Why don't special attacks always work?

Started by BigBobby2016 July 27th, 2016 9:25 AM
  • 481 views
  • 11 replies
Male
Seen August 14th, 2016
Posted August 4th, 2016
24 posts
6.8 Years
When fighting in a gym, sometimes my special attacks won't work. I'll have one charged up, I'll hold the screen and watch my special bar increase to max and then light up, but it never actually performs the special attack.

Sometimes I'll have to do it 2-3 times in order for the special attack to work. In the meantime I won't be using fast attacks while trying to use the specials. I've lost gym battles because of this! Is this a bug or am I doing something wrong?

VisualJae

Spam Hyper Beam for days

Male
New York, NY
Seen October 27th, 2017
Posted September 12th, 2017
1,126 posts
7.6 Years
You're probably releasing it too early. Every special attack has its own windup and cast time, which is why attacks like Hyper Beam is amongst the worst due to how long it takes to actually use it.

VisualJae

Spam Hyper Beam for days

Male
New York, NY
Seen October 27th, 2017
Posted September 12th, 2017
1,126 posts
7.6 Years
I've never heard of people "failing" to use a special attack. I've never encountered the issue, albeit I only have about 170 gym battles won. All I know is that the attacks will not launch if you fail to give the Pokémon enough time to actually use the attack.
Male
Seen August 14th, 2016
Posted August 4th, 2016
24 posts
6.8 Years
Hmm, OK. Maybe I'll take a video sometime...lol. Seriously, it happens at least once every time I fight in a gym.

Hopefully it's not related to the my phone's interface to its touch screen :( I have other problems too. For example, do you ever get into the situation where you are trying to scroll to the "Transfer" button for a pokemon but the game won't scroll until you X out and select the pokemon a second time?

Squirrel

Age 28
Male
Seen 5 Days Ago
Posted July 10th, 2021
9,551 posts
11.7 Years
If I hold it until the bar is light up I should be fine? There have been times where I held is a few seconds even...let me pokemon get killed just to hopefully see the special do *something* eventually...
Are you holding the screen down once the white bar(s) has filled up, or are you holding it down in order to fill the bar?

Hmm, OK. Maybe I'll take a video sometime...lol. Seriously, it happens at least once every time I fight in a gym.

Hopefully it's not related to the my phone's interface to its touch screen :( I have other problems too. For example, do you ever get into the situation where you are trying to scroll to the "Transfer" button for a pokemon but the game won't scroll until you X out and select the pokemon a second time?
Never had this happen thankfully and it's not something of heard of many people having before; you could try reinstalling the game and hopefully that'll help you out with some of these issues? Otherwise I'd try submitting a bug ticket to Niantic, they're usually pretty good at sorting them, if not a little slow.

VisualJae

Spam Hyper Beam for days

Male
New York, NY
Seen October 27th, 2017
Posted September 12th, 2017
1,126 posts
7.6 Years
Hopefully it's not related to the my phone's interface to its touch screen :( I have other problems too. For example, do you ever get into the situation where you are trying to scroll to the "Transfer" button for a pokemon but the game won't scroll until you X out and select the pokemon a second time?
Nope. Never.

The only occasional issue I have with transferring is server-side, where transferring would temporarily fail because it didn't register.
Male
Seen August 14th, 2016
Posted August 4th, 2016
24 posts
6.8 Years
Are you holding the screen down once the white bar(s) has filled up, or are you holding it down in order to fill the bar?
There are two different bars when I use special attacks so hopefully I'm not confusing when I talk about them here. The first bar is between 1-5 (depending on the special) and it fills/lights up when I use lots of fast attacks. When one of these bars is fully lit up I hold the screen to start charging up the second bar. Usually when this second bar fills all of the way up I perform a special attack and then I release the screen. Sometimes (maybe 10-15% of the time) when the second bar is all filled up and lit, however, I don't do a special attack.

Nope. Never.
The only occasional issue I have with transferring is server-side, where transferring would temporarily fail because it didn't register.
Crap, maybe it is my screen then. I play on a Blackberry Priv which is hardly the most common phone in the world. I absolutely love the thing, but I wouldn't be that surprised if it had some weird quirks with Pokemon Go as the phone was designed for business customers.

Mister Coffee

Blathering Fool

Male
Seen November 7th, 2020
Posted June 12th, 2019
992 posts
11.7 Years
About scrolling through a pokemon profile in order to reach the "Transfer" button at the bottom... I have a very nice two month old Nexus 6 with no problems of any kind. Despite this, sometimes I will be forced to deal with lag while scrolling through a pokemon profile that essentially prevents me from sliding the screen to the bottom of the page. So even with an incredibly nice brand new phone, yes I deal with lag while scrolling through pokemon profiles.

As for annoyances with using Special Attacks, Special attacks are useless to me. They take way too much time to charge up, and even with type advantage they hardly ever deal enough damage to out DPS most basic attacks. Generally in the amount of time it takes for me to round off a powerful special attack, I have been attacked a good 3 to 4 times making the special attack often useless since I can take so much damage in that amount of time.
On top of that, I lag all the time while triggering special attacks. Sometimes I can hold the screen down, the attack will get it's black bordered framing as if it will fire, my pokemon will stop moving, but there will be no announcement for the attack, no animation for the attack, and the opponent will take no damage for the attack, meanwhile during the whole set up and failure of the special attack, my pokemon will have not moved or dodged through the whole thing and I will have taken an incredible amount of damage during the entire bug play out.

I've just learned to strategize my battles without ever using special attacks because they just do more harm than good while I'm playing. Sometimes I will try to do a special attack near the end of a pokemons health when I know I have type advantage and I know I could defeat the opposing monster in a single swing, but even then often during the charge up and animation, I will still take more damage than it's really worth when I could have instead been basic attacking and dodging while taking much less damage to defeat the opposing pokemon.
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Male
Seen August 14th, 2016
Posted August 4th, 2016
24 posts
6.8 Years
About scrolling through a pokemon profile in order to reach the "Transfer" button at the bottom... I have a very nice two month old Nexus 6 with no
...snip...
attacking and dodging while taking much less damage to defeat the opposing pokemon.
Wow, you certainly do seem to understand my plight :)

Hiidoran

ohey

Age 32
Male
Indiana
Seen 1 Week Ago
Posted February 4th, 2022
6,203 posts
17.6 Years
It could honestly just be the way your phone communicates with the server during battles, considering no one else posting has yet to completely replicate your issue.

I will say that the special attacks do take some time, even after all the indicators are full. I get really frustrated by how long it takes between being able to use my special attacks, and how long it takes to do them. I think the problem lies somewhere between the intended wait time Niantic designed special attacks to take, and the actual wait time you experience due to server and phone communication. I find battles to be pretty laggy to begin with, but they've improved a good deal since the release of the app, so hopefully it'll get better for all of us over time, yeah?
Age 28
Male
Indiana, U.S.
Seen January 22nd, 2021
Posted September 6th, 2016
40 posts
6.8 Years
Don't know about the special attack problem, but the scrolling problem happens to me all the time. I either have to keep swiping up for a good 3-4 seconds, or just back out, like you said. I have a Samsung Galaxy S5 and I guess it could just be that my phone is lagging (since it's not exactly a new phone...), but my phone seems to work perfectly with everything else on Pokemon GO, so idk...