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@lostby7 wrote:
While I enjoy simple puzzles, I do see far too many in certain areas which has the effect of overwhelming me to the point of just ignoring all of them….I can’t tell which one will take me hours to solve and which ones are easy without reading all the pages and I just don’t have the time to do it.
Maybe it is time for a puzzle rating. I attempted my first puzzle a month or so ago. I spent probably 3-4 hours (at work not home) attempting to solve it. I did not have any luck. The cache owner did not offer any assistnace… so puzzles will remain ignored for a long time.
I just read the post in the Lonely cache game section about the new list… Looks like puzzles a perfect for the Lonely Cache game.
@nohandsgps wrote:
The cache owner did not offer any assistance…
I hope it wasn’t me, don’t need any more bad karma…
@nohandsgps wrote:
Maybe it is time for a puzzle rating.
I would be THRILLED with this….I have always thought that puzzles should be rated for solve difficulty. If GC could create a puzzle rating system I’d go back to solving them rather than ignoring them…but I guess that is getting us off topic….sorry.
But another, more important point is how these caches are tying up otherwise good locations for other, and future, caches.
At the same time many “good locations” are freed up by cachers leaving the game, new trails being built, new parks being finished, etc.
There are many excuses for not being able to place new caches. Even in the “heart of puzzle country”. Puzzle caches is just one. Why look at all the new places that new cachers like WI.Hibiscus and Hitman4 have found and they’ve been there all along!
I have been able to publish new caches without issue both puzzles and traditionals in Appleton and surrounding towns and cities.
I watch the newly published caches within 30 miles of downtown appleton and a majority are not puzzles which tends to backup gotta run’s observation.
I have one universal response for those of you who ignore puzzle caches: it’s your own loss. It adds so much more to the past time than just walking on a trail in the woods and hopping out at the next dead-end guard rail. To be honest, if there was no such thing as a puzzle geocache I would have quit long ago.
I disagree with marc and his logic. I do not believe for a second that a geocacher places a geocache with the sole purpose for hundreds of people to find it. They want to read interesting posts and stories. They want to read about an experience. Not posts like “My 31st of 40 today as I made my way through Appleton”. Almost every log on my puzzle caches from those in town and from those from out of town are very much different from this. They talk about the experience. I would rather have 5 people visit any 1 of my puzzle caches and experience something new than 100 people log my Burger King guard rail cache.
I do not believe that puzzle cache saturation is a problem. Sorry.
Puzzle saturation can affect the future of caching. Consider this: How are new cachers to begin to figure out where to place a new cache, when there are so many hidden ‘bombs’ out there?
Also, who says placing a geocache should be easy?
You earn a placement count just like you earn a find count, no?
Maybe it is time for a puzzle rating.
Most certainly would be welcomed by many!
@-cheeto- wrote:
I have one universal response for those of you who ignore puzzle caches: it’s your own loss…To be honest, if there was no such thing as a puzzle geocache I would have quit long ago…
I totally agree. It is a loss. I used to love to solve puzzles but after awhile so many of them got so difficult, finding one which was manageable in a reasonable amount of time became more of a rarity than a norm…as a result I just stopped trying to sort the manageable from the inscrutable. Do I dislike puzzles, no. I just don’t have the time to try and sort them out….give me a rating system and I’d get back in the saddle and start solving them…but until then it is my loss. I lose real-estate to cache in and caches to find…
With the exception of cemetery or other marker puzzles that can be solved easily in the field in minutes, I’m not a fan of puzzle caches. I avoid them like the plague for the most part and usually filter them out when I export my caches to my GPS. Basically only traditionals and select multis are on my GPS when I go caching. In other words, just load and go.
Do I think that’s my own loss? No. Just because there is a puzzle cache out there does not mean I have to find it. I’m not the only one that feels this way too.
@marc_54140 wrote:
But another, more important point is how these caches are tying up otherwise good locations for other, and future, caches. Yes, each cacher has a right to place a cache. But when an area becomes saturated with puzzles, it can have a negative effect.
Two words: Heesaker Park 🙄
@-cheeto- wrote:
There are many excuses for not being able to place new caches. Even in the “heart of puzzle country”. Puzzle caches is just one. Why look at all the new places that new cachers like WI.Hibiscus and Hitman4 have found and they’ve been there all along!
This is the heart of the matter. The original topic of the thread dealt with saturation. We can digress into the well-trod realms of the merits of puzzle caches, writing courteous logs, and whatnot, but Marc’s original question was, and I quote:
@marc_54140 wrote:
Will cache saturation become an issue?
The answer is, “Doesn’t seem to be.”
Funny thing is, when we started playing this game (2006) I remember reading logs and cache descriptions about how it was “good to have more caches up in {town name}.” There are now about twice as many caches worldwide, if my memory serves, and people still find ways to put new ones out, as -cheeto- observes.
While saturation is possible in theory, I believe in practice that people will be creative, the game will refine itself, the bad/lame/unpopular/unmaintaned caches will fall by the wayside as a process of natural selection, and life will go on.
On the Left Side of the Road...@todd300 wrote:
Just because there is a puzzle cache out there does not mean I have to find it. I’m not the only one that feels this way too.
You are exactly right, Todd300, and this is a great attitude to have! Just because there is an icon on your “nearest unfound” screen does not mean you need to go find it. 100% on target observation.
On the Left Side of the Road...@marc_54140 wrote:
As I cache throughout Wisconsin (and IL, MN, etc), meeting different addicts from all over, I have been hearing more and more about cache saturation. And specifically, puzzle caches.
Not wanting to solve them, or go hunt for them, is one issue. I am hearing from more and more cachers who specifically state they will not do puzzles. Look at the number of finders for them. Look at the number of puzzles some cachers have found. The numbers are not promising.
But another, more important point is how these caches are tying up otherwise good locations for other, and future, caches.
The topic was refined so the puzzle discussion is on topic with the thread.
@lostby7 wrote:
The topic was refined so the puzzle discussion is on topic with the thread.
Well ya, that’s my point if you read it as it relates to saturation. Regular caches are still the majority of caches placed versus puzzles. But if everybody wants to B&M about puzzles in general, it’s a free country.
On the Left Side of the Road...@todd300 wrote:
With the exception of cemetery or other marker puzzles that can be solved easily in the field in minutes, I’m not a fan of puzzle caches. I avoid them like the plague for the most part and usually filter them out when I export my caches to my GPS. Basically only traditionals and select multis are on my GPS when I go caching. In other words, just load and go.
Do I think that’s my own loss? No. Just because there is a puzzle cache out there does not mean I have to find it. I’m not the only one that feels this way too.
Feel free to hunt and log my traditionals and multi’s if and when you pass through Appleton.
I have hidden & published 1 traditional for every Unknown/Puzzle cache. With nearing 100 caches hidden that’s a few traditionals.
One thing I pointed out in a personal email to gotta run and not on this thread thus far is if you look at many parks in a puzzle laden area like Appleton you will see a good mix of puzzles with non-puzzles. Therefore many of our public spaces please both the puzzle cachers and traditional cachers. Whether by design or at random this brings balance to “saturation”.
I would never take a park that could hold multiple caches and fill it completely with puzzle caches. Nor would many other cache hiders. Not even seldom seen (a puzzle cacher who has also published over 60 non-puzzle caches)
As for the point about missing out. We can agree to disagree. I like expanding my knowledge of our world and learning new things. You like seeing new places. Geocaching is a hobby that can please both of us.
So far in my caching trips, I have not found cache saturation to be an issue. They seem spaced well enough apart and are, for the most part, still in decent enough locations that are worth going to.
I can see cache saturation becoming an issue when caches are being dumped into an area 1. just because they can 2. its being done for numbers 3. because someone feels they should ‘own’ an area and no one else should be able to place caches there.At the moment I look at it this way – Just like not every cache needs to be found, not every empty space within .10 of another cache needs to have a cache hidden.
I think I would call it quits if caching degraded into a film canister behind every telephone pole every .10 miles, or if all I was going to was guard rails, dumpsters, or bus stops to find a cache. Seeing as how that hasn’t happened yet, all is good. Cache on.
I’ve learned not to jump in too soon, usually until my name is mentioned. Much of the anti-puzzle rhetoric is directed at me which of course begs for a response.
In general, I quite obviously echo the sentiments of those who do not have an issue with the nature or number of puzzle hides in the valley. Primarily because there are an ever increasing number of cache hides to keep most cachers happy. Now it’s easy to make sweeping generalizations about various approaches to the way people play the game, but I do think the camps can be split into 2 categories. Quality and Quantity.
Puzzle caches are an issue for Quantity cachers because they require an unknown investment on time and travel which makes if difficult to maximize the number of finds they can tick off in a given period of time. For many, not all who lean this way, it isn’t worth the time or energy involved and they do not see any real merit in the process of the solve. This is also, I might add, the Prime Directive of GC.com, to place easy to find caches for the least able among us, as long as you have to have a GPS in hand. Ironic since most Traditional caches can be found using just google maps.
For cachers in the Quality camp, the nature of the puzzle and getting to the solve is the reward and getting the final cache is just icing. Many cachers in this camp have given up on finding all the caches in their hometown radius since they see no reward in wasting time chasing around town to visit the same park and sometimes the exact spot in the same park they’ve been to a half dozen times before or drive to yet another dead-end street so they can mill around and hope to find an elusive 35mm hanging from a cedar limb before the squad cars pulls up.
Never the twain shall meet. Like Extreme Left and Extreme Right, the merits of each approach can be justified till their mouthpieces are blue in the face, but it will always amount to very little movement in either direction. Once you settle into a habit, it’s hard to break.
Which begs the question. Where do threads like this get us? A little like town halls, it’s the most vocal being most vocal and trying desperately to get the other side to see their viewpoint. There is a small chance that some of the independents will be won over, but that’s slim.
I’d suggest the initial question would have been better posed if it had been about Quality, not Quantity. Would we all not prefer a dozen exceptional caches to three dozen forgettable ones? Caches will continue being published until one day every public space will be saturated. Many parks already are. At that point the proximity guideline will change or the game itself will change to accommodate saturation. Until that day I expect, as others have suggested, atrophy will do its part to keep the poor caches to a minimum.
Still with me? Great… thanks for investing the time and giving me the benefit of the doubt. Now it’s time to back up my own approach to placing puzzles. A few key points to consider.
A. There were hundreds of caches and dozens of difficult and mind-numbing puzzles in the Valley when I got started, most of which came from the author of this thread.
B. Everything I do is deliberate, especially the placements of my caches. This is just a guess, but I suspect that more than 75% of the caches I submit are within 518-538 feet of a nearby cache, another of mine or someone else’s. Why you ask? Because I try to maximize the space available to me and get more caches placed than what might otherwise be placed if the only prerogative is “there’s a good place for a cache”.
C. If there are a couple Traditionals already in a city park, is there any “location” benefit to placing more traditionals except to get more easy finds? Or is it to see more of the same park? And if that’s what you want to do, wouldn’t you rather just explore the park on your own and not be distracted by a GPS? I’d actually argue that placing less frequented puzzle finals is a good thing as it keeps what would be higher Traditional traffic down. Imagine if all the caches in Riverside Cemetery were traditionals when a certain cacher created the perfect storm over there and brought the heat on us. I don’t think there would be any caches in that cemetery today.
D. Better than half of my puzzle finals are not in any park but are true urban hides, some in noteworthy locations some not. Very few of these spots would ever be considered by 99.9% of Traditional cache places as a “good place for a cache”. They are not “taking up valuable space” as suggested. Certainly, I have many puzzle placed in many parks, but they are not my first choice and I am always considering the balance of Puzzles, Trads and Multi’s when placing. And, I say this in FULL knowledge of the ARROGANCE it portrays, I also know that an S|S cache will likely be more memorable than other caches in those parks were they left to be filled by traditionals. There, now everyone knows just how full of myself I am.
E. I wish more people who get worked up over puzzles would just simply ignore them. Some of the most vocal anti-puzzle voices are the same people who will contact me or others who’ve found my puzzles and ask for a hint or clue. DUDE, WHY ARE YOU DOING THEM IF THEY BOTHER YOU! This I just cannot fathom. I often gets notes like “maybe I’ll just start to ignore your caches” to which I usually respond “please do”.
For as many anti-puzzle voices that there are out there, there are just as many pro-Puzzle voices and recently quite a number of pro-puzzle newbies who have quickly taken to puzzles. These are the people I create puzzles for, just as Earthcaches are created for those who like them. And there is no stopping the flow of ideas that comes out of this head. So brace yourselves, because the puzzles will keep coming, from me at least, and in many cases, to a park near you.
As has been said in a hundred threads a thousand times over, there are a million ways to play this game and a millions rewards to get out of it. To each, their own!
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