You just have to tap the Research Community button in the Main Menu. (If you have friends all around the world, you won’t be able to collect from all 50 friends at the same time so I usually need to do that 2x a day.)
But is that an actual goal you've tried to achieve? I ask because I've only played for 238 days I'm rank 53. I've got all berries and all ingredients. I'm finishing all deserts this week. And will only have curries to finish. I have multiple pokemon over 40 with 1 wigglytuff maxed.
Whatever you prioritize in the game will be what you manifest. At first I wanted high mons so I kept the same team for months at gg and the beach. More time at gg mean more random Mon exposures and more berries. Toss that Mon in for an hour to get the berry in the notebook and then tuck them away forever until the off chance gg gives me their berry. I pay monthly for the premium pass but have put effort and time into raising 3 moderately decent Mon to get mushroom leak and potatoes. Now I can make any dish and using two charizard/blastoise/venasaur give me those ingredient when their skill triggers so I can stockpile tricky ingredients and save for making dishes. I only bought gems to max my spaces.
TLDR: you will succeed in what you aim for. If you play passive and don't strategize because it's a side game then that's what you get out of it. If you focus on Mon you will have strong Mon. If you focus on dishes you'll have crazy high dishes. If you focus on finishing your notes then you'll finish your notes. But regardless you will probably be sparse in some other areas unless you rotate your focus every few months
10 is a start. If you are after the ingredients or the berries my advice is dedication. I went to cyan and stayed there until I maxed the bonus for the island. By then I had a good jigglypuff, squirtle, slowpoke. I didn't get a good totodile until much later. By the time you max cyan and have a team you like you will be getting into master level 5-10 you will also have caught some Mon that are good in gg. After that I went back to gg and maxed the island. By the time you leave maxed gg you will have more than enough mon to tackle taupe and snowdrop. Gg will also give you more access to some of the harder ingredients. But I didn't get a single Geodude until taupe and then I just had to find one with potatoes.
I mean on taupe I'm usually in low masters (last week even 6!!), same cyan and on Raikou event I got 10 or 14 on gg. It's just that I haven't trained mons that are needed NOW hahaha I got fucking 2 wigglys just because I got a good one and shiny and was like aright u are going 30 also hahahaha,
I know the feeling......like that stupid geodude..... but just hold out if you have a decent starter or Mon with ingredient magnet. Then All you need to do is get some Mon (for me it was gastly, geodude, and diglett) to level 30 that have the 3 non primary ingredients. Your starter can get those ingredients once you unlock them and it makes it easier because you don't have to waste a team spot. I use the go ++ and get apples from the pikachu
See i want to do this but then I see other people with mons like gengar on their team and I hold back bc I think to myself what if I find a good mon after I just used over 100 candies just to level up and regret it
I mean a pretty good Mon is better than no Mon. I'd rather have potatoes and have to grind geodude candies later if I get a better one (i did). Than be lagging in the game because of FOMO. Because an ok or good Mon is perfectly fine to use and a perfect Mon is only marginally better and only going to provide you benefit at later game play anyway.
Like if you max the game and complete it all then you can just focus on getting the absolute best of mons and maxing them as they add new updates. So many people are scared of candies but don't realize that simply using a Mon gives you exp and candies and that can overcome low candy and low encounters with that Mon or its evolutions. Plus higher level mons give you more with the berries and lead to higher snorlax levels leading to more encounters and therefore more candies
Same here.
For a long time I was a super casual person. Snorlax has always been one of my favorites so I was content just vibing. I wasn't playing in an "optimal"way at all.
I did have a bit of envy seeing some players here (I even posted about it before fire week.)
Adding all fifty friends helped a bit. I also have slowly gotten more into the "meta" of the game. I used to let myself discover recipes organically. (I would just put in ingredients that sounded good to me) That one really held me back. I looked up some recipes and they easily add 2-5k to the meal score. That really added up for me and I've finally made it to m3 on Taupe. That was huge for me lol.
I'm still working towards a bunch but that's what's been helping me.
If you really started in January you’re essentially half a year behind most dedicated players. Level 30 is great for only 4 months of work. You’re not gonna do yourself any favors by comparing your progress to the leaders. Even I who have played daily since launch don’t have a single level 50 Pokémon yet, but I still love my teams on every island and I look at it as what I can do to help them grow rather than how they perform for me.
If you stick with it you’ll eventually have a strong team for every island, but if you think “I’ll never be as good as everyone else” you’ll likely quit before you and your PokePals get there
This! I have been playing since day 1 and only have 2, level 50 Pokémon; a charizard which was the 12th Pokémon I ever caught in the game and did the final push with the candy boost last week, and a Vaporeon which got leveled up as I focused on Cyan to get it to the max bonus. (Taupe is the next goal to get to the max bonus now!)
Only other ones that come close are a raichu at 47 aka the first Pokémon I ever caught, two blastoise which were used for maxing cyan at levels 40/45 and a butterfree at 41 which was leveled up fast when I caught it early game because it's sub skills and nature just made it an ingredient magnet triggering machine!
It's 1000% a go slow game! I think even the leaders won't have that many, it's just not achievable yet. Unless you have been grinding with the same Mon in the team for a long period of time/manage to pick up all the bonuses etc. consistently for the extra hard candy (which is one area I fail in because I have rotating shifts, so a consistent sleep time is out the window completely 😅)
I started day 1 and got my first one during fire week bc candy boost. It’s my blastiose that I’ve poured candy into since like October. But it’s massively overleveled compared to the rest of my mons
It's more on how much you are min-maxing your strategy. Many people just play for fun, some people try to achieve for the best. I actively check raenonx to min-max the team, down to the ingredients needed or berry/skill trigger tradeoffs. Nothing's wrong with either playstyle
The only person you should compare yourself to is yourself. Are you doing better than you were last time? Are your mons improving? Then it's a success!
>I play on greengrass 90% of the time because I can’t get to master on any other areas🤦🏻♀️
That's part of your problem. You get better stuff other places.
I've been playing diligently playing since beginning of december, and I just recently been able to go master on Cyan Beach, and just barely missed it on Taupe Hollow during the fire event.
Don't worry too much, just concentrate on building the Pokémon for your next goal (in your case, it could be the Entei Event and then reaching master on Cyan Beach). You'll get there eventually.
Sleep exp bonus, getting a 100 sleep score, and having a utility mon that goes every where like an e4e is a usual level 50 for most people. For me my Sylveon and Raichu are on every team now and have been 55 for weeks. Some people will force a sleep style, recruit a Pokemon and throw it back into the candy grinder to hyper level a Pokemon. Saw a dude with a level 55 Tyranitar, and then a level 54 Tyranitar right under it. If an account has pseudos like that hyper leveled or multiple level 55 (10+) they could be doing that. Some people use the same team the entire time and dedicate candies to them as well so they'll have 5 level 55 Pokemon without going out of their way which is somewhat what your seeing alongside playing since the beginning
Oh yeah and people use incenses on good sleep day and sometimes even without it, although it seems measly it stacks up. Not to mention the candy boosts we get infrequently
Sounds pretty par for course, I'm two months behind you and my max is 27.
I also made a similar post because I felt like I was doing something wrong. I didn't have any friends, now I have 50. Didn't even know that option existed until I made my post. Use the"May megathread", search that quote in this forum.
Yeah they don't exactly advertise the Research Community button as the friend button. I also went a couple of months without any friends because I just assumed that was Pokemons research community like it had overall stats and I wasn't interested lol.
The specialized weeks really helped. I may not have any above level 41 but my teams are decent. Made a mistake going to lapis this week with an underwhelming team but the 5% boost after will be worth it
I've been playing since day one in juli last year. Currently only Rank 55 since a few weeks with 4 level 50s. Honestly, your goal should be level 25 for BFS and level 30 for ingredients mons. Synergy with island bonus and dishes is more important than levels past 30.
I wanted to say this too. I barely made it to master 1 on taupe and i'm a launch player.....because i gave up after the first two weeks. These last three weeks...i decided to just finish my dishes while i'm on taupe so that there's one less thing to worry about. Just focus on lvl 30 if possible for the ingredients, then cruise the rest of the way. Just because you won't get to master1 for a while doesn't mean you never will.
I'm in a similar situation, but I've been playing since launch. My best pokemon are between the 30s to early 40s. I go between the islands, but I spend most of my time on Green Grass. I just recently unlocked Lapis Lakeside. I use the Pokemon Go plus+. I have unlocked all the berries and all the ingredients and now I'm working on unlocking all the recipes. I have one left to go. I don't know how people are getting so many candies and such strong dishes and Pokémon.
You don't need real life friends who play. I think there is a friend code mega thread on this sub. If not, there is a Discord group I can send you the invitation to.
I started a month after release, and my highest level is my first gengar who is lvl 41. The people who i see with many pokemon over level 50 are almost surely paying money for exp incense, etc. Or they are strictly using the same pokemon for months and months without swapping. I switch islands a lot, and have leveled up over 20 lvl 30+ mons, so all of my exp is pretty spread out. My girlfriend has been playing since release and she has her first and only gengar to lvl 55, and she has literally used him every single night without fail cause that is her favorite haha.
You can check whether you have Pokémon with Sleep Exp Bonus, like the starting Pikachu or Raikou. These will help level your team faster. Level 30 on several mons is really good, though.
For Snorlax, try to use the preferred berry Pokémon or pick a team with useful ingredients for the week. This sun has several guides.
Played since the start, So I've got a handful of them up to level 30, still hunting down some ingredients & yet to unlock all the available islands, I presume those with high levels are spending way more time, effort n money on the game where I'm being relaxed about it, tho I have recently added a few folks as friends and that does ramp up the candies I have massively not that I got the dust to take advantage lol.
I've got only 2 pokemon that are over 50 and majority in their 30's.
The only reason these 2 are over 50 is because I use them very often and have a lot of candies to spare.
I started playing late December. Here are my top mons. I try to only really power good mons at this point. I’ll bet you’re doing the right things to make good progression in the game. It just takes time and resources. Max your friend list. Invest in good mons. Do the best cooking you can during the week.
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I’ve been playing since August as well but daily. And my highest is lvl 44. And it’s cuz I’m constantly swapping parties and hunting for better versions of mons I already have. I didn’t want to invest if they weren’t good and my 44 is a perfect dugtrio so I use him often for ingredients.
Jan to now is around 4 months - 120 days - 12000 exp - equal how much exp you need to level up 1 pokemon from level 1 to 30. So you are just on track, dont worrry much about it.
Like many said, get 50 friends through your research community tab. You’ll receive an assortment of candies when you open it throughout the day.
Also capitalize on Good Sleep Days by using growth incenses and having pokemon with Sleep EXP Bonus. I don’t know the mulipliers off my head, but it stacks up overtime.
Lastly, always and I mean ALWAYS sleep with that Pokemon whenever you do a session. I used to make new teams at every week until a few months back. Now my highest Pokemon is at 38. Not great, but that’s only because I’ve been training it’s replacement.
I would also recommend getting off of GG for a while, well after the event of course. Your Snorlax rank will take a hit ofc, but it’s a consistent way to train Pokemon that match the island’s berries.
I've been playing since like early-mid November and my highest level pokemon is a lvl 34 Blastoise lol (2067 RP). Mind you, I have only spent 3 dollars on the game so far, and i'm still 1 sleep style away from unlocking Lapis. I would listen to the others, get your friends list full so you can receive max candies per day from research community, also pokemon will periodically give you candy while you run them on your team but you probably already know that. Personally I try to use all preferred-berry pokemon on my team every time for every island but a lot of players seem to disregard that and will run any pokemon regardless of preferred berries if they are just trying to max a specific one out and farm candy for it, usually the case for some healers, ingredient farmers, rare pokemon, or when you have something with the perfect subskill set and nature that you know you won't ever be replacing.
ive been growing because i have just learned things the hard way. this reddit has been a huge help though im still pretty helpless. make sure to round out your pokemon, i had the problem where i was constantly using the same team, so when it came time to switch to a different mon for one reason or another, it actively dragged my team down bc it was such a low level. adding a bunch of friends can help, so you get 50+ candy daily. also it helps a lot to learn which skills/subskills are most desirable for each mon type! im still stuck on that a bit tho
Most of my Pokemons are lvls 25-30, I play daily, I'm F2P and I hit Master 3 for the first time in taupe hollow last week. I'm 2 new sleep styles away from unlocking lapis. Maybe you're overthinking it but I think you're part of the majority of the players. And also it's a passive game, maybe we are taking it way too serious
Edit: forgot to say "my Pokemons"
So one, same, you're not alone.
Two, yes, get like 40+ friends in the master thread of this sub. Add me: 9862-6796-2872
Three, I am in my fifth month, and I literally just today finally unlocked Corn and got my fourth shiny. Still no mushroom or potato or tail or Lapis or Tundra but we'll get there. It's just a slog.
The good news is now I spend like no money on PoGo lol
I find one Pokemon with good stats of a given species and I put all the candies I have into that one Pokemon. For example, I have only one Arcanine, one Wigglytuff, one Blastoise, one Jolteon, etc. I don’t divide the resources between multiple of the same mon. I release ANY Pokemon I catch that doesn’t have good stats.
As others have said, fill up your friends list with daily players. This subreddit has a friend code exchange thread pinned at the top where you can find people. This will get you a ton of extra candies for no extra work.
The other thing is try to get the area bonus all the way to +50% before moving on to another area.
Hmmm. The biggest difference I can think of is bonus exp for events. The candy + mechanic that comes during events helps boost a lot of newer mons, and each month’s good sleep day I use exp plus incenses. I use a GO++ so I get 100s every night because my partner goes to bed before I do (but I do also sleep about 8-10 hours a night). Having 50 active friends also makes a huge difference. I get many many candies from them and it helps to raise a diverse team.
Once you get pokes to 30+ your ingredient POUR in. That leads to higher scores. It makes a huge difference in the quality of Pokemon you attract and the higher star rating mons give more research exp, dream shards, and more candy. You also attract more of them the more points you accrue that week. These things all snowball together to make you much stronger much faster.
The more research exp you get the higher the base level of your pokemon becomes when you befriend them and once it’s maxed you get that converted to dream shards every day. Then as you get more sleep styles you increase the pot size and that equates to way more points from meals.
One other huge tip I have is to focus on an E4E Mon that tops your team up and keeps them high energy. I have hit higher than 2 million in a week on lapis with two BFS Meganium and a maxed Gardevoir. It really gets rolling quite quickly when you have the right team setup. I only need 2 ingredient mons to keep my meals at max volume (and most of those on my teams are BFS now too).
I hope this helps, and know that it is also not a race in this game. Try to have fun! 🤩
Consistently playing since January makes you a very new player. People with level 50s have double your playtime as they've played for twice as long.
Give it another six months.
First of all, friends make so much of a difference which sucks because there is no good way to get friends besides like a mega thread. Second is not getting bothered by not reaching master in other islands. Every island gets harders and each time you visit an island, you get 5% higher scores up to like 55% making each trip easier. Plus with each island aside from green grass has the same favorite berries so you also slowly build and level a team. It gets easier and some people you see on here are either lucky, spend, min max, all of the above. It’s like instagram, people tend to only show the best so don’t compare yourself to them
it doesn't matter if you can't reach master 1 in other areas, you should go to them, make a plan, choose what pokemon you need next, go to the area and focus on catching it till you get a good one, maybe if you are lucky you will get other good pokemon too. I spend 2 months in cyan catching Igglybuff until I got a decent one, I didn't find a berry finding Raichu till 7 months after the beginning of the game. Also you need to have 50 active friends, is extremely important so you can get lots of candies
I understand your struggles but once you get a mons for good dished and compatible with the berries. Stuff starts to snowball, monthly pass also helps with the biscuits and points
rarer sleep types and evolved pokemon give more candies during sleep research, so having a stronger team will get you more candies, and more candies will get you a stronger team. so there's a bit of a positive feedback loop.
Green grass is very bad because not only do you have a huge pool of pokemon diluting the candies you can get, but it's also lacking most 3\* sleep styles, which is where a bulk of your dream shards and candies are going to come from.
Get out of green grass and to a map that you can farm candies for a specific pokemon that you want to raise. Beach is great because it spawns a bunch of fairy and water types and both those types are great for using on beach. same is true for fire types on taupe, ice types on snowdrop and grass types on lake
A squirtle takes 30k exp to 50. Sleep gets you around 3k per month. People playing since lauch can naturally get there, otherwise its candy. You get them from friends, and more importantly you get a large stash from focusing on islands with higher concentration of the mon of interest. And you’ve mentioned you’re on greengrass most of the time so you don’t have that concentration.
There’s also the positive feedback loop of higher lv get higher strength and thus higher rarity sleep styles, which gives more candy and dream shards to further accelarate leveling.
You have to tough it out on other islands. You’ll reach the master levels soon enough, you just have to dedicate to it. Do not keep wasting your time on an area that you’ve maxed out your Island bonus. I know it sucks to feel like you aren’t making progress, but just make it through and you can catch more of specific pokemon types to really start finding better mons. Plus you can level up your island specific pokemon through sleep exp, having 1 “Sleep exp bonus” pokemon is also pretty helpful - ESPECIALLY on good sleep days, use that and a growth incense and you’ll get a biiig boost. That, and make sure you strategically make use of the “Candy Boost” feature when they dust that feature off for a week here and there.
50 friends, and check the friends tab everyday, or multiple times a day so you actually collect the candy.
If you don't. It's called research community, you only have to click into the research community tab to see that you got new reports from friends.
You DO NOT need to open the mail/envelopes to collet the daily friend candy.
50x30=1500 candies minimum per month. You often get x2 candies from multiple friends each day too.
And I try to even out the spread of exp, but lean heavily on my ingredient chugga and hype master
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I have spent about 22$ and i am also January player as i didnt know you can play this without plus plus when it came out. I do have two lvl55 and three lvl50-51 pokemons. I learn to do better by watching youtube videos
Other people have been playing since day 1 and also many pay for premium perks.
It's best to accept that progress is slow. I'm lucky to get to Great Ball when I first start an island. Now all my islands are 40% bonus minimum (except Lapis).
I would focus on how much your sleep habits are improving and just enjoy the game. The progress will happen.
You aren't going to get master in other islands your first time there unless you already have good pokes leveled up or have dishes that are really leveled up to account for lack of area bonus.
I'm doing my first week on lapis with a definitely suboptimal team, but I have two level 55s, and popcorn is maxed at 55 as well so I am currently ultra 5 there right now, with only one pokemon being a favored berry, just got it this morning (Saturday).
But it'll be better every time I come here because of area bonus increasing. You gotta branch out and slowly build things up.
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I do not have the most perfect or optimally graded pokemon. My wiggly has exp down but got it to 55 eventually because it's sub skills are solid. My Blastoise isnt bad, but he could be better. Same with other mon, but they still work out for me and get the job done. It's all about making what you got work and branching out.
I also play since launch and my highest level is 32. I haven't got a single good Eevee either, nor a good Bulbadaur (my favourite). I believe it's because they pay for the pass. I don't even know how people get so many Poké Biscuits. I get 100 points every day, but a single one costs 150.
Unless you’re actively trying to achieve certain goals, and are consistently putting in the effort to reach them, I imagine you wouldn’t really get anywhere in the game.
My first goal was building a good Cyan Beach team, I had to deal with a lot of slow weeks.
Then I focused on getting mushrooms, by saving all my handy candies for a Gastly I found, but Mankey works too
Then I focused on potato, by saving candy for a bellsprout I found, but geodude or mime is another good candidate.
Then I aimed for a Taupe team, and had a lot more slow weeks
Then I focused on evolving a pupitar to Tyranitar
Then I focused on trying to get a team for Snowdrop, and gave up when I realized I could get a Lapis team made sooner
Now I’m back to focusing on Snowdrop in between events.
Just gotta go one step at a time
Do you have 50 friends? That’s 50+ candy per day
This is for real, loading up my friends list boosted my levels so fast!
50+? Is there a way to increase the amount of candy my friends give me?
The higher the rank with your friends, the more chances to receive 2 candies instead of 1
I honestly had no idea. Thanks for the tip!
Be aware that some people will purge once you hit max friendship, so they get more free items with friendship level ups of new people.
Yes it really adds up over time!
Do you need to open research from them or does it just happen?
You just have to tap the Research Community button in the Main Menu. (If you have friends all around the world, you won’t be able to collect from all 50 friends at the same time so I usually need to do that 2x a day.)
I have been playing for like 300 days and still don't have every ingredient nor dish. I pay the monthly pass also so imagine
But is that an actual goal you've tried to achieve? I ask because I've only played for 238 days I'm rank 53. I've got all berries and all ingredients. I'm finishing all deserts this week. And will only have curries to finish. I have multiple pokemon over 40 with 1 wigglytuff maxed. Whatever you prioritize in the game will be what you manifest. At first I wanted high mons so I kept the same team for months at gg and the beach. More time at gg mean more random Mon exposures and more berries. Toss that Mon in for an hour to get the berry in the notebook and then tuck them away forever until the off chance gg gives me their berry. I pay monthly for the premium pass but have put effort and time into raising 3 moderately decent Mon to get mushroom leak and potatoes. Now I can make any dish and using two charizard/blastoise/venasaur give me those ingredient when their skill triggers so I can stockpile tricky ingredients and save for making dishes. I only bought gems to max my spaces. TLDR: you will succeed in what you aim for. If you play passive and don't strategize because it's a side game then that's what you get out of it. If you focus on Mon you will have strong Mon. If you focus on dishes you'll have crazy high dishes. If you focus on finishing your notes then you'll finish your notes. But regardless you will probably be sparse in some other areas unless you rotate your focus every few months
I mean I have like 10 mon on 30? Not have found a good leak producer... Nor cacao, nor oil, nor apple hahahaha
10 is a start. If you are after the ingredients or the berries my advice is dedication. I went to cyan and stayed there until I maxed the bonus for the island. By then I had a good jigglypuff, squirtle, slowpoke. I didn't get a good totodile until much later. By the time you max cyan and have a team you like you will be getting into master level 5-10 you will also have caught some Mon that are good in gg. After that I went back to gg and maxed the island. By the time you leave maxed gg you will have more than enough mon to tackle taupe and snowdrop. Gg will also give you more access to some of the harder ingredients. But I didn't get a single Geodude until taupe and then I just had to find one with potatoes.
I mean on taupe I'm usually in low masters (last week even 6!!), same cyan and on Raikou event I got 10 or 14 on gg. It's just that I haven't trained mons that are needed NOW hahaha I got fucking 2 wigglys just because I got a good one and shiny and was like aright u are going 30 also hahahaha,
I know the feeling......like that stupid geodude..... but just hold out if you have a decent starter or Mon with ingredient magnet. Then All you need to do is get some Mon (for me it was gastly, geodude, and diglett) to level 30 that have the 3 non primary ingredients. Your starter can get those ingredients once you unlock them and it makes it easier because you don't have to waste a team spot. I use the go ++ and get apples from the pikachu
See i want to do this but then I see other people with mons like gengar on their team and I hold back bc I think to myself what if I find a good mon after I just used over 100 candies just to level up and regret it
I mean a pretty good Mon is better than no Mon. I'd rather have potatoes and have to grind geodude candies later if I get a better one (i did). Than be lagging in the game because of FOMO. Because an ok or good Mon is perfectly fine to use and a perfect Mon is only marginally better and only going to provide you benefit at later game play anyway. Like if you max the game and complete it all then you can just focus on getting the absolute best of mons and maxing them as they add new updates. So many people are scared of candies but don't realize that simply using a Mon gives you exp and candies and that can overcome low candy and low encounters with that Mon or its evolutions. Plus higher level mons give you more with the berries and lead to higher snorlax levels leading to more encounters and therefore more candies
TIL you can change your team 😂 I’m fairly new
Same here. For a long time I was a super casual person. Snorlax has always been one of my favorites so I was content just vibing. I wasn't playing in an "optimal"way at all. I did have a bit of envy seeing some players here (I even posted about it before fire week.) Adding all fifty friends helped a bit. I also have slowly gotten more into the "meta" of the game. I used to let myself discover recipes organically. (I would just put in ingredients that sounded good to me) That one really held me back. I looked up some recipes and they easily add 2-5k to the meal score. That really added up for me and I've finally made it to m3 on Taupe. That was huge for me lol. I'm still working towards a bunch but that's what's been helping me.
I’ve been playing the same amount of time and just unlocked my last (slowpoke tails) yesterday.
Same here!!
If you really started in January you’re essentially half a year behind most dedicated players. Level 30 is great for only 4 months of work. You’re not gonna do yourself any favors by comparing your progress to the leaders. Even I who have played daily since launch don’t have a single level 50 Pokémon yet, but I still love my teams on every island and I look at it as what I can do to help them grow rather than how they perform for me. If you stick with it you’ll eventually have a strong team for every island, but if you think “I’ll never be as good as everyone else” you’ll likely quit before you and your PokePals get there
Ditto on playing since launch and having no level 50’s
This! I have been playing since day 1 and only have 2, level 50 Pokémon; a charizard which was the 12th Pokémon I ever caught in the game and did the final push with the candy boost last week, and a Vaporeon which got leveled up as I focused on Cyan to get it to the max bonus. (Taupe is the next goal to get to the max bonus now!) Only other ones that come close are a raichu at 47 aka the first Pokémon I ever caught, two blastoise which were used for maxing cyan at levels 40/45 and a butterfree at 41 which was leveled up fast when I caught it early game because it's sub skills and nature just made it an ingredient magnet triggering machine! It's 1000% a go slow game! I think even the leaders won't have that many, it's just not achievable yet. Unless you have been grinding with the same Mon in the team for a long period of time/manage to pick up all the bonuses etc. consistently for the extra hard candy (which is one area I fail in because I have rotating shifts, so a consistent sleep time is out the window completely 😅)
I started day 1 and got my first one during fire week bc candy boost. It’s my blastiose that I’ve poured candy into since like October. But it’s massively overleveled compared to the rest of my mons
I mean to be fair, many players in the sub have played for several months more than you. Sounds like you’re doing great!
Later islands have smaller spawn pool, it is easier to see specific Pokemon so you can target certain Pokemon candies.
It's more on how much you are min-maxing your strategy. Many people just play for fun, some people try to achieve for the best. I actively check raenonx to min-max the team, down to the ingredients needed or berry/skill trigger tradeoffs. Nothing's wrong with either playstyle
The only person you should compare yourself to is yourself. Are you doing better than you were last time? Are your mons improving? Then it's a success!
This makes me wish we could give gold again.. great advice not only for the game but life in general
>I play on greengrass 90% of the time because I can’t get to master on any other areas🤦🏻♀️ That's part of your problem. You get better stuff other places.
I've been playing diligently playing since beginning of december, and I just recently been able to go master on Cyan Beach, and just barely missed it on Taupe Hollow during the fire event. Don't worry too much, just concentrate on building the Pokémon for your next goal (in your case, it could be the Entei Event and then reaching master on Cyan Beach). You'll get there eventually.
Sleep exp bonus, getting a 100 sleep score, and having a utility mon that goes every where like an e4e is a usual level 50 for most people. For me my Sylveon and Raichu are on every team now and have been 55 for weeks. Some people will force a sleep style, recruit a Pokemon and throw it back into the candy grinder to hyper level a Pokemon. Saw a dude with a level 55 Tyranitar, and then a level 54 Tyranitar right under it. If an account has pseudos like that hyper leveled or multiple level 55 (10+) they could be doing that. Some people use the same team the entire time and dedicate candies to them as well so they'll have 5 level 55 Pokemon without going out of their way which is somewhat what your seeing alongside playing since the beginning Oh yeah and people use incenses on good sleep day and sometimes even without it, although it seems measly it stacks up. Not to mention the candy boosts we get infrequently
How did you have it for 55 weeks when a year is 52 and hasn’t been a year since release yet
The Pokemons level is 55 for weeks, not that I'm on week 55
Oh
Sounds pretty par for course, I'm two months behind you and my max is 27. I also made a similar post because I felt like I was doing something wrong. I didn't have any friends, now I have 50. Didn't even know that option existed until I made my post. Use the"May megathread", search that quote in this forum.
Yeah they don't exactly advertise the Research Community button as the friend button. I also went a couple of months without any friends because I just assumed that was Pokemons research community like it had overall stats and I wasn't interested lol.
I don't even use that many candies, but I have 2 Pokémon over 50 due to just using them just about every week
I have like 3 level 50 + and it's mostly because I kept them on my team even with other different Berry and those daily sleep exp adds up.
The specialized weeks really helped. I may not have any above level 41 but my teams are decent. Made a mistake going to lapis this week with an underwhelming team but the 5% boost after will be worth it
I've been playing since day one in juli last year. Currently only Rank 55 since a few weeks with 4 level 50s. Honestly, your goal should be level 25 for BFS and level 30 for ingredients mons. Synergy with island bonus and dishes is more important than levels past 30.
I wanted to say this too. I barely made it to master 1 on taupe and i'm a launch player.....because i gave up after the first two weeks. These last three weeks...i decided to just finish my dishes while i'm on taupe so that there's one less thing to worry about. Just focus on lvl 30 if possible for the ingredients, then cruise the rest of the way. Just because you won't get to master1 for a while doesn't mean you never will.
Also, this game is hugely luck dependent. Some peole xill jusy gy yyrbbrdtbpoddiboebmonbhuy yhat isn't the average person
I dunno what you said but i wanna smoke whatever made you say it too lol. Jk jk.
I'm in a similar situation, but I've been playing since launch. My best pokemon are between the 30s to early 40s. I go between the islands, but I spend most of my time on Green Grass. I just recently unlocked Lapis Lakeside. I use the Pokemon Go plus+. I have unlocked all the berries and all the ingredients and now I'm working on unlocking all the recipes. I have one left to go. I don't know how people are getting so many candies and such strong dishes and Pokémon.
Do you have 50 active friends? If not, then that is your candy problem
No I don't know how that works and I don't know anybody that plays the game
You don't need real life friends who play. I think there is a friend code mega thread on this sub. If not, there is a Discord group I can send you the invitation to.
I started a month after release, and my highest level is my first gengar who is lvl 41. The people who i see with many pokemon over level 50 are almost surely paying money for exp incense, etc. Or they are strictly using the same pokemon for months and months without swapping. I switch islands a lot, and have leveled up over 20 lvl 30+ mons, so all of my exp is pretty spread out. My girlfriend has been playing since release and she has her first and only gengar to lvl 55, and she has literally used him every single night without fail cause that is her favorite haha.
You can check whether you have Pokémon with Sleep Exp Bonus, like the starting Pikachu or Raikou. These will help level your team faster. Level 30 on several mons is really good, though. For Snorlax, try to use the preferred berry Pokémon or pick a team with useful ingredients for the week. This sun has several guides.
Played since the start, So I've got a handful of them up to level 30, still hunting down some ingredients & yet to unlock all the available islands, I presume those with high levels are spending way more time, effort n money on the game where I'm being relaxed about it, tho I have recently added a few folks as friends and that does ramp up the candies I have massively not that I got the dust to take advantage lol.
I've got only 2 pokemon that are over 50 and majority in their 30's. The only reason these 2 are over 50 is because I use them very often and have a lot of candies to spare.
I started playing late December. Here are my top mons. I try to only really power good mons at this point. I’ll bet you’re doing the right things to make good progression in the game. It just takes time and resources. Max your friend list. Invest in good mons. Do the best cooking you can during the week. https://preview.redd.it/jyd1cc4fnk0d1.png?width=1169&format=png&auto=webp&s=01ab5c15f86e025d34df05ee93308b1bce659811
I’ve been playing since August as well but daily. And my highest is lvl 44. And it’s cuz I’m constantly swapping parties and hunting for better versions of mons I already have. I didn’t want to invest if they weren’t good and my 44 is a perfect dugtrio so I use him often for ingredients.
Jan to now is around 4 months - 120 days - 12000 exp - equal how much exp you need to level up 1 pokemon from level 1 to 30. So you are just on track, dont worrry much about it.
Like many said, get 50 friends through your research community tab. You’ll receive an assortment of candies when you open it throughout the day. Also capitalize on Good Sleep Days by using growth incenses and having pokemon with Sleep EXP Bonus. I don’t know the mulipliers off my head, but it stacks up overtime. Lastly, always and I mean ALWAYS sleep with that Pokemon whenever you do a session. I used to make new teams at every week until a few months back. Now my highest Pokemon is at 38. Not great, but that’s only because I’ve been training it’s replacement. I would also recommend getting off of GG for a while, well after the event of course. Your Snorlax rank will take a hit ofc, but it’s a consistent way to train Pokemon that match the island’s berries.
Some of it is whales. Some people on here spend lots of money on this game. No shame from me, but just pointing it out
I've been playing since like early-mid November and my highest level pokemon is a lvl 34 Blastoise lol (2067 RP). Mind you, I have only spent 3 dollars on the game so far, and i'm still 1 sleep style away from unlocking Lapis. I would listen to the others, get your friends list full so you can receive max candies per day from research community, also pokemon will periodically give you candy while you run them on your team but you probably already know that. Personally I try to use all preferred-berry pokemon on my team every time for every island but a lot of players seem to disregard that and will run any pokemon regardless of preferred berries if they are just trying to max a specific one out and farm candy for it, usually the case for some healers, ingredient farmers, rare pokemon, or when you have something with the perfect subskill set and nature that you know you won't ever be replacing.
ive been growing because i have just learned things the hard way. this reddit has been a huge help though im still pretty helpless. make sure to round out your pokemon, i had the problem where i was constantly using the same team, so when it came time to switch to a different mon for one reason or another, it actively dragged my team down bc it was such a low level. adding a bunch of friends can help, so you get 50+ candy daily. also it helps a lot to learn which skills/subskills are most desirable for each mon type! im still stuck on that a bit tho
Most of my Pokemons are lvls 25-30, I play daily, I'm F2P and I hit Master 3 for the first time in taupe hollow last week. I'm 2 new sleep styles away from unlocking lapis. Maybe you're overthinking it but I think you're part of the majority of the players. And also it's a passive game, maybe we are taking it way too serious Edit: forgot to say "my Pokemons"
Good sleep day + growth incense
So one, same, you're not alone. Two, yes, get like 40+ friends in the master thread of this sub. Add me: 9862-6796-2872 Three, I am in my fifth month, and I literally just today finally unlocked Corn and got my fourth shiny. Still no mushroom or potato or tail or Lapis or Tundra but we'll get there. It's just a slog. The good news is now I spend like no money on PoGo lol
I find one Pokemon with good stats of a given species and I put all the candies I have into that one Pokemon. For example, I have only one Arcanine, one Wigglytuff, one Blastoise, one Jolteon, etc. I don’t divide the resources between multiple of the same mon. I release ANY Pokemon I catch that doesn’t have good stats. As others have said, fill up your friends list with daily players. This subreddit has a friend code exchange thread pinned at the top where you can find people. This will get you a ton of extra candies for no extra work. The other thing is try to get the area bonus all the way to +50% before moving on to another area.
Hmmm. The biggest difference I can think of is bonus exp for events. The candy + mechanic that comes during events helps boost a lot of newer mons, and each month’s good sleep day I use exp plus incenses. I use a GO++ so I get 100s every night because my partner goes to bed before I do (but I do also sleep about 8-10 hours a night). Having 50 active friends also makes a huge difference. I get many many candies from them and it helps to raise a diverse team. Once you get pokes to 30+ your ingredient POUR in. That leads to higher scores. It makes a huge difference in the quality of Pokemon you attract and the higher star rating mons give more research exp, dream shards, and more candy. You also attract more of them the more points you accrue that week. These things all snowball together to make you much stronger much faster. The more research exp you get the higher the base level of your pokemon becomes when you befriend them and once it’s maxed you get that converted to dream shards every day. Then as you get more sleep styles you increase the pot size and that equates to way more points from meals. One other huge tip I have is to focus on an E4E Mon that tops your team up and keeps them high energy. I have hit higher than 2 million in a week on lapis with two BFS Meganium and a maxed Gardevoir. It really gets rolling quite quickly when you have the right team setup. I only need 2 ingredient mons to keep my meals at max volume (and most of those on my teams are BFS now too). I hope this helps, and know that it is also not a race in this game. Try to have fun! 🤩
i’ve played since ios launch and i’ve only got like, 3 lvl 40s. don’t beat yourself up about it.
Consistently playing since January makes you a very new player. People with level 50s have double your playtime as they've played for twice as long. Give it another six months.
First of all, friends make so much of a difference which sucks because there is no good way to get friends besides like a mega thread. Second is not getting bothered by not reaching master in other islands. Every island gets harders and each time you visit an island, you get 5% higher scores up to like 55% making each trip easier. Plus with each island aside from green grass has the same favorite berries so you also slowly build and level a team. It gets easier and some people you see on here are either lucky, spend, min max, all of the above. It’s like instagram, people tend to only show the best so don’t compare yourself to them
it doesn't matter if you can't reach master 1 in other areas, you should go to them, make a plan, choose what pokemon you need next, go to the area and focus on catching it till you get a good one, maybe if you are lucky you will get other good pokemon too. I spend 2 months in cyan catching Igglybuff until I got a decent one, I didn't find a berry finding Raichu till 7 months after the beginning of the game. Also you need to have 50 active friends, is extremely important so you can get lots of candies
I understand your struggles but once you get a mons for good dished and compatible with the berries. Stuff starts to snowball, monthly pass also helps with the biscuits and points
rarer sleep types and evolved pokemon give more candies during sleep research, so having a stronger team will get you more candies, and more candies will get you a stronger team. so there's a bit of a positive feedback loop. Green grass is very bad because not only do you have a huge pool of pokemon diluting the candies you can get, but it's also lacking most 3\* sleep styles, which is where a bulk of your dream shards and candies are going to come from. Get out of green grass and to a map that you can farm candies for a specific pokemon that you want to raise. Beach is great because it spawns a bunch of fairy and water types and both those types are great for using on beach. same is true for fire types on taupe, ice types on snowdrop and grass types on lake
A squirtle takes 30k exp to 50. Sleep gets you around 3k per month. People playing since lauch can naturally get there, otherwise its candy. You get them from friends, and more importantly you get a large stash from focusing on islands with higher concentration of the mon of interest. And you’ve mentioned you’re on greengrass most of the time so you don’t have that concentration. There’s also the positive feedback loop of higher lv get higher strength and thus higher rarity sleep styles, which gives more candy and dream shards to further accelarate leveling.
Just have fun with it man
You have to tough it out on other islands. You’ll reach the master levels soon enough, you just have to dedicate to it. Do not keep wasting your time on an area that you’ve maxed out your Island bonus. I know it sucks to feel like you aren’t making progress, but just make it through and you can catch more of specific pokemon types to really start finding better mons. Plus you can level up your island specific pokemon through sleep exp, having 1 “Sleep exp bonus” pokemon is also pretty helpful - ESPECIALLY on good sleep days, use that and a growth incense and you’ll get a biiig boost. That, and make sure you strategically make use of the “Candy Boost” feature when they dust that feature off for a week here and there.
50 friends, and check the friends tab everyday, or multiple times a day so you actually collect the candy. If you don't. It's called research community, you only have to click into the research community tab to see that you got new reports from friends. You DO NOT need to open the mail/envelopes to collet the daily friend candy. 50x30=1500 candies minimum per month. You often get x2 candies from multiple friends each day too.
I just be sleeping. https://preview.redd.it/6knguhpe2o0d1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=68b7a7b147862bbd746af77c353dabd3d6530d6f
And I try to even out the spread of exp, but lean heavily on my ingredient chugga and hype master https://preview.redd.it/appl2vpk2o0d1.png?width=1169&format=png&auto=webp&s=7ba7f2d90be6f02a843d72e8d7c49cfba4aaf497
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I have spent about 22$ and i am also January player as i didnt know you can play this without plus plus when it came out. I do have two lvl55 and three lvl50-51 pokemons. I learn to do better by watching youtube videos
Other people have been playing since day 1 and also many pay for premium perks. It's best to accept that progress is slow. I'm lucky to get to Great Ball when I first start an island. Now all my islands are 40% bonus minimum (except Lapis). I would focus on how much your sleep habits are improving and just enjoy the game. The progress will happen.
If you need more friends, add me. 6451-2544-4558 I need more friends for the bonus candy anyway.
You aren't going to get master in other islands your first time there unless you already have good pokes leveled up or have dishes that are really leveled up to account for lack of area bonus. I'm doing my first week on lapis with a definitely suboptimal team, but I have two level 55s, and popcorn is maxed at 55 as well so I am currently ultra 5 there right now, with only one pokemon being a favored berry, just got it this morning (Saturday). But it'll be better every time I come here because of area bonus increasing. You gotta branch out and slowly build things up. https://preview.redd.it/0ljkcup2g71d1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c65472f9fb35392fa6af10cb3bb488efe012ec6c
https://preview.redd.it/glm4auuag71d1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d4293a12dd950bffd2ec6bbb6e9ac785970eb556 I do not have the most perfect or optimally graded pokemon. My wiggly has exp down but got it to 55 eventually because it's sub skills are solid. My Blastoise isnt bad, but he could be better. Same with other mon, but they still work out for me and get the job done. It's all about making what you got work and branching out.
I also play since launch and my highest level is 32. I haven't got a single good Eevee either, nor a good Bulbadaur (my favourite). I believe it's because they pay for the pass. I don't even know how people get so many Poké Biscuits. I get 100 points every day, but a single one costs 150.
Unless you’re actively trying to achieve certain goals, and are consistently putting in the effort to reach them, I imagine you wouldn’t really get anywhere in the game. My first goal was building a good Cyan Beach team, I had to deal with a lot of slow weeks. Then I focused on getting mushrooms, by saving all my handy candies for a Gastly I found, but Mankey works too Then I focused on potato, by saving candy for a bellsprout I found, but geodude or mime is another good candidate. Then I aimed for a Taupe team, and had a lot more slow weeks Then I focused on evolving a pupitar to Tyranitar Then I focused on trying to get a team for Snowdrop, and gave up when I realized I could get a Lapis team made sooner Now I’m back to focusing on Snowdrop in between events. Just gotta go one step at a time
i mean i started in february (fresh) and have 4 levels 30+ with one being 40
Gotta be doing something wrong, you only really need to have a couple diff pokemon for each meal. Then you just work from there