Pokemon GO Player's Dragonite Has Been Defending the Same Gym for Over a Year

Summary

APokemon GOplayer’s Dragonite has been defending a gym for over a year. BeforePokemon GOadded PvP or raids, the only way players could really battle in the game was through gyms.

Gyms inPokemon GOwork much differentlythan they do in the main seriesPokemongames. InPokemon GO, players are able to claim a gym for their team of choice, whether that’s Valor, Mystic, or Instinct. They can then leave Pokemon at the gym to defend it, whilePokemon GOplayers from the other two teams attempt to knock them out and take the gym for themselves.Pokemon GOplayers can earn coins for successfully defending gyms, though the 50 per day limit means there’s no real benefit to having a Pokemon in a gym for a significant amount of time.

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Unfortunately,Pokemon GOplayers in rural areasdon’t really have a choice in the matter, as it could take a ton of time for their Pokemon to ever be knocked out of certain gyms. This is what’s happened to Reddit user Lvl-7, whose Dragonite has successfully defended aPokemon GOgym for just over 365 days so far. Lvl-7 confirmed to commenters on the post that they do indeed live in a rural area, and in fact, there are other Pokemon in the Gym that have been there even longer than their Dragonite. According to Lvl-7, someone currently has a Pokemon in that particular gym for over 500 days.

If the Dragonite is ever knocked out of the gym, Lvl-7 will get a measly 50 Poke Coins for their trouble. Of course, that’s assuming they haven’t already hit the daily cap, in which case they will basically get nothing for their Dragonite’s year-long service besidesGym Leader medal progress.

It’s long been suggested byPokemon GOplayersthat Niantic add the option to manually pull Pokemon out of Gyms. This way,Pokemon GOplayers have an easier way of getting their Pokemon back if they put them in a low-traffic area. Niantic hasn’t announced any plans to add a feature like that to the game, but it’s always possible that it could happen at some point down the road.

After all,Pokemon GOis still updated regularly with new features. In fact, Niantic is in the midst of testing ahelpfulPokemon GOquality of life featurethat would allow players to skip raid countdowns, so who’s to say that other long-requested features won’t make it into the game eventually.

Pokemon GOis out now for iOS and Android mobile devices.