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Ahoy! Yesterday the Bug Out! Event in Pokémon GO has started. This event will be active until Tuesday, August 16th at 8 pm local time. As the name suggests, this event is about Bug-type Pokémon.

With this event there is a 2x XP for catching Pokémon with Nice, Great or Excellent Throws. So it's not a double catch XP, but only a 2x multiplier to the bonus for Nice, Great or Excellent throws. But that's still over 2k XP for catching Pokémon with an Excellent Throw. The Ultra Unlock bonus adds to this that you also get more Candy and a higher chance for Candy XL by making these throws.

There is a Bug Out! Catch Challenge with 3 parts. This gives some items and encounters. Here you can see the first step.

During the 2nd or 3rd step we should be getting some Mega Energy. Right now I don't know how much it'll be, but there should be some Scizor Mega Energy. I'm going to wait until I have completed those to see if I have to do a Mega Scizor Raid to get enough to Mega Evolve it.

This event also has a Collection Challenge, which rewards 15,000 XP and a Bug Catcher Pose. Here is a screenshot of it.

You have to catch several Bug-type Pokémon, and then some other ones you also have to evolve. All of these Bug-type Pokémon can be found in the wild during this event. Skorupi and Pineco are the rarest wild spawns of the event. Dwebble as well but you don't need to catch Dwebble for the Collection Challenge.

Grubbin makes its debut during this event. You can evolve it to Charjabug for 25 Grubbin Candy. You can further evolve Charjabug into Vikavolt with 100 Grubbin Candy, but you HAVE to be at a Magnetic Lure to evolve it.

Here is my first Grubbin encounter and photo of my Grubbin Pokédex registry.

I'll be trying to trade with friends for Lucky Grubbin before I'll evolve it. On that note I'm also going to have to check if there are some of these other Bug-type Pokémon that I don't have Lucky yet. I know for a fact I've never evolved Shelmet, so I need to see if maybe I do have a Lucky for it. Sometimes I do have a Lucky Pokémon for a long time and just kinda waiting and hoping I'd encounter the evolution in the wild to catch and get the Pokédex registry.

Event Field Research Tasks

This event has A LOT of Event Field Research Tasks. All of them are for Bug-type Pokémon.

• Catch 5 Pokémon: Caterpie ✨ OR Weedle ✨
• Catch 10 Pokémon: Wimpod OR Dewpider
• Catch 15 Pokémon: Plant Cloak Burmy ✨ OR Sandy Cloak Burmy ✨ OR Trash Cloak Burmy ✨
• Catch 10 Bug-type Pokémon: Volbeat ✨ OR Illumise ✨
• Use 10 Berries to help Catch Pokémon: Combee ✨ OR Sewaddle
• Make 3 Nice Throws: Venonat ✨ OR Kricketot ✨
• Make 3 Nice Throws in a Row: Silcoon OR Cascoon
• Make 3 Great Throws: Grubbin
• Make 3 Great Throws in a Row: Paras ✨ OR Dwebble ✨
• Make 2 Excellent Throws: Nincada ✨
• Trade a Pokémon: Shelmet ✨ OR Karrablast ✨
• Take Snapshots of 3 Different Bug-type Pokémon that you caught: Yanma ✨

What's interesting here is that you can get both Volbeat and Illumise from the Catch 10 Bug-type Pokémon here no matter where you can. Because Volbeat and Illumise are regional Pokémon it means that I could get Illumise from these because it doesn't normally spawn here. It did spawn in the wild globally like maybe last year? But now these quests still have a chance to look for Shiny Volbeat or Shiny Illumise if you don't have them.

Paras and Combee are interesting rewards too for the Stardust. 500 Stardust per Paras and 750 per Combee.

I'm also going to be looking for the Make 2 Excellent Throws for Nincada because it isn't spawning in the wild so it's usually only available during some events. I did get a Shiny Nincada from a Field Research back in the event where it had its Shiny debut, but still would be great to look for another!

Ultra Unlock Bonus

Last weekend during the global challenge for GO Fest Sapporo, we reached the Ultra Unlock requirements which add bonuses to this event.

Timed Research: We get the Bug Out! Catch Challenge as part of the Ultra Unlock. And this Challenge will reward with Scizor Mega Energy. I think that'll be in the 3rd step.

Pansaga appearing globally. This is great for me to catch more of them and also trade with friends to try and get a Lucky Pansage!

Unown T is appearing in 1-star Raids. I already have Unown T because I did a Raid from it one time back when all the Unown to spell ULTRA were in Raids in an event sometime ago.

Extra Candy and increased chance for Candy XL by catching Pokémon with Nice, Great or Excellent Throws

• Nice Throw: +1 Candy
• Great Throw: +2 Candy
• Excellent Throw: +3 Candy

I'm not sure about the chances to receive Candy XL. But based on the +1, +2 and +3 I assume it might be +10%, +20% and +30%.

These Candy bonuses are applied before Pinap Berries. So if you catch a Pokémon with an Excellent Throw it would be 6 Candy for that Pokémon, but if you use a Pinap Berry that will be 12 Candy. And if it's a bug-type Pokémon and you're using a Mega Level 3 Bug-type Mega then that'll be 14 Candy.

What are you looking forward to in this event?