Articuno power up?
Being a little short of good Ice-type attackers, I wonder whether I schould power up my 15.13.15 Articuno (level 20) for Rayquaza raids. Any thoughts?
Answers
I will not power up Articuno. It's stats are to low. Sure it's better then the other ices, but will be surpassed with gen4 coming. I have a team of 3 Walrein (35,5, 33,5, 31,5), 2 Cloyster(31,5) and a Lapras (31,5) and I'm pretty sure that I will get a lot of extra balls with that team in comparison to other players using Dragonite and Golem or even Aggron. I invested some dust and charge TMs, but I'd rather do that than putting rare candy and more dust into a mon who will be surpased soon. A second Groudon has my priority here.
I took a look at Gen4, and it wasn't clear that anything would surpass Articuno. Mamoswine is the only real candidate, and with the usual nerfing that Niantic hits the stronger mon with, it might not beat Articuno out, although it's likely it will be better than all the other Ice mon.
That said, we have Rayquaza and Salamance coming out later today, and with the community day on 2/24, everyone and their cousin's dog should gain at least 1-2 strong Dragonites, so having good ice to take those mon on is pretty important. As of right now, Articuno is is the strongest counter, and even if Mamoswine is better next generation, Articuno will still be second best and very strong against Dragons.
Ice mon aren't strong in the traditional sense (high CP). Their strength lies in a lack of good counters. Fire has to worry about water moves, fight doesn't resist ice, rock is weak to ice, and steel doesn't have many strong attackers yet (Metagross is looming, though). And the weak attacks are counterbalanced by ice being effective and double effective against certain targets (like Dragons). Poor stats don't cripple ice mon, they keep them balanced.
