Pokemon Go players urged not to delete their friends too quickly in light of XP exploit

Eleni Thomas
Pokemon Go friends

Some Pokemon Go players are frustrated that users delete their new friends too quickly before they are able to even claim the one-day bonus, sparking a new debate online that questions at what point is it okay to delete a friend from the game.

One of the biggest aspects of Pokemon Go is the way in which community members can interact with each other, whether it be through in-person raid events or other similar activities. A mechanic that encourages interactions within the fanbase is the friends system in place.

Each player is given their own Trainer Code which they can use to request friends within the game or add people remotely. While this is a great way to simply connect with others in-game, developer Niantic also encourages this by adding specific rewards.

At the moment, there are four different friendship tiers within the game. Good friend, Great friend, Ultra friend, and Best friend. Increasing your friendship level with other players brings with it new and better bonuses. These include but are not limited to Stardust costs for trades, extra damage bonuses during gym battles, and more.

To become a Good Friend with another player, you only need to have added them in the game on that day. Therefore, many players utilize this as a way to gain quick XP increases by adding and deleting new friends constantly.

However, players have now taken to Reddit to encourage people to hold off a few minutes before deleting new friends as it is stopping the XP bonus from unlocking.

One Redditor created a thread, writing “Please give the other person a chance to claim the friend XP before you delete them.”

Others jumped in sharing their disliking for the concept of adding and deleting people on Pokemon Go so quickly that they were unable to claim their reward. 

One wrote “Yikes. I only delete if I think they haven’t been on forever.” Another added, “Friends limit is 400, so I often delete people that are not in my trading area after hitting best friends. I usually wait one week or less if I see that they have sent me a new gift, meaning they have opened and gotten their XP.”

Comment
byu/anxieteafortwo from discussion
inpokemongo

Each player is capped at 400 friends, meaning it is vital to pick others who play frequently so that you can continue to level up your friendship rating and get greater bonuses

However, this isn’t to say that the dev team won’t look at increasing this 400-friend cap at some point in the future.

For all the latest Pokemon Go news and updates, be sure to check out Dexerto’s full coverage here.

About The Author

Eleni is a Melbourne-based journalist. Having completed her Bachelor's in communication (Journalism) at RMIT University, Eleni is now a Senior Writer for the Dexerto Australia team. A big Nintendo fan (with a Triforce tattoo to prove it) and a lover of the zombie genre, Eleni covers gaming, entertainment as well as TV and movies for the site. She is also passionate about covering Queer and female representation. Contact Eleni at eleni.thomas@dexerto.com