Community Raid Days?

Players who have been with Pokémon Go over the past three months or so might have participated in the three Summer Tour events, or at least the bonus after those events, which would be the Legendary Bird Days. In all of those cases, all the Gyms are locked for raids of the three Pokémon within a three-hour time frame. It's almost like a Community Day, except it happens with raids. In fact, it's too similar - so I propose an expanded concept of this, which I would call "Community Raid Days".

It would help to point out how similar the two events are, by specific characteristics. The three-hour time frame is the most strikingly similar aspect; Community Days also occur within a similar period of time, barring any major errors that may cause extensions to occur. All players are similarly facilitated through the locking of all Gyms for raids of the same Pokémon, as the analogue of increased appearances during Community Day. Shiny forms are possible during this, and this is a hallmark of a Community Day as well. Even exclusive moves are involved, as another hallmark of Community Day - Moltres Day for example had the Sky Attack move when Moltres was raided during the event. These are all significant similarities that prompt me to think up of this concept.

As for the execution, there are a few things to consider. The most important is what Pokémon to feature. Since Pokémon that are in Level 1 and Level 2 raids are relatively common, they probably would be better reserved for a possible Community Day instead. Pokémon of upper evolutionary stages present in higher raid levels seem to be the best candidates instead, as well as the Legendary Pokémon present in Level 5. Based on this, Machamp and Tyranitar - the latter as a possible rerun of June's Community Day in raid form - could be possible candidates, and it is likely that the second-generation Legendary Beasts will have theirs some point down the line.

Other feature considerations could be taken into account. Since Community Raid Days would be all about raids, Lure Modules are useless to be extended; instead, Star Pieces and Lucky Eggs could be extended. Field Research tasks could also be changed as in Community Day, though it could be good to vary them like in the Squirtle Community Day in July - instead of "catch-3", they could be "catch-2" to account for limited raids, and the rewards could be the Golden Razz Berry or the recently introduced Silver Pinap Berry, as well as anything that may be earned through raids. These would make them on par.

The recent Legendary Bird Days and Community Days share so many similarities that it's not hard to consider the former as an offshoot of the latter. At that point, they might as well be standardized, and "Community Raid Days" would be the solution. Given the popularity of the recent ones, they might very well happen again, and standardization would establish this as a fixture, just like Community Days as they have unfolded over the course of this year.

One year ago: Pokémon and Party Games