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Welcome, Trainers! Congratulations on Level 43!
I will be honest with you: the road to 44 from here looks a lot harder than it actually is. There is a way to cheese most of the challenges presented to you, but for those who do not have friends in Pokémon Go, I will provide some legitimate advice.
Your tasks are all related to PvP this time around. They are as follows:
Without any ado, let’s get right into it.
Win 30 Trainer Battles in the Great, Ultra, and Master Leagues
When I tackled this challenge, I mistakenly thought I could cheese it by doing Master League battles. My thinking was that ifExcellent Throwscount towards Throws of all lesser varieties, surely aMaster League winwill net my progress in all other League.
Unfortunately,this is not the case. Hopes were dashed.
However, that does not mean there is no easy way to cheese this. In fact, cheesing this fight is much simpler than doing30 Master Leaguechallenges legitimately. And, if you love yourself, you will probably be using this method to ascend to Level 44.
By now, you will have made some friends in Pokémon Go. If you have not,you should for this challenge, if not for the plethora of goodies you get for being a socialite in this game.
Now, and this is indeed the hard part about this cheese method,ask your friend if they will PvP with you. The goal is to sucker your friend into90 Trainer battles, 30 for each League. They will doabsolutely nothingexcept exist as a punching bag for your Pokémon.
This methoddoes not requirethat you have Pokémon at any level in particular, as long as theirCP does not exceed that of the League’s limit. The limits for each league are as follows:
Your best strategy in convincing your friend is the promise that you will do the same in return. Many Trainers are trying to do the same challenges as you, so if none of your friends are willing to do this for you, you may turn toonline Pokémon Go communitiesto help recruit anew punching bagfriend.
To get through this challenge as quickly as possible, make sure yourfriend picks low-level Pokémonwith Typings to which you have powerful counters. For example, if your friend picks weakIce-TypePokémon, make sure your team is filled with very powerfulFire-Typeswith the intention ofone-shotting each individual Pokémon. You will be rinsing and repeating this method 90 times (180 times if you honorably help your friend with the same challenge). Luckily, YouTube and other online streaming services exist to help make this grind a bit less boring.
Win 20 Trainer Battles in the GO Battle League
I promised before that I would provide some legitimate advice for the friendless, but the truth is that you will have to do some actual PvP to get to Level 44. Luckily, it is only20 battles of any leaguethat you wish to participate in.
PvP is challenging to navigate. In order to excel in PvP, you need Pokémon with particular and rare IV levels to make some competition. That is if you are pitted against Trainers with some PvP chops from previous seasons. The average Trainer fightwill not be tough as long as you have a good spread of Typingsand learn when toswitch outand whento protect yourself at optimal times.
This guide will go into the best Pokémon for PvP, but first, we should discusshow IVs and CP work.
CP Scaling, Levels, and IVs
The new Trainer’s gut instinct is to pick Pokémon with as close to maxed out IVs, or Pokémon with the highestATKstat, for the sake of fighting in the Battle Leagues. Given the information readily available in the game, their logic is sound. HighATKPokémon tend to do the best when it comes to raiding, so it is reasonable to assume that the same would go for PvP. However, prioritizing theATKstat is the worst thing you can do when picking out Pokémon for your team.
This is due to howCPscales with a Pokémon’s IVs as it is leveling. Since Battle Leagues are limit-locked based onCP, Pokémon in the Great and Ultra Leagues must have a limited ATK stat becauseCP scales up faster with ATK than any other stat. This means you will have the most success with Pokémon with a mediocre to non-existent ATK stat. This will slow your damage, sure, but your Pokémon will getmore Levelsand will subsequently be extremely tough to take down in the League.
Evolutions
Similarly to higher level Pokémon performing the best, it is also in your interest toevolve Pokémon as much as possiblebefore hitting the CP cap for the League you are targeting.
I hope you didn’t throw away any low-CP Pokémon, thinking they were useless. Here, they areincredibly valuable. These Pokémon can be evolved to their last evolution forms while remaining at a low Level, and furthermore, low CP. This keeps them viable for the League, and they are powerful additions to your team. If you have a fully-evolved Pokémon or two in your lineup, you will have a lot more success in the Leagues than a Trainer that picks Pokémon at random – or worse, that uses the Recommend Team feature (don’t do this if you want to win).
Recommended Pokémon and Team Building Resources
To make your life a bit easier, we have compiled a list of Pokémon thatgenerally do wellin the Leagues. These lists arenot definitive, however, and it is possible that picking Pokémon straight from these lists without any thought to composition could lead to ultimate failure. For more in-depth help for team building, we recommend usingPvPoke’s comprehensive toolsto give yourself the best chances at success. The Pokémon in these lists are also sourced from this website, and I have used this website extensively for my own teams.
Now, let’s get into the lists.
Great League
The top-performing Pokémon are these:
Ultra League
Master League
A couple of notes here. You will have noticed that each Pokémon in this list hastwo Charged Attacks. The higher your rank in PvP, the more likely it is that you will face off against opponents with Pokémon that were explicitly builtforPvP. If you already have some ranks under your belt, making sure that your Pokémon are prepped with the BiS moves will be essential.
However, another note, if you do not have ranks in PvP and you are just doing this for the first time – you are in luck. Though you may suffer some losses, you do not have to be perfectly prepared to get through this challenge. Actually, it is likely that you will get through the 20 matches you need with just a little bit of preparation easily if you are low rank.
Decide for yourselves what the best course of action is for you. Don’t let PvP intimidate you - there may be a lot to it, but let yourself enjoy the process. Take it easy, and these fights will be a source of exhileration and excitement! Good luck out there, Trainers. Happy battling!
Pokémon Go: Level 40 to 50 All Tasks and Rewards
Ascending the levels from Level 40 onward is no easy task. This guide exists to help you navigate and prepare for these tough challenges.
