Question

What is the EASIEST way to get PGC points?

Comments

Same question here. We are constantly on the edge between Sapphire and Emerald so never know if we'll earn enough to end the year on Emerald because it varies pretty much daily.  We've done all the "easier" things to earn points, but would love to get that extra nudge to help get us closer to the next tier.  We'd answer more community items if we knew the answers (do upvotes and questions like this count?), and we'd be willing to create new checkers if someone gives step by step instructions on exactly how to access that system (we haven't used Lua but we assume we can always adjust existing checkers to work).

Answer 1

There are some points for Profilestats usage and statbar usage. Put one of the types of statbar on your Geocaching profile:

https://project-gc.com/Profile/Statbar

and consider putting your Profilestats also on your Geocaching profile:

https://project-gc.com/Profile/ProfileStats

Answer 2

Validating your e-mail address and taking a paid membership gets you a lot of points instantly.
After that, just use the site a lot.

Comments

Sorry, but I disagree with promoting the idea of buying a membership as an easy way to gain points.  In my humble opinion, the true motivator for buying a membership is to help improve the site services to all its users.  The reward for that is improved and enhanced tools for the paying members to enjoy.

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It wasn't my intention to promote anything. Instead I was simply answering the question with the items that make up the majority of my PGC points.
The fact is that taking a paid membership does give you a lot of PGC points and unlocks features that give you even more PGC points not available for non-paying users.
So it does seem that Project-GC wishes to reward people with a paid membership with more PGC points than non-paying users. If Project-GC does not want this to be an argument to take a paid membership, then this policy should be reviewed.

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No worries and please do not take offense.  I was just expressing my opinion how I perceived your answer.  When answering a similar question, I usually just leave the monetary part out at first.  Then, I will explain it further if they ask.

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None taken and I do understand your point. I just didn't intend it that way.

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Phew! I was worried I might ignite a down vote battle.  Just kidding.  Thanks for being open minded.

Answer 3

You get also 15 points for new cache and event notifiers if you are a pgc-paying member:
https://project-gc.com/User/NewCacheNotifiers
 

Comments

I disagree, if only because I have an event notifier and I don't have 15 points. And yes, I am a fully paid up member of PGC.

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I don't know about details of the criteria that goes into the table "Specification of your points" on https://project-gc.com/Home/PGCPoints

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@TwigNZ try activating a new event notifier and see what happens.  When I did that recently, I noticed another 5 points added to my PGC notifiers category.  At one time it was 10 and is now 15.  The playing field for points is changing constantly as pointed out in this quote by the Admin: "The system is still under development there is a high risk that we will change the formulas, which will then affect the order in the top list as well."  This language is located in the paragraphs from this link https://project-gc.com/Home/PGCPoints

Also, ensure that all notifiers are checked to include setting up an active New Cache Notifier located at this link https://project-gc.com/User/NewCacheNotifiers

Answer 4

Another easy way is to do a donation. Don't know how much points you get per Dollar/Euro - but at the end it is another easy way to get PGC points. Perhaps someone knows the donation / point ratio.

But at the end donation is not for getting points. It is just for supporting the PGC Team and a way to thank for there great work providing all these statistics and having a lot of IT costs.

Comments

I don't think mentioning donations as an easy way to gain points is the right thing to do. The spirit behind donations is to financially assist the sight helping it to improve it's services to all users.  Donating because you want points is not a good motivator and misses the point.  This also holds true with paying for a membership.

Answer 5

Create a lot of challenge caches - in that way you boost your own amount of points and contribute to the game :-)

Comments

I don't think challenge caches give PGC points -- just the checkers and tags.

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I'm pretty sure they do as I in 2017 released a lot (27) of challenges using the checker on the caches - and got Diamond that year. 2018 (10 challenges released) and 2019 (11 challenges released) I got Emerald - in 2016 I released 1 challenge and got Diamond.

I have my paid membership, used the profilestats etc on my gc profile - no other donations and no very high activity on the forums. I used a different profile for the checker forum as people tend to lurk at upcoming challenges in there

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Unfortunately, there is no listing of the points breakdown for past years. It is also not mentioned in the examples on the https://project-gc.com/Home/PGCPoints
I do not remember the years I published the challenge caches I would have some category for challenges. But it might get there through the usage of challenge checkers (which is now gone)? Hard to say. Maybe somebody who published challenge cache this year can confirm.

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I just counted at my Hides page and counted :-)
I guess the "And much more ..." could include this.
I only published events this year - getting tired of people either trashing or stealing my caches all the time or writing nasty logs :-/ at least 150-200 caches have gone missing this and last year - and the first approx 100 were delivered back to me in my front yard one night after 3 months... so...

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IN the past one got reasonable points for using the Challenge Checker. This is no longer the case, since the awarding of points was modified, due to some user(s) apparently (ab)using the system that way.

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This is some language written into the link under PGC points from the Home tab, "The system is still under development there is a high risk that we will change the formulas, which will then affect the order in the top list as well."

This suggests the playing field for points and how they are accumulated is constantly changing.  Unless you are certain about where the points come from, it is probably not a good idea to guess.  What happened last year is not the same as what is happening this year and likely next year it will change again.