Is Banette good?
Im currently missing a ghost attacker, and got a banette with double ghost attacks (Hex/SB). My only other pokemon with ghost attacks are my Crobat and my Gengar that has Sludge Bomb as charge move. Do you think its worth powering up Banette as a glass cannon? (If its only good with Shadow Claw, i can spend a fast TM on it).
Answers
Is Banette good? No.
It's mediocre to bad, at most it works as a filler if your team really needs another ghost attacker. Would not recommend spending any resources on one, you'd be far better served getting another Gengar.
Ghost isn't a crucial attacking type anyway. The only thing that makes Gengar useful is its stupendously high DPS that can compete with strong pokemons from other types that can deal SE damage to psychics and ghosts.
Bannette is a glass cannon dependent on dodging. He's not worth messing with unless
1) You are good at dodging
2) He comes with shadow claw (or you have a dozen FTMs and nothing to do with them).
3) You get him at about L27+, as you will likely need to Max him to make him viable
4) You really need ghost offense (for completness, as apeantly you do).
He will only last slightly longer than Gengar against psychic, even though Bannette takes neutral damage.
Banette is underrated and stronger than people think, however it is absolutely REQUIRED that you dodge with it. People thought it was terrible until it was used to start doing raids people thought it was entirely incapable of then people were like "Oh this thing is actually really good." But if you cannot dodge you cannot use it.
So I guess Xatu is also good because it can solo Machamp if you have 6 leveled up all the way to 40?
Banette is a bad pokemon with a stupidly good moveset, which makes it useable, but it's a pretty tough sell to call it "good". It's as fragile as Gengar with remarkably lower DPS and many people question if even Gengar is worth powering up because it dies to a bad stare.
I regret powering mine. Practice shows that it is the pure definition of a glassy glass canon.
I would go with the recommendations above to not bother, unless you found a high IV / level banette yourself. Safe yourself the dust and use a TM if necessary and you got a spare one.
Practice will show it's not too useful tho. I conclude that on my own experience soloing tier 3 Pokemon.
P.S. I think the difference between Gengar en Banette power on the website was not clear enough. Usually I follow them blindly, but the power and fragileness could have been mentioned more explicit.
The best use I found for banette was in Confusion Alakazam raids. Banette can usually survive 1 more Confusion than Gengar so was more likely to get 2 shadow balls off. It doesn’t hit as hard as Gengar, but if the comparison is 6H+1SB vs 8SC+2SB then the choice is obvious.
But once your TTars are high enough level you no longer need the glass cannons to get you ahead of the clock.
