Shinies.. they’re the emblem of ‘I’m either super lucky or play waaaaay too much of this game, you’ll never know!’ that every true Pokémon trainer aspires to find and love. The thing about shiny Pokémon however, is they can be tricky to find!
There are a couple of ways without working around the game’s code to find the beloved and coveted shiny Pokémon. Let’s go over them!
In the Wild
In the wild has some of the most bazaar counters for each percentage increase. To get the best chances of getting a shiny, you need to have a shiny charm by unlocking the whole dex and fight a whole bunch of the same breed of Pokémon! I’ve read both you should chain them and it shouldn’t matter, but I chain just to be careful.
For starters, if you’re just starting the game and haven’t unlocked much, but want to get the shiny before you leave? You have a 1/4096 chance of finding one! That number lowers at 50, 100, 200, 300, 400, and then caps out at 500 times. If you are still going with no shiny charm at 500 Pokémon fainted in your wake, you still are only at 52ish% chance that you’ll have received your illusive wonder.
A Shiny Charm is going to be key in almost any type of shiny hunting you’re doing, but for this method you’ll be looking at having that percentage jump up 10% just for having your dex complete. If you’re looking to massively over level and get all the things? Maybe going the way of killing everything is for you! If not, let’s continue to the second one!
Breeding / Masada Method
Breeding is a beloved way to get strong and even perfect Pokémon without having as much surprise as just random encounters. This number system is also far less variable as well. What you’ll need is a Shiny Charm by completing your Dex, a foreign Pokémon for breeding (I typically use a foreign ditto for versatility) and patience.
Finding a shiny Pokémon with the Masada Method is significantly faster than it you were fighting continuously. Instead of starting at 1/4096 chance, it’s always a 1/512 chance. The chances never increase. That being said, this is the most common way I see people farming their shinies instead of finding them in the wild. Some die hard trainers continue to do this a a test of strength and endurance to prove that you still can, but many go by just breeding and hatching thousands of Pokémon.
Max Raids / Max Adventures
This way is much newer than the previous two, but is a way that many still try to find their shiny babies. With this, you go into basically a boss battle with friends or NPCs if you don’t have the online service with Nintendo and fight a Dynamaxed or Gigantimaxed Pokémon. The Max Raids have a pretty low shiny rating and cannot be lifted up, 1/4096 with shiny charm or not. The reason that some still do this is if you need extra items for enhancement or if you are participating in a raid month that happens frequently.
Max Adventures are much different though. Their shiny rates are high, 1/100 with shiny charm and 1/300 without, and you have the chance of finding shiny legendaries. Yeah, you read that right. You could find a Shiny Giratina in a Max Adventure. The trick with these? It’s fairly difficult to get through them with NPCs. Going with a party is the only way to really be sure you’re getting the chance of finding what you’re looking for, but even then it can be tough if you don’t find the right Pokémon on the way.
