(Late and Great) Local Ex-Raid, 9/3/2018

Well, the Ex-Raid that occurred today had a number of things that happened once again, but that didn't make it any less great. For starters, it happened late again, as it was scheduled for 6 PM in the evening. While this does work out to the advantage of some people, as Monday is indeed a work day and the 6 PM time conveniently falls just outside of work, it might be a bit bothersome for others, considering how some people noted that the previous 6 PM Ex-Raid - one that I didn't attend and coincided with a special moment - was in colder weather. This scheduling has its ups and downs.

A good thing is that this Ex-Raid once again has the normal number of participants, numbering to over 90. As such, there were many battle flights. In all, there were eight: two for each team, and two dubbed as "rainbow" flights, which simply meant that they had players from different teams. It should be noted that with the way raids work, things may or may not provide an advantage to the players... or in my own terms, "handicap" or "assistance". Prior to this Ex-Raid, the Gym firmly belonged to Valor, and there was not enough time to "blank" the Gym, let alone change it to any other team. Thus this time it was a "handicap", and as things stood, I only got 11 balls to catch Mewtwo, again being forced to catch on the third-to-last ball.

The Mewtwo I caught today is not overly strong, but it's by no means less capable either. It is the eleventh one I've gotten since I've participated in the Ex-Raids. As my Pokémon storage grows full, I may have to think about trading away some of the Mewtwo to those who have not been as fortunate in getting one. Thanks to the trading system, now it becomes less desirable to transfer Pokémon to remove them from storage, and in the case of Mewtwo, it is simply too precious to do so even without trades. Of course, trades will also depend on the willingness and resources of the player willing to "adopt" it, which may be variable depending on circumstances.

Mewtwo @ Fountain.
I'll have to come back and take another picture for a daylight raid.

Also once again, for this Ex-Raid, I was unable to take an in-game picture with the normal means using the camera and the AR mode. This was what happened with the previous Ex-Raid, for which I had planned to take a picture in this way. (As a makeshift, the picture above was taken by a direct screenshot.) I talked to one of my fellow raid mates, and I was told that he was unable to take pictures either, and therefore this is a major bug, threatening the existence of something like the "Mew @ Everywhere" project. However, a week ago, I had discovered that a picture of the previous raid miraculously existed, so now I include it for reference.

The picture of my raid mates and Mewtwo, which was supposed to be posted last time.

Lots of things happened (again) in this Ex-Raid. By now, most of them should be able to be expected, and preparations can be made to support the positive ones and sidestep the negative ones. By my experience, I'm sure that I can do so in order to support my raid mates in the Ex-Raid effort. Surely lots more things will happen in subsequent ones, and dealing with them is what makes things great in the end.

One year ago: Bandai Pokémon XY Swing - Pikachu