Ingress: Home Territory

My definition of a home territory is one where the majority of portals are your submissions. Which means just because you live in a territory does not mean that is your home territory. And it is perfectly okay to have a small home territory. So if you have managed to put together a cluster of 30 portals 20 of which are your submissions then that is your home territory. That might lead to a lot of gerrymandering, and that's okay.

A home territory might or might not be an entire neighborhood. A home territory might cover multiple neighborhoods.

Ideally you carry a key to every portal in your home territory so you can remote recharge as necessary. That also liberates you in that you can move out and about the city without losing your home territory portals to decay or easy capture because the XM level went below 50% after a few days.

Ever since I left timtomhuze behind like so much exhaust fume my primary focus has been to build my home territory. That would be mostly Jackson Heights, but it also spills over into Woodside. Heck, I have made portal submissions all over Queens, from Flushing to Astoria to Long Island City. I must have made 1,000 portal submissions by now with a few hundred more to go. My next wave of focus is along the 7 train line on both sides of the track. I covered 74th Street to 82nd Street yesterday.

A side project for me is to become the top blue agent in NYC as measured by AP.

Then I will have space to start building my team - The Squad - in earnest.

Home territory building is a ton of fun. It beats the excitement of attending L8 farm events. Fact be noted I have never lacked for L8 ammo since I left timtomhuze behind like so much exhaust fume. I also have rediscovered the delight of using all levels of ammo from L1 to L8.

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Ingress: Team Momentum: What Gives?

Just in the past few months we have seen the team momentum go from the blue team to the green team and now back to the blue team. It is only a matter of time before the pendulum swings again. The blue team was able to push it to 66% of the territory. And then they were pushed back to 40%. The green team took it to 60%. And now that the pendulum has swung, you have to ask, how far will the swing go this time? I have a feeling 66% is not an option. It is now going to be a 60-40 swing, or a 55-45 swing.

How do you regain momentum for your team? I believe the formula is simple. The team that organizes more L8 farm events will dominate a territory. I believe the blue team regained momentum by organizing near daily L8 farm events.

How do you take that up one notch? Well, you take that up one notch by organizing simultaneous and consecutive L8 farm events. So instead of 20 L8 portals, you shoot for 50 or even 100.

I firmly believe attack events can also be planned. Attacks do not have to be solo efforts. But the L8 farm is the ultimate group act in this game. Not even L7 farms come close.

In the next phase expect the blue team to shoot for simultaneous and consecutive farm events in their attempt to shoot past 60% of the territory. And the only way for the green team to stop that would be for them to organize numerous L8 farm events.

It can feel like a zero sum game. Portals flip. That is the game. You are not building anything permanent. You can increase the velocity of the game, but you can not change the fact that portals flip and farms get taken down, and team momentum switches sides almost like clockwork.

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Ingress: The Cross Faction Squad

(1) You are past 2.5 million in AP.
(2) You play Ingress for at least 10 hours a week. Staring at the Intel map and G+ and COMM socializing does not count. This is 10 hours of actively interacting with portals.
(3) You personally know someone who is already a member of either The Squad or The Cross Faction Squad.
(4) Induction happens only in person.

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Ingress: State Of The Game: New York City (3)

Looks like the blue team has regained momentum after a few massive attacks on the West Village. And the momentum has been gained through one strategy: doing nearly daily L8 farm events. But I have no doubt the pendulum will swing again. It always does. The only question is if the swing will be in the 60-40 zone or the 55-45 zone. One team owning 66% of the territory might never happen again.

The Upper East Side is solid green. The East Village and the West Village might take hits, but they always go back to being strong green.

A big change in Queens is is that now FMCP (Flushing Meadows Corona Park) mostly stays green. It used to be almost always blue. Gotta watch Henrock.

Washington Heights has become a strong blue zone. KeyserJoze might have had a role to play.

Forest Hills is the bluest dot in the city. Too bad it is such a remote location that few people visit.

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Ingress: Could The Squad Be Cross Faction?

Last night agent BxBomber (green) put forth an interesting thought. How about having a cross faction Squad? I had not thought about it, but the idea makes tremendous sense.

A cross faction Squad would be a mark of good sportsmanship. I can think of few secrets in this game. This is a simple game. I am a blue agent. When I see a green L7 farm my first instinct is to hack. I get the same AP for capturing a L3 green portal as I would a L7 green portal, but L7 portals are harder to capture.

To me the most exciting aspect of this game is complex fielding. And so what I have been most excited about for the past few months now has been making portal submissions.

What would a cross faction Squad do? It would come up with best practices in the game to publicly share. It would organize cross faction events. That would include L7 and L8 farms. It would make major efforts at portal submissions and player recruiting. It would come up with a set of values.

I am open to the idea. Let the brainstorming begin.

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