New feature: Elemental medal catch bonus

[Afterglow Ampharos]

EDIT: Check the Daily article here!


http://pokemongolive.com/en/post/elemental/

We are adding a new feature which grants a catch bonus when you earn medals based on catching certain types of Pokémon (Kindler, Psychic, Gardener, etc.). These new bonuses will give you a better chance of capturing Pokémon with a related type. For example, as you reach a higher tier for the Kindler Medal, your bonus to catch Fire-type Pokémon such as Charmander, Vulpix and Ponyta increases.

Trainers can work their way to a new tier by catching many Pokémon of the same type. If a Pokémon has multiple types, your bonus will be the average of your bonuses for each type. For example, Pidgey is both Normal and Flying type. Your bonus in this case would be the average of your Normal-type and Flying-type bonuses.

Look forward to this new feature coming soon!

The Pokémon GO team

My two cents:

Sounds to me like a great way to make the most commonly caught types (Normal, Flying, Poison, and Bug) even more common.

In theory, it sounds great because you can use the dragon types you catch to make future dragon types easier to catch. But in practice, you don't find as many dragon types as you do normal, flying, bug... So THOSE are the ones you're going to be getting most of your bonuses on.

If I'm interpreting this correctly... Basically, catching lots of Normal/Flying begets catching even more Normal/Flying. Just what I needed. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer.

 

[bobandbill]

Just letting you know I've linked the Daily article I just made in your post, ordinaryOddBall. Seems you beat me to the thread making, haha. I'll also give this the news prefix.

 

[VisualJae]

If I'm interpreting this correctly... Basically, catching lots of Normal/Flying begets catching even more Normal/Flying. Just what I needed. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer.

And I wouldn't interpret it that way.

First off, every game that seeks longevity will need incentives to keep players playing, regardless of what "stage" the player is in (early game, mid game, end game).

- Early game players will seek to fill the PokéDex and unlock new items through leveling.
- Mid game players will seek to complete the PokéDex and begin investing in their teams.
- End game players are done with their PokéDex and seek to perfect their teams and max out their own levels.

Second of all, what level are you? Whatever it is, I'm sure you've seen the difference in capture ring colors: green for high capture rates all the way to dark red for incredibly low capture rates.

You know it's kind of brutal having to use Great Balls on CP500 Pidgeys because a regular Poké Ball keeps the capture ring in red. This applies to any basic Pokémon with high CP. So many high CP Pokémon get ignored because players think it's not worth using copious amounts of Poké Balls on them when you know you'll transfer the Pokémon anyway. It'll also be really nice to not have to use Ultra Balls on sub-CP300 starter Pokémon because their base capture rates are low to begin with.

Third, players have been clamoring for medal incentives since the game was released back in July. Nearly everyone I've talked to regarding medals always said something along the lines of, "What's the point of them? Showing them off?"

Essentially at this point, yes, medals are only good for showing off. I have 15 gold medals, 10 silver medals, and 3 bronze medals. So what? Exactly. This is Niantic responding to player feedback and they should be applauded for it.

Tying rewards to obtaining the medals will give players another reason to hunt for specific Pokémon. Regarding the Schoolkid medal for Normal-type Pokémon, why not get that gold medal? Now you'll have a better chance at capturing any Snorlax you come across from now on. The Bird Keeper medal for Flying-type Pokémon? Should you come across a wild Dragonite, you better hope you got gold for that medal.

The rich don't get richer. That's not the way to look at things. It gives players who have invested tons of time into the game more of a reason to continue playing. It gives players still in the middle of their journeys a different look at the Pokémon they encounter while working toward their main goals.

 

[Z25]

This is a pretty solid update. Surprised it's not trading first though.

This will be pretty helpful for say:

"Oh I caught two hundred pidgeys lately! My normal and flying medal is upgraded so much! Now my catch rates higher!"

Next Day:

"Whoa a wild persian with 1,500 CP!" (Theoretically of course)

My increased catch rate will over balance the game's decreased catch rate!

*One pokeball later


"I caught it first try, yay!"

These type of scenarios could come up often enough with all the different type combinations implemented, so it's pretty nice.

I could see this becoming really useful for higher leveled users. So I like the idea for this update.

 

[jstaylor62]

They had to do something to reward experienced trainers. At level 28, having caught 5K Pokemon with 800+ being Pidgeys, I should not have a 100 CP Pidgey escape 5 times ...

 

[Maserati777]

Now if only we had a good tracking system...

Though this may help me catch some Abra's and Pikachu's. I've seen 5 Abra's but have only caught one, the other 4 fled immediately after breaking out of the first ball. It didn't matter what c they were or if they had a green circle. At least in the games we have Arena Trap and Sleep Powder.


Does this count Pokemon already caught or are we starting over? I've caught tons of Drowzee and Jynx so those should help me catch Abra in the future.

 

[Neltharion83]

I see two big questions:

- Do you start over or does whatever you already caught get considered? (I guess they do get considered, because then it simply means swapping out some existing medals with no purpose for new medals with a purpose, because all the medals for catching different types already exist).

- Do they immediately factor the bonus into the circle color, to give you visual feedback for hard-to-catch types where you also have a bonus? (i have no clue, but i sure hope they do it).

 

[Afterglow Ampharos]

They're advertising this as a helpful way to catch rare Pokemon, but all this does is make Pokemon types you've already seen hundreds of times easier to catch. Which is still nice to have, but it's not going to make rare types any easier to catch for most players who have very few of said types.

 

[VisualJae]

Though this may help me catch some Abra's and Pikachu's. I've seen 5 Abra's but have only caught one, the other 4 fled immediately after breaking out of the first ball. It didn't matter what c they were or if they had a green circle. At least in the games we have Arena Trap and Sleep Powder.

Somewhat off-topic, but might as well answer. Abra has a 99% flee rate, by far tthe highest for any Pokémon currently available in the game. This is likely a reference to Abra in the core series games where they will use Teleport on first chance.

Basically if you don't catch it on your first try, count on saying goodbye to it.

 

[Neltharion83]

They're advertising this as a helpful way to catch rare Pokemon, but all this does is make Pokemon types you've already seen hundreds of times easier to catch. Which is still nice to have, but it's not going to make rare types any easier to catch for most players who have very few of said types.

If they factor it into the circle color, you get a visual feedback, i hope they do this properly. Then you will only use regular pokeballs for most of the pokemon known to you, maybe a superball, and you use the hyperball for the rare types. That makes it easier.