"Baby pokémon, evolution stones, friendship statistic, trading. Let’s talk how Generation II might change the game… or how it wouldn’t"

#PokemonGO: As my pokédex is nearing completion, I’ve started thinking of Generation II, the defining generation of pokémon during my childhood (I’ve played hundreds of hours of Gold/Silver!).I think it’s worth to talk about what kind of changes the introduction of a new set of pokémon could/would make on the game.Below I listed new mechanics introduced by Generation II, mostly centered around specific ways to trigger evolutions and evolution branches.Baby PokémonWe will get previous forms of many Gen I pokémon:Pichu (→ Pikachu)Iggytuff (→ Jigglypuff)Cleffa (→ Clefairy)Elekid (→ Electabuzz)Magby (→ Magmar)Smoochum (→ Jynx)Tyrogue (→ Hitmonlee / Hitmonchan / Hitmontop) – more of him belowIt might be possible to just find them in the wild and evolve with a simple button press but maybe they could be a result of a new breeding mechanic?Although I can see how it could complicate existing incubator/egg mechanic giving us adult pokémon not their baby forms.Evolution BranchesIn Generation I we only had one evolution branch which was Eevee → Jolteon / Flareon / Vaporeon but we could choose one of each by naming them properly. Outside that easter egg hidden mechanic, Eevee evolutions are random.In Generation II we have branches all over, which are based on movesets, certain stones, stats or even the time of day.Evolution StonesI think items won’t be introduced into Pokémon Go (Clefairy evolves into Clefable with a press of a button not through Moon Stone) but it gets trickier for one example of a branched evolution tree:Gloom can evolve into Vileplume (I) or Bellossom (II, through Sun Stone)I think stones would complicate the gameplay so Bellossom would probably become an RNG outcome, maybe even rarer than Vileplume.Attack / Defense InterplayTyrogue can evolve into Hitmonlee or Hitmonchan or Hitmontop depending on how attack and defense work for him.Hitmonlee if its Attack is higher than its Defense.Hitmonchan if its Defense is higher than its Attack.Hitmontop if its Attack and Defense are the same.This could be solved by checking IV stats making it important to hold onto specific Tyrogues to evolve new Hitmontop. Or Niantic could go the easy way and just make it random like Eevees too.Frienship?Eevee can now also evolve into Espeon and Umbreon if it has a high friendship stat which doesn’t currently exist in Pokémon Go. Espeon evolves during day and Umbreon during night – that could be mirrored by the game as we already have different UI (and possibly different spawns? haven’t checked sources here).Chansey can evolve into Blissey with high friendship stat and so can a high friendship Golbat into Crobat.More than half of Gen II’s baby pokémon require high friendship to evolve into their adult forms (Pichu, Cleffa, Igglybuff, Togepi).TradingTrading is on the list of things Niantic probably wants to add into the game but the question remains if it would ship before Gen II is added or if it would be a way to get evolutions of the following pokémon.Slowpoke can evolve into Slowbro (I) but also Slowking (II), when traded while holding a King's Rock.Onix (I) can evolve into Steelix (II) when traded holding a Metal Coat item.Scyther (I) can similarly evolve into Scizor (II) when traded holding a Metal Coat item.Seadra (I) can evolve into Kingdra (II) when traded holding a Dragon Scale item.I think all of those could easily skip items and maybe could even skip trading requirement because they’re linear. However…Porygon (I) can evolve into Porygon2 (II) when traded holding an Up-Grade item.This is complicated because there’s also a Porygon-Z (IV) evolution available for Porygon in Generation IV when holding a different item. Assuming Niantic wants to keep adding generations to the game as years go by, it might be confusing. Or they’ll rely on RNG and call it a day! :PDifferent FormsUnown is another fun new thing. It’s one species but has 26 derivative shapes / forms. We could at least get a medal / achievement for collecting all of those, maybe?Takeaways:Would Niantic introduce various stones for pokémon to use to evolve on top of candy?Would branched evolutions be solved with pure randomness, original (and advanced) mechanics like day/night cycle or would we get a hidden mechanic like with naming Eevees?Would Friendship statistic be introduced if so many pokémon evolutions rely on it? Maybe it could be increased by making a pokémon your buddy and walk with it for days? That would be great if I think about it.Should trading become a requirement for certain evolutions, increasing serendipity between players or would it be too annoying for solo players?Please discuss below how you think Generation II rollout would change the game! via /r/TheSilphRoad http://ift.tt/2dXdur8