Monday, June 19, 2017
Gym rework, some information
And Niantic has gone public with quite a lot of information about the new gym system.
- Six permanent slots for assigning defenders
- Only one defending pokemon of the same kind in a gym
- Gyms are attacked in the order the defending pokemon were assigned
- Each defending pokemon has a refillable motivation number. When zero that defender leaves the gym
- Berries are used to restore motivation
- Gyms can be spun like pokestops for getting items
- Trainers receive gym badges for ineracting with gyms. Higher level badges increase the rewards for spinning gyms
- Raid bosses in gyms that need cooperation from several trainers to take down
- Rewards keyed to taking down a raid boss
- New items
So, what does this all mean?
Let's have a look at the gym raid bosses first. I'll cover the new gym battling in another post.
The raid boss mechanics will be delayed. At the start of the new gym system only some beta testers will have access, and only at some gyms. During an unspecified time frame this will be expanded to eventually cover all players and all gyms.
Give it at least one month before everyone can participate.
Prior to spawning a raid boss a gym will eject every defender inside. This means that gyms will no longer stand in the semi permanent ownership of one team for weeks or even months.
There's a timer above a gym where a raid boss will spawn. When that timer reaches zero the boss spawns. While there's no data on the exakt time this is obviously a mechanism for allowing trainers to physically move to the gym.
A boss fight lasts for five minutes.
A maximum of 20 (or possibly 21, the wording is unclear) trainers can participate in one raid boss fight.
You need a raid pass, a once per day item from spinning gyms, to participate. You can only hold on to one raid pass. The in-game shop will sell premium raid passes that bypasses this limitation.
Defeating the raid boss gives you a chance to catch an extra powerful pokemon. What 'extra powerful pokemon' means is not specified.
Defeating the raid boss gives you some new items:
- Rare candies -- can be converted into any kind of candy
- Golden razz berries -- a higher that the standard increased chance to catch a pokemon in the wild, can also be given to a defending pokemon to max out its motivation
- Fast technichal machine -- teaches a pokemon a new primary attack
- Charged technical machine -- teaches a pokemon a new charge attack
So hold on to your extreme IV pokemon. It got a crap moveset? Use a technical machine.
Hold on to your hats, gym's going defunct
Gyms going down really soon.
That message seems to have been posted around twenty to two pm CET. Don't expect to have dinner with functional gyms if you live in Europe.
That message seems to have been posted around twenty to two pm CET. Don't expect to have dinner with functional gyms if you live in Europe.
How to make the most out of a roadbump
This will be the last tips and tricks post valid for the current, and soon old, gym system.
If you're more than one player attacking a gym, and if the lowest placed defending pokemon is substantially easier to knock out than the one above (think CP 1500 flareon below a CP 2500 blissey), then attack in sequence.
Let's say you're three team mates attacking.
Player one attacks alone and declares when the roadbump is going down, at which time player two enters combat. Repeat for player three.
The third player should be done with the roadbump long before the beefier defender above it goes down, which means all three players work together from defender number two and upwards.
Why?
If all three players join combat simultaneously you'll be rewarded with the number of defending pokemon plus one, all multiplied by 1000, in gym prestige lowered.
Attacking in sequence adds another two thousand prestige lost for the gym (given the three player example above) at virtually no extra cost for the attackers.
This is because running over the roadbump one attacker at a time lowers prestige by 1000 for each attacking player.
So you get the extra bonus while at the same time keeping the added speed and lowered cost in terms of pots and revives used per player for downing the harder targets which stand above the roadbump in the gym.
If you're more than one player attacking a gym, and if the lowest placed defending pokemon is substantially easier to knock out than the one above (think CP 1500 flareon below a CP 2500 blissey), then attack in sequence.
Let's say you're three team mates attacking.
Player one attacks alone and declares when the roadbump is going down, at which time player two enters combat. Repeat for player three.
The third player should be done with the roadbump long before the beefier defender above it goes down, which means all three players work together from defender number two and upwards.
Why?
If all three players join combat simultaneously you'll be rewarded with the number of defending pokemon plus one, all multiplied by 1000, in gym prestige lowered.
Attacking in sequence adds another two thousand prestige lost for the gym (given the three player example above) at virtually no extra cost for the attackers.
This is because running over the roadbump one attacker at a time lowers prestige by 1000 for each attacking player.
So you get the extra bonus while at the same time keeping the added speed and lowered cost in terms of pots and revives used per player for downing the harder targets which stand above the roadbump in the gym.
Saturday, June 17, 2017
Gyms going down June 19
Well, now Niantic has defined 'soon', at least kind of.
June 19 gyms are going down. No specific hour is specified, but sometime during office hours pacific time.
There's even less information about when gyms will be back up again.
June 19 gyms are going down. No specific hour is specified, but sometime during office hours pacific time.
There's even less information about when gyms will be back up again.
Friday, June 16, 2017
Heads up warning: gyms closing down 'soon'
The heads up warning is live at Niantic.
There's no information on the definition of 'soon'. A minimum of 21 hours, or in reality a full day is my guess.
I'm still betting on after the event ends. Ripping an income source for incubators while the reward for hatching an egg is five-fold in terms of XP risks alienating a number of players.
There's no information on the definition of 'soon'. A minimum of 21 hours, or in reality a full day is my guess.
I'm still betting on after the event ends. Ripping an income source for incubators while the reward for hatching an egg is five-fold in terms of XP risks alienating a number of players.
Thursday, June 15, 2017
Getting the most out of a disco
Where I play we call the level one through three gyms 'disco'. The reason is old memories from when ad-hoc dance events sported blinking lamps in red, yellow and blue. For whatever reason the word stuck.
In an earlier post I wrote about why fully tearing down a gym is not merely preferred, but kind of important.
The other side of the coin is whether it's really worth the extra cost of a revive and a potion to drop a pokemon inside a disco you've just torn down.
Usually not, but long term, yes.
If players always populate the three first spots you'll end up with a level three gym at 6000 prestige, and probably two pretty iffy defenders out of the three inside.
A populated friendly disco is golden for a small raiding group. I'm talking three, at most four players, but let's say three. It's the kind of number that could be walking to a pub or a café. No real raiding is planned at all.
So we hit upon a level three gym. 2000 prestige is nothing. You basically need a perverted combination of a 1300 chansey, followed by one 2600 and one 3100 blissey to force friendly players to walk away.
At 8000 prestige a prestige defender goes inside and the gym pops to 10000. A battle each and the gym stands at 13000 prestige, at which time one of us adds a defender while the other two run another battle each.
17000 prestige. The next player drops a defender inside and the two other run a battle each.
21000 prestige. We'll either leave it at 23000 prestige after adding the third defender, or we'll run another two or three battles each, which leaves the gym at 29000 or 32000 prestige. The latter is preferable as there's an open spot which would push the gym to 34000 prestige unless a rival player arrives to clean out the prestige defender.
All in all we're talking less than five minutes spent at the gym.
In an earlier post I wrote about why fully tearing down a gym is not merely preferred, but kind of important.
The other side of the coin is whether it's really worth the extra cost of a revive and a potion to drop a pokemon inside a disco you've just torn down.
Usually not, but long term, yes.
If players always populate the three first spots you'll end up with a level three gym at 6000 prestige, and probably two pretty iffy defenders out of the three inside.
A populated friendly disco is golden for a small raiding group. I'm talking three, at most four players, but let's say three. It's the kind of number that could be walking to a pub or a café. No real raiding is planned at all.
So we hit upon a level three gym. 2000 prestige is nothing. You basically need a perverted combination of a 1300 chansey, followed by one 2600 and one 3100 blissey to force friendly players to walk away.
At 8000 prestige a prestige defender goes inside and the gym pops to 10000. A battle each and the gym stands at 13000 prestige, at which time one of us adds a defender while the other two run another battle each.
17000 prestige. The next player drops a defender inside and the two other run a battle each.
21000 prestige. We'll either leave it at 23000 prestige after adding the third defender, or we'll run another two or three battles each, which leaves the gym at 29000 or 32000 prestige. The latter is preferable as there's an open spot which would push the gym to 34000 prestige unless a rival player arrives to clean out the prestige defender.
All in all we're talking less than five minutes spent at the gym.
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