Pokemon Go / Tropes A-C

Pokémon GO Tropes
A to C (Adaptational Badass | Anti-Frustration Features) | D to H | I to R (Luck-Based Mission) | S to Z

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#-A

• Acceptable Breaks from Reality: Water Pokémon that should realistically exist only in oceans, lakes, and rivers can be found floating in landlocked regions.
• Achievement System: Medals are earned by achieving certain milestones such as traveling so many kilometers, catching so many Pokémon of various types, hatching eggs, or fighting enemy Gyms. While originally just cosmetic, certain badges now offer rewards for completing each tier.
  • Earning the badges for catching certain amounts of a type of Pokémon grants a bonus to the capture rate for that specific type. For example, each tier of the Schoolkid medal adds +1 to the capture rate for Normal-type Pokémon.
  • Certain other badges unlock the ability to purchase unique clothing options themed around that badge. For example, leveling up the Gym Leader badge by defending gyms unlocks three sets of clothing themed around the three team colors.
• Adaptation Distillation: Around the board, Pokémon Go breaks down most series elements to focus on Pokémon's most basic trait: Gotta Catch Them All.
  • Any story is limited to a couple of quips from Professor Willow in the special research quest chains.
  • Combat is significantly pared down and reduced in focus:
    • Move variation is simplified down to fast moves, which have no unique effects besides damage and animation speed, and charged moves, whose complexity is within the bounds of "this charges faster/hits harder, and maybe gives a buff or debuff".
    • Pokémon statistics have similarly been simplified into just HP, attack, and defense, with no differentiation between special and physical.
    • Held items no longer exist, though some items that were held items in the main games (such as the Lucky Egg) do make appearances as Power Ups.
    • You don't fight most Pokémon before catching them, with exception to Team Go Rocket Pokémon and raid bosses.
  • Pokéstops and Gyms consolidate Pokémon Centres and Pokémarts into a single location type, giving healing items and Pokéballs for free.
• Adaptational Badass: Too many. It has its own page.
• Adaptational Wimp:
  • The heavily simplified battle system nerfs Pokémon who rely on items, abilities, or anything else that doesn't boil down to "hit opponent hard and take hits good". Marowak doesn't have Thick Club to boost its strength, Eelektross can now be hurt by Ground-type moves because Levitate doesn't exist, and Klefki's support-oriented movepool is replaced with standard damaging moves (which it can't use as well, since its lower stats were balanced by that strong support movepool).
  • Due to the way attack and defense were originally calculated, the game used to heavily favor Pokémon which are relatively even in both physical and special attack while giving little-to-no weight to speed, which is the One Stat to Rule Them All in core games. This made dedicated special attackers and Fragile Speedster Pokémon sub-par at best. This spawns a new problem, however; it makes Pokémon with high defense and low attack have much lower CP that one with high attack and moderate defense or Glass Cannons.
  • This is also why Jolteon was relatively weak compared to its kin, since it relies more on speed than they do. The current system, while largely ignoring Speed stats, gives much more weight to the stronger of a Pokémon's attack/special attack and defense/special defense stats, creating a system much more in line with the main games.
  • Xerneas is one of the most feared Pokémon in both in-game playthroughs and competitve in the main-series, but in Go, until Geomancy was added as a fast move, it suffered from a lack of STAB Fairy fast moves, being stuck with the lackluster Tackle and Zen Headbutt, and as a result, is unviable in most situations.
  • Deoxys-Attack Forme is an absolute terror of a Glass Cannon in the main games, being extremely specialized in both attacking and Speed stats with a movepool that lets it outpace and destroy almost everything in one or two hits, but will fold to almost any attack if it does get hit itself. However, GO uses an endurance-focused battle system where both sides of a fight can reliably always get an attack in, which prevents it from accomplishing anything because its paper-thin defenses mean it will fold quickly before it gets any significant damage off. This also extends to raid battles — in fact, Deoxys-Attack is one of the few Legendary raid bosses that can be defeated solo.
  • Then there's also the various moves that are otherwise really good in a mainline game sucking in PvE. For example, Earthquake, which is one of the best moves in a mainline, is being reduced to close to one of the worst moves in the game due to its slow speed and inefficiency, while others such as Fire Blast and Close Combat suffer from similar problems and are thus outright unviable in most situations.
  • On the flip side, moves with huge energy costs and slow speed become unviable for PvP, some examples being Dazzling Gleam and Zen Headbutt.
• Alien Sky: During events focused on the doings of the mythical Pokémon Hoopa, the sky is locked to a starfield. If the player zooms in to their character, its rings can be seen in the sky.
• Allegedly Free Game:
  • Downplayed. The game is free to play, starts you off with a decent assortment of items, awards items for each level up, and provides a random assortment of three to eight (though rarely more than five) items every time you visit a PokéStop. Additionally, the game rewards you for capturing and defending Gyms for your team with gold coins, which can be used to purchase additional items. It is entirely possible to play the game to its fullest extent and be a competitive player without spending any real money. However, there are a few exceptions. Items which make the game easier (Lures, Incense, Lucky Eggs, Incubators, Bag Expansions, etc.) are rarely handed out as rewards in-game (mostly from mission chains) and cannot be obtained from PokéStops. In order to acquire them in any significant amount, you'll need to spend real money.
  • If you live in an area with fewer gyms and PokéStops, you'll find it more difficult to replenish the supply of even your basic items, which may require you to spend money to keep playing.
  • As of 2019-2020, this has started to be played more straight with special limited-time research events that reward early-access encounters with previously unreleased legendary and mythical Pokémon, before they appear in EX Raids. They require tickets to be accessed - tickets that can only be purchased with money, not Pokécoins. The second of these events, A Drive to Investigate, rewarded Genesect. Since Pokémon from research are obtained at a lower level than those obtained via raids, this has been the only way to obtain a Genesect at less than 1500 CP, eligible for Great League, making it (for the time being) the first piece of content truly only available to those who spend money.
• Ambiguous Gender:
  • Before the release of Generation 2 Pokémon, there was no way of identifying a Pokémon's gender, much like in the original Pokémon Red and Blue. Even now, a Pokémon's gender is only listed on its stats screen, so unless the Pokémon is a One-Gender Race like Jynx or Tauros, experiences Bizarre Sexual Dimorphism like Nidoran, or has more subtle gender differences like Pikachu or Venusaur, you're not going to know if that wild Pokémon is a boy or a girl until you catch it.
  • Blanche of Team Mystic has no strong features to identify their gender. At most, they are wearing raised heels and a ponytail. Character designer Yusuke Kozaki (of Fire Emblem and No More Heroes fame) has stated that he thinks Blanche's gender should be open to interpretation, after seeing the fan reaction. Officially, the character was initially referred to as female, while later on, an official tweet in August 2019 carefully avoided any pronouns at all, followed by an October 2019 blog post of Willow's research notes that used 'they' for Blanche.
  • In contrast to other games in the series which ask, "Are you a boy or a girl?" the new avatar customization screen merely prompts, "Please choose your style," a change praised by many players for its gender inclusivity.
• Anti-Frustration Features: Too many to count, so of course it has its own page.
• Anti Poop-Socking:
  • The whole idea of the game, it seems. This may well be the first Pokémon game that actually encourages people to go outside, get fresh air, and get physical activity.^note Ingress adapted the concept of going outside to play before Go did, although it was targeted primarily at older players.
  • The Adventure Sync function lets the player advance walking-related tasks while the app is off, encouraging them to put their phone away and take a nice long walk without worry of missing out on egg hatching or bonus candy.
  • Raids and GO Rocket Leader battles are only active for a set time period each day, usually between sunrise and sundown. This discourages people from playing in the dead of night.
  • For a short time after release of the weather system, the game would discourage players from going outside during "Extreme" weather conditions by removing all weather-related bonuses. While the game still warns of severe weather, there are no longer any penalties for actually playing under such conditions.
• April Fools' Day:
  • In 2018, the icons for Pokémon were changed to the menu sprites from Pokémon X and Y.
  • For 2019, an easter egg would spawn a Pikachu wearing Ash Ketchum's hat.
• The Artifact: Like in the main series, you start out with a choice of one of three starter Pokémon — Bulbasaur, Charmander, and Squirtle, with Pikachu being a hidden fourth option — each of which have a fairly low encounter rate even after their spawn rates were increased during Generation IV's release (especially during favorable weather). In the main series, the starter serves as a way to acquire new Pokémon early on. In this game, their only purpose is to serve as a tutorial for the game's catching mechanics, since there are no wild battles and thus they do not aid in catching Pokémon. Nor are they particularly good for gym battles, for that matter, as there are Pokémon that are stronger and easier to acquire for that.
• Artificial Brilliance: While the game tends to be notoriously bad in picking teams against a rival gym, when facing a Raid Boss, the AI will pick a team not only based on the Boss's types, but also what attacking moves they carry (something the player can't even know until the battle begins). This can mean if a Boss Exeggutor knows Psychic attacks, it won't suggest your Poison-types to face it, or if a Boss Magmar knows Karate Chop, it'll refrain from suggesting your Rhydon over your Vaporeon.
• Artificial Stupidity:
  • The game is not very good at constructing default teams for a player to attack a gym or some ordinary raids. The game will arrange a team based on what elements would be good to attack the gym with on average but doesn't take CP or the order of the gym's mons into account. This could leave the player with a party that includes an 800 CP Ground type to attack a 2,400 CP Water type. In raids, the game sometimes prioritizes Blissey and other Tanks with high survivability but lackluster offense.
  • There's a grace period when an enemy mon faints during a Gym or Rocket battle, wherein you can rack up damage as the computer takes its sweet time to spawn in.
  • Rocket Grunts appear to have two Protect Shields just like you, but they never use them. Rocket Leaders and Giovanni use them, but always on the first two charge attacks. None of them know how to swap out Pokémon, and will send out the same ones in the same order every time. Team leaders in training battles also don't use shields or switching in lower leagues (they do so in Master League, where they would also use Legendaries), though since it's for training, they may be going easy on you.
• Artistic License – Physics: Grounded Pokémon will randomly jump to evade Poké Balls tossed at them without any buildup before taking off. This includes larger Pokémon that are too heavy or not nimble enough to lift themselves from the ground.
• Ascended Fanon:
  • "Weather can affect what Pokémon may appear; i.e. raining means more water-type Pokémon" Not true initially; the app didn't check weather status, only GPS location. A weather function was only added in December 2017.
  • "It's possible to get X Legendary!". Most Legendaries (and Ultra Beasts) eventually became available by either regular Raids, EX Raids or (in the case of mythological Pokémon) dedicated mission chains.
• Ascended Glitch: For a few days, the bonus item pile for spinning Pokéstops 7 days in a row always came with one rare evolution item. This turned out to be a bug and got patched out, but due to popular demand, it was eventually brought back as a permanent feature.
• Ascended Meme:
  • Spark dabbing became this in June 2019 after the game's official Twitter account tweeted a picture of him dabbing to celebrate Team Instinct reaching their first Global Challenge goal.
  • The egregiously memetic Com Mon Bidoof got its own event in late June 2021 while introducing its shiny form. The first few days saw increased Bidoof spawns where any caught Bidoof would know the move Shadow Ball, followed by Thunderbolt and then Ice Beam. The event was topped of by the introduction of branching quests, in the form of a questline where players would choose between a set of tasks focusing on Bidoof and a set of tasks focusing on, well, Bidoof. The branches rewarded players with Bidoof and, you guessed it, Bidoof, respectively.
• Assist Character: Buddy Pokémon with a Great Buddy ranking or higher have a chance at jumping in and knocking a deflected Poké Ball back towards the wild Pokémon during an encounter.
• Asskicking Leads to Leadership:
  • Gyms are captured by beating the Pokémon other players have left behind to defend it. Once they've won, the player can then deposit one of their own Pokémon there and use them to try and defend the location from other teams. Members of the same team can then come and reinforce the Gym, adding more Mons for the other teams to fight.
  • Under the old Gym system, a Gym's standing Leader was determined by who has the strongest Pokémon in it. So if the strongest Pokémon present had 500 Combat Points, depositing a Pokémon with 600 would make you the new Gym Leader.
• Augmented Reality: Players are able to encounter wild Pokémon by finding them in specific real-world locations, both urban and rural. They can then capture these Pokémon by finding them using the device's camera, though that feature is optional; disabling it presents the player with a generic grass field instead, on which they can capture the Pokémon. Furthermore, as of February 2019, players with AR-capable devices can take out any Pokémon they own and place it in the real world to photograph it.
• Awesome, but Impractical:
  • AR Mode, while great for pictures and such, makes it harder to catch Pokémon because you have to hold your device steady in a certain position in addition to throwing the ball. If it's turned off, Pokémon stay centered on the screen regardless of your position, and doesn't enforce the distance between trainer and Pokémon as hard - meaning that you won't constantly be short-throwing balls. AR+ mode, on the other hand, has actual rewards for the increased difficulty.
  • Gyarados. While a very powerful Pokémon overall, the sheer effort required to get one (400 Magikarp candies, or 101 Magikarp) makes going for other slightly weaker but far easier to obtain Water-types such as Vaporeon^note only 25 Eevee candies, albeit with only a 1 in 3 chance of getting the proper evolution a more appealing option. Even its extended moveset falls into this category: the 2020 Community Day-exclusive Aqua Tail is of no use outside of Player Versus Player, where it's a requirement for non-coverage roles.
  • Ditto's Transform ability allows it to copy the first Pokémon in a gym, including those you haven't caught. However, Transform counts as a move and you have no control over Ditto using it, so the opposing Pokémon is going to get a couple shots off which you have no way to dodge. Furthermore, it only means that, barring Ghost- or Dragon-Type opponents, neither side will have type advantage while the opposing Pokémon may or may not be stronger than Ditto.
  • Using the Pokémon Go Plus accessory. While it's great to be able to catch Pokémon at a much faster speed than engaging them on your device (as well as being able to catch them without running the game), you'll find that it does a rather poor job at attempting to catch Pokémon, with many otherwise easy catches escaping and the peripheral quickly draining your stock of normal Poké Balls.
    • The Poké Ball Plus accessory is just as bad, if not worse, due to its perfectly round design making it difficult to fit in most pockets coupled with the issues to be had with the Go Plus accessory.
  • While Slaking has an obscenely large CP with the stats to match it, its Quick Move is always the piddly-damage Yawn, which is only used to charge its Charged Move. Because Pokémon defending a Gym are programmed to use Quick Moves at a certain pace as opposed to how fast one's fingers can mash the screen, Slaking charges and deals damage at a much slower pace on defense and amounts to little more than a punching bag for attackers. It still gets placed often in Gyms to scare off casual players who don't know any better.
  • Several Legendary Pokémon can boil down to this trope. Unless caught during their favored weather, they are usually caught at CP lower than the Pokémon you fielded to beat them, and the only way to get the candy to power them up is to either catch more of them through their Raids^note a tedious task that becomes moot if the Legendary flees once all balls are drained or if the game restarts for memory reasons, invest Rare Candy into them^note which involves hoping you get more Rare Candy from the Raids you complete and walk them^note a highly inefficient method, as you need to walk 20 km for 1 candy. And even if you've powered them up to outstrip your other Pokémon, they can't be used to defend Gyms, so they're only useful for Team GO Rocket battles and PvP.
  • Outside of Player Versus Player, where a second move becomes essential, getting a second charge move to cover up for deficiencies in a good Pokémon's moveset sounds great, except the price for second charge move depends on the distance required to get candies when walking with that species as a buddy - starting at 10,000 Stardust and 25 candies for anything needing 1 km, and many Pokémon may have only one viable charge move. There are a few cases where buying a second move is reasonable, but unless a player has resources to burn, it can be more sensible to spend that quantity of stardust and candy just building up a second Pokémon with a different moveset.
  • Deoxys Attack Forme. It has the highest attack of any Pokémon in the game; unfortunately, only Dark Pulse is a viable charge move out of three possible, and its Defense is abysmal. It also doesn't mesh well with GO's battle system, which favors bulky Pokémon over faster ones.
  • Originally, Mega Evolutions fell into this. They were introduced as a way for players to get access to legendary-like Pokémon via specific ComMons, which sounds good on paper but were saddled with a bunch of restrictions that reduce how useful they are:
    • In order to mega-evolve a Pokémon, you need a certain amount of Mega Energy for their species, and its cost is lowered after you Mega Evolve them for the first time.
    • Mega Evolutions are timed, meaning there was no point in using them unless you're absolutely sure you are going to use their mega forms right away.
    • Mega Evolved Pokémon can't participate in the GO League and can't be placed as Gym defenders.
    • The most common way to get Mega Energy for specific Pokémon is to battle mega-evolved Pokémon of the same species in raids, which means using a precious Battle Pass or a Remote Raid Pass, both which are rarely given out and must be bought with coins and winning a challenging fight to do solo. At which point, why not just capture a legendary instead, which appear in raids about as often, are always at full power, and can still be used for the GO League?
    • Mega Evolutions have had multiple buffs since: Mega Energy costs can be reduced by repeatedly Mega Evolving an individual Pokémon, waiting will reduce costs further until they're free, the time they stay in that form is 8 hours instead of 4 hours, they now have utility purposes outside of battle (granting players more candy and candy XL from catching same-typed wild Pokémon and providing more catch XP), and while still not usable in the GO League nor as defenders, they give allies a damage-increasing Status Buff for their types during raids.
  • Despite the buffs to Mega Evolution, defensively-oriented Mega Evolutions like Steelix and Aggron still struggle for combat purposes. Being able to outlast damage is theoretically useful, but the number of places it can apply that is limited. They're still banned from the GO Battle League and being a Gym defender (despite their powerful defense potentially being a major asset in the latter), and while they're technically usable in Raids, their Timed Mission status favors Pokémon that output a ton of damage; the only situation they have an exclusive niche in are if you know ally Raid trainers are going to be using same-typed Pokémon and get the boost from it, but if an offense-oriented Mega Evolution exists with the same type, it will most definitely redundify the defensive one.
  • Primal Groudon and Primal Kyogre's Mega Evolution bonus applies not just to their typings, but to all Pokémon that would be weather boosted by the weather either one would have created — ie., Groudon's sun benefits Ground, Fire, and Grass-types, while Kyogre's rain improves Water, Electric, and Bug-types. This is a cool and flavorful way to implement their lore in the game, but for practical purposes, they're not well-equipped to take advantage of their own boosts: unless you're bringing Primal Groudon to a Steel-type raid boss, the additional boosted types are for Pokémon that aren't great against said boss to start with, as only Fire and Ground hit the same type supereffectively. Also, neither are all that flexible with using their added typings,^note Groudon can only use Fire and Grass-type attacks as charged moves, while Kyogre only has Electric-type as a charged attack and is incapable of Bug-type attacks at all, so if you do want to specifically use their other boosted types, you're probably better off bringing a different Mega-Evolved Pokémon that is naturally that type and is capable of using it.
• Awesomeness Meter: The game rewards the player for catching Pokémon with a little added flair, granting an experience bonus and increasing the chance of a successful capture. Landing the ball within the colored circle is deemed a 'Nice', 'Great', or 'Excellent' throw depending on the size of the circle, which is worth 10, 50, and 100 points, respectively. Throwing a curveball is an additional 10 exp bonus, which is accomplished by either spinning the ball before throwing it or throwing at a sufficient angle.

B

• Balloonacy: As of July 7, 2020, Team GO Rocket has begun invading via hot air balloons. The balloons randomly float down from the sky and hover near your Trainer for a bit, then fly off. Tapping on them initiates an encounter with a member of Team GO Rocket that mostly works the same as the ones found at Pokéstops: they can carry a leader if you have the Rocket Radar on you, and they can carry Giovanni if you have the Super Rocket Radar on you.
• Battle in the Rain: If it's raining outside, you can have a battle against leaders and trainers in the rain. Ditto if it's snowing too. The weather has no impact on trainer battles, but it can make the fights look cool.
• Big Applesauce: The climax of the trailer, where thousands of players are participating in a contest to catch Mewtwo, takes place in Times Square at night. (And it seems that, indeed, NYC has some rare ones.)
• Big Ball of Violence: Gyms that are under attack from rival teams will be shown having clouds and sparks spewing out from the gym.
• Bonus Feature Failure: During the end of May 2019, a surprise "Sleeping Snorlax" event was launched, flooding the overworld with Snorlax taking naps. These Snorlax, unlike "awake" Snorlax and those evolved from Munchlax, have Yawn as their fast attack, the same zero-damage attack intended to cripple the Slakoth line.
• Boring, but Practical:
  • Pokémon commonly dubbed as "early game birds/rodents/bugs" by the fandom, such as Pidgey and Weedle, have the benefit of requiring only 12 candy to evolve into its second stage, as opposed to 25 or 50 for most species. While catching and evolving such common species is boring, it's an extremely efficient source of experience, especially when combined with a Lucky Egg. As Gym defenders are worn down by damage and don't heal, it's also handy to do chip damage to help the next trainer conquer the gym.
  • Hatching a Pokémon from an egg may not be as exciting as catching it in the wild, but egg-hatched Pokémon have an IV floor at the tens (meaning the worst mon may have a 10-10-10 spread) and often come with enough candies to evolve to their next stage right away, and some eggs contain species difficult or impossible to find in the wild or not native to your region. That said, hatched Pokémon are always forced to be half their progress bar^note not that the game tells you this, as it's quite inconsistent on displaying this progress bar, with 20 out of 40 being shown at two-thirds rather than the more intuitive half when hatched (unlike wild catches which can be at the very end of it), often requiring powering up to make them usable in combat.
  • Mission-rewarded Pokémon. Like hatched Pokémon, they have a set progress and an IV floor in the tens. Unlike hatched Pokémon, their progress is set at roughly 40%^note 15 out of 40 and they can be obtained after completing missions from Pokéstops, Mission Chains and Research Breakthroughs. Furthermore, some reward mons are more common and easily to obtain^note such as Magikarp, obtained after catching 10 mons, or the triad Gastly-Anorith-Lileep, obtained after making three great throws than others^note Larvitar requires three Excellent throws, and Dratini requires one very rare Dragon-type catch. That said, missions and their rewards change every month, and special events even have special missions rewarding event Pokémon by performing certain tasks.
  • If you're crafting a team for Great or Ultra Leagues, you may be interested in these quite cheap options:
    • Great League Altaria, one of the undisputed high kings of the Great League even after several years. While it has a requirement of 400 Swablu candies in order to evolve, its secondary attack is a meager 10,000 stardust and 25 Swablu candies. Give it the right moveset with a few TMs^note Dragon Breath + Sky Attack / Moonblast, Dragon Pulse or Dazzling Gleam and obliterate your way through the rankings like hell!
    • Great/Ultra league Whiscash. An evolution of a Com Mon widely available, with a cheap secondary attack and perhaps one or more regular TMs in order to get the right moveset^note Mud Shot + Mud Bomb / Blizzard. The reward is a powerful pokémon able to take down high level threats such as the ever-present Altaria.
    • Great League Diggersby. An even more Com Mon than Barboach with the same cost for a second attack, and one of the best mons in the Great League, capable of destroying threats such as the ever present Galarian Stunfisk and Skarmory.^note Mud Shot + Earthquake / Fire Punch.
    • Want to take your opponent by surprise? Then take a look at Great League Noctowl, another Com Mon which can make quick work of Trevenants and Sableyes.^note Wing Attack + Sky Attack / Shadow Ball.
    • Unlike almost every other starter out there, Sceptile doesn't require its Signature Move in order to be a viable mon for your PvP team. This means that it gets all the benefits (cheap 10,000 stardust and 25 candy second attack, 125 candies to evolve, few resources to power up to acceptable levels) without the drawback of waiting for an event or spending an Elite Charged TM in order to get Frenzy Plant. Couple that with the right moveset^note Bullet Seed + Leaf Blade / Earthquake via TMs and you get a quite dependable mon.
• Born as an Adult:
  • As in the main series, some Pokémon were introduced before their baby forms, such as Pikachu before Pichu. Before the corresponding baby form was added to the game, the adult form could hatch from an egg.
  • Unlike in the main series, where Pokémon (starting from Generation IV) hatch at the lowest level, a Pokémon will hatch at a level equal to the player's level at the time they obtained the egg (maximum of 20), with their progress bar at the three-quarters mark. This can overlap with Disc-One Nuke as well as Pint-Sized Powerhouse depending on the Pokémon species and CP.
• Boss in Mook's Clothing:
  • Very rarely, you'll run into a Team Rocket grunt with far more threatening dialogue that doesn't indicate what element you'll be fighting against. Fighting these grunts is like fighting the GO Rocket Leaders on crack, with rare Pokémon and 10,000+ CP level Pokémon—usually leading with the starter Pokémon or a Snorlax.
  • Flying-type Rocket grunts can turn into this when their lineup randomly gives them a Dragonite on the 3rd slot. An unprepared player might assume one can bulldoze through them with Electric Pokémon, but this Shadow Dragonite can and will tear them apart if not accounted for. Even using Ice-type Pokémon for their 4x weakness multiplier is no foolproof effort, considering their generally-low defense stats and Dragonite potentially having Steel Wing to hit them (as well as the other supereffective types Fairy and Rock) back with supereffective damage.
• Boss Subtitles: Raid bosses are introduced this way when you first click on the gym that spawned them.
• Bribing Your Way to Victory:
  • Players can earn Pokécoins in-game by placing their Pokémon at Gyms and defending for long enough, capping at 50 coins a day. Or they can use real-world money to buy coins.
  • If you have money to pay for coins, you can buy Lucky Eggs to double your XP gain. Used properly, you can average about 30,000 exp per egg. About $40 will get you to level 30, provided you save up your candies and mass-evolve Pokémon while the egg is active.
  • The Plus wrist accessory, which sells at 35 USD, allows the player to use some of the functions of the app while their device is asleep, so long as it maintains a bluetooth connection. It allows Pokémon to be captured with a simple button press, use Poké Stops, and records the player's steps to aid in hatching eggs and gaining movement achievements. However, it is a Press Start to Game Over when it comes to catching Pokémon. The accessory has no way to display the power or species of the Pokémon, it defaults to your weakest Poké Ball type with no option to switch or use berries, and there's no option for trick throws, which all adds up to a greater likelihood of wasted Poké Balls.
  • Just like the main games, a vehicle makes getting to Pokémon easier. Unlike the main games, you don't need to stop at a bicycle; a car or other motorized transport can provide far easier movement and opens up an opportunity to move outside your home region to catch exclusive species.
  • Normally, obtaining a Rocket Radar (the only way you can defeat Arlo, Cliff or Sierra) requires defeating six GO Rocket Grunts, grabbing the Mysterious Components they drop, and assembling them. However, they're also available in the shop for 200 Pokécoins, which is much faster and more convenient. Downplayed in that you have to find the hideout yourself, however.
  • Your Buddy will normally enter an "excited" state when you perform enough activities with it, wherein you can get up to 20 Hearts with them and Candy distance is halved. However, a lot of these actions are quite tedious and most have a 30 minute cooldown until they actually count...or you could just buy a Poffin from the shop for 100 coins, which puts your Buddy into the "excited" state immediately, and fills up all your hearts for the day as well. Still downplayed, as feeding a Poffin to your buddy will prevent you from refilling the gauge using normal berries and the timer will naturally run out.
  • Premium Battle Passes allow you to enter raids if you used up your daily raid pass and play the premium tier of PVP where the rewards for winning multiple battles are a lot higher compared to the non premium version. The passes are rarely given out as quest rewards, but they can also be bought in the shop for 100 coins each.
• Burning with Anger: Shadow Pokémon, unlike those from Colosseum and XD, sport angry red eyes and are cloaked in purple flames.
• The Bus Came Back:
  • Done with an achievement: the Ace Trainer badge was originally for training up gyms. However, with the June 2017 overhaul removing gym training, players could no longer train up gyms, making it so that the badge was impossible to earn. However, the December 2018 addition of Player Versus Player also added in the ability to train against the three team leaders, and doing that would also count towards the Ace Trainer badge (with any pre-June 2017 progress counting).
  • Shadow Pokémon return in the GO Rocket update after having last appeared in Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness in 2005 (apart from a brief appearance in Pokkén Tournament).
• But Thou Must!: If you get a Pokémon through a research reward, you cannot refuse to catch it altogether and must successfully catch it before you can catch more from research or advance to the next step.
• Button Mashing: What the combat system effectively boils down to- rapidly tapping the enemy Pokemon to use Fast attacks, and tapping the Charged Attack icon at the right moment, which leads to a minigame to increase the attack's effectiveness. Formerly weak attacks in the main games like Water Gun, become some of the strongest moves in the game due to its fast animation speed leading to greater DPS.

C

• Calling Your Attacks: When catching wild Pokémon, they will shout their cry before they attack in an attempt to deflect your ball.
• Canon Foreigner: During a special event, Jessie and James invade via their unique Meowth balloons and can be battled.
• Cap:
  • Trainer level is capped at 50, athough the amount of experience required to level 40 is pretty ridiculous. Getting to level 10 requires 45,000 exp. Getting to 20 requires another 165,000. Getting to 30 requires a whopping 1,790,000. The next stretch to 40 requires 18 million, or 90% of the total experience required for level 1 to 40. For levels 41-50, in addition to the increasingly absurd amounts of experience, each further level up requires 4 difficult tasks to be performed, reflecting a mastery of some portion of the game.
    • Prior to November 30, 2020 “GO Beyond” update, the trainer level cap was 40.
  • Pokémon level is capped at 50, or trainer level +10 if trainer level is below level 40. Each use of power up increases Pokémon level by half level, which costs increasing amounts of candies and stardust. To power up Pokémon beyond level 40, XL candies are required instead, which are a lot rarer than regular candies. Best Buddy Pokémon temporarily gain +1 level while being an active buddy, where level 50 Best Buddy Pokémon becomes level 51.
    • Prior to November 30, 2020 “GO Beyond” update, the Pokémon level cap was 40, or trainer level +2 if trainer level was below level 38.
  • The player can only carry 350 items, 250 Pokémon, and nine eggs at any given time. Bag and storage upgrades increase the item and Pokémon limit, respectively, by 50 with each purchase. The egg limit cannot be increased; however, starting in late November 2020, bonus eggs received from weekly walking distance or defeating a Team GO Rocket boss can now be guaranteed in one of three “bonus” egg slots, even if you have all 9 slots filled.
  • The Friends list is limited to 400 friends, to which 50 gifts can be sent per day, and from which 20 gifts can be opened per day. The player can only hold a maximum of 10 gifts at once to encourage gifts to be sent out regularly.
  • When a player's Pokémon is removed from a Gym, the player earns 1 coin for every 10 minutes that Pokémon has defended the Gym for. A maximum total of 50 coins can be earned per day this way.
  • All Pokémon have a maximum potential CP value, which varies depending on the Pokémon. Unevolved or common Pokémon have low maximum CP, while evolved or rare Pokémon have higher potential. For example, a basic Pidgey maxes out at 769, while the final evolution Pidgeot can reach 2407, which is average as far as evolved Pokémon go. Primal Kyogre and Primal Groudon top the chart at 6672, while Legendaries typically range between 2570 (Deoxys-Defense) and 4913 (Regigigas). The weakest are Magikarp and Feebas, who max out at a puny 310 CP (but evolve into the mighty Gyarados and Milotic at 3834 and 3398 respectively). A full list can be seen here. In order to reach the listed maximum possible CP for any given species, the Pokémon need to have perfect IVs and powered up to level 50. Likewise, the lowest CP value each Pokémon can have is 10. In gyms, the lowest possible CP value is 2, allowing a CP 10 Pokémon to bottom out in motivation.
  • Players have a limit of 10 berries per 30 minutes that they can feed to Pokémon in allied gyms, as well as a total of 100 berries across all Pokémon per 30 minutes. Any attempt to go beyond that will give a message that the Pokémon in question is full and not interested in eating further.
  • Players can perform 100 "normal" trades + 1 special trade per day.
  • There is a limit of 4,800 total catches per day and a rolling cap of 14,000 catches over a 7-day period.
  • The player can store a maximum of 2,000 mega energy per mega-eligible Pokémon.
  • The player cannot purchase Remote Raid Passes if they have three or more already in their inventory, although they can be obtained in other ways.
  • Players can participate in, at most, 5 remote Raids per day. This cap is increased in some one-day raid events.
  • Players can earn at most 3 Zygarde Cells per day by following Routes. For any particular Route, Zygarde Cell(s) have a chance to spawn only on the first time following it on any given day.
  • Players can participate in, at most, 5 entries of GO Battle Leagues, with each entry good for 5 battles, for a total of 25 GBL trainer battles per day. Certain GBL-related event boost this cap.
• Cap Raiser: You can spend 200 coins on an "item bag" to increase your inventory space by 50 slots each; a similar upgrade is available to increase Pokemon storage space. The default is 350 items and 300 Pokemon, but maximum storage is in the thousands and increases slightly with new updates. Some events allow greater storage increases at a lower cost, usually to promote a big update.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Team GO Rocket's goons, and especially Arlo. Their takeover of Poké Stops has them bragging about doing it for taking the items (you know, the ones that you get for free) just for themselves and For the Evulz.
• Clingy MacGuffin:
  • Eggs cannot be discarded; you have to walk them until they hatch to get rid of them.
  • Mythical Pokémon (such as Mew) cannot be transferred, taking up permanent space in your Pokémon storage. Thankfully you can also own only one of each, preventing you from filling up your storage with untransferable Pokémon.
  • Stickers also cannot be discarded; the only way to get rid of them is to attach them to gifts that you send to your friends. They don't take up your inventory space, however.
• Collection Sidequest: In addition to the regular Pokédex, there are several other indexes catered towards different types of Pokémon that become availvable once you've collected enough of that specific type:
  • Shadow and Purified: Pokémon seen/obtained as Shadow Pokémon after rescuing them from Team GO Rocket, and Pokémon that were Purified afterwards.
  • Perfect: Pokémon the player caught with a perfect "four-star" rating.
  • 3 Stars: Pokémon the player caught with a three-star rating.
  • Shiny: Pokémon seen and caught as Shiny Pokémon
  • Lucky: Pokémon received through trades that became Lucky Pokémon.
  • Event: The total count of costumed Pokémon caught or hatched.
  • Mega: Pokémon that have been Mega Evolved.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Eggs have green, orange, pink, purple, or red spots to indicate that they require 2, 5, 7, 10, or 12 km respectively to hatch, and each color has their own list of Pokémon that they could possibly be. The pink-spotted eggs, likewise, only hatch into Alolan, Galarian, or baby Pokémon.
• Com Mons:
  • While what Pokémon that have become these has changed over time as more Pokémon have been released, as well as between different places (with some lesser common Pokémon having greater spawn rates in some areas compared to others). Several starter Pokémon and other species that fall into the "Early-game rodent/bird/bug" role will be "boosted", and appear with much greater frequency. Events will add other Pokémon to the boosted pool as well.
  • In different weather conditions, the encounter rates of Pokémon with specific types will increase slightly, such as Grass, Ground, and Fire-type Pokémon appearing more commonly in clear skies and Poison, Fighting, and Fairy-type appearing more often under cloudy weather conditions.
  • Each egg type (2km, 5km, the friend-exclusive "Alolan" 7km, and 10km) has different rates for which species they will hatch into.
• The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: Team GO Rocket fights involve battles against Shadow Pokémon with stats 2-3 times what a human could possibly get. It's suggested that this is because they're literally cheating - they are Card-Carrying Villains after all.
• The Computer Shall Taunt You: Team Rocket grunts and leaders drop snide quips after winning battles against the player. Inverted with the player's team leader, who follows up with a word of encouragement.
• Confusion Fu: In mid-2023, the Dark-type GO Rocket Grunts (distinguished by their quote, "Wherever there is light, there is also shadow.") started using Kantonian Muk at random. Since it's pure Poison-type, has no weaknesses in common with Dark-types, and even resists Fairy and Fighting-types that hit Dark-types supereffectively, anyone who built a team that only combats Dark-type will be in for a nasty surprise.
• Consolation Prize:
  • If a wild Pokémon flees, you still get 25 XP for your effort.
  • Failing to defeat a Raid Boss gives you 1,000 Stardust on your first failed attempt. If you win on a subsequent attempt, you'll get the experience and items, but not the Stardust.
  • You always get some stardust after completing a GO Battle League set, even if you lose all 5 matches.
• Cosmetically Different Sides: There is no functional difference between the three Teams, apart from names, colours and emblems.
• The Corruption: Shadow Pokémon from Pokémon Colosseum and Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness were reintroduced to Go in late July 2019 with slight reworks. They are now illegal experiments headed by Team Go Rocket and used by their Grunts that increase their combat potential, while suffering in constant agony as their muscles and strength grow out of control.
• Cursed with Awesome: If your device's GPS is low signal, inside a building, or is otherwise screwed with, your character may wander around idly even if you're not doing that in real life. Annoying for positioning yourself precisely, but great for earning free walk distance whenever you're not actively playing.

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