Pokémon GO

[pika pal]

So I saw Zygarde hit Go a few weeks ago, been cruising around Home seeing if I can snag one because that's just what I do now I guess, but it's been a slim search so far.
I understand the research can get you one at 10%, and then Routes allows you to get cells to get it to 50%, but what's the actual vibe of obtaining one?
Is it literally *just* the one you get out of the research that you can then power up separately? Is it even something that's had a chance to proliferate regardless? Is it good so no one wants to give it up quite yet?

It'd be a combination of the latter two points: Zygarde is currently only available in 10% form through the Research, but the same step that gives you the Zygarde is how you get the Cube to start picking up Cells via the route feature, which are used to transform Zygarde (akin to an evolution mechanically) into its higher forms. Zygarde's higher forms have significant PvP potential (Great and Ultra League favor low ATK/High Bulk Pokemon), so people likely to hang onto theirs even if they could transfer it.

The question is how long it's Research Locked since the only source is walking routes and finding cells, they may want to keep it exclusive if additional Zygardes end up becoming a source via transfer or something.

tl;dr don't expect Go Zygarde in Home for a while.

That said, August is going to be a very packed month for Go stuff: with Carbink making its "widespread" debut in the upcoming Go Fest (as the Mega Energy source for Diancie), alongside a lot of Legendary reruns like Cresselia, Xerneas/Yveltal, Groudon/Kyogre (for Primal Energy raids), and Rayquaza (for Mega Energy debut). So if you're hunting Go Mark stuff you couldn't find before, keep an eye out during the month because a lot of "new" things are dropping alongside rare stuff getting another injection.

 

[R_N]

It'd be a combination of the latter two points: Zygarde is currently only available in 10% form through the Research, but the same step that gives you the Zygarde is how you get the Cube to start picking up Cells via the route feature, which are used to transform Zygarde (akin to an evolution mechanically) into its higher forms. Zygarde's higher forms have significant PvP potential (Great and Ultra League favor low ATK/High Bulk Pokemon), so people likely to hang onto theirs even if they could transfer it.

The question is how long it's Research Locked since the only source is walking routes and finding cells, they may want to keep it exclusive if additional Zygardes end up becoming a source via transfer or something.

tl;dr don't expect Go Zygarde in Home for a while.

Yeah makes sense. I imagine 100% Zygarde in particular will be a major PVP unit.

That said, August is going to be a very packed month for Go stuff: with Carbink making its "widespread" debut in the upcoming Go Fest (as the Mega Energy source for Diancie), alongside a lot of Legendary reruns like Cresselia, Xerneas/Yveltal, Groudon/Kyogre (for Primal Energy raids), and Rayquaza (for Mega Energy debut). So if you're hunting Go Mark stuff you couldn't find before, keep an eye out during the month because a lot of "new" things are dropping alongside rare stuff getting another injection.

Legendaries are all taken care of at this point but good to know about the Go Fest stuff; I think I thought it already happened. Carbink will be a nice one to add to the collection.
Doing wonder boxing during an event's always a good way to pick up some spares. Was there a fossil event recently, for example? Big uptick in those guys both in GTS searches and in the wonder box.


I know you (& others) have mentioned here & there but as someone who doesn't play Go and is only into collecting go marks because I've lost my mind to wonder box, it's really fascinating what stuff is significantly rarer than I would ever imagine. Either because they had a very limited release, no true reruns, only available for specific avenues, regional exclusives....the latter's interesting both because there'es far fewer than I thought but also the ones that are regional are ones that make me go "wait really?" Kangaskhan or Klefki, for example.
or the ones that haven't been released. It stunned me that the gen 8 starters still aren't in the game, or how most of gen 8 in general isn't around; and how even the "commons" were in fact very not common. I knew they had to slow down to a drip feed to keep the game more relevant for collectors, but I would at least have thought the starters would have had a run and stuff like Wooloo would be significantly more common. To make no mention of no Rookidee, no Blipbug, no Nickit, etc.

 

[pika pal]

Legendaries are all taken care of at this point but good to know about the Go Fest stuff; I think I thought it already happened. Carbink will be a nice one to add to the collection.
Doing wonder boxing during an event's always a good way to pick up some spares. Was there a fossil event recently, for example? Big uptick in those guys both in GTS searches and in the wonder box.


I know you (& others) have mentioned here & there but as someone who doesn't play Go and is only into collecting go marks because I've lost my mind to wonder box, it's really fascinating what stuff is significantly rarer than I would ever imagine. Either because they had a very limited release, no true reruns, only available for specific avenues, regional exclusives....the latter's interesting both because there'es far fewer than I thought but also the ones that are regional are ones that make me go "wait really?" Kangaskhan or Klefki, for example.
or the ones that haven't been released. It stunned me that the gen 8 starters still aren't in the game, or how most of gen 8 in general isn't around; and how even the "commons" were in fact very not common. I knew they had to slow down to a drip feed to keep the game more relevant for collectors, but I would at least have thought the starters would have had a run and stuff like Wooloo would be significantly more common. To make no mention of no Rookidee, no Blipbug, no Nickit, etc.

Yeah, the current event is "Adventure Week," which among other things promotes outdoor walking and has the Fossils as pretty common spawns. I imagine you're seeing a lot of the Gen 6 fossils since their shinies debuted with this event (meaning people are hunting and hatching a lot of them to look for those), followed by Aerodactyl, Shieldon, and Cranidos as old Pokemon that are still very relevant to use in something or another (hence lots of captures for Power-up Candy).

The Regionals are weird because some of them I get and others are indeed perplexing, whether for the mon itself or how they're handled as Regionals mechanically. Kangaskhan for example I sort of get because it's Australia exclusive with the Kangaroo/Marsupial motif since those species are only naturally found in Australia as well. The weird ones come in with stuff like Farfetch'd, which is based in East Asia (I assume because of the Duck + Onion Leek joke), but Galarian Farfetch'd I believe has just been a generalized Seasonal Spawn/Egg (i.e. time specific availability but not specific to one area) even though for Candy and Dex purposes they share an entry.

I think the issue with the ridiculous drip feed is that they blew their load on stuff early as mentioned, and they're so low on "hype" stuff to still add, especially because a lot of Pokemon with use in main series (be it collection prospects, PVP, or Main Game runs) don't translate a lot of those traits to here, or the later gens have a LOT of mons with gimmicks built in that are hard to translate meaningfully if at all, so they mostly have design to go off of. Hell, some Pokemon who are in the game still have oddities, like how Regional Evolutions still can't evolve from the base form outside of very specific events (i.e. no way to evolve a Cubone INTO an Alolan Marowak), turning those into more "event exclusive" mons to make.

I also think regardless of that it's to induce a sense of scarcity when they seldom run the good OR the junk-rares. "Oh man, if I don't go hard on Wooloo this time it'll be months before I can get the Dex entry for Dubwool" and such. With that mindset it makes players go that much harder on stuff they want (like the Hatch-Day for Riolu, who until now was only available rarely from 10KM Egg hatching) and more inclined to spend money if it affects the hunt (such as buying the Timed Research tasks for more High IV encounters or Incubators on Hatch focused stuff).

 

[QuentinQuonce]

The way they've released Zygarde stinks (I tried using a route yesterday and found it the process so buggy I gave it up as a bad job) but it annoys me all the more because the one I caught was pretty decent (15-15-13 IVs; every other one-time mythical I've caught has had garbage stats).

A while ago I'd have been tempted to put some candy into it and power it up, but you just know they'll release others eventually so I'll probably end up getting a better one down the line. I'm not even that motivated to go out and find cells since the rate is so low that getting 250 will take forever. I'm sure they'll make that easier in the coming months so I'm fully content to wait.

 

[pika pal]

The way they've released Zygarde stinks (I tried using a route yesterday and found it the process so buggy I gave it up as a bad job) but it annoys me all the more because the one I caught was pretty decent (15-15-13 IVs; every other one-time mythical I've caught has had garbage stats).

A while ago I'd have been tempted to put some candy into it and power it up, but you just know they'll release others eventually so I'll probably end up getting a better one down the line. I'm not even that motivated to go out and find cells since the rate is so low that getting 250 will take forever. I'm sure they'll make that easier in the coming months so I'm fully content to wait.

The other problem is the Routes have terribly hostile QoL implementation, both in general and for finding the cells specifically. The two biggest ones being that the route pauses if you switch off the app even briefly (so can't do things like check a text, answer a phone call, or change your music unless you stop until you reopen it) and that Route auto-ends when you reach the stop rather than having a confirmation prompt.

The reason the latter sucks is because the Route has things that you have to actively interact with, including Route Spawns (usually mons for your World Region) and the Zygarde Cell. The Cell requires you to spot a Green glow on a mostly-green Map floor AND has mostly been reported spawning near the end of the route (which auto-completes if you actually get the end). I have seen multiple people relating stories of spotting the cell and the route ending before it was on-screen for a full second to actually try and collect it.

The Optimal play for this feature is to walk to the end while doing nothing else and not interacting with other players (how's that "get out and meet the community" plan going Niantic?), then stopping just at the end and standing still for minutes to watch for a spawn, because you need to watch for the game to drop a penny in the tiny window you care about on a 500-2000m walk.

 

[QuentinQuonce]

The other problem is the Routes have terribly hostile QoL implementation, both in general and for finding the cells specifically. The two biggest ones being that the route pauses if you switch off the app even briefly (so can't do things like check a text, answer a phone call, or change your music unless you stop until you reopen it) and that Route auto-ends when you reach the stop rather than having a confirmation prompt.

The reason the latter sucks is because the Route has things that you have to actively interact with, including Route Spawns (usually mons for your World Region) and the Zygarde Cell. The Cell requires you to spot a Green glow on a mostly-green Map floor AND has mostly been reported spawning near the end of the route (which auto-completes if you actually get the end). I have seen multiple people relating stories of spotting the cell and the route ending before it was on-screen for a full second to actually try and collect it.

The Optimal play for this feature is to walk to the end while doing nothing else and not interacting with other players (how's that "get out and meet the community" plan going Niantic?), then stopping just at the end and standing still for minutes to watch for a spawn, because you need to watch for the game to drop a penny in the tiny window you care about on a 500-2000m walk.

Couldn't have put it better. I'm sure it'll improve massively in time but for now I'm not touching it.

 

[R_N]

just saw this on bulbapedia, and figured i'd ask this here

Apparently, because of how Spinda works in Go (9 distinct spot patterns, rather than randomly generated), it cannot be transferred out of Go at all? Is that right?
Even if they didn't want to support the random spots in Go, I figured they'd either just let them keep the spots on transfer (& not care that there would be a bunch of spindas with the same spots) or they'd rerandomize them on transfer (& not care that it changes).

 

[Pikachu315111]

just saw this on bulbapedia, and figured i'd ask this here

Apparently, because of how Spinda works in Go (9 distinct spot patterns, rather than randomly generated), it cannot be transferred out of Go at all? Is that right?
Even if they didn't want to support the random spots in Go, I figured they'd either just let them keep the spots on transfer (& not care that there would be a bunch of spindas with the same spots) or they'd rerandomize them on transfer (& not care that it changes).

Maybe they're waiting to do something when the next mainline game with Spinda comes out. If I recall, BDSP actually had it's own issue with Spinda where something messed up in its spots code resulting in the Spinda having the wrong spot positions than its supposed to be, hence Spinda can't be transferred to HOME from BDSP either (because GF is just OBSESSED with with consistency). So until Spinda is in the next mainline game where GF will possibly try to work something out to resolve the issues with Spinda from GO and BDSP, any Spinda in those games are stranded.

I wonder if they were originally going to do something between GO and BDSP with Spinda as it would have been the first mainline game with Spinda in it since Spinda was added in GO, but then the incorrect coding issue happened and scrapped those plans.

 

[R_N]

Maybe they're waiting to do something when the next mainline game with Spinda comes out. If I recall, BDSP actually had it's own issue with Spinda where something messed up in its spots code resulting in the Spinda having the wrong spot positions than its supposed to be, hence Spinda can't be transferred to HOME from BDSP either (because GF is just OBSESSED with with consistency). So until Spinda is in the next mainline game where GF will possibly try to work something out to resolve the issues with Spinda from GO and BDSP, any Spinda in those games are stranded.

I wonder if they were originally going to do something between GO and BDSP with Spinda as it would have been the first mainline game with Spinda in it since Spinda was added in GO, but then the incorrect coding issue happened and scrapped those plans.

I doubt they had any plans with it, honestly. Go Spinda have set patterns they want you to collect (exclusively through research tasks, apparently), so I doubt it introduces the algorithm. And they probably care more about the randomness of patterns in the mainline, so they don't let you transfer them. And they care more about consistency, so you double can't transfer and let the patterns change. That'd just be ridiculous.


Ultimately both caring too much about spinda and also not caring about spinda at all. See also: not just letting the spinda spots change, or finding a way to save the proper spot pattern so its consistent (you're already storing a lto of game specific info and probably making changes internally, just swap the value and feed it to the appropriate game so it displays properly...), with BDSP-Home transfers for Spinda. Care enough not to do that, don't care enough to find a solution.

 

[pika pal]

just saw this on bulbapedia, and figured i'd ask this here

Apparently, because of how Spinda works in Go (9 distinct spot patterns, rather than randomly generated), it cannot be transferred out of Go at all? Is that right?
Even if they didn't want to support the random spots in Go, I figured they'd either just let them keep the spots on transfer (& not care that there would be a bunch of spindas with the same spots) or they'd rerandomize them on transfer (& not care that it changes).

Can confirm it does not let you select Spinda to send to Home. Spinda basically has a fixed pattern you get from a rare Research task, and which pattern they use changes by Season.

Unironically I think it's their being a stickler for Spinda being consistent with the pattern, so neither willing to hard-code Go Spinda to retain their spots, or thinking they have to do something as insane as identify which of the Millions of values gets that Spinda pattern. Gamefreak and co. are no stranger to obtuse/roundabout methods of handling simple issues on the coding side.

 

[R_N]

Can confirm it does not let you select Spinda to send to Home. Spinda basically has a fixed pattern you get from a rare Research task, and which pattern they use changes by Season.

Unironically I think it's their being a stickler for Spinda being consistent with the pattern, so neither willing to hard-code Go Spinda to retain their spots, or thinking they have to do something as insane as identify which of the Millions of values gets that Spinda pattern. Gamefreak and co. are no stranger to obtuse/roundabout methods of handling simple issues on the coding side.

Yeah.....unfortunate. But thanks for confirming.

Unless they ever change their minds (maybe just have them register as special "Go Forms"; the heart spinda in particular would be an easy one) or update the Home Go Dex this means you can never ever complete it. Go could release every single one of the remaining pokemon tomorrow (& also more Zygardes) and you'll always have the Spinda spot blank. Oops!

 

[R_N]

After a string of extremely aggressive GTSing, I am so close to filling out the available Go pokemon in Home (I'm aware Passimian drops in a few days and such, but you get the gist), but I am stalling hard on the last 20 or so and want to ask you folks if my vibes on them are right for why they're annoying and what might make them more common

its a little long so i'll put it under a spoiler

Hide

The "waiting for DLC" Gang:
Emboar, Swadloon, Leavanny, Swanna, Trumbeak, Toucannon
I could get these (like I did with a few others, including the rest of the Snivy line) but their asks are often annoying enough if they show up at all its like whatever the DLC will be out within 6 months. Mostly just listing these for posterity

Johto: Delibird
I assume this is more common around Christmas time? I've actually not seen any from Go, though; even if it's yearly it feels like there'd be more junk offers at least. Certainly people love throwing up the random SV Delibirds they've found asking for nonsense...

Hoenn: Torkoal, Relicanth
Both of these are regionals, the eternal thorn in my side. Still, there's a lot of Asian origin Pokemon on the GTS; the fact I can't find Torkoal at all is really surprising. Maybe the relative commonness of Torkoal (it's in SWSH, BDSP and SV...) means people just don't throw it up as much?
Relicanth....is only in a very specific part of the world apparently? New Zealand (& "surrounding islands")? Geeze. Do regionals really just never get released elsewhere even temporarily?

And of course Spinda...which isn't obtainable in Home through Go at all. So an eternal blank spot. Makes good trade fodder for random stuff, though.

Sinnoh: Pachirisu, Spiritomb, Rotom
Pachirisu is another regional, but Canada is pretty big and surely full of people. Why is the squirrel so rare, come on.
Spiritomb & Rotom I have less a feel for; they seem like they'd be rare spawns, maybe during halloween only? Though Rotom is working with the issue of being in every Switch game and also everyone got a free one (that they vastly over value) in Home.

Unova: Basculin, Sigilyph, Cubchoo, Beartic, Mienfoo, Mienshao, Larvesta, Volcarona

Basculin-White isn't in the game yet, right? Serebii gave me mixed messages at one point...regardless, trying to track down either Red/Blue Basculin has also been weirdly hard. Is it only around during certain periods? Feels like it would have been an "uncommon" kind of encounter.
Sigilyph turned out to be regional exclusive to Egypt & Greece so...well, it sucks but I get why that's rare. Also explains why Pharaoh Cut Furfrou seems to be the most coveted
Cubchoo & Mienfoo I have no gauge on why they don't show up. I guess cubchoo could be "out of season"?
Larvesta I do know because I have a friend who is an "end game" Go Player and has been whiffing the egg gacha hard ever since it went live. Rare spawn in eggs and you can only get so many per day and can only hatch so many at a time. I'm still going to make a grumpy face about it.

Kalos: Carbink

I got extremely lucky on finding back to back offerings of Hawlucha & Klefki, so it's just waiting out Carbink which thanks to you folks I know is due for a (common?) rerun thanks to Go Fest soon.

There's also Zygarde, which at this point I suspect will be the same as Spinda in terms of "can never transfer" because Niantic is dedicated to the cells gimmick.

Alola: Salazzle, Comfey, Sandygast, Palossand
I've only seen one (1) Go-mark (Male) Salandit on GTS, even with legends in the mix. I've gotten plenty of Salazzle through offering my own stuff, but its usually SWSH or SV predictably.
Comfey is Hawaii only. SO I get that it's rare but was hoping Hawaii as a popular tourist spot would at least pepper a few. Is it annoying to get there too?
Sandygast I have no feel on.

Gen 8: Runerigus
OK this one I actually have seen Yamask-G on the GTS for its just annoying to thread the needle on one I can actually trade for. I think this was released...last year? Another halloween one. Might see an influx in a few months, maybe?
Incidentally I managed to get Wooloo(Dubwool), Falinks, Perrserker, Mr Rime (& Mr Mime G) and Ursaluna (i've had an ursaring for ages but Peat Blocks are too much of a nightmare and I had a spare legend to fish around with) in the span of about 4 days after loads of nothing. A real feast/famine situation with this project.

e: literally minutes after this post I finally got a basculin, hot doggity

 

[RocketSurgery]

The "waiting for DLC" Gang:
Emboar, Swadloon, Leavanny, Swanna, Trumbeak, Toucannon
I could get these (like I did with a few others, including the rest of the Snivy line) but their asks are often annoying enough if they show up at all its like whatever the DLC will be out within 6 months. Mostly just listing these for posterity

None of those are particularly rare, but maybe also not worth transferring to home for most people. Tepig had its community day a while back, so the window for people to transfer tons of extra non-shinies is probably closed, and people may not want to transfer extra Emboar with its community day exclusive Blast Burn.

Johto: Delibird
I assume this is more common around Christmas time? I've actually not seen any from Go, though; even if it's yearly it feels like there'd be more junk offers at least. Certainly people love throwing up the random SV Delibirds they've found asking for nonsense...

Yeah, it's common only around Christmas. I think recently it's been around during winter, but pretty uncommon/rare.

Hoenn: Torkoal, Relicanth
Both of these are regionals, the eternal thorn in my side. Still, there's a lot of Asian origin Pokemon on the GTS; the fact I can't find Torkoal at all is really surprising. Maybe the relative commonness of Torkoal (it's in SWSH, BDSP and SV...) means people just don't throw it up as much?
Relicanth....is only in a very specific part of the world apparently? New Zealand (& "surrounding islands")? Geeze. Do regionals really just never get released elsewhere even temporarily?

Torkoal has been made available globally a couple of times now through Hoenn tour and GO Fest, but may still be rare enough that people are holding on to it. Relicanth is much more rare. It was in 7k eggs recently during the Hoenn tour, so it was still kind of limited even then and is probably still worth holding onto for trades in game.

Sinnoh: Pachirisu, Spiritomb, Rotom
Pachirisu is another regional, but Canada is pretty big and surely full of people. Why is the squirrel so rare, come on.
Spiritomb & Rotom I have less a feel for; they seem like they'd be rare spawns, maybe during halloween only? Though Rotom is working with the issue of being in every Switch game and also everyone got a free one (that they vastly over value) in Home.

Pachirusu is only available in northern Canada (the much less populated part), so not many people would have it.

Spiritomb is only around on Halloween, and usually only through research, so not many extras.

Rotom so far has only been available through GO Fests, so it is very limited and you're unlikely to find any extras on HOME any time soon.

Unova: Basculin, Sigilyph, Cubchoo, Beartic, Mienfoo, Mienshao, Larvesta, Volcarona

Basculin-White isn't in the game yet, right? Serebii gave me mixed messages at one point...regardless, trying to track down either Red/Blue Basculin has also been weirdly hard. Is it only around during certain periods? Feels like it would have been an "uncommon" kind of encounter.
Sigilyph turned out to be regional exclusive to Egypt & Greece so...well, it sucks but I get why that's rare. Also explains why Pharaoh Cut Furfrou seems to be the most coveted
Cubchoo & Mienfoo I have no gauge on why they don't show up. I guess cubchoo could be "out of season"?
Larvesta I do know because I have a friend who is an "end game" Go Player and has been whiffing the egg gacha hard ever since it went live. Rare spawn in eggs and you can only get so many per day and can only hatch so many at a time. I'm still going to make a grumpy face about it.

For the most part spot on. I think red/blue Basculin is somewhat uncommon/rare; no white in game yet. Cubchoo is common enough during winter. Mienfoo is pretty uncommon; at one point it was only a GO Battle league reward, now it might be in 7k eggs.

Kalos: Carbink

I got extremely lucky on finding back to back offerings of Hawlucha & Klefki, so it's just waiting out Carbink which thanks to you folks I know is due for a (common?) rerun thanks to Go Fest soon.

There's also Zygarde, which at this point I suspect will be the same as Spinda in terms of "can never transfer" because Niantic is dedicated to the cells gimmick.

Zygarde will probably be put into raids at some point and then will be transferrable, but who knows how long it will be before that happens.

Alola: Salazzle, Comfey, Sandygast, Palossand
I've only seen one (1) Go-mark (Male) Salandit on GTS, even with legends in the mix. I've gotten plenty of Salazzle through offering my own stuff, but its usually SWSH or SV predictably.
Comfey is Hawaii only. SO I get that it's rare but was hoping Hawaii as a popular tourist spot would at least pepper a few. Is it annoying to get there too?
Sandygast I have no feel on.

Salandit is only available through 12k eggs, so getting a female will be a challenge. I don't know about Comfey. Sandygast was made available for during an event in which you could only get it through research quests. If it spawns in the wild at all right now it must be very rare, since I have not seen one since the event ended, so probably unlikely to see many on HOME.

Gen 8: Runerigus
OK this one I actually have seen Yamask-G on the GTS for its just annoying to thread the needle on one I can actually trade for. I think this was released...last year? Another halloween one. Might see an influx in a few months, maybe?

Another Halloween-season only mon, I think it's been somewhat limited, but hopefully easier to get this coming Halloween.

 

[pika pal]

After a string of extremely aggressive GTSing, I am so close to filling out the available Go pokemon in Home (I'm aware Passimian drops in a few days and such, but you get the gist), but I am stalling hard on the last 20 or so and want to ask you folks if my vibes on them are right for why they're annoying and what might make them more common

its a little long so i'll put it under a spoiler

Hide

The "waiting for DLC" Gang:
Emboar, Swadloon, Leavanny, Swanna, Trumbeak, Toucannon
I could get these (like I did with a few others, including the rest of the Snivy line) but their asks are often annoying enough if they show up at all its like whatever the DLC will be out within 6 months. Mostly just listing these for posterity

Johto: Delibird
I assume this is more common around Christmas time? I've actually not seen any from Go, though; even if it's yearly it feels like there'd be more junk offers at least. Certainly people love throwing up the random SV Delibirds they've found asking for nonsense...

Hoenn: Torkoal, Relicanth
Both of these are regionals, the eternal thorn in my side. Still, there's a lot of Asian origin Pokemon on the GTS; the fact I can't find Torkoal at all is really surprising. Maybe the relative commonness of Torkoal (it's in SWSH, BDSP and SV...) means people just don't throw it up as much?
Relicanth....is only in a very specific part of the world apparently? New Zealand (& "surrounding islands")? Geeze. Do regionals really just never get released elsewhere even temporarily?

And of course Spinda...which isn't obtainable in Home through Go at all. So an eternal blank spot. Makes good trade fodder for random stuff, though.

Sinnoh: Pachirisu, Spiritomb, Rotom
Pachirisu is another regional, but Canada is pretty big and surely full of people. Why is the squirrel so rare, come on.
Spiritomb & Rotom I have less a feel for; they seem like they'd be rare spawns, maybe during halloween only? Though Rotom is working with the issue of being in every Switch game and also everyone got a free one (that they vastly over value) in Home.

Unova: Basculin, Sigilyph, Cubchoo, Beartic, Mienfoo, Mienshao, Larvesta, Volcarona

Basculin-White isn't in the game yet, right? Serebii gave me mixed messages at one point...regardless, trying to track down either Red/Blue Basculin has also been weirdly hard. Is it only around during certain periods? Feels like it would have been an "uncommon" kind of encounter.
Sigilyph turned out to be regional exclusive to Egypt & Greece so...well, it sucks but I get why that's rare. Also explains why Pharaoh Cut Furfrou seems to be the most coveted
Cubchoo & Mienfoo I have no gauge on why they don't show up. I guess cubchoo could be "out of season"?
Larvesta I do know because I have a friend who is an "end game" Go Player and has been whiffing the egg gacha hard ever since it went live. Rare spawn in eggs and you can only get so many per day and can only hatch so many at a time. I'm still going to make a grumpy face about it.

Kalos: Carbink

I got extremely lucky on finding back to back offerings of Hawlucha & Klefki, so it's just waiting out Carbink which thanks to you folks I know is due for a (common?) rerun thanks to Go Fest soon.

There's also Zygarde, which at this point I suspect will be the same as Spinda in terms of "can never transfer" because Niantic is dedicated to the cells gimmick.

Alola: Salazzle, Comfey, Sandygast, Palossand
I've only seen one (1) Go-mark (Male) Salandit on GTS, even with legends in the mix. I've gotten plenty of Salazzle through offering my own stuff, but its usually SWSH or SV predictably.
Comfey is Hawaii only. SO I get that it's rare but was hoping Hawaii as a popular tourist spot would at least pepper a few. Is it annoying to get there too?
Sandygast I have no feel on.

Gen 8: Runerigus
OK this one I actually have seen Yamask-G on the GTS for its just annoying to thread the needle on one I can actually trade for. I think this was released...last year? Another halloween one. Might see an influx in a few months, maybe?
Incidentally I managed to get Wooloo(Dubwool), Falinks, Perrserker, Mr Rime (& Mr Mime G) and Ursaluna (i've had an ursaring for ages but Peat Blocks are too much of a nightmare and I had a spare legend to fish around with) in the span of about 4 days after loads of nothing. A real feast/famine situation with this project.

e: literally minutes after this post I finally got a basculin, hot doggity

In order

- The DLC Gang is weird because the vast majority of those Pokemon are fairly common spawns, save Tepig who is limited to Research and rare spawns (but has had a community day where it spawned in droves), so it is odd that there are no throwaways of those flying around.

- Regionals generally are only available in their home country outside of very specific times. Most frequently you'll see stuff like Go Fest or Go Tour themed around a game region and making the corresponding "real world" Regionals available through eggs (which still is rare outside their home turf) like Kangaskhan for the Kanto Fest.

- Spiritomb tends to be made available once a year through a special Research for the last part of the year/Halloween, so not very plentiful as of now. Not sure why it hasn't been a raid boss yet. Rotom only has two of the Appliance forms in the game as Snapshot encounters from specific Go Fests in certain regions, so small time window and very limited number of participants. Pachirisu I guess Canadians don't do GTS haggling.

- Basculin I believe is regional so see Pachirisu for whichever region of the world it spawns in. Cubchoo I think is only around during Christmas and winter, while Mienfoo the only way I know it to be available is as a reward encounter in Go Battle League PVP (meaning someone has to win 3/5 for a set of battles at certain difficulties and then the Encounter spawn has to be Mienfoo out of a pool of at least 13 Pokemon (and this assuming even distribution on the encounters). Volcarona sucks to get

- Carbink is slated for Go Fest Global in about 2.5 Weeks since it is the Raid Boss that gives Diancie Mega Energy (Diancie itself being a one-off from special Research). Carbink was also available early from Research and the assumption is it will be catchable from the Raids because it's good but needs to be nearly max level in PvP for one of the Leagues. Zygarde is a TBD because the Cells are a Route feature but no telling if they make it easier to obtain later or give ways to get more Zygarde to in turn encourage getting more Cells for them (like one Zygarde for each of the 3 Leagues would mean plenty of Candy farming off the raids and then months of looking for ~~location data~~ Cells)

- Salazzle is almost as bad as Volcarona. The only major way to get Salandit right now is hatching 12 km Eggs (long time to do) which you get from beating Rocket Leaders (which entails beating 6 Grunts per Leader for a Radar to find them) for a CHANCE at Salandit (Uncommon rarity out of a pool of 12 Pokemon with 4 commons, 3 Uncommons, 1 semi-rare and 4 Very Rare) that then has to be Female (1/8 chance after all of the above). Top this off with the rest of the egg hatches for it not being very exciting and you'd basically be hatching exclusively for Salandit Gacha. Sandygast was from Research during an event ~2 months ago, so people hunted it but couldn't exactly farm it (had to find specific Research Tasks to catch 25 Water Pokemon per Sand), not to mention needing candy to evolve one if they were collecting within Go.

- For Yamask-G, it's very rare outside of Halloween (where it splits Research real estate with normal Yamask), or has to be hatched from a non-farmable Adventure Sync Egg: you get a 5 and/or 10km Egg once a week on Monday based on your overall walking distance the previous week IF you have a free egg (when you get eggs from basically anything that gives you items or Pokeballs like spinning stops or opening gifts without optional or being able to remove eggs you don't want to hatch). Getting this thing sucks.
-- The rest of the Galar spawns mentioned run a gamut. Ursaluna was a Community Day for the reasonably common last-season Teddiursa, Wooloo is sparingly available but common when it shows up (GBL Reward spawn, common spawn during Sleep tie-in, and slated for the PWC tie-in event soon where they run a bunch of PvP relevant Pokemon in the wild), and the rest would be uncommon through things like 7km Regional Eggs (Perrserker/Galar Meowth), only in Go Battle encounters (Falinks), or from Research that I don't think has rerun (Galarian Mime/Mr. Rime).

Brief addendum to Rocket's comment beating me to the punch: Mienfoo is not currently in 7km eggs, so I think it is exclusive to GBL if it is available at all this season.

 

[R_N]

Thank you both, so most was about spot on and the ones that weren't are pretty much "rarer than you thought they were". It's genuinely fascinating how....very specific, I'll say, some Pokemon can be. The go fests having subregionals, the battle league exclusives, the extremely rare eggs...would never have imagined Salandit would be on par or worse than Larvesta! The research-exclusive Pokemon also throw a wrench into things since people will be less willing to dump them into Home.

Makes me appreciative of how lucky I got on a ton of other pokemon (including, just now, a Yamask-G for a Cofagrigus) over the past 2 months

Honestly how some of you folks manage to deal with this in Go is impressive, especially since it takes so much more dedication to obtain and evolve. No wonder there's so much underlying bitterness at stuff Go does to make everything harder.

I'll probably keep checking GTS on & off (need to anyway, for when Passimian) but I might just bite the bullet and start fishing for actual trades rather than GTS at some point. Or at least check in again around the proper season, for some of them.

oh, also...

In order

- The DLC Gang is weird because the vast majority of those Pokemon are fairly common spawns, save Tepig who is limited to Research and rare spawns (but has had a community day where it spawned in droves), so it is odd that there are no throwaways of those flying around.

The base forms are quite common (well, Ducklett a bit uncommon), but the intermediate or final forms less so. I've actually had quite a number of Tepig in my possession, even; but not as many people evolve them all the way and then put them on GTS. Presumably most people just dump their spares and outside of certain Pokemon are unlikely to have evolved ones in more abundance than their lower versions.


The biggest exception being the babies. Conceptually, I get why, babies are introduced after their evolved forms since they go by region, so they're probably not marked as common spawns and judging by how the rest of this conversation goes probably locked behind research or rare eggs.
But this did not make them probably some of the top aggrevations where I popped off every time I managed to barely stumble into one and get a trade out before they disappeared. Even Togepi! Togetics were stunningly common, but not the egg proper. Mime Jr in particular was a nightmare and I only got finally found one literally yesterday (ironically after finding a separate Mr Mime-G to evolve); Europe-exclusive didn't help here but sheesh.

- Basculin I believe is regional so see Pachirisu for whichever region of the world it spawns in.

Basculin is "just" based on Hemisphere, according to serebii, so together they're effectively worldwide. But based on what Rocket said, sounds like they aren't very common spawns. Unfortunate.

 

[pika pal]

Thank you both, so most was about spot on and the ones that weren't are pretty much "rarer than you thought they were". It's genuinely fascinating how....very specific, I'll say, some Pokemon can be. The go fests having subregionals, the battle league exclusives, the extremely rare eggs...would never have imagined Salandit would be on par or worse than Larvesta! The research-exclusive Pokemon also throw a wrench into things since people will be less willing to dump them into Home.

Makes me appreciative of how lucky I got on a ton of other pokemon (including, just now, a Yamask-G for a Cofagrigus) over the past 2 months

Honestly how some of you folks manage to deal with this in Go is impressive, especially since it takes so much more dedication to obtain and evolve. No wonder there's so much underlying bitterness at stuff Go does to make everything harder.

I'll probably keep checking GTS on & off (need to anyway, for when Passimian) but I might just bite the bullet and start fishing for actual trades rather than GTS at some point. Or at least check in again around the proper season, for some of them.

oh, also...


The base forms are quite common (well, Ducklett a bit uncommon), but the intermediate or final forms less so. I've actually had quite a number of Tepig in my possession, even; but not as many people evolve them all the way and then put them on GTS. Presumably most people just dump their spares and outside of certain Pokemon are unlikely to have evolved ones in more abundance than their lower versions.


The biggest exception being the babies. Conceptually, I get why, babies are introduced after their evolved forms since they go by region, so they're probably not marked as common spawns and judging by how the rest of this conversation goes probably locked behind research or rare eggs.
But this did not make them probably some of the top aggrevations where I popped off every time I managed to barely stumble into one and get a trade out before they disappeared. Even Togepi! Togetics were stunningly common, but not the egg proper. Mime Jr in particular was a nightmare and I only got finally found one literally yesterday (ironically after finding a separate Mr Mime-G to evolve); Europe-exclusive didn't help here but sheesh.


Basculin is "just" based on Hemisphere, according to serebii, so together they're effectively worldwide. But based on what Rocket said, sounds like they aren't very common spawns. Unfortunate.

Research Exclusive Pokemon aren't AS much of a headache to get within Go in theory, since during the event they're tied to the research is reasonably common. Issue there is since you can't get them outside that time people like to hang onto them as Trade pieces or transfer during certain Spotlights for more candy on their good ones.

For Sigilyph, keep an eye out for a bit and during Go Fest NY in about 2 weeks, since they show up as wild spawns for that event (no word on Global Go Fest a week after that) and thus may see another dump on GTS.

And yeah, most Babies are only available via Eggs. Togetic had an entire Community Day and is still a rare Wild Spawn outside that because they don't put Babies like Togepi on the map. It had the side-effect of making Togetic day very lucrative since it still had "evolved" level drops for Candy and Stardust, people amassing upwards of 4k Candy for the species AFTER evolving Togekisses with the special move. In general, Baby Pokemon are MUCH rarer than their evolved counterparts if said evolved forms are wild anywhere (even Regionals like Mr. Mime-K), the only exception I know at the moment being Riolu (who had a "Hatch Day" event and inevitably has Lucario's Mega Release to contend with).

Main things in the WCS event that aren't already pretty typical spawns include Passimian Debut, and stuff like Scraggy, Lickitung, and Sableye in the Wild plus a few Raid bosses like Skarmory and Galarian Stunfisk. Not sure if you need to grab any regionals separately but a few of those pop up as PvP staples that will be spawned for Candy padding (Sandshrew and Zigzagoon being two others there)

 

[QuentinQuonce]

I believe Pachirisu is also going to be part of the global Go Fest. Galarian Yamask has just been put into 10KM eggs so it might get slightly more common from here on out, but realistically it'll be much easier to obtain in October.

Torkoal you missed the window on - it was in 10KM eggs during Go Fest (I hatched a shiny, go me! Guarding that thing fiercely) but that was obviously only for a couple days. Pachirisu is generally considered the rarest regional (not my conclusion, this was being discussed on r/Silphroad the other day) purely for the fact that the population of where it spawns is just lower but it's weird that Torkoal is rare on the GTS given that it's native to India, which has a massive population.

Not sure why Swadloon is rare (Sewaddle is everywhere for me atm) but as someone else said it might not be considered worth the transfer. Pikipek IIRC hasn't been too common this season (and again Trumbeak/Toucannon not worth the transfer - pretty sure it can't be shiny yet can it?) but I've still got a ton of shiny Tepig and I think a few spare shiny Delibird; I seem to recall catching a fair few of those which was notable to me because IIRC it's not a boosted-odds species.

I've actually been fairly lucky with Salandit recently and have a couple of females - I've traded most of them so could drop a couple into Home if you're really keen to get one (/Salazzle). There'll probably be some sort of hatch event for it at some point. I look forward to having the same luck I've had with Combee and catching three shiny males.

(also fun fact, I still haven't gotten around to evolving the G-Yamask I got during last Halloween's event! Need to make some time for the next 2x evolution XP hour...)

 

[Ivy]

American GoFest is in a week, so there's more chances for the torkoal and such.

 

[RocketSurgery]

I went to the NYC GO Fest this weekend, and it went pretty well in terms of shiny haul. I do think the Park experience was better last year, though. This year it was in "Randall's Island Park" (I guess Central Park is too big and/or expensive to try and section off a part and keep non-players out).

Getting to the park was a bit of a pain -- you could buy tickets for a ferry that Niantic set up, or take a bus which I hear was free for the event but standing room only, or you could walk across a bridge from Manhattan. We came over on the bridge and it was definitely crowded, moreso when leaving than on our way in.

Much of the park also lacked tree cover, so we were pretty much out in the sun the whole time. The options for food and drink were also somewhat limited: a bunch of food trucks and some water stations if you had a bottle, but most of these were also out in the open so you'd be waiting in a long line out in the sun. The line for the merch tent was similarly right out in the open, and I hear some people waited for hours to get in, so we didn't even bother.

In contrast, last year's park location of Seattle Center was better in terms of being much easier to get to, having lots of trees and shade, and also some buildings to pop into to get food or merch.

In terms of city experience, though, it's definitely hard to beat NYC. You are pretty much always within range of a pokestop, and you never have to worry about a raid lobby failing to fill up. Plus attendees got an extra three hours of spawns on Saturday because of Verizon network problems. (I have Verizon and my game definitely struggled at times, but fortunately not so much I was locked out of the game for any extended period of time).

We must have missed the trade area this time; last year there was a specific spot for people looking to trade to go to and find people to trade with, but we didn't stumble upon it this year. I totally forgot about all the newer regionals like Klefki, Hawlucha, Comfey, or we might have made more of an effort to find it.

In terms of the haul, I was happy to get a lot of shinies I didn't have yet. The highlights were three(!) Tyrunt after not getting any during adventure week and a Golett that I got last minute. I also got shiny satchel Aerodactyl and crown Pikachu. Incidentally, while I was clearing out eggs to get presents I also finally hatched a Larvesta.

As for R_N's HOME hunt, there were lots of Sigilyph spawns at the event, so you might be able to find some of those on the GTS soon. No Torkoal this time around, but at Global GO Fest this weekend Carnivine and Pachirisu will be spawning from incense, so those might be available soon too.

 

[R_N]

As for R_N's HOME hunt, there were lots of Sigilyph spawns at the event, so you might be able to find some of those on the GTS soon. No Torkoal this time around, but at Global GO Fest this weekend Carnivine and Pachirisu will be spawning from incense, so those might be available soon too.

Well, since you mentioned me....

Hide

During the Passimian Hunt, I actually managed to luck out and cut through a large swath to the backlog thanks to some lucky out of nowhere additions to the GTS
-Actually found a Basculin later that day on the 9th; i dont even remember what they wanted but it was something i had spares of. Not too big a nask.
-Yamask-G the same day too
-Relicanth for a Gorebyss on the 11th. This was funny since I had to pull out Ultra Sun to "refuel" and hunt a Clamperl, but you bet your ass I hit that trade button asap lol
-Delibird actually had a few go up randomly, but they were for some obscene trades that, for a Pokemon that would be come pretty common in a few months wasn't worth it...but then one went up for a Pawmot on the 12th! We take those!
-Torkoal for a Giratina on the 13th. I had a spare Mewtwo so I was able to chain into it. "wow what a steal" <- unironic things that this whole experience has made me state
-Some Spiritombs went up but for various legendary Pokemon. Unlike Torkoal, I passed since they'd come around on Halloween, but they went very fast. Around this point I realized there's probably quite a few people on GTS that are desperate for their Go Pokedex as well. This would become a theme. But on the 14th, one went up for a Blitzle. Just any Blitzle too...I sent them a Go Mark one I had lying around.
-They had a Pokestop around me so whiel I dont like playing Go, I do like messing with my friend so I thought it'd be funny to keep getting and hatching eggs until I got bored or got a Larvesta. And on egg #8 I got the thing and yes my friend was in shambles and everyone in the group bullied them it was great. I'm glad I'm not a Go player though, because 400 candies is...goodness...that's a lot for a Pokemon you can only get out of eggs....I know you can get candies out of the buddy feature but those aren't very quick either....in contrast sending it over to evolve was painless. Is Volcarona at least, like...meta? To be worth its steep cost.
-Sigilyph for a Lugia on the 16th. I had actually seen a few Go Sigilyphs pop up around the same time, it was interesting to me since Go Fest hadn't started yet. One of them wanted a level 90-100 Mewtwo. The Lugia was the only one I could do. Thankfully easy to replace as well
-Got a Mienfoo out of some GTS loops (putting up some pokemon X for something I need, then putting that back up X again, repeat).
-My crown Jewel, a few Comfey had gone up that same day and one of them wanted a reasonable legend: Dialga. It was a tense 13 minutes as I dug around before rmeember I hada spare.
-I got a Passimian on the last day it was available, it was honestly really rough going. I only saw 3 show up in the search and it was for like a Kubfu (of course). I did manage to get one after a lot (A LOT) of sending my own dudes up on GTS though. I imagine the 3 Star Raid exclusivity made it something people didn't really send over...I'm also guessing it's not very good so there's little reason to get more.

Also thank you again QuentinQuonce for the girl salandit!


Then for Go Fest I was hoping to get Carbink and Rotom. I saw one in the GTS (for a Frost Rotom) but I didn't get to it in time. I went through SO many loops before getting the Carbink. Do you know how many Moon and Heavy Ball Carbink are on GTS? TOO MANY.
I suspect that Carbink only being available as part of research (from a pool of 4 or 5 pokemon) made it more rare than I had expected so less people would send it to Home.

And Rotom....I didn't get at all. I didn't even SEE one for an absurd ask. I checked both any Rotom and Frost Rotom (since that was the one available) but neither of them ever came in through the entire event.
I think Rotom is at a really bad spot, GTS wise. It's really rare to begin with in Go (photobombs only in Go Fests) but everyone has Rotoms in Home. Even ignoring it being in SWSH, BDSP and LA you get a free one for just using the GTS. It was to the point that I started just releasing any Home-origin Rotom, to stop the cycle. Do you know how many I threw away because the answer is probably closer to 100 then you'd think.
So you got a rare pokemon that has little incentive to trash much less send to Home, and then Home itself gives everyone a Rotom to fuel all the rotom trades you put up. Bad combination.


While I'm here, Pachirisu continues to be obnoxious in new ways. 3 of them finally landed on GTS. All from the same guy. All asking for DLC legendary Pokemon. He kept taking them down and putting them up for different ones (definitely the same ones too). I think he still has the Urshifu one up there and its like dude it aint happening. The other 2 he either took down for good or some even more desperate Go Dex people took him on the trade but since I saw him actively doing the reuploads before...

Iin a month I'll be able to evolve the Sewaddle & Ducklett, and Pikipek in DLC 2; I found an Emboar for Emboar trade though so that was nice. The end result is now I only need Pachirisu, Rotom, Cubchoo/Beartic, and Sandygast/Pallosand
so needless to say i'm rubbing my hands at the idea of global go fest putting more pachis into the system

 

[pika pal]

Well, since you mentioned me....

Hide

During the Passimian Hunt, I actually managed to luck out and cut through a large swath to the backlog thanks to some lucky out of nowhere additions to the GTS
-Actually found a Basculin later that day on the 9th; i dont even remember what they wanted but it was something i had spares of. Not too big a nask.
-Yamask-G the same day too
-Relicanth for a Gorebyss on the 11th. This was funny since I had to pull out Ultra Sun to "refuel" and hunt a Clamperl, but you bet your ass I hit that trade button asap lol
-Delibird actually had a few go up randomly, but they were for some obscene trades that, for a Pokemon that would be come pretty common in a few months wasn't worth it...but then one went up for a Pawmot on the 12th! We take those!
-Torkoal for a Giratina on the 13th. I had a spare Mewtwo so I was able to chain into it. "wow what a steal" <- unironic things that this whole experience has made me state
-Some Spiritombs went up but for various legendary Pokemon. Unlike Torkoal, I passed since they'd come around on Halloween, but they went very fast. Around this point I realized there's probably quite a few people on GTS that are desperate for their Go Pokedex as well. This would become a theme. But on the 14th, one went up for a Blitzle. Just any Blitzle too...I sent them a Go Mark one I had lying around.
-They had a Pokestop around me so whiel I dont like playing Go, I do like messing with my friend so I thought it'd be funny to keep getting and hatching eggs until I got bored or got a Larvesta. And on egg #8 I got the thing and yes my friend was in shambles and everyone in the group bullied them it was great. I'm glad I'm not a Go player though, because 400 candies is...goodness...that's a lot for a Pokemon you can only get out of eggs....I know you can get candies out of the buddy feature but those aren't very quick either....in contrast sending it over to evolve was painless. Is Volcarona at least, like...meta? To be worth its steep cost.
-Sigilyph for a Lugia on the 16th. I had actually seen a few Go Sigilyphs pop up around the same time, it was interesting to me since Go Fest hadn't started yet. One of them wanted a level 90-100 Mewtwo. The Lugia was the only one I could do. Thankfully easy to replace as well
-Got a Mienfoo out of some GTS loops (putting up some pokemon X for something I need, then putting that back up X again, repeat).
-My crown Jewel, a few Comfey had gone up that same day and one of them wanted a reasonable legend: Dialga. It was a tense 13 minutes as I dug around before rmeember I hada spare.
-I got a Passimian on the last day it was available, it was honestly really rough going. I only saw 3 show up in the search and it was for like a Kubfu (of course). I did manage to get one after a lot (A LOT) of sending my own dudes up on GTS though. I imagine the 3 Star Raid exclusivity made it something people didn't really send over...I'm also guessing it's not very good so there's little reason to get more.

Also thank you again QuentinQuonce for the girl salandit!


Then for Go Fest I was hoping to get Carbink and Rotom. I saw one in the GTS (for a Frost Rotom) but I didn't get to it in time. I went through SO many loops before getting the Carbink. Do you know how many Moon and Heavy Ball Carbink are on GTS? TOO MANY.
I suspect that Carbink only being available as part of research (from a pool of 4 or 5 pokemon) made it more rare than I had expected so less people would send it to Home.

And Rotom....I didn't get at all. I didn't even SEE one for an absurd ask. I checked both any Rotom and Frost Rotom (since that was the one available) but neither of them ever came in through the entire event.
I think Rotom is at a really bad spot, GTS wise. It's really rare to begin with in Go (photobombs only in Go Fests) but everyone has Rotoms in Home. Even ignoring it being in SWSH, BDSP and LA you get a free one for just using the GTS. It was to the point that I started just releasing any Home-origin Rotom, to stop the cycle. Do you know how many I threw away because the answer is probably closer to 100 then you'd think.
So you got a rare pokemon that has little incentive to trash much less send to Home, and then Home itself gives everyone a Rotom to fuel all the rotom trades you put up. Bad combination.


While I'm here, Pachirisu continues to be obnoxious in new ways. 3 of them finally landed on GTS. All from the same guy. All asking for DLC legendary Pokemon. He kept taking them down and putting them up for different ones (definitely the same ones too). I think he still has the Urshifu one up there and its like dude it aint happening. The other 2 he either took down for good or some even more desperate Go Dex people took him on the trade but since I saw him actively doing the reuploads before...

Iin a month I'll be able to evolve the Sewaddle & Ducklett, and Pikipek in DLC 2; I found an Emboar for Emboar trade though so that was nice. The end result is now I only need Pachirisu, Rotom, Cubchoo/Beartic, and Sandygast/Pallosand
so needless to say i'm rubbing my hands at the idea of global go fest putting more pachis into the system

A note, Passimian was also available via a Research Task (Trade a Pokemon -> Get an encounter) during the World Championship tie-in event, so while not common you could get it for free if you had people to interact with. People would be going out and doing a lot of catching and trading (since trades reroll IVs and give Candy) to complete those on the side.

For Sigilyph I THINK it might have been available at London Go Fest a week prior, so some people might have been putting theirs up before Go Fest NYC this past weekend brought in a new "wave" to increase the trade pool and thus potentially reduce their value.

Sandygast looks like the main one you'll struggle to find randomly (Rotom I just don't think is gonna happen without a Blue Moon or some active help at this rate) until they rerun its event.

The other thing with Carbink is that it's rare for Go Fest but valuable in PVP, so people are inclined to hold onto their spares even without an optimal one. The big time to watch for would have been the incoming Weekend for Global Go Fest, where Carbink is available to raid as a low-difficulty target (2 Star so soloable with Steels) that has incentives beyond the mon itself (Candy from catches and Diancie Energy for Ticket buyers) that would have resulted in a bigger influx of "excess" Carbink.

I still wonder how long Rotom's going to remain a rarity. Genuinely surprised that you evidently got the Galarian Birds so quickly, because those things are the scarcest thing in Go save Rotom (or at least are comparable while I expect people are more reluctant to transfer them).

 

[R_N]

A note, Passimian was also available via a Research Task (Trade a Pokemon -> Get an encounter) during the World Championship tie-in event, so while not common you could get it for free if you had people to interact with. People would be going out and doing a lot of catching and trading (since trades reroll IVs and give Candy) to complete those on the side.

For Sigilyph I THINK it might have been available at London Go Fest a week prior, so some people might have been putting theirs up before Go Fest NYC this past weekend brought in a new "wave" to increase the trade pool and thus potentially reduce their value.

Sandygast looks like the main one you'll struggle to find randomly (Rotom I just don't think is gonna happen without a Blue Moon or some active help at this rate) until they rerun its event.

Yeah I saw that task as well, but it still didn't result in a lot of people throwing one into GTS in a timely manner.
Sigilyph makes sense, interesting how they keep using that as a Go Fest encounter. Guess they realized maybe it was a bit too rare?

Sandygast & Rotom yeah I might just head over to the trade forum at this point. Who knows when the former might come around again and the latter is as pointed out a nightmare. I'll wait for the Global Go Fest though, just in case; need to search for Pachi anyway.

The other thing with Carbink is that it's rare for Go Fest but valuable in PVP, so people are inclined to hold onto their spares even without an optimal one. The big time to watch for would have been the incoming Weekend for Global Go Fest, where Carbink is available to raid as a low-difficulty target (2 Star so soloable with Steels) that has incentives beyond the mon itself (Candy from catches and Diancie Energy for Ticket buyers) that would have resulted in a bigger influx of "excess" Carbink.

Ohhh the Global was going to have the raid, not this one. That makes more sense.
I'm surprised it's valuable for PVP, Carbink's not one of those Pokemon I imagine would be "great". I knew catching it gave Diancie Energy but not the raid stuff. Any particular reason why?

I still wonder how long Rotom's going to remain a rarity. Genuinely surprised that you evidently got the Galarian Birds so quickly, because those things are the scarcest thing in Go save Rotom (or at least are comparable while I expect people are more reluctant to transfer them).

Yeah Rotom's been around for a while too, hasn't it? What's the form change situation like anyway. Is it one of those cases where it costs a bunch of candy to swap forms or is it "you catch it as that and it stays that way"?

And slight correction I got the normal Birds. I didn't even bother searching for the Galarian Variants; as I commented in the Home thread I didn't even realize they had been released in Go. In fact just doing a cursory search doesn't turn up any Go Mark galarian birds on GTS, so if I had to chase down all the variants hooooo boy would I have probably just given up on this whole escapade (or gotten VERY familiar with the trade forum...). It'd also mean I would have to get all the Furfrous and brother let me tell you. That is not happening.

The various Home pokedexes doesn't care about form just that you have the pokemon, and only displays the default. I keep a few of the variants if I happen upon them (I actually found the majority of the regional forms) but I don't worry about getting all of them. So for example when I got the Galarian Mr Mime, it filled in the Mr Mime spot in the dex and there's no dedicated slot for Mr Mime-G. No need to collect all the Burmy with a specific mark, any one Burmy will do (& always display as the Grass Cloak) for a given game.

 

[QuentinQuonce]

As the resident Skrelp and Venonat fanatic the current event is perfect for me. Double candy, more raid passes while Xerneas, Yveltal, and Turtonator... what more could you want?

Amusingly after missing it during Adventure Week I've managed to find two shiny Tyrunt, gorgeous shiny that it is. Had a very auspicious few days, my friend traded me a Pom-Pom Oricorio she'd been saving from Brazil and it turned into a lucky 98 (it's a female, nickname suggestions pls. I'm thinking something stereotypical for an American cheerleader like Brittany or Ashleigh or Jennalynn) and then I got my first ever shlundo* - Aerodactyl - from another trade. But that still wasn't the best - I got a shundo Skrelp! On my baby account, but still.

*for those unfamiliar with the terminology, shundo is shiny hundo (100% stats); shlundo is shiny lucky hundo



Haven't used Home in months outside of just chucking Pokemon into it from Go and I've just opened up the app and... goddamn. There's 68 shinies from Go in there, including several legendaries... if only I'd known people wanted Go-origin Pokemon so badly. I'd have never released anything on Go.

Should take all of 5 minutes to get all the new species when Home updates for the DLC. Who needs to actually play the game, anyway?

This year's the first Go Fest I really haven't given much of a thought to. None of the featured species or new shinies are particularly interesting and the ticket price is way too high. Come talk to me when shiny Diancie gets released in seven or eight years. I'll be free on Sunday so will no doubt get out to do some Mega Rayquaza raids but, having a lucky 98 shiny Ray already, there's really not much incentive to raid much harder than is needed to get enough energy to mega evolve it once. Then I'll just have it as my buddy for the next few weeks and rack up additional energy.

Everyone seems to expect a Sinnoh tour next year, but I'm less and less convinced. The only "ordinary" Sinnoh shiny left is Stunky: Chingling is the last baby Pokemon with its shiny unreleased, while Chatot, Carnivine, and Pachirisu haven't had their shinies released yet but obviously they're regionals. Also the last two of those are being featured in Go Fest so it feels a bit weird to have them as the selling point for another event so soon after (if we assume Sinnoh tour will be in Feb/March as the others were). Shinies aside, there's a bunch of Pokemon from Sinnoh that just straight-up haven't been released at all: Rotom still has three forms unreleased while Phione, Manaphy, and Arceus have yet to make an appearance. I highly doubt they'd want to drop all of those at once.

I continue to be baffled at how Rotom has been handled in Go: the actual way it's been released is fine, whatever, cool. Wash Rotom was a nice surprise back in 2020 (2020's Go Fest really was the best one ever as far as I'm concerned). It's the sort of Pokemon you'd expect to be available from a gimmick feature of some sort like Kecleon or Scatterbug so I can see why it's taken ages to be rolled out. But it's just so odd to me they'd ignore the original form for this long: they've released three of the more popular forms so it's going to be really underwhelming if that's the last one.

Not complaining, though. Just wish I had an insight into the thinking behind Niantic's release schedule. Enjoying being surprised and also being massively impatient are... not traits of mine that mesh well.

Anyway. Someone suggested that they might do a "recap" tour of the first three regions and honestly that's pretty plausible to me. Though they did just make shiny Mew available again recently so maybe not...

All I really want are Suicune, Entei, and Raikou back. Why are those three seemingly never in raids?

-They had a Pokestop around me so whiel I dont like playing Go, I do like messing with my friend so I thought it'd be funny to keep getting and hatching eggs until I got bored or got a Larvesta. And on egg #8 I got the thing and yes my friend was in shambles and everyone in the group bullied them it was great. I'm glad I'm not a Go player though, because 400 candies is...goodness...that's a lot for a Pokemon you can only get out of eggs....I know you can get candies out of the buddy feature but those aren't very quick either....in contrast sending it over to evolve was painless. Is Volcarona at least, like...meta? To be worth its steep cost.

Funny thing with this: my experience has been the opposite of seemingly everyone else. Having raided/traded numerous legendaries and gotten enough candy to evolve... well, every species, I've not had anything to use Rare Candies on in a while so I was getting colossally backed up with them for a good few months. Larvesta gets announced and we learn it's a 400-candy evolution: "aha!" I say, "now I've got something to spend them on."

It was actually hatching the damn thing that was the hard bit, but once I had it I immediately poured rare candies into it and I'm currently about 30 away from being able to evolve it. Haven't lifted a finger for it (well, on Larvesta directly)

...although I'll wait until I actually have one worth evolving, I ain't wasting 400 candy on a 10-14-11 Larvesta.

PvP stuff doesn't interest me all that much so I've no idea how good Volcarona is there, but iirc it's in the upper tier of both Bug and Fire attackers for gyms and raids. As is often the case for newly-added Pokemon, I believe it doesn't have an exceptional moveset so it'll probably take a future update to take it the level that it's truly stellar. And, of course, Volcarona has a signature move in Fiery Dance that'll probably be added if it ever gets a community day, which it very probably will in time.

Then for Go Fest I was hoping to get Carbink and Rotom. I saw one in the GTS (for a Frost Rotom) but I didn't get to it in time. I went through SO many loops before getting the Carbink. Do you know how many Moon and Heavy Ball Carbink are on GTS? TOO MANY.
I suspect that Carbink only being available as part of research (from a pool of 4 or 5 pokemon) made it more rare than I had expected so less people would send it to Home.

Carbink is absolutely the sort of thing I'll be sending to Home so dm me again if you're still struggling to obtain one in a couple of weeks! It's one of those "one and done" Pokemon I'd only keep if it were a) shiny b) a hundo, I fully only care about it insofar as it's a dex entry.

 

[Mex]

Ohhh the Global was going to have the raid, not this one. That makes more sense.
I'm surprised it's valuable for PVP, Carbink's not one of those Pokemon I imagine would be "great". I knew catching it gave Diancie Energy but not the raid stuff. Any particular reason why?

High bulk, strong typing, hits 1500CP just under the level cap. It's similar to bastiodon, but has a generally better moveset, Rock Throw is less awkward to use than Smack Down due to just being a shorter move animation, Rock Slide being cheaper than Stone Edge is nice if you need to hit a charge move fast, and Moonblast is a really strong charge move in general.

Helps that Rock/Fairy is a pretty significantly better typing than Rock/Steel, less of a weakness to ground and especially fighting is pretty huge

 

[R_N]

Ah this actually reminds me....while I was doing the eggs I was also trying to do other stuff in Go for tasks (I mean may as well, right?) and during the PAssimian PWC tasks there was one for using 5 charged moves. But despite using a lot of charged moves against Rocket Grunts to the point where I can't even fight any more because I dont have any Pokemon strong enough to fight the Admins only 2 ever counted. I'm not sure why? Was there something I missed about them? Very few were blocked and I used quite a few different kinds with an "Excellent" rating.