system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
Why did my paper get reviewed by five reviewers?

The usual number of reviewers in my field is 1-3. However, my latest submission got five reviewers. I only received the comments of four reviewers so I guess one of the reviews was of unacceptable quality but four reviewers is still a lot.

The outcome was a major revision with all four reviewers stating that it's a good paper but lacking measurements of type [fancy method for which I don't have equipment].

Any guesses why the editor would like to have so many reviews that essentially all say the same?
gpt
Could be that the review you didn't see was number three, and when the editor got it they panicked and contacted several people for emergency reviews, and ended up with two extra.

Or they were drunk. Could be anything really.