It’s happening lately that even if the niantic wayfarer flags the POI as not in-game and “like” it to pilot to become a gym (even in an empty cell with all new POIs), it still doesn’t pilot the gym transformation as i want.
For example, i tried to pilot a stadium i submitted days ago to be a the gym of that cell, but even tho i literally put like before it appeared in game, it still gave the gym transformation to some irrelevant little plaza nearby. I mean, it’s a matter of few meters but i prefer pilot gyms who are actually “cool”, like stadiums, churchs or landscapes.
Why is it this way?
Scopely Explore (Niantic) do not discuss the methods but it is believed that “random” is now the largest factor.
Previously people where “Stuffing” photos on to wayspots then getting mates to vote on them all to trigger the next Gym.
Remember: Your preferred Gym will not be the same as everyone else’s.
I would much prefer if Gym clusters are just coincidence and not just a group of locals that want them all as close to them as possible.
My objective was to put them in different places on things that were actually cool instead of some random “POI” that should remain a Pokestop.
In another case of mine, instead of giving the gym to a cool entrance of the old town of the city it gave it to some random cave…i mean, it’s cool but i don’t think that it will be used as much as the entrance of the old town.
But then you are giving the decision to whoever thinks of it first.
Not everyone would use it for the correct reasons.
I much prefer the Random.
If it’s random, then I would have to candidate things i REALLY want to be gyms first
That is 1 way to improve the chances but as the Gyms come with wayspot 2, 6 and 20 you are not going to be able to pick a specific wayspot.
Even if you have a completely empty L14 cell you could nominate the 1st 2 in the preferred area but it will get harder to nominate 6 or even 20 in that area and there is no saying that someone else could nominate at the other end and theirs could be the Random selected to be the Gym.
It’s a problem, especially if there is nothing around besides what you submitted
Sorry, I am not sure what you mean is the Problem…
If the only wayspots around are the ones that you nominated then the Gym will be something that you nominated? It also means that you do have “some” influence on which wayspots could be selected as a Gym.
Example: You have a completely empty L14 cell. Nominate the 2 preferred Gym locations 1st. 1 of them will become a Gym.
When the 6th Wayspot is Accepted it will upgrade 1 to a Gym but it could be any of the 5 none-gym wayspots so only 20% its the other of the original 2.
At 20 wayspots each has a 5.5% of becoming the 3rd Gym.
So your answers are…
- No, you can’t choose which wayspot will become a Gym.
- If you (and only you) are populating a brand new empty L14 cell then you have a small amount of influence on the Gyms (especially the 1st one).
- You can not stop someone else getting a nomination accepted in a L14 cell that you have been trying to get to 20 wayspots and it is possibly that it will be their nomination that becomes the Gym. Accept it.
Thank you for the clarification.