Walking a Buddy for Fun

Every time I start getting close to reaching Best Buddies, I go through the same old predicament. Once my current Pokemon buddy reaches Best Buddies, what do I walk in its place? There are so many Pokemon to choose from, and some will resonate more than others. Now, I’ve written in the past about what Pokemon you should buddy with. But that little guide really doesn’t help to narrow down the list that much. After all, there are so many Pokemon that we get attached to, ones that are useful and ones that are cool.

But I feel like I’m missing something.

I can’t put my finger on what it is, but whenever I do search for a new buddy, I get a lot of the same thoughts. After all, unless you are super hardcore, leveling up a buddy is a month-long adventure. Of course, one could meticulously level up many buddies at once, making the most use of the 20 swaps a day. I could theoretically do this, but having to sit through long animations and loading screens gets pretty tedious.

Frankly, going casual is the least painful way of getting a best buddy. Sure, it’ll take a month or so (down to 15-ish days if you get them excited enough) but at least I am saving precious seconds from not having to sit through animations. After all, many Pokemon take their damn sweet time just walking onto the buddy screen.

“I really ought to walk this Pokemon.”

Another issue is that, well, there are a lot of Pokemon I should be walking. After all, I need candy to help me level up and evolve Pokemon. Magikarp, Wailmer and Noibat are all good options, since you need 400 candy to evolve them. But we also need Mega and XL candies for a lot of Pokemon. After all, we already have Pokemon like the Kanto starters, Gengar, Houndoom and Altaria, a lot more to come. Once you have initially evolved a Mega Pokemon, you’re guaranteed a ton of Mega Candy. Without even noticing, I somehow ended up with 800 Mega Houndoom candy from walking my Hundour.

And then we have all the Legendaries and Pseudo-Legendaries that need candy. Outside of raids, getting candy for rarer Pokemon is an absolute chore. Legndaries are even worse, since you only get one candy every 20 kilometers.

But here is the key thing: if it’s a chore, why am I doing it? There’s only so many Pokemon you can deal with, so why am I making my life harder for myself?

In the end, I always settle for something cool and fun.

After getting Best Buddy with my shiny, hundo Skarmory, I did find a new buddy to start leveling up with. As of writing, I am now walking a shiny 2-star Palkia. Its stats are shit, and Palkia tends to fall behind its siblings Giratina and Dialga. But the key thing is, it looks cool and I like it. Palkia looks cool wandering around the open world, and it is just an all-round neat, shiny Pokemon, even if my one has shit stats.

At the end of the day, making a Pokemon a Best Buddy is a bit of a commitment. It takes a long time to get to Best Buddies, so I might as well have some fun while I do that.

And if I find a better Pokemon to walk? I can always switch my buddies out and go back to leveling them later.