Thought to combat backpacking

KonnTowerKonnTower ✭✭✭✭✭

Make weapons obtained through quantum capsules and maybe drones "bind to account", meaning they must be used by the account they were spawned in. No more wife/kids/etc feeding you bursters.

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Comments

  • svbornsvborn ✭✭✭

    What prevents spouses and kids from farming portals through regular hacking? If you imply that they are actually spoofers flying around to produce items in the kinetic capsule, they could just as easily fly somewhere and farm, no?

  • KonnTowerKonnTower ✭✭✭✭✭

    I believe I said quantum...


    Quantums and drones are easy passive income. Going somewhere requires actual hacking and working.

  • svbornsvborn ✭✭✭

    Oh, sorry, I misread that and misinterpreted the rest.

  • HosetteHosette ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited October 2021

    I think there would be a huge cost to that.

    Hacking of gear is pretty evenly distributed but use of it isn't. In my area it's pretty common for people who mostly like to build to swap gear with people who have more of a penchant for destruction, and I think that's a good thing. We also tend to hold gear temporarily for each other. Back when anomalies happened it was extremely common for people traveling to an event to get support from their community in the form of gear drops.

    Imagine the logistics of what you're asking. How would it work if I tried to load 200 X8s into capsules to drop to a friend. Would I be unable to load the capsules? Would I be able to load them but I couldn't drop them? How would I know which of my bursters (which all look alike to me) are transferrable and which ones aren't? Would I be able to prioritize the use of non-transferrable bursters in my play?

    Why do you only focus on weapons? Weapons are cheap. Hard shields and other VR items are much more valuable because of their rarity.

  • VenomousToadVenomousToad ✭✭✭✭✭

    It would be a good start. Stop inactive accounts from being able to drop anything. Active accounts should be defined by taking actions that show up on comm. And inactive accounts shouldn't be replicating anything in quantums. If you aren't actively playing then you don't need the replication anyway. The quantums should be turned off for them.

  • SSSputnikSSSputnik ✭✭✭✭✭

    I agree with COMM action being a prerequisite. Saya week of no COMM action, quantums stop duping.

  • KonnTowerKonnTower ✭✭✭✭✭

    Agree with you and @VenomousToad . There are lots of low-tech ways to discourage the benefit of multiple accounts. COMM action requirements (delivered via a questing system or something) would be easy to add with PoGo code and help.


    @Hosette the key is that the duped gear couldn't be used by anyone other than the person who got them from their quantums/drone. Normal hacked gear would remain free for trade. Only the "easy" gear generated through drones/quantum duplication would be applicable. From an IT perspective, I suppose the main problem would be how much overhead it might cause for databases. You could still hold the weapons for someone, but you couldn't use them. Bind-on-account isn't a new concept, many games employ it to cut down on multi-accounting.

  • ZeroHecksGivenZeroHecksGiven ✭✭✭✭✭

    So if someone isn’t playing the game a certain way, they should be punished? I think there are plenty of ways the backpacks can be stopped without having any in-game requirements…. Just don’t think Niantic wants to step in…

  • jjavierjjavier ✭✭✭

    It's legal to duplicate items and give to another agent of your faction, why not? and is not too easy to do as you must meet them in person.

    Having multiaccount is not legal, situacion that can be avoided linking your ingress account to only phone number.

  • SSSputnikSSSputnik ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited October 2021

    That means zero deploys, zero linking, zero attacks.

    There are a ton of hack only accounts out there, all of which I am extremely dubious of.

  • ZeroHecksGivenZeroHecksGiven ✭✭✭✭✭

    My point was more in regards to someone who isn’t active for a month or two at a time. There are plenty of long time agents in my area that only pop up every few months or so. I’d be dubious of any account that straight up never does anything either/

  • SSSputnikSSSputnik ✭✭✭✭✭

    If you play months apart, I'd also suggest nobbling quantum caps was also appropriate.

  • VenomousToadVenomousToad ✭✭✭✭✭

    If you aren't active for a month or so then you don't need the quantums replicating anyway. Quantums should be for active players.

  • ZeroHecksGivenZeroHecksGiven ✭✭✭✭✭

    again, just because your "active" isn't someone else's "active", doesn't mean they should be punished because some people use backpacks.

    There are a hundred reasons someone might not be out and playing, but they still might want to use quantum caps to work on gear reserves or keys or whatever they want. Someone in the hospital, someone in the military, someone sick at home, someone working remotely with no portals nearby (this is me once or twice a year), etc, etc, etc.

    But hey, you live in a place that has no portals, so not only can you not play, but after a week, you'll lose even more functionality of the app, that'll surely keep agents playing this game. Thank god we have the drone, oh wait, you'd also prefer to see the function removed as well (per the other thread you're commenting in).

  • starwortstarwort ✭✭✭✭✭

    Are there actually people who feed each other bursters made from Quantum capsules? That seems such a niche activity to be concerned about. "I have 500 bursters, but oh no, I can't give eight of them away because they generated in a capsule last night." That'll stop them...

  • SSSputnikSSSputnik ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited October 2021

    Some people have a dozen or so accounts with quantum caps, that generates a lot of gear.

  • HosetteHosette ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited October 2021

    I think it would be good if Quantum caps slowly stopped replicating over time if an account didn't meet a minimum activity threshold. However, if that happens the decay should be tied to the amount of AP that the account has. If you have, say, 100 million AP and you stop playing then probably your capsules should replicate at full speed for a couple of months and then the rate would start dropping off. If you have 50K AP and you stop playing maybe the replication rate falls off after a week. You also probably shouldn't be able to replicate gear more than 1 above your current level.

    Something along those lines seems like it would prevent the problem of having an array of low-level Quantum-farm backpacks while not affecting players who have invested significant effort in the game but had to stop playing for a while for whatever reason.

  • HosetteHosette ✭✭✭✭✭

    It thought of this after my previous post: It would also be useful if low-level accounts replicated non-leveled gear at a slower rate. A L3 account could duplicate resos/bursters/cubes/US of L1-4 at full speed but mods and keys would be much slower.

  • ZeroHecksGivenZeroHecksGiven ✭✭✭✭✭

    This I agree with, 100%. Like hacking, if you’re a level 4 agent, you should only be able to replicate L5 gear.

  • VenomousToadVenomousToad ✭✭✭✭✭

    I've been seeing a lot of people openly playing with their backpack accounts. They know they can't be banned for it and their local community is ok with it. I'm afraid this will start happening more if something is done about the backpacks. Sadly it's how the game is played anymore. Not saying it's right. It's just a major flaw.

  • ArtilectZedArtilectZed ✭✭✭✭✭

    Are you reporting those backpack accounts, and not getting on comm about them?

  • mortuusmortuus ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited October 2021

    whats the point? its very hard getting backpack accounts banned... what niantic needs do is a new verify method with phone number or something as it is now nothing stops those to create more accounts.

  • KonnTowerKonnTower ✭✭✭✭✭

    I think the general takeaway I can see is there are plenty of low-tech options to encourage fair play. Appreciate all the responses. 👍

  • ArtilectZedArtilectZed ✭✭✭✭✭

    We used to have the verified badge, which was tied to phone numbers, it did not stop backpackers. In the US, you can get the "freemium" plan from Freedom Pop, which would be an easy way around trying to tie accounts to phone numbers.

    Just report the accounts when you see it. Don't call anyone out in comm. If Niantic decides to take action, they're not going to tell you that they did something, if they see evidence of cheating. If they didn't do something, I think it stands to argue that they didn't see the player cheating. Move on with life and play on, when that happens. There is literally nothing else that can be done.

  • GearGliderGearGlider ✭✭✭✭✭

    Another potential way not mentioned in the thread: Have QCAP duplication be tied to a small amount of distance traveled on the map, say .25km. Playing Ingress normally will net you this easily, while backpacks that may only be logged into to transfer items would not gain this without some effort of getting off the couch.

  • KonnTowerKonnTower ✭✭✭✭✭

    Better to require some comm action. We're getting adventure sync, distance is about to be a useless stat.

  • HosetteHosette ✭✭✭✭✭

    Comm actions mean that people who aren't able to travel to portals for whatever reason (e.g. in lockdown, hospitalized, on military deployment) but who were still doing what they could in the game (drone hacking, recharging) would lose the ability to dupe. I think AP gain would be a fairer metric.

  • SSSputnikSSSputnik ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited October 2021

    Reporting back pack accounts to Niantic works like this.

    TICKET -> NIANTIC -> BIN

    The only time I have ever seen backpack action taken required 2 Vanguards of opposite factions operating in conjunction with multiple local agents and literally about 100 reports.

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