GamePress

Who to next add to my attacker squad?

My current attackers are (all L30 wonders) DT/OR Dragonite, MS/SE Rhydon, RT/SE Golem, Count/DP Machamp, RS/DP Poliwrath, Conf/Solar Exeggutor, WG/HP Vaporeon and Bite/HP Gyarados. I currently have 620k stardust, 7 Fast TMs, 3 Charged TMs and 65 Rare Candy, but expect to earn more with the event, Entei raids and Ho-Oh raids.

1. L28 12A/15D/14S Espeon with Conf/FS (requires 19k stardust)
Walked an Eevee 10km and was fortunate to immediately get the best moveset. The lowest further investment required. May not be useful for Entei and Ho-Oh raids, but will be crucial for solong Gengar and Machamp.

2. L20 14A/10D/15S Raikou with TS/WC (75k stardust + 66 candy)
Top counter to Ho-Oh, useful for soloing Scyther and a more bulky Gyarados killer than Jolteon. Very likely to be worth the investment but does it really do better against Vaporeon than Exeggutor and Venusaur?

3. L23 15A/15D/14S Alakazam with Conf/SBall (58k stardust + 50 candy + Charge TMs)
Incredible IVs but SBall is only good for soloing Alakazam (which is almost impossible with L30 attackers). With FS, he could help solo Machamp and Gengar, duo Snorlax and sweep through weakened gyms.

4. L20 13A/15D/13S Larvitar (75k stardust + 153 candy + 37 Rare + may need TMs)
Have walked him over 250km and tried three Tyranitar raids (where nobody showed up). Having the best attacker in the game would make Blissey easier to deal with; Bite/SE is also devastating against Ho-Oh and great for soloing Gengar.

5. L20 11A/15D/13S Entei with FF/OH (75k stardust + 27 candy + 39 Rare + Fast TM)
Hope to earn a few more candy from Entei raids. I do have two Arcanines, a Charizard and a few Flareons with CP around 2000, but are they good enough for soloing Scyther and attacking Blissey with DG?

Asked by hkn7 years 5 months ago
Report

Answers

Don’t stop at Level 30, Max them ALL out.

Up
0
Down

What’s the point of even mentioning they’re wonders then if he’s just going to keep them at Level 30. Can have wonders with 11 Attack but you still won’t reach any breakpoints stopping there.

Up
0
Down

You will reach some but you won't know if you just blindly stop at L30. 11 attack Golems just reach the Ho-Oh breakpoint at L30 for example.

Up
0
Down

Hey everyone, "break points" are all that matter. Don't worry about gym battling, 4/5 difficulty raids, or future PvsP fights, because "break points" are the most important thing.

Up
0
Down

That’s the go to that’s been passed around here way too long. First stop at level 30, now breakpoints but only look at the Attack IV. Ignore those 0 Defense/Stamina ones cause they don’t matter at the moment...

Up
0
Down

I think you should not prioritize option 1, 4 and 5 due to their ATK IVs. Having lower ATK IVs require additional dusts and candies to achieve same performance of 14/15 ATK IVs.

I prefer powering up option 2 and 3 because they have 14 and 15 ATK IVs, respectively. In addition, Raikou (option 2) is one of the best counters for flying and water type pokemons.

Up
0
Down

The 12 attack IV on the Espeon doesn't really hurt you, because confusion is a very slow, but very powerful move. The breakpoints don't matter nearly as much as with weaker but faster moves like bite or psycho cut.

Up
0
Down

Definitely take the raikou to 30, he is very useful in gyms and now in Ho-Oh raids.

Up
0
Down

You can't go wrong powering up the C/FS Espeon.

The Raikou is definitely worth powering up, but you can make it a long term project. It has a lot of uses, though.

Alakazam with ShB is also useful against Gengar, although I've found my powered-up PC/SB 'Zam to be less effective than I'd hoped against both Gengar and 'Zam bosses. With those IV's, though, I'd definitely power it up sooner or later. If you don't like SB, you can TM it, and you'll get either FS (very useful), or FB, which is great against Blissey and Snorlax in gyms.

Tyranitar is not the best attacker in the game, and you are overestimating its effectiveness against all the defenders you named (although it is definitely good against Gengar raid boss, but you want B/C for that purpose). Still, T-tar is a strong attacker that can slot into a number of roles, and you want to have one. But I would put it on the back burner for now, at least until you have more larvitar candies. Don't spend that many of your rare candies on T-tar.

No hurry on the Entei. For Scyther, you want rock types (i.e. Golem), and for Blissey, Machamp is way better, and even the fighting Poliwrath will outperform Entei.

Summary: the Espeon is a no-brainer, and the Raikou is probably the next most useful. The 'Zam needs to be powered up as well, and then try out ShB, and see if you like it. If not, you can't go wrong charge-TM'ing it. Wait a while on the other two. You will regret spending that many of your rare candies if you get a Mewtwo anytime soon.

Up
0
Down

For Blissey with HB or Psychic, Machamp and Poliwrath are definitely better, but I find them (and even Dragonite) too fragile against DG (which Tyranitar is also weak to), which is why I am considering a Fire-type (currently, if I know a Blissey has DG, I lead with Exeggutor).

Up
0
Down

Do NOT max out or power up too many Vaporeons and Golems.

Vaporeon and Golem's position in the meta are the most tenuous.
There are other water and rock Pokemon with much better attack, but limited by moveset.

These are the potential competitors for Vaporeon and Golem in Gen 1/2, which can usurp their roles if given a better moveset. Also, potential Gen 3 competitors.
The number is the Pokemon's base attack stat.

Potential competitors for Vaporeon (205):
Sharpedo (243)
Kingler (240)
Gyarados (237)
Starmie (210)
Feraligatr (205)

Potential competitors for Golem (211):

Tyranitar (251)
Rhydon (223)
Armaldo (222)
Aerodactyl (221)
Kabutops (220)
Omastar (207)

Many of these competitors are glass cannons, but in a meta where DPS is king, it doesn't matter that much.

Up
0
Down

Totally agree with you, but i believe attack stat of Aggron is 198, so it is actually lower than Golems attack stat

Up
0
Down

Raikou is probably the safest counter, though, if youre really stingy with your resources, you should wait until a week after Ho-Oh leaves to see if Raikou is re-released and try for a better one. 87% 14 Attack best moveset is tough to beat though.

Up
0
Down

Not sure where my first comment went, hope I don't create a double post here.

2. Raikou is a clear nobrainer winner. It's extremely useful right now for Ho-Oh and will stay a top electric attacker for multiple generations. Solid investment with immediate use = power up now.

1. Powering this Espeon up to 30 might not have any impact on its performance. It hits breakpoints against Machamp and Gengar at L30.5 and L31 but those have only a small effect. I have personally never noticed any difference between L28 and L30 C/FS Espeons in many successful Machamp solos. 19k dust isn't much though so you might as well power it to 30 if you like it that way.

3. As stated already, SB is also good against Gengar. That said, anything Alakazam does in solo raids, any random L28+ Espeon from a wild high level Eevee with whatever IVs does almost as well. I would keep it as a project you can work on later since the IVs are great, but it's not worth spending your fairly limited resources on at the moment.

4. Machamp and Dragonite are way better Blissey counters than Tyranitar and you have one of each already. C/SoB Eggy and FS/OH Flareon are also faster than TTar. I would keep walking so as no to spend rare candy and also to give yourself a chance to hatch one with even better IVs. The upside of TTar is that it doesn't require many TMs since there's only one useless charge move.

5. Flareons do Scyther solos and kill Blisseys just fine without you needing to invest significant resources into an Entei. I would not power it up at this moment. For Scyther solo, a team of your Golem, Dragonite, 4 Flareons should complete the raid easily.

EDIT: Remember that assuming best movesets, Flareon is the best nonlegendary fire pokemon. Flareon is better than Arcanine with any moveset except E/FB, while Charizard FS/OH ties with Flareon's second best FS/FT moveset.

Up
0
Down

I don't think I said Machamp has a useless charge move. DP is a huge increase over CC but any player low on CTM should just settle on CC since it's good enough.

Up
0
Down

by hkn 7 years 5 months ago

Thank you for the answers. I decided to immediately power up my Raikou to L30.

The level 5 egg that I went to today was another Entei and my Rare Candy count increased to 71.

I have five good attackers for Ho-Oh raids:
1. L30 Raikou with TS/WC
2. L30 Golem with RT/SE
3. L30 Vaporeon with WG/HP
4. L30 Dragonite with DT/OR
5. L30 Gyarados with Bite/HP

Unfortunately, Exeggutor, Machamp, Poliwrath and Rhydon have type disadvantages against Ho-Oh.

Just remembered that I have a L29 14A/14D/10S Gastly and 200+ candy. Perhaps I should evolve him and then decide whether he is worth using TMs on to get Hex/SBall. (My Gengar with SC/SBall is only L24 13A/9D/13S; not worth spending 51k stardust on a non-wonder.)

Up
0
Down

Vaporeon has a breakpoint for Water Gun at L32 for 15 attack which gives it a huge performance boost against Ho-Oh. Worth looking into if your Vaporeon has high attack IV. Barring any new options Rhydon might honestly be fine for your 6th because it knows Stone Edge, despite MS being resisted by Ho-Oh. Other than that, any higher level Jolteon or Vaporeon would be decent also.

SC is worth much more than a difference of 9% IV on Gengar. A 0% Gengar with SC is better than a 100% Gengar with Hex in most situations, that's how much difference the moveset makes. Now, stardust is of course a consideration, if you could use a Gengar (good for Gengar solo, decent for Machamp solo), evolving the L29 makes sense anyway. I would not try to TM it to Shadow Ball if you miss since you're so low. If you get Sludge Bomb, you can still use it as a filler for a Machamp team.

All-in-all, I think you put too much weight on the wonder status. The SC Gengar's IVs are acceptable, only 2 away from wonder, and are actually better for the purpose of going against Confusion Alakazam since it has higher HP IV.

Up
0
Down

Given the current state of raids, you need more than one of something. Want to take down a Raikou, you should have 2-3 strong Rhydons, not one. And no one has enough Tyranitars unless they have 6 with B/C and 6 with B/SE, as well as a few with Fire Blast just in case the move becomes a useful legacy.

Don't power up Entei until you're all done with the raids - you could always get a better one, unless you have a perfect. Then pick out the best one as a candidate for powering up.

Up
0
Down