Pokemon Go Update

[GilliC]

Who all is still playing?
What level have you reached?
Who are your favorite attackers and defenders?
Have you renamed any of your Pokemon? (Do you have a naming scheme?)
Who is your buddy at the moment?

[GilliC]

I just reached Level 29. I'm competing a bit against my SO, and there are a few people at work who play, so we get alerts when something interesting spawns in the building. I just spent a few days in the US with my sister, and we had fun getting to play together.

I have a small fleet of Vaporeons in the 17-1800s at this point. For attacking water Pokemon I have to strategically use my mid-level Volteons and Electabuzz (in the 13-1500 CP range). My defenders are two maxed-out Poliwraths around 2050. I decided that since I can keep attacking a gym and reviving my attackers, I want to focus my Stardust on powering up my defenders, since they have to stay behind without any help.

My Vaporeons, Flareons, and Jolteons all have silly names. The others have notations to indicate their IV stats. And my sister just got me hooked on the idea of using Japanese characters to indicate which types of attacks some of them have.

I'm walking a Golem at the moment. When I've amassed a bit more Geodude candy I plan to switch to an Abra so that I can work on evolving an Alakazam.

[dr.girlfriend]

I pretend that it's my 7-year-old son who's playing, but it's really me who's more into it! ;-) I'm about 10k points away from level 28. We don't do much battling at gyms -- the ones at work are way too competitive, every Pokemon over 3k CP, but there's a local gym in our neighborhood that we take over every once in awhile. I have one Vaporeon at 2241, and then a few more Pokemon between 2000 and 2200 (two more Vaporeons, two Exeggutors, and a Gyrados). Most of them are just their default name, but DS named all the Vaporeons Rainer, Rainer Jr., Rainer III, Rainer IV, etc.

We've used the buddy thing to evolve a few that were on the edge -- Kadabra, Raichu, and a few others I can't remember right now.  I think that was a great addition to the game.  DS's latest ambition is to have a Dragonite, so Dragonair is our "buddy" right now, and we're up to 81 candy with him. That's a lot of walking (55.2 km so far!) since it takes 5k per candy for that one. After that we'll probably go for Blastoise, and then Charizard. It drives me crazy that in my Pokedex it says I've seen all of those, plus a bunch of other good ones -- Aerodactyl, Arcanine, etc. -- but didn't catch them. I don't know how they popped up when I didn't see them, unless they popped up behind me when I was looking at something else. It's such a tease!

I'm really resisting spending money on this app, but it's SO tempting. I earned enough Pokecoins to expand my bag and it hardly seemed to make a difference.

[GilliC]

Oct 23, 2016 13:57:16 GMT -5 dr.girlfriend said:

It drives me crazy that in my Pokedex it says I've seen all of those, plus a bunch of other good ones -- Aerodactyl, Arcanine, etc. -- but didn't catch them. I don't know how they popped up when I didn't see them, unless they popped up behind me when I was looking at something else. It's such a tease!

They made a change in one of the latest updates. Now it's considered "Seen" if you see one in a gym. I don't know why. And it only counts once, so no matter how many Snorlax I find in gyms, it still just shows Seen:1, Caught:0. I don't know if I like the change or not, but now it's driving me nuts that there are a few things I saw once in a gym that aren't recorded in my Pokedex. I don't like the inconsistency!!!

Oct 23, 2016 13:57:16 GMT -5 dr.girlfriend said:

I'm really resisting spending money on this app, but it's SO tempting. I earned enough Pokecoins to expand my bag and it hardly seemed to make a difference.

We calculated how many Pokecoins we could get for a pint of beer (alcohol is $$$ in this country), so we decided to buy a beer's worth of Pokecoins. I've upgraded my bag a few times, which is nice when I'm far from Pokestops, but I still throw out most of my potions to make space for balls. Mostly I just use the coins for Lucky Eggs. I normally never pay for in-game purchases, but I figured that I play the game so much that the developers deserved to get a little back from me.

[nsl]

I don't play much during the week, so I'm just now getting close to finishing level 21.

I don't mess around with gyms because the fun for me is in finding and evolving, so the game has definitely started to lose its appeal now that I've caught everything that appears even semi-regularly in my area, and have evolved almost all of those.

My kids love renaming Pokemon, but my latest favorite is the Nidoqueen I named "Mommy" and the Nidoking called "Daddy." Also, DS 1 was insistent that we call our new Ninetails "Emily." No idea why.

Right now I have a Growlithe as my buddy, and we've already evolved a Charmeleon, a Raichu, and a Ninetails. Next up we're going to evolve a Rhyhorn into whatever he becomes.

[dr.girlfriend]

Did you guys see this? (GilliC nsl) --  I'm excited!

Halloween is here, and Pokémon GO has its own treats to give out! Starting October 26 and lasting through November 1, you can receive way more Candies than usual. Every Pokémon you catch will award six Candies—twice the normal amount. The Professor will give you two Candies instead of one for every Pokémon you transfer to him. And your Buddy Pokémon will award Candy four times faster than they usually do. Plus, you'll get twice the Candy you'd normally get when you hatch Eggs. Walk and catch all the Pokémon you can to get your fill of Candy during this special event!

Some spooky Pokémon will also be much more common leading up to Halloween. Be on the lookout for more of the following Pokémon on your trick-or-treat route:

•Zubat


•Golbat


•Gastly


•Haunter


•Gengar


•Drowzee


•Hypno


Don't miss this fun chance to catch more Pokémon and collect more Candies in Pokémon GO leading up to a happy Halloween. For more Halloween fun, be sure to visit Pokemon.com/Halloween, where you can download Pokémon pumpkin stencils and share your festive photos using the hashtag #PokemonHalloween.

Have a happy Pokémon Halloween!

[Deleted]

Oh dear god, NO MORE ZUBATS AND DROWZEES!! That's like 1/2 of what I ever see anyway!

I barely play anymore. Weather turned gross in Seattle so I don't get out for walks much now and whenever I would boot it up recently as I headed out the door at work on my lunch break, it had ANOTHER update so then I can't use it. My buddy is my only Flameon because it's adorable. I have no good-level mons.

[nsl]

My kids will go nuts if we catch a Gengar.

[GilliC]

I'm excited about the extra candy! But we're bummed about more Drowzees and Zubats!!!

[GilliC]

Oct 25, 2016 17:18:35 GMT -5 GilliC said:

I'm excited about the extra candy! But we're bummed about more Drowzees and Zubats!!!

Tons of Cubones and Marowaks! That's fun!

And I really like the way they handled the extra buddy candy. Instead of walking something like a Dratini or an Omanyte 5km for 4 candies, it's just updated to 1 candy per 1.25km (5/4)!

[dr.girlfriend]

Ha, we never see Drowzee, so I'm excited for that. It's not on the list but I'm also seeing a ton of Cubones and Meowths.