Ingress AMA Archive

A1: I spoke to NIA OPS, they said, “Depends on the Portal candidate. If the candidate is associated with the business and meets our criteria (for example a hyper-local cafe), this would be ok.“

A2: The series name has already been confirmed. It is Cassandra Prime. The logo will probably be released once we get closer to the event. More information on how the series will flow will be out next week.

A3: I spoke to the OPR team. By the time this AMA is published you should already have started to see Portals that were previously in “limbo” come online.

A4: Hawaiian pizza is pizza. Damn good pizza. The salt of the ham goes well with the sweet of the pineapple. I highly recommend it.

A5: The policy hasn’t changed. Keep reporting them.

A6: The Mission Day application is currently closed. There will be an announcement with additional information in the coming days about it.

A7: What I’m about to type is my own personal opinion. I haven’t confirmed it with anyone and it would be unlikely to be confirmed at this point anyway. In my opinion, additional levels make sense to have. What that looks like and how people will level up I am not sure I have a good answer for. I would imagine that once the full Ingress Prime update is complete (client and server) that then the development team can focus on implementing new things.

A8: No. You will not lose your gear and we will not be resetting all of the Portals.

A9: Similar to my answer to question seven -- I think once the full Ingress Prime update is complete (client and server) that then the development team will start to implement new things. It makes sense to add new medals and achievements. But I have no confirmation about this. It is only my opinion.

A10: The best advice I was told is to slow down, and rate every criteria for a Portal on its own merit.

A11: This is on the OPR roadmap. I don’t have an exact date for you. But it will be coming at some point in the future I was told.

A12: I’ve talked about this before. But I think it’s a great idea so I’ll happily answer it again. In my opinion, I think this is a wonderful idea. I would hesitate to give AP for it though. But if you can upgrade a resonator and there are different levels of mods it make sense. I will continue to advocate for this though.

A13: My worst Ingress experience. Hrmmm… The one that stands out to me was the Cassandra Washington DC Anomaly. We knew we were going to be outnumbered so we created a strategy to overcome things. Part of the plan was creating a BAF (you got points for them back in the day). Everything was going more or less to plan through the first few measurements. We even got the BAF up once. It all came down to the last measurement and the Resistance were leading. We were planning on putting the BAF up again but something was blocking it. We were scouring Intel and couldn’t find the blocking link. It took almost the entire fourth measurement to find it. It turned out to be a tiny link between two portals on opposite sides of a street that someone threw it looks like while simply driving past. Because it took so long we couldn’t get it up and by the end of it someone from the Resistance had made it out to one of the anchors. That was a kick in the gut. I think someone did the math and said that if we would have gotten that field up we would have won. I could be wrong. I’m sure someone will go back and do the math on it and let me know. Regardless of the outcome we had a blast. The event and afterparty were so much fun.

A14: I wasn’t able to get an answer from the team before posting this. I’ll keep trying and provide an update when I do. I’m sure there will be a social post about it coming soon as well.

A15: The team is looking into it.

A16: NIA OPS says, photos may get removed if they do not meet criteria or the wrong photo was added (OPR duplicates). Will need more details before we can comment on a specific incident.

A17: We have no plans at this time to utilize them as we did for the Dark XM Cure event. There was a specific strategic need to do what we did that doesn’t exist for the Anomaly game play.

A18: By the time this is posted the information will already be out there.

A19: Purely random. Sometimes the RNG is kind. Sometimes it isn’t. I’ll see if we can’t improve the process to have a more even distribution if we do something like that next time.

A20: We are trying. NIA OPS constantly reevaluates their policies and procedures. For example, they no longer auto close tickets. Every ticket is read and responded to. However, ban appeals may be closed without further response if the petitioner has already received a reply from us and we have no new information to provide. I think a lot of the disparity comes down to local knowledge versus what NIA OPS can prove conclusively and expected outcomes. Most people submit tickets with an expected outcome -- usually a ban. But NIA OPS workflow, depending on the incident, sometimes requires additional intervention and warnings prior to jumping straight to a ban. Just because a player isn’t banned or there isn’t visible action doesn’t mean the player aren’t reprimanded or a mark put on their record.

A21: I do not have access to the ticketing system. So no, I cannot read them.

A22: I had a conversation with NIA OPS about this. We both agree that it seems against the Agent Protocol.

A23: To predict the weather. Seriously. I would use all my sensors to knowledge to be the best weather Tecthulhu that ever existed.

A24: This is something we talked about before. I think we would need to figure out how to ensure inappropriate images were not used for beacons if we opened it up for everyone. Maybe we could have a contest to design some new ones. I think it’s an idea worth considering.

A25: I spoke to NIA OPS. Most Mission Days are hack only. Passphrases are not required and neither is a random order. They should only be used if they enhance the experience of Mission Day but are not a requirement. Here are the guidelines for setting up a Mission Day: https://docs.google....

A26: It’s a combination of things. I collaborate with Ethan to see where NL1331 is going. I look at regions that might not have had a Niantic presence before or that could benefit from me coming. The Anomaly schedule plays a role as well as I might be needed to help at an event. I take that list to my supervisor, we discuss what is reasonable, then I make my travel plans.

A27: Not at this time.

A28: That is a lot of missions. If I could carve out enough time with my schedule, it seems like a great challenge. I love London as a city and have family in England. I need to get back there.

A29: We have an awesome Global Product Marketing Manager who has created an entire launch plan for Ingress Prime. I’m pretty excited about it. He would hate me if I stole his thunder and leaked anything though. So better to wait and see.

A30: This has been discussed. Similar to my answer to question seven. I think once the full upgrade to Ingress Prime is complete then we’ll start to see new features implemented. I would imagine inventory will be one of the topics up for discussion. But we’ll have to do some analysis on what the right number is, how much per tier, etc. We don’t want to ruin the economy of the game by doing something willy nilly.

A31: By the time these answers are published all of that Intel will have been released.

A32: This is a fair criticism. Thank you for bringing it up in a polite manner. To be frank, a lot of what we are doing is new to us. Each time we do something it is usually an iteration of something. So there is bound to be mistakes as we learn our way through new processes and procedures. It isn’t being done maliciously. That much I can assure you. Each time we analyze the lessons learned and try to improve. But sometimes, things slip through the cracks. Feel free to ping me about things if there are outstanding issues. I’ll try to get them resolved.

A33: Not at this time.

A34: Soon™.

A35: This would require a re-write of how the mission planning tool functions or at least a decent upgrade. While I think it is a great idea personally, I think there are higher priorities at the moment.

A36: We can certainly do more. The feedback has been overwhelmingly positive about the event. I agree about scheduling it around Ingress First Saturdays. Good input.

A37: We’ve actually talked about an idea like this. Google has an API for something called Nearby (https://developers.g...) that looked interesting. Again, I don’t think new features like this will be implemented until the full Ingress Prime upgrade is complete. But it definitely something I would love to have and will advocate for.

A38: and Agent Olympiad. Those four events are the only way to obtain the Passage to Osiris medal.

A39: I was not a fan of cod milt sushi that I had in Japan. The best thing I ate was a grade A5 kobe wagyu steak in Kobe, Japan. Just thinking of it makes my mouth water.

A40: Yes. I think this worked out well last time so we will do it again.

A41: As soon as the beta is ready to be tested by Agents.

A42: I love Montréal. I have been there numerous times. I am a big fan of poutine as well.

A43: I brought this to NIA OPS attention. They are going to test this. Thank you for bringing this up.

A44: Yes. I can’t really say anything more than this though.

A45: You can have your account on multiple devices. But it is considered cheating to be playing on those devices simultaneously. It is considered cheating to be playing multiple accounts on multiple devices as well.

A46: According to the Development team, there are higher priorities at the moment. It could be something later down the road that is supported but it is not currently on the roadmap.

A47: Information is compartmentalized. Only those that need to know have access to it. For example, the Gamemasters are the only ones with access to when the measurements will be taken within a window, shard information, etc. The critical documents are protected using account permissions. The stories you have heard are just that… stories and rumors.

A48: Not at this time.

A49: NIA OPS says, “Our games are meant to augment reality, not replace it. If you're not certain you have the right to access a location or are not certain it is safe to access, please do not make any attempts to do so. As a player or any other member of the community, you must respect access restrictions, never trespass, or in any manner gain or attempt to gain access to any property or location where you do not have the right or permission to be.”

A50: NIA OPS and the OPR team says for now only edits are being implemented.

A51: Perhaps after a couple of months when things settle down.

A52: This isn’t a bad idea. I’ll bring this up to the team.

A53: Whatever version(s) are supported at that time will be the one(s) players will be able to use. Unfortunately, I can’t provide a more clear answer than that.

A54: I would have no way of knowing.

A55: This answer is similar to question eight.

A56: NIA OPS says that the OPR Guidelines state to one star submissions in Military bases.

A57: It is difficult to speculate about what is being referred to as 'The Osiris Sequence' universe. The degree to which it may deviate from events of the past is not known.

A58: Oh man if I did that I’d be spilling the beans. You’ll have to sit through it and experience it. No shortcuts.

A59: Great question and again, thank you for asking in a respectful manner. The short answer is -- we messed up. Nothing short of human error. There is no other explanation than that. Because we did it for the first weekend we applied the same courtesy to cities from the second weekend as well.