Gen3 and raids
Word is that gen3 is coming soon, maybe as soon as a partial (or complete) release for the Halloween event. Given that, it would make sense to have some gen3 raid bosses. And if the raid bosses are changing, we could also lose some, which might be trouble for some people.
I got my first T-Tar last night in a raid (98%), IT/FB so I TM'd it to B/SE (don't have enough CTMs to try for B/C, and SE is solid - I'm a free player, level 34, so different constraints than pay players). I'm worried that gen3 will come out and that T-Tar and Machamp will be replaced as raid bosses before I get a good stable of them to fight with.
Mind you, I don't think there's a player in the world that would be upset that Quilava, Bayleef, and Croconaw move on, as well as Weezing, Magmar, Electabuzz, the Eevolutions, and the Gen1 starters (well, maybe a few people want another Charizard - mine suck).
But if T-Tar and Machamp leave, that would be bad (Machops are super rare here - no player I know has collected enough of them from the wild to have a useful group of them.)
So, some of the best raid bosses could vanish? Any thoughts? Any speculation on how new raid bosses would shake out? Or perhaps they will just add a few more to the list without taking any away. A level 2 raid for a Belial (evolves to Metagross), Bagon (evolves to Salamence) or Ralts (evolves to Gardevoir) would be worth something even to a high level player.
Also, and perhaps more importantly, do you all think that going forward, there will ALWAYS be some sort of legendary boss available - that's the trend since the beasts were released, 3 months of access to them? Or maybe a few days of a legendary from gen3 for the Halloween event?
Of course no-one outside of Niantic knows what's going to happen, but any thoughts, educated guesses (or uneducated guesses), or idle speculation? And how do we all prepare for these changes?
Answers
if they rotated in 2 weeks with a limited Gen 3 release that would be good news. anyone who doesn't have some of the raid bosses hasn't really tried to get them. A Machamp can be beaten by 2 people at level 30. I haven't done most of the tier 3. But that's mainly because I don't care.
I am also L34 and free to play. I am not able to solo a Machamp yet because I have not done a Mewtwo raid and my Alakzams are not very good. If you make it a priority I bet you could solo a Machamp. For me it's not a priority because I can go at a lunch hour and get 20 Machamp candy within 15 minutes of my office.
From TPC, about the upcoming Halloween event: "... we can't wait to get out and about to see what sort of excitement we can scare up while catching new Pokémon to fill out our Pokédex."
So, either:
1) Some new mon from gen3, like the ghosts.
2) Some new mon as raid bosses (Ho-oh, Celebi, or Mew).
3) Something new from gen2, like different unown.
4) Maybe they split off regular and shiny, adding to the pokedex.
Unless you can dream up a fifth possibility, what else could be new in the pokedex?
They may be addressing players who didn't complete their pokedex yet.
Or they may refer to mewtwo. Many of us didn't have a chance to get one to fill our pokedex.
There are also a decent number of Gen 1 & 2 new pokemon to be released - Unown forms, mew, celebi, etc. Nothing really points towards Gen 3 ;)
Really like your idea of making pre-evolutions of the strongest mons available as raid-bosses. On the other hand it would still be pretty easy to get a salamence for everyone. Raid bosses will change at one point that's for sure. GEN 3 won't be released this year for sure. Next step will be to finish the beasts and then make mewto available to more players.
Another idea I had in my mind would be to reward the player whos pokemon gets fed with berries with 20 dust too, so putting mons into gyms which others hope to get candy from or get fed to take the gym alive would make defenders relevant again.
Salamance wouldn't be that easy. Bagon would require 125 candy to evolve to Salamance, and then another 75 or so to get it up to level 30 to fight. So 200 candy, which would be about 30 raids. Want to spend a month's worth of free raid passes to get a Salamance? Or you could raid for 30 T-Tars. Which is more useful overall? Or one could use rare candy. Still expensive.
I personally don't foresee any Gen 3 legendaries before they finish with Gen1&2. They haven't even gotten through the beasts yet. We still haven't seen Ho-oh, Celebi, or Mew, not to mention Mewtwo is still in testing.
I also don't see them adding lower tier Gen3 raid bosses before they are released into the wild either. Unfortunately, for them they kinda blew the raids by choosing all the best mons from Gen1&2(except dragonite) in the first batch.
I strongly suspect that they will do something with raids for the Halloween event. They want to show that raids are a permanent part of the game, integrated with every thing else. So an event implies some special changes (likely candy for Halloween) and will probably include something different for the raids. Also note that the Beast migration will almost certainly happen during the event, with us in the Americas getting Suicune. It wouldn't surprise me if there are a few new raid bosses that are special for the event, to get people to come out and raid them. If they are gen1-gen2, well, that's fine. Misdreavus at level 2 would be appropriate (Halloween), as would something with Gengar, although he's already a raid boss. Maybe UberGengar at level 4, with something special about it. Dunno.
As far as I know all niantic said was that we would have a chance to "catch new pokemon" and if we've learned anything in the past 15 months it's not to get our hopes up. The general public and clickbait news sites said gen 3 is coming when it is more than likely just mew or celebi. Or Ho-Oh if the nerf him first
