New friends update

noledole

Can you please undo the update syncing friends list to all Niantic games?!?!?!?

I HATE this new update. It is messing up my gameplay on both games due to being saddled with inactive friends. I know nobody who plays both games anymore due to you guys scheduling community days and events that conflict with each other. At the very least can you increase allowed number of friends???? I am pretty much maxed out now in Pokemon go which impacts my gameplay. It is also a pain keeping straight who is important on what game when screen names might differ.

NorajCandies

Friends capacity increased to 400 as advertised with synchronization.

Randrir

I agree too many are active in 1 game but not in the others. Need to purge in both games for management sake. This was NOT a good idea.

Yohanes12

Since has been update niantic social, hpwu and pogo will be same account. You can see PoGo in niantic account too.

SomnaSol

This is a nightmare. I was deleting all these "friends" who I don't recognize from HPWU, then found many friends disappeared from Pogo. And same--most of these new "friends" in HPWU are not even active. This is a really bad idea.

SomnaSol

Yohanes12

@SomnaSol be careful. Wrong delete friend, you get lost progress friendship level in PoGo too, also hard finding friends in HPWU.

Sometimes a newbie niantic account doesn't know where's real user niantic for niantic profile.

If you stuck niantic profile check a support help for this one :

https://niantic.helpshift.com/a/pokemon-go/?p=web&s=friends-gifting-trading&f=your-niantic-profile&l=id

I hope there's setting niantic profile in HPWU.

AltarielValice

So what's basically happening at the moment is players had at some point downloaded the game or stopped playing all at once when the hype for either game had died down.

While some still play either of the games, players either have blank accounts which they cant delete , dead players who dont play anymore or if they do delete these accounts, missing friends that they play with all the time. I think that the feature would work better if it didnt interact with the deletion process. Basically allow the players the choice to sync but not to sync the deletion.

FunMJ316

I deleted a bunch of new "inactive" friends in Wizards Unite that appeared yesterday and just noticed it deleted them in Pokemon! I am crushed. A bunch were lucky friends. I need them restored. There should be a warning that is going to happen. Help bring my friends back.

Undo the sync. Worst update ever!

Antique100

Are you kidding me?

With virtually no notice Niantic does this?

Last night I deleted 5 players from my WU friends list who don't play WU. I've played PG with them for years, and now "poof" they are gone from PG. I have no way to get in touch with any of them to apologize.

JudyB

I understand that Niantic have combined all games in "Niantic Social", but I don't think they have thought about the consequences.

Any removal of friends *must* warn players that this will affect all games and request confirmation.

If they must show all friends in all games then we need much better filtering of friends. The sort of things that would be useful are:

* Nicknames as in Pokémon Go

* Ordering friends by the last time they played

* Introducing some sort of friend level as in Pokémon Go to allow ordering by the frequency of gifts etc

Antique100

@JudyB

"Any removal of friends *must* warn players that this will affect all games and request confirmation."

Absolutely!

Too bad no one thought of this before they launched this "improvement".

Now I've unfriended 5 people I've played PG with for years, and I've no way to get them back.

What a dumb move by Niantic!

CuddlyTeddyMage

I have "friends" in HPWU with NO NAMES! How does this make any sense?

Imawebbie

For those that accidentally deleted friends in PoGo, just add them back with the friend code, if you have it. You won’t lose your progress with them. Before this update I accidentally deleted my brother from my friend list one day right before a raid. I was so panicked! But then I added him back and everything was fine... still best friends!

SparkleLikeAGem

@CuddlyTeddyMage I think those are POGO friends who never played HPWU at all.

<insert stream of insults and complaints here>

Antique100

@Imawebbie

I wish I could restore my Pokémon GO friends that I deleted last night, but these are not personal friends. I have no way of getting in touch with them to get their codes.

Yelena0318

This has been a nightmare for me, both games should not be able to do that without are approval. I even changed my codes several times in both games and still getting more people added. Still trying to reach my Pokémongo friends who I by accident deleted in Wizards. This is making me think to quit wizards.

Drakonite

if you had played pogo/wu and have become inactive and you are now playing pogo/wu you will have noticed the last few days that niantic sync'ed the 2 games' friends lists (and ingress although ingress has no friends so its atm less of a bother, and catan together and sync'ed the friends' lists from the other game(s). You might think "oh ok let me go and deactivate/delete my inactive game account! that'll sort out the sync madness." DO NOT I repeat DO NOT as deleting an account on any of niantic's games anymore will delete ALL of them. So, if for example you are inactive in pogo and got a bunch of ppl in wu you dont even know and you go and delete your pogo account, your wu account will also be deleted as well.

from a discord server im in.

Yoshigibbs

I totally agree and now I don't know how to find my friends who I accidentally deleted!! If anyone recognizes me after the accidentally deleted, I'm so sorry!!

Who's dumb idea was this?!?!

pommeSQRD

Proposed Fix (going forward - won't fix the mess created, only allows players to clean up their lists):

1. Add a layer of separation between Niantic Social (all contacts) and individual games (in-game friend lists). This way people can remove inactive players from specific games / keep different (clean) friend lists for each game.
2. Add buttons in-game to send friend requests to other games. This way people can add friends from other games without knowing their codes if they want. And other party can choose to accept if they want.

Technical Design for #1:

• Friend ID - this is unique Niantic Social ID (let's assume email addresses in examples)
• Is Friend in PoGo - boolean (can expand to include other PoGo specific attributes like nicknames, friendship level)
• Is Friend in HPWU - boolean
• Is Friend in Ingress - boolean

Functional Requirements for #2:

• In HPWU friend's profile, add icons for PoGo and Ingress. If friend has an account in other game, enable the icon. Clicking the icon will send a friend request in the corresponding game.
• Similar setup in PoGo and Ingress.

Sample Data: User has 2 friends in PoGo only (apple, fig), 3 friends in HPWU only (banana, cherry, elderberry), 1 joint PoGo/HPWU friend (durian), no friends in/does not play Ingress

• Format = { Friend ID, Is Friend in PoGo, Is Friend in HPWU, Is Friend in Ingress}
• { [email protected], Yes, No, No }
• { [email protected], No, Yes, No }
• { [email protected], No, Yes, No }
• { [email protected], Yes, Yes, No }
• { [email protected], No, Yes, No }
• { [email protected], Yes, No, No }

Use cases:

• User adds honeydew in PoGo. Adds new row: { [email protected], Yes, No, No }. Expected result: honeydew appears in PoGo friend list, not in any of the other apps
• honeydew also has HPWU account. In PoGo, User clicks the HPWU icon to send friend request. honeydew accepts. Update row: { [email protected], Yes, Yes, No }. Expected result: honeydew now appears in PoGo and HPWU friend lists
• User removes durian from PoGo friend list. Update row: { [email protected], No, Yes, Yes }. Expected result: durian now appears in HPWU friend list only
• User removes fig from PoGo friend list. Up to devs how to implement - remove row entirely or update with all Nos. Expected result: fig no longer in any friend lists. Only way to add back is by friend code.
• Add fig to HPWU via friend code. Add/Update row: { [email protected], No, Yes, No }. Expected result: fig now appears in HPWU, not in any of the other apps
• Initiate PoGo friend request to fig from HPWU. Update row: { [email protected], Yes, Yes, No }. Expected result: fig now appears in HPWU and PoGo (with original friendship level)

pommeSQRD

Proposed Fix (going forward):

1. Add a layer of separation between Niantic Social (all contacts) and individual games (in-game friend lists). This way people can remove inactive players from specific games / keep different (clean) friend lists for each game.
2. Add buttons in-game to send friend requests to other games. This way people can add friends from other games without knowing their codes if they want. And other party can choose to accept if they want.

This doesn't undo the sync but it will allow people to clean up their friends list.

Technical Design for #1:

• Friend ID - this is unique Niantic Social ID (let's assume email addresses in examples)
• Is Friend in PoGo - boolean (can expand to include other PoGo specific attributes like nicknames, friendship level)
• Is Friend in HPWU - boolean
• Is Friend in Ingress - boolean

Functional Requirements for #2:

• In HPWU friend's profile, add icons for PoGo and Ingress. If friend has an account in either, enable the icon. Clicking the icon will send a friend request in the corresponding system.
• Similar setup in PoGo and Ingress.

Sample Data: User has 2 friends in PoGo only (apply, fig), 3 friends in HPWU only (banana, cherry, elderberry), 1 joint PoGo/HPWU friend (durian), no friends in/does not play Ingress

Use cases:

• User adds honeydew in PoGo. Adds new row: { [email protected], Yes, No, No }. Expected result: honeydew appears in PoGo friend list, not in any of the other apps
• honeydew also has HPWU account. In PoGo, User clicks the HPWU icon to send friend request. honeydew accepts. Update row: { [email protected], Yes, Yes, No }. Expected result: honeydew now appears in PoGo and HPWU friend lists
• User removes durian from PoGo friend list. Update row: { [email protected], No, Yes, Yes }. Expected result: durian now appears in HPWU friend list only
• User removes fig from PoGo friend list. Up to devs how to implement - remove row or update with all Nos. Expected result: fig no longer in any friend lists. Only way to add back is by friend code.
• Add fig to HPWU via friend code. Add/Update row: { [email protected], No, Yes, No }. Expected result: fig now appears in HPWU, not in any of the other apps
• Initiate PoGo friend request to fig from HPWU. Update row: { [email protected], Yes, Yes, No }. Expected result: fig now appears in HPWU and PoGo (with original friendship level)

RascleRand

I was frustrated that I inadvertently deleted several PoGo friends. I have no way of contacting them for their friend codes.—some are on another continent!

Additionally, I added new friends for remote gyms. I will have Togo through that FB chat to re-add these friends.

Antique100

Yesterday evening there was an ANNOUNCEMENT introducing Niantic Friends.

I posted on that annoucement thread, asking a question.

Now that annoucement is gone. Poof. why?

Yohanes12

@Antique100 looks like annoucement is hide post, so be sure looking for tommorow.

@RascleRand speaking remote gyms for friends, why don't invite for online too.

Morganza

Desperately needed: buttons for "Hide inactive players" to hide players inactive *in this game* for 2/7/30 days.

gozersmom

Having the friend lists synced between games is kind of neat AS LONG AS I CAN DELETE FRIENDS FROM ONE GAME ONLY. Most of the new friends I have in Hpwu (from pogo) tried it out and never went back and now I have all this deadweight in my friends list.

Being able to sort friends by last played would help manage this influx. But allowing deletes in one game only would be better.

Baltazar666

I have the same issue like many other here. I deleted inactiv players in WU and by that kicked them out in PoGo and vice versa. How the **** do you think I could get them back now? From non of them I have the code anymore. So if you don't fix this soon I will stop playing. Restore old friend list as it was before the change! This mess is Niantic fault so now fix it!

1StR

Forced merger of the friends lists in different games is awful for a combination of reasons:

1. It creates inconveniences: not everybody plays every game. "Ghost" friends that cannot be deleted just in one game - make it more difficult to manage gifts/friends. It is especially painful in HPWU, where, unlike in PoGo, you cannot add notes to a friend, you cannot sort by those, and you cannot search for a specific name/nick-name-note.
2. Some players kept a small number of friends in HPWU for a reason: to avoid the pains of friend management - as it was in PoGo. Now you've shoved it up the throat!
3. There could be privacy reasons and serious problems for some players. The games are different, with different degree of exposure. Some players planned carefully who to friend in different games. Combining info from two (or more) games can give away certain personal aspects. This is a serious privacy violation!

Additionally, all this being done without a proper information about the implementation lead to some bad consequences in the games: people have deleted "ghost" players in HPWU that lead to the removal of friends in PoGo. And no it is not always possible to "entry friend code again", as some friends were obtained in a single personal encounter - while travelling or online. And from HPWU side, - you have no clue who those friends are on the PoGo side. There are many more examples of the problems created by your awful move.

WBG/Portkey & Niantic: How about publicly admitting that you have screwed up your players big time?

After that:

1. Make combining friends between different games "opt-in" - for everybody and for every existing and new Niantic game.
2. Allow players to unfriend separately in each game.
3. Allow players adding friends separately in each game. (I don't want to grow my HPWU friends list just because I want to play a remote raid in PoGo.)
4. Add a better friend-list management interface in both games, especially in HPWU, where "Search" is missing.

Antique100

I love HPWU, but I am beginning to wonder if Niantic/WB love it.

It's become apparent that whoever ocntrols WU is only devoting a minimum of dev resources to the game.

It took three (3) months to fix major bugs (IOS purchasing, Android AS, SOS Report disappearance).

The middle of March arrived before a calendar for the month appeared. One wonders what will happen in April.

Many minor bugs still remain (e.g. banner colors).

WU players received zero warning about the functionality of Niantic Social. PG players had warning and can click a box next to a Friend and see what other Niantic games that person plays. If I had been able to do that in WU, I would not have lost forever some of my long-time PG Friends.

An Announcement about Niantic Social showed up in WU 24 hours after the feature was pushed out. This Annoucement vanished overnight. Since then there has been total silence on this issue from WU staff.

It makes me sad. I love this game, but obviously as only a small group of devs work on it, the game will continue to only stumble along.

Morganza

The official explanation that the nameless entries on your friends list are people who didn't finish the signup process is clearly incorrect; I sent one of them a gift who shows as active today and briefly saw that their most recent return was Peter Pettigrew, then the field went blank again -- probably a miscoded privacy setting.

Drakonite

@Antique100 for many AS has not been fixed yet.

and it doesnt surprise me theyre not devoting dev time to it, it is not making them money. I've been wondering why they havent pulled the plug since May 2020 if not before.