In Pokemon Unite, each character can use three “held items” at level nine that boost their stats in not-so-significant and significant ways, depending on what level they are. Here’s a way to navigate the Pokemon Unite upgrade scene.
The max right now is 30, but for the most part, the greatest yield of stats and bonuses is at level 20, when the item nearly reaches its max potential, and conveys its highest level of unique boosts.
Get a triple-20 as soon as you can
Let’s start with the elephant in the Pokemon Unite upgrade room: buying upgrades [item enhancers] for said held items with cash. So as I described in detail in my review, when buying item enhancers at the in-game store, if you are out of tickets, Unite pulls up a secret menu that asks if you want to exchange gems (premium currency) for tickets. It’s extremely unfortunate, and it means people can pay to get better items. Using the float stone as an example, there’s a 10% higher movement speed increase if you have it at level 20 as opposed to level 1.
With all that in mind, it is possible to acquire enough tickets to upgrade a few items to level 20 for ranked play at a decent pace. Here’s how you do it.
The economy of Pokemon Unite upgrade item enhancers and tickets
Let’s start with a simple conversion. One item enhancer costs 10 tickets (50 will cost you 500 tickets).
To upgrade an item, you’ll need to spend:
Level 2: x3
Level 3: x4
Level 4: x5
Level 5: x6
Level 6: x8
Level 7: x10
Level 8: x12
Level 9: x14
Level 10: x20
Level 11: x25
Level 12: x30
Level 13: x35
Level 14: x40
Level 15: x45
Level 16: x50
Level 17: x55
Level 18: x60
Level 19: x65
Level 20: x80
Level 21: x100
Level 22: x120
Level 23: x140
Level 24: x160
Level 25: x180
Level 26: x210
Level 27: x240
Level 28: x270
Level 29: x300
Level 30: x300
That’s 2,587 item enhancers to raise one item fully to 30. It comes out to roughly $40 if you buy every enhancer.
Hefty, huh? Again, don’t freak out, level 20 is doable, before the upgrade costs go completely off the rails.
For the most part, you really want to use your tickets solely for buying item enhancers. Buy the held items themselves for 1,000 in-game gold: you can always earn more, and they are extremely beneficial and key to creating builds for your favorite characters. To help with your sanity, try and focus on mastering a few characters at a time. It’ll reduce your temptation to upgrade tons of held items for supports, speedsters, attackers, and so on.
Leveling up your trainer
If you level-up fully to 40, you’ll net 1,130 item enhancers. You’ll also pick up 2,400 tickets, which you can use on item enhancers.
It’s going to take a long while to fully complete the trainer track, but you can buy 7-day boosts for 400 tickets (or 40 premium gems, but I’m trying to keep this guide mostly free-to-play oriented). If you’re certain that you’re going to be mainlining the game for that amount of time, it might be beneficial to grab a battle point boost card. To consume it, press X on the main menu, go to the all items screen, locate it, and confirm its use.
The season pass free or premium track
Like most games with a season pass, Pokemon Unite has a free and premium track. While there are plenty of free ticket and item enhancer rewards, the premium track will veer off around level 14 and start netting you 300 ticket rewards, and fork at level 24 to grant you occasional 30 pure item enhancer bonuses.
Plus, once you reach max level, you start accruing loot boxes instead of levels. These can grant you 100 tickets, 10 holowear tickets (Pokemon cosmetic skins), or 10 fashion tickets (trainer cosmetic skins) per pull. It’s not super consistent, but it’s another way to earn tickets.
You can always make the decision to go premium at a later date to focus on your Pokemon Unite upgrade habit; the decision is ultimately yours.
Pokemon Unite upgrade progression via events/gifts
So on day four of logging in using the 14-day welcome campaign, you’ll get 600 tickets. At days nine, 11, and 13, you’ll get 700.
Logging in and participating in one quick battle will grant you 50 each, for 100 easy tickets a day for five minutes of work. You can also score tons of tickets through the Aeos missions in the event section (the calendar on the main menu).
At this point in the game I think of everything in tickets, or more specifically “how many item enhancers does this get me?” My goal is to get every held item I’m using to 20 for ranked play, and I think it’s feasible over the next several months. That said, the ability to skip the line and even go further to 30 should be fixed. You already cleaned up on some whales, eh Tencent? I think you can afford to shut the tap off.
