Welcome to Raid Review, where we take a look at the current raid rotation in Pokemon Go in order to see how valuable the current candidates are and what's worth your precious raid passes and what should generally be ignored! This is an ongoing series for Gamepress where we break down the proceedings into three-to-four different sections and work out the top choices for each, with consideration given to PvP and PvE alike.
Five-Star and Mega Raids
Giratina - Altered Forme
Giratina is back, and it finally has access to its signature attack: Shadow Force! This new move has managed to breathe some new life back into our Ghost Dragon, but sadly not too much life. This move's exceedingly high cost makes it an iffy choice in PvP, where it's primarily useful against bulky opponents when shields are down. Still, Gratina-Altered Forme definitely isn't a bad choice to aim for if you need its skills on your PvP team.
Mega Banette
The latest Mega-Spook is here, and it's pretty decent, overall. It directly competes with Mega Gengar and stands no chance on that front, but it is another Ghost Type to add to your arsenal, and is very solid for a discounted/free Mega Evolution given time and effort!
Three-Star Raids
Our three-star raids are a bit focused on PvP this time, with Umbreon, Drifblim, and Drapion all featuring. While a bit less important than they once were, all three still have genuine utility in their own right that makes them worth considering. However, the 10-IV cap can definitely be an issue for any Great League builds, so it's best to farm any that you may want and arrange trades to hopefully score more PvP-ready IV spreads.
Then, on the other hand, we have Gengar. The classic Ghost Type raider has been overshadowed by other Ghost and Dark Types, especially Shadows, but it's also still a worthwhile Pokemon in-and-of itself. Oh, and it's also the main ingredient for making Mega Gengar, which basically reigns the Ghost meta supreme.
One-Star Raids
Another pvp-focused tier, Trevenant, Cofagrigus, and Runerigus in particular stand out as powerful PvP options that are very useful in your own right, while Sableye is an outright staple of the Great League, though it really wants to run Return, so it's not quite as big of a deal here. As with Tier 3, the big issue here is IVs, so nab a few and trade them for better numbers.
Closing
We have more of a focus on PvP this time around, with a lot of solid/staple Pokemon popping up. This is a good time to shore up your team and work on building a more comprehensive PvP core, but you're going to want to find a friend to trade with if you're going in that direction.
Our next Raid update is scheduled for October 27, but that one is not going to be quite as big of a change. As such, our next article may be a bit shorter, but we will still cover it.
