Can we change the agreement reward system?

I’ll start with my thesis, then add supporting arguments:

Players should get 2 agreement points for an approved review, and only 1 agreement point for rejections.

First, my primary reasoning:

Ever since the addition of the platinum wayfarer agreement badge, many reviewers simply reject nominations as fast as possible to earn agreements. Several of my community groups have wayfarer sub-groups (Facebook, band, discord), and this type of reviewer is generally referred to as “rapid-fire rejectors.”

As long as an ‘RFR’ can quickly 1* a nomination and get an agreement point toward their platinum badge, those of us who take creating nominations seriously will become increasingly frustrated and maybe quit. This defeat’s the developer’s reasoning for adding the wayfarer program. So, again, my question, can we please fix the reward system?

Here is a bit more discussion:

Receiving gifts from my friends that are from POI that I nominated is my favorite part of playing PoGo. It shows that I have added to the playing experience of my player communities. Thank you to Niantic for allowing us to nominate new locations. I have successfully nominated dozens of locations, in half a dozen states, so I have learned what a good nomination looks like. I take the task seriously... I research the location, submit attractive photos, while on foot, with descriptive titles, detailed descriptions, and compelling support photos. I train other players how to follow those same rules, and I have seen many great nominations come from my friends’ accounts, as well.

When I started nominating two years or so ago just about every good nomination was approved, and I learned what made a rejectable nomination. I added a lot of stops and gyms in my small hometown. For the first time, players stayed local for community days and EX raids. I have actually been named the ‘official poke master’ of my local county fair for all the stops and gyms I’ve nominated. It’s not a real title, but I’m friends with several fairboard members, and they appreciate what I do to bring people to the fair.

Recently, however, almost every nomination gets rejected. You can ask me to post photos. That would be pointless. Scoreboards, pools, parks, artwork, signs, colleges, historical landmarks and buildings, all rejected by who I think are these RFR’s. They are rewarded with the same point as someone who thoughtfully considers a nomination.

Furthermore, because RFR’s reject many more nominations than someone like myself, who carefully reviews each nomination they select, can approve, RFR’s get even more points.

Having said all that, I’ll close by asking again:

Can we please reward those who thoughtfully approve nominations to improve the entire community’s gameplay more than those who callously reject every nomination they see as quickly as possible solely for their own platinum badge?

Thank you for reading and considering.

”Uncle Grandpa” from Ohio

Comments

  • sogNinjaman-INGsogNinjaman-ING Posts: 3,313 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Going to have to disagree here.

    With regards to your suggestion that reviewers just 1* everything purely to get their Platinum PoGo badge quickly, that would require the vast majority of reviewers to follow this procedure. It would need enough reviewers so the 1* vote becomes the dominant vote and therefore ends up as the "correct" (ie community agreed) answer. However, if here is a good percentage of the review community reviewing properly, then people going for the "1* for everything" approach are going to find they are not "correct", and their review rating will drop. Drop down to "Fair" or "Poor" and your badge stats don't change.

    If we go with your suggestion that lots of reviewers are going to 1* reviews just to get their Platinum PoGo badge quickly, then giving 2 badge points for each submission accepted "correctly" will just mean that instead on 1* reviews, everything will get 5* reviews, which will cause the same sort of problems overall with ineleible waypoints making it into the system.

  • KetaSkooter-INGKetaSkooter-ING Posts: 177 ✭✭✭

    The cause is a combination of misunderstanding the newest criteria, misinformation propagated by social groups, and nomination score mechanics, along with reviewers opting to 1* all nominations they're on the fence about instead of voting normally. Niantic's test nominations are generally all very clear yes or no so its easy to vote correctly on them.

    Both submitters and reviewers are to some degree at fault as your post demonstrates, Niantic has specifically said reject almost all pools fairly recently and you list pools.

    What is most needed is a submitter and reviewer education effort more extensive than a bullet point list. I recently watched a twitch video of a person showing how to review with wayfarer for his few pogo viewers. He proceeded to say a LFL at a church is a great waypoint then he 3* every single category. Like I said misinformation is being propagated by social groups.

  • Jtronmoore-PGOJtronmoore-PGO Posts: 1,581 ✭✭✭✭✭

    So your fix is not really a fix but will make the review system worse. This case they will just accept anything to get the extra point. Bringing in tons of ineligible wayspots just for the simple points

  • Aeryle88-PGOAeryle88-PGO Posts: 440 ✭✭✭

    Something have to be done againts reviewers who reject submission abusively.

    But i don't think what you suggest is a good solution.

  • MsBBStacker-PGOMsBBStacker-PGO Posts: 4 ✭✭

    Perhaps a better solution: Your rank adds more weight to your vote. If your ranking is poor, you vote gets 1 point. Fair raters get 2 points. Good raters get 3 points. Great raters get 5 points.

    I don't know how the star rankings are used to weigh a waypoint but perhaps each criteria gets points according to the wayferer vote. All 1* votes for each criteria automatically get zero points. All 5* votes get 10 points 5 points for 3*, 2 points for 2*, 7 points for 4*. (These points are arbitrary...i recommend someone smarter than me suggest better numbers.) Add all criteria points together and multiply that answer to the Rater's rank points and the way point earns so many points.

    Have 10 raters review the way point and if the way point gets so many total minimum points, it becomes a stop.

  • sogNinjaman-INGsogNinjaman-ING Posts: 3,313 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Whatever the ranking of the reviewer, it is still in the interest of the reviewer to rate everything 5* as they score more "points" for it, whatever their rating. Again, this sysyem rewars reviewers for voting every sub as a 5* rating every time.

  • Jtronmoore-PGOJtronmoore-PGO Posts: 1,581 ✭✭✭✭✭

    The best solution would more than likely be keep it at 1 agreement regardless of if its accepted or not. But in the reviewing process if someone is chosing to reject said submission to have to 1 chose the reason and then have a subheader for the reason to narrow it down for why they chose that. Then once this happens and if ever niantic reviews any rejection reasons they can narrow it down to people rejecting maliciously. In the end there will never be a perfect system and people need to realize this.

  • Purptacular-PGOPurptacular-PGO Posts: 284 ✭✭✭✭

    I'm also in Ohio, and I find this to be an interesting discussion. I don't personally see the need for a change to the "Agreement" system, because I feel like I review so few gray-area submissions... the vast majority of the submissions I review are either clearly eligible locations like playgrounds, picnic shelters, sports fields, and nature signs, or clearly ineligible gems like "Look at this Hot Wheels car on the shelf in my bedroom. Please send Pokestops."

    I haven't personally had any of my clearly eligible submissions rejected. I've just had them languishing in voting or in queue for 6+ months. I would be interested to see your rejections.

  • CopperChick-PGOCopperChick-PGO Posts: 272 ✭✭✭

    How about people can't nominate things unless they have a good rating in Wayfarer - a lot of this junk will go away. I know a guy who tried nominating but he got so mad everything was denied so he gave up. He also got mad when someone changed the name of a nomination. It was something the railroad company installed to keep debris from falling on people as they walked under the bridge, and somehow it was in game. Someone changed the name to shade structure and he was all mad because that is not what it is. I said okay that POI does not qualify and someone changed the name to something that qualifies and you are upset? He thinks if someone nominates it the POI should be approved. This all started when his friend put a piece of his personal art outside his apartment complex, submitted it, it got approved, he nominated something else in the cell so it became a gym and now he has a gym within reach of his apartment and that mysterious artwork is nowhere to be found.

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