I have read on Reddit and in the Ingress Community a lot of negative feedback about the Aurora challenge. In my view the biggest issue is pacing yourself and setting realistic expectations.
I already described my first 5 days and my journey to 500 in my last post here: https://drthod.com/aurora-at-the-half-way-mark-looking-back/
I slowed down a little bit since then. Some of it was expected – some of it was to avoid burn-out as it seems a lot of players have experienced. The Aurora challenge is pretty time consuming. This leaves you with 3 options:
a) Lower your goal and go for bronze or silver
b) Grind, grind, grind and get it over with as quickly as possible – ignoring normal play
c) Pace yourself and use the full 11 days. Fit the challenge into your game and don’t let the challenge become your game
I’m likely in the minority that managed to follow c). I have to admit – I’m at a large advantage that I currently have a lot of disposable time during these 11 days. In the first 5 days I tried to build a basis of 100+ points each day to ensure I would manage to reach gold. That allowed me to attack the second half of the challenge more relaxed.
Wednesday: I start the day by writing a blog post instead of going out. My daily goal is 100 by 18:00 Uk time – but it takes me until after 14:00 that I even leave the house. I finally arrive at 14:45 in Folkstone – a portal rich town close by where I have been during the Starburst world record.
I spot some blue fields in the East of me. Not a very portal dense area – but I want to enjoy the game. Taking down blue fields, going to unique portals I haven’t been before is part of that. So East I go – slowly making my way further and further from the area I originally intended.
I turn back after half an hour. Some blue fields dead, several unique portals added to my Pioneer badge. Only around 30 points in my first hour – but I had fun playing Ingress what is more important.
I carry on to the harbour and the Folkestone Lighthouse. Again – not the most efficient way to make points. But there are 2 strategic portals to take – level 6 and 7 – and currently belonging to Resistance. I make them my second and third portal to score 4 points before I carry on along the lower part of the Leas – the part slightly less dense with portals – but the part I haven’t been yet.
I get back to my car just after 18:00 – 700 glyph hacks total since start of the challenge, 661 unique, 647 points.
Thursday: This day can be described as the day to scrape some points here and there. I always knew I wouldn’t make many that day. GCSE results day for my daughter – and me her taxi to her old as well as new school. 6 portals – double each – on the way to and back from her old school – you just need to park strategically.
Her new school turns out to be a bigger problem – not a single portal shows up in Ingress. Huge queues – and my daughter prefers to be on her own. So an hour plus to go towards town and scrape a few more portals together. Lots at the Cricket ground nearby – alas all behind a fence. I’m just about to reach portal dense areas when I’m summoned back. 10K steps by the time I’m back at the car to carry on my taxi service and 35 portals for the day. Not efficient – but they add up.
I take a detour on my way to the horses to collect a handful more singles and to triple point a cluster of 8 portals. From there it is just another 3 miles to another Lighthouse that is an anker for several blue fields. Who cares if this is the first day I fall short of 100 – the South Foreland Lighthouse it is. One more 4 pointer in the bag.
I even stumble upon a memorial in the middle of the fields on my way back. Photosphere, nomination – and I can proudly tell that it is already accepted (together with my other nomination earlier the week).
I end on 720.
Friday: A day in London with my son and daughter. London is a heaven for a small town player like me. Portals next to portals. But I’m not in London to play but rather to spend time with family. I guess I only even attempted just every 5th portal – maybe less. If I wanted to grind I could have ended the challenge here and then. But I’m happy enough to end the day on 849. Just 151 to go and still 3 days time.
My AP for the day clearly suffer. The first day I don’t bother to link or field.
Saturday: I really hate my constant lack of inventory space. Low level resonators and ‘useful’ keys pile up and I just can’t bring myself to just ditch all of them. So a third and last visit to Dover castle during the challenge.
It is a blitz visit. Parking on the overflow that is only open during very busy times (and finally allows me to reach an otherwise elusive portal). Into the castle – speed deploying P1 with 4 R1 / 4 R2 and do normal hacks on a batch of portals I have done before to use up the majority of my 150 R1 and 150 R2. Quick fielding using keys from earlier in the week and the few that dropped and I likely managed to get my fastest 100K AP ever without a double AP event.
Carry on to the South of the Castle and the few portals I haven’t done yet. And quickly home again. I’m on 901.
No more Ingress for the day – but I start catching up slowly with my spreadsheet to keep track of what I have done and to have a nice data source to analyse after the event.
Sunday: My local Nemesis spend Saturday cleaning the Northern part of the town and nicely layer up some fields. I’ve been in some areas – but mainly with my son and in a very casual way.
Finally an option to use my spreadsheet that I generate to analyse drops.
Time and resource wise this is complete overkill. But having done the spreadsheet for other reasons it allows me to actually backtrack for each portal which glyph combination I have already done – and which I still need to do.
I end on 950 and only did fill in holes close by. Still a lot left in the North of the town – including a new portal I nominated earlier this week.
I’m nearly up to date with my spreadsheet. Just 50 more points to go. And the final report will contain a few more numbers – like resonators collected during the event etc.
I finally hacked my first P8 during the London visit – and promptly failed. I will end without a single portal with 5 points. But the majority are level 1 and 2. I slowly start to hack/build more level 4/5 again.
2 hacks per portal seems my sweet spot – followed by 1. Guess London is partly to blame for some of that.
I’m now on 95% overall success with glyph hacks.
| Glyphs | Success | Fail |
| 1 | 100% | 0% |
| 2 | 96% | 4% |
| 3 | 89% | 11% |
| 4 | 72% | 28% |
| 5 | 0% | 100% |
| All | 95% | 5% |