After weeks of preseason matches, the Go Battle League season one. The competitive battling mode in Pokemon GO will begin its first official season next week on March 13.
Leading up to next Friday there will be a multitude of events to help you prepare competitive teams for the first season of competition. This includes special raids and legendary encounters as battle rewards.
Now that the preseason is over, trailers who reached rank 4 will receive a free Battle Pass. Better yet, from now until the start of season one you can pick to battle in the Great, Ultra or Master Leagues instead of being forced into what the game has you play.
On top of that, you’ll be able to encounter Darkrai (March 6 to 9), Altered Forme Giratina (March 13 to 16) and Thundurus (until further notice) in the mystery Pokemon rewards for winning Go Battle League matches.
Reports of Thundurus appearing as a reward were popping up across the internet yesterday, and this announcement officially confirmed it. Also, Darkrai and Giratina will be available in their shiny forms.
The raid event running from March 10 to 12 will feature numerous Pokemon that excel in PvP battles. Here is what the announcement had to say:
…strong Pokémon will be appearing in raids, including Skarmory, Swampert, Shieldon, and more! Registeel and Cresselia will be appearing in five-star raids. You’ll also earn twice the usual Stardust from Raid Battles and Trainer Battles during this event. Please note that this bonus will not apply to GO Battle League Trainer Battles.
March 13 to 16 will also see a GO Battle League-related raid event as well as the introduction of Shiny Tumburr:
…more Pokémon thought to be powerful in the GO Battle League will be available in raids, including Altered Forme Giratina in five-star raids. Fighting-type Pokémon will also be appearing more frequently in the wild! Also if you’re lucky, you might find a Shiny Timburr!
During this event, you’ll also get a free Premium Battle Pass if you win all five of your matches in a single set in the Premium path. This means if you never lost you could keep on getting the Premium rewards for free.
You’ll also be able to do up to 35 matches per day in the Pokemon GO Battle League and the stardust rewards will be increased.
It’s going to be a busy week leading up to season one, and the pace only picks up once the season begins. First, here are a few tweaks that they made to the Pokemon GO Battle League for season one:
- Amount of Stardust or TM rewards now based on rank
- Early ranks (2 & 3) now require wins to rank up instead of just playing matches
- Changes to Pokemon you can encounter
- Added: Metagross, Beldum, Rufflet, Pikachu Libre
- Removed: Snorlax, Machop, Meditite
- Increased: Scraggy
- Rank 10 rewards based on Champion Steven (Items and an avatar pose)
- Elite TMs added as end of season rewards for Rank 7 or above
That last one is massive because players have been asking for this item for a long time. Elite Charged and Fast TMs let you pick which move your Pokemon will learn instead of letting the game randomly assign an attack from the creature’s move list. They can also teach event-exclusive attacks.
The announcement also revealed the full breakdown of when you’ll be able to play certain leagues for season one. Each League will be available for two weeks at a time and then there will be a period of two weeks where you can access any league.
All the events begin and end at 1 p.m. PDT on their respective days. Here’s the full schedule:
- Great League (max CP 1500): March 13 to March 27
- Ultra League (max CP 2500): March 27 to April 10
- Master League (no CP limit): April 10 to April 24
- Any League: April 24 to May 1
- Season Two: May 1
You can read the full announcement of Pokemon GO Battle League season one right here.
Keep on top of everything going on in Pokemon GO this month by checking out the details on Abra Community Day and learn how to take on the Thundurus Raid with this guide.
Published: Mar 5, 2020 01:13 pm