Gaining new ability should still be free but require a visit to a guardian center.
SO WHEN THE BRUTALLY CRAPPY SERVER GIVES YOU THE "SUCCESS NOT TRUE" MESSAGE YOU WOULD STILL LOSE THE TRAINER TOKEN, BUT NOT THE UPGRADE IF ONE OR MORE GUARDIANS LEVEL UP!!!
It's not hard, it's impossible. Crabby (and firball and vinibble) can't be found in the wild. It's clearly stated by the sellers in Guardian centers. And by the way, "buy evolve 1000 coins" has no meaning in any human language.
And so your last guardian, heavily wounded and using up the last healing potion, finally lands the KO blow on the last opponent? Well, you can bet the immortal souls of seven generations of your descendants that you'll get the "success not true" message.
cbeenker you can buy evolution items with tokens. If you go back to the first maps and lay waste on some low level trainers with chests you'll probably harvest 2-3 tokens every day, not to mention those from defeating new guardians.
Yeehaw, another pokemon worshipper comes along and thinks he's the only one who ever watched toons and played games! Congratulations p4u13, we were just starting to lose faith in mankind's foolishness.