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Challege Caches rejected - not enough qualified


The Snowdog

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Our reviewer (who shall remain unnamed) is rejecting many new challenge caches because "not enough people in your area have already completed that challenge." He wants us to demonstrate that at least ten people within fifty miles qualify for any new challenges. Is this an official Groundspeak position (it's not anywhere in the guidelines that I can find) or something that is left to the discretion of the reviewer?

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I think you can translate that into:

"A challenge cache must be automatically qualifiable by high number cachers without them having to do anything they don't already do"

Real challenges, like the one I own, are not allowed any longer. Compare the logs on my cache versus the standard "We checked and we qualify for this one. TFTC." found on most challenges. <shakes head>

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A challenge cache needs to appeal to and be attainable by a reasonable number of cachers.

The guideline does not specify that the challenge must already be met by reasonable number of cachers. Will HQ allow any challenges which appeals to a reasonable number of cachers but they all need to attain it first?

Edited by arisoft
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11 minutes ago, fbingha said:

I think you can translate that into:

"A challenge cache must be automatically qualifiable by high number cachers without them having to do anything they don't already do"

Real challenges, like the one I own, are not allowed any longer. Compare the logs on my cache versus the standard "We checked and we qualify for this one. TFTC." found on most challenges. <shakes head>

Because of this, i no longer place challenge caches. A challenge should be just that, something that a person has to put some effort into completing. It's ridiculous that a cache on the ISS or at the bottom of the ocean is ok but then CCs have to be obtainable for the masses. This is another one of the reasons that geocaching has slowed down so much.

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18 minutes ago, fbingha said:

I think you can translate that into:

"A challenge cache must be automatically qualifiable by high number cachers without them having to do anything they don't already do"

Definitely not high number. But yes, challenge caches these days are more like accomplishments. And the starting point is that, in many regions, 10 people must be shown to have qualified already. That's hardly a "high number".  I think the frustration with that comes on 2 parts: 1) You have to find 10 people who qualify, 2) Usually those 10 people are the ones you want to try to prompt into qualifying, rather than just giving them a new cache to find.

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11 minutes ago, on4bam said:

Seems the reviewer has put a number on "reasonable" depending on active cachers density "reasonable" may be less or more.

Yes, "reasonable" is determined on a region by region basis by the local reviewers. Ontario is set at 10.  The other issue with Ontario is that there are loads of cachers just over the border who can't be used even if they qualify, and you can use cachers in the far reaches of Ontario hundreds of km away who may never even look at the cache.  The "region" thing can be awkward; in some cases 'distance' from the cache would be a better metric.

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55 minutes ago, The Snowdog said:

Our reviewer (who shall remain unnamed) is rejecting many new challenge caches because "not enough people in your area have already completed that challenge." He wants us to demonstrate that at least ten people within fifty miles qualify for any new challenges. Is this an official Groundspeak position (it's not anywhere in the guidelines that I can find) or something that is left to the discretion of the reviewer?

It's silly but true: specifically outlawed are challenges that would actually challenge the existing population. But I think you should be happy it's left to the discretion of the reviewer: my guess is that if GS were to implement a hard limit, it would be higher than what most reviewers will allow. It's just one example of what's so messed up about challenge cache policy: challenge caches require nothing but database mining, like spelling words, are prohibited, yet to prove a challenge is feasible, you have to show it can be accomplished through database mining.

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24 minutes ago, thebruce0 said:

Definitely not high number. But yes, challenge caches these days are more like accomplishments. And the starting point is that, in many regions, 10 people must be shown to have qualified already. That's hardly a "high number".  I think the frustration with that comes on 2 parts: 1) You have to find 10 people who qualify, 2) Usually those 10 people are the ones you want to try to prompt into qualifying, rather than just giving them a new cache to find.

I wasn't referring to the number 10 when I said "High Number" but rather to geocachers with ALOT of finds, tens of thousands. Those are the people whom I believe Groundspeak changed the rules towards. Allowing them to qualify for most challenges without them having to do anything different than what they already do.

Edited by fbingha
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26 minutes ago, dprovan said:

challenge caches require nothing but database mining, like spelling words, are prohibited, yet to prove a challenge is feasible, you have to show it can be accomplished through database mining.

Well, it's finders they don't want resorting to bookkeeping and database mining. The CO in the publish process is a different thing.

 

15 minutes ago, fbingha said:

I wasn't referring to the number 10 when I said "High Number" but rather to geocachers with ALOT of finds, tens of thousands. Those are the people whom I believe Groundspeak changed the rules towards. Allow them to qualify for most challenegs without them having to do anything different than what they already do.

Well, I wouldn't say the motivation was to gear challenge caches towards high count finders. That's a side effect of the "acocmplishment" mentality. Naturally, the more you find, the more chance you'll already qualify.

To get around that though many of my recent challenges include county boundaries. Regional cachers who'd easily qualify for most any challenge with 20,000+ finds already may not qualify within a limited set of counties. So that was my way to encouraging already-prolific cachers to have a new challenge to qualify for, despite easily qualifying statistically since they travel-cache a LOT.

Limiting challenges to qualification regions is the best way, in the current challenge cache climate IMO, to 'even the playing field', as it were.  The only caveat is that you have to prove that the challenge can actually be currently qualified within the county/ies boundary, as well as having enough people in the greater region to qualify.  At least this has a better chance at changing the typical 'top 10' qualifiers in the region to some other unexpected cachers.

Love it or hate for high numbers cachers who do NOT qualify for an easy challenge just because qualifiers have to be a specific county boundary, and some other local cacher to that boundary with a fraction of their finds does qualify :P

Edited by thebruce0
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50 minutes ago, arisoft said:

The guideline does not specify that the challenge must already be met by reasonable number of cachers. Will HQ allow any challenges which appeals to a reasonable number of cachers but they all need to attain it first?

Will you please edit your post to remove the quote you have attributed to me? I did not say that.  I was pointing at the quote in the guidelines issued by Groundspeak, which answered the OP's query.

 

If you want to take issue with it then take it up with them - not me.

 

Edited by MartyBartfast
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1 hour ago, thebruce0 said:

Definitely not high number. But yes, challenge caches these days are more like accomplishments. And the starting point is that, in many regions, 10 people must be shown to have qualified already. That's hardly a "high number".  I think the frustration with that comes on 2 parts: 1) You have to find 10 people who qualify, 2) Usually those 10 people are the ones you want to try to prompt into qualifying, rather than just giving them a new cache to find.

Absolutely. The cacher setting most of these is actively trying to inspire us to go beyond, and there are several of us who are actively working on the ones that did get approved, before the reviewer tightened up on them. And that to me is what challenge caches are about - to inspire us to go beyond what we have already accomplished. As it is to sign (and get started on) challenges like this I have to drive several hours to larger metro areas, where such caches are generally available.

Edited by The Snowdog
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If you have to work hard to find 10 people that qualify for a challenge (which is indeed a pain in the nether regions) , that should mean that there are hundreds or thousands of local cachers who DON'T qualify.  These are the people that will then go out to get the caches needed to qualify.

Sure, the high number cachers qualify immediately and can run out for the challenge cache.  But, they miss out on the adventure of getting all those new caches in order to qualify.  Or else they have already had the adventures - either way plenty of caching gets done.

Non-issue?

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I will also count cachers who "were relatively close."  They will be challenged to find those remaining months on a Jasmer calendar, those five more T5 caches, etc.  I am also flexible on the number of geocachers ("8 is pretty close to 10") and the distance/region definition.

One purpose of this guideline is to cut back on "look what I did" challenges that few people are interested in duplicating.

Think not only of the high-number cachers who will already qualify - statistically, they're a minority.  Think also of the low-number cachers whose lives are not built solely around geocaching.  They view the challenge caches as rude intrusions taking up room on the map - caches they will never be able to find. 

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3 hours ago, thebruce0 said:

Well, it's finders they don't want resorting to bookkeeping and database mining.

What finders are you talking about? The finders in my area had a great time with spelling challenges. I claim it's only GS and other people that never liked challenge caches to begin with that care about whether it involves bookkeeping or not.

9 minutes ago, Keystone said:

Think also of the low-number cachers whose lives are not built solely around geocaching.  They view the challenge caches as rude intrusions taking up room on the map - caches they will never be able to find.

Are you saying GS is intent on eliminating any caches on the map that casual cachers have no interest in? If that's the logic, there are a whole lot of puzzle caches in my area that will likely be the next target.

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23 minutes ago, Keystone said:

Think also of the low-number cachers whose lives are not built solely around geocaching.  They view the challenge caches as rude intrusions taking up room on the map - caches they will never be able to find. 

There T5/4.5/4 caches I think of as " rude intrusions taking up room on the map" as I will never do them. Are they next to go?

Never mind an answer on that, I don't care about them really, plenty of other caches to do. It should be the same about challenges, don't like them? Ignore them. As these days standards are lowered so much for challenges, most of them should not even be called challenges anymore.

 

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1 hour ago, dprovan said:

What finders are you talking about? The finders in my area had a great time with spelling challenges.

Someday, we may be able to build a website that addresses only the desires of the finders in your area. Until then, we'll have to continue with a website and game guidelines that are used by millions of other people, including many who might not have exactly the same opinions as you and every other finder in your area.

1 hour ago, dprovan said:

Are you saying GS is intent on eliminating any caches on the map that casual cachers have no interest in? If that's the logic, there are a whole lot of puzzle caches in my area that will likely be the next target.

 

54 minutes ago, on4bam said:

There T5/4.5/4 caches I think of as " rude intrusions taking up room on the map" as I will never do them. Are they next to go?

Each time someone tries to answer this question, a few people insist on presenting irrelevant analogies. This has all been explained before. The reasoning hasn’t changed, but here it is again.

A challenge cache is nothing like a hard puzzle cache or a T5 cache. If you find a T5 cache or a hard puzzle cache, you log it as found. Simple as that. When you find a challenge cache, you can’t log it as found unless you’ve qualified. Challenge caches are the only physical cache that get away with an additional logging requirement. The main reason they’ve been allowed to get away with ALRs is they fill a void the website doesn’t -- rewarding cachers for an achievement. That’s worthy of giving an exception to the prohibition on ALRs. 

But we humans are prone to taking worthy ideas and seeing how far we can push the limits. Pre-moratorium, the limits were often pushed to where the end didn’t justify the ALR exception. Such as people putting out challenge caches that few people, including the CO, had any real hopes of qualifying. It was one of the most mentioned issues in the surveys we conducted during the moratorium. Excessive bookkeeping was another. The new guidelines aimed to address those and other issues presented by players and reviewers.

Everyone is certainly welcome to continue arguing the guidelines. But making faulty comparisons between challenge caches and any other physical cache is an exercise in futility.
 

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1 hour ago, dprovan said:
4 hours ago, thebruce0 said:

Well, it's finders they don't want resorting to bookkeeping and database mining.

What finders are you talking about? The finders in my area had a great time with spelling challenges. I claim it's only GS and other people that never liked challenge caches to begin with that care about whether it involves bookkeeping or not.

Not me. I like bookkeeping too. But there are many who don't. So, those finders. You can claim Groundspeak "never liked challenge caches to begin with", but I don't agree. I will agree they know that it's a concept that has its difficulties because the community loves them or hates them. So I don't envy their need to make hard decisions regarding them.

 

34 minutes ago, Rock Chalk said:

But we humans are prone to taking worthy ideas and seeing how far we can push the limits.

Indeed. And those limit-pushers on concepts people enjoy are really what have kept geocaching evolving - for better or worse - over the years.  And the same is true with any pastime, hobby, sport, technology, etc... it's the nature of humanity.

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1 hour ago, Rock Chalk said:

Someday, we may be able to build a website that addresses only the desires of the finders in your area. Until then, we'll have to continue with a website and game guidelines that are used by millions of other people, including many who might not have exactly the same opinions as you and every other finder in your area.

I can't believe you said that. I didn't realize GS had it out for the people in my area who are just trying to have a good time like everyone else.

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7 hours ago, The Snowdog said:

Our reviewer (who shall remain unnamed) is rejecting many new challenge caches because "not enough people in your area have already completed that challenge." He wants us to demonstrate that at least ten people within fifty miles qualify for any new challenges. Is this an official Groundspeak position (it's not anywhere in the guidelines that I can find) or something that is left to the discretion of the reviewer?

10 is a pretty common number that I hear in my area as well, but the distance part may vary a bit.  Urban areas are usually easier to find folks that qualify vs. out in the boonies somewhere.  Good luck with your submission!

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I got a response like this back in the day for a challenge. It was different back then but I was able to come up with a couple of cachers who could qualify and it was published. Not saying that will happen now but I think to ask a cache hider to look threw and find 10 is a little much for  the hider. I am sure I have signed many challenges that I qualify for but I won't even look threw my own stats to see if I qualify.   Hope you can get it worked out!

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9 hours ago, Rock Chalk said:

Each time someone tries to answer this question, a few people insist on presenting irrelevant analogies. This has all been explained before.

I know it's not the same (and I'm not going to re-read all challenge threads) but the fact remains that challenge caches are no longer challenges. Before a challenge could (but didn't have to) be like "to qualify for the Olympics you need to be able to run 100m in under 11 seconds, these days it's more like "you need to be able to run 100m in under 30 seconds" which of course most can do.

I haven't seen many new challenges published here and I haven't done any new ones either. How about a new Jasmer challenge? You can find 10 cachers who already qualified but if you started geocaching the last few years it's near to impossible. No  more October or November 2000 caches within 5500 Km from where I live (All of Europe + North Africa + Eastern Canada).

 

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12 hours ago, Keystone said:

Think not only of the high-number cachers who will already qualify - statistically, they're a minority.  Think also of the low-number cachers whose lives are not built solely around geocaching.  They view the challenge caches as rude intrusions taking up room on the map - caches they will never be able to find. 

I am 69 years old with a heart condition.  I regard T4.5 caches and tree climbing caches as rude intrusions taking up room on the map - caches I  will never be able to find.  There are a lot more of those than challenges that low numbers cachers will never be able to find.

However, I respect the rights of other cachers to do caches that I cannot do.  Why cannot others respect my right to attempt challenges that they cannot do.

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12 hours ago, on4bam said:

As these days standards are lowered so much for challenges, most of them should not even be called challenges anymore.

I haven't had much experience with post-moratorium challenges, having found just one and hidden one. The one I found, which required 24 D2/T4 caches, took me a year to qualify after its publication and, as you can imagine, many of those qualifying caches were epic adventures in their own right. In the fifteen months since its publication, it's only had four found logs so qualifying for and finding this one certainly isn't a walk in the park for your average cacher.

For my own challenge (GC752YF), which requires 20 Australian caches with the "takes more than one hour" attribute, I put together a list of ten pre-qualifiers before I submitted it, but had to draw on the adjacent regions of northern Sydney and the Hunter Valley as well as my own Central Coast region to make up the number. The cache, published in August, has had only three finders to date, two from Sydney who were vying for FTF immediately after publication and one from the Central Coast a day later. There's been a steady stream of successful runs on the checker since then but none of those green ticks have yet led to finds so I suspect there might be a degree of tyre-kicking going on. On the face of it, though, it doesn't seem like the broader community have found this one to be a walk-in-the-park either in spite of those pre-qualifiers.

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46 minutes ago, Gill & Tony said:

However, I respect the rights of other cachers to do caches that I cannot do.  Why cannot others respect my right to attempt challenges that they cannot do.

Perhaps they feel weak in some ways if they are unable to cope with all the challenges ahead?

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4 hours ago, on4bam said:

I know it's not the same (and I'm not going to re-read all challenge threads) but the fact remains that challenge caches are no longer challenges. Before a challenge could (but didn't have to) be like "to qualify for the Olympics you need to be able to run 100m in under 11 seconds, these days it's more like "you need to be able to run 100m in under 30 seconds" which of course most can do.

Actually it's more like... it used to be "to qualify you have to run 100m in under 11 seconds."  Now it's "to qualify you have to be able to run 100m in under 11 seconds."  In the former, it was a new requirement everyone had to do as of a certain time (an actual challenge); in the latter it's a feat you have to have demonstrably achieved at some point (an accomplishment).

I posted about this very difference waaaaay back before the moratorium when the date restriction allowance was removed, effectively making all "challenges" into career "accomplishments".  They both have their strengths and weaknesses (easier or harder to newbies or veterans).  But the former also promotes a more competitive mindset (it's time-based) whereas the latter is more individualistic; doesn't matter who does it when. (other than of course the universal FTF race)

 

Edited by thebruce0
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14 minutes ago, thebruce0 said:

Actually it's more like... it used to be "to qualify you have to run 100m in under 11 seconds."  Now it's "to qualify you have to be able to run 100m in under 11 seconds."  In the former, it was a new requirement everyone had to do as of a certain time (an actual challenge); in the latter it's a feat you have to have demonstrably achieved at some point (an accomplishment).

The challenges I've done and seen were always accomplished by the CO before they placed the challenge. So it was: I can run 100m in under 11 seconds but since not enough people can do that, 11 seconds is not allowed but if you can run it in under 30 seconds then it's allowed. (and yes, comparisons always fail but you get the picture).

 

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Sure, you're arguing the degree of difficulty of the challenge, whic is pretty subjective.  My illustration wasn't drawing attention to the number of seconds, but the manner in which one qualifies.

To your point, in one region 11 seconds may be fine and easy. In another, 30 seconds is near impossible (whether it's number of people who qualify, or whether the nature of the pool makes it harder; not a great analogy for the challenge caches in that case :P). But that regional degree of difficulty judgement (reasonableness) is up to the reviewer to decide.

Edited by thebruce0
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I look at it like this.

Challenge caches are the sole remaining exception to the rule against additional logging requirements (ALRs).  Enough people complained about ALRs as a rule that Groundspeak listened and clamped down.  Challenge caches almost went with the others, but Groundspeak relented and allowed them to stay, but not as before.

Challenge caches aren't coming back like they were before.  Just like virtual caches aren't coming back like they were before.

The question, then, is whether we as a group learn to be happy with what we have.

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To answer the original question - we had a challenge cache publish in January that we knew would be difficult (checker has an 87 rating).  The reviewer at the time told us we had to provide a list of local cachers that qualified.  Their comment was they usually ask for 10 but would let us get by with 5 due to the difficulty.   I had done the research before placing the cache to make sure it wasn't an insane challenge, so I did provide a list of 10 on principle although some on the list were not really local.      

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22 hours ago, thebruce0 said:

Sure, you're arguing the degree of difficulty of the challenge, whic is pretty subjective.  My illustration wasn't drawing attention to the number of seconds, but the manner in which one qualifies.

To your point, in one region 11 seconds may be fine and easy. In another, 30 seconds is near impossible (whether it's number of people who qualify, or whether the nature of the pool makes it harder; not a great analogy for the challenge caches in that case :P). But that regional degree of difficulty judgement (reasonableness) is up to the reviewer to decide.

It's that regional degree of difficulty for why it makes sense to me to leave it up to the review to determine if a challenge is "reasonably attainable" as opposed to using a fixed number of geocachers that have attained.   A "find 100 caches in a day" is reasonably attainable in cache dense areas.  In most countries in the world, however, finding 100 caches in a day would require international travel. 

One of the reasons that I support the "reasonable and attainable" requirement is that it seemed like in many area where challenge cache really became popular,  it looked like a contest to see who could create the most difficult challenge.   I appreciated Keystones comment about recognizing that casual geocachers wanting to enjoy this aspect of the game as well.  This may be a bit of semantics but I see a difference between a challenge and challenging.  One can issue a challenge to other geocachers to accomplish some task.  That doesn't necessarily mean that the task must be challenging.  

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59 minutes ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

One of the reasons that I support the "reasonable and attainable" requirement is that it seemed like in many area where challenge cache really became popular,  it looked like a contest to see who could create the most difficult challenge.   I appreciated Keystones comment about recognizing that casual geocachers wanting to enjoy this aspect of the game as well.  This may be a bit of semantics but I see a difference between a challenge and challenging.  One can issue a challenge to other geocachers to accomplish some task.  That doesn't necessarily mean that the task must be challenging.  

Yep, I have no problem with the 'reasonably attainable' regionalized standard either.  It makes sense to me. Especially as years go on and more nad more vets start racking up 10's of thousands of finds casually and there are still newcomers.  There will consistently be high(er and higher)-difficulty challenges being published, so having a flexible bar for 'reasonable' that reviewers set for their region is very smart.

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24 minutes ago, thebruce0 said:

There will consistently be high(er and higher)-difficulty challenges being published, so having a flexible bar for 'reasonable' that reviewers set for their region is very smart.

Probably worth pointing out a little historical perspective.  When the first "Challenge" Listing was Published with approval from Groundspeak as a test case (Northern California Delorme Challenge, it was a virtual at a time when virtuals were not allowed, and there was neither the requisite caches on every page to complete it, nor anyone in the world, let alone the State of California, that qualified at the time of Publication.  It took over a year before someone qualified to claim the Listing as Found.  The early log entries are great to read through, as people post their progress and discuss their stories.  I think it's that aspect of Challenges that people miss most.

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1 hour ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

One of the reasons that I support the "reasonable and attainable" requirement is that it seemed like in many area where challenge cache really became popular,  it looked like a contest to see who could create the most difficult challenge.   I appreciated Keystones comment about recognizing that casual geocachers wanting to enjoy this aspect of the game as well.  This may be a bit of semantics but I see a difference between a challenge and challenging.  One can issue a challenge to other geocachers to accomplish some task.  That doesn't necessarily mean that the task must be challenging.  

Well said.

 

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17 minutes ago, Touchstone said:

It took over a year before someone qualified to claim the Listing as Found.  The early log entries are great to read through, as people post their progress and discuss their stories.  I think it's that aspect of Challenges that people miss most.

Completely agreed. It's the actual 'challenge' aspect and the progress of completion, rather than merely having accomplished some statistical goal. In that case it's sort of like, no one has done this yet - who will be the first?

There being so many more cachers today and a wide spread of statistics, there are still quite often high-D challenges published that while the most prolific cachers already qualify, are still greatly enjoyable by the rest of the community until they qualify; so it might not be "no one has done this yet", but "so few have done this yet". So how do we as a community provide challenges for the prolific cachers who will likely already qualify? Without putting out near-impossible challenges that everyone else might take years to qualify with regular dedication?  Or in other words, is it still possible to publish challenges that are (relatively) equally challenging for both vets and newbies alike?

One way I answer that I posted earlier: make 'standard' challenges but bind them to 1 or more counties (where they can still be qualified of course) instead of using universal profile stats. That also serves to get people out caching more in their local area (or traveling to said area to cache more).

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3 hours ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

One of the reasons that I support the "reasonable and attainable" requirement is that it seemed like in many area where challenge cache really became popular,  it looked like a contest to see who could create the most difficult challenge.

That sounds boring, alright, but surely the fact that some areas have boring COs doesn't justify the attempt to enforce subjective, relative, and arbitrary standards for everyone else.

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On 11/22/2017 at 9:07 AM, Keystone said:

I will also count cachers who "were relatively close."  They will be challenged to find those remaining months on a Jasmer calendar, those five more T5 caches, etc.  I am also flexible on the number of geocachers ("8 is pretty close to 10") and the distance/region definition.

One purpose of this guideline is to cut back on "look what I did" challenges that few people are interested in duplicating.

I was under the impression that one of the main reasons for redesigning the challenge cache guidelines  was to reduce the amount of work reviewers had to do  To reduce the "subjective" nature of the guidelines.  Here we have a situation where a reviewer has to make a subjective decision regarding how popular a challenge might be.  In my opinion, based on the wrong criteria.  This interpretation assumes that the fact that x number of people have achieved, or are close to achieving, the challenge means that it would be a popular challenge.  There may be thousands of people who are nowhere close to achieving the challenge who would be interested in trying for it.  The people who have already achieved it may not care about the challenge at all.  Also, restricting the list of people to those local to the challenge assumes that nobody is interested in a challenge outside their own local area.  I have found 35 challenge caches, only two were in my own country, none were within 50Km of home.

Why do we need to cut back on "look at what I did" challenges?  Even assuming that it is possible to prove that few people would be interested in a challenge, why would that matter?   

Sorry, but I think this whole "only make popular challenges" concept is just plain wrong.  The guidelines are, on the one hand, removing the ability to make challenges which were popular and on the other are saying that only caches which will be popular can be created.

 

 

 

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13 minutes ago, Gill & Tony said:

Also, restricting the list of people to those local to the challenge assumes that nobody is interested in a challenge outside their own local area.  I have found 35 challenge caches, only two were in my own country, none were within 50Km of home.

I got 76, only 19 within 50 Km of home. Most are in Belgium but also in the Netherlands, France and Denmark. Still have 46 that we didn't have time for in Victoria (Oz), NZ and Norway. I'm sure a lot more people than expected would qualify if a challenge is close to tourist spots. A challenge to having found caches in xx countries would be easy if near an airport for instance (Found one near CPH, Copenhagen, where you needed 20 countries) but near impossible if placed in a farmland area with no tourism.

 

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34 minutes ago, Gill & Tony said:

I was under the impression that one of the main reasons for redesigning the challenge cache guidelines  was to reduce the amount of work reviewers had to do  To reduce the "subjective" nature of the guidelines.  Here we have a situation where a reviewer has to make a subjective decision regarding how popular a challenge might be.  In my opinion, based on the wrong criteria.  This interpretation assumes that the fact that x number of people have achieved, or are close to achieving, the challenge means that it would be a popular challenge.  There may be thousands of people who are nowhere close to achieving the challenge who would be interested in trying for it.  The people who have already achieved it may not care about the challenge at all.  Also, restricting the list of people to those local to the challenge assumes that nobody is interested in a challenge outside their own local area.  I have found 35 challenge caches, only two were in my own country, none were within 50Km of home.

Why do we need to cut back on "look at what I did" challenges?  Even assuming that it is possible to prove that few people would be interested in a challenge, why would that matter?   

Sorry, but I think this whole "only make popular challenges" concept is just plain wrong.  The guidelines are, on the one hand, removing the ability to make challenges which were popular and on the other are saying that only caches which will be popular can be created.

 

 

 

I'm not sure where you picked up the "popular" phraseology in this discussion.  Nor does "popular" appear in any of the documentation in the Help Center, although I can understand your confusion if you are equating it with "appeal", which isn't really the same thing in my mind.  Nonetheless, you might find the following Help Center article helpful regarding the subjective nature of Reviewing process when it comes to Challenge Listings:

 

https://www.geocaching.com/help/index.php?pg=kb.chapter&id=127&pgid=787

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14 minutes ago, on4bam said:

I got 76, only 19 within 50 Km of home. Most are in Belgium but also in the Netherlands, France and Denmark. Still have 46 that we didn't have time for in Victoria (Oz), NZ and Norway. I'm sure a lot more people than expected would qualify if a challenge is close to tourist spots. A challenge to having found caches in xx countries would be easy if near an airport for instance (Found one near CPH, Copenhagen, where you needed 20 countries) but near impossible if placed in a farmland area with no tourism.

 

A challenge to find caches in 3 continents depends on where you live.  It would not be easy for someone living in central USA, but simple for someone living in Sydney.  One family holiday to Disneyland and one to Bali and it's done. 

 

Finding 20 virtuals in a day would be hard for someone living in Sydney, but simple for someone living near Las Vegas.  A trip to Vegas and Death Valley - all done!.  Of course, that would be much easier for a low numbers cacher who hasn't found any virtuals yet, but harder for a high numbers cacher who has already found all those virtuals but spread out over a time span.  

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13 minutes ago, Touchstone said:

I'm not sure where you picked up the "popular" phraseology in this discussion.  Nor does "popular" appear in any of the documentation in the Help Center, although I can understand your confusion if you are equating it with "appeal", which isn't really the same thing in my mind.  Nonetheless, you might find the following Help Center article helpful regarding the subjective nature of Reviewing process when it comes to Challenge Listings:

 

https://www.geocaching.com/help/index.php?pg=kb.chapter&id=127&pgid=787

I was aware of that guideline, but admit that I was equating popular with appeal.  The guideline says 

Quote

A challenge cache needs to appeal to and be attainable by a reasonable number of cachers. Your reviewer may ask for a list of cachers from your area who qualify.”

This guideline aims to ensure that a challenge cache is obtainable by a reasonable number of players. If only a few people can find and log a challenge cache, then it’s almost like a private cache. (And private caches aren’t permitted on the website.)  The “reasonable number” of cachers must reside in the area where your cache is placed.

My point is that simply because 10 people who live in the area have already achieved the challenge doesn't mean that the challenge appeals to any of them.  In fact, speaking for myself only, the fact that I had already achieved a challenge would reduce the appeal for me.  It is no challenge to have already achieved something.  Something that I had not thought of and had made very little progress towards, now that would be much more appealing.

Also, restricting the list to local cachers only is just plain wrong.  Many cachers travel extensively - I have cached in 30 countries, with 7 more coming up next year - what should the fact that I want to tackle a challenge published in another town, state or country, be ignored?

But, over all of this, why should challenges be restricted to those which "appeal to and be achievable by a reasonable number of cachers"?  Why shouldn't someone be allowed to publish a challenge that only they have achieved?  Why should Alamogul not be allowed to publish a "Find 175,000 caches" challenge?  Nobody else is likely to ever achieve it, but why does that matter?  

No other cache type has this restriction.  Scuba caches only appeal to the (comparatively) small number of cachers who are scuba qualified.  You don't have to find a group of people who are scuba qualified in your region before you publish one.  Technical tree-climbing caches and rock climbing caches appeal only to those who are capable, brave enough and have the proper equipment.

This whole area is subjective and, in my opinion, completely unnecessary.

 

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8 hours ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

I appreciated Keystones comment about recognizing that casual geocachers wanting to enjoy this aspect of the game as well.

On 11/21/2017 at 2:07 PM, Keystone said:

Think not only of the high-number cachers who will already qualify - statistically, they're a minority.  Think also of the low-number cachers whose lives are not built solely around geocaching.  They view the challenge caches as rude intrusions taking up room on the map - caches they will never be able to find.

When I first began caching, I saw some challenge caches and thought "there's no way I'd ever qualify for that".  Lo and behold, a few years later and I now qualify for many of them, without even trying.

Also, consider that some cachers are "low-number" now, but in a few years they may become "high-number cachers" after they retire or win the lottery or have some other change in their life situation. I think it's unfortunate if overarching restrictions are applied to appease "casual" cachers, which are the type of cachers that are less likely to pay for Premium Membership. After all, if it's just a casual activity for them, then they're less inclined to spend money on PM.

 

8 hours ago, on4bam said:

A challenge to having found caches in xx countries would be easy if near an airport for instance (Found one near CPH, Copenhagen, where you needed 20 countries) but near impossible if placed in a farmland area with no tourism.

Reminds me of a CC in a neighboring US state that requires finding caches in 5 different countries in one day. This cache is at least an hour's drive away from an international airport. I saw that challenge and thought it to be a bit "unreasonable" for the region, but I don't begrudge its existence.  I might be more annoyed if there were a bunch of CC's that I considered to be "unreasonable" in the same area, but that 1 CC isn't taking up a ton of real estate and there are more than a dozen Trad caches around it in the same park.

And even if I was annoyed, I wouldn't expect GS to make an overarching rule just to relieve my annoyance. If there were a bunch of scuba caches 500 ft from lakeshore, blocking caches from being placed on the walking trail around the lake, then I wouldn't want GS to archive those scuba caches just because I'm not a diver.

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8 hours ago, Gill & Tony said:

Finding 20 virtuals in a day would be hard for someone living in Sydney, but simple for someone living near Las Vegas.  A trip to Vegas and Death Valley - all done!.  Of course, that would be much easier for a low numbers cacher who hasn't found any virtuals yet, but harder for a high numbers cacher who has already found all those virtuals but spread out over a time span.  

This reminds me of one of the multiple CC threads in the past where this was discussed.  I called these "forethought" challenges, where there may not be 10+ pre-qualified cachers, but many cachers could easily qualify if they knew about the requirements ahead of time. For example, find one Mystery cache a day for 7 days in a row. There are plenty of cachers that could create a relatively simple plan to achieve this if they knew about it ahead of time. There were some other examples and discussion of "forethought" challenges in those other threads, so I'm not going to repeat it all here.

tl;dr - I agree that requiring a particular number of cachers to already be qualified is an unfortunate and overly-restrictive rule, because "forethought" challenges.

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