[LIVE] Shiny Roaming Latias after 10,786 soft resets in Sapphire

Shiny Roaming Latias in Sapphire has been obtained. I’m so happy with her and I can’t believe the nature either! Latias is probably comfortably in my top 5 favourite shinies, maybe even 2nd behind Suicune to be honest. I actually did 1,000 resets for her back in 2019 and it was the only hunt that had been “scrapped” as I wanted to hunt it with a better-looking ID. The stars truly aligned when I got the same ID as my DTQ in my other Sapphire so how about that. I now own two LeafGreens and two Sapphires with the same ID on them. 14441 & 17771.
This was roamer number 16 for my Roamer Quest. Just Latios left to claim in Ruby until I’m done. I talk a little about what comes next in this video for those of you who have been asking me.
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There’s a lot to understand about this hunt so I’ve been as descriptive as possible. I may revisit this section with more details eventually and if any come up but for now here’s how the information
The roamers are generated in Ruby and Sapphire with the TV which tells us that a blue (Ruby) or red (Sapphire) Pokemon has been reported in certain locales. Once you finish hearing about the report, the roamer is then generated as shiny or not shiny.
Before starting the hunt, get a Teleport Pokemon (with Teleport set to Mauville) & a Surf Pokemon. You will also need the roamer to be registered already in the dex before starting this hunt.
Once you generate the roamer, teleport to Mauville. In this newer variant of what’s known as the Mauville Method (see below), we bike directly to Route 118. The amount of routes connecting to 118 gives us a theoretical 9.5% chance of landing it immediately therefore we no longer check the dex in Mauville to save potential time. If the roamer is on 118, encounter it and reset.
If the roamer is on 110, 117 or 110, bike directly to that route, check the dex and encounter it if you hit.
If the roamer is on 133, bike directly to route 117, check the dex and encounter it if you hit.
If the roamer is on 134, bike directly to route 110, check the dex and encounter it if you hit.
If the roamer is on 121, bike to 111 and then back to 118, check dex. This is the only 4 boundary crosses using this method. This takes advantage of the fact that the roamers are land-locked & will not go from 121 to the sea routes to the right. The roamer also has the potential to skip 122 entirely in this process due to potentially bugged code (to be determined).
If the roamer is on 119, 120 or 123, reload using the bike shop and go back to 118 & repeat.
If you’re on route 117, 110 or 111 and the roamer is two boundaries away (119 for example), bike to the nearest route and check the dex. If you’re not successful and it has moved away further, reload the area.
The key emphasis on this method is not to chase the roamer. It’s more beneficial time-wise to reload using the bike shop and reshuffle the roamer’s location than it is to chase the 4 boundaries in the original Mauville Method. Less biking overall just acts as a time saver across X amount of time. In the 1,000 trial runs of 4 boundaries, I only hit 83. That's a mere 8.3% success rate and a whoooooole ton of biking.
I did 4,500 or so of the original method and once Rich and I started experimenting and sharing feedback, it really picked up the pace. I estimate this variant to be ~35% faster which is quite substantial. There is always a degree of RNG of course but hitting those Route 118 resets really adds up. I was roughly hitting 22 an hour originally but with this method, ~30 is common. 35 was the most I’ve had with godly RNG luck. It really isn’t out of the question to imagine someone getting close to 40 with just perfect luck.
It’s probably unlikely (imo) that there will be further optimisations of the Hoenn duo but if there are any updates, I’ll update this section with the information required.
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Massive thanks to Rich (Shiny Ghosthunter Richie) for spending a crazy amount of hours testing, experimenting, looking through footage with me. He was the one who suggested route 118 be a staple start point as well.
A further thank you to Hangar (HangarOfRoam) for the original Mauville method which you can find here;
• How to Shiny Hunt Roam...
A special mention to Peru for probably the worst shiny luck in history with an absurd 40,000+ hunt for this Roaming Latias. A terrible tale.
Outdated but still deserving of a mention is Metarkrai for his research on RAM placements for the roamers as well as an old guide that may still serve some use someday. (in French, FYI)
Rich - / @theshinyperujakoplrs
Hangar - / @hangarofroam
Peru - / @theshinyperujakoplrs
Metarkrai - / @zreety
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