On PvP, from a newbie

This has to be said from the start: I'm a poor PvP player, and I have always been regardless of what game I played. Pokemon GO at least alleviates my problem by using something akin to a turn based system, something that makes me look less bad and allows for pre-planning in a way that most live-action PvP-systems doesn't.

A few aspects of Pokemon GO PvP immediately stand out.

• Attack effectivness trumps STAB, especially with the new 1.6 damage multiplier, both as a bonus and a penalty
• A duel very much becomes a game of rock paper scissors
• Disregarding typing just isn't done in PvP -- you lose rather than taking longer to win
• Some attacks are simply better than others. I'd argue that this is more true for PvP than for gym-battles
• PvP combat is different from gym combat

There are a number of aspects where the differences aren't as pronounced as well.

• A squishy remains a squishy
• If shopping for a second charge attack is pointless that remains true no matter if you're planning to use the pokemon for PvP or gym combat
• Having premade teams speeds up your gaming, more so for PvP than for gym combat

And lastly there's one aspect you need to handle. There's an error where if your device-clock differs from true time then you're basically unable to play PvP.

If your charge attacks take significantly longer to activate in PvP compared to when you fight the three trainers then you suffer from this.

• Go to the website time.is; if your clock is off by a second or more fix the problem
• On my Galaxy S9 I turn off automatic time, turn it back on and restart the phone. There's probably stupid overhead in what I'm doing, but it works perfectly
• It takes my phone less than a full day to offset time, so I just go through the actions above whenever I'm about to duel

I'll return with posts about PvP from time to time as I learn more. However, my views will always be those of an amateur.