Lapras dilemma and use for Ice-types
During the Water Festival, I used the "evolve 2 Shellder" research task to farm Lapras candies to power up a 91% hatchling with Blizzard, which I intended to use on both gym defence (which matters a lot in my area) and Ice-type offence.
However, I lucked upon a level 30 wonder Shellder, which got Avalanche upon evolution, and also earned a 96% Lapras with Hydro Pump (which, with Frost Breath, is the best defensive moveset) from research.
I am also planning to power up my best Articuno (go Team Mystic!) once I get my fourth and in my opinion, Articuno is the only Ice-type currently worth spending CTMs on (but still less important than Tyranitar and Blissey/Chansey, of course).
Would an Articuno with Ice Beam and a Cloyster with Avalanche suffice for Ice-type offence until both get outclassed by Mamoswine? What are Ice-type attackers useful for in the interim? I currently use a 96% Gardevoir with Confusion + Dazzling Gleam to battle flying dragons in gyms and also have two Dragonites with Dragon Tail + Outrage.
If I have no need for another Ice-type attacker, I will only use Lapras as a defender and thus power up the 96% one with Hydro Pump for the classic "only feed GRBs to some defenders, letting others fall so the attackers open slots for me" trick.
Answers
Your Cloyster and Articuno are probably enough for ice attackers. Rayquaza will probably make a return as a raid boss by the end of summer, but a lot of people will be interested in that for the shiny chance so your ice, dragon, and fairy pokemon will probably be enough. If you wanted another ice type now Piloswine is a possibility now that will not go to complete waste, assuming its evolution Mamoswine doesn't get complete trash moves.
> Lapras with Hydro Pump (which, with Frost Breath, is the best defensive moveset)
Ice Shard/Ice Beam is Lapras' best defensive moveset. Among currently available moves, Frost Breath/Surf is its best defensive moveset.
I love ice types. Most of them are roughly equivalent, so I would take a look at secondary typings - I prefer Cloyster and Piloswine as my choices, though a good Walrein (30+) is also acceptable. Lapras just doesn't seem to have offensive capability. To be fair, I don't have a lot of experience with Articuno - I missed him during his original release.
Everything wil get outclassed by mamoswine, and Glaceon. both have similar attack and glaceon also has offense and bulk, do not spend anything on articuno or lapras really, they arent worth it, as gen IV's likely to come out soon now the the regi's are in raid rotation.
however, if they surprise us with a rayquaza return, still dont rely on those ice types, alolan golem is coming out in july (as well as alolan ninetales is projected to be very effective againt double dragon sets rayquaza has), and smack down tyranitar, despite its lack of use at the moment, will have a brief spot un the sun of rayquaza returns before gen IV.
So you want them to spot-buff Lapras? Remember that it never got a targeted nerf, it was just one of the losers when the stat conversion formula changed, just like Arcanine.
I agree that it's a cool pokemon and I'd also like for it to be more relevant, but spot-buffs and spot-nerfs don't seem like something Niantic wants to do unless they absolutely have to.
