I think the point here is that people who didn't achieve the milestones because of issues with the client or server are deserving of equal badges to people who got to the milestones. When two people walk together and take much the same actions in the same places, but one logs 4100m Trekker and the other logs 2800m Trekker, it sure feels unfair to deny one of them badges they would have otherwise earned.
They did publish scores, and the medals were pushed right away, so there are registries from all events. Here is an example from Poland.
Even if they don't have this in on database it would take one day for a non db specialist to import all this data back to a database and find all people that collect a single artifact. It took me about one hour to import all results (not just artifacts) to MySQL just by copy&pasting. One extra hour maybe and I could automate this. It is not too much effort and they probably already have that db.
I was going to write a long post about the whole stuck in Prime unfairness, as glyph hacking was almost impossible in Prime, but luckily I now who won’t have to. Still if I had been able to glyph better (didn’t have so much trouble to get it to work), I would have been able to get more artefact’s and could have gotten elite status on those. (My glyph hacking skill’s are not the best 1&2 glyph is not a problem, 3&4 glyph is sometimes doable for me, but 5 glyph hack’s is almost impossible for me and most portals around me where lvl’ed to lvl 6-8 al the time.)
At this time, we can only guess and wait what will happen. I hope for the best and will wait patiently. I do not mind if takes another week to find a solution to assign the basic/elite medal to players affected by the issues correctly.
Of course, an update from the official site and answers to our questions here would be greatly appreciated.
No, that would not correct the issues widely experienced. Seems like Prime did not track the km properly, among other issues. Those who use redacted, alongside people who used prime got the km (and less/incorrect km for Prime users). Would put more of a stain on Prime and Ingress as a whole if they didn't do it the right way.
So, was it the case like players using Prime had a high likelihood of not receiving any medal due to several issues, while players using Redacted had a higher chance of receiving the elite medal?
niantic actually need redacted gone now, so that we are at events solely on prime. agents switching during the field test to redacted actually has given them false data, because all data collected is from both operating systems-prime and redacted. so the likelihood of problems on the next event will be high in my opinion. the data collected from the next event will give them a true reading of how prime copes during an event. if we can log in on the next event!
so for now yes we all get our medal but will niantic know what to fix for the next event to ensure it runs smoothly? not attacking the agents in any way that switched fyi, because even I considered using it myself. and i logged in on redacted also, to see if that would load up as prime wouldn't for me.
i hoped we would have had clarification during the livestream in regards to the medal, so I guess they are still looking into it. they did put out some codes (compensation) lol during the stream. so check out the vid for those guys or the codes page.
Well, they give out codes in every livestream as far I know. These codes have nothing to do with compensation for the outcomes of the field tests.
I hope they are still looking into the data in order to assess the problem correctly and to address players' efforts to earn an elite medal from the event.
It cannot be that players get somehow punished for using Prime - facing issues and making them to loose walking process and causing them not to be able to login for a significant time during the event. And, as a result, receiving no medal instead of an elite medal for all the effort and the hard work.
I would have used Redacted if I could. But, unfortunately, I cannot as a new player. Prime is my only option. But, as it seems, and after my last comment and people reaching out to me, there was a clear inequality between players who have used Prime and Redacted during the event. It seems that beside the six challenges such as finding artifacts, deploying resonators and so on, the real challenge was to use Prime for the entire duration of the event.
I played the entire time of the event with a partner. We both walked the same route, hacked nearly all the same portals. They managed to get a few extra portals deployed than I could, so managed to obtain Elite status in deployment while I fell short (partly due to lag on my part).
But the kicker was, they earned Elite in distance, and I fell over 1.5km short of their distance as tracked in-game. And so I "only" was awarded the regular badge.
I also note that one single artifact was not counted towards my score, and THAT single point would have tied with the lowest-Elite-scoring agent (20 vs 21).
I do realize that, if the non-playbox-playing agents were removed from the overall score (if you remove the 20-or-so players that did not collect even a single artifact during the window), then my partner would STILL have earned Elite for distance (and deployments). My untracked distance would also have counted enough for Elite.
So now, unless Niantic goes for a deepdive into the data, I get to admire my plain vanilla badge that everybody else gets, but not the Elite one that I know in my heart that I earned.
I just received an elite medal for the field test. Big thanks to the support team for solving the problem and analysing the data. I could not be happier. That is really awesome.
Field Test was intended as a test of features in Prime and on the Niantic back end, but the Elite medals ended up primarily going to agents who fell back to Redacted when Prime had difficulties. Agents who loyally stick to Prime obeyed the spirit of the event but in too many cases were unable to get the requirements done.
Huge kudos to Niantic for listening to the players and pushing Elite medals to (at least some of) those who got shortchanged.
Good call to award medals to all who participated in the Field Test as indeed there were a lot of issues with Prime. You were, as I understand it, pushing things to the limit in order to make improvements.
However, the situation in Oulu and Tartu was different. Someone at Niantic seemingly just forgot to switch on measuring until 42 minutes after the event had started, yet measuring ended as advertised.
Most participants did by far the most work in the first half, which was then not counted. Elite medals have been awarded on the basis of stats earned during the second half of the event, apparently based on the event's personal progress page.
This Elite status in some cases has been at odds with the personal stats email and event city ranking page, causing confusion and bad feeling, worry that Elite status will be randomly withdrawn again and many left wondering if they would have received the Elite medal if the measurement had been carried out correctly.
It seems likely that if the stats for the first 42 minutes had been taken into account, the Elite medalists may well have been significantly different.
Placing mods and resonators, for example, in the first half, was much easier than in the second half, when game stopping high confusion reigned, supplies had been depleted and tactics moved to a mad scramble to just get the minimum 6 tasks done, once it was realised Niantic had not measured the first half.
This was not due to testing errors, duly warned about in the initial event description. This happened because someone forgot to 'flip the measuring switch' for Oulu and Tartu. This was not a time zone mistake. 42 minutes after the official event start we suddenly received notification of measurement opening.
I ended up getting an Elite medal ... which is great for me. And I feel fairly certain I would have qualified for the Elite medal if the measurement had been carried out properly. So I'm not bringing this issue to you on my own behalf.
But I know there were many dedicated players who worked (and walked) their socks off during the first half of the event. It leaves a bad taste that many travelled 8 hours or more to attend with a clear plan to achieve the Elite medal, and they are left without, due to basic Niantic human error.
At a time when Niantic wants the Ingress community and Factions to pull together, this Field Test has resulted in bad feelings as certainly some Oulu and Tartu players did not get the Elite medal when they should have done so, and there is no way for us to verify who was deserving and who not. That was your job.
Now the shards have started and immediately failed. We face going to an Anomaly in a few short weeks with no Redacted safety net. Our trust in the functionality of Prime is at rock bottom. Our trust in Niantic to handle events (and to rectify errors) professionally and fairly and correctly has been sorely shaken.
I am an Ingress enthusiast who has played since Beta. Now for the first time I am questioning whether or not I should attend the next Anomaly.
What confidence can we have, based on recent performance, that Prime will not fail spectacularly? Or that Niantic will not again make large impacting errors during the event? And if this were to happen, that Niantic won't again fail to fairly remedy their mistake?
For the first time you are asking players to pay for their Anomaly experience. How can Niantic reassure us that we will be satisfied customers?
the Elite one that I know in my heart that I earned
I'd sent my concerns via the in-app Support on the weekend. As of yesterday one of my local teammates let me know that the Elite medal had been pushed. And then overnight I got an in-app response:
Hello Agent,
Thanks for your patience while we investigated this issue.
We are sorry to hear that you experienced difficulties interacting with the scanner during the inaugural Field Test event. Since this was an event that was conducted to test the limits of the scanner when interacting with new tasks during a limited time window, we did expect issues that were unprecedented.
Because of these issues, I'm glad to inform you that the elite version of the Field Test: Hexathlon medal has been successfully added to your account. You can visit the Agent profile to view this medal.
Thank you for helping us test and explore the limits of what the Ingress scanner can do. Wish you good luck with your further portal interactions.
Comments
I think the point here is that people who didn't achieve the milestones because of issues with the client or server are deserving of equal badges to people who got to the milestones. When two people walk together and take much the same actions in the same places, but one logs 4100m Trekker and the other logs 2800m Trekker, it sure feels unfair to deny one of them badges they would have otherwise earned.
I also have no idea how one would fairly score people whose event didn't start until more than an hour past the advertised time.
They did publish scores, and the medals were pushed right away, so there are registries from all events. Here is an example from Poland.
Even if they don't have this in on database it would take one day for a non db specialist to import all this data back to a database and find all people that collect a single artifact. It took me about one hour to import all results (not just artifacts) to MySQL just by copy&pasting. One extra hour maybe and I could automate this. It is not too much effort and they probably already have that db.
I was going to write a long post about the whole stuck in Prime unfairness, as glyph hacking was almost impossible in Prime, but luckily I now who won’t have to. Still if I had been able to glyph better (didn’t have so much trouble to get it to work), I would have been able to get more artefact’s and could have gotten elite status on those. (My glyph hacking skill’s are not the best 1&2 glyph is not a problem, 3&4 glyph is sometimes doable for me, but 5 glyph hack’s is almost impossible for me and most portals around me where lvl’ed to lvl 6-8 al the time.)
there is a live transmission via youtube 18:00 gmt, maybe we'll get an announcement on it during that?🤷♂️
At this time, we can only guess and wait what will happen. I hope for the best and will wait patiently. I do not mind if takes another week to find a solution to assign the basic/elite medal to players affected by the issues correctly.
Of course, an update from the official site and answers to our questions here would be greatly appreciated.
No, that would not correct the issues widely experienced. Seems like Prime did not track the km properly, among other issues. Those who use redacted, alongside people who used prime got the km (and less/incorrect km for Prime users). Would put more of a stain on Prime and Ingress as a whole if they didn't do it the right way.
So, was it the case like players using Prime had a high likelihood of not receiving any medal due to several issues, while players using Redacted had a higher chance of receiving the elite medal?
hey Nia give my Elite medal 😡
Now I do realise how much errors to count km in the Field Test when someone reachs elite status even under the 3000m
niantic actually need redacted gone now, so that we are at events solely on prime. agents switching during the field test to redacted actually has given them false data, because all data collected is from both operating systems-prime and redacted. so the likelihood of problems on the next event will be high in my opinion. the data collected from the next event will give them a true reading of how prime copes during an event. if we can log in on the next event!
so for now yes we all get our medal but will niantic know what to fix for the next event to ensure it runs smoothly? not attacking the agents in any way that switched fyi, because even I considered using it myself. and i logged in on redacted also, to see if that would load up as prime wouldn't for me.
i hoped we would have had clarification during the livestream in regards to the medal, so I guess they are still looking into it. they did put out some codes (compensation) lol during the stream. so check out the vid for those guys or the codes page.
Well, they give out codes in every livestream as far I know. These codes have nothing to do with compensation for the outcomes of the field tests.
I hope they are still looking into the data in order to assess the problem correctly and to address players' efforts to earn an elite medal from the event.
It cannot be that players get somehow punished for using Prime - facing issues and making them to loose walking process and causing them not to be able to login for a significant time during the event. And, as a result, receiving no medal instead of an elite medal for all the effort and the hard work.
I would have used Redacted if I could. But, unfortunately, I cannot as a new player. Prime is my only option. But, as it seems, and after my last comment and people reaching out to me, there was a clear inequality between players who have used Prime and Redacted during the event. It seems that beside the six challenges such as finding artifacts, deploying resonators and so on, the real challenge was to use Prime for the entire duration of the event.
I played the entire time of the event with a partner. We both walked the same route, hacked nearly all the same portals. They managed to get a few extra portals deployed than I could, so managed to obtain Elite status in deployment while I fell short (partly due to lag on my part).
But the kicker was, they earned Elite in distance, and I fell over 1.5km short of their distance as tracked in-game. And so I "only" was awarded the regular badge.
I also note that one single artifact was not counted towards my score, and THAT single point would have tied with the lowest-Elite-scoring agent (20 vs 21).
I do realize that, if the non-playbox-playing agents were removed from the overall score (if you remove the 20-or-so players that did not collect even a single artifact during the window), then my partner would STILL have earned Elite for distance (and deployments). My untracked distance would also have counted enough for Elite.
So now, unless Niantic goes for a deepdive into the data, I get to admire my plain vanilla badge that everybody else gets, but not the Elite one that I know in my heart that I earned.
I just received an elite medal for the field test. Big thanks to the support team for solving the problem and analysing the data. I could not be happier. That is really awesome.
Thank you Nia 😍🙏🏻
Thanks for the medal push #NianticActuallyListens
Precisely this.
Field Test was intended as a test of features in Prime and on the Niantic back end, but the Elite medals ended up primarily going to agents who fell back to Redacted when Prime had difficulties. Agents who loyally stick to Prime obeyed the spirit of the event but in too many cases were unable to get the requirements done.
Huge kudos to Niantic for listening to the players and pushing Elite medals to (at least some of) those who got shortchanged.
@NianticOfficial
Good call to award medals to all who participated in the Field Test as indeed there were a lot of issues with Prime. You were, as I understand it, pushing things to the limit in order to make improvements.
However, the situation in Oulu and Tartu was different. Someone at Niantic seemingly just forgot to switch on measuring until 42 minutes after the event had started, yet measuring ended as advertised.
Most participants did by far the most work in the first half, which was then not counted. Elite medals have been awarded on the basis of stats earned during the second half of the event, apparently based on the event's personal progress page.
This Elite status in some cases has been at odds with the personal stats email and event city ranking page, causing confusion and bad feeling, worry that Elite status will be randomly withdrawn again and many left wondering if they would have received the Elite medal if the measurement had been carried out correctly.
It seems likely that if the stats for the first 42 minutes had been taken into account, the Elite medalists may well have been significantly different.
Placing mods and resonators, for example, in the first half, was much easier than in the second half, when game stopping high confusion reigned, supplies had been depleted and tactics moved to a mad scramble to just get the minimum 6 tasks done, once it was realised Niantic had not measured the first half.
This was not due to testing errors, duly warned about in the initial event description. This happened because someone forgot to 'flip the measuring switch' for Oulu and Tartu. This was not a time zone mistake. 42 minutes after the official event start we suddenly received notification of measurement opening.
I ended up getting an Elite medal ... which is great for me. And I feel fairly certain I would have qualified for the Elite medal if the measurement had been carried out properly. So I'm not bringing this issue to you on my own behalf.
But I know there were many dedicated players who worked (and walked) their socks off during the first half of the event. It leaves a bad taste that many travelled 8 hours or more to attend with a clear plan to achieve the Elite medal, and they are left without, due to basic Niantic human error.
At a time when Niantic wants the Ingress community and Factions to pull together, this Field Test has resulted in bad feelings as certainly some Oulu and Tartu players did not get the Elite medal when they should have done so, and there is no way for us to verify who was deserving and who not. That was your job.
Now the shards have started and immediately failed. We face going to an Anomaly in a few short weeks with no Redacted safety net. Our trust in the functionality of Prime is at rock bottom. Our trust in Niantic to handle events (and to rectify errors) professionally and fairly and correctly has been sorely shaken.
I am an Ingress enthusiast who has played since Beta. Now for the first time I am questioning whether or not I should attend the next Anomaly.
What confidence can we have, based on recent performance, that Prime will not fail spectacularly? Or that Niantic will not again make large impacting errors during the event? And if this were to happen, that Niantic won't again fail to fairly remedy their mistake?
For the first time you are asking players to pay for their Anomaly experience. How can Niantic reassure us that we will be satisfied customers?
the Elite one that I know in my heart that I earnedI'd sent my concerns via the in-app Support on the weekend. As of yesterday one of my local teammates let me know that the Elite medal had been pushed. And then overnight I got an in-app response:
Hello Agent,
Thanks for your patience while we investigated this issue.
We are sorry to hear that you experienced difficulties interacting with the scanner during the inaugural Field Test event. Since this was an event that was conducted to test the limits of the scanner when interacting with new tasks during a limited time window, we did expect issues that were unprecedented.
Because of these issues, I'm glad to inform you that the elite version of the Field Test: Hexathlon medal has been successfully added to your account. You can visit the Agent profile to view this medal.
Thank you for helping us test and explore the limits of what the Ingress scanner can do. Wish you good luck with your further portal interactions.
Have a great day ahead!