The internet community pretty much had their pitchforks out after Niantic in a badly (non) communicated move doubled the price of frackers. NianticBrian tried some damage control afterwards by explaining his decision to be necessary for such a powerful item – but emotions ran high over the last few days.
There certainly was one part I completely missed in all these discussions – any quantitative attempt to actually put a value to a fracker.
I just did an analysis. I know I risk to place myself here between Niantic and the agents – as the analysis shows that both sides ‘are right’. But I will risk it and share what I have done.
| Store | CMU | items1 | total | per item |
| Attack C | 2700 | 50 XMP, 5 US, 5PC | 60 | 45 |
| Attack R | 5700 | 100 XMP, 15 US, 15 PC | 130 | 44 |
| Builder C | 5400 | 50 R L1-6 | 90 | 60 |
| Defense C | 2400 | 24 CS | 24 | 100 |
| Defense R | 7500 | 24 RS, 8T, 8FA | 40 | 187.5 |
| Meetup Bundle | 9600 | 10 RHS, 10 RMH, 1 Beacon | 20 | 430 |
| Aurora Bundle | 4800 | 10 CHS, 10 CMH, 1 Beacon | 20 | 190 |
Looking at the per item cost column we could argue that Bursters or XMP are around 50 CMU per item, low value mods (common shields) 100, medium value mods 200 (rare shield, turret, force amp) and high value items 400 (rare heat sink, rare multihack). I deducted 1000 CMU for the beacon in the bundle calculations.
The next step gets a bit more complex. So please read carefully or ask me questions. The value of a single hack depends heavily on 4 factors:
- luck (I exclude this factor as it will even out over time or across many players)
- If you glyph hack or not (or how good at glyph hacking you are)
- What mods there are on the portal. You need heat sinks to hack >2 times in 10 minutes and multi hacks to hack >5 times
- Ito En+ or Ito En- mods change the kind of output you get
I ignore the level of the portal – I also ignore how many agents hack. I will come to this bit in the next part.
The table below shows you the amount of items (on average) that you can expect. I did some slight rounding. These values are based on my own research as well as work from others published before me. The amount does include a fracker – so all values are already doubled compared to a normal hack.
| Hacking | Mods | Hacks | R/XMP | CS/US | RS/MH/HS |
| No Glyph | only defense | 2 | 10 | 0.6 | 0.2 |
| No Glyph | RHS | 3 | 15 | 0.9 | 0.3 |
| No Glyph | VRHS | 4 | 20 | 1.2 | 0.4 |
| No Glyph | VRHS/MH | 5 | 25 | 1.5 | 0.5 |
| 50% Glyph | only defense | 2 | 25 | 0.9 | 0.3 |
| 50% Glyph | RHS | 3 | 37.5 | 1.35 | 0.45 |
| 50% Glyph | VRHS | 4 | 50 | 1.8 | 0.6 |
| 50% Glyph | VRHS/MH | 5 | 62.5 | 2.25 | 0.75 |
| 100% Glyph | only defense | 2 | 40 | 1.2 | 0.4 |
| 100% Glyph | RHS | 3 | 60 | 1.8 | 0.6 |
| 100% Glyph | VRHS | 4 | 80 | 2.4 | 0.8 |
| 100% Glyph | VRHS/MH | 5 | 100 | 3 | 1 |
The numbers do differ bay a factor of 10 for XMP/Resonators and a factor of 5 for mods between best case of a modded portal and a highly skilled player and the worst case of someone at a random R8 who can’t glyph hack. This is a problem as we will see in the next part were I look at the value gained using a fracker.
I use the 50 CMU, 100 CMU and 200 CMU established in part 1 to calculate the total value (per agent) for a fracker. Keep in mind that my values above show the total amount gained for an agent. The fracker ony contributes 50% of that outcome – so I had to apply a factor of 2 as correction.
I know there is a certain amount of apple/orange comparison included here. You can only buy level 6 gear – a fracker can be used on a level 8 portal – increasing the value. At the same time, you can buy what you want – while a fracker and hacking means random and effort – two factors which lower the value. I’m aware of these issues – but I call it evens to keep it simple.
| Hacking | Mods | Hacks | Value | Break even |
| No Glyph | only defense | 2 | 300 | 16 |
| No Glyph | RHS | 3 | 450 | 11 |
| No Glyph | VRHS | 4 | 600 | 8 |
| No Glyph | VRHS/MH | 5 | 750 | 7 |
| 50% Glyph | only defense | 2 | 700 | 7 |
| 50% Glyph | RHS | 3 | 1050 | 5 |
| 50% Glyph | VRHS | 4 | 1400 | 4 |
| 50% Glyph | VRHS/MH | 5 | 1750 | 3 |
| 100% Glyph | only defense | 2 | 1100 | 5 |
| 100% Glyph | RHS | 3 | 1650 | 3 |
| 100% Glyph | VRHS | 4 | 2200 | 3 |
| 100% Glyph | VRHS/MH | 5 | 2750 | 2 |
I assume a cost of 4800 CMU for break even. Buying sets of 10 frackers is a 38% discount and you reach break even earlier.
The most important column here in my view is the break even column. With the old price, even a single player could make a profit under perfect conditions – profit meaning a value > 2400 CMU (or >1490 CMU if using 10 packs of frackers).
There certainly was a use case to use them in small numbers of two (the couple playing) or three (a few fellow agents meeting up). Especially if level 8 gear was rare in your area or a portal was ideally build up.
But the true value comes with numbers. Deploy a fracker and have 10 or even 20 agents hacking to gain the true value of a fracker.
As such the new price of 4800 CMU has its justification for FS events or anomalies. But it completely prices out the solo player or the couple / small group of local agents with a single R8 around in a radius of 20 miles. I understand why Niantic felt forced to increase the price – because a fracker can be such a powerful and valuable item.
But by doing so it throws the small groups / individual players under the bus. Possibly this is even the larger market of frackers sold.
Is there a solution?
In my view there is a simple one – well – I hope it is simple to implement. Keep the cost of the fracker at 4800 CMU. I think that is the right price for the power of a fracker. At the same time introduce a personal fracker at a cost of 1200 CMU. Looking at my table this seems to be a reasonable price. That ‘personal fracker’ would work like a normal one – only that the benefit goes to the player using the fracker and nobody else. For XM decay – maybe 10-15% instead of the 50%. And if you make it silent, then you even fulfil the dream of some contributors who wanted a silent key fracker.