We have all been there, feeling cheated by the RNG, or being blessed by it.
During the the Zapdos and Articuno events I shared a car ride with mostly the same people.
For Articuno, 25 raids, I got no shiny and a bad 93% as best. We were 5 in the car. One got six, another two and three got none. Best IV were a 100% that got a way.
Zapdos were another story, 30 raids, I got 7(!) shinies and a good 87% (actually also shiny) as best. Other six in the car got 4, 4, 3, 1, 1 and none. Two in the car got 100% and both got caught.
With a restricted time limit I would have hoped Niantic had tweaked the RNG a little. Making it a greater chance to catch your first, but then gradually decrease the chance. Just pure random distribution may give very uneven distribution on small samples. That just gives a lot frustration without any other benefits in the game.
Niantic does tweak RNG in other settings. Most of you have noticed that the first hours of a new shiny release there is a decent chance to catch one or more, after that you may catch a thousand without getting one.
(of course, Zapdos were the shiny I cared least about, I would without hesitation traded all seven for a single shiny Articuno. But I got a decent amount of candy out of it)
Zapdos shiny rate seems to have been boosted from normal raid shiny rate, based on multiple threads about the topic on TSR.
I like the idea of boosting the rate for the first shiny but it's not going to happen because shiny hunt keeps people buying passes in many cases, but the motivation to get more than 1 isn't great.
I don’t even have a problem with it being guaranteed, providing you meet some prerequisite, such as “do x number of raids and your chances increase”. Far too often, I’ll see a level 25 who has never raided before nab a shiny or a hundo on the first attempt, while I have done 80 without either. RNG when used as the only factor gets old really quick. We should have some sort of control over our successes.
And besides, the mentality of “if you get one too, mine becomes less valuable” is the epitome of selfishness. That statement really boils my potato.
Ho-Oh: 1/11 best is 93%
Kyogre: 1/18 best is a weather boosted 96%
Articuno: 0/6 best was 91%
Lugia: 0/4 best was 89%
Zapdos: 0/11 best was 98%
Mewtwo 69% and at most 80% (haven't bothered checking, since disappointed neither Mewtwo got an amazing appraisal).
Best regice was 96% (caught 18), best latias was 91% (caught 3 of 5).
Further, I consistently hatch "strong" (not amazing) versions of the good Pokemon when I finally get them - and more often than not seem to get the minimum 32 candy during the double candy events on these Pokemon (I'll get 64 feebas/trapinch candy, but only 32 Beldum/Dratini/bagon candy).
I'd say my luck:
Is dead on the expected value for kyogre, regice.
Shiny luck was good for Ho-Oh, bad otherwise.
IV luck was great for zapdos (plus got two 96% out of the 4 research breakthroughs), but otherwise pretty bad overall. Awful for Mewtwo, hoping to change that with the third on Thursday...
And abysmal on hatches. Had 8 10km eggs stored up for this double candy event, hatched 3 feebas with none over 80%, a 32 candy Beldum under 80%, two mareep (one was 93% and I missed that community day, so actually pretty happy with those), a Slakoth, and a Porygon under 80%.
