Pokemon Go Battle Showdown event live now, power-up punch move added
Niantic announced another Pokemon Go event on March 5. The Battle Showdown event brings increased Pokemon spawns, bonuses and a brand new power-up punch move.
Battle Showdown live
Niantic wasted very little time between announcing the Battle Showdown event and it going live, just two minutes to be precise. This particular Pokemon Go event focuses on fighting-type Pokemon.
These fighting-type Pokemon will appear more frequently, with Niantic officially stating that the increased spawns will include Mankey, Machop, Makuhita and Meditite. Furthermore, there is a chance of encountering a shiny Mankey or shiny Machop.
Event duration
The Battle Showdown event went live at March 5, 1pm PST. It will run for one week exactly, culminating on March 12, 1pm PST.
Battle Showdown bonuses
The latest Pokemon Go event brings with it four bonuses. They are as follows:
- 2× Catch, Battle, and Raid Stardust
- 2× XP for Gym Badges
- Earn up to five rewards per day from Trainer Battles, including Rare Candy
- Earn up to three rewards per day from challenging team leaders, including Rare Candy
The Pokemon Go Battle Showdown event encourages player to play PvP battles…Power-up Punch
A new move has also been added to Pokemon Go: Power-up Punch. The new move has been permanently added to the game.
Pokemon such as Poliwrath, Hitmonchan, Kangaskhan, Medicham, and Lucario will all be able to utilize the move.
Pokemon Go trainers will be wondering whether Power-up Punch has a place in the game’s current meta. It appears it does not.
On a Reddit post discussing power-up punch stats, Angel_on_my_Shoulder summarised its place in the game, “From a PvP perspective its performance is quite bad. It ties with Brick Break as the second least efficient Fighting type move in PvP but I assume Power-Up Punch will be able to raise stats a la Ancient Power. PvE stats are also pretty bad. Its dps is the same as Brick Break and slightly higher than Low Sweep, which are the only other 3-bar fighting type charge moves. Obviously it doesn’t hold a candle to Dynamic Punch either.“
While the damage dealt by power-up punch is far from substantial, it is in the 35 energy category. This means it is able to charge up relatively quickly, often enabling you to take opponents by surprise.
