Special Items In Pokemon GO And 8x Evolutions They Activate

The first batch of Special Items for evolutions in Pokemon GO have been released, and today we're running down their uses. To attain one of these Special Items – or Evolution Stones, or whatever one wants to call them – are available from Pokestops. That's where they come from, and they're very, very rare indeed.

The only requirement that any of the several different Special Items have is a level of 10. If the player has reached level 10, they'll begin to be able to see Special Item drops. Before that, Special Items will not drop at all. This is likely done to keep users from creating multiple accounts just to spin Pokestops for Special Items to trade later – once trading has arrived, of course.

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There is no special trick to getting Special Items in Pokemon GO – none yet, anyway. Niantic has played their cards close to the hilt with this release, so we're not yet aware of anyone finding the rarity of these Special Items in the game. Thus far our research suggests that Special Item drops are incredibly rare.

Some players spin over 100 Pokestops without seeing one Special Item. Some players have gotten 2x Special Items in one day. It's all about random, blind luck. And tenacity – there's always going to be a better chance at getting a Special Item if a player goes out and spins a bunch of Pokestops than if they spin none at all.

Once a user has a Special Item, they're allowed to perform certain evolutions on several unique Pokemon. One Special Item is used up – used once and it's gone – per evolution. Each of these evolutions requires an amount of Pokemon Candy to perform, and none of these evolutions can be performed any other way.

* Sun Stone + Gloom = Bellossom* Sun Stone + Sunkern = Sunflora*π King's Rock + Poliwhirl = Politoedπ King's Rock + Slowpoke = Slowkingø Metal Coat + Onix = Steelixø Metal Coat + Scyther = Scizor∆ Up-Grade + Porygon = Porygon2Ω Dragon Scale + Seadra = Kingdra

Above is a list of the Pokemon evolutions that can be performed with Special Items. Each Special Item on this list is marked by a unique symbol with which each item can be further identified. Sun Stone, King's Rock, and Metal Coat are all able to be used on two different Pokemon. Up-Grade works only on Porygon, and Dragon Scale works only on Seadra.

Additional evolution combinations will almost certainly be introduced in the future for Pokemon GO. Until then, the Pokemon that result when evolved with a Special Item are incredibly rare. While the code we've analyzed seems to suggest they're all able to spawn in the wild, they're all extremely difficult to catch, each coming with a Base Capture Rate of 0.05 – amongst the most difficult to capture in the entire game.

Chances are every single user will find a use for a Special Item at some point in their Pokemon GO gaming experience. At the same 1-spot space used up in a trainer's backpack, all Special Items are no more cumbersome than a single Pokeball. It's well worth keeping any of the 5x Special Items in a user's backpack even if they wont be able to utilize it until well into the future.

It's quite likely there'll be additional Special Items in the future. It's also possible that Niantic may allow Trading of Special Items at some point in the future. As such, it makes a LOT of sense to keep Special Items when they appear. Users should not throw any Special Items in the trash unless they just want to see the world burn.