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Rate My Cache


stelea

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Posted

I am posting this topic at the suggestion of Annie from Groundspeak. I emailed her with the idea of adding a new feature to the website. The idea is that before you can log a find, you have to rate the terrain and difficulty of the cache. By doing this the cache will have a more accurate rating because it will be an average of everyone who has found it. Presently the cache owner rates their own cache but different people have different ideas of what is difficult and what is not. I have seen many caches that are rated 5 and 5 (the highest possible) but in actuality they're not as difficult as that. If we had an average of all those who have found the cache it would give a more realistic rating. The owner would have to rate it when they hide it but once people start logging finds the ratings of all finders would be averaged. Sound reasonable?

Posted

When i first thought that i suggested it here. I am sure i wasn't the first.

 

Maybe someday it will happen...

 

One thing to consider also is that depending on the time of year, this can factor into the equation too. (At least here in Ohio.)

Posted

I am posting this topic at the suggestion of Annie from Groundspeak. I emailed her with the idea of adding a new feature to the website. The idea is that before you can log a find, you have to rate the terrain and difficulty of the cache. By doing this the cache will have a more accurate rating because it will be an average of everyone who has found it. Presently the cache owner rates their own cache but different people have different ideas of what is difficult and what is not. I have seen many caches that are rated 5 and 5 (the highest possible) but in actuality they're not as difficult as that. If we had an average of all those who have found the cache it would give a more realistic rating. The owner would have to rate it when they hide it but once people start logging finds the ratings of all finders would be averaged. Sound reasonable?

 

I would love to see that.. and would also like to see a "quality" rating added in as well. I know it's subjective, but it would be a helpful piece of data when planning a trip. Much more effecient than trying to read every log on a bunch of caches to pick out the best ones. Each account should only be able to log once and everyone should have the option of "no comment" which would not affect the averages.

Posted (edited)

For probably 97% of all the caches out there, the terrain rating won't change by more than a half a point no matter how many people rate them (unless the owner is completely deluded about their rating).

 

As for difficulty of the find, well, that is fairly fluid over time...The first finders may find it more difficult than later people, especially if it's one of those that migrates a bit. Novices will almost always find it more challenging than folks who've seen that sort of hide before--and face it, all of us get lucky once in awhile with even the most difficult cache, or we get stumped over the simplest.

So the rating for difficulty would fluctuate so wildly that it wouldn't be at all reliable! It would make doing PQs a nightmare because you couldn't know which caches had been overrated or underrated in the last few days.

 

As it stands now, once you get used to how someone in your area hides their caches, you're able to judge whether it will be easier or more difficult than it's rated.

 

The other 3% of the caches would likely be the true 5/5's--which are very rare, and are usually only rated that way because they take special equipment and a real investment of time to complete. Cachers probably do tend to overrate the toughest caches, but they get adjusted gradually as a few people log them. It's probably better to overrate them and have people be forewarned than to underrate them.

 

I'd much rather see folks consistently use the clayjar system to rate their caches, and not change the results by more than a half a point until they've gotten feedback from a few finders.

Edited by Neos2
Posted
So the rating for difficulty would fluctuate so wildly that it wouldn't be at all reliable!

 

I guess it depends on your idea of "flucate widly" but given the range of possible ratings is limited to 1 to 5, statistics would suggest little variance in the rating UNLESS it was totally incorrect in the first place.

 

I just did a small test in Excel assuming a rating of three with 20 finds, with each find ranging from 1 to 5. I found that the rating average ranged from approximately 2.5 to 3.5 as I added a new rating, so it hardly moved that much. You can easily play with a spreadsheet and a reasonable range of numbers to see what happens.

 

Assuming the rating was reasonable in the first place, I would expect that rating to vary little.

 

So I think it would be a useful idea.

 

Regards

Andrew

Posted

.....

I'd much rather see folks consistently use the clayjar system to rate their caches, and not change the results by more than a half a point until they've gotten feedback from a few finders.

This makes the absolute most sense. Ignore your own perceptions of the ratings and use one consistent scale and it would fix the "problem".

 

Also - given seasonal variations of some terrain - I am not sure finder ratings would be useful without the context of weather.

Posted
Also - given seasonal variations of some terrain - I am not sure finder ratings would be useful without the context of weather.

 

And it is different now with owner ratings? Weather still has an impact does it not?

 

In respect of clayjars I find it way to general and broad to be of much use. I nearly always adjust what it suggests down or up.

 

Regards

Andrew

Posted (edited)

.....

I'd much rather see folks consistently use the clayjar system to rate their caches, and not change the results by more than a half a point until they've gotten feedback from a few finders.

This makes the absolute most sense. Ignore your own perceptions of the ratings and use one consistent scale and it would fix the "problem".

 

Also - given seasonal variations of some terrain - I am not sure finder ratings would be useful without the context of weather.

 

I haven't used the clayjar system for a while but I've found it to be pretty accurate.

 

D/T ratings seems to be fairly non-subjective so when they need to be tweaked I've never really seen much of a need to poll a large group to help make the decision. It's usually just a few folks who see a problem suggesting the owner up or down some stars.

Edited by BlueDeuce
Posted

D/T ratings seems to be fairly non-subjective so when they need to be tweaked I've never really seen much of a need to poll a large group to help make the decision. It's usually just a few folks who see a problem suggesting the owner up or down some stars.

Fair point.

 

Andrew

Posted

D/T ratings seems to be fairly non-subjective so when they need to be tweaked I've never really seen much of a need to poll a large group to help make the decision. It's usually just a few folks who see a problem suggesting the owner up or down some stars.

Fair point.

 

Andrew

 

Same here. I've found that if the Clay Jar website is used even someone new to Geocaching can set accurate D/T ratings. What I typically see is terrain rating of 1 for caches that clearly aren't handicap accessible. All I do is send the owner a link to Clay Jars website and I usually get a thank you and the owner adjusts the rating.

Posted

Don't forget that a lot of folks do not DNF, and this would effect the D rating of a cache, if only the logged finders score is used.

We have a D4, that has a few "I found it easy" logs. When we last checked on the cache, it had a million foot steps near it, but no DNF logs (it is in an area, where a million foot steps are not a problem).

Posted

That is a good point. Most cache owners, if someone logs a DNF, will adjust the Terrain rating, or the Difficulty, depending on the circumstances. :D Then again, if a cacher has completed one very difficult cache, they might think another one isn't quite as hard as the cache owner knows it will be for everyone else . . . :D

 

Like others, I think using the ClayJar system works very well. If anyone sees a cache rated a '1' that isn't wheelchair accessible, a polite note to the cache owner should take care of that.

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