Although Buddy Pokemon were the highlight of the latest Pokemon Go update, reports from dozens of shrewd players on The Silph Road subreddit seem to suggest that the spawn rates of rare Pokemon increased significantly as well.
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Although some users on the subreddit are skeptical, countless others are seeing rare Pokemon at every turn — Pokemon they haven’t seen in their areas since the game launched in early July. Here’s what the original poster had to say:
“[Picture of nearby Pokemon shows Pinsir, Tauros, Venasaur, Onix, Weedle]: none of these Pokémon (except for Weedle, of course) spawned with any degree of frequency nearby. All of the sudden, spawn rates have skyrocketed nearby – the best I’ve ever seen is a single Ivysaur that didn’t even spawn at a nest, but now there are always Tauroses and Pinsirs, as well as the occasional very rare ‘mon, as pictured.”
One user said they had seen six Arcanines since Thursday, another is beginning to see Kabuto and Cubone spawn at a nest near their house. Yet another saw “a Charizard, a Parasect, an Onix, multiple Gravelers, two Tauros, a Magmar, a Pinsir, and the silhouette of a Lickitung throughout the day” on Friday.
Some users are speculating that this might have been a weekend-long event, while others think that Niantic might simply be bumping up the spawn rate of rare Pokemon to maintain interest in the game.
Either way, despite the fact that there has been no official word from the developers (nor will there be, in all likelihood), it’s clear that many users found rare creatures in their areas for the first time this weekend.
Now let’s just hope this was a permanent change to rare spawns.