Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Global is just around the corner, taking place on February 24 and 25, 2024, from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. local time. There’s a lot going on during this two-day celebration of all things Pokémon Diamond, Pokémon Pearl, Sinnoh, and Hisui, so a little planning will go a long way to help you maximize your GO Tour experience. From making decisions about which path you will take to preparing for raids against incredibly powerful Pokémon, there’s plenty you can do before the event to help your experience be as successful and enjoyable as possible.
Sort Out Your Storage
If all goes well, you’ll catch a lot of Pokémon during this event. The last thing you want to do is stop in the middle of the fun to transfer Pokémon to Professor Willow because your Pokémon storage is full. Taking the time to transfer Pokémon now will save time and stress later, especially with the risk of accidentally transferring a Pokémon you meant to keep because you’re in a hurry.
This applies to item storage as well. While you’ll need lots of Poké Balls, Revives, Potions, Incubators, and more over the course of the event, you’ll also be acquiring new items by completing research tasks and participating in raids. That means you’ll need to be thoughtful about what you keep and what you discard. These are decisions you probably don’t want to be making while getting ready for your next Origin Forme Dialga raid, so clean your item storage now to save yourself stress later.
Choose Your Partner
The exclusive Special Research story featuring Team GO Rocket requires you to choose between Turtwig, Chimchar, or Piplup. You’ll have the chance to make multiple decisions for this event, so choose early and wisely. Fortunately, there are no bad choices—all three are all adorable first partner Pokémon! But this is a good opportunity to assess whether you could most benefit from an agile Fire-type Pokémon, a proud Water-type Pokémon, or a sturdy Grass-type Pokémon.
Hit the Road
Make the most of your preparations by hopping on the Road to Sinnoh, an event taking place from February 19 at 10:00 a.m. to February 23, 2024, at 10:00 p.m. local time. All Trainers will be able to take advantage of a 1/2 Egg Hatch Distance bonus, Timed Research that awards encounters with Heatran, Origin Forme Giratina, Cresselia, and Darkrai, and more. Starting during this event, Trainers can also purchase one or both of the following paid research tickets for US$5.00 each (or the equivalent in your local currency)—the bonuses included in both tickets will last through the global event taking place that weekend!
The Road to Sinnoh: Raids ticket provides access to event-exclusive Timed Research, which includes rewards such as 10 Dialga Candy, 10 Palkia Candy, 5 Heatran Candy XL, 5 Giratina Candy XL, 5 Cresselia Candy XL, 5 Darkrai Candy XL, and an Eevee Mask for your avatar. Ticket holders will also receive an additional 5,000 XP for completing raids, 1 additional Candy for catching Pokémon in raids, and 2 additional Raid Passes from spinning Photo Discs at Gyms each day. If you’re working toward powering up certain Legendary or Mythical Pokémon, this could certainly be helpful as every Candy and Candy XL adds up.
Road to Sinnoh: Hatch gives Trainers the opportunity to earn Timed Research rewards that include encounters with Pachirisu, Chatot, and Carnivine, and a Pikachu Mask for your avatar. The ticket also includes event bonuses such as double Hatch XP, double Hatch Candy, and double Hatch Stardust!
Even if you don’t purchase a ticket, you can make the most of daily five-star raids featuring the following Raid Bosses: Darkrai (February 19); Cresselia (February 20); Uxie, Mesprit, and Azelf (February 21); Heatran (February 22); and Origin Forme Giratina (February 23). Several of these powerful Pokémon appear frequently in the GO Battle League—Cresselia is a contender in the Ultra League and Origin Forme Giratina is found both in the Ultra League and Master League—making this an excellent opportunity to stock up Candy and Candy XL to power up your Pokémon.
Make Time and Space for Origin Forme Dialga and Palkia
Origin Forme Dialga and Origin Forme Palkia will make their Pokémon GO debuts during this year’s GO Tour events. This is undoubtedly an exciting opportunity to capture extremely powerful Pokémon, and Trainers will likely want to participate in as many raids as possible. It’s a great use of your time and resources to power up a dozen or so Pokémon to challenge Origin Forme Dialga and Origin Forme Palkia before the event kicks off—while you only start each raid with six Pokémon in your battle party, having extra Pokémon waiting in the wings will ensure that you don’t have to stop to revive your Pokémon before diving into another raid. Stocking up on Revives, Max Revives, and Potions will help your Pokémon to quickly recover between raids.
Take Time for Trades
A Special Trade allows Trainers to swap Pokémon that can’t be traded normally—including Pokémon and Pokémon forms not currently registered to your Pokédex, Legendary Pokémon, and Shiny Pokémon—and you’ll have the opportunity to make up to six of these Special Trades each day during the event. Even with the increased limit, it may be a good idea to coordinate your Special Trades ahead of time considering how much there will be to do during the day. Trades made during the event will only cost half the usual Stardust, but it’s still a good idea to make sure you’ll have plenty for this event.
Stock Up on Useful Items
Different Pokémon will be attracted to Incense at different points in the day, and you’ll want to catch as many different species of Pokémon as possible. Start collecting Incense now so you won’t run out! You’ll probably also want to make sure you have plenty of Poké Balls so you don’t run out during the event.
Gather Star Pieces and Lucky Eggs to maximize the Stardust and XP you gain by catching Pokémon and participating in raids.
Eggs placed in Incubators during the event will only require half of the normal Hatch Distance, so make sure to have Incubators at the ready!
Start Strategizing
Research tasks often involve evolving Pokémon, so hold onto some Pokémon that you know you want to evolve until the event. Consider adding a tag so you can easily find (and evolve) these Pokémon when the time comes, and make sure you have all the items and Candy you’ll need to evolve them.
Practice your Nice, Great, and Excellent Throws. Research tasks often challenge you to make these types of throws in succession, so you’ll want to be in good throwing form when the event begins.
Powering up Pokémon is another common research task. You can create a tag for Pokémon that you’d like to power up so you can complete any such tasks quickly and efficiently.
Take Care of Yourself
There’s a lot to do during Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Global, and you don’t want to play hungry or dehydrated! If you want to maximize your event time, you can prepare all the meals, drinks, and snacks you could possibly need ahead of time. If you’re planning on spending time outside during the event, don’t forget your sunscreen. And don’t forget to take occasional scheduled breaks. It might be hard to step away from the action for even a few minutes, but you’ll probably enjoy yourself more if you do!
GO Battle League Pokémon to Look Out For
During this GO Tour, you’ll mainly be catching Pokémon originally discovered in the Sinnoh region. While you’ll want to catch as many different species of Pokémon as possible, there are some that may prove particularly helpful on your quest to master the GO Battle League. If you’re interested in adding any of these Pokémon to your GO Battle League lineup, try to catch a lot of them to collect the Candy you’ll need to power them up and teach them a second Charged Attack.
Pokémon you may encounter that perform well in the Great League include Lickitung, Umbreon, Bastiodon, and Toxicroak. These Pokémon—or the Pokémon that evolve into them—will appear in various habitats over the course of the event, so be sure to check the habitat schedules for the Pokémon you’re most interested in catching. While some of these Pokémon don’t require too much work to get into fighting shape, Lickitung requires a lot of Candy XL to approach the 1,500 CP cap, so you can certainly get a lot of mileage out of this event just by catching and powering up Lickitung.
In the Ultra League, Umbreon, Empoleon, and Toxicroak are all excellent Pokémon with a strong track record of performing well. Given that some of these Pokémon are also viable in Great League, you’ll want to make sure you maximize your Candy collection if you plan to power up one for each league.
As for the Master League, Dialga tends to dominate since it’s a rare Dragon-type Pokémon that isn’t vulnerable to Fairy-type attacks. With the Master League’s lack of CP limit, it’s definitely useful to bring Pokémon with the highest possible CP, so it’s well worth the time and effort to participate in Dialga raids and use either Pinap Berries or Silver Pinap Berries when the time comes to catch Dialga. Palkia is slightly less dominant than Dialga, but it’s still extremely useful—especially with the rise of Groudon armed with its Precipice Blades attack. Like Dialga, Palkia boasts an extremely high max CP, which can make it a challenge to fully power up. Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Global is a blessing for Trainers hunting for the necessary Palkia Candy and Palkia Candy XL to max out this Pokémon.
Check out the official Niantic Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh blog for additional information about the event.
Enjoy making the most of your GO Tour experience, Trainers!
