Making Sense of Field Research Tasks

In Pokémon Go, most Research tasks (Field Research, but also applies to Special and Timed Research as well) are obvious in what they demand a Trainer to do, and therefore don't need to be explained any further. Some of them, however, have little intricacies that might be helpful to be explained in order to make the best possible use of them. In fact, the process may also be regarded as making sense of (understanding) them, and so I've decided to do just that by taking up this post.

One kind of task that in some ways does need to be understood are tasks that require throwing Poké Balls. They're prefixed with "make..." or "land...", but either way, the throw must be successful in nabbing the Pokémon - not wide, not short, not missing them, and not knocked away (unless rebounded via Catch Assist by a Buddy Pokémon). If a kind of throw - Nice, Great, or Excellent - is specified, then throws of that kind or better count; for example, Excellent throws count as Great throws as well, but certainly not vice versa. Other than that, curveball and in-a-row requirements should already be pretty clear, as is the rest of the explanation above.

Some raid tasks may demand a Trainer to catch Pokémon after a successful raid or complete them regardless, and this is rather obvious. What may not be obvious is that there are two terms for the difficulty of a raid, one of which is "Level" (which I use personally) and the other being "-star", which has become the term of choice lately. There's not much that can be done about this except to know that the two terms are in play and they mean the same thing. The hope may be that someday, either of the two will become consistent and confusion can be removed, making them make sense.

With the advent of "level-up" tasks, some Research tasks have gotten rather verbose. Beyond their verbosity, they can still be completed, though the effort in understanding takes a bit more. The primary thing is to list and fulfill all of the criteria in order to complete the task as stated, and if there are terms that are ambiguous, to try a couple of different possibilities. It also doesn't hurt to have friends who can do the same as well, thereby being able to remove any confusion quickly in completing the task.

Research tasks are mostly an undaunting thing in Pokémon Go, but sometimes and more recently, particular tasks may present somewhat of a daunting challenge in understanding (making sense of) them. Some pointers such as the above are still helpful in this regard, especially with potentially complex and verbose tasks in the future. The key may just be to remove the mental blocks, at which point the understanding will come.

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