"My funny first raiding/social experience in Pokemon Go (returning player)"

#PokemonGO: Like many others, I started playing PokemonGo in the summer of 2016. Stayed in for a couple of months, reached level 20 and then lost interest (mainly due to the potato smartphone I had at the time which made the gameplay experience extremely frustrating).About a month ago, I bought a new S9 and thought it would be a good idea to test how well would the game run on this device. Installed the app and 20 minutes in I was addicted to the game once again. Everything was different: 2 more gens, a weather system, research tasks and the mighty Raids everyone was talking about. I started playing casually, catching Pokemon here and there and in about a week, while I was at my lunch break, I saw a Raid Egg that was going to hatch in 3 minutes. I was by myself, had nothing to do and still had a bit of time, so I asked "Why not?"This is a good time to point out that up until that moment I hadn't done any research on Raid mechanics or bosses. I have also never had any social interaction with people I didn't know as I have always played the game alone.The egg hatches and I'm super excited to see a Regice popping out. Then my jaw drops when I see its CP is over 40k. "Am I supposed to beat this thing? Oh, recommended group size of 20 people... F*ck it, let's fight it. I won't beat it but at least I'll be able to see if with this new phone I can dodge properly before lagging to death."I take a sit in some stairs, get into the public lobby and after 120secs I start pounding the floating ice cube with my strongest Pokemon and biggest pride: a 1,6k CP Arcanine I caught 2 years ago. A few seconds later with half of my team shredded to pieces I hear a voice behind me: "Hey are you doing the raid?".I turn back and at the top of the stairs I see the most bizarre group of people ever: The one who asked the question was a woman in her 30s, cigarette on one hand and two smartphones on the other. A biker in his 50s, wearing a vest and arms covered in tattoos and a teenage boy I assumed to be his son or nephew. Finally, there was a guy wearing a suit and sunglasses.I swear this group was so random it looked like it had come out of an anime. I wasn't prepared for this. I'm an introvert who has been soloing the game and wasn't expecting to have any social interaction at that moment, specially not with such a bizarre group of people."Err, yes, I'm doing the raid.""Why are you doing it alone?", she asked.I turned red with embarrassment. "It's the first time I'm doing this. I'm just checking it out!""Oh, in that case leave and do it with us. It's easier if we do it together.""Bwahaha! It's difficult even for 6/7 people!", the biker added. He was very friendly and joyful, which made me less uncomfortable. He then starts asking other people what their levels were. This is when I realised these were just random people who came for the Raid (yes, I initially I thought they all knew each other and came together for the Raid). They were all level 36+. "What about you?""I'm level 22..."He stays silent for a few seconds, probably realising we didn't have a good chance of beating the Raid, and then asks: "Do you have any fire Pokemon?".Well, excuse me, I'll have you know I beat Pokemon Blue, Crystal, Emerald and Platinum several times, bred for competitive IVs and Natures and my Platinum savegame has over 400 hours so I'm well aware of type matching. This I what I though to myself but I understood I was the noob on THIS particular Pokemon game so I simply I replied "Yes, I have a few.""Should we wait for more people?", asks the lady."I'll have to go back to work in a few minutes...", goes the guy in the suit."Yeah, the two of us will have to go too, let's just start", says the biker.The Raid restarts, now with 6 accounts in, and the battlefield gets filled with Moltres and Ho-Oh's. And there's my Arcanine! Hopefully they won't be able to see its CP...I'm obviously the first to have my team wiped and I think the smartest decision is of course to heal them back up and send them to battle again."What are you doing?", the biker asks. "No no, that's wasting time! Just send everything in!"The raid goes on and the time's up when the boss is at 10% HP."Bwahaha! Well, some times you win, others you lose. That's life for you!", said the funny biker. The others remained silent, most likely upset for failing the Raid.Everyone then went on with their lives and that was my first raiding experience! Although we didn't win, I really enjoyed it!I would just like to end this story by expressing my fascination with this game's ability to bring people together. In what other social environment would you find such a diverse group? Where else would you find these people, so different among themselves, playing a game together and interacting with each other?I'm level 26 now and I've done my first EX raid a few hours ago. The experience was somewhat similar (yes, I caught the Mewtwo: 80%, 14/12/10).This definitely motivated me to try and get in touch with my local community and see how many different and interesting people I can meet.I would love to know about your experience in the comments as well! via /r/pokemongo https://ift.tt/2uUq71K