? Why aren't more people picking up the game and staying with it anymore?"
COVID, Prime rollout mismanaged, players "aging out" /gatekeeping communities, and the stream of PoGo players coming to Ingress to make portals being shut off. Ingress is now a direct competitor to PoGo, but is being told they must be profitable on their own (can't use pogo money), but the effort/investment to reward ratio is nowhere near close for the cash cow casual gamers. Niantic management is asking the impossible from their Ingress team and set them up to fail.
"Guardian hunting - love it or hate it - required teamwork. But like I said, love it or hate it, killing guardians was the first nail in the coffin and it drove a lot of people away from the game."
It's very hard to login to an automated dashboard (Brokers Guild) and enter a players name to pull up their scraped portal list with age. Right.....
"And from there on, as I've said, most of the changes that have been made to Ingress cater to individual, and urban play. Linking under fields, key dupes going away, all of these changes make it easier for individuals to play the game and in no way shape or form increase the requirement for teamwork."
They haven't reduced the need for it either. Teamwork still always beats individual effort.
"Used to be even anomalies could be influenced by teamwork and fielding over an anomaly site. Now, it's all about battle beacons and shards. And yes there is teamwork involved in beacon and shard anomalies but that's the ONLY time a larger community really influences the game anymore - at least here in the US."
Right, fielding over an anomaly instead of going there and directly competing is really strategic.... I laughed at this one, thanks.
"There has not been a single change that makes going to a hard-to-reach low-signal portal more significant. For me, that's the funnest part of the game. Going places I've never been before, having to figure out ways to get a signal in the middle of nowhere. And yeah, no key duping means I have to go back again. But it means I'm going back again and again to the same place if I want to keep using a strategic portal."
Yes, exactly the point. You don't get free actions anymore. One day of investment to cheese owning an area isn't conducive to healthy competitive play. It skewed the map to handful of players on the edges who grabbed a couple hard to get keys and spit them out like candy. The return on investment was infinite. Now they need to keep going back for keys instead of doing nothing. Too bad, game is much more balanced now.
"I will grant that Quantums made it too easy to dupe keys. And I am all for that aspect of the game being removed. I do however, believe there should be a mechanism that makes it harder to dupe keys but doesn't remove the feature entirely from the game. And kinetics seem to be the perfect answer to that problem."
Not particularly. Players are already directly editing their KM walked per week in Google's app and we still haven't fully eliminated backpacking. Quantum removal was a huge first step. I still think requirements for COMM activity before you can collect your kinetic rewards should exist. Add a new COMM message that says "Player XYZ has downloaded thier kinetic reward at "ABC Portal"". Communities would have a way to identify backpack accounts and see which ones aren't actually part of the Ingress community.
"People have been arguing against large fields for a long time. And you're right, it does seem to be a part of the game that's going away. But to say that the game is better off now that you've gotten your way ignores the reality of the shrinking player base. The game may be less toxic but it's also less fun and less community oriented. And a less toxic game with nobody playing it is the road we continue to travel."
Nobody has argued we should remove large fields. We've argued that players should be able to play the game alongside them instead of control freaks being able to dictate when/where you can or can't play.
This entire thread you've typed up shows you're upset that that little guys on the edges miss being able to stop others from doing anything. TBH it was a very unbalanced, asymmetric playstyle. If you want to stop people from having their portals/links/control fields in the game, GO TO THEIR LOCATION AND DO IT. You have bursters, you have gear. Meet them out there instead of tossing lazy links miles over them. But don't worry, you can still limit them to 500m links if you'd like, while still maintaining your MU dominance.
If I were John Hanke, I'd be making every effort to make going places a bigger part of all of Niantic's games. Every location-based game will get boring if your game can be played stem to stern without going anywhere new. Encouraging exploration provides endless opportunities for every one of Niantic's games to be endlessly interesting.
If your town has a big giant field over it, and you really want to make tiny triangles you should need to go somewhere new to take them down. If you want to make a BAF, you need to go somewhere out of the way so it'll stay up for more than a few minutes. You need to explore. And you need to work together.
Pokemon Go should have more reasons to visit a mountain-top Pokestop.
Pikman Bloom should give players a reason to go somewhere new and experience new things.
That's how you keep these games from getting tired and old. It's an advantage that no other game has. You'll get tired of Candy Crush. You'll get tired of smashing pigs. It's pretty hard to get tired of exploring the world around you.
That's how every single one of Ninatics games can grow endlessly.
Let's not forget that niantic has slashed the Ingress team and resources compared to 7-8 years ago, so expectations should be appropriately adjusted.
The once very frequent ingress reports and other lore content videos/posts directly drove player activity. This has all but vanished.
We *never got* the once-much-anticipated new backends. Luckily, dwindling player activity has allowed niantic to get away with a bargain basement server host.
Agents (not me) are spending hours of their time, loads of data, and much electricity to scan portals, but so far there is absolutely zero resulting benefit to ingress. Prove me wrong on that.
Agents have been desensitized to the once outrageous appearance of store items in the item carousel. Now ingress has gone full P2W with multiple gear items in the store.
Anomalies are a fraction of their former glory, with very few satellite sites and no connected cells, which alienates many agents who don't have the means to travel to the few distant sites.
Where we once had multiple active, engaged community managers, do we even have one now? Where are the AMAs?
What function do vanguards and XMAs perform? Have these groups had any "new blood" or member cycling recently?
If you make a big field with a TTL of greater than a week, it's intentionally disruptive.
If you make a big field with a TTL of around a day, it's not.
The problem was/is not that big fields stop people playing. The problem is that people are building big fields off portals so durable that they prevent people playing.
The problem is the design.
Aside from that, the bigger issue is that the teams have fragmented. Spoofers were always a problem and people chose to make big fields anyway. When people realized they could make 200 layers off a local portal and the field would stay up for 6 months because the keys were off portals that no-one could access but had been duplicating, they chose to stop using large area coverage as a metric, and started using layers as a metric.
Given that the majority of players these days seem to be far more focused on their profile than actual achievements, when you can get more MU from a 10km field with 200 layers, as a 200km field with 1 layer, why bother with the big field that requires cat herding and actual chance of disruption?
because the other huge reason for regional communication went away with the **** of guardians
Also, to this point, if the only thing keeping your teamwork going was intentionally being an a**-hat and using tools that were no better than spoofing (including people spoofing to do it), I have questions about your idea of teamwork.
I'm just gonna point out that you, @KonnTower, @VenomousToad and all the others on this thread and others who've complained about guardians and BAFs for years have pretty much gotten everything you want when it comes to game mechanics. And the player base continues to dwindle.
Ironic that when competitive aspects of a game are eliminated or destroyed, people stop playing competitively.
"A person often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it.” ― Jean de La Fontaine
The problem was/is not that big fields stop people playing. The problem is that people are building big fields off portals so durable that they prevent people playing.
Ain't nobody quitting the game over linking under fields. It wasn't a game changer like so many thought.
Oh man, you definitely misunderstand who I am then. I've fought against all these nonsense changes like fielding under fields for years, and even raised all the issues that came to pass when MUFG were released way back when. If I "got all I wanted" we'd have ditched Aegis and returned shields to 10/20/40, reduced Glyphing output by about 66%, and a host of other reversions, that would take us back to what made the game strong. Don't pitch me and @KonnTower in the "Wants the same thing" bucket at all.
The fact that you think MUFG key duplication is "necessary" despite the fact that it got added when the game's "Big Fielding" aspect was already in decline just highlights the disconnect.
As for guardian hunting, when it existed, it was the worst of players favourite activity. And Niantic did everything to avoid getting rid of it, by actively damaging other parts of the game, until they finally accepted that it was encouraging spoofing, scraping and cheating.
It's not that I don't agree that big fields with teams working in concert, were an amazing part of the game. I just disagree with your claim that the teamwork-destroying game feature is what caused teams to come together. It's been 10 years, and for many of us, the exact descriptions of doom and gloom and slide into obscurity that we gave as these features got added, has happened. Reversion of one of the worst (MUFGs) is one of the few steps in the right direction.
Likely it won't be enough because the teams are already broken beyond repair without some other injection of either development or marketing, and the toxicity of players intentionally preventing others play for the sole purpose of driving them from the game has never been addressed by the company. But when they make a good change, that moves the needle back to the team, yeah, I'm going to defend that.
Largely because the people they were trying to recover had already quit by that stage. New players take it as a given and the slide continues because they don't see a point in removing those bigger fields when they can "just play anyway". The teamwork aspect won't come back while there's no benefit or need for it.
Regarding GP hunting-
Onyx badges are the top tier and should take significant effort to earn. The mechanism to make getting Guardian hard was simply - other players blowing up your GP.
Yes, it felt good to deny an enemy onyx guardian a day or two before they got it. It made them try again with another more durable portal.
Niantic used to include capture date on the stock Intel map to facilitate this.
Then once that was removed, agents created their own tools to track the ages of these portals. That should not be a shocker.
Guardian hunting brought out the bullies. Everyone in all the guilds should have been banned for scraping data. The badge should have been removed way earlier than it was. The game is about triangles, not mental warfare.