As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/
Options
[PokemonGO] used Draining Kiss on BATTERY! It's super effective!
akjak
TheraSpooky GymRegistered User regular
TheraSpooky GymRegistered User regular
What the what?
Pokémon GO is a free-to-play location-based augmented reality mobile game developed by Niantic and published by The Pokémon Company. It is available on iOS and Android, not yet worldwide.
The game quickly became one of the most used smart device apps after launching, surpassing the previous record held by Candy Crush Saga in the United States, and was a boon to the stock value of Nintendo, which owns a part of The Pokémon Company. It was praised by some medical professionals for potentially improving the mental and physical health of players, but attracted some controversy due to reports of causing accidents and being a public nuisance at some locations.
Or, in the words of @Mr Ray:
At this point Pokemon Go may just be the biggest phenomenon in the history of anything, ever. For example, it is currently responsible for more google searches than "porn" and has been for five days now.
It is more popular than porn.
On the internet.
Let that sink in for a minute.
Ok, how do I play?
Download it from your phone's app store, and while you wait read this: https://www.reddit.com/r/TheSilphRoad/comments/4ukjzn/pokémon_go_information_knowledge_lessons_learned/
Another guide: https://www.reddit.com/r/pokemongo/comments/4sd611/a_guide_to_pokemon_go_leveling_your_trainer/
Further down this very page is another great guide...
Also, do you want Pikachu as your starter?
How do I know where to go in my town to get stuff?
Well, the quickest way is to also make an Ingress account and use this: https://www.ingress.com/intel
Holy cow, PokeVision. RIP
Ingress is the first game by Niantic, and a lot of mechanics are the same. If you wonder "why is...?" in PokemonGO, the answer is probably "because Ingress."
Anyway, nearly all the "portals" on that intel map will be poke-locations as well. You won't know whether they're stops or gyms until you go check it out!
This also appears to be working still, as a way to find pokestops. Some of those points are going to be gyms, which you can "vote" for as being a gym instead of a stop.
What team should I join?
What color do you like?
What do I do at a "Pokestop"?
When you're in range, the marker on your map will change and animate. Tap on it, and then "spin" the medallion in the middle to get free stuff. Usually you'll get pokeballs, but other Useful Things can be had too. Some things even can't be had by purchasing.
You can spin a stop approximately every 5 minutes.
Pokestops also have a slot for a "module." The only one available right now is a lure. It will make wild pokemon spawn more often around that pokestop for 30 minutes. When a lure is active, there will be hearts spewing from the pokestop on your map.
What do I do at gyms?
Gyms are the battles. There's a lot more info out there, but you try to take over enemy gyms or try to bolster and defend friendly ones.
Against an enemy gym, you can bring 6 pokemon. How many you'll be up against depends on the gym's "prestige."
Against a friendly gym, you can bring 1 pokemon. However, each friendly pokemon you "defeat" will add to your gym's prestige, which opens up more slots for defending pokemon to be placed there.
You can place 1 pokemon per friendly gym (assuming there's a slot open). Once per day (well, every 21 hours) you can go into the shop and claim your "defender bonus" of 10 pokecoins per pokemon you have sitting in gyms. Right now it's pretty difficult for any team to be holding a gym for long, so it's not often right now that you'll get more than 10 coins per day. But as our 'mons get stronger and gyms get harder to take down, you might approach that 100 coins per day... Later.
You can dodge in gym battles?!
Yup.
Should I "power up" these guys, evolve them, or...?
IVs are in the game, so check them before doing anything.
My advice (from a ripe level 19! Woo!) is to just save all the pokemon you get until in your teens. The Combat Power of those guys you catch early is never going to be competitive in the gyms. People are already putting 2k CP 'mons on gyms around here.
So. Save all the candy and stardust you get.
After level 10 or so, evolve whatever Pidgey etc you have with the highest CP. At 7 or 8 you'll get a Lucky Egg too, and evolving is big xp! So save a Lucky Egg until you're ready to evolve a ton of guys. Hint: Those Weedles and such only cost 12 candy to evolve. Evolve them for the xp and then transfer them.
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS TOO MANY PIDGEYS
Pidgeys, Weedles, Caterpies, and any other common 12-candy evolution pokes are the best possible goldmine for raising your trainer level. And raising your trainer level is the best way to find more powerful pokes, so catch literally every single one you see.
Basically, you get 500 EXP as a flat reward for evolving a pokemon. Since they're so cheap to evolve and so common, you can stock up a TON of them, pop a lucky egg for double EXP, and start evolving them as fast as possible for 1k EXP each. My personal term for this is Factory Farming, and I'm set to run my first one this weekend, I'm up to ~30-40 banked evolves.
Transfer them?
Yep, way way down on the Pokemon's stat page is a "Transfer" button. All it really means is "send them off for the prof to cut on, and get a candy in return, yay!"
What's this "nearby pokemon" thing?
The pokemon listed as "nearby" are in very specific locations. If you want to catch one of them, you need to use the list as a sort of dowsing rod. Pokemon that are further away will appear lower on the list. As you walk if you see the pokemon you are aiming for rise on the list you'll know you are going in the right direction.
This pokestop is a private place, unreachable, offensive...
Report it here: https://support.pokemongo.nianticlabs.com/hc/en-us/requests/new?ticket_form_id=319928
Ow, my battery!
Yep. Anker. The battery pack of choice for Ingress and Pokemon GO players alike.
Now get out there and catch some Pokemon! Be nice to everyone, be respectful of persons and property, and don't fall off a cliff.
Switch: SW-4133-1546-2720 (Thera)
Twitch: akThera
Steam: Thera
Twitch: akThera
Steam: Thera
akjak on
+1
This discussion has been closed.
Posts
And a helpful image:
Official PA Forums FFXIV:ARR Free Company <GHOST> gitl.enjin.com Join us on Sargatanas!
2008, 2012, 2014 D&D "Rare With No Sauce" League Fantasy Football Champion!
Demographics: I spotted a couple older than me playing (40s) and a grey haired senior playing. Lots of high school to university types. I'd say 60/40 male/female. When I went back to my car some woman was exiting hers as she had just parked, phone in hand. I could hear the pokemon music playing as she locked her doors.
Do they show as ??? when they're higher CP than you'd normally see?
That was my experience this morning.
3DS Friend Code: 0404-6826-4588 PM if you add.
Pokemon GO
Unless you’ve been in a coma or doing some intensive underground cave research for the last two weeks, you’ve undoubtedly heard of the world-wide phenomenon that is Pokemon GO,, produced by a partnership between Niantic labs (formerly a part of Google) and The Pokemon Company .
What it is not
This is not a traditional Pokemon game. If you came here looking for EVs and IVs; breeding hints; player-vs-player battles; or building a relationship with individual pokemon, you won’t find that here.
What it is:
What you will find is that Niantic basically took their prior game Ingress and added a Pokemon skin on top of it. It has a lot more in common with Ingress than it does with Pokemon. P-Go (or alternately PoGo) uses your smartphone and actual location in the Real World to key into a virtual game that has pokemon hiding in tall grass all around you. You will catch, power up and eveolve these critters in order to gain and maintain control of various pokegyms scattered around Real World locations, and gain mastery for one of three teams.
It’s a lot of fun and pretty much everyone on the entire planet is playing right now.
How to get it
For Apple/iTunes go to https://itunes.apple.com/nz/app/pokemon-go/id1094591345?mt=8
For Android devices go to https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.nianticlabs.pokemongo&hl=en
How to play (hints)
First off, Pokemon GO is a massively mutliplayer online game. It requires a full-time data connection, so unless you are lucky enough to live on top of a pokestop or gym, you’re going to need a 3G/4G device. (Some players in urban areas MAY be able to use WiFi locations to play, but don’t count on it.)
The official documentation (such as it is) is available at https://support.pokemongo.nianticlabs.com/hc/en-us
The Main View
This is what the main view of the game looks like. You player avatar (4) will ALWAYS appear in the center of the view. The map will be a local copy of your region from google maps. To move on the map, you need to move around in the real world. Important locations are shown around you as PokeStops (3), where you get gear, and PokeGyms (2), where you battle other Pokemon. You can tap on the compass (1) to toggle map auto-rotation. Otrherwise, a single finger drag will rotate the map. Tap once, then drag up/down to change the elevation/zoom level. (You can never zoom out as far as you would like.) To see other areas of the map, you will need to go there.
“Tall grass” is shown as little bursts of green confetti that pop up from time to time. These are most common in parks and large greenspace areas. Note that tall grass is not a guarantee that a Pokemon will spawn there! It is simple a slightly higher chance.
The Pokemon that are nearby you will show up on the “radar” (7). Tapping on this will open a window that shows the closest nine Pokemon, ranked in oprder of distance. The number of footprints indicates how far away that particular Pokemon is from you. As you move around, the number of footprints will change as you get closer or further from each Pokemon. The “radar” will “flash” whenever there is a change.
The footprint scale is:
Zero footprints – 40m or less (about 130 feet)
One footprint – 40m to 75m (about 130ft to 250ft)
Two footrpints – 75m to 150m (about 250ft to 500ft)
Three footprints – 150m to 225m (about 500ft to 750ft)
Catching “Wild” Pokemon
When you are close enough to a “wild” Pokemon it will appear on your main screen. Unlike traditional Pokemon games, you don’t battle wild Pokemon in order to weaken them before capturing them. Instead, there is a capturing mini-game. Tap on the Pokemon shown on the main map, and you will enter the capturing mini-game.
The Name and Combat Power(3) of the Pokemon will be displayed in the center of the screen. The bottom of the screen will show your active PokeBall (6). When you reach a high enough level to have access to better PokeBalls (i.e. GreatBall, UltraBall, MasterBall, etc.) you can switch pokeballs by tapping on the backpack icon (8). You can also access bonus items like Razzberries by tapping this icon.
To capture the Pokemon, press on the Pokeball and swipe upwards toward the Pokemon, as if you were “tossing” it. The goal is to hit the the pokemon’s “hitbox” represented by the white ring (5). The colored ring (4) will show a color that represents the difficulty of the capture. Green is an easy capture, yellow to orange is moderately difficult, and red is going to be very difficult capture. You can affect the chances of a successful capture in a few ways:
Obviously, better Pokeballs have a higher chance of a capture. Players will unlock GreatBalls at level 12 and UltraBalls at level 20.
If you use a Razzberry, you get a small bonus to your next capture chance. Note that each Razzberry will affect the chance of success for exactly ONE throw. That is, if the throw hits, and the pokemon escapes from the ball, the Razzberry bonus is “used up” and you will need to use another Razzberry.
Finally, the timing of your throw makes a difference. The maximum chance will be when the colored ring is smallest.
If you manage to throw though the colored ring, you can get one of three bonuses. You can get a “Nice!” bonus of 10XP if the capture succeeds and you manage to hit the colored ring when it is 75% of full size or less. You can get a “Great Throw” bonus of 50XP if the capture succeeds and you manage to hit the colored ring when it is 50% of full size or less. You can get a “Excellent!” bonus of 100XP if the capture succeeds and you manage to hit the colored ring when it is 25% of full size or less.
You can also get an additional bonus of 10XP is you throw a “curve ball”. You can hold the Pokeball and “spin” it by moving your finger is a tight circle at the bottom of the screen for a moment. The ball will start to glow and throw off stars/sparks. When you release, the ball will “curve” or “hook” in the direction of the spin. Consistently throwing a Curve Ball can be difficult!
Every successful capture will gain you three pokemon-specific candy and 100 Stardust.
Collecting Gear
Visit PokéStops to gather PokeBalls and other items. You’ll find PokeStops in the world near public art, unique architecture, or public gathering places. On your Map View, PokéStops are represented by blue squares. When you’re close enough to a PokéStop to search it, the box on top of the blue square will open.
Tap on the Pokestop icon to load the photo disc, then spin the disc to collect items. The Pokestop will turn from blue to pink to indicate that you have spun it. You can pop the individual item bubbles to collect them individually, or simply press the “X” button at the bottom of the screen to collect everything. If you spin the disc before the photo loads you may not get anything. You can only spin each Pokestop once every five minutes. You will know when each Pokestop is ready to be spun again when it fades from pink back to blue.
Items that you can get from Pokestops include Pokeballs, Potions (for healing pokemon), Revives (for reviving fainted pokemon), Razzberries, and Eggs (for hatching new Pokemon). You will never get PokeCoins, Incense, Lucky Eggs, Lure Modules, Egg Incubators, or Stardust from a Pokestop.
Powering Up and Evolving Pokemon
There are two ways to increase the power of your Pokemon. Unlike the handheld games, neither one of them involve battling at gyms or gaining experience through fighting. Instead you will feed your pokemon Stardust and Candy. Tap on the Pokeball on the main screen, then select “Pokemon” (on the left side) to see your current Pokemon collection. Tap on any Pokemon to open their summary screen.
The summary screen will show you the current CP and potential of that specific Pokemon (1). The combat power potential is indicated by the white arc over the Pokemon’s image. Think of this as a kind of fuel gauge that goes from “empty” on the far left, to “full” on the far right. The white dot indicates where this particular pokemon is in its development. The highlighted portion to the left of the dot represents past power development and the ghosted portion to the right of the dot is potential power development.
You can increase the development of the pokemon by feeding it candy and stardust. Candy is specific to each pokemon. For example, to develop a Rattata, you will use Rattata Candy; to develop a Pidgey, you will use Pidgey Candy; and so on. Each “step” of power development of a specific pokemon will require one or two candy – this cost will never change. Stardust is generic and is used for ALL pokemon development. The Stardust cost for each step of power development will increase as the pokemon becomes more powerful. For example, the 70CP Rattata shown here only needs 600 Stardust to increase CP by one step. Meanwhile, a 900CP Scyther will need 2200 Stardust to increase CP by a single step. As you power up your pokemon, Stardust will be the most valuable resource in the game. (And you can’t get it from Pokestops!!)
The other way to increase the power of Pokemon is to Evolve them. Pokemon in GO are limited to Generation I pokemon, so don’t expect a lot of evolutions that you may be accustomed to. Evolving does not require Stardust. Instead, it requires anywhere from 12 to 400 Candy specific to that pokemon. More advanced evolutions of pokemon generally will have a higher potential CP than lower evolutions.
Counter-intuitively, the cost to power up CP does NOT change when evolving. For example, if a Rattata needs 600 Stardust to power up, after evolving into a Raticate it will still need 600 Stardust to power up! Evolution will not move the white dot on the potential arc. However, when a pokemon evolves, it’s moveset will change randomly. This means that you could go from a lower evolution with a great moveset to a higher evolution with a lousy moveset. Because of this, the general consensus is to avoid powering up lower evolutions unitl after evolving them into their final moveset.
Evolving pokemon grants a flat XP award of 500XP.
Incubators and Eggs
Occasionally, Pokestops will give you eggs. These are bonus pokemon that you can hatch from scratch. Generally speaking, hatched pokemon will have a higher potential CP than wild caught pokemon. Tap on the Pokeball on the main screen, then select “Pokemon” (on the left side) to see your current Pokemon collection. Swipe to the left to see your eggs. You can only have a total of nine eggs at any time. Eggs still count towards your total pokemon even though they are not shown on the main pokemon screen and are tracked separately. For example, in the image below, I have 114 total pokemon, but 9 of those are eggs. If I were to acutally count my live pokemon, I would only find 105 of them on the main screen. The other nine are the eggs. (Yes, it’s confusing.)
All players start with one “infinite” Incubator. Additional Incubators are awarded at various levels, or can be purchased from the in-game shop.
Eggs come in three flavors, based on the distance needed to hatch them. Interestingly, there MAY be a “bug” in some versions of the game with some phones where the distance is listed in kilometers, but the eggs require distances measured in miles. That is, instead of being a 10km egg (6.2 miles) it might actually be a 10 mile egg. (Sadly, my phone is affected in this way.)
Distance traveled is only measured when the phone is travelling at walking speed, wihtthe app open and running. Testing has shown that the “speed-lock” on this is about 8km/h (about 5MPH). This is about the speed of fast jog – sorry runners and cyclists, you move too fast! Interestingly enough, driving with the app open (and the phone sitting on the dash or in a glove box – PLEASE DO NOT PLAY POKEMON GO WHILE DRIVING!!!!), some distance will be measured when the car is slowing to a stop or starting to accelerate. Freeway and interstate commute miles won’t count, but in-city drivers will be able to log some distance here.
When an egg hatches it will give a pokemon that will generally start out much higher CP than what you would normally see in the wild. This is not universally true, but in general it will be. The egg will also have some amount of Stardust and Candy specific to that pokemon. Usually there will be enough Candy in the egg to power up that pokemon type around a dozen times.
I reccomend using the "infinte" Incubator exclusively for 2km eggs since it will never run out. Use purchased and awarded incubators for the longer distance Eggs to preserve them for use.
Wait, is that a thing?
The harder the rain, honey, the sweeter the sun.
I've heard mixed reports on this. Generally it seems helpful to point you in the right direction initially, but the closer you are the less accurate it seems to be. Used in conjunction with the list it should be useful though.
Also just a note, even with a full list of 3 feet, the system is still working, it just means all the ones it found are far enough way from you. Once you get close to one of them it still has been dropping it down to 2 feet for me. I had the same thing happen last night and I still used it to grab a pikachu.
Official PA Forums FFXIV:ARR Free Company <GHOST> gitl.enjin.com Join us on Sargatanas!
Official PA Forums FFXIV:ARR Free Company <GHOST> gitl.enjin.com Join us on Sargatanas!
I also took a detour today while visiting a courthouse I seldom visit and ended up sitting in the center of town for like fifteen minutes, right near a cluster of Pokestops and a gym. Saw people walking into the town green with their phones and waving as they approached other people doing the same. I really wanted to get out and join them... soon!
Yeah, that trick seems to wok best when it's at least 3 paws out, if not also further down the list. And once it shows up on your screen, it will no longer send the pulse.
Remember, if and when you hit a gym and put a critter in, to immediately go to the store, and tap on the shield icon in the upper right to collect your reward for getting into a gym. If you think you can get into more than one, by all means chance it, but otherwise, it's best to at least nap your coins and stardust early.
You would need to turn at that point
Imagine a dot at the center of a tic tac toe board and how the indicator would react if a Pokemon was there but you traveled straight along any of the lines
I get it, but sometimes no matter which way I go it still moves away it seems. Or it goes into a wall or inaccessible area.
It's not a thing. The green pulse happens every thirty seconds and is just a signal that the list has updated - it has no bearing on the direction you're facing or moving.
It's worth noting the list is in order of what is closest to farthest from you. You could be getting closer, but new pokemon could be spawning between you and what you are targeting.
The harder the rain, honey, the sweeter the sun.
According to this guide, it's Level 9:
http://www.ign.com/wikis/pokemon-go/Level_Rewards_and_Unlockable_Items
Unless it's inconsistent?
That explains that. Thanks for all the helpful tips in here, by the way. Explained some things I didnt get (like how the shrinking colored circles interact with ball tossing).
To the best of my knowledge there's no evidence that the size of the circle interacts with capture chance - circle size dictates bonus exp for nice/great/excellent throw, and color indicates the odds the pokemon will break out of a ball, but anything else is speculation. Might be true, might be the modern equivalent of 'holding down+A keeps them in the ball'
There's a preposterous amount of speculative misinformation/rumor floating around for this game
Anecdotal at best, but I've also never failed an excellent, even on a harder to catch pokemon, but I've definitely failed a few "Nice" shots. Someone failing an excellent would be something I'd be very interested in hearing.
Yeah they need to fix that bug quickly.
I rarely get excellents, but I've definitely failed greats plenty of times. Honestly I've had more success with the circle completely full than very small.
I suspect though it makes no difference, with possibly a bonus to catch chance if you do land specifically a Nice/Great/Excellent
Most days yes. Yesterday was super bad. Today has actually been really good though other than the occasional typical lockup on catching (plus sometimes input not responding). But I use Google
Google works fine for me at the moment, but that one is only lvl 5. My main at lvl 12 or 13 is the TC account, and it won't even authenticate at the moment.
I have never found a creature that is 3 steps away. I can walk towards it and get it to go towards the top of the list, but then it will just disappear. I only bother with the 2 steps or less creatures.
I've been using their Battery Saver mode because I'm on a 4yr old iPhone 5 and my battery doesn't last long. So when I'm trying to get steps on eggs or whatever, I keep the phone inverted in my pocket and in battery save mode. But I've also found that the awake/sleep saver-state seems to crash the app, which isn't great, because if I hardlock the app, I usually get shut out for about 2 hours after the crash. Not sure why that is.
The raspberries ensure that they don't run away after the failed attempt.
"You have the greatest chance of capturing the Pokémon while the colored ring is at its smallest diameter. At the opportune moment, fling the Poké Ball toward the Pokémon."
Source-> https://support.pokemongo.nianticlabs.com/hc/en-us/articles/221957648-Finding-and-Catching-wild-Pokémon
I'd call that better than just anectodal evidence. :biggrin:
I swear Charmander has taken my berries and ran before. Maybe it was on the ball after the ball after the raspberries.