If you use a Raid Pass for a level 4 Raid, but no one else shows up, so you leave before the pre-raid timer ends, do you get your Raid Pass back, or is it gone forever? If this is the case, how can you see if anyone else is there without using the pass?
It's lost forever.
No, you cannot see whose in the lobby before you use the pass.
Niantic is making bank off everyone wasting 100 coins trying to take on a raid boss without knowing what they are in for. They even lowered the trainer level to level 5 to get into raids. Like what can a level 5 trainer do lol
A level 5 trainer can have a Tyranitar just by taking part in the raid. It doesn't matter what his part in defeating was if enough high level players took part too and did the work...
It's just for the dex, a level 5 Tyranitar is nearly useless at this stage later on.
So Niantic ensures a higher amount of potential customers spending money for raidpasses, just to fill their dex with rare mons.
I really don't think this hurts the spoofers at all...
Spoofers will just spoof into extremely busy areas like San Fran, Santa Monica, Long Beach, Tokyo, super dense places to begin with...
They are not going to waste their time and spoof to some rural gym to see if anyone is there.
I was at my small town gym and a tier 4 egg hatched...Tyranitar popped out, saw 1 person, didn't want to waste my pass for the day...
Spoofers/cheaters will always have an edge/win. No need to ruin the game for the honest folks by blocking the lobby...
Well...I live in one of those busy places and I can tell you that Tier 3/4 raids are still a crapshoot in all but the very densest parts of town (I have yet to try those areas to see how many others play). I jumped into a Tier 4 raid tonight; it had 4 other players between about level 24 and level 35 (and I think at least one of them was fighting with low-CP garbage). It took at least 30 minutes before we finally got a seventh player who made the difference to the battle. Don't get me wrong - as a player with no organized group of teammates, I would definitely prefer to be in my city than in a rural area, but it's far from a guarantee that you'll have the critical mass to win a raid.
I get the logic of blocking the lobby to punish spoofers, though it's frustrating to waste raid passes. What I think is even more interesting as evidence that the gyms are somewhat spoofer-resistant is banning ill-gotten pokemon from gym play. It is very curious that even in this city, I have never seen an Ampharos (or Flaaffy or Mareep) in a gym. (I have seen an Unown, but only one.) Have to wonder if almost all of the Ampharos obtained by local players were caught via spoofing - and thus are prohibited from gym play.
