As was recently announced, some of the bonuses that have been part of the game since the current situation started will remain in the game after October 1 and some will no longer be in the game. No matter if you are familiar with them or not, I will go over them as things I like, things I am not sure about, and things I do not like and wish were not changed.
I like that the maximum number of Gifts than can be carried will remain at 20 gifts. On those days I am able to collect a lot of gifts (usually weekends and the occasional day off), at least the next day I can send out more the next day. I like sending out gifts as much as possible. I want to help my friends as much as I can and that is really the only I can on a regular basis.
Similarly, the number of openable gifts will remain at 30, which is good for those of us who cannot get out to too many Pokestops during normal travels. I need replenishment and gifts are one of the few ways I can get replenishment when I am.
Doubling the number of remote raiders from 5 to 10 per raid is a blessing. I know there were times where I wanted to invite people and so did a friend. We might not have been able to get everyone in. With this change, this allows more people in, which makes the experience better for all trainers, especially those who live in areas where raids are few and far between except for remote raids.
Giovanni coming back out in October will be fun. I enjoyed playing the quest and having a month long goal to try to get every month. Playing hide and seek with Giovanni was one of the highlights of the month.
Triple bonus for 1st Pokemon Catch of the day (usually the guaranteed spawn or the first Rocket Grunt Balloon) is a no brainer. So is the one free Daily Research and the increased distance to interact with Pokestops and Gyms. I like these ideas.
Remote trainer battles at Good (1 Heart) Friends is good to satisfy those Battle Another Trainer Daily Researches. I like this idea for that reason. It also allows for more PvP is a true no pressure situation where you have to win once in 5 times to move on and get rewards. There are rewards in trainer battles.
The jury is still out on “Pokemon habitats will increase and more Pokemon will appear in the wild”. Sounds great, but will I finally be able to get home spawns, like everyone else?
The jury is out on this “once a day, your Buddy Pokemon will bring you gifts from nearby Pokestops when you’ve nearly run out.” How many will I get? What is “nearly run out”? When will I get these? I cannot get to many nearby Pokestops, and therefore need my Buddy to find gifts most days. Otherwise, I will be able to only give out a handful. Not fair to me and other more rural players who cannot get out to Pokestops.
The jury is still out on this “incense effectiveness” thing. If home game incense goes back to the way it used to be, I will be very disappointed. I used to get no home spawns with incense before the current situation. Reading further, the 1 hour incense will remain, which is nice… but I would rather it be that 1/2 hour at home (not walking) and 1 hour while walking. I get bored after about 40 minutes with home incense. Making Home Incense 30 minutes is a good way to change the effectiveness of incense and reward walking (1 hour of effectiveness). As of now, this remains the only way I can get home spawn. If home incense is once every 5 minutes like I have heard, that will effectively kill home use of incense.
For those who like Go Battle League, the removal of walking distance is a plus. I don’t care.
Not a change yet, but the fact that remote raiders will eventually do less damage is a bad thing. For some of us, the only way we can win 5* and Mega raids is through remote raids. Making these raids harder by nerfing remote players will only serve to frustrate the more rural players even further.
Gifts have enough Pokeballs in them, IMHO. I want to keep my potions and revives on high replenishment rates as well. Also, maybe once in a while throw in some Super Incubators (see next point). Let’s make sure that we can keep up with Rocket Grunts and the future with Giovanni.
Pokestops should drop gifts 100% unless you are full up. I like that and it makes sense so that players know that when they no longer get gifts from a Pokestop, we have to give some out to our friends. That was a nice reminder to send gifts and I could stop and send and then get back out to play. Now it’s check in every so often and waste time and effort in seeing if I am full or not.
1/2 distance eggs should remain. Who wants to walk 10 k to hatch a Feebas? It’s not worth a 10 k egg. I got so used to the 1/2 distance it will be disappointing to not be able to get them going like I have become accustomed to. The 2 k egg Pokemon aren’t really worth 2 k much either. I wish there was a way to get rid of the eggs if we don’t want them.
Hopefully some day, Ex-Raids will come back. Those were fun. I got to see some people at them I didn’t see very often, but I knew were active in the communities I got them in. I saw some of my friends there I see often and got to enjoy time with them. I got to invite my now Fiancee to a couple on weekends when she was available as a part of a date and to introduce her to some of the people I play with on a regular basis. I would have liked to maybe get one from her to meet some of the community by her. We also got Pokemon that were not generally available in them.
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