Should You Buy the Magikarp for 500 Pokéollars? Yes, Here‘s Why:

As a Pokémon trainer, few purchases require as much careful consideration as the Magikarp salesman‘s offer. This shady dealer wants to sell you a completely useless Magikarp for the whopping price of 500 Pokéollars. That‘s your entire early game budget!

I‘m here to tell you – go ahead and buy it.

Now let me explain why…

The Infamous Magikarp Salesman

The Magikarp salesman first appears in Pokémon Red/Blue in the Pokémon Center before Mt. Moon. He‘s known for aggressively pushing Magikarp sales using dodgy hype lines like:

"I‘m positive this Magikarp will make a fantastic addition to any trainer‘s team!"

But there‘s no pulling the wool over our eyes. Magikarp is famously one of the weakest Pokémon around. All it can do is hop and splash!

So why shell out 500 Pokéollars for this virtually useless fish?

Evolving Magikarp Pays Off Big Time

Here‘s the thing – Magikarp might be weak, but its evolution Gyarados is one of the most powerful non-legendary water Pokémon ever.

Your useless Magikarp will evolve into a beastly sea monster at level 20.

Talk about a glow up! This is the best bang for buck power increase of any evolution.

Let‘s look at the stats side by side:

Pokémon	HP	Attack	Defense	Sp. Atk	Sp. Def	Speed	Overall
Magikarp	20	10	55	15	20	80	★☆☆☆☆
Gyarados	95	125	79	60	100	81	★★★★★

As you can see, Gyarados dominates Magikarp in every category. It remains one of the top non-legendary water Pokémon in all of the games.

With powerful moves like Hydro Pump, Crunch and Dragon Dance in its arsenal, Gyarados can annihilate opponents.

So investing 500 Pokéollars to get your hands on a Magikarp early can give you an incredibly strong Gyarados before the first gym! That‘s value.

Later in this guide I‘ll provide some tips to evolve Magikarp efficiently.

Other Benefits of Buying Magikarp

Aside from unlocking Gyarados, here are some other reasons why buying this fish is smart:

• Saves time grinding yourself – Catching your own wild Magikarp can take ages. Buying one saves you hours of fruitless fishing.
• High energy – The salesman wasn‘t lying about its vigor! This Magikarp likely has better base stats than average.
• Gives you a headstart – Training Magikarp early lets you get the XP needed to hit level 20 faster.
• Bragging rights – Not many trainers can resist the sales pitch and purchase. Be one of the smart ones!

Now let‘s examine some of the potential cons of buying Magikarp before reaching a verdict.

The Case Against Buying Magikarp

I‘d be remiss not to mention the downsides of purchasing this floppy fish:

• It‘s expensive – 500 Pokéollars is a lot of money early game when funds are tight.
• You still have to grind levels – Evolving it yourself involves fighting many battles to get the XP needed.
• No guarantees on stats/quality – The Magikarp‘s IVs and nature could be subpar.
• Magikarp are common – You‘ll encounter endless others through regular play.

However, the pros outweigh the cons here in my opinion. Let‘s dig deeper.

Optimizing Magikarp & Gyarados for Battles

If you do get the Magikarp, you‘ll want to optimize it for battles. Here are some tips:

• Teach it the most powerful water and dark type moves like Hydro Pump and Crunch
• Boost speed with Dragon Dance to enable sweeping
• Give it Muscle Band to raise attack
• Use EV training to maximize offense
• Target lower defense opponents like Exeggutor first

Analyzing the damage formulas shows Hydro Pump will OHKO most foes after a Dragon Dance:

And here‘s an EV training regiments to make Gyarados a speedy attacker:

These optimizations will give you the very best battle performance.

Evolving Magikarp Efficiently in Pokémon GO

Evolving Magikarp in Pokémon GO takes 400 candies, which takes ages to accumulate normally.

But there are ways to speed up the process:

• Walk Magikarp as your buddy to earn 1 candy per km
• Fight in Magikarp raid battles for rare candies
• Hatch eggs with bonus Magikarp candies
• Use pinap berries while catching to double candy
• Do "Catch X Pokémon" field research tasks

With these tips, you‘ll max out those 400 candies quickly!

What Makes Magikarp Rare & Valuable?

The Magikarp salesman only offers plain old regular Magikarp. But certain Magikarp are highly coveted by collectors:

• Shiny – Alternate gold color sparkling version
• Perfect IVs – Ideal for breeding & battling
• Odd colors – Pink, black, or white
• Events – Special distributions

The shiny Magikarp/Gyarados is particularly prized. The shiny odds are roughly 1 in 450.

Is 500 Pokéollars a Fair Price?

Okay, so we‘ve established buying Magikarp can be rewarding. But is 500 Pokéollars a fair deal?

Let‘s consider:

• A standard Pokéball costs 200 Pokéollars
• 10 potions can be bought for 1,000 Pokéollars
• TM moves cost between 2,000 – 5,000 Pokéollars

So valued against other items, 500 for a rare Pokémon seems reasonably priced.

It‘s certainly steep when money is tight early on. But the long-term investment of scoring a Gyarados makes it ultimately worthwhile.

My verdict: 500 is fair market value for Magikarp. Take the deal!

Final Verdict: Buy the Magikarp!

After weighing all the pros and cons, I believe buying the Magikarp for 500 Pokéollars is absolutely worth it.

Yes, that‘s a lot of money at the start. But the opportunity to get a Gyarados quickly is too good to pass up. It will make the rest of your journey much smoother.

The only real downside is missing out on the satisfaction of raising your own Magikarp from the ground up.

But in terms of pure practicality, buying a pre-leveled Magikarp to evolve ASAP is the smarter play. Once you have that ferocious sea monster shredding through opponents, you‘ll be glad you bought it!

So in summary:

✅ Buy the Magikarp
✅ Evolve it into mighty Gyarados
✅ Dominate the Pokémon League

Just try haggling the price down to 450 first. Good luck on your journey!