"[Theory] Pokemon with battle experience get better movesets when they evolve."

#PokemonGO: I've been working on a theory that pokemon with pre-evolution gym experience get better movesets, maybe by taking extra rolls and then choosing the best move—in the same way hatched pokemon roll for IVs multiple times and then choose the highest.The game tracks individual pokemon's battle experience: In addition to IVs, level, etc., pokemon have hidden "BattlesAttacked" and "BattlesDefended" attributes. In my limited tests, "BattlesAttacked" goes up by 1 when a pokemon is a part of a team that defeats a pokemon in a gym battle. I imagine "BattlesDefended" counts teams defeated while defending a gym. These attributes have barely been discussed, and so far, no function has been identified. It's possible that their function is not yet implemented, but it's also possible that it's just not yet discovered.Normally, you seem to have a roughly equal probability of getting each move (Link only discusses pidgeys and rattattas. I got similar results from a database of non-pidgeys and rattattas, though with a bit of a slant towards worse moves).I evolved 25 pokemon that had already won gym battles—perhaps about 3 on average, though all at least 1 (unfortunately I did not keep track of this as well as I should have). They got better moves than what you'd expect if moves were uniformly distributed: the distribution of charged moves in particular is close to what you'd expect if they rolled moves twice and chose the better one.The actual distribution of the experienced pokemon's moves by DPS ranking, compared to what you'd expect if they were uniformly distributed and rolled once or did best of 2:DPS RankActual1 RollBest of 2Quick Move1/264%50%75%2/236%50%25%Charge Move1/356%33%55%2/332%33%33%3/312%33%11%Over half of them got the best charge move. Exact moves and pokemon are here.25 is a small sample, and it could just be a sampling effect. But it's compelling initial evidence.This deserves further investigation. To start:Figuring out exactly how the "BattlesAttacked" and "BattlesDefended" attributes work. (This would be simple for anyone willing to break TOS on their account)Looking at a larger sample of pokemon with battle experience.Looking at pokemon with more battle experience.Getting better data about movesets of pokemon without battle experience.At this point, though, I'll definitely be popping my pokemon into battle a few times before evolving them. via /r/TheSilphRoad http://ift.tt/2brkJJC