Today the Aurora Glyph Hack Challenge was announced. Personally, I think the challenge is great. I managed 793 different portals during the Myriad Hack Challenge. So, I will go for gold again and reckon that this will be slightly easier for me this time around. But I don’t think this will be the case for everyone. So let us have a look at the tiers and how to reach them.
| Medal | Myriad | Aurora | Percent |
| Bronze | 100 | 100 | 100% |
| Silver | 350 | 500 | 143% |
| Gold | 750 | 1000 | 133% |
| Global | 13000000 29124588 | 36000000 36000000 | 277% 124% |
The bronze badge needs the same number of points. You can get now up to 5 points from a single portal – as such this should be easier to do as long as you glyph hack anyhow. If you don’t glyph hack yet – get started. Go for easy targets (level 1 or 2).
The silver badge is an extra 43%. This means that you either need to hack more portals – or need to plan to do multiple points per portal. I think that number is nicely balanced and should be reachable with some effort.
The gold badge is ‘only’ 33% extra. Getting this badge really depends on your play style. As some posters already said – you can get the badge with ‘only’ 334 portals total.
Strategy
| Points per portal | Needed for Gold | Comment | Resources |
| 1 point | 1000 | No strategy here. Just go to as many portals as possible and glyph hack them. | None (apart of enough portals) |
| 2 points | 500 | Hack and build up or hack and destroy | Resonators / XMP (you should have plenty anyhow), Heat Sink / Multihack optional |
| 3 points | 334 | Hack and build up or hack and destroy | Resonators / XMP (you should have plenty anyhow), Heat Sink / Multihack recommended |
| 4 points | 250 | Hack and build up with at least one other agent or hack and destroy | Resonators / XMP (you should have plenty anyhow), Heat Sink / Multihack heavily recommended |
| 5 points | 200 | Hack and build up with 7 other agents friend or hack and destroy | Resonators / XMP (you should have plenty anyhow), Heat Sink / Multihack needed |
So, let us have a look at the different strategies. The 1-point strategy only works if you have plenty of portals available to you. In some areas (I can think of London) this is well doable – but for most agents this isn’t an option.
The 2-point strategy cuts down the number of portals needed dramatically. I tend to build up / take down portals anyhow when I’m in a new area. I just have to be clever with the hacking strategy. I won’t be waiting 5 minutes for cooldown. But I don’t think that is necessary. In most cases you can go in a loop and just ensure that you hit each portal twice.
The 3-point strategy sounds great on paper. But looping three times over a portal needs coordination – or time to wait at each portal. Agent xabelx did the Maths and it takes 56 hours if you hack/wait before moving on (without HS). I think a better strategy is hack once, come back after a loop, hack second time and use HS. You could save some HS by looping twice – but this needs lots of coordination.
The 4-point strategy needs either enemy portals of level 6+ or a fellow agent. It only cuts down the number of portals needed from 334 to 250 and therefore I don’t think it truly is worthwhile the effort. Take advantage if you can. Do the 3-point strategy in your ‘home area’ and invite a fellow agent to upgrade and get a 4-th point for a portal. Alternatively go to a 6+ enemy area. Loop 1 – hack. Loop 2 – destroy and hack. Loop 3 – build up to level 3/4/5.
The 5-point strategy in my view is not recommended. You need LOTS of coordination to get it done. You have to be really good at glyph hack to actually get the 5 glyph hack right. And all this to reduce the number of portals needed from 250 to 200. If you have 200 portals with level 8 potential in your area, then you likely have many more portals around. If you are on your own, then the best way to get it done is – take an enemy lvl8 portal. Hack it and destroy one (or 2) resonators. Hack it again after waiting 5 min. Then destroy and build up again.
So what will I do?
I will go for a mixed approach. I will go mainly for the 3-point strategy in my home-town. That should give my up to 500 points. I will then look further away and mainly aim for the 2-point strategy. I aim to get at least five points from a single portal – just because you can. But I doubt I will do this on many portals, as the overhead time to do it is just too much.
I’m always walking – I tend to take down enemy portals if I can. I nearly always build them up to gain points for my unique portals captured – or to build fields. That means for me it is great as my play style will mean I will easily do >1.34 points on average per portal over the time of the event.
But just because it seems easier for me doesn’t mean it is easier for everyone. I’m really concerned about the global challenge. In my view we won’t make that one. On paper it seems ok. Niantic raised the total needed by 24% compared to what we achieved during the Myriad Challenge. And most participants will do >1.24 points per portal. I’m just not sure there will be enough participants this time around.
The Glyph Hacking badge was among the last badges I got to bronze. For a long while I didn’t glyph at all – and I’m sure I’m not the only one. In the beginning I could only safely hack 1 and 2 glyph sequences. 3 glyph sequences more often then not were wrong and I was hopeless at 4 and 5 glyph sequences. Actually, quite often I would deliberately build up a portal to level 2 because I knew I still was able to glyph hack it.
Another issue is cargressing and busgressing. I heard from a lot of people who organized a car and cruised around to manage 750 different portals. With glyph hacking this isn’t as simple and players on foot have a clear advantage.
I might calculate a few numbers to estimate what I think is a more realistic target. Niantic was way off during Myriad when the goal was set at 13 million – and we reached 29 million instead. This time they set the goal at 36 million. I think they are much closer – but I think this time we are more likely in the 20-35 million range.
Yes – we can get up to 5 points for a single portal. But in reality it is mainly 1-2 points. This is still enough to gain +24% on points. But what is the loss from cargressing and agents who don’t glyph / can’t glyph / get glyphs wrong in stagnant areas and therefore get zero points for some portals.