Stop adventure labs

[+IceColdUK]

10 minutes ago, arisoft said:

Some geocachers stop playing Adventure Labs after realizing that these "finds" have Difficulty and Terrain level zero, reducing greatly the average D/T they have already collected.

On the website stats, Labs are excluded from the calculations.  Guess it might be different elsewhere...

[+coachstahly]

I don't agree that they need to be stopped but I won't do them at all due to the number of finds you "earn" based on the number of stages/zones/stops each one has.  I believe GS believes these to be, eventually, replacements for Wherigos but without the requirement for a physical container at the end, unless a bonus cache is associated with it.  I don't find them particularly desirable to do but the same goes for 1.5/1.5 traditional caches.  Just because I don't like doing them doesn't mean they should be removed from the site.

[+dprovan]

8 hours ago, Mausebiber said:

Open the app, open the Adventuer Lab, on top you find "activity", just click.  Pencil on top let you edit your log.

Thanks, but you just wasted your time. I thought it was clear that, in addition to not knowing how to edit my AL logs, I really don't care because I see no reason to edit my AL logs. I already knew I'd be able to figure it out if I wanted to. It's not even worth the effort of your first step -- "Open the app" -- let alone poking around trying to find the right corner.

[+barefootjeff]

5 hours ago, coachstahly said:

 I believe GS believes these to be, eventually, replacements for Wherigos but without the requirement for a physical container at the end, unless a bonus cache is associated with it.

 

I'm starting to think they're intended as a replacement for multis, seeing as an AL with a bonus cache is almost indistinguishable from a multi with virtual waypoints. Once ALs go mainstream, and particularly if they increase the number of allowed stages, I expect that will be the death knell for multis given the scoring disparity.

[+Tungstène]

On 8/27/2020 at 11:45 PM, barefootjeff said:

the find count is just a number, you can't do anything with it or redeem it for prizes

 

I just stumbled upon such a lab yesterday, while I was in Paris France.

 

There is a lab you can play and, after playing you can go and ask for your prize, determined by the number of locations you validated (best prize worth 25 €).

 

This is a lab by "Eau de Paris", the public organisation in charge of water quality in French capital.

 

Edited August 29, 2020 by Tungstène
Added screenshot with link to list of prizes.

[+Mermaid.Man]

On 8/27/2020 at 9:24 AM, Mermaid.Man said:

It's nice to see this being discussed. It bothers me that a multitudes of 'finds' are awarded for completing an adventure when really no geocaches have been found at all. I'm not into stats, but I do like the fact that my 'found' total accurately reflects the number of geocaches that I have found. 

And yes, I do choose to ignore them for this reason. The downside to this though is that adventures often have a 'bonus cache' associated with them which is not findable without completing the adventure. 

I did my first Adventure today and thoroughly enjoyed it.  The app was a much slicker interface than the app that I have previously used for Wherigo caches.

 

I created a sockpuppet account to do the Adventure with (which seems a good way to avoid the unwanted smileys), and then found the bonus cache with my regular geocaching account.  Works for me.

Edited August 29, 2020 by Mermaid.Man

[+thebruce0]

On 8/29/2020 at 5:15 AM, Mermaid.Man said:

I created a sockpuppet account to do the Adventure with (which seems a good way to avoid the unwanted smileys), and then found the bonus cache with my regular geocaching account.  Works for me.

 

As mentioned, you can hide your AL finds. They're not permanently deleted, but are hidden from your profile and not counted in stats. You can 'undelete' them if you want. No need to create a sockpuppet.

 

 

On 8/28/2020 at 9:37 AM, IceColdUK said:

On 8/28/2020 at 9:26 AM, arisoft said:

Some geocachers stop playing Adventure Labs after realizing that these "finds" have Difficulty and Terrain level zero, reducing greatly the average D/T they have already collected.

On the website stats, Labs are excluded from the calculations.  Guess it might be different elsewhere...

 

I'm guessing what was meant was that if you were to take your total find count (including ALs) and say, perform an average D or T score from that total, since those +5 smileys per AL add nothing to the D or T sums, they effectively count for 0 - not rather that they're included in your stats but show as a 0/0.

Of course, if you were to total your D or T grid finds, that should equal your actual geocache find count (and wouldn't be the same as your profile total count that includes AL stage finds).

[+Mermaid.Man]

54 minutes ago, thebruce0 said:

As mentioned, you can hide your AL finds. They're not permanently deleted, but are hidden from your profile and not counted in stats. You can 'undelete' them if you want. No need to create a sockpuppet.

 

Well I'm afraid I can't see the advantages of your method. It's much quicker and easier to let my puppet do the Adventures, rather than having to manipulate my finds for every adventure that I do. Setting up the puppet took 2 minutes and now he's all set for a long career of adventuring. 

[+Max and 99]

2 hours ago, Mermaid.Man said:

 

Well I'm afraid I can't see the advantages of your method. It's much quicker and easier to let my puppet do the Adventures, rather than having to manipulate my finds for every adventure that I do. Setting up the puppet took 2 minutes and now he's all set for a long career of adventuring. 

I'm not disagreeing with you at all! But your post made me think of those geocache owners who state on the AL Bonus Cache that if you don't complete the adventure lab they will delete your find. So I'm wondering how they'll reconcile those two accounts. Not that it matters, they can't rightfully delete your bonus cache log anyways, once you sign the physical log. 

[+ecanderson]

How could they possibly know?  Only those who leave logs on the AL are visible after the first 10, correct?

[+barefootjeff]

32 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

I'm not disagreeing with you at all! But your post made me think of those geocache owners who state on the AL Bonus Cache that if you don't complete the adventure lab they will delete your find. So I'm wondering how they'll reconcile those two accounts. Not that it matters, they can't rightfully delete your bonus cache log anyways, once you sign the physical log. 

 

Out of the dozen or so I've looked at over the weekend, I've seen quite a few with that wording on the bonus cache, enough to make me think they got through the review process with that wording in there, for example:

 

Quote

It is a requirement that any cacher who claims this find must have completed all 5 stages of the Adventure Lab first. I will be checking, and I will reserve the right to remove any log where this has not occurred. I'm sorry, but there have to be some rules.

 

So I'm wondering if ALRs like this on AL bonus caches are being allowed, or at least having a blind eye turned towards them.

[+baer2006]

5 minutes ago, ecanderson said:

How could they possibly know?  Only those who leave logs on the AL are visible after the first 10, correct?

Correct.

[+arisoft]

43 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

I'm not disagreeing with you at all! But your post made me think of those geocache owners who state on the AL Bonus Cache that if you don't complete the adventure lab they will delete your find. So I'm wondering how they'll reconcile those two accounts. Not that it matters, they can't rightfully delete your bonus cache log anyways, once you sign the physical log. 

 

If you have signed the logbook you can appeal to HQ to reinstate your find. I have never seen a such requirement. Could you give an example.

Edited August 30, 2020 by arisoft

[+baer2006]

4 minutes ago, barefootjeff said:

Quote

It is a requirement that any cacher who claims this find must have completed all 5 stages of the Adventure Lab first. I will be checking, and I will reserve the right to remove any log where this has not occurred. I'm sorry, but there have to be some rules.

 

So I'm wondering if ALRs like this on AL bonus caches are being allowed, or at least having a blind eye turned towards them.

I cannot imagine that such an ALR (which it effectively is) will survive, when a log dispute has to be resolved by Groundspeak. E.g. there is the perfectly legitimate situation, where a team of cachers plays the ALC (with the final goal to find the bonus), but one of the group isn't interested in lab caches, or the app doesn't properly work on his phone, or whatever. But they still participate in the search for the bonus, and of course enter their name in the logbook. There is IMHO no way the CO is entitled to delete that find on the bonus cache.

And anyway, most "cheating" with ALCs occurs the other way round: Players complete the full ALC but don't log the bonus (because they armchair-logged the lab caches).

[+Max and 99]

33 minutes ago, arisoft said:

 

If you have signed the logbook you can appeal to HQ to reinstate your find. I have never seen a such requirement. Could you give an example.

The very first AL Bonus Cache I checked had this requirement on the page (I know I've seen others!).

 

 

 

 

Edited August 30, 2020 by Max and 99

[+ecanderson]

Yeah, good luck proving that one way or the other after 10.

I still think it's a mistake to limit the leaderboard to 10 for a variety of reasons, but this is certainly one of them.

[+Max and 99]

3 hours ago, ecanderson said:

How could they possibly know?  Only those who leave logs on the AL are visible after the first 10, correct?

I'm not sure what you mean by that second question. Can you explain?

 

I think what you're saying is that after the first 10 on the leaderboard, only people who leave a log on the adventure lab are known to have completed it? So if they are not one of the first 10,  and they do not leave a log, you have no way of knowing if they completed it. I think I got it! ?

Edited August 31, 2020 by Max and 99

[+ecanderson]

Yup, that's exactly what I meant.  Because there's no requirement to add comment after an AL is found, there's therefore no way of knowing, past the first 10, whether anyone has actually completed the AL before logging the bonus -- so you can't use anything about the AL system to make a determination about whether the bonus logging was legit or not.  So the cut-and-paste above that says "Note: Any logged finds..." is so much hot air.

Edited August 31, 2020 by ecanderson

[+Wacka]

Don't like em. dom't do em.  No one is forcing you,. Simple as that.

[+Max and 99]

11 minutes ago, Wacka said:

Don't like em. dom't do em.  No one is forcing you,. Simple as that.

Learned something new.

[+funkymunkyzone]

On 8/29/2020 at 9:48 AM, barefootjeff said:

 

I'm starting to think they're intended as a replacement for multis, seeing as an AL with a bonus cache is almost indistinguishable from a multi with virtual waypoints. Once ALs go mainstream, and particularly if they increase the number of allowed stages, I expect that will be the death knell for multis given the scoring disparity.

 

But why would you think that?  They are quite clearly *not* a replacement for multis and I'd be willing to bet a very decent sum of money that they don't replace multis.

 

I don't even think they will change the popularity of multis, particularly as you can't have physical waypoints for an AL.  And I can't imagine very many hiders would waster an AL credit on creating a simple offset or a couple of stage multi.

[+funkymunkyzone]

8 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

 

Out of the dozen or so I've looked at over the weekend, I've seen quite a few with that wording on the bonus cache, enough to make me think they got through the review process with that wording in there, for example:

 

 

So I'm wondering if ALRs like this on AL bonus caches are being allowed, or at least having a blind eye turned towards them.

 

That's funny.  I never even considered that a CO would try and enforce that (although i guess I should have right)

 

Personally, I went the other way entirely.  I created an AL that took a player through a story, and there is a "bonus" letterbox cache at the end, except that if you want, you can simply do the letterbox cache as it literally takes the player on the same physical journey, just with slightly different questions.  The letterbox is locked - complete the AL and you get the code to unlock it, or visit all the waypoints on the letterbox and gather the info to calculate the code.  I figured this was the best way to cater for the preferences of the most geocachers.

 

Edited August 31, 2020 by funkymunkyzone

[+funkymunkyzone]

8 hours ago, ecanderson said:

Yeah, good luck proving that one way or the other after 10.

I still think it's a mistake to limit the leaderboard to 10 for a variety of reasons, but this is certainly one of them.

 

It might be a mistake to limit the leaderboard, but in order to support an ALR that is completely against the geocaching guidelines? Nope, not a reason at all.

[+barefootjeff]

1 hour ago, funkymunkyzone said:

 

But why would you think that?  They are quite clearly *not* a replacement for multis and I'd be willing to bet a very decent sum of money that they don't replace multis.

 

I don't even think they will change the popularity of multis, particularly as you can't have physical waypoints for an AL.  And I can't imagine very many hiders would waster an AL credit on creating a simple offset or a couple of stage multi.

 

Most of the multis here have just virtual waypoints providing answers for working out the coordinates of the final. Of the 19 I've created, 14 have purely virtual waypoints, so just like an AL plus bonus but without all the extra smileys for doing it. If ALs go mainstream in the same way as other cache types, with no limit on how many you can create, which would a CO be more likely to create and which would a seeker prefer to find?

[+IceColdUK]

3 hours ago, funkymunkyzone said:

Personally, I went the other way entirely.

Same here.  My ‘bonus’ cache includes the same waypoints as the Adventure.  I figured they’d be interesting to all cachers, not just those playing the AL.

[+funkymunkyzone]

2 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

 

with no limit on how many you can create

 

I think that's a pretty big assumption, and I doubt Groundspeak would ever go that way.  With no saturation guidelines on AL locations, it would render the whole game of geocaching obselete as it would become a game of virtuals only.  Might as well play the M game in that case.

[+baer2006]

2 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

If ALs go mainstream in the same way as other cache types, with no limit on how many you can create,

If GS does this (which I'm pretty sure they will not), my crystal ball says that this will happen (at least here in Germany) ...

• Day 0: GS releases unlimited ALC credits to everyone
• Day 1: Someone publishes an ALC "power trail" with 50 locations, each 10 meters apart
• Day 3: Someone else (a sock puppet team account, to share the workload) publishes an ALC power trail with 1000 location, each .001' apart
• Day 5: Someone publishes a browser script, which automatically creates ALCs from a arbitrarily large CSV file as input
• Day 6+: Jokers play with this script and create enormous ALC trails all over the place
• Day 8+: The Adventure Lab app is effectively dead, because it immediately crashes after launch due to data overload.
• Day 12: GS shuts off the whole Adventure Lab API. THE END!

[+barefootjeff]

1 hour ago, baer2006 said:

If GS does this (which I'm pretty sure they will not), my crystal ball says that this will happen (at least here in Germany) ...

• Day 0: GS releases unlimited ALC credits to everyone
• Day 1: Someone publishes an ALC "power trail" with 50 locations, each 10 meters apart
• Day 3: Someone else (a sock puppet team account, to share the workload) publishes an ALC power trail with 1000 location, each .001' apart
• Day 5: Someone publishes a browser script, which automatically creates ALCs from a arbitrarily large CSV file as input
• Day 6+: Jokers play with this script and create enormous ALC trails all over the place
• Day 8+: The Adventure Lab app is effectively dead, because it immediately crashes after launch due to data overload.
• Day 12: GS shuts off the whole Adventure Lab API. THE END!

 

Okay, point taken, but consider this if they remain a limited commodity. My region currently has one AL and if anyone here wants to do more than that, they have at least an hour's travel to the nearest ones in Sydney or Newcastle. Even if every active cacher here got a credit to create one, there'd likely only be about a dozen, so we'd each knock off the other eleven over a couple of weekends and then what?

 

Yet even now, there are reports of ALs piling up on top of each other in more densely populated regions. So how do you provide enough of them so that there's an ongoing interest in low density areas yet avoid ALs every 10 metres in high density areas? Which brings me back to what I said at the beginning of this thread:

 

Quote

I can't help wondering if, when Adventures stop being labs and go mainstream, what there'll be to stop them having all the same problems as the proliferation of old virtuals had. Even more so as ALs aren't reviewed and there's no saturation limit.

 

[+coachstahly]

1 hour ago, baer2006 said:

Day 1: Someone publishes an ALC "power trail" with 50 locations, each 10 meters apart

 

I heard from a friend who plays ALCs (at a Community Celebration event) that there's already somewhat of a PT of ALCs up in the northern part of my state.  I think he said something along the line of 100 stops, which means, as I understand them, 20 ALCs published with 5 stops each.  As I haven't downloaded the needed app, I have no idea if what he said is true but I have no reason to doubt him in any way.

[+ecanderson]

8 hours ago, funkymunkyzone said:

 

It might be a mistake to limit the leaderboard, but in order to support an ALR that is completely against the geocaching guidelines? Nope, not a reason at all.

As has been noted, it is no different than requiring someone to go through the exercise of a puzzle multi before finding the final of any cache, gathering pieces of the coordinates along the way.  The weirdness here is that these 'multis' are wrapped around two different systems, the regular gc.com cache system and the AL system.

[+thebruce0]

Imagine a group of numbers-folk deciding to provide people a way to inflate their numbers. As exampled above, a powertrail of 100 'stages', 20 ALs with 5 stages each, where each stage you, say, merely input an ID number on the lamp post along a sidewalk to get the smiley. 

No reason they can't do that. An effective equivalent to the game of taking a photo kissing a frog.

 

Over time the AL landscape will spread out in style and quality - many quick and simple for the numbers (or fairly generic in experience), while others attempt to push the limit and create very creative unique experiences within the current bounds of allowability. That's what happened with Geocaching Challenges, it's just taking longer because the AL system is a bit improved =P.  I loved the potential in Geocaching Challenges - but they were ruined by being overrun with the lowest common denominator. If ALs continue with a mechanic that allows proliferation of sub-par experiences, it'll be ruined for the relatively rare, legitimately great ones.

Edited August 31, 2020 by thebruce0

[+baer2006]

2 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

Okay, point taken, but consider this if they remain a limited commodity. My region currently has one AL and if anyone here wants to do more than that, they have at least an hour's travel to the nearest ones in Sydney or Newcastle. Even if every active cacher here got a credit to create one, there'd likely only be about a dozen, so we'd each knock off the other eleven over a couple of weekends and then what?

 

Yet even now, there are reports of ALs piling up on top of each other in more densely populated regions. So how do you provide enough of them so that there's an ongoing interest in low density areas yet avoid ALs every 10 metres in high density areas? Which brings me back to what I said at the beginning of this thread:

 

I totally see your point. The current application page for creators (https://www.geocaching.com/play/request/adventurelab) says:

Quote

To be eligible, you must meet the following criteria:

• You must be a Geocaching Premium member.
• You must have found at least two Adventure Lab Caches.
• You do not have a current credit or active Adventure.

(emphasis by me)

 

So it is rather hard to get ALCs started in areas where there aren't any, because none of the locals have the chance to play the two required to qualify. Two "kick starter" cachers are needed, who have traveled to get two ALC finds and are willing to create one of their own.

 

OTOH, once the threshold of two ALCs in a town is reached, the numbers can rise quite fast. From what I've heard, if you qualify and apply for "credits", you are almost guaranteed to get them sooner or later. In my home zone (Munich and vicinity) we got a new ALC every few days in the last weeks. I wouldn't vote for "Stop AL" as in the title of the thread says, but the current flood in some areas isn't ideal either - especially for those who like them, because the map becomes really hard to use.

 

[+funkymunkyzone]

1 hour ago, ecanderson said:

As has been noted, it is no different than requiring someone to go through the exercise of a puzzle multi before finding the final of any cache, gathering pieces of the coordinates along the way.  The weirdness here is that these 'multis' are wrapped around two different systems, the regular gc.com cache system and the AL system.

 

Except that, barring challenge caches, earthcaches and virtuals, no CO can require anything to be done by a finder other than sign the log. Anything else is an ALR and these are all unenforceable. So yeah, hence my statement that supporting rogue COs with unenforceable ALRs is not a reason to change the leaderboard.

[+ecanderson]

Ah, I think I understand.  You can't require the finder to come by the coordinates legitimately -- is that the argument?

[+funkymunkyzone]

4 minutes ago, ecanderson said:

Ah, I think I understand.  You can't require the finder to come by the coordinates legitimately -- is that the argument?

 

Yes, unfortunately. Although thats another topic really. The point is, no ALRs.

[+ecanderson]

I still look at it as a multi-cache run on two different systems.  You could take any AL and use it as the front end of a multi-cache on gc.com by itself and wind up with exactly the same experience, though perhaps easier, given some of the issues of the AL system.  The only reason anyone can come up with for why this is an "ALR" is because it's operated on two systems instead of one.  Nothing says that the waypoints of a multi have to be published anywhere on gc.com, only the final.  Still don't buy the argument.

 

Edited August 31, 2020 by ecanderson
typosopyt

[+funkymunkyzone]

27 minutes ago, ecanderson said:

I still look at it as a multi-cache run on two different systems.  You could take any AL and use it as the front end of a multi-cache on gc.com by itself and wind up with exactly the same experience, though perhaps easier, given some of the issues of the AL system.  The only reason anyone can come up with for why this is an "ALR" is because it's operated on two systems instead of one.  Nothing says that the waypoints of a multi have to be published anywhere on gc.com, only the final.  Still don't buy the argument.

 

 

There's no rule to say you have to visit every waypoint of a multi in order to find the final.  *Usually* the easiest way (without obviously just cheating and being given the final coords) is to visit all the waypoints, but if you happened across the final, or you worked it out another way, then so be it, it's a legitimate find.  That's really the point I am getting at.  I'd rather not dwell on the cases where people cheat, because I'm not interested in pandering to cheaters, or making life hard for non-cheaters just because cheaters exist.

Edited August 31, 2020 by funkymunkyzone

[+ecanderson]

6 hours ago, funkymunkyzone said:

 

There's no rule to say you have to visit every waypoint of a multi in order to find the final. 

 

*Usually* the easiest way (without obviously just cheating and being given the final coords) is to visit all the waypoints, but if you happened across the final, or you worked it out another way, then so be it, it's a legitimate find.  That's really the point I am getting at.  I'd rather not dwell on the cases where people cheat, because I'm not interested in pandering to cheaters, or making life hard for non-cheaters just because cheaters exist.

As to the first sentence, that's usually moot.  Properly constructed, there are few multis that could be solved without visiting every waypoint.  I can't recall one offhand.  I know I've never run across a final by mistake, though I hear that it does rarely happen.

 

 

 

 

[+Goldenwattle]

13 minutes ago, ecanderson said:

As to the first sentence, that's usually moot.  Properly constructed, there are few multis that could be solved without visiting every waypoint.  I can't recall one offhand.  I know I've never run across a final by mistake, though I hear that it does rarely happen.

 

 

 

 

I have found at least two without completing the multi. One I had done one stage of a six stage multi and was passing a structure headed for the second stage, and thought that that would make a nice hide, so checked and there was the cache. Another I searched some likely places in the area and found the cache at the third place I checked. I have attempted to find others but didn't manage it, although after doing the multi on at least one occasion found I was so close.

[+barefootjeff]

41 minutes ago, ecanderson said:

As to the first sentence, that's usually moot.  Properly constructed, there are few multis that could be solved without visiting every waypoint.  I can't recall one offhand.  I know I've never run across a final by mistake, though I hear that it does rarely happen.

 

 

I've found a few without visiting every waypoint. One had its first waypoint up a tree which I wasn't comfortable climbing, but there was only one track through that section of the park and I was able to do a linear search to find the second waypoint (a virtual one at a signpost). Another one, with virtual waypoints, I couldn't find one of them but was able to guess what the answer would be. The third one, again with virtual waypoints, had a checksum so if you got the right answers for all the other waypoints, you could work out the remaining one (that was by design by the CO as one of the waypoints was a difficult climb).

 

On my own, I've had a few people find them without going through all the waypoints. Some without a boat have figured out a water-access one through some online research and guesswork, and on The Great Train Heist, which has far-flung waypoints which are often visited on separate days to the final, there have been some group finds where it's likely not all members of the group have visited the waypoints. Another one, with three waypoints where you have to match the location with one of four photos, there are 64 possible outcomes and one cacher meticulously ruled out those which landed on private property, were within the national park or too close to another cache, then visited each of the remaining locations until she finally found it. None of that bothers me at all, as I'm happy for people to enjoy my caches in whatever way they want as long as they sign the log and put it back properly afterwards.

[+funkymunkyzone]

3 hours ago, ecanderson said:

As to the first sentence, that's usually moot.  Properly constructed, there are few multis that could be solved without visiting every waypoint.  I can't recall one offhand.  I know I've never run across a final by mistake, though I hear that it does rarely happen.

 

 

 

 

I have found numerous multis and puzzles without visiting all the waypoints in the case of the multi, or solving the puzzle by the intended method, or even at all, in the case of mysteries - and no, no cheating involved.

 

In any case, I don't think we are now disagreeing on anything.  I took your comment earlier " it is no different than requiring someone to go through the exercise of a puzzle multi before finding the final" as meaning the CO was somehow requiring it, beyond just the proof of the signature in the log.  And it seemed like you were on the CO's side when you said "You can't require the finder to come by the coordinates legitimately" which I took to imply that if you dont find a cache exactly by the method the CO intended, visiting all waypoints etc, was somehow illegitimate.  The only illegitimate way to find a multi or a puzzle is to simply be handed the final coords, and there's nothing a CO can do about it unfortunately - any other way you figure out the location of the final and find the cache is fair game.  I FTF'ed a puzzle cache fairly recently without solving it - the CO had constructed the puzzle in such a way that I could deduce the final location down to about a 100m stretch of road.  The cache was found in the very first place i looked.

[+ecanderson]

Seems "properly constructed" is in the eyes of a lot of beholders!

Being able to skip stages seems to imply that some of these weren't quite as carefully planned (to avoid exactly that) as they might have been.

In any case, I don't see the AL as an "ALR", just part of the process where, properly constructed, you don't really have any choice apart from actually doing the AL to get the coordinates.  Creating an AL with a bonus where you can armchair the AL wouldn't fit my definition of a well constructed AL.

[+funkymunkyzone]

2 hours ago, ecanderson said:

Seems "properly constructed" is in the eyes of a lot of beholders!

Being able to skip stages seems to imply that some of these weren't quite as carefully planned (to avoid exactly that) as they might have been.

In any case, I don't see the AL as an "ALR", just part of the process where, properly constructed, you don't really have any choice apart from actually doing the AL to get the coordinates.  Creating an AL with a bonus where you can armchair the AL wouldn't fit my definition of a well constructed AL.

 

As I said, we aren't disagreeing at all.

 

[+barefootjeff]

2 hours ago, ecanderson said:

Being able to skip stages seems to imply that some of these weren't quite as carefully planned (to avoid exactly that) as they might have been.

 

Sometimes the ability to skip a stage is the intent of the CO, perhaps to provide redundancy should one of the waypoints go missing or be temporarily inaccessible or to allow people with a variety of abilities to be able to complete it. My Quest for the Middle Sea Diamond is like that. It has a checksum waypoint in addition to the six waypoints that provide digits for the coordinates, so if five of those are found the remaining one can be inferred. Two of the waypoints are water access but one can be seen from the shore if you figure out where to look from and are willing to go for the long drive to get there, so someone without a boat can still do it. That's by design, since my intent was to provide a fun experience, not a rigorous test.

[+funkymunkyzone]

3 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

 

Sometimes the ability to skip a stage is the intent of the CO, perhaps to provide redundancy should one of the waypoints go missing or be temporarily inaccessible or to allow people with a variety of abilities to be able to complete it. My Quest for the Middle Sea Diamond is like that. It has a checksum waypoint in addition to the six waypoints that provide digits for the coordinates, so if five of those are found the remaining one can be inferred. Two of the waypoints are water access but one can be seen from the shore if you figure out where to look from and are willing to go for the long drive to get there, so someone without a boat can still do it. That's by design, since my intent was to provide a fun experience, not a rigorous test.

 

To be honest @barefootjeff I don't think you're disagreeing with @ecanderson on the topic of "well constructed".  Your multi is not poorly constructed because a player skips one waypoint - you've designed it that way so it's not really skipping a waypoint at all - it's that a player, by design, only needs to visit x number of your waypoints.

[+ecanderson]

And given the issues he raises, the flexibility sounds like a nice touch.

[+Lynx Humble]

Groundspeak still doesn't care about correcting the multiple issues plaguing lab cache before awarding new ones because a bunch of people got awarded a second series today in my area....

[+Max and 99]

On 9/1/2020 at 2:52 PM, ecanderson said:

Seems "properly constructed" is in the eyes of a lot of beholders!

Being able to skip stages seems to imply that some of these weren't quite as carefully planned (to avoid exactly that) as they might have been.

In any case, I don't see the AL as an "ALR", just part of the process where, properly constructed, you don't really have any choice apart from actually doing the AL to get the coordinates.  Creating an AL with a bonus where you can armchair the AL wouldn't fit my definition of a well constructed AL.

My personal opinion of well constructed means not asking questions that can easily be answered by guessing:

A. Is the sculpture a plant or human

B. What month was this plaque dedicated (5 letters)

C. What flower is shown at the center (four letters)

D. How many columns in front of the building? Use number..

[+ecanderson]

Yes, those would be pretty poor choices.

[+JL_HSTRE]

On 8/30/2020 at 10:18 PM, Wacka said:

Don't like em. dom't do em.  No one is forcing you,. Simple as that.

 

Adventure Labs don't take up proximity either, unlike say Challenge Caches or difficult Puzzles or 12-stage multis.

 

On 8/31/2020 at 4:24 AM, barefootjeff said:

Most of the multis here have just virtual waypoints providing answers for working out the coordinates of the final. Of the 19 I've created, 14 have purely virtual waypoints, so just like an AL plus bonus but without all the extra smileys for doing it. If ALs go mainstream in the same way as other cache types, with no limit on how many you can create, which would a CO be more likely to create and which would a seeker prefer to find?

 

If Adventure Labs remain limited to 5 stages each then a Multi (or Wherigo) would be required for a 6+ stage cache.

 

Also, the all virtual stage multis are usual in urban areas where a physical hide is difficult to place and keep safe from muggles. Replacing those with Adventure Labs seems like a good idea.

 

Multis in the woods are rarer now but will likely contine to use mostly physical stages, even if they are only tags in some cases.