Pokemon GO players have a chance to capture two rare birds, Lugia and Articuno. Some players attempting these raids are finding that adding legendaries to their compendium is a tough prospect, partially because of Niantic’s design, and partially due to good ‘ol network issues.
The first hurdle is having a suitable and strong enough monster. A Lugia that spawned near me this morning had a CP of 42,753, which means that I couldn’t just waltz in with any monster. This makes sense, of course.
So then: we all need the help of other players. If you live in a rural area, where both players and gyms are scarce, you might be shit out of luck. I live in Brooklyn, and was surprised to find that the single legendary spot near me only had two other people show up for the raid. These players told me that they couldn’t find enough players near them, either — they had travelled across the city to get to that gym, to no avail.
While there are reports of players defeating legendaries a handful of trainers (I’ve heard of runs with 7-10 players), most of us will likely need close to the 20 available raid slots filled, ideally with beefed-up critters like Tyranitar. Unless you’re already a part of a group and can coordinate these encounters, just starting the battle may be difficult. Given Niantic’s trailers, where huge groups of people are always visible, this is all intended.
Fortunately, it is possible to defeat a legendary even if some people in your group haven’t fully prepared for it. Once a legendary is downed, you’ll receive a limited number of Premiere Balls, which outline how many chances you’ll have at capturing the monster. According to data miners, the capture rate starts at a measly 2%, a percentage that can increase with berries — but not by much.
So it’s entirely possible for players to go through the trouble of powering up their monsters, assembling a group, winning the battle…and then walking away with nothing. Well, that’s if things go according to plan. A number of players have unfortunately encountered connection issues just trying to start a raid, or trying to capture a Lugia. I’ve also heard stories from players in large groups where only a couple of people got the prize, despite everyone chipping in.
On social media, plenty of heartbroken players are reporting legendaries escaping or lagging out:
@NianticLabs this many people tackling Lugia, no one has gone past half Health of Lugia, network errors. How are kids supposed to do it?! pic.twitter.com/4bw1pfgbiu
— Hannah (@hannycalderr) July 23, 2017
Legendary raids are very frustrating; 4 Articuno raids and 4 Lugia raids completed. Caught precisely 0 of them. Fml. #PokemonGO pic.twitter.com/HVNSeo9Dyt
— Martijn(tje) (@RSMartijn) July 23, 2017
Thanks Niantic for making Lugia so hard to catch when you need twelve people just to get a chance at it.
— AxelChildofDestiny (@AxelChldofDstny) July 23, 2017
@NianticLabs @NianticHelp PokemonGoApp crap idea to put Lugia raid on a Chester street with poor signal and network error lot of annoyed ppl
— IansLazyTweets (@ianislazylad) July 23, 2017
Totally lost ??? Lugia is really hard to defeat. Especially when there’s no other players in the area. #Lugia is super hard! @PokemonGoApp pic.twitter.com/BX4xCG24FD
— DAVO (@davoolson) July 23, 2017
@trnrtips I just wasted a raid pass trying to get lugia again and It keeps lagging out.@NianticLabs This looks like when PoGo released xD
— スモージー (@SmoozieUHC) July 23, 2017
2nd Lugia that run away, this bad boy is hard to catch! #PokemonGO
— Bruno Ferreira (@BrunoF93) July 23, 2017
@PokemonGoApp Chester, attempt to catch Lugia met with over 30 minutes of this, 3 attempts to catch, very dissapointed #pokemongochester pic.twitter.com/1PwlDMXQa4
— Dave Newton (@DaveNewton24) July 23, 2017
Did 3 Lugia and 3 Articuno Raids and couldn’t catch neither of them… Either the catchrate is way too low or I’m just unlucky as hell again
— Prof (@YT_Prof) July 23, 2017
@NianticHelp @NianticLabs Really appreciate being stuck on this screen when trying to fight Lugia. EVERYTIME, FOR 90 MINUTES!?? pic.twitter.com/fIED393ypw
— Jakey (@JakeDGorton) July 23, 2017
Just wasted 2 hours, about 20 attempts and all my items due to horrendous lag failing to get a lugia #ChesterPokeGo #PokemonGOFestFAIL
— Mark Hughes (@hughesagoodboy) July 23, 2017
The thing is, network issues aside, it makes sense for legendaries to be hard to catch. They’re legendaries! It wouldn’t feel special for everyone to just have one, now would it? At the same time, I can see why some people feel frustrated. In the main games, you don’t have to rely on other players to get what you want, and it’s also very easy to become overpowered. The tension of capturing a legendary lies less in the combat encounter than it does in the low capture rate. Even that can be circumvented: the real games have Master Balls with 100% capture rate, and failing that, anyone can just reset their game and try again. Not so IRL: not only are there a number of logistical issues to overcome, you are limited by Premiere Balls.
Pokémon Go’s devotion to cooperation means that we’re all getting a more “authentic” legendary experience, while paradoxically straying from what it’s usually like to play Pokémon. Pokémon players, myself included, are not used to having legendaries actually be rare and tough to catch.
Granted, a good number of folks out there have had enough luck to nab a legendary, even if it does take a few tries. Actually, in some places, the groups accruing for this event look very similar to the early days of Pokémon Go:
Geeks of Chester congregate on otherwise quiet street to catch Lugia #PokemonGO pic.twitter.com/UGkKv2CIof
— I_Loves_MeKitty⚓ (@I_Loves_MeKitty) July 23, 2017
Thousands heading to catch Legendary pokemon Lugia in Chicago!! #pokemongo #chicago #pokemon #PokemonGOFest #lugia pic.twitter.com/gjSt2nlB9i
— El Jonyboi (@jonyboi55) July 23, 2017
Lugia is happening! #pokemongofest pic.twitter.com/7djjKmzjM2
— Long Island Instinct (@LiTeamInstinct) July 23, 2017
Image source: Neozs on r/TheSilphRoad
Comments
6 responses to “Some Pokemon GO Players Are Having Trouble Capturing Lugia And Articuno”
At this point I’m hoping PAX will save me, either that or some massive group meetup in my capital city of choice.
Personally I think they’ve made it to ridiculously hard I myself have spent thousands of coins on both Lugia and Articuno raids most of which have had 12 tp 20 players most of which after a hard slog we win to be awarded around 13 Premier balls and guess what the first time are used for gold berries 6 normal berries out of the 13 shots landed great 75% of the time and nice the rest and it’s still run away. I appreciate that they are legendaries and should not be easy to catch however if you look at all the YouTube videos out there of people catching them they were catching them first go with a pinap berry which is absolutely ridiculous and in no way corresponds with my personal experience
At the risk of sounding Sour grapes I really feel like legendary raids just misses the mark and leaves players bitter.
My partner and I are both in our late 20s, and out of friendship group there’s only two other go players, who live literally opposite side of town to us. Factor in that legendary spawns are random and you can’t exactly make plans via Facebook groups and such to catch up at 7pm on Friday at place X and attempt to catch one (Which is how we do our Destiny raids).
I’d much rather have had to complete lots of little achievements and then have a really low catch rate Lugia/Articuno appear and miss out that way, as apposed to nowing unless there’s dumb luck of a group in town I’ll just never catch one.
on one side there is Niantec’s dream of how the game is designed and played.
On the opposite end of the spectrum is the real world in which 99.9% of it isn’t filled with pokéstops on every corner, gyms at every convenience, and full cell service or a abundance of pokémon spawns.
One side of the scale cannot move and is out of the control of the people, it would be nice if the developer could meet in the middle and reward players who still play, instead of focusing the punishment of cheaters.
I can also safely assume that 80% of cheaters are doing so because the game provides absolutely no tools to allow it to be played to any level of completion without the help of a third party. Let alone without being over 18 and having access to a car.
At the risk of continuously repeating myself my antique has looked at it from the money standpoint. Let’s face it it was obvious from the start when each level would give you 30 to 40 items in your bag as a reward thanks for the reward but now you’ve just forced me to use 200 coins to extend my bag by 50 items now you’ve got the gym raids where you pay 100 coins to enter a raid that you may possibly lose but if you win you then still have to buy a boss and in this case Lugia and articuno both of which are almost impossible to catch even using golden berries and landing great shots he should not be this hard I think my antique needs to reward every player who joins their first raid the ability to catch a Lugia and Articuno as demonstrated in the thousands of YouTube videos released of these catches in real time every single one I have seen we’re catching the legendary Articuno and Lugia with a pinap berry and A Single Shot not even a nice or great shot. After you have accumulated one Articuno and one Lugia from a legendary raid and obviously use a number of passes to do so the catch rate would return to it’s normal 2% and good luck if you want more the idea is everybody gets a legendary only some get more than one of each that seems to be more fairer then going through tons of coins tons of passes tons of health tons of revives excetera excetera only then not be able to catch the boss at the end even though you’ve gone through all that effort to get through the raid
I managed 2 out of 3 Lugia captures and 3 out of 9 Articuno’s (Lugia weren’t spawning in the CBD so our group had to detour a bit). Honestly I think once premier balls are exhausted, you should be able to use ultra balls etc until it flees (at an appropriate flee rate I might add). The trouble is you get so few balls, lags causes issues at the worst of times, and the single worst part for Articuno and various other flyers is a glitch where throwing a ball without utmost care causes it to sail over the targets head.
That last part was so bad that I regularly waited for them to fly up so I couldn’t possibly miss. I do tend to feel that there needs to be some rebalancing for future Legendaries though. The trailer made it look like you get one instantly for defeating a raid. Considering in some places cities and locations it would take quite a bit of organisation to get enough people, and premium passes cost money, I kind of wish that’s how it was. After all, you literally have to be willing to pay (or have had the foresight or fortune to take gyms and save up coins, which I was lucky) and can still leave empty handed…
Pokémon players, myself included, are not used to having legendaries actually be rare and tough to catch.
Regarding that, I’m assuming after GSC. Catching Mewtwo with nothing but ultra balls and an ill prepared team or hunting down the 3 doggos would be comparable to this Lugia deal I imagine
To be fair, at least in the games you can just reload a save and keep trying. Trouble is you only get as little as 6 to 8 premier balls on average here, and if you fail, pass wasted. And this is only short term apparently.
It’s not just connection issues or being in a rural area. Most groups I’ve raised with are on their third catch or fourth for Lugia. Meanwhile all my attempts to catch it have failed, around 6-7 times? This one girl has tried 14 raids and still hasn’t caught one. Are some people singled out just to make it feel “rare”? Am I one of the unlucky accounts chosen “never to obtain”? Sure feels like it.
I’ve done 9 articuno raids and still haven’t caught one. However I haven’t bought any coins and have used saved up coins or daily passes. Is here any possibility that the catch rate goes up if you have purchased coins from the game?
I have been in 12 raid battles for Articuno and caught 4, try throwing Golden Rarppberry at them they work for me
Need to make changes where I live there is not enough trainers for raids its a joke trying to catch a legendary here no chance. Not to mention driving miles looking high and low at all times of the day spawn for good pokemon is horrible also. Makes it hearing people in other places catching multiple legendary. Sorry pokemon go but me and a few fellow trainers gonna stop spending on this game and quit.
So in other words, no matter how skilled you are or how much effort you put into it, unless you get lucky, have a way to get to the area, have a good connection, and have a lot of other people to help you, you’re not gonna get any legendaries. That’s pretty fucked up. If their excuse for all this is then being legendaries, well, according to pretty much everything else, there’s only one of each legendary, and pokeballs don’t do shit to them. This doesn’t make sense, is a terrible mechanic, and is extremely unfair.