Wheel of Challenges

[+Max and 99]

Wheel of Challenges

 

Tune in to the Wheel of Challenges each month to discover new geocaching challenges and earn souvenirs!

Edited March 21, 2023 by Max and 99

[+Max and 99]

I am really surprised that they are including streaks in these Challenges. 

[+kivilaak]

14 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

I am really surprised that they are including streaks in these Challenges. 

Yep, streaks are forbidden in challenges, but this is not the first time when same rules are not valid for HC originated campaigns ...

[+Hügh]

52 minutes ago, kivilaak said:

Yep, streaks are forbidden in challenges

No, streak challenges are permitted (up to 365 days.)

[+niraD]

49 minutes ago, kivilaak said:

1 hour ago, Max and 99 said:

I am really surprised that they are including streaks in these Challenges. 

Yep, streaks are forbidden in challenges, but this is not the first time when same rules are not valid for HC originated campaigns ...

Huh? Streaks up to a year are still allowed in challenges. New streak challenges can't go beyond 365 days, they can't require more than one cache per day, and they can't require specific types, sizes, difficulty/terrain ratings, etc. for the caches. But basic streaks up to a year are allowed by the challenge cache guidelines.

[Rock Chalk]

25 minutes ago, barefootjeff said:

Come on, HQ, COVID lockdowns are over so we don't need these extremely long promotions any more!

 

It's not required to participate.

[+JL_HSTRE]

1 hour ago, barefootjeff said:

Just when I was thinking it's nearly over, along comes the six-month Wheel of Challenges. Come on, HQ, COVID lockdowns are over so we don't need these extremely long promotions any more!

 

Presumably Groundspeak is getting positive feedback - surveys and/or user activity stats - that lead to a conclusion of success and thus similar programs.

 

I like having a month to complete one of these challenges. If it's one day or a weekend it's quite easy to be unable to participate due to work, weather, or health. If it's a very date-specific (ex: Last Day & First Day) I understand, but for more general challenges I appreciate a month.

 

Back in 2013, 31 Days of Caching was effectively impossible for me because I had a coast-to-coast round-trip via airplane. Also, August challenges are hell if you live in places like Florida or Arizona. 

 

As for this particular challenge: without knowing what each month's challenge will be I find it hard to have an opinion. Could be fun, could be dull. If there's a streak component I will likely skip that one.

[+niraD]

1 hour ago, JL_HSTRE said:

I like having a month to complete one of these challenges. If it's one day or a weekend it's quite easy to be unable to participate due to work, weather, or health. If it's a very date-specific (ex: Last Day & First Day) I understand, but for more general challenges I appreciate a month.

I was kinda disappointed that there wasn't a Pi Day promotion this year.

 

(Yeah, I know the 3.14 date works only with the month-first system used in the US.)

[+Goldenwattle]

2 hours ago, Rock Chalk said:

 

It's not required to participate.

And that is what I have chosen to do.

[+Goldenwattle]

20 minutes ago, tbbiker said:

It sounds nice, but my noodle really can't handle another multi-month souvenir hunt so soon after the last one (which hasn't even ended yet).  Not sure if this is an attempt to keep new players in the hobby over a long period of time, but after 191 souvenirs, I could care less about them.  I look at them once when I get a new one then rarely look at them again.  Oversaturation killed them for me.

Same here. I now hide non geographical ones from view. I couldn't care less about them and rarely look at them, except when I get a new country or state. The only ones which interest me are the country, state, etc ones.

 

And on countries, I'm still waiting for a souvenir for New Caledonia. I have 15 finds there, but  no souvenir yet. New Caledonia is a frequently visited place by cruise ships, and also a short flight from Australia and NZ.

[+MNTA]

Souvenirs are here to stay, they are not geared toward the folks here that are already hooked. 

 

As for the comment about burnout. Nope don't see it. Heck thinking back I usually qualify very quickly in the month. 

 

[+Team Canary]

I collect the souvenirs along the course of normal caching, or I don't. Whatever happens.

 

These promotions are not for die hard cachers, they're to entice new players.

[+CAVinoGal]

4 hours ago, Goldenwattle said:

6 hours ago, Rock Chalk said:

 

It's not required to participate.

And that is what I have chosen to do.

 

1 hour ago, Team Canary said:

I collect the souvenirs along the course of normal caching, or I don't. Whatever happens.

 

If our normal caching activity gets us the souvenir, then it happens. Occasionally we will see that we might be close, and go for a cache specifically, but typically our normal caching will earn us the promotional souvenirs.  I'm curious as to what the "Challenges" will be...

 

We'll be traveling to the East Coast in a month, affording us new territory to explore, and that may make it easier to meet whatever challenge is presented for that particular time frame.  We introduced a friend to geocaching as a retirement hobby, and she has really gotten into it, so she motivates us to earn all the souvenir promos now - even though our usual caching gets us there anyway.  She watches us and prods us along...

[+Gill & Tony]

4 hours ago, Goldenwattle said:

I'm still waiting for a souvenir for New Caledonia. I have 15 finds there, but  no souvenir yet. New Caledonia is a frequently visited place by cruise ships, and also a short flight from Australia and NZ.

New Caledonia is available.  Int came out a couple of months ago.

[+Goldenwattle]

3 hours ago, Gill & Tony said:

New Caledonia is available.  Int came out a couple of months ago.

Well I haven't got it. Just checked.

[+Gill & Tony]

31 minutes ago, Goldenwattle said:

Well I haven't got it. Just checked.

That's strange,  I have got it.   Maybe have a word with HQ.

[+Gill & Tony]

31 minutes ago, barefootjeff said:

Maybe they'll prove me wrong, maybe one of the Wheel's challenges will be to find a bunch of caches with the takes more than an hour attribute, but I doubt it since the only way to search for such caches is with an old-fashioned PQ.

Or with GSAK

[+Goldenwattle]

Re my missing New Caledonia souvenir. I contacted HQ and they kindly added it, but unfortunately now the wrong date, 22/Mar/2023 .

It should be 18/Sep/2018.

 

I suppose I should have told them the date, but I naively thought they would correct something and the souvenir with the correct date would appear.

[+MNTA]

4 minutes ago, Goldenwattle said:

Re my missing New Caledonia souvenir. I contacted HQ and they kindly added it, but unfortunately now the wrong date, 22/Mar/2023 .

It should be 18/Sep/2018.

 

I suppose I should have told them the date, but I naively thought they would correct something and the souvenir with the correct date would appear.

weird that it was not automatic

 

Glad you got it straightened away

[Moun10Bike]

2 minutes ago, Goldenwattle said:

Re my missing New Caledonia souvenir. I contacted HQ and they kindly added it, but unfortunately now the wrong date, 22/Mar/2023 .

It should be 18/Sep/2018.

 

I suppose I should have told them the date, but I naively thought they would correct something and the souvenir with the correct date would appear.

 

I'm sure they would have loved to have included the correct date, but the basic tool they have to retroactively award souvenirs does not provide that ability. It would take an overhaul of that tool, or a manual change by an engineer with access to the live database.

[+Goldenwattle]

8 hours ago, Moun10Bike said:

 

I'm sure they would have loved to have included the correct date, but the basic tool they have to retroactively award souvenirs does not provide that ability. It would take an overhaul of that tool, or a manual change by an engineer with access to the live database.

Thank you for explaining that. At least I got the souvenir .

[+Max and 99]

From HQ:

"We took the wheel for its first spin and the challenge it landed on is Seeking Smileys. This challenge is all about seeing how many caches you can find in a month. From April 3–30 you have the chance to earn three new souvenirs for easy, medium, or hard levels of the challenge:

Easy: Find and log 5 caches to earn the first souvenir.
Medium: Find and log 10 caches to earn the second souvenir.
Hard: Find and log 100 caches to earn the third souvenir.

If you are a Premium member, keep track of your progress toward earning souvenirs by following your statistics on Geocaching.com where you can see how many geocaches you find this month.

Best of luck and see you again on April 25 to find out what challenge is next in May."

Edited April 12, 2023 by Max and 99

[+Max and 99]

Any guesses what the other challenges might be based on these icons:

The car, 3 coins and the 2 people (Friends' League?) are the ones I'm most curious about.

 

 

Edited March 28, 2023 by Max and 99

[+HHL]

12 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

The car, 3 coins and the 2 people are the ones I'm most curious about.

My uneducated guesses:

Car: find x caches with x or higher distance from home.

Star: find x caches with x D/T ratings.

Heart: find caches with a summary of x or more favourites.

Two people: attend x or more events.

Question mark: find x ore more mysteries.

Seems more or less obvious.

Edited March 28, 2023 by HHL
typo

[+solid-rock-seekers]

46 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

Any guesses what the other challenges might be based on these icons:

 

Interesting to see that the challenge icons listed on the wheel itself are slightly different as compared to the six challenge icons shown in the overlay at the bottom of the screen.  Maybe one challenge idea has been replaced by a different one?  It's not clear which of those is "more current" either.

 

Five remain unchanged:  star, heart, smile, car, 2-people.  However, on the wheel there is an icon of 3 coins, while in the overlay there is a question mark.

 

I concur with the guesses about likely meanings of some of the icons:

* star - new finds with a high D/T combination (maybe at least 5 stars?)

* heart - new finds with high favorites (maybe 10+ ?)

* car - new finds with sufficient distance from home location, as currently calculated on "statistics" page (maybe at least 25 miles?  50 miles?)

* 2 people - attendance at new events

* question mark - new finds of unknown cache type (aka mystery or puzzle)

 

* three coins -- this one is a little puzzling to me.  Maybe new finds of "Premium Member Only" caches?  However, that would be a souvenir that would be available only to premium members.  I don't know if HQ has done that before.  Maybe that's a reason for the change?

 

I also agree with others that have mentioned that the "middle" tier of 10 finds seems too low for a second souvenir.  Seems like 5, 20, 100 or 5, 25, 100 would have been a more uniform progression.  Or maybe even 5, 30, 100, with 5 being about one find per week and 30 being about 1 find per day.

Edited March 28, 2023 by solid-rock-seekers

[+Hügh]

18 minutes ago, solid-rock-seekers said:

* three coins -- this one is a little puzzling to me

 

The three coins have a multi-cache icon on them, so possibly something about finding multicaches or multiple caches within a set time period.

Edited March 28, 2023 by Hügh

[+Harry Dolphin]

On 3/21/2023 at 5:18 PM, barefootjeff said:

 

I realise that, but the short sharp annual promotions were fun, something that spurred a bit of extra effort for a few weeks, but when they run continuously for months or even years on end they become drudgery.

 

BTW, since we're not required to participate, can we have an option to turn off the push notifications in the app about them?

 

I think they've finally come up a souvenir promotion that I have no interest in.

[+KRON family]

I guess the heart icon could mean find caches with a certain number of popularity points.

The three circles with the multicache icon and the question mark could indicate a connection to the Diverse cacher badge - i.e. finding as many icons as possible.

The figures could be related to events, but also to the Teamwork required attribute, or to a feature of the site - adding friends.

For the car icon, there is a drive-in cache attribute.

The asterisk could stand for D/T. But according to the last article, specifically the sentence "From seeing how many geocaches you can find in a month, to testing how long you can keep up a daily streak", one icon should indicate a daily streak. 

[+JL_HSTRE]

Quote

Easy: Find and log 5 caches to earn the first souvenir.
Medium: Find and log 10 caches to earn the second souvenir.
Hard: Find and log 100 caches to earn the third souvenir.

 

This is a big step in the right direction compared to past souvenir-based promotions by providing tiers. I even think the quantity for each tier is good. I've been caching for 13 years with 7000+ Finds. Even in my busiest years (2012-2013) I only got 100+ Finds in 8 out of 24 months, and 2 of those 8 included hitting a biking power trail. It's easier now with Adventure Labs, but still an accomplishment for the vast majority of geocachers.

 

One thing about this I wish was different: each person should only got one souvenir for the month. East/Medium/Hard should correspond with different souvenir variations (Bronze/Silver/Gold). Don't award the souvenir until May 1, then award just one based on the highest tier achieved.

[+CAVinoGal]

1 hour ago, JL_HSTRE said:

This is a big step in the right direction compared to past souvenir-based promotions by providing tiers. I even think the quantity for each tier is good. I've been caching for 13 years with 7000+ Finds. Even in my busiest years (2012-2013) I only got 100+ Finds in 8 out of 24 months, and 2 of those 8 included hitting a biking power trail. It's easier now with Adventure Labs, but still an accomplishment for the vast majority of geocachers.

 

I completely agree with this!  Looking at my stats in Project-GC, I only have 3 months where I topped 100 finds, and my best month was 114 finds.  All 3 of those months were in 2018, the year we set a goal to find a cache every day.  One other month that year I hit 96, my monthly average for the nearly 6 years I've been geocaching is in the 20's and 30's most months.  The streak year, the average per month was 76, but that's the highest it's ever been!  So 5 and 10 finds a month is easily doable, 100 will be a real challenge, and quite a jump up from 10.  If the second tier was 30, or 40, one or more a day, it would be more of a challenge than 10.

 

1 hour ago, JL_HSTRE said:

One thing about this I wish was different: each person should only got one souvenir for the month. East/Medium/Hard should correspond with different souvenir variations (Bronze/Silver/Gold). Don't award the souvenir until May 1, then award just one based on the highest tier achieved.

^^^THIS! +++

I don't need (and probably won't get) all 3 souvenirs each month.  One souvenir, for whatever I do manage to accomplish, will be more than enough! 

 

My husband, my geocaching partner, and I both managed to earn all 12 of the Signal's Labyrinth souvenirs with our usual caching, what we would have done anyway.  And we didn't stop when we earned the souvenir, waiting for the next one...we just did what we normally do.  Example - we've both earned the final Labyrinth and the bonus for getting all 12.  But there's an event tonight that we are attending, and there will be FTF opportunities handed out, and we will likely go find and log them, before the Challenges start on April 3.  And we've pretty much decided we will not go far out of our way to grab all the challenges - if they sound fun we might target specific caches; if we are traveling and can find enough wherever we are to get one, we'll do it.  Going for 100 caches in April??? We'll see.  That's an average of 3 or 4 a day, every day.  We would definitely be stepping up our game to accomplish that!

[+thebruce0]

On 3/21/2023 at 10:56 PM, Team Canary said:

These promotions are not for die hard cachers, they're to entice new players.

 

Or for die hard cachers who may just love caching along a theme for a time. Just like die hard cachers who love caching for challenges. But this is for fun. And a little digital graphic. For fun. Because why not. Anyone who doesn't want to, doesn't have to.

[+MNTA]

Finally a challenge for the addicts. Glad I have not really done any of the AL near my home as I'll be needing them.

5 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

 

I realise I'm not the typical cacher here and that these souvenir promotions are aimed at the US and European markets

 

Yep. 

 

Book you travel plans now probably some cheap tickets to some destination. I did one power trail (never again) Got 108 in one day solo. Was so tired of getting in and out of the car. 

[+HHL]

6 hours ago, CAVinoGal said:

8 hours ago, JL_HSTRE said:

One thing about this I wish was different: each person should only got one souvenir for the month. East/Medium/Hard should correspond with different souvenir variations (Bronze/Silver/Gold). Don't award the souvenir until May 1, then award just one based on the highest tier achieved.

^^^THIS! +++

+1

[+lee737]

On 3/22/2023 at 7:40 AM, barefootjeff said:

Just when I was thinking it's nearly over, along comes the six-month Wheel of Challenges. Come on, HQ, COVID lockdowns are over so we don't need these extremely long promotions any more!

+1. I think they should mix things up a bit - a few short/sharp souvenir challenges, 4 wks max, and throw in the odd low-notice-curve-ball, streak-week style. I love a mission to find a bunch of caches, but these do get dull.

[+solid-rock-seekers]

On 3/28/2023 at 1:44 PM, Hügh said:

The three coins have a multi-cache icon on them, so possibly something about finding multicaches or multiple caches within a set time period.

 

Thanks for noticing that - I hadn't "zoomed in" enough on the icon on the coins to discern it.  Seeing that it is a multi-cache icon surely indicates that challenge has something to do with multi-caches.  Thanks!

[+Gill & Tony]

Add me to the list of people who would prefer one souvenir at the end of the month.

[+MNTA]

Any one know if there is a progress indicator? 

 

 

[+Max and 99]

I haven't seen any.

[+CaracalShan]

There isn't one I believe, the blogpost says to check your statistics to see how many caches you have found this month, but that's pretty useless since caches found on April 1st or 2nd don't count for the Wheel of Challenges... I also would prefer just one souvenir with a different level, and not three souvenirs which look exactly the same, apart from 1 small colour detail.

[+Max and 99]

The leaderboard is the closest thing I've seen to show me the number of caches found since the promotion started. 

[+Max and 99]

48 minutes ago, barefootjeff said:

Except that's now gone back to its default mode of resetting weekly:

Good catch! I didn't even notice that.

[+LimpingGabriel]

6 hours ago, CaracalShan said:

There isn't one I believe, the blogpost says to check your statistics to see how many caches you have found this month, but that's pretty useless since caches found on April 1st or 2nd don't count for the Wheel of Challenges... I also would prefer just one souvenir with a different level, and not three souvenirs which look exactly the same, apart from 1 small colour detail.

Yeah, this kind of drives me nuts. The challenge says it’s “all about how many geocaches you find in a month” but it’s a couple days short of a month, so statistics aren’t really a super great way to check. Why not have caches from April 1 and 2 count too?

[+MNTA]

Let's add it is very difficult to check how many individual Lab caches finds you've found.

 

So yesterday after first deciding no I did not want to average 3-4 a day for a month that I would give the 100 a shot. You know they have the number available as I've already gotten two of the souvenirs just display it somewhere for us so I don't have to count.

 

Down to NEEDING 3 a day and already a bit tired but I'm addicted to challenges and I have a personal challenge to clear my 10 mile radius of traditional caches (There is one at 9.7 that requires a boat that I may not get  ) and down to 45 out of 668. So this challenge will defiantly help.

 

 

[+thebruce0]

Well, not everyone will get the Hard souvenir. Probably very few in the grand scheme of worldwide geocachers. And that's just fine.  Just like we don't have to 'find them all'

[+CAVinoGal]

On 3/28/2023 at 5:16 PM, CAVinoGal said:

Going for 100 caches in April??? We'll see.  That's an average of 3 or 4 a day, every day.  We would definitely be stepping up our game to accomplish that!

 

And here we are, a few days into the new promo challenge, and I have found ... one cache, and an FTF at that!!  Actually, our geocaching has been more cache maintenance than cache finding this past week or so.  It seems just as we get one back into play, another disappears!  We've been doing a lot of rebuilding (lots of rain and damp warping the specially built container so it would not seal properly) and rethinking hides, and haven't got many locally yet to find.  We'll get the souvenirs we get, and I highly doubt it will be the gold this month.

[+thebruce0]

4 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

all the promotions of late have just been about finding even more lots of caches over an extended period.

 

I don't disagree. But theming and story vs actual practical accomplishments is a tough line to draw. The Labyrinth was very themed. This one is literally the challenge wheel, so it's going to be about accomplishing some statistical goal, likely each having an easy/medium/hard, and certainly won't all be about quantity. Time and place for a variety of souvenir promo themes. But yes, I agree more theming and story would be nice; it's just a tough balance to draw.

[+thebruce0]

1 minute ago, barefootjeff said:

The Labyrinth may have had a story behind it, but the tasks for each stage had nothing to do with that story, they were just "accumulate 500 points on the leaderboard" with random bonus points thrown in now and then. Its basic structure was virtually the same as the six-month Reach the Peak that preceded it, only with a different narrative.

Every souvenir promo is going to be based on some statistic. The leaderboard points for the Labyrinth were for a variety of hide styles. Not merely quantity. Points are the way they 'convert' finds to the theme's progress. So you can choose what progression you want to take; the long way, the short way, or the adventurous way. That's different than mere quantity, which this first challenge wheel souvenir is. You can't get away from the fact of course that souvenir promos will be about finding geocaches. The themes just dictate the available makeup of those caches we're directed to find.

 

On the flipside, if a souvenir promo were all about story and narrative and the finds were not quantity at all, people who love the caching challenge would complain simply because they earned them caching normally (and some do even with these). There are some that want story, theming, narrative; and some that want statistical tasks and challenges, and couldn't care less about theming. Can't really have it both ways.

 

So HQ can only try different things, and hope to appeal to various groups who enjoy different aspects of the hobby. This time, they're kind enough to give us a variety of souvenirs from easy to hard, instead of catering to the 'average' and below geocacher. 100 finds in a month is waaaay above the average geocacher, from the way it sounds by their reports. And the 'theme' for this series is, well, statistical tasks. And all we know so far is what the first month requires. Who knows what varieties of caching experiences may show up in the next 5 months. Everyone's already speculating at the icons...

 

So ya, you may not get the hard souvenir, but you could choose to try, or not, or just wait for the next month, or wait for the next promo entirely and hope it's more narrative and story driven. Or not. *shrug*

 

I'm just going to try to enjoy whatever promo they put forward and see if I can earn what I can. Remembering that it's just for digital graphics I rarely if ever look at... But more important, plus whatever memories and adventures I'm fortunate to have along the way. 

[+MNTA]

Ok time to be brutally honest.

 

GS is a for profit company that has to pay its bills.  I'm sure they know where all of their paying customers are located. Now while there is a sizable number for sure in Australia. Imagine if you were a cacher in India or so small area or rural America. There are pockets of areas where the game is different than others. All you can do is try to improve those areas. BTW Ive place three caches in non-urban area including extreme South Eastern Oregon desert, and the coast range mountains. Though even there there are several caches in the area.

 

Now back to the game, these promotions are geared towards increasing the paying customers and new customers. I'd suspect that Europe far outstrips even the US, and the density of caches exist to support challenges like this. My first cache was with my parents in 2009, I did not do my second cache till 2013 where I did three with my parents. Then in 2014 my dad and I started doing it after the New Year.  That is when I got hooked and became a paying member. The reason for this story is it is tough to convert non-cachers to paying customers. 

 

I'm sure GS was aware of the loyal fan base that was dissatisfied with the challenges. Finally we have one that is tough. Yes you can not do it in your area of Australia. But even for me it is tough and I've made the decision to try. No one forced me. Oh I'll have to travel a lot as I'm down to 45 Traditional caches in my 10 mile radius. Yesterday after I was done with work and before the sun went down I did a 50 mile loop in the country picking up 5 caches in the rain, as I dislike caching in urban areas like many of the folks here, these were all PNGs but that was fine for me we need ALL kinds of caches. Maybe if folks placed more of everything more people could do challenges like this. It's raining and dark I'm not going to do a mile hike and the mountains still have snow from todays storm. Getting 4-5 a day for 28 days is hard and I almost did not try but finally a challenge I can do. 

 

Please realize that while we get the problems that folks in down under experience we in the rest of the world want to this game to thrive and evolve everywhere. If it was still using printouts and GPSr the game would be dead as it would be a hobby list read by a a dedicated minority of folks . I learned long ago you can't find them all and I will not always get all the souvenirs nor do I want them. This game gets me out of the house takes me to wonderful places and entertains me more than I can admit.  

 

The rules, the look and feel of the game will change for sure. We might not recognize what it is 10 years from now. This should be a good thing. Embrace change and get the maximum enjoyment we all can from this great game. Please allow for this as you will see challenges like this geared toward the majority not minority. Being in the minority is not a bad thing. Things like improved maintenance and improving the over all caching experience, I truly believe will help not only here in the US but world wide including Australia.  Requesting exceptions may not be the correct way to go, history has proven this. 

 

So thank you GS for improving my caching experience with this challenge and all the hard work you all have done.

 

. 

[+MNTA]

@barefootjeffIt is not about good or bad caches, nor is it solely (pun intended  ) about numbers. For some folks it is and that is fine let them do their power trails, for others as it has been pointed out may find 1 a month and that is fine. There is room for all and these promotions as it is impossible to make everyone happy, GS can't and won't. I'm already tiring but I have the time and will power through this promotion.  

 

Interestingly, I did urban caching today and 5/9 caches I found I gave favorite points. 

 

BTW the dog in the good cache looks to be having a great time just like you in the bad cache picture which is why it is not a bad cache. I'm sure those 7 finders will remeber the experience while no one remembers a park bench. But caching in the good pic is giving an experience, while yours is a memory and an experience! 

 

The rain has finally stopped maybe I'll take my dog after one of the nearby shorter .25 miles trails for a cache.

[+thebruce0]

19 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

Choosing was only an option if you had a good spread of unfound caches nearby to choose from. I only got through that promotion by the good fortune of the timely appearance of some new local caches

Yes, we on the forum are well aware of your anecdotal local geocaching landscape whenever it comes to finding more than a handful of geocaches.

 

2 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

What I'm seeing now, both on my own hides and those elsewhere that are similar, is that anything that takes a bit of time and effort to complete is now rarely found, even with brand new caches. Caching has changed from being experience-oriented to being points-oriented, and I suspect these continuous find-lots-of-caches promotions are contributing to that.

Things change.

It happens.

The old has not gone, it is still around, even if it's becoming overshadowed.

 

Again, HQ can't appeal to everyone all the time, and I'll just point again to my prior post about balancing the variety in souvenir promotions - whether they last 1 day, 1 week, 1 month, 6 months, or 1 year.