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Publisher and FTF's connected


-Fezzy

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:laughing: I've been caching for just over 2 months now and put out 3 caches after the review process is complete and the cache successfully enabled the same geocacher pops up either as FTF or 2TF is there a connection or is this cacher just good at the game... :laughing:

 

Some people are almost obsessed with getting FTFs and will have instant notifications sent to their phones and will drop everything to rush out for a cache, so I suspect that's what's happening here rather than some illicit complicitness.

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Reviewers dont get time to do much caching - they are too busy reviewing all the new caches people place from what I can gather. :ph34r:

All areas of the country seem to have FTF hunters who get up in the middle of the night to find a new cache before someone else does.

The fun is to find the cache before someone else and sign the virgin log.

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Some people work funny hours, some people don't work at all. Some people check the site regularly, or have email notifications and a smartphone. Some people are able and willing to go right out the moment they get the notification, some people are just lucky that they get the notification just as they are standing practically on top of the cache.

 

If you've got someone in the area who is very keen on getting FTF they will pop up as FTF time and time again. I've done it for a while, a caching friend of mine once set a very long multi where one stage was a waterproof container the size of a film pot hidden under about three feet of water just to (unsuccessfully) frustrate his local FTF hound.

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I generally review & publish in the evening but that doesn't stop people going out in the gathering dusk to get a FTF. I know in the Southern region there are dedicated FTF'ers.... Sometimes I'll publish caches during the mid morning or afternoon to confuse them :lol:

 

Chris

Graculus

Volunteer UK Reviewer for geocaching.com

UK Geocaching Information & Resources website www.follow-the-arrow.co.uk

Geocaching.com Knowledge Books

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I generally review & publish in the evening but that doesn't stop people going out in the gathering dusk to get a FTF. I know in the Southern region there are dedicated FTF'ers.... Sometimes I'll publish caches during the mid morning or afternoon to confuse them :lol:

 

Chris

Graculus

Volunteer UK Reviewer for geocaching.com

UK Geocaching Information & Resources website www.follow-the-arrow.co.uk

Geocaching.com Knowledge Books

 

I think it's great to have them published at anytime if it's possible.

 

A dedicated FTF hound can crush the spirit of the local community, especially so for newer cachers, who can, in some areas, never get an ftf opportunity.

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A dedicated FTF hound can crush the spirit of the local community, especially so for newer cachers, who can, in some areas, never get an ftf opportunity.

I don't agree. The same opportunities are open to everyone, but a little effort is required! If you don't check your notifications regularly, and be prepared to drop everything and go, you can't start wingeing that someone else got there first!

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A dedicated FTF hound can crush the spirit of the local community, especially so for newer cachers, who can, in some areas, never get an ftf opportunity.

I don't agree. The same opportunities are open to everyone, but a little effort is required! If you don't check your notifications regularly, and be prepared to drop everything and go, you can't start wingeing that someone else got there first!

 

I agree. I'd also add that the FTF hunt is only a small part of the game. And the FTF hunt is only fun because it's competitive. I hunt the FTF and usually lose to Pumpkin67. But the times I win are great. More so b ecause I know I beat someone to the cache.

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I generally review & publish in the evening but that doesn't stop people going out in the gathering dusk to get a FTF. I know in the Southern region there are dedicated FTF'ers.... Sometimes I'll publish caches during the mid morning or afternoon to confuse them :lol:

 

Chris

Graculus

Volunteer UK Reviewer for geocaching.com

UK Geocaching Information & Resources website www.follow-the-arrow.co.uk

Geocaching.com Knowledge Books

 

I think it's great to have them published at anytime if it's possible.

 

A dedicated FTF hound can crush the spirit of the local community, especially so for newer cachers, who can, in some areas, never get an ftf opportunity.

 

I'm not sure I'd agree with that. When I started caching I so desperately wanted to collect some TBs to move along but my first serious caching run was in Dartmoor and it seemed there was another family doing the exact same thing as me but a day beforehand. So all the caches showing up as having TBs actually turned out to have a note from this other cacher in the log saying they'd taken the TB.

 

Later I wanted to grab myself an FTF but it still took me a while. The inconvenience of working for a living meant that a cache would be published, I'd get the weekly notifications (I wasn't a premium member at the time) and by that time they had all been found. One day just by chance I refreshed the "nearest unfound" list just before going to bed and found one had just gone live. So instead of going to bed I went out to find the cache and finally got my FTF.

 

Now I work for myself I'm often one of the first to find a local cache. Truth be told if someone gets so disheartened about others with different circumstances that allow them to find caches first they're probably going to get disheartened sooner or later over anything, whether it be a proliferation of micros or a few DNFs of caches that turned out not to be there any more.

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Sometimes I'll publish caches during the mid morning or afternoon to confuse them :lol:

 

 

I am sure some reviewers publish them oddly just to wind some FTFers up. I saw something like that near me a week or two back some were released in a wide spread series then a few more the next day and others a day or two later. One cacher was getting a little wound up, especially as the final was published first.:laughing:

 

Or it might have simply been that the reviewer was publishing them as time permitted.:ph34r::D

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A dedicated FTF hound can crush the spirit of the local community, especially so for newer cachers, who can, in some areas, never get an ftf opportunity.

I don't agree with that at all. If it crushes the spirit of people then those people by definition would also like to be FTF and it means they are just sore losers. They need to up their game and be there first.

 

When I first started, Edinburgh had very few caches, and there was a predominant FTF hound that always got there first. This was because he was retired and could get out of the house as soon as they were published. It took me ages to beat him to a cache and boy did it feel good when I did. But what it didn't do was crush my spirit of the game, it upped my game to get out sooner. Back then we didn't have notifications and smart phones, so you had to be on the ball to notice and be there first.

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Sometimes I'll publish caches during the mid morning or afternoon to confuse them :lol:

I am sure some reviewers publish them oddly just to wind some FTFers up. I saw something like that near me a week or two back some were released in a wide spread series then a few more the next day and others a day or two later. One cacher was getting a little wound up, especially as the final was published first.:laughing:

Or it might have simply been that the reviewer was publishing them as time permitted.:ph34r::D

If we get asked to publish a series all at the same time we'll try and do that. The owner may say to publish them as and when they are submitted and reviewed. If there are no specific instructions I'll publish them as I do them so they may appear 'randomly'. I have had a cacher ask me to publish a series a few each day over a number of days.

 

I publish mostly in the evening when I'm home from work and on Saturday and Sundays, usually morning but could be anytime. If I get a moment or two at work I'll take a look at the queue then. So yes, it may look like it's done deliberately to frustrate the FTF'ers but that's not the case :D

 

Chris

Graculus

Volunteer UK Reviewer for geocaching.com

UK Geocaching Information & Resources website www.follow-the-arrow.co.uk

Geocaching.com Knowledge Books

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More annoying is where a cacher places a cache and takes a buddy along with them, who then immediately 'finds' the cache, claiming FTF. :mad:

 

I've seen that happen a few times - it is a bit obvious when the date is a couple of days prior to publication. I just don't rush to find caches by certain folk for this reason.

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We had a manic night where I live on Wednesday night. We had about 12 caches go live in less than half an hour and there are about half a dozen local cachers who all play the FTF game.

 

Personally I don't play it, but I do enjoy watching the logs come in as the local cachers bust a gut to sign the log first.

 

I think they must have all slept very well on Wednesday night though haha!!!

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More annoying is where a cacher places a cache and takes a buddy along with them, who then immediately 'finds' the cache, claiming FTF. :mad:

 

I've seen that happen a few times - it is a bit obvious when the date is a couple of days prior to publication. I just don't rush to find caches by certain folk for this reason.

 

Exactly, and other variations on the theme!

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Those of you who have quoted what I said previously, have slightly missed the point, it was applauding the random times for publication, that will give greater chance of a more diverse group getting an ftf.

 

If a reviewer kept a routine then it would only be people who are free at that particular time of day ... random widens the field.

 

Widening the field makes it more fun for newbies to get a look in, which breathes life into the game.

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Those of you who have quoted what I said previously, have slightly missed the point, it was applauding the random times for publication, that will give greater chance of a more diverse group getting an ftf.

 

If a reviewer kept a routine then it would only be people who are free at that particular time of day ... random widens the field.

 

Widening the field makes it more fun for newbies to get a look in, which breathes life into the game.

My bold - I don't think I or most of the others did? I actually agree with your sentiments here which is what you eluded to in your first sentence/paragraph. Which is why I left that out of my quote.

 

What I didn't agree with was your completely separate second paragraph written in a total different context to the first. Which is still totally different from what you have said above.

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Those of you who have quoted what I said previously, have slightly missed the point, it was applauding the random times for publication, that will give greater chance of a more diverse group getting an ftf.

 

If a reviewer kept a routine then it would only be people who are free at that particular time of day ... random widens the field.

 

Widening the field makes it more fun for newbies to get a look in, which breathes life into the game.

My bold - I don't think I or most of the others did? I actually agree with your sentiments here which is what you eluded to in your first sentence/paragraph. Which is why I left that out of my quote.

 

What I didn't agree with was your completely separate second paragraph written in a total different context to the first. Which is still totally different from what you have said above.

 

It was related to the first statement, and I stand by it, I live in such a community. :huh:

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Weighing in from way far away.

The publishing seems to happen at 2 am consistently. We have one very persistent ftfer. He logs like; notification 2:09, out door 2:12, biked to gz, cache in hand 2:27.

I can't wait till winter to see what he does. Lol

Yesterday there was still a "new" one by 3:30; my eleven year old walks in door, do you want to go? I knew there was a good chance it just hadn't been logged online yet, but away we went. She found "her" FTF, she was so very very excited.

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More annoying is where a cacher places a cache and takes a buddy along with them, who then immediately 'finds' the cache, claiming FTF. :mad:

 

I've seen that happen a few times - it is a bit obvious when the date is a couple of days prior to publication. I just don't rush to find caches by certain folk for this reason.

 

Sometimes a cache is genuinely found before it's published. A caching friend of mine was over from the US, figured a particular point would be good for a cache and found a film pot there with a virgin log book. I checked the maps and saw no cache, so I asked my local reviewer if we'd found an unpublished cache or the final stage to a puzzle or multi, and it turned out we'd found a cache four days before it was published.

 

So my buddy got an international FTF before the cache had even gone live.

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I love a FTF hunt... I love the not knowing until the log is open... I don't then care if I'm first or not, I had my buzz.

 

The thing I really like about the FTF hunt is the increased chance of bumping into another cacher and swapping a tale or two... so all caches near decent alehouses should be published during opening hours :lol:

 

Agreed. In my area for the longest time another cache was something of a nemesis of mine for FTF hunts. One day I'd gone out to find a cache that just went live and met him at the cache also hunting, so we shared the FTF. After beating him for a few and being beaten by him for a few it had a certain poetic edge to it to share an FTF on a cache.

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I recall one of my caches in a series of 15 being disabled because it had been muggled. It was Friday afternoon so I posted a note stating that I had placed a replacement cache at slightly different co-ordinates and I was sending it up for review later in the day. Another cacher who will remain nameless e-mailed me to ask if i could provide him with the new co=ordinates as he was doing the series in the morning. Whilst I pointed out that it may not even be published by the reviewer for 3/4 days I e-mailed him back with the co-ordinates and stated that he would be in the unique position of finding the cache several days before publishing.

 

Our local reviewer ' Antheia' excelled and published it within the hour and the team doing the series ended up being 4th to find at 10am the following morning!!!.

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A dedicated FTF hound can crush the spirit of the local community, especially so for newer cachers, who can, in some areas, never get an ftf opportunity.

 

Only ONE dedicated FTF hound in the area?!!!!!!!! LOL - there are LOADS round here!!!!! It's not as much crush spirit, or sore losing - more like resignation that others will beat you to it!!!! Being on my tod even with the pup I'm a little wary of going out to rifle in the undergrowth under cover of darkness when notifications come thru in the evening!

 

Having said that can't complain, did manage two FTFs last week - tho they were 50 miles away!!! No I'm not that "dedicated" just happened to be passing on my way to hols!!!

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Surely they are not that crushed/upset etc by FTF activity. I think they are probably just, more driven, determined and then more prepared/organised to get the latest new co-ordinates to get out to try a FTF. Its fun!!!. I have yet to see a log stating 'Really disappointed, sorry I seem to be FTF this morning. Off home to drown my sorrows etc etc.'

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I live in such a community. :huh:

Wendy, I think most if not all of us do. [insert shrugs shoulders smiley here]

 

As I have already said, for those that want the FTF but keep getting beat then they have to up their game. I suppose the principle is no different to being an athlete. If you aren't winning you have to up your game until you do win, and then keep on top of your game so that others don't get there before you.

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