Ingress Game Design doesn't gel with Goals

2

Comments

  • Deaf1Deaf1 ✭✭
    edited October 2019

    I stopped playing largely because I'm a rural player in a state that has only three active players. It's difficult to keep things recharged without frackers.

    Post edited by Deaf1 on
  • These are choices being made and you're getting mad about Niantic giving you more options?

    This is the layman's failure of game design.

    Players don't choose from an array of options in a myraid of ways. They optimize. And if John Hanke's goal is social interaction and exercise, then the 'optimal' method dos not direct people towards that but rather away from it.

    There's also an element of the prisoner's dilemma. A player who chooses a less inefficient method will always know that the other team is "likely" to take the more efficient method. Therefore choosing the less efficient method is allowing your opponent to have an advantage.

    Players generally don't choose from the myriad of "options" unless there's another benefit from it.

  •  I think we're are looking for a way to make farming itself a community event, not including the before or after pub event.

    I'm all for new solutions, but yes, there's a certain amount of nostalgia looking back to 2012-2014, where we had social farming.

  • KhatreKhatre ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited October 2019

    That was the right move, still too many frackers ig.


    But glyphs are fun, too easy imo even in complex.

  • GargishGargish ✭✭✭

    More and more people don't even go to farms anymore. People submit repeatedly until they finally have their couch portal and fill it with farm mods. That works at least if the faction is the dominant one. The other faction eventually stops playing. Making glyph hacks less profitable will make enemy portal hacking much less attractive.

  • This is a huge problem in many areas outside of major metropolitan areas... some far worse than others. Has anyone ever entertained the idea of using portal density of an area to affect the hacking output of portals in those areas?


    I'm no programmer, and I'm sure there are issues with that concept, but there is a major disparity between the gear available to rural players in comparison to urban and even suburban. Messing with frackers or gear availability across the board really hurts those players to the point where many of them do quit. Be careful not to undo the things that have helped make this game MORE accessible to more players.

  • 10/20/40 were already buffed values. Back when I learned to love Ingress, shields were 3/6/10

  • Sure, but if I told people they were losing a 70 shield and taking it to 10, they'd probably have an aneurysm 🤣

  • mortuusmortuus ✭✭✭✭✭

    I agree, prime just freezes for me every day since redacted died... Do i enjoy this game as much now? Not really with all the issues i thought would be solved by now...

  • "start building and contributing to your community. Recruit new players. Help them learn the game. Organize local farms, beergresses, First Saturdays. Create missions and do them them together as a team, plan and organize team ops, get a group together to hunt for new POI submissions."

    @StallionMang Well put!

    Exactly. Not related to frackers, shield stickiness or glyph output.

    I guess there are many ways to see gameplay, "Ingress is all about change" sure how is that working out for you? Nerfing shields is not balancing the game is it? Who has respect for attacking a 2x Aegis portal today compared to attacking a 2x Axa portal 3 years ago, remember how hard it was? Taking down a portal is not a problem today. Farming is not a problem today. Nothing is a problem today besides (1) keeping players (2) see what is happening and communicating in the scanner.

    Challenge is excitement = fun. Challenging tasks needs planning, top notch gear and team work. What is harder in the game today compared with 3 years ago? Nothing -exactly! Everything has been made easier and streamlined for individual play. Do people move around or just sit at home/work hacking their sofa portals? Niantic has the statistics on this.

    I still argue that any underdog faction needs the best shields possible to turn the table and balance the game. Only they can do it. Then they need a reason to build and means to defend. They will need it. It should be fare no ****. If a playarea is 80/20 topdog faction can´t afford to hard shield and defend 80 but underdog faction can afford to hard shield and defend 20. Today nobody can hard shield anything and defense is almost impossible because shields jumps off. Aegis is now what Very Rare shields was before more or less.

    I'm not saying farm wars and faction vs faction is the way forward -just saying Ingress came that route in gameplay. If it is history or roots depends on who You ask, I guess.

  • MuzzgoodMuzzgood ✭✭✭
    edited October 2019

    (had some forum problems when posting not sure how many identical posts I'm doing now but here goes! I try to split the post)

    @StallionMang Well put!

    "start building and contributing to your community. Recruit new players. Help them learn the game. Organize local farms, beergresses, First Saturdays. Create missions and do them them together as a team, plan and organize team ops, get a group together to hunt for new POI submissions."

    Exactly. Not related to frackers, shield stickiness or glyph output. 

    I guess there are many ways to see gameplay, "Ingress is all about change" sure how is that working out for you? Nerfing shields is not balancing the game is it? Who has respect for attacking a 2x Aegis portal today compared to attacking a 2x Axa portal 3 years ago, remember how hard it was? Taking down a portal is not a problem today. Farming is not a problem today. Nothing is a problem today besides (1) keeping players (2) see what is happening and communicating in the scanner.

    Challenge is excitement = fun. Challenging tasks needs planning, top notch gear and team work. What is harder in the game today compared with 3 years ago? Nothing -exactly! Everything has been made easier and streamlined for individual play. Do people move around or just sit at home/work hacking their sofa portals? Niantic has the statistics on this. 

    I still argue that any underdog faction needs the best shields possible to turn the table and balance the game. Only they can do it. Then they need a reason to build and means to defend. They will need it. It should be fare no ****. If a playarea is 80/20 topdog faction can´t afford to hard shield and defend 80 but underdog faction can afford to hard shield and defend 20. Today nobody can hard shield anything and defense is almost impossible because shields jumps off. Aegis is now what Very Rare shields was before more or less. 

  • MuzzgoodMuzzgood ✭✭✭
    edited October 2019

    (part 2)

    I still argue that any underdog faction needs the best shields possible to turn the table and balance the game. Only they can do it. Then they need a reason to build and means to defend. They will need it. It should be fare no hand1cap. If a playarea is 80/20 topdog faction can´t afford to hard shield and defend 80 but underdog faction can afford to hard shield and defend 20. Today nobody can hard shield anything and defense is almost impossible because shields jumps off. Aegis is now what Very Rare shields was before more or less. 

    I'm not saying farm wars and faction vs faction is the way forward -just saying Ingress came that route in gameplay. If it is history or roots depends on who You ask, I guess.

    Again, Thanks for a great game!

    (the forum has a word filter?)

  • @Muzzgood

    Exactly. Not related to frackers, shield stickiness or glyph output. 

    No, but removing frackers or changing shield stickness or glyph output, wouldn't prevent any of that either. Like anything significant in this world, nothing is fixed by one specific action, but actions to improve the situation are always good.

    Just because you can do all those things doesn't mean my point is invalid, because those things are largely unrelated.

  • I still argue that any underdog faction needs the best shields possible to turn the table and balance the game.

    As someone who's been part of and seen it happen in multiple regions, I've never seen or experienced the "underdog" being able to hold permanent farms. Every time it's turned around, it's been flash farming, until they're no longer the underdog and can start establishing permanent farms. And flash farming rarely relies on heavy shielding because by it's nature, its protection is speed and temporary obfuscation.

    Strong anchors are usually more protected by access than shields, and every portal is destroyable. Farms and access to gear are what affects balance, and while Frackers can change that balance, shields rarely do. To hold a permanent farm takes determination, not more shields.

  • Perfect that You have the multiple region overview!

    Then You can tell me -after the Aegis nerf last december -what is Your picture -did the game start to balance in all the regions that You oversee? Or did the the dominance just accelerate even worse than before the nerf?

    Since I do not have Your overview I can only talk from what I see -and what I have seen the dominance accelerated after the Aegis nerf.

  • jsylvisjsylvis ✭✭✭✭

    "When they raised the shield count, taking down a 30+ portal farm went from 300 X8s to 600-800X8s plus 100ish ultrastrikes, because everyone has Aegis etc. "


    Something is very off with your numbers.

  • Nope. This was my primary play method in 2014 and I had pretty good tracking. The introduction of far higher shields, stickiness and finally AXA roughly doubled the defensive capacity from a bursters usage POV.

  • If only that outcome could have been easily predictable...

  • Hard choices are never fun but they are necessary some times.

  • EvilSuperHerosEvilSuperHeros ✭✭✭✭✭

    Sounds more like a lack of using ultra strikes to their actual potential or not wanting to get out and walk. Lotta gear to **** a little farm.

  • ReignInPugsReignInPugs ✭✭
    edited October 2019

    Coming from the guy who just dropped 5 fracks in pasadena then "starred at his phone for 10 minutes in silence"

    Post edited by ReignInPugs on
  • SSSputnikSSSputnik ✭✭✭✭✭

    We still pub farm, standing in a carpark sounds horrible.

    I think frackers increase socialization, you fill inventory faster and can talk and drink more beer!

  • Current social behavior is Job and money first ! Than male and female relationships with a family. Than friendship Relationships. All that requires a lot of time and money !

    Housing cost have sky rocketed. Apartment rents too. Cars and car repairs through the roof ! Car traffic every where is crazy !

    People are more scared than ever with crime rates and shootibgs. You see a guy or girl walking round sone where the call police !

    Every second you breath is your time on earth.

    SO WHY MAKE INGRESS MORE TIME CONSUMING AND HARDER !

    If your done with school and parents let you live you live at home with everything free Ingress complicated is for you !

    Example: I know lots of Agents who wobt field. Too time and money consuming.

    So your area is unfieldable. Too many links everywhere. Like a salvage yard !

    Than lots of agent dobt play the game. They mess with it. They wont help your faction win ! And dont care. They wont add onto existing fields. Just through links ! Ha ha ha. Or many agents sit on com and chat not about the game. They dont care. I was shunned when i asked fellow agents if they could upgrade local portals when they go by them. They hated me. Hiw dare I suggest they put out effort !


    Who wants ro sit waiting for ingress PRINE to boot UP AS MINUTES OF YOUR LIFE PASS BY. OR PRIME FREEZE IN MIDDLE OF MOST IMPOTANT FIELDING AND YOU HAVE TO LEAVE. PRIME TIMES OUT SO QUICK. ALWAYS REBOOT REBOOT.

    Or all the bottons you can easly be some where else on scanner in a second..


    The real issues ate in logistics and application ! Stream line. Cut time wasted. Easy gear collection a must !

    You get gear than team up and field thats the socialising.

    You see PUB Prices now ? Eveb well of people no players dont go out as much.

    You get the idea. Data costs now !

    Think. You cant design a mobile game from a deck top computer.

    I am done now. Alot of points to ne made.


    All of you know why.

  • Frackers don't add or take away any social aspects of the game. People get together to frack or not. Most of the veteran players have never warmed up to Prime and new players discovering the game are few and far between. I go to new places and seldom even turn on my phone to play. Farming, for me, is much more difficult in Prime.

    In my AO in what used to be an active area is not anymore. The gray faction is the most predominant.

    One thing that you might experiment with is cross factional farms where any player can put a rezo on a portal to bring it to 8 or making the double 7 and 8 rezo placement permanent. There is little interest to gather 8 players to build a farm in my area anymore and maintain it. It becomes too much like work and not fun.

    Finally, you might increase output on portals which haven't been used in awhile or rural portals. Rural players only advantage in the game was the Guardian badge and rural players always have had a tougher time.

    At this point most of the stuff that should be portals are already portals. Granted, new candidates are built and discovered. You need to bring Seer and lower the requirements for levels. A new player entering the game who has 100 portals accepted should be platinum or onyx and they should have the chance to get that. I don't think we veterans would mind.

  • The change allowed us in my region to start taking back territory from the dominant faction, because with the reduction in strength and the reduction in reproduction, they're starting to be stretched thin and actually have to play the game again instead of simply sitting on 4 AXA P8s and recharging, while Aegis grow in backpacks. The underdog got a minor boost from the shield stickiness reduction, and a major boost from not allowing Aegis to reproduce in Quantums.

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