Elite Raids Are Meh

Elite raids are a bit of a new feature. Simply put, they are designated raids that feature a specific Legendary Pokemon at a specific time. Currently, Hoopa Unbound, Regieleki and Regidraco are the Pokemon that have featured in these raids. They have special red eggs and appear at specific times. But how are they?

Well, they had a rocky start.

When Hoopa appeared in Elite Raids, the boss was insanely tough. Being only really weak to bug types, it took a lot of players to take down. But what made matters worse was how buggy the raids were. Connection issues ran wild and people found they couldn’t even get into raids. On top of that, the bonuses promised to go with Elite Raids didn’t work at all. We were supposed to get increased and rarer spawns after completing Elite Raids but never appeared.

But the original Hoopa raids weren’t alone when it came to bugs. The two Regi Raids weren’t much better. In fact, the most recent Elite Raids only happened because the original Elite Raids were full of glitches, to the point that many people couldn’t even start raids. It was a make-up event because the original event was almost unplayable.

And it’s not like these Pokemon are even much good. Hoopa Unbound is powerful, but we have Mewtwo for psychic damage and a whole host of dark and ghost types that are easier to obtain. The two new Regis aren’t very good at all, and Regieleki doesn’t translate well into Pokemon Go because there are no speed IVs and speed overall is nonexistent compared to the main series games.

But there are more problems with Elite Raids. They only spawn at certain gyms at certain times. The raids can open at 11am, 2pm or 5pm. So you do have a better chance to prepare for an Elite Raid. However, you’d think that there would be an even number of raids at each different hatch time, but you’d be wrong. They all seem to be random. Where I currently am, I can see about 10 gyms. However, I saw one raid at 11am, 4 raids at 2pm and not a single raid at 5pm. Which completely screws over a lot of players. For some reason, every Elite Raid Day has this problem. None of them are split evenly. And not all gyms are elegible for Elite Raids.

And because these raids are for local players only, you can’t invite any friends to help you with these raids. I get that Niantic doesn’t like remote raids, but remote raids can massively help people who just don’t have enough players to take on raid bosses.

Thing is, I can see what Niantic are trying to do with these raids. And frankly, they are way, way better than the old EX raids that we had before Covid. Those raids were annoying because they always spawned at random times, like 2pm on a Tuesday, when most people are busy with work or school. Elite Raids at least a little more accessible, and only happen on weekends. But they still need to be a bit more accessible, and allowing remote passed would make Elite Raids a lot better.

Once they’ve removed the bugs, that is.