Friends League

[+Periwinkle128]

Seems as though if a cacher has a new cache published, they should get points.  No one will find new caches w/o new caches being placed.  There seems to be very little recognition for those who place (often many) caches.

 

[+noncentric]

[+niraD]

1 hour ago, Periwinkle128 said:

Seems as though if a cacher has a new cache published, they should get points.  No one will find new caches w/o new caches being placed.  There seems to be very little recognition for those who place (often many) caches.

One of the things I appreciate about Groundspeak is that they discourage/prohibit "breeder" caches or "curse of the FTF" caches or challenge caches that require cache ownership. IMHO, caches should not be placed for these external reasons, or for Friends League points, or for any other reason besides the desire to own and maintain a cache for the long term.

 

And noncentric, I'll see your  and raise you .

[+cerberus1]

We see a lot of cachers place (often many) temporary caches, some only lasting six months or so before they're all archived and a new batch comes out.

Maybe a  cacher that can't get his caches to last more than a few months should be noticed by his peers.     

 

There's more than enough new caches placed.   We stopped beta-testing (ftf) because many shouldn't have been placed.   

 

 - But what does "recognition"  have to do with the friends league?

 

 

[+Team Christiansen]

8 minutes ago, cerberus1 said:

 - But what does "recognition"  have to do with the friends league?

 

 

Although I agree with you and @niraD, I think he is wanting an extra element (points for caches published) in the still ongoing weekly competition with your friends.

[+Max and 99]

2 hours ago, Periwinkle128 said:

Seems as though if a cacher has a new cache published, they should get points.  No one will find new caches w/o new caches being placed.  There seems to be very little recognition for those who place (often many) caches.

 

The Friends League points are absolutely meaningless right now, so don't pay any attention to them. Those points are for a promotion that ended a long time ago (you can tell by the Difficulty/Terrain calculations and Dropping off trackables). They mean nothing.

[+Team Christiansen]

7 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

The Friends League points are absolutely meaningless right now, so don't pay any attention to them. Those points are for a promotion that ended a long time ago (you can tell by the Difficulty/Terrain calculations and Dropping off trackables). They mean nothing.

Although the Mary Hyde's Treasure promotion is over, the Friend League function has remained as a feature to compete weekly with geocaching friends. A new competition starts each week. See the screenshot below. Note that the explanation on the right below the clock no longer makes mention of the 6-week Mary Hyde promotion. So far this week, I am in 4th place among my 20+ friends. 

Although it has remained ongoing for months now, what is meaningless is the total league score at the top. That part had meaning during the promotion, but not now.

[+Max and 99]

2 hours ago, Team Christiansen said:

Although I agree with you and @niraD, I think he is wanting an extra element (points for caches published) in the still ongoing weekly competition with your friends.

 

Ok, I'll agree with that (points for caches published in the weekly competition with your friends).

 

[+dprovan]

Recognition for cache owners is given in the logs of the people that find their caches. If there's not enough recognition given in the logs, you won't be able to make up for it with awards.

[+Touchstone]

7 hours ago, Periwinkle128 said:

Seems as though if a cacher has a new cache published, they should get points.  No one will find new caches w/o new caches being placed.  There seems to be very little recognition for those who place (often many) caches.

 

I'd be OK with that plan, as long as the converse is true.  Stacking up DNF's without a response get's you dinged a point.  Involuntary Archiving by a Volunteer Reviewer for non maintenance basically wipes out all you points.  Seems fair to me.

[+CAVinoGal]

On 8/3/2018 at 1:40 PM, Team Christiansen said:

Although it has remained ongoing for months now, what is meaningless is the total league score at the top. That part had meaning during the promotion, but not now.

 

How did the total score enter into the Mary Hyde promo?  All the souvenirs I earned for that, and the final trackable code, were all based on my own personal points score, not any combination with my friends.  As far as I can tell, the total score at the top has never counted for anything, it's just an interesting number!

 

On 8/3/2018 at 10:52 AM, Periwinkle128 said:

Seems as though if a cacher has a new cache published, they should get points.  No one will find new caches w/o new caches being placed.  There seems to be very little recognition for those who place (often many) caches.

 

Everyone can seek geocaches, but hiding them is a different game, IMHO.  It takes a certain amount of skill to craft a *good* cache hide that will stand the test of time, and I don't think that earning points on the Friend League will encourage those who want to hide caches.  In fact, it may encourage a lot more quickly placed caches that won't add much more to the game, just to earn a few more points.  

 

On 8/3/2018 at 3:27 PM, dprovan said:

Recognition for cache owners is given in the logs of the people that find their caches

 

Yup.  I enjoy reading logs left on my placed caches, and hearing of others' experiences while finding them. That's all I need.  I rarely look at the Friend's League anymore.

 

[+barefootjeff]

44 minutes ago, CAVinoGal said:

How did the total score enter into the Mary Hyde promo?  All the souvenirs I earned for that, and the final trackable code, were all based on my own personal points score, not any combination with my friends.  As far as I can tell, the total score at the top has never counted for anything, it's just an interesting number!

 

I'm pretty sure at least one of the weeks was based on the total score, not the individual tally.

[+Max and 99]

1 hour ago, barefootjeff said:

 

I'm pretty sure at least one of the weeks was based on the total score, not the individual tally.

Correct. From the email:

 

Buccaneers unite! With pirate events behind us, it is time to gather your crew and set sail.  We received a second message in a bottle signed by the infamous Mary Hyde. This week you need all your seaworthy men and women. On the Friend League collect a combined total of 30 gold coins from July 17 to July 23 together with your crew to earn the souvenir with the first map piece!

[+CAVinoGal]

1 hour ago, Max and 99 said:

Buccaneers unite! With pirate events behind us, it is time to gather your crew and set sail.  We received a second message in a bottle signed by the infamous Mary Hyde. This week you need all your seaworthy men and women. On the Friend League collect a combined total of 30 gold coins from July 17 to July 23 together with your crew to earn the souvenir with the first map piece!

 

Hmmmm, so if you , personally, only earned, say 15 points, but your "team" earned 30 or more, you still earned the souvenir?  I guess hubby and I each earned more than 30 ourselves, so it became a moot point; and it seems that 30 points was not that hard to earn on your own anyway.  I just don't remember ever  needing any of the "Friends League" to earn any souvenirs.  If your friends cached and you didn't find any that week - you'd still get the souvenir?  That's not how I remember it, but that doesn't mean it's not how it worked!

 

But that's all off topic to the OP's original discussion about receiving points for hiding caches.  It may factor in sometime; we don't know what GS will do.  I, personally, don't think it would be beneficial to the community as a whole.  It would play to the numbers seekers, and wouldn't increase cache quality.  It wouldn't change my cache placment behavior at all (would not motivate me to place caches any more than I already am motivated to do so.)  But that's me. To others - would you be more motivated to place caches if you got Friend's League points for doing so?

Edited August 7, 2018 by CAVinoGal

[+Max and 99]

10 minutes ago, CAVinoGal said:

 

Hmmmm, so if you , personally, only earned, say 15 points, but your "team" earned 30 or more, you still earned the souvenir?  I guess hubby and I each earned more than 30 ourselves, so it became a moot point; and it seems that 30 points was not that hard to earn on your own anyway.  I just don't remember ever  needing any of the "Friends League" to earn any souvenirs.  If your friends cached and you didn't find any that week - you'd still get the souvenir?  That's not how I remember it, but that doesn't mean it's not how it worked!

 

But that's all off topic to the OP's original discussion about receiving points for hiding caches.  It may factor in sometime; we don't know what GS will do.  I, personally, don't think it would be beneficial to the community as a whole.  It would play to the numbers seekers, and wouldn't increase cache quality.  It wouldn't change my cache placment behavior at all (would not motivate me to place caches any more than I already am motivated to do so.)  But that's me. To others - would you be more motivated to place caches if you got Friend's League points for doing so?

You never got a souvenir unless you contributed to the points, just fyi.

And to answer your question, I certainly would not be motivated to place a cache just to get points on the Friend League. 

[+CAVinoGal]

2 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

You never got a souvenir unless you contributed to the points, just fyi.

OK, so you had to find at least something each week of the promo.  That would make sense!