Pokémon GO

Been waiting with decreasing optimism for a last minute announcement about the Kalos tour next week but it seems like I have to face facts: we really are only going to get one Zygarde and one Hoopa encounter.

Niantic/Scopely really did themselves out of easy money there. I have a ton of green raid passes and was fully prepared to raid Zygarde all weekend but now there's just... not that much I'm interested in tbh. Just the two new megas and the slim possibility of getting a shiny Hawlucha/Klefki from an egg. Oh, well.
 
QuentinQuonce said:
Been waiting with decreasing optimism for a last minute announcement about the Kalos tour next week but it seems like I have to face facts: we really are only going to get one Zygarde and one Hoopa encounter.

Niantic/Scopely really did themselves out of easy money there. I have a ton of green raid passes and was fully prepared to raid Zygarde all weekend but now there's just... not that much I'm interested in tbh. Just the two new megas and the slim possibility of getting a shiny Hawlucha/Klefki from an egg. Oh, well.
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There's not even a Zygarde encounter right? It's just the cells. And the Hoopa is on the pro-track.
It's really fascinating that the two "big" things are, uh. Mega Malamar & Mega Victreebel. I think there were assets pushed for Mega Dragonite? That's kind ofa good one but......

Like Mega Mewtwo would've made a ton of sense but I guess that's being saved for Go Fest.
Mega Zygarde would have been perfect but nope. Just. Cells in the routes, I guess.
Zygarde raids, in general, would have been novel since it'd let you reroll and maybe earn extra cells. And include any of its million moves? And let us transfer it since there'd be more than one

instead it's a bunch of megas on rotation. And it's not even all of them.
 
R_N said:
There's not even a Zygarde encounter right? It's just the cells.
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I'm not certain, I read that there'd be a research quest but not sure if it awards a Zygarde encounter or just a load of cells. If the latter I guess I can remain hopeful it'll eventually get put in raids when they release the mega.

R_N said:
And the Hoopa is on the pro-track.
It's really fascinating that the two "big" things are, uh. Mega Malamar & Mega Victreebel. I think there were assets pushed for Mega Dragonite? That's kind ofa good one but......

Like Mega Mewtwo would've made a ton of sense but I guess that's being saved for Go Fest.
Mega Zygarde would have been perfect but nope. Just. Cells in the routes, I guess.
Zygarde raids, in general, would have been novel since it'd let you reroll and maybe earn extra cells. And include any of its million moves? And let us transfer it since there'd be more than one

instead it's a bunch of megas on rotation. And it's not even all of them.
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Yeah and it's not even clear yet how Malamar and Victreebel will drop since all the other megas are on a rotation. Possibly they'll just be spawning all day with a low chance, or in the last 5 minutes of each hour or something like that. Either way, zzz. Hopefully there'll field research awarding cells (though I doubt it) and maybe some with Mega Diancie energy too? Obviously I assume the masterwork research will award a fair amount of it but I've not even got the one from Go Fest up to level 3 yet as I put off ME'ing it for ages and have been trying not to use up too much of the energy. The event tasks at that Go Fest gave out such tiny amounts.
 
QuentinQuonce said:
I'm not certain, I read that there'd be a research quest but not sure if it awards a Zygarde encounter or just a load of cells. If the latter I guess I can remain hopeful it'll eventually get put in raids when they release the mega.
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I think the only thing related to research is that the go-pass gives zygarde cells (& accessories) while the routes give more cells than normal

Checking the other stuff coming along it looks like the other big "thing" will be mega level 4 & Mega Raid level 4 & 5 which also need extra currency which. Oh. Boy. great?
 
As someone who dropped off years ago and only got back into playing in September, I’m frankly way more interested in the Road to Kalos lead-up than in the actual event, since I don’t have the Primals or Spacial Rend and think some of the backgrounds are cool. I’m not really tempted to burn a bunch of passes on tons of Megas. I think the only stuff I’m interested in on the days of is catching Xerneas and Heracross, and hatching a Hawlucha and Red/Blue Flabébé. :worrywhirl: Zygarde raids or Mega Mewtwo definitely would have changed that.

I’m also pretty surprised/bummed that they didn’t include Fancy or Poké Ball Pattern Vivillon at all. If the latter doesn’t at least get a distribution in Z-A soon I’m gonna snap
 
R_N said:
I think the only thing related to research is that the go-pass gives zygarde cells (& accessories) while the routes give more cells than normal

Checking the other stuff coming along it looks like the other big "thing" will be mega level 4 & Mega Raid level 4 & 5 which also need extra currency which. Oh. Boy. great?
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Oh darn, that's even more underwhelming. I thought I read there'd be a separate research.

Looks like they're reserving Zygarde for a later event then - hopefully this year, but who knows. Leaks seem to indicate Mega Mewtwo and a Zeraora debut will be the focus of Go Fest this year. 10th anniversary Go Fest seems like the perfect time to release G-Max Melmetal too (or possibly Pikachu, I suppose) but we'll see if that happens or not.

Esserise said:
As someone who dropped off years ago and only got back into playing in September, I’m frankly way more interested in the Road to Kalos lead-up than in the actual event, since I don’t have the Primals or Spacial Rend and think some of the backgrounds are cool.
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Honestly yeah, even as someone who doesn't care about backgrounds this event is pretty cool purely for the trade fodder opportunity.

Esserise said:
I’m also pretty surprised/bummed that they didn’t include Fancy or Poké Ball Pattern Vivillon at all. If the latter doesn’t at least get a distribution in Z-A soon I’m gonna snap
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Yeah those two are weird omissions. Wonder if they might drop at the Tainan/LA events? But I assume they'd have been advertised if so.

Mind you, we're still waiting on Zen Mode Darmanitan and everyone thought that'd drop during Unova Tour...
 
My theory is that Niantic MASSIVELY overestimated the value of the old Megas for both the Mega Level 4 rollout (bonus is pretty miniscule vs the cost) and the "cater to new/returning players" approach (Megas are useful but only a handful, so a lot of the Mega Raids are still "dead" time).

These events feel like they're struggling more as of late specifically with balancing the "New" and "Old" player appeal. Raids for the big shiny new Meta boss are a good hook for existing spenders, but several of them require resource commitment or a degree of investment in the game to get good mileage out of them (several Adventure Effects for example mostly matter if you play heavily to min-max rewards from catch times). Meanwhile, the wild spawns, lesser stuff like regular Legendaries/Megas are good for new players or more casual ones to get a foothold to play at a higher level and thus "keep up" with their community, but don't have a lot to sell to vets who might already have all of these if they care for them.

Most events have a problem with leaning a bit too hard to one or the other: Go Fests and Tours have frequently been headlining something like the Kyurem or Necrozma fusions, which are strong but require two Mons, a big energy grind, all for a damage increase that you will mostly notice if you play in small groups/solo, without any wild spawns I remember sounding particularly amazing. Wild Area or the Max Out Finale meanwhile has the Mighty Pokemon which make for AMAZING quick builds of decently competent Pokemon, along with GMax Pokemon to enter into the Max Battle Loop, but their raids are usually at most reruns of previous headliners which MAY be appealing, but ultimately don't shake up very much or call for a great deal of grinding (save for Eternatus who is ALL grind but too extreme even for a lot of Vets).

I think the first Wild Area felt like the best balance they have hit with this approach, as the Wild Encounters had a good pool, the Origin Dragons + Primals are a good and bombastic headliner for raids even if rerunning (variety helps so that it's harder for rerunners to get their fill of something they might already have a lot of), and the "new" thing with Toxtricity was relevant very immediately (Electric being a type with middling Max options at the time vs Grimmsnarl being crept-already).
 
Apparently, from folks who were there for the sound test before the event proper, the new music for the event is Zygarde's theme from Z-A which... I know that it's technically also the Xerneas & Yveltal but also it was specifically the rendition made for Zygarde. X & Y themselves in their battles just reuse the original one.

It's barely even going to be here!
 
QuentinQuonce said:
A change no-one asked for, wanted, or is likely to consider justified

https://pokemongo.com/news/mega-evolution-2026-update

Honestly between this and how lacklustre the past few months have been, I think I'm going to take a break from Go for a while. Better things to do.
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I don't mind the new currency since it's mostly a lateral move on regular Raids if not a gain due to saving my passes. For the Mega Levels, Level 4 is redundant if you have multiples built for battlers like I did, but I guess it's an option to dump energy into for marginal gain. That said, the mechanics of the Super Mega Raids are eye-rollingly terrible.

Niantic/Scopely don't seem to comprehend that if people aren't engaging with a mechanic in groups, forcing group mechanics will result in less people playing it at all. It also doesn't help that it's implemented in a way that is completely arbitrary to force those higher numbers (Shadow Raids don't limit you to 1 Gem per person on Subduing) or just makes the fight more cumbersome for no reason (why make the Primals Megas in all but name and then exclude them, despite also making them some of the strongest raid battlers?)

My best bet is the system will meander with minimal engagement for a few months and then get overhauled to be less garbage (if still trash overall) like the initial Mega system and Max Battles.
 
BTW the "surprise" at mega night was in fact mega dragonite. Which you know isn't a bad Pokemon by any means but it does feel pretty questionable to not, like, position it earlier? As a thing to sell your many many many add ons? Certainly more than the malamar or victreebel.



Anyway the "en guarde" zygarde themed research reward was 50 cells and an encounter with Unown Z.
 
So, although I'm not actively trying to fill the mega dex I thought well I wanted to go to the meet up anyway and get xern & yvel, so may as well time it well enough and get some of the good ones

Does not work. There is fundamentally too much going on. I barely even saw Xerneas & Yveltal raids (did manage one of each; shiny xern too!) because of all the Dragonites & Victreebels, much less the regular mega raids. Don't get me started on the awful Pikachus.

I feel like there are multiple solutions to this, but the easiest one is to just stuff a ton of mega energy into the field research instead of none.
 
Been doing some remote lucky trades and while the feature is nice and overdue to have, I wish there were better ways to communicate with this.

Within the next 7 days I expect to be able to remote lucky trade with willempju (sometimes low on list when I can't open gifts anymore lol) and Ulquiorra (whom is on west coast and also can't open gift by the time sent to me lol). Anyways please have the pokemon you want to offer ready so we can get this done. I had to tell another friend to not trade me any hundos as they re-roll when trading, and the odds of having a lucky hundo are 1 in 64 so I don't prioritize on getting as a shiny nor with special background though they are certainly nice to have at least and I have a few shundos including one I bottle capped recently.

My biggest wants are Kyurem and Zacian, essentially those that are good for raiding and the master league. I don't need Groudon, Zekrom, Mewtwo nor Rayquaza at least.
 
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At least with this latest battle pass thing I've finally managed to get a Kangaskhan. I really both like and dislike the idea of regional exclusive Pokémon. It's cool from a mechanics stand point but awful from a player one.

I might make it to Mewtwo tomorrow but it's a hell of a slog. The only Kanto Mon I don't have if I get to Mewtwo would be Moltres... And considering I can't raid I doubt I'll get one anytime soon.
 
DHR-107 said:
At least with this latest battle pass thing I've finally managed to get a Kangaskhan. I really both like and dislike the idea of regional exclusive Pokémon. It's cool from a mechanics stand point but awful from a player one.

I might make it to Mewtwo tomorrow but it's a hell of a slog. The only Kanto Mon I don't have if I get to Mewtwo would be Moltres... And considering I can't raid I doubt I'll get one anytime soon.
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Don't forget the Incense attracting Legendaries. It's a tiny chance and hard to catch but I have been seeing the Kanto (and Galarian) Birds among the Legendaries, so there is a chance if you can use it while already out and about.

Which is my excuse to springboard into mentioning this event is cool but doesn't feel like it should be an event. The Legendaries are infrequent and unlikely you catch the majority of them (with extremely limited PvP prospects because of the high minimum level despite the IV range), so while there's a novelty, it's a much less exciting main feature for a Milestone-anniversary type of event. The wild spawns also have some neat novelties but the common junk still occupies too much space, whether by design or because of the Biome mechanics.

Honestly this feels like it'd be way better as a once-a-season deal if not the standard behavior for Incense. The chance at rare Pokemon (Legendary or otherwise) as a unique surprise to you like the Galarian Birds have been maintains the surprise and "oh, neat" feel they claim they want them to have, but the window is so small as is to stoke FOMO on a reward without a great deal of pull (for power OR collecting)
 
Personally I ran into a lot of legends and it was pretty novel, but the low catch rates less so. I think if there was some sort of catch boost available it would have been better. Put it after mewtwo or something, even.

I think the real issue I had with the event was the dedication to biomes that you allude to. There's actually a lot of very unique Pokemon that show up during the event (salandit immediately comes to mind), but you will probably never ever see them not because they're rare but because you never had a chance to see them spawn.

I think everything should have spawned every where. While this means you're probably still going to haev trouble finding what you "want" it will at elast be offset by knowing you can run into anything
 
pika pal said:
Don't forget the Incense attracting Legendaries. It's a tiny chance and hard to catch but I have been seeing the Kanto (and Galarian) Birds among the Legendaries, so there is a chance if you can use it while already out and about.
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While this was true, I only saw two legendaries but that's presumably because I wasn't walking around (and didn't have the option too). I don't think anything like this should be gated behind raids or incenses. It's just a shame this was on such a short timeline, having this active for the entire week (as opposed to just a single day) would have been ideal.

Latios which I missed and Tapu Koko which I did manage to get. I did make it to Mewtwo as well, which leaves Moltres as the only Mon missing from my Kanto Dex. It's probably going to stay like that now until a fortuitous set of events happens for me to get hold of one.

I doubt I'm back in for the long run, but the event did severely deplete my balls situation so at least now I can open gifts and spin pokestops again (which had been major blocks on a lot of researches). I don't have a gym near my work or home so getting coins is also difficult.
 
From remote lucky trades so far, my goateeVGC account got a 15/15/14 lucky kyurem. From what I've been told so far if I want to max one out as a black kyurem for the master league that it should work same as a hundo. I'll likely wait a few weeks or so before fusing and maxing one.
 
R_N said:
Long-awaited Mimikyu is finally here. Releasing it as an April Fools pikachu-focused event is actually pretty good.
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I was genuinely expecting the Costume Pikachu again, so genuinely genius they "surprise" dropped the actual Mimikyu
 
R_N said:
This year really should be them starting to do the paradoxes, which equally feels like they shouldn't wait that long on their shinies. Maybe after Kalos tour? Should be close to the end of the season then too, and that's Paldea-focused.

And hey let's take a look at this now that we're done with the year

2025 - 58
-Jan 3 - 2 (Fidough line)
-Jan 15 - 2 (Shroodle line)
-Jan 21 - 3 (Rookidee line)
-Feb 11 - 1 (Dhelmise)
-March 5 - 1 (Kubfu [was Untransferrable])
-March 19 - 2 (Nickit line)
-March 26 - 2 (Sizzlipede line)
-March 31 - 2 (Mudbray line)
-April 9 - 2 (Gossifleur line)
-April 16 - 3 (Tinkatink line)
-April 24 - 3 [5] (Applin line [Dipplin & Hydrapple Home only])
-May 10 - 1 (Kingambit)
-June - 1 (Urshifu)
-Go Fest - 1 (Volcanion)
-June 20 - 2 (Yamper line)
-July 15 - 1 (Tatsugiri)
-July 22 - 3 (Honedge line)
-July 29 - 2 (Toedscool line)
-August 6 - 2 (Snom line)
-August 18 - 1 (Eternatus [cannot be transferred])
-August 25 - 1 (Dondozo)
--the new stuff after this line--
-September 16 - 1 (Indeedee)
-September 23 - 1 (Dudunsparce)
-September 30 - 1 [2] (Duraludon [Archaludon Home only])
-October 10 - 2 (Dipplin, Hydrapple)
-October 21 - 2 (Poltchageist line)
-November - 2 (Spidops line)
-November - 3 (Impidimp line)
-December 2 - 3 (Nacli line)
-December 11 - 2 (Clobbopus line)
-December 24 - 3 (Rolycoly line)
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So someone on Reddit the other day made the startling calculation that, of all the current unreleased species (78, not counting Orthworm which is coming soon and the three WiWa starters), over half of those are legendary, mythical, or paradox (42, to be precise). Furthermore, of all the non-special Pokemon lines yet to debut, none of them are three-stage lines. Only standalones and two-stage families left (again with the exception of the new starter trio which are very likely to be three-stagers).

Despite that they've actually been rolling out new additions at a semi-decent pace this year: we've had 16 new Pokemon so far with at least one new addition per month, and we're not a third of the way through the year yet. If they keep this pace up we're on track for somewhere between 2025 and 2024's number.

With so many legendaries still to come it's weird they've been holding so many of them back. Zeraora is coming later this year but it's very possible it could be the only one; Kubfu and Eternatus were the only new additions to the game in 2025. Seriously, where are Koraidon and Miraidon, or the Treasures of Ruin? I've been expecting them for some time and nada. Is it too much to hope they'll make an appearance post-Go Fest? I can understand wanting to do something a bit different with the Paradoxes but it feels like it's time for Koraidon and Miraidon at least.

Though if they want to stretch things out there's so many alternate forms that are right there. They released Therian Enamorus in February but there's a bunch of as yet unreleased. It absolutely boggles my mind that Meloetta Pirouette Form hasn't been introduced yet even after Unova tour and its masterwork research. Zen Mode Darmanitan is also conspicuous by its absence; some people probably expect it to be an actual form change but given the way Go usually handles alternate forms I think it could absolutely be a 3-star raid boss. There's still two Vivillon forms unreleased as well as Hisuian Sliggoo and Goodra. Not particularly expecting to see Ash-Greninja or Chest Form Gimmighoul; Bloodmoon Ursaluna is... anyone's guess really but might make a cool one-time encounter for a Halloween pass. And then there's obviously a shit ton of new megas yet to come (apparently Mega Falinks is the May raid day) and still loads of Gigantamaxes. They're being very slow with those but then again it just feels longer because the last two were Pikachu and Meowth. What's funny is that most of the G-Max species are already in the game: I've been churning Sizzlipede and Hatenna XL candy for ages.

And then looking at some of the remaining unreleased species:
  • still no Wishiwashi or Pyukumuku or Minior. They're mechanically complex perhaps but I'd be very surprised not to see these debut before a presumptive Alola Tour next year
  • no Type:Null. Definitely feels like it might be a season-long Pokemon, probably the one leading up to Alola Tour, so end of this year
  • no Basculegion still!!! I want my undead fish
  • no Archaludon yet, and probably not for a long time still (sigh)
  • no Farigarif, that's a surprise
  • no Manaphy, Phione, or Arceus, that's not really a surprise
  • a bunch of fairly unremarkable Gen VIII and IX species left to come, but Chewtle feels like such a weird exception, I'd have expected it to be here by now. And if you want a mon with a "loads of forms to milk" gimmick Milcery/Alcremie say hi
 
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