by Doc – Owner, Founder, What’s the Problem With Doing a Few Thousand 6-Star Tera Raids?

Read this first:

I promise you what you’ve seen on Youtube and Reddit is not the best way to Tera Raid. If you want to actually be a great raider, the menu at the top and the links below are the place to learn.

I’ll assume you’re familiar with the builds listed on my 6-star Tera Raid Tier List, as I’ll be referencing them and basing recommendations on these builds. These builds are designed to be useful for most raids and to actually avoid dying, not just builds that work half the time that otherwise take your team down with you. Additionally, the NPC Partners tier list gives you an idea of what NPCs to reroll for, if that’s your style, and this sheet tells you whether a raid opponent is all-physical, all-special or both, informing you of what kind of defensive stats you need to raise. If you’re not educated on proper Tera Raid strats and how the “script” works, read that post as well before moving forward.

I’ll also add that we’re not addressing “cheese” builds like Stored Power, as those are risky and often take a few tries. It’d be faster to just play the raid normally. Lastly, each Tera Raid is unique and your success may depend on your build, status conditions, NPC partners, the Tera Type, or any other number of things. These are just suggestions based on my personal experiences with each 6* Tera raid. I went through and fought every single one multiple times over six months to produce this post.

Because some raiders can use different loadouts to attack from different types, I’ll indicate the type after their name. Annihilape Fighting is different than Annihilape Ghost, for example.

The Paldea Raiders

Annihilape

Game: Both
Base Type: Fighting/Ghost
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Close Combat
Shadow Claw
Assurance
Focus Energy

Additional Moves:

Bulk Up
Rage Fist

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
90% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
25% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up
5% Time Remaining: Uses Rage Fist

Tips:

Annihilape is one of the hardest ones, because he’s always going to be able to hit you at least neutrally and he self-boosts enough to cause a problem for anything on the special side of the aisle. Bring a physically tanky Pokemon with Iron Defense who is at least equally hit by Fighting and Ghost so that he uses Close Combat instead of Shadow Claw (Ghost types aren’t an option here thanks to Shadow Claw, you can try Zamazenta Body Press and/or Zacian) and if you’re lucky, Close Combat won’t wipe you out. Fortunately, Close Combat users often wipe themselves out with the Defense drops – you just have to survive. So put down Iron Defense turn 1 if you can, put it down again after he resets his stats at that 95% Time interval, and start hitting super effectively for self-healing. If he’s hitting with Close Combat and you’ve got those stat boosts in, it’s an easily winnable raid (ignoring Fighting Tera of course).

Also, heads up – his ability is Defiant, not Vital Spirit, so while you can put him to sleep you can’t debuff him. And if you get an Intimidate NPC, he gets an Attack boost EVERY TIME THEY RESPAWN. Reflect and Will-O-Wisp are your friends here if physical Attack is still a problem for you.

Armarouge

Game: Scarlet
Base Type: Fire/Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Armor Cannon
Psychic (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Night Shade
Will-O-Wisp (85% chance to burn target)

Additional Moves:

Calm Mind
Sunny Day

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
65% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day

Tips

Not a bad time to bring Weather wars. Kyogre is my favorite for this one, as Will-O-Wisp’s Burn status is useless against it and his Sunny Day will be countered by your Rain Dance. He’ll use Psychic against you instead, which you can counter with your own Calm Mind, and Kyogre doesn’t need much to surviva that. So long as you keep his Sun down it’ll be straightforward. Fair warning: if you’re fighting a Tera that happens to give extra STAB to one of his attacks… you’re going to have a harder time. If he’s not using Armor Cannon (which functions basically as Close Combat but Fire type) to drop his stats for you, then he’s actually a really, really hard raid most of the time. If Kyogre isn’t an option, Chi-Yu’s alright too.

Avalugg

Game: Both
Base Type: Ice
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Icicle Crash (30% chance to cause flinch)
Heavy Slam
Snowscape
Ice Spinner

Additional Moves:

Iron Defense

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Uses Snowscape
75% Time Remaining: Uses Iron Defense
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips

Avalugg suffers from the Snowscape glitch. Not particularly hard, just hit him with a Special Attack that’s super effective and he’ll behave himself (his Iron Defense makes physical attacks pretty hard, even with great Attack stats and super effectiveness). Don’t be weak to Ice or Steel and you’ll be fine. You’ll even get a lot of free turns when he’s trying to repeat Snowscape, so that’s nice. Enjoy the freebie.

Baxcalibur

Game: Both
Base Type: Dragon/Ice
Ability: Random

Moves:

Icicle Spear
Dragon Rush (20% chance to cause flinch)
Snowscape
Body Press

Actions:

80% Time Remaining: Uses Snowscape
75% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% HP Remaining: Uses Snowscape
20% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Baxcalibur would be hard if not for the Snowscape glitch. He’s still a very bulky and heavy hitter, but you get so many freebies from the glitch that you should be okay. Still, weather-dependent raids are absolutely nonfunctional here nor is any Dragon-type or anything weak to Ice or Fighting. Also, expect that you won’t have as many turns available to you, as Icicle Spear’s animations take forever in most cases.

Blissey

Game: Both
Base Type: Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Dazzling Gleam
Hyper Voice
Sing (55% chance to cause sleep)
Light Screen

Additional Moves:

Defense Curl

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Uses Defense Curl
75% HP Remaining: Uses Defense Curl
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Sing
30% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Hit him with a physical attack. Rinse and repeat. Bring Electric or Misty Terrain if you’ve got it, because it’s still a Sleep raid.

Bombirdier

Game: Both
Base Type: Flying/Dark
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Rock Slide (30% chance to cause flinch)
Acrobatics
Knock Off
Feather Dance

Actions:

80% Time Remaining: Uses Knock Off
75% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Feather Dance

Tips:

Feather Dance invalidates your physical attack, so you’re limited to Special here. You’re likely not going to be able to resist his attacks easily, but don’t worry about that Knock Off – it doesn’t actually remove your Shell Bell. Aim for something not weak to Flying, Dark or Rock, like Diancie, Wo-Chien or similar. He’s got pretty good type coverage so you don’t have a ton available to you, but he’s not hard within what you have.

Breloom

Game: Both
Base Type: Grass/Fighting
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Bullet Seed
Low Sweep (100% chance to lower target’s Speed by 1 stage)
Spore (100% chance to cause sleep)
Aerial Ace

Additional Moves:

Grassy Terrain

Actions:

80% Time Remaining: Uses Grassy Terrain
75% HP Remaining: Uses Spore
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
45% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
20% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

SLEEEEEEEP. This one is especially irritating as it’s got a very wide moveset. Zacian may be useful for this one, as Misty Terrain can prevent Sleep, and Miraidon plus its Electric Terrain resists enough of it that you shouldn’t have much difficulty. His Tera Type on this raid can lock you into a hard time, particularly if it’s Electric, so don’t be afraid to go for something with neutral typing if it can prevent sleep. Just know that Spore is a 100% hit move and it immediately inflicts sleep, so if you don’t outspeed with that terrain…

Ceruledge

Game: Violet
Base Type: Fire/Ghost
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Bitter Blade
Shadow Claw
Psycho Cut
Will-O-Wisp (85% chance to burn target)

Additional Moves:

Sunny Day

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
65% Time Remaining: Uses Will-O-Wisp
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day

Tips:

Ceruledge is fun because he stacks multipliers on his Fire attacks, like STAB, Sunny Day and such. And by “fun” I mean “not fun”, because if you don’t resist Fire you are SOL. You can get away with taking shots from Psycho Cut and Shadow Claw (do be wary of Shadow Claw’s increased critical hit chance, as that’ll tear you to pieces and ignore your Defense stat while you’re at it) but you’d better not take a Fire shot. There’s no clear-cut answer to this set of offenses, so you might run Swampert or something like Palkia to handle the Fire.

Cetitan

Game: Both
Base Type: Ice
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Ice Spinner
Body Slam (30% chance to paralyze target)
Snowscape
Stomping Tantrum

Additional Moves:

Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% Time Remaining: Uses Snowscape
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Yawn

Tips:

The easiest raid you’ll ever have. Cetitan’s AI is bugged and he’ll spam Snowscape when there’s other weather out because he is affected by the Snowscape glitch, and his only real threat is that one Yawn at the end of the raid. Just hit him! When he knocks you unconscious, drop a Heal Cheer and keep hitting. Oh, and don’t be weak to Ice or Ground. No Garchomp allowed.

Clawitzer

Game: Violet
Base Type: Water
Ability: Standard

Moves:

Water Pulse (20% chance to confuse target)
Dragon Pulse
Aura Sphere
Crabhammer

Additional Moves:

Rain Dance

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
75% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
45% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Water Pulse

Tips:

This one’s a bit harder, and you don’t have easy options as to what you’ll do with it. Vileplume is a nice option if super effective, as he resists everything there but Dragon Pulse, and Dragon Pulse ain’t that great. He’s a bit lacking in the defensive stats department so you’ll be alright tanking your first two hits – just make sure you’re self-healing fast enough to keep pace with him. Alternatively, no shame in dropping in a Kyogre depending on if you’re feeling up to some Weather Wars today, and if Tera Types permit. Worst-case scenario you go with Urshifu Water or Ogerpon Grass.

Clodsire

Game: Both
Base Type: Poison/Ground
Ability: Random

Moves:

Earthquake
Poison Jab (30% chance to poison target)
Megahorn
Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Uses Yawn
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Earthquake

Tips:

SLEEEEEEP. Clodsire is a butt when it comes to hitting with Yawn. He does it, likes it, and is scripted to do it, and neither Gholdengo nor Electric/Misty Terrain can work to keep it away because he’s super effective against the types that typically have Electric/Misty Terrain. Enamorus doesn’t work either (Poison Jab) which leaves you with Taunts that only work before the Tera Shield goes up, Heal Cheers, and Annihilape running Vital Spirit instead of Defiant or Inner Focus. If you remember that you’re losing your stats basically on Turn 2 and play accordingly, you’ll be alright with Annihilape.

Corviknight

Game: Both
Base Type: Flying/Steel
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)
Drill Peck
Body Press
Hone Claws

Additional Moves:

Tailwind

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
75% HP Remaining: Uses Hone Claws
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Tailwind

Tips:

Gholdengo running a Ghost set is a viable one for this, but it won’t be easy. Be prepared for him to be quite tanky with extremely large physical attack damage, and to have to put up an immense physical defense yourself. Deoxys-Defense or Flying Lugia might be a useful one for this with the right Tera. It really all comes down to whether you’re getting hit with that Iron Head flinch too much. Also, if he uses Hone Claws against of your teammates it won’t show up on your screen, but it’ll show up as a stat boost for him in the stats screen. So in a single turn he can have +4 Attack without warning. Corviknight is a great example of a plainly unfair raid, but you can solve it with physical defense boosts.

Cyclizar

Game: Both
Base Type: Dragon/Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Double-Edge (33% recoil damage)
Dragon Claw
Dragon Pulse
Knock Off

Additional Moves:

Shift Gear

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
80% Time Remaining: Uses Knock Off
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Shift Gear

Tips:

Never had a problem with this one. Aside from the mid-raid stat wipe, he’s not particularly hard. Knock Off doesn’t permanently remove your item, by the way. I believe it comes back the next turn.

Dachsbun

Game: Both
Base Type: Fairy
Ability: Random

Moves:

Play Rough (10% chance to lower target’s Attack by 1 stage)
Double-Edge (33% recoil damage)
Bite (30% chance to cause flinch)
Baby-Doll Eyes

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Play Rough

Tips:

Very easy. Expect the usual mid-raid stat wipe, don’t be weak to Fairy or Dark, and you’ll be fine.

Ditto

Game: Both
Base Type: Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Transform

Actions:

50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Okay, these are fun. Ditto will always copy the host of the Tera Raid – offline, that’s you. Your Tera Raid Partners will bring Pokemon equal to your level, so you need to get a Magikarp and juice it to level 100, and teach it nothing. It only knows Splash. Then you just sit there, cheering on your teammates as they beat up this poor, defenseless Ditto-Magikarp that only wanted love.

Dondozo

Game: Both
Base Type: Water
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Wave Crash (33% recoil damage)
Order Up
Heavy Slam
Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)

Additional Moves:

Rain Dance
Curse

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Curse

Tips:

SLEEEEEEEP. The good news is he’s not going to hit you with anything most of the best Sleepers are weak to. Iron Hands is probably your best bet provided you keep up with the Electric Terrains, and fortunately he can run either Fighting or Electric so you should be okay regardless of his Tera. He’ll hit you for neutral damage regardless of what you run, so if that’s a concern to you just try Gholdengo instead, who resists Heavy Slam and Order Up.

Dragalge

Game: Scarlet
Base Type: Poison/Dragon
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Dragon Pulse
Sludge Bomb (30% chance to poison target)
Water Pulse (20% chance to confuse target)
Toxic (badly poisons target)

Additional Moves:

Acid Spray
Draco Meteor

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Uses Acid Spray
75% HP Remaining: Uses Draco Meteor
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
45% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
30% HP Remaining: Uses Draco Meteor

Tips:

Fairy, Dragon and anything weak to Poison is way out of the question here, and that Acid Spray is not going to make life easy for you either. No matter who you run, it has to be a Steel type. If Magearna’s a Steel Tera, you could run Magerna, as her stats are obscenely good for this exact raid. Having her as a Steel Tera is important for this raid (honestly, have two Magearnas in your Tera raid box if you can – one for each type of attack) as that renders you immune to that Acid Spray at the beginning. That Acid Spray means all his future attacks will hit you for 2x damage if you don’t rectify the stat drop, so we have to nullify it. Dusk Mane Necrozma and Metagross are also options for this.

Dragapult

Game: Violet
Base Type: Dragon/Ghost
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Shadow Ball (20% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Dragon Pulse
Thunderbolt (10% chance to paralyze target)
Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)

Additional Moves:

Reflect
Light Screen

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Uses Reflect
75% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Light Screen

Tips:

Good luck finding someone who isn’t going to be hit by this super effectively. It won’t actually be that hard, it’ll just be annoying. With this moveset, only Normal, Fighting, Poison, Ground, Rock, Fire, Electric, Dark and Fairy types will take neutral damage. Nobody will resist this, so pick whatever you have available that’s of those types exclusively and is super effective against their Tera and start whaling away. You might have more success if it’s a special attacker, since it drops a Reflect pretty early on.

Dragonite

Game: Both
Base Type: Dragon/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Dragon Rush (20% chance to cause flinch)
Extreme Speed
Dragon Dance
Aqua Tail

Additional Moves:

Light Screen

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
65% Time Remaining: Uses Light Screen
50% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Dragon Dance

Tips:

Dragonite is a contender for the hardest Tera Raid opponent in the base game. Dragon Dance plus Extreme Speed means that he’s at +6 Attack within the first three turns (because when he uses it against your teammates, even though you don’t see it, it’s added to his stats against you too) and he can hit you first. I hate to keep relying on Gholdengo, but… well, bring Gholdengo if you can. He’s only hit neutrally by Aqua Tail, resists Dragon Rush and is, crucially, immune to Extreme Speed until he Teras to Steel. Alternatively, try Dusk Mane Necrozma. If those don’t work, you can always try Haze, though Haze is very situational so I don’t have it on any raiders. Best of luck with this one.

Espeon

Game: Both
Base Type: Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tera Blast
Psychic (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Psyshock
Tickle

Additional Moves:

Psychic Terrain
Calm Mind

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Psychic Terrain
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
20% HP Remaining: Uses Psychic Terrain

Tips:

First, run a special attacker here so Tickle doesn’t apply to you. Second, check on that Tera Blast. Tera Blast means that I can’t say exactly what he’ll hit you with, so bear that in mind. Taking that into consideration, you should simply run a Dark type if Tera Blast permits, and there’s nothing he can really do about your immunity to Psychic. Darkrai or Hoopa Unbound are easy choices for this. Otherwise, try running a different Psychic type like Dawn Wings Necrozma for the Psychic resistance.

Farigiraf

Game: Both
Base Type: Normal/Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Twin Beam
Hyper Voice
Low Kick
Uproar

Additional Moves:

Agility

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Uses Agility
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Uproar

Tips:

Gholdengo. You’ll resist Twin Beam and be immune to everything else until you Tera. Gholdengo Ghost is the better option because of Steel’s weakness to Low Kick (which hits Gholdengo at 60 BP), but honestly, you’re probably not going to have a hard enough time with this raid to need a specific counterpick. Heck, I beat it with Raikou for fun! Do be considerate of the Low Kick though, as that can do a number on you if you pick a heavy raider.

Flareon

Game: Both
Base Type: Fire
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tera Blast
Flare Blitz (33% recoil damage, 10% chance to burn target)
Lava Plume (30% chance to burn target)
Will-O-Wisp (85% chance to burn target)

Additional Moves:

Sunny Day
Curse

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Curse
20% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day

Tips:

STAB Sunny Day Flare Blitz is no joke, man. The Tera Blast doesn’t make it any easier, as I can’t say exactly what you’ll have to plan around. Worst case scenario, expect to bring in some niche special attacking counters (Kyogre and Armarouge/Ceruledge being your favorites for this, as Kyogre brings the rain and Armarouge/Ceruledge brings Flash Fire) and prepare to do neutral damage. Flareon’s probably the hardest of the Eeveelution raids because of the sheer power alone, but you can neutralize it if you play it right.

Frosmoth

Game: Both
Base Type: Ice/Bug
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Blizzard (10% chance to freeze target)
Bug Buzz (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Hurricane (30% chance to confuse target)
Snowscape

Actions:

80% Time Remaining: Uses Snowscape
75% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Easy raid. He suffers from the Snowscape glitch, so you can raid pretty much unobstructed. Enjoy the free Herba Mystica.

Gallade

Game: Both
Base Type: Psychic/Fighting
Ability: Random

Moves:

Psycho Cut
Close Combat
Will-O-Wisp (85% chance to burn target)
Aerial Ace

Additional Moves:

Hypnosis (60% chance to cause sleep)
Disable
Psychic Terrain

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Uses Hypnosis
75% HP Remaining: Uses Disable
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
25% HP Remaining: Uses Psychic Terrain

Tips:

Bring a special attacking Psychic type. The Lati twins are an easy pick for this whether they Tera into Dragon or Psychic. Gallade will probably still hit you with a resisted Close Combat, which is what we want – if you can tank a Close Combat he’ll cut his own stats for you, basically granting you a free Calm Mind (with diminishing returns after the first one) in terms of damage output. I won’t lie, this is a weird raid – it’s one of the few raids in Paldea that don’t wipe your stats after 40% of the clock is burned, and the scheduled Disable and Hypnosis do provide some confounding variables, but it’s not bad enough that you need to bring anti-sleep measures. Just drop a Heal Cheer if Hypnosis hits and use the Disable turns to self-boost or hit with a secondary attack.

I really try to avoid recommending the easy-choice top tiers as a matter of best practices (Gholdengo notwithstanding). We all know that 80% of the time Bellibolt steamrolls whatever you put in front of him. If your interesting and fun mid-level raider doesn’t work, sure, pick the top tier. But Fairy Tera Garchomp? …yeah, you’ll need a neutral top tier for that one.

Garchomp

Game: Both
Base Type: Dragon/Ground
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Outrage
Earthquake
Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)
Rock Slide (30% chance to cause flinch)

Additional Moves:

Swords Dance

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance
30% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Ha ha ha… you’re in for a painful time. He hits like a truck and nothing resists all his attacks. If he has the Fairy Tera you are fighting one of the hardest 6-star raid and type combinations in the game. The closest thing you get to an easy button on this raid is Arceus Normal, who can drop in, hit a Cosmic Power right off the bat so he doesn’t die, and then Swords Dance + Body Slam. So long as he keeps at least one Cosmic Power under his belt and pays attention to the double stat wipe in this raid, he should be okay. Arceus Normal with +6 Attack is about a 10-hit KO on Garchomp, but you have to keep overcoming the stat wipes to make it happen. Still, it’s not a guaranteed win even with Arceus.

If you insist on not using Arceus, then you need a Tera raider that is not weak to Dragon, Fire, Ground or Rock and has access to at least Bulk Up, but preferably Iron Defense. Garchomp is a purely physical opponent but he is possibly the hardest-hitting opponent in Paldea… and he gets Swords Dance after his Tera Shield breaks, which happens right after he wipes your stats too. You may be best off anticipating that and dropping a Defense Cheer just so you don’t get OHKOed. Every little thing in this raid contributes to you losing; he has Rough Skin, which takes 8-10 seconds of animations for each turn. He can always hit you at least neutrally. He wipes your stats twice and basically can’t be statused. It’s a contender for the hardest Tera raid out there.

Gardevoir

Game: Both
Base Type: Psychic/Fairy
Ability: Random

Moves:

Moonblast (30% chance to lower target’s Sp. Atk by 1 stage)
Psychic (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Calm Mind
Thunder Wave (90% chance to paralyze target)

Additional Moves:

Misty Terrain
Psychic Terrain

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Uses Misty Terrain
75% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
45% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Psychic Terrain

Tips:

Gardevoir is one of the hardest Tera Raids ever, due in no small part to the fact that she can and will drop multiple Calm Minds and then just OHKO you with no recourse, and it’ll gain the Calm Mind boost from when it uses it against your teammates as well, so it can end up with +4 on each stat. Your only option, no matter which Pokemon you bring, is to either have your own Calm Minds stacked and ready, or Haze. I’ll be honest: there are some Tera Types for a Gardevoir raid that even I haven’t managed to beat (Normal type being the most difficult). Don’t focus on being super effective against Gardevoir, focus on survival and self-healing as best you can. Steel types are, of course, preferred here given their resistances to both Fairy and Psychic, but if you can’t swing that, then at least have Calm Mind or Haze. Top-tier low-effort strats are perfectly acceptable here.

Garganacl

Game: Both
Base Type: Rock
Ability: Random

Moves:

Stone Edge
Heavy Slam
Salt Cure
Hammer Arm (100% chance to lower user’s Speed by 1 stage)

Additional Moves:

Sandstorm
Rock Slide (30% chance to cause flinch)

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
60% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Rock Slide

Tips:

The downside here is that he’s really, really bulky and the Sandstorm doesn’t help. The upside is that you’re probably never going to get hit with Salt Cure because of the way the AI prioritizes raw damage. Oh, and also that Gholdengo resists everything he can throw at you. It’s funny – usually Gholdengo is useful because he can’t be statused. Now it’s just his typing we want!

Gengar

Game: Both
Base Type: Ghost/Poison
Ability: Standard

Moves:

Shadow Ball (20% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Sludge Bomb (30% chance to poison target)
Dazzling Gleam
Will-O-Wisp (85% chance to burn target)

Additional Moves:

Hypnosis (60% chance to cause sleep)

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Uses Hypnosis
75% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
45% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
25% HP Remaining: Uses Hypnosis

Tips:

Gengar has Cursed Body, which means any attack you hit him with has a 30% chance to be disabled. I’m also pretty sure the AI requires his first move to be a Will-O-Wisp, so physical attackers, while still workable, are inferior to special attackers as you’ll be burned. What you’ll need is basically a special attacker with more than one attacking move in his arsenal who’s sturdy enough to be alright with being burned. That condition applies to most of the top tiers, so just pick the one that’s not being hit super effectively and is at least neutral to the Tera! Don’t worry about finding one that beats Sleep, as Hypnosis is annoying but the Burn status actually keeps it from landing, so you’ll want to stay burned. Not too hard!

Glaceon

Game: Both
Base Type: Ice
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tera Blast
Ice Beam (10% chance to freeze target)
Blizzard (10% chance to freeze target)
Charm

Additional Moves:

Snowscape
Calm Mind

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Snowscape
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
20% HP Remaining: Uses Snowscape

Tips:

You’re in for a fight. Glaceon is a tank, and packs Snowscape and Blizzard. Guess what? When it’s snowing, Blizzard, base 130 power, always hits. Fortunately, special attackers with Calm Mind who happen to resist Ice (Steel, Water, Fire and, hilariously, Ice) will only have to worry about that Tera Blast. Between the unpredictability of Tera Blast, the guaranteed Calm Mind, the brutal Blizzards and the midraid stat wipe, it’ll be rough. I’d bring, if the Tera isn’t super effective against them, Kyogre, Armarouge or Regice, as each of them have “weather wars” potential. And don’t even think about a physical attacker, as Charm has the opposite effect of Swords Dance: -2 Attack stages.

Glimmora

Game: Both
Base Type: Rock/Poison
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Power Gem
Sludge Wave (10% chance to poison target)
Hyper Beam
Rock Polish

Additional Moves:

Sandstorm

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
85% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
55% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge

Tips:

Dialga. Dialga Steel solves this whole raid. If you’re running a Dialga with Steel Tera, 6IV, EVs invested split into Sp. Def and Def* then the most damaging thing he can do to you is Hyper Beam, and that’s approximately a 4-hit KO assuming 4 critical hits. You’ll be a-okay, this is an easy raid even without Dialga.

*Dialga’s running Bulk Up, so you should ideally invest into Sp. Def, but my Dialga build on my save file was running the split EVs when I tested this. Strat’s fine though.

Goodra

Game: Both
Base Type: Dragon
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Dragon Pulse
Surf
Sludge Bomb (30% chance to poison target)
Power Whip

Additional Moves:

Rain Dance

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance

Tips:

Lucky us, Ferrothorn and Kartana resist everything he can throw at you! …and neither of them are in Gen 9. Conveniently, he’s not all that hard of an opponent anyway. Expect to be hit by Surf most of the time as that’s what Rain Dance will bring to the table, but if you feel like it, Sunny Day invalidates that completely. Pecharunt has a pretty easy time of it, as the worst he can hit you with is a 4-hit KO, but you really should be able to deal with him any number of ways. About half the types aren’t weak to any of his attacking types, so just pick one and run it. Heck I did it with Volcarona Fire once (on a Psychic Tera, not even super effective) just for kicks, and it went pretty smoothly.

Grafaiai

Game: Both
Base Type: Poison/Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Knock Off
Gunk Shot (30% chance to poison target)
Take Down (25% recoil damage)
Flatter (confuses target, raises Sp. Atk by 1 stage)

Additional Moves:

Toxic (badly poisons target)

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Uses Toxic
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Gunk Shot

Tips:

If you get poisoned, Heal Cheer it. Otherwise this is a pretty easy raid, besides the occasional confusion.

Gyarados

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Aqua Tail
Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Hurricane (30% chance to confuse target)
Ice Fang (10% chance to freeze, 10% chance to cause flinch)

Additional Moves:

Taunt
Dragon Dance

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
40% HP Remaining: Uses Taunt
20% HP Remaining: Uses Dragon Dance

Tips:

This is one of the hardest Tera raids in Paldea, and may be the single hardest raid here besides the Salamence equivalent. Gyarados gets Moxie, which raises his Attack +1 stage for every KO he gets. That includes NPC partner KOs. That means that you will randomly go from Gyarados having no stats to +6 Attack in a freakin’ blink and you’re suddenly dying. I do not currently have a 100% consistent way to beat this. At present, your best option is to pick the tankiest, bulkiest top tier that is super effective and to do your best. I’d encourage Dialga Steel or Palkia Water here or something with Bulk Up/Curse/Cosmic Power/Iron Defense, as they’ll wall off most of his attacks besides Hurricane. There’s so many RNG conditions on each of his moves that I don’t think there’ll ever be a really easy solution here besides physical defense boosts and hoping for good RNG on Hurricane.

Hilariously, I once beat Gyarados with a Fairy Tera using the Muk build that runs Curse. It only worked because I had an Intimidate NPC who kept his Attack down, and because Curse is just Bulk Up but you lose a Speed stage. If you’re the type to reroll NPCs, Intimidate (Arcanine, Paldean Tauros and Staraptor) is your friend. But don’t rely on that, as that’s outside the scope of this guide.

Haxorus

Game: Both
Base Type: Dragon
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Outrage
Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Giga Impact
First Impression

Additional Moves:

Dragon Dance

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Dragon Dance

Tips:

Yes, he’s a glass cannon. Problem is the “glass” part is irrelevant now, because he’s got Tera Raid HP on his side. Conveniently, his best attack against a Fairy type is just Giga Impact… you see where I’m going with this. Zacian is going to be your best bet, and failing that, Zamazenta Body Press. Kinda funny to see the Sword and Shield working together. He’s an all-physical attacker so Body Press is a viable alternative, basically. If neither of those are sufficient, then it’ll be harder but you can resort to anti-physical options like Burned status, Bulk Up/Curse, etc.

Plan for this raid to be a bit rigged if he’s using Outrage. Across 17 uses of Outrage in 3 different games, it crit 5 times. I know that’s a small sample size, so I’m not going to say it’s 100% rigged, but… it seems highly improbable for a move that crits 1/16th of the time.

Heracross

Game: Both
Base Type: Bug/Fighting
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Megahorn
Close Combat
Thrash
Leer

Additional Moves:

Bulk Up

Actions:

75% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Definitely one of the craziest Close Combat raids out there, because his Leer will basically end you if he uses it twice and hits you with Close Combat. Close Combat raids are always fun – they’ll use it on everyone and go from -2 Def and Sp. Def to -6 in a single turn, which is nice. But Heracross’ Leer means that you’re susceptible to getting OHKOed. Bring a Bulk Up or Iron Defense user like Zamazenta, or aim to kill him really, really fast otherwise. I pulled it off with Raikou, but I wouldn’t recommend it to others. These raids end up being either an 8-10 turn raid or a complete wipe, there’s little in-between.

Hippowdon

Game: Both
Base Type: Ground
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Earthquake
Ice Fang (10% chance to freeze, 10% chance to cause flinch)
Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)
Rock Slide (30% chance to cause flinch)

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Uses Yawn
60% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Yawn

Tips:

SLEEP. And Gholdengo’s not an option to deal with it either, not to mention there’s no single type that can resist everything he’s got. I’d recommend Zacian packing Misty Terrain for the sleep, Vital Spirit Annihilape or failing that, Arceus with Misty Terrain instead. Hippowdon’s not hard, but his weird combination of Sleep and Ground-type moves does make life harder on us.

Hydreigon

Game: Scarlet
Base Type: Dark/Dragon
Ability: Standard

Moves:

Dark Pulse (20% chance to cause flinch)
Dragon Pulse
Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Taunt

Additional Moves:

Work Up
Nasty Plot

Actions:

85% HP Remaining: Uses Taunt
75% Time Remaining: Uses Work Up
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
25% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
20% Time Remaining: Uses Nasty Plot

Tips:

Don’t complicate it, run a Fairy type. His only real avenue is procing a Defense drop from Crunch and being irritating with Taunt, otherwise you’re fine. The Enamoruses (Enamori?) are fine for this, as is Zacian. If Fairy types aren’t an option because the Tera is Fire or something, pick a Fighting or Dark type as they’ll be hit neutrally to Dragon Pulse but won’t have to worry about stupid secondary effects at least. Also, when he uses Work Up (which I think occurs twice, once early on and once when the Tera Shield goes down, but I’d need to run it again as these are old notes) drop a Defense cheer. I know, cheers are lame, but it’s okay to use one here.

Jolteon

Game: Both
Base Type: Electric
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tera Blast
Thunderbolt (10% chance to paralyze target)
Shadow Ball (20% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Thunder Wave (90% chance to paralyze target)

Additional Moves:

Electric Terrain
Calm Mind

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Electric Terrain
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
20% HP Remaining: Uses Electric Terrain

Tips:

Easy raid. Wo-Chien resists Thunderbolt and Shadow Ball, but has several weaknesses of his own that could come out through Tera Blast. Alternatively, Ursaluna’s immune to both those attacks and need only worry about Tera Blast. Just pick something strong enough that isn’t weak to Electric, Shadow Ball and his Tera and you’re fine. Jolteon’s pretty physically weak so while it won’t be comfortable having to deal with a boosted Tera Blast, you can make up for it by killing him faster.

By the way, not only will he Thunder Wave you at his first available opportunity but this raid, more than any other I’ve done, seems to have rigged RNG. Since I started taking notes for this post and for testing tier list builds, I’ve fought this raid thirteen times. Ten of the thirteen times I was paralyzed for three to five turns straight. The odds of this are astronomically low.

Kilowattrel

Game: Both
Base Type: Electric/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Hurricane (30% chance to confuse target)
Thunder (30% chance to paralyze target)
Uproar
Scary Face

Additional Moves:

Charge
Rain Dance

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Charge
85% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance

Tips:

Kilowattrel runs Competitive, so any stat-debuff at all, like Acid Spray, is a VERY BAD IDEA. You’ll give him a free Nasty Plot, basically. Otherwise, this is an RNG raid stacked on top of a casino. Hurricane and Thunder both have a 70% chance to hit without rain (making this a good raid to use a weather wars-capable Pokemon in, though he doesn’t put up rain until the very end and neither should you) and also have a 30% chance to confuse and paralyze you, respectively. So each turn he attacks you you have a 21% chance of walking away with something really dumb. Conveniently, he’ll also sometimes flatly miss the move, giving you a freebie, but you’re still best off running something that’s Ground or Electric type if you can. Running a Ground type guarantees he’ll only use Hurricane, and Electric type resists both of his attacks, forcing him to run Uproar.

Having said all that, Calm Mind is mandatory here because he only uses Special attacks, so that’s nice. Bellibolt with Charge is probably the easy solution to this one (though when is Bellibolt not the easy solution?)

Kingambit

Game: Both
Base Type: Dark/Steel
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)
Night Slash
Kowtow Cleave
Thunder Wave (90% chance to paralyze target)

Additional Moves:

Swords Dance

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
65% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance

Tips:

The good news is Iron Hands, Urshifu Water and Kingambit resist both Dark and Steel, so between all three of them you likely have enough attacking types to cover most possible Teras, and Bulk Up/Reflect negates a lot of the damage of his attacks. The bad news is you’ll be doing it paralyzed, and he may switch to using Iron Head when you Terastallize, which is one of the meanest moves in the game. Some Teras are also uniquely hard for this raid: Fighting, for example, is only weak to Psychic, Fairy and Flying, and only Flying isn’t weak to Kingambit’s moveset. So I’d recommend, if the Tera permits, to run one of those three Pokemon listed earlier and if not then to pick a Pokemon that resists Steel and if possible, Dark, that is otherwise neutral to his Tera type. Volcarona Fire is an especially good pick against some Teras because he has both Harden and Quiver Dance, enabling him to tank anything and cut Kingambit’s damage in half with Flame Body. So you’re not locked down by any means.

Klawf

Game: Both
Base Type: Rock
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Stone Edge
Rock Smash (50% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
X-Scissor
Sandstorm

Additional Moves:

Knock Off
Iron Defense

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
80% HP Remaining: Uses Knock Off
49% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Iron Defense

Tips:

Nothing particularly hard about this raid, on the condition that you’re not weak to Rock Smash. If you give him cause to use Rock Smash, things’ll get ugly as soon as even one Defense drop comes in. Otherwise, play it like you would any basic raid.

Leafeon

Game: Both
Base Type: Grass
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tera Blast
Leaf Blade
Double Kick
Charm

Additional Moves:

Sunny Day
Swords Dance

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance
20% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance

Tips:

This is a complicated raid on paper, but Leafeon’s not sturdy enough to give you a hard time… until the end. Odds are you’re going to be hit with back to back Swords Dances before you can get the kill. This is when physical bulk matters, because you’re going to probably be on the receiving end of +4 Attack Tera Blasts of whatever Tera he gets (which prevents me from giving more specific advice, unfortunately). Weirdly, I had great success with Volcarona Bug, though that type works better on the defensive side than the offensive side of this raid. Gholdengo Ghost works well too as he’ll remain immune to that Double Kick. If you’re truly struggling with this raid, start by running Iron Defense, and go for resisting his Fighting and Grass type attacks (Poison, Bug and Flying resist both) and being neutral to his Tera Blast so you at least can set up. I can’t give specifics because I don’t know what Tera he’ll end up running, but when in doubt try something overpowered like Koraidon.

Lycanroc

Game: Both
Base Type: Rock
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Accelerock
Rock Slide (30% chance to cause flinch)
Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Taunt

Additional Moves:

Sandstorm

Actions:

80% Time Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
75% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
20% HP Remaining: Uses Rock Slide

Tips:

Lycanroc is a jerk with the Taunt, and you should expect it Turn 1. Most raids results in an immediate Taunt, where you then have to hit with secondary moves to charge Tera instead of self-boosting like you’d’ve preferred. You’ll want to outspeed him if you can, and run your own Taunt – Taunt counters Taunt, after all. But do note his 112 base speed. Also, take special note of the very early stat wipe – you might be better off just charging Tera until the stat wipe, then building stats. Basically, expect that he’ll Taunt you as soon as he can nearly all the time, so you have to either outspeed him or have a game plan to operate without stat-boosting moves.

Don’t sweat it too much – you have those Metronome builds with self-healing moves like Drain Punch, Parabolic Charge, Giga Drain that can work for just about every Tera. It’s a winnable raid even without stat boosts, he’s just a prick.

Mabosstiff

Game: Both
Base Type: Dark
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Reversal
Outrage
Take Down (25% recoil damage)

Additional Moves:

Taunt

Actions:

80% Time Remaining: Uses Taunt
75% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Not a hard raid, especially if you’re Fairy type. The Taunt early on is after you have had time to drop a stat buff, so really, this one’s a gimme.

Magnezone

Game: Both
Base Type: Electric/Steel
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Thunder (30% chance to paralyze target)
Flash Cannon (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Tri Attack (20% chance to burn, freeze, or paralyze target)
Thunder Wave (90% chance to paralyze target)

Additional Moves:

Rain Dance
Iron Defense
Electric Terrain

Actions:

80% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
75% Time Remaining: Uses Iron Defense
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Thunder Wave
20% Time Remaining: Uses Electric Terrain

Tips:

Gholdengo. Doesn’t matter which one. Magnezone suffers from a variant of the Snowscape glitch that seems to revolve around needing to spam Thunder Wave until you’re afflicted by Paralysis or something else. He seems to have it worse than most other raid bosses too, as I’ve gone entire Magnezone raids without him throwing out a single real attack. The AI just checks if you have a status and if not, drops Thunder Wave. Gholdengo’s immune to that, so you can just set up an OHKO and cash in free Shards.

Maushold

Game: Both
Base Type: Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Play Rough (10% chance to lower target’s Attack by 1 stage)
Take Down (25% recoil damage)
Low Kick
Charm

Additional Moves:

Tidy Up

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% Time Remaining: Uses Charm
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Tidy Up

Tips:

Physical attackers need not apply, but otherwise he’s not hard. The worst thing Mickey and Minnie can throw at you (assuming you’re not heavy and weak to Low Kick) is Take Down, which will do a nice amount of damage but shouldn’t be worse than a 4-hit KO on whatever you’re running, usually.

Mimikyu

Game: Both
Base Type: Ghost/Fairy
Ability: Standard

Moves:

Play Rough (10% chance to lower target’s Attack by 1 stage)
Shadow Claw
Shadow Sneak
Wood Hammer (33% recoil damage)

Additional Moves:

Misty Terrain
Swords Dance

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Uses Misty Terrain
75% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance

Tips:

No matter what, take your first turn and self-boost, because the NPC partners will have to break Mimikyu’s Disguise ability first. Aside from that, there’s some moderately difficult conditions to plan around. Mimikyu gets STAB on Shadow Claw, which also has a high crit rate, and on Play Rough. That Misty Terrain means Dragon types are persona non grata for this raid, and ditto for status-reliant builds like Giratina. Bulk Up and/or Reflect builds will do well here for the fact that all his moves are physical, but take the time to figure out whether your build is weak to any of the three types of attacking moves first. And be sure to KO him before he gets too far into that Swords Dance usage!

Orthworm

Game: Both
Base Type: Steel
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)
Earthquake
Smack Down (100% chance to remove Flying-type/Levitate immunity)
Sandstorm

Additional Moves:

Coil

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Uses Coil
80% HP Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Sandstorm

Tips:

No matter what, don’t bring a Flying type, as Smack Down just removes that immunity. Coil also functions as, basically, Bulk Up, so bear that in mind. Oh, and he has Earth Eater, so Ground type attacks don’t work. All that aside, he’s not particularly hard, just VERY physically defensive. Bring a special attacker who’s not weak to Steel, Ground or Rock and with reasonable physical bulk and you’ll have nothing to worry about.

Pawmot

Game: Both
Base Type: Electric/Fighting
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Wild Charge (25% recoil damage)
Close Combat
Double Shock
Nuzzle (100% chance to paralyze target)

Additional Moves:

Electric Terrain

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
80% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Electric Terrain

Tips:

Hope you like being paralyzed. There’s really no way around it, he’ll spam Nuzzle a ton. Fortunately, there’s plenty of Dragon-Psychics available, with the Lati twins coming in at top of mind, and they resist both of his types. If you’ve got one running Psychic and the other Dragon, you’ll be fine no matter what Tera he runs (except for Steel, in which case you should just grab Iron Hands and show him who the best Electric/Fighting type is). Don’t get focused on removing the paralysis, as he practically hands this raid to you on a platter if he uses Close Combat and the paralysis is really just a minor annoyance. The stat drops from CC are free HP self-healing for you.

Pelipper

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Flying
Ability: Hidden Ability

Moves:

Hurricane (30% chance to confuse target)
Hydro Pump
Mist
Supersonic (55% chance to confuse target)

Additional Moves:

Rain Dance
Agility

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
75% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Agility
20% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance

Tips:

This is an RNG raid, that’s for sure. As always, Gholdengo’s an easy choice due to being immune to confusion, and Dialga resists everything he can throw at you, as do Miraidon and Raging Bolt. Remember that confusion is guaranteed to last at least two turns and can last up to five, but it’s only a 33% chance of actually wasting your turn. No shame in a Heal cheer if it happens at an inopportune time. Raging Bolt might be the best choice for this raid overall, as Sunny Day wipes his Rain Dance and Hurricane is a guaranteed hit in rain. Dependent on Tera, of course.y

Pincurchin

Game: Both
Base Type: Electric
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Zing Zap (30% chance to cause flinch)
Thunder (30% chance to paralyze target)
Surf
Poison Jab (30% chance to poison target)

Additional Moves:

Thunder Wave (90% chance to paralyze target)
Electric Terrain

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Uses Thunder Wave
65% Time Remaining: Uses Electric Terrain
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Electric Terrain

Tips:

The nice thing is, there’s no way you’ll ever be put to sleep in this raid, because you’re going to be standing on Electric Terrain practically the whole time. The downside is, this raid is half RNG. Unless you bring a Ground-type (in which case you’re hit with Surf) everything else you bring has a fairly large percent chance to status or flinch you, and I kinda think this raid is one of the ones with rigged RNG, if rigged RNG actually does exist in Tera Raids at all. You’re best off bringing an Electric type for most Teras, and if the Tera resists Electric then Dialga is easily the best choice. Dialga resists everything he can throw at you.

Revavroom

Game: Both
Base Type: Steel/Poison
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Gunk Shot (30% chance to poison target)
Overheat (100% chance to lower user’s Sp. Atk by 2 stages)
Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)
Taunt

Additional Moves:

Scary Face
Shift Gear

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Uses Scary Face
75% HP Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% HP Remaining: Uses Shift Gear
20% HP Remaining: Uses Shift Gear

Tips:

Surprisingly, not that easy of a raid with some Teras. He gets STAB on Gunk Shot and Iron Head, which are RNG moves that eventually become a “win button” for him either by causing flinch or by poisoning, and will Taunt you at every first available opportunity, so if you don’t outspeed him you’ll be Taunted the entire game. You’ll need something that outspeeds a 90 base stat if you want untaunted turns. If you run a Steel-type to resist his moves, he’ll Overheat on you. Conveniently, Skeledirge Fire resists all three of his types of attacks until he Terastallizes (at which point he loses the Poison resistance, but you can fix getting poisoned with a Heal Cheer) and Torch Song also acts as a Sp. Atk stat boost that works around Taunt. Ceruledge Fire and Swampert Water or Ground is acceptably good here as well though Taunt is still a problem for them. If you’re not a fan of those options, your best shot here is to probably pick the bulkiest, meanest super effective top tier raider you can find and go to town with that… as long as you’re not Fairy type!

By the way, Shift Gear makes this raid harder towards the end as well. Skeledirge can’t handle physical attacks all that well, so use a Defense Cheer when you get to the Shift Gear part. Trust me on this one, it’s easier to do that than to die.

Salamence

Game: Violet
Base Type: Dragon/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Outrage
Dual Wingbeat
Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)
Tera Blast

Additional Moves:

Dragon Dance

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Dragon Dance
30% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

This will hurt. He’ll have Moxie, which means he’ll randomly have +6 Attack and you won’t know what hit you. Not to mention that Tera Blast means I can’t give you universally correct advice, as his moveset changes each time you see him. What I’ll say is that you need something absurdly high in Defense to get through this, but Body Press isn’t a great option thanks to Dual Wingbeat. However… Regirock is a great Body Press user and resists until he Teras (some Regirocks Tera into Rock, which is nice)! Start with him. Failing Regirock, Groudon could do it, if Tera Blast isn’t an unfortunate typing for you. Worst case scenario, get Arceus on the line.

Scizor

Game: Both
Base Type: Bug/Steel
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

X-Scissor
Bullet Punch
Close Combat
Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)

Additional Moves:

Iron Defense
Focus Energy

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Uses Iron Defense
75% HP Remaining: Uses Focus Energy
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

The good news is this is a Close Combat raid, so if he uses it he’s extremely weak on the special side (not so much on the physical thanks to Iron Defense). The bad news is Bug, Steel, Fighting covers a lotta stuff. Ho-oh and Volcarona are your easy choices here depending on Tera; they both have Fire, and Volcarona has a Bug option too. Skeledirge is also an option, and if you’re desperate to do the same thing over again, Gholdengo Ghost. But Volcarona Bug’s my preferred pick, Tera permitting, because Lunge does so much lifting against this physical attacker that you can’t overlook it.

One thing I don’t feel gets paid enough attention to in these raids is the aesthetic. You’re in a crystal cavern with colored lights flashing all around, and the color changes with the Tera of the opponent you’re fighting. You see giant reflections of their face on the well. It’s kind of an intense experience, or at least it would be if the devs had cleaned it up so the text boxes and such were faster.

Slowking

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Surf
Psyshock
Trick Room
Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)

Additional Moves:

Light Screen
Rain Dance
Calm Mind

Actions:

70% Time Remaining: Uses Light Screen
90% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
20% HP Remaining: Uses Trick Room

Tips:

Tera permitting, Swampert Water is a pretty easy pick for this raid, as he’ll get hit with Surf (not Psyshock unless it’s a Psychic Tera) the whole match, which he resists after Terastallizing, and the free Rain Dance sure makes life easy for you. If the Tera resists water, the Lati twins both resist everything Slowking can throw at you, so pick whichever one works best for you and roll with it. The Trick Room usage messes up your move order sometimes, but it’s not a big deal.

Staraptor

Game: Both
Base Type: Normal/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Close Combat
Brave Bird (33% recoil damage)
Double-Edge (33% recoil damage)
Feather Dance

Actions:

85% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
25% HP Remaining: Uses Brave Bird

Tips:

Staraptor’s not easy, but Gholdengo resists everything he has. If you run Gholdengo Steel you’ll be weak to Close Combat when you Terastallize, so that’s not a decision to make lightly, especially when all of yours and his stats will be reset at the same time. Frankly, it’s kind of a pick-your-poison because Fighting and Flying is a great BoltBeam combo. Physical attackers need not apply thanks to Feather Dance, but if you happen to run Reflect, Breaking Swipe, Chilling Water or something else that’ll wall off his physical attacks it’ll be a breeze. Prioritize picking someone who’s neutral to all that and happens to have at least one of those moves over something that’s resisting his attacks but doesn’t have any of the Attack-lowering moves I suggested.

Sylveon

Game: Both
Base Type: Fairy
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tera Blast
Hyper Voice
Moonblast (30% chance to lower target’s Sp. Atk by 1 stage)
Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)

Additional Moves:

Misty Terrain
Calm Mind

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Misty Terrain
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
20% HP Remaining: Uses Misty Terrain

Tips:

SLEEEEEEEP. And in response, Gholdengo. I’m not 100% sure but it seems Sylveon’s AI has a condition requiring it to repeatedly try to put you to sleep with Yawn for the first few turns, and Gholdengo just shrugs it off. So you can set up freely and, Tera permitting, hit ’em super effectively while he’s spamming moves that won’t work. Do be careful: Sylveon may have Pixilate, which makes Hyper Voice a Fairy move, and Tera Blast means you need to check that you’re not weak to his Tera. Worst case scenario, you run Zacian and keep a Misty Terrain up if Sylveon has a Ground Tera.

Talonflame

Game: Both
Base Type: Fire/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Brave Bird (33% recoil damage)
Flare Blitz (33% recoil damage, 10% chance to burn target)
Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)
Tera Blast

Additional Moves:

Sunny Day
Swords Dance

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance

Tips:

That Tera Blast instantly makes any advice I give you dependent on what his Tera Type is. However, there’s a few Pokemon who could easily could easily take down any Tera Type Talonflame regardless of its Tera. No matter which one you run, know that Will-O-Wisp and Reflect go a long ways towards neutralizing this guy.

Ho-oh or Armarouge is the best option, as he removes Fire options from Talonflame’s repertoire while benefiting from the free Sunny Day, and the Fire options are the strongest. If Talonflame has a Tera super effective against Ho-oh (Water, Electric, Rock, Ground – remember, he loses Flying’s immunity to Ground) then it depends. If it’s Electric or Rock, bring Groudon. If it’s Water, just bring Miraidon. If it’s Ground, Palkia is pretty solid. (Don’t feel like you have to stick with these choices if you have a better one). Talonflame does hit like a truck, especially after that Swords Dance, but the devs mercifully put it towards the end of the raid so you can probably tank at least one SD-boosted attack before landing the killing blow.

Tauros

Game: Both
Base Type: Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Close Combat
Thrash
Zen Headbutt (20% chance to cause flinch)
Raging Bull

Additional Moves:

Bulk Up
Screech

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
90% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
25% HP Remaining: Uses Screech

Tips:

He’ll be easy. Just don’t be weak to Fighting or Psychic and let him Thrash you a bit (and honestly, if he uses Close Combat and it’s not super effective it actually benefits you – the defensive drops are free HP for you). You won’t take much damage, not really, and he’ll confuse himself so you get a free turn here and there. Flying types are an easy pick for this. Bonus points from me if you KO him before he wipes your stats!

Tauros (Scarlet)

Game: Scarlet
Base Type: Fighting/Fire
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Flare Blitz (33% recoil damage, 10% chance to burn target)
Close Combat
Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)
Headbutt (30% chance to cause flinch)

Additional Moves:

Sunny Day
Bulk Up

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up
20% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day

Tips:

This one’s a bit harder than the non-version specific one above. In this one, he’ll use Sunny Day and Flare Blitz to give you a hard time, so unless you’re resisting Fire you can expect either Flare Blitz or Flamethrower to kick in, both of which have a burn chance, cutting your physical attack down. He’s still not too hard, you just can’t expect to have the nice stat drops from Close Combats all the time. The Lati twins and Rayquaza are an acceptable pick here if you’re struggling, but most of the time you’ll be alright if you can just play some weather wars and tank at least two Close Combats once the sun goes away.

Tauros (Violet)

Game: Violet
Base Type: Fighting/Water
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Wave Crash (33% recoil damage)
Close Combat
Surf
Headbutt (30% chance to cause flinch)

Additional Moves:

Rain Dance
Bulk Up

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up
20% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance

Tips:

The Water-type variant of Tauros Scarlet, so read the above guide. Conveniently, there’s no equivalent to the burn chance in this raid, just a flinch… I’m not sure which one is worse. Lati twins are still recommended but you can get by with just about anything that resists Water and can tank two Close Combats (Rayquaza is another good choice given that criteria). The ability to play weather wars here is a good ability to have, so consider it as well.

Tinkaton

Game: Both
Base Type: Fairy/Steel
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Gigaton Hammer
Play Rough (10% chance to lower target’s Attack by 1 stage)
Knock Off
Thunder Wave (90% chance to paralyze target)

Additional Moves:

Misty Terrain
Sweet Kiss (75% chance to confuse target)

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Uses Misty Terrain
75% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Sweet Kiss
15% HP Remaining: Uses Sweet Kiss

Tips:

Step 1. Don’t be weak to Steel. Step 2. Don’t be weak to Fairy. Step 3. Run a physical attacker that uses Bulk Up, because physical defense is tantamount in this raid. If you can manage that, you’ll be fine. Honestly, I’d encourage a Water or Fire type, as avoiding that Gigaton Hammer damage is the easiest path to winning, and if you can inflict a Burn status you’ve got a lot of this raid in the bag. Not that hard of a raid, so long as Gigaton doesn’t crit.

Toedscruel

Game: Both
Base Type: Ground/Grass
Ability: Standard

Moves:

Energy Ball (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Earth Power (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Spore (100% chance to cause sleep)
Hex

Additional Moves:

Grassy Terrain

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Grassy Terrain
75% Time Remaining: Uses Spore
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
25% HP Remaining: Uses Spore

Tips:

SLEEEEEPPPPPP. Typical sleep raid that would otherwise be a walk in the park. You might get screwed by RNG on the Sp. Def lowers, so bring a Calm Mind user that can defeat sleep. It’s not even enough of a heavy hitter to absolutely mandate Calm Mind, if you have a top tier and somewhat tanky physical attacker that can defeat sleep (*cough* Iron Hands *cough*). That’s not a joke – I beat Poison-type Toedscruel with Iron Hands Fighting. If you can beat the sleep, this is an easy raid.

Torkoal

Game: Both
Base Type: Fire
Ability: Hidden Ability

Moves:

Lava Plume (30% chance to burn target)
Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)
Clear Smog (resets target’s stat changes)
Body Slam (30% chance to paralyze target)

Additional Moves:

Sunny Day
Iron Defense

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
75% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Yawn
20% HP Remaining: Uses Iron Defense

Tips:

Imagine the midraid stat wipe. Now imagine it happening ten times per raid. Now imagine you’re being put to sleep during that raid. Now imagine you’re being burned or paralyzed. This raid is a contender for the most unfair Tera Raid in Paldea because of the sheer amount of stupid RNG crap you have to deal with. It’s especially bad when it’s Steel Tera, because your two Fighting-type sleep counters (Annihilape and Iron Hands) won’t work and are nerfed by Burn, you can’t use any Misty Terrain users because they’re Fairy, and he’s super effective against Gholdengo.

Fortunately, I managed to solve this jerk, even with a Steel Tera. Parabolic Charge Miraidon is pretty well set up to deal with this nonsense. He outspeeds Torkoal, resists Lava Plume but Torkoal will still use it, and you’ll eventually proc a burn from it so you can’t be put to sleep. Electric Terrain’s boost survives Clear Smog, and Metronome isn’t affected by the Clear Smog or the midraid stat wipe. So you can drop an Electric Terrain and Metal Sound on the first two turns and start hitting Parabolics until the cows come home. If you need to do a bit more damage, use Attack Cheers!

Toxapex

Game: Both
Base Type: Poison/Water
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Water Pulse (20% chance to confuse target)
Liquidation (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Poison Jab (30% chance to poison target)
Pin Missile

Additional Moves:

Chilling Water (100% chance to lower target’s Attack by 1 stage)
Toxic (badly poisons target)

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Uses Chilling Water
75% Time Remaining: Uses Toxic
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Chilling Water

Tips:

This one’s somewhat RNG heavy, depending on your Tera. The guaranteed Toxic means that unless you’re immune to Toxic (Steel and Poison types) he is going to either land a guaranteed KO on you or force you to use a Heal Cheer – spending a turn on a cheer isn’t bad, but let’s avoid it if we can. We also absolutely need to avoid being poisoned. Chilling Water and Liquidation means that you should probably run Bulk Up to avoid the debuffs, because he’s most likely going to hit you with Liquidation (results will vary depending on your typing) and that’s going to kill your Defense. So something like Okidogi, Sunsteel Strike Necrozma, Dialga are your best. You can do it with others – I did it with Pecharunt, though it was an uphill battle.

Tyranitar

Game: Scarlet
Base Type: Rock/Dark
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Stone Edge
Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Screech
Rock Blast

Additional Moves:

Iron Defense

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Crunch
20% HP Remaining: Uses Iron Defense

Tips:

He’s completely invalidated by physical Defense boosts or by Breaking Swipe/Chilling Water. Find someone with Bulk Up and either of those two moves and you’re good to go, making the basic assumptions that you’re not being hit super effectively of course.

Umbreon

Game: Both
Base Type: Dark
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tera Blast
Dark Pulse (20% chance to cause flinch)
Foul Play
Tickle

Additional Moves:

Calm Mind
Curse

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Curse
20% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind

Tips:

Dark is easy to resist, but you’ll have to work around that Tera Blast too. Fighting, Dark and Fairy all resist him normally and there’s no Tera that can handle each of those three, besides maybe Fairy. But you’ll have plenty of options anyway. Make sure to get a Taunt off pretty quick so he can’t land that Calm Mind right off the bat; otherwise, he’s tanky but not difficult. Oh, but do expect to avoid a physical attacker here – Tickle will cut your physical attack down quickly.

Vaporeon

Game: Both
Base Type: Water
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tera Blast
Surf
Hyper Voice
Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)

Additional Moves:

Rain Dance
Calm Mind

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
70% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
20% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance

Tips:

SLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP. Like all the other Eeveelutions, he has Tera Blast. Unfortunately, he also has Yawn. Conveniently though, Iron Leaves has Electric Terrain and resists his Water attacks, so Tera permitting, I say run Iron Leaves. Expect Yawn spam if you don’t have anti-sleep measures, he’ll put you under as soon as he can. If you’re feeling fancy you could run Origin Forme Palkia with Sleep Talk, but… start with Iron Leaves or something more kosher, okay?

Volcarona

Game: Both
Base Type: Bug/Fire
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Bug Buzz (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)
Hurricane (30% chance to confuse target)
Tailwind

Additional Moves:

Amnesia
Sunny Day
Light Screen
Quiver Dance

Actions:

85% HP Remaining: Uses Amnesia
75% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Light Screen
20% Time Remaining: Uses Quiver Dance

Tips:

The good news is Diancie resists everything he can throw at you and Calm Mind neuters all his options because they’re all special attacks. The bad news is he’s much tankier on the Sp. Def side especially with that Amnesia, and Bug-Fire-Flying is a heck of a BoltBeam move list. Oh, and you can’t really counter that with Rain because Hurricane’ll just get even more accurate. Aaaaaaaand expect him to proc a secondary status from things about twice as often as you’d have liked. Expect to be getting hit with Flamethrower the most, as Sunny Day will boost that.

Truthfully, I don’t think I have a 100% solid counter to Volcarona, while he’s not super hard he just has so much type coverage that it’s terribly inconvenient to fight. Diancie should be your first attempt unless his Tera resists Rock, in which case I’d suggest grabbing a top tier of one of these types (Normal, Flying, Poison, Ground, Rock, Ghost, Fire, Water, Electric, Dragon, Fairy) as those are the types that are not weak to any of his attacking options, and running with that. Zacian, Miraidon, Dialga and so on could all work here to some degree.

The Kitakami Raiders

Ambipom

Game: Violet
Base Type: Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Double Hit
Ice Punch (10% chance to freeze target)
Fire Punch (10% chance to burn target)
Thunder Punch (10% chance to paralyze target)

Additional Moves:

Screech

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
89% HP Remaining: Uses Screech
40% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
50% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
20% HP Remaining: Uses Double Hit

Tips:

This one’s not as much of a gimme as you’d think, thanks to Screech and his preference for physical moves. However, most of what can run Bulk Up should be permissible here, and Ghost types are immune to Double Hit, so you’re not going to have a hard time grabbing a raider that can beat this. I will say that after that stat drop + Screech hits on basically Turn 2 or 3, you’re going to need to drop a Defense cheer immediately after so he doesn’t catch you off-guard. From there you can self-boost your physical stats and regain your footing.

Basculegion (Scarlet)

Game: Scarlet
Base Type: Water/Ghost
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Wave Crash (33% recoil damage)
Aqua Jet
Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Scary Face

Additional Moves:

Icy Wind (100% chance to lower target’s Speed by 1 stage)
Rain Dance

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Uses Icy Wind
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
25% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

That second stat wipe sucks, dude. He’s an all-physical attacker, so just grab something with Bulk Up and you’ll be fine. If you’re wanting to play it safe, don’t resist Wave Crash so he doesn’t have an excuse to use Crunch and proc that -1 Defense stage. Not too hard if you have enough HP going into the second stat wipe to survive 2-3 turns. If you’re bringing something that can play “weather wars” with sun, that’ll be useful, but either deincentivising him from using Crunch or beating the stat proc with a physical Defense boost is your higher priority. Any Dragon type or other Water resister will be okay (besides the Lati twins), so consider Dialga, Palkia or Rayquaza if necessary.

Basculegion (Violet)

Game: Violet
Base Type: Water/Ghost
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Surf
Aqua Jet
Shadow Ball (20% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Scary Face

Additional Moves:

Icy Wind (100% chance to lower target’s Speed by 1 stage)
Rain Dance

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Uses Icy Wind
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
60% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
25% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

A mirror image of the Basculegion raid from Scarlet, but now it’s Sp. Def we’re worred about. Kyogre is, as always, an easy choice against Water and has Calm Mind for that Shadow Ball problem, but for Grass or Dragon Teras you have fewer options. Grass Teras can be beaten with something like Lugia Flying or Pecharunt (style points if you do it with Muk or Seviper), and Dragon Teras have Enamorus and Magearna to contend with. So there’s options available to you either way.

Chandelure

Game: Both
Base Type: Ghost/Fire
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)
Shadow Ball (20% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Will-O-Wisp (85% chance to burn target)
Poltergeist

Additional Moves:

Heat Wave (10% chance to burn target)
Sunny Day

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Uses Heat Wave
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
35% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

This one isn’t always easy, especially because of the RNG on most of his moves. You won’t be able to use Gholdengo, but he’s so reliant on special moves and on Fire that just bringing Incineroar Fire should make this an easy victory. If he’s running a Tera that resists Fire you still have options open to you, like Raging Bolt, Groudon, or if it’s Dragon Tera, Enamorus. But Incineroar Fire’s the easy win here. Your playstyle regardless of your Pokemon will basically be landing a few shots until he wipes your stats, then building stats for free and having the rest of the match to do so. Easy money if you do it well.

Clefable

Game: Both
Base Type: Fairy
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Moonblast (30% chance to lower target’s Sp. Atk by 1 stage)
Psychic (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Meteor Mash (20% chance to raise user’s Attack by 1 stage)
Encore

Additional Moves:

Dazzling Gleam
Calm Mind

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Uses Encore
40% HP Remaining: Uses Dazzling Gleam
41% HP Remaining: Uses Dazzling Gleam
60% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind

Tips:

This raid is a gigantic “F you” from Game Freak to you directly.

I don’t have a “universal pick” for this raid. Gholdengo’s immune to Encore, which triggers a mild version of the Snowscape glitch, but Gholdengo doesn’t do enough damage, even at +6 Sp. Atk and with Clefable at -4 Sp. Def, to beat the timer, and neither does Skeledirge Fire with his Torch Song (unless he’s super effective). What I can tell you is that you’ll be using the same move for the entire raid, so it had better be a lifesteal one. I generally try to avoid recommending top tiers on this page, but the “Metronome builds” like Bellibolt with Parabolic Charge, Arceus Grass with Giga Drain, Ceruledge Fire with Bitter Blade or Magearna with Draining Kiss any are all useable strategies and should cover most of the possible Tera types in super effectiveness. I’d recommend stuff like Vileplume or Drain Punch strats but those are weak to Psychic or Fairy.

Conkeldurr

Game: Both
Base Type: Fighting
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Rock Slide (30% chance to cause flinch)
Close Combat
Mach Punch
Slam

Additional Moves:

Bulk Up

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
89% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
49% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up
30% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Ah, a Close Combat raid. Fun, but only if you resist Fighting and/or have Def-raising moves. Conkeldurr’s pretty tough, but Iron Leaves walls this raid quite effectively. He doesn’t wipe your stats until the end, so put up an Iron Defense your first two turns, then two Swords Dances and then blast away with Leaf Blade. He’ll go to -6 Def. pretty quickly aside from the stat resets, but that won’t stop you from killing him fast. Enjoy using Iron Leaves, he’s weird but fun.

If Conkeldurr is of a Tera that’s going to resist Grass, you still have some nice options like Deoxys-Defense, Glastrier and ol’ reliable – Body Press Zamazenta.

Crawdaunt

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Dark
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Aqua Jet
Crabhammer
Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Giga Impact

Additional Moves:

Leer
Swords Dance

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
65% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
60% HP Remaining: Uses Leer
50% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
30% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance

Tips:

Crabhammer has an increased critical hit rate. That’s never good. You’re best off running something that’s very resistant to Water to compensate for that, even if it doesn’t resist Giga Impact. Crunch is also a problem here, as if you lose more than a stage of Defense and you can’t build it back up, you’re toast. I’d say to run a physical attacker possessing Bulk Up that resists Water pretty handily. Palkia is the easy choice here, Tera Type permitting of course. I’ve done it with Swampert and Pecharunt as well, but a Crabhammer crit is pretty damaging to Swampert and being weak to Crunch isn’t a blessing either. Palkia’s your first choice and anything else that resists Water that carries Bulk Up is your second.

Dusknoir

Game: Both
Base Type: Ghost
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Poltergeist
Dark Pulse (20% chance to cause flinch)
Will-O-Wisp (85% chance to burn target)
Ice Punch (10% chance to freeze target)

Additional Moves:

Gravity
Spite

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Uses Gravity
70% HP Remaining: Uses Spite
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
30% HP Remaining: Uses Spite
10% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Between having Pressure and using Spite, Dusknoir’s actually kind of a weird raid. It’s arguably the only raid where PP management is a concern, though it only serves to limit the number of 5-16 PP moves you can reasonably use, so Gholdengo Steel and Necrozma’s dual-legendary builds will suffer (not that you’d use them here anyway). Expect that Poltergeist is getting thrown at you, and otherwise just play it like a normal raid besides avoiding bringing something that relies on a 5-16 PP move. Oh, and expect to be burned the ENTIRE time, because he spams Will-O-Wisp about half the time when you aren’t burned. It’s a form of the Snowscape glitch, but Gholdengo’s not as useful here because he’s still weak to Poltergeist. Still, Gholdengo Ghost actually is a 3-hit KO against this guy but you’ll get the occasional freebie turn to self-heal, so it’s viable to run. I’ve done it, but it was too close to bother recommending.

Gliscor

Game: Scarlet
Base Type: Ground/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Acrobatics
Knock Off
Quick Attack
Earthquake

Additional Moves:

Sandstorm
Swords Dance

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
75% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
40% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance
15% Time Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
5% Time Remaining: Uses Earthquake

Tips:

Fairly middle of the road in terms of difficulty. It’ll depend heavily on your Tera Type what strats are available to you. My advice is to, as always, take note of the very wide type coverage that he has, and the Swords Dance he gets halfway through. That Swords Dance is the hardest part of the raid. If you’re not armed with Bulk Up for his physical attacks, you’re going to struggle. So pack a physical attacker, make sure you have two Defense boosts before knocking out his Tera Shield (he typically hits 40% at the same time you break his Shield). Since you’re not going to resist his whole moveset, don’t be afraid to grab a bulky attacker that’s Flying, Water, Ground, Dragon, Dark, Ice or Fairy as he’s neutral to all those types and there’s options aplenty for them.

Golem

Game: Both
Base Type: Rock/Ground
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Earthquake
Rock Slide (30% chance to cause flinch)
Flail
Smack Down (100% chance to remove Flying-type/Levitate immunity)

Additional Moves:

Stone Edge
Iron Defense

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
85% HP Remaining: Uses Stone Edge
45% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
30% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
29% HP Remaining: Uses Iron Defense

Tips:

Not absurdly hard if you’re not getting super effectively, just know that you’ll need either Bulk Up or Iron Defense for this puppy. Golem is a physical defense tank and he hits like a truck, but your stats are never wiped in the raid, so if you can get off one or two Defense boosts immediately you’ll find yourself on easy street. Iron Leaves with Iron Defense is an easy solution here for most Teras, but you probably don’t need to run a specific mon to make this one work.

Kommo-o

Game: Both
Base Type: Dragon/Fighting
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Focus Blast (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Dragon Claw
Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)
Scary Face

Additional Moves:

Clangorous Soul
Reversal

Actions:

75% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
60% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
45% HP Remaining: Uses Clangorous Soul
30% HP Remaining: Uses Clangorous Soul
10% Time Remaining: Uses Reversal

Tips:

This is a very hard raid if you’re not coming into it correctly, and it’s obscenely RNG-dependent because of Focus Blast. If you’re not getting slapped by Focus Blast’s Sp. Def drop you’re getting flinched by Iron Head, and when you’ve made some progress in the raid he’ll basically gain legendary-level stats with Clangorous Soul. Lunala Ghost or Psychic is the play here: on Turn 1, drop a Cosmic Power and just Shadow Ball/Psychic him to build Orb charge until he wipes your stats at the 75% HP threshold. Lunala’s practically invincible and is about a 5-hit KO from Dragon Claw (ignoring possible Dragon Tera STAB) if you put down another Cosmic Power after having your stats wiped. Post-wipe, take the time to drop 2-3 Calm Minds, self-heal with a Moongeist Beam/Psychic, then another Cosmic Power. Once you’ve got +2 Defense and a few Calm Minds, Terastallize. You lose your Focus Blast resistance when hitting the Tera button and he becomes pretty powerful after Clangorous Soul, so you’ll come prepared with those Cosmic Powers.

Post-wipe, your big concern becomes outputting enough damage to beat the clock. You can typically accomplish that by having 4-5 Calm Minds under your belt (if not super effective) and then whaling away. Don’t be afraid to invest the time in Calm Minds, especially if you’re playing on the Switch 2 version of the game where the animations are much faster. Failing that, an Attack cheer’s not a bad alternative. Good luck.

Leavanny

Game: Both
Base Type: Bug/Grass
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Leaf Blade
X-Scissor
Grassy Glide
Sticky Web

Additional Moves:

Grassy Terrain
Swords Dance

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
90% HP Remaining: Uses Grassy Terrain
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance

Tips:

What Leavanny lacks in defensive stats he makes up for in Attack, and what he lacks in his typing he tries but fails to make up for with that Grassy Terrain. Expect to be hit with Leaf Blade most frequently unless you resist Grass, Grassy Terrain isn’t up and/or the Tera favors Bug. It’s not necessarily a hard raid but if that Grassy Terrain is still up when that Swords Dance goes live, you’re going to seriously struggle, so make sure to either wipe it or put five turns between when he’s fresh and when he’s about to die. Fortunately, that HP threshold is right when his Tera Shield breaks, so you’ll have one free turn after it breaks to take your shot and self-heal. You won’t usually have the problem of killing him so quickly that Grassy Terrain is still up, but hey, I have faith in you. Bulk Up or Iron Defense users encouraged, especially if they resist Grass. Or just pick Dialga or a Fire, Poison, Flying or Steel type.

I know I said Calm Mind is mandatory for this raid because of his immense Sp. Atk, but Iron Valiant *does* kinda negate that, so… y’know. Make it easy on yourself.

Ludicolo

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Grass
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Energy Ball (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Atk by one stage)
Hydro Pump
Fake Out (100% chance to cause flinch, only works on first turn)
Chilling Water (100% chance to lower target’s Attack by one stage)

Additional Moves:

Rain Dance
Teeter Dance (100% chance to confuse target)

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
70% HP Remaining: Uses Chilling Water
50% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
20% Time Remaining: Uses Teeter Dance

Tips:

Calm Mind is mandatory for this raid, as a rain-boosted Hydro Pump will inflict what we call a “bad time” and Chilling Water cuts down physical attack. You don’t have to play weather wars with him if you pack Calm Mind, but you can if you want. He’s not absurdly hard so long as you have that Sp. Def boost up before he gets that first shot off, and preferably two if you can manage it. Otherwise it’s business as usual. Alternatively, Iron Valiant with Spirit Break can handle him pretty well thanks to the guaranteed Sp. Atk drop (but that goes for most of the special attacker opponents on here, so…)

Mamoswine

Game: Both
Base Type: Ice/Ground
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Icicle Crash (30% chance to cause flinch)
Ice Shard
Bulldoze (100% chance to lower target’s Speed by 1 stage)
Freeze-Dry (10% chance to freeze target)

Additional Moves:

Snowscape
Amnesia
Earthquake

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Snowscape
75% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Uses Amnesia
10% HP Remaining: Uses Earthquake
45% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge

Tips:

Pretty heavy-hitting on the physical Attack stat, but Bulk Up solves that problem. My personal favorite for this raid is the Normal-type physical attacker Arceus, as he can just Swords Dance x3 at the beginning of the raid and drop a Cosmic Power, and he’s good for the remainder of the raid. Mamoswine’s not too hard, just self-buff your physical defense and remember that he’s not going to reset your stats, so the investment is worth it the whole raid!

Mandibuzz

Game: Both
Base Type: Dark/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Dual Wingbeat
Dark Pulse (20% chance to cause flinch)
Toxic (badly poisons target)
Bone Rush

Additional Moves:

Snarl (100% chance to lower target’s Sp. Atk by 1 stage)

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
90% HP Remaining: Uses Snarl
75% HP Remaining: Uses Snarl
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Uses Snarl

Tips:

The Toxic seems like it’d be a pain, enough that you need to bring a Steel or Poison type. Nope! A heal cheer mostly solves it, so long as he doesn’t spam it hard. In my experience I’d get hit with about 2-3 Toxics per raid, so I let them sit for a turn and then heal cheered them. Mandibuzz isn’t hard so long as you’re ready for that extremely early stat wipe and you’ve brought a physical attacker, not a special one. He’s most likely to hit you with Dark Pulse as that’s his best move, but Tera STAB can change, so be wary. Your best bets with him are basically anything that’s not getting hit super effectively, and is at least middle of the pack in damage output. Mandibuzz is still bulky, even if he’s not particularly hard.

Mienshao

Game: Both
Base Type: Fighting
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Aerial Ace
Brick Break
Aura Sphere
Reversal

Additional Moves:

Calm Mind

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
65% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
40% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
20% Time Remaining: Uses Aura Sphere

Tips:

Get a Taunter and use it Turn 1. He’ll typically use that first Calm Mind on Turn 3 (of course, that’ll fluctuate based on damage) but limiting that Calm Mind is the easy path to victory here. After that, you only need to worry about his Flying and Fighting type moves, which don’t hit that hard so long as you’re not relying on screens, and an attack like Chilling Water or Breaking Swipe nerfs those significantly. I used Haxorus here to great effect, but just about anything that has both Taunt and either of those two moves will be fine. He’s not hard without that first Calm Mind.

Milotic

Game: Both
Base Type: Water
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Dragon Pulse
Water Pulse (20% chance to confuse target)
Safeguard
Aqua Tail

Additional Moves:

Coil
Hypnosis (60% chance to cause sleep)
Rain Dance

Actions:

99% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Uses Coil
70% HP Remaining: Uses Hypnosis
60% Time Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
10% Time Remaining: Uses Hypnosis

Tips:

The 99% stat boost is not a typo, you really do spawn in, get your stats wiped before you can even raise them, and then have the rest of the raid to whale away on him. The meta here is to start the raid and wait five seconds. I usually spend that time chuckling at the uselessness of having him immediately wipe my stats. Aside from that, resisting Water is pretty important because of rain boost; he’ll hit you with physical and special both, so pick your favorite side of that coin and run with it. He’s not difficult, but he has the potential to be with stuff like Hypnosis, so surviving several hits is key. Water and Grass types here are the best option, but if the Tera doesn’t allow for that then just running a top tier tank like either of the Necrozma combinations works okay too. Mid-level difficulty at worst.

Also, heads up: that Hypnosis is a 1 in 4 chance of targeting you specifically, so while it’s annoying it’s not necessarily something that requires you to bring sleep counters. Heal cheers solve it if it does hit you.

Morpeko

Game: Violet
Base Type: Electric/Dark
Ability: Standard

Moves:

Aura Wheel
Lash Out
Thunder Wave (90% chance to paralyze target)
Torment

Additional Moves:

Taunt
Electric Terrain

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Taunt
75% HP Remaining: Uses Taunt
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
30% HP Remaining: Uses Electric Terrain
25% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Not a hard raid, but a stupid one thanks to Torment and the double Taunt early on. Morpeko can only hit you with Electric and Dark, so Great Tusk is, hilariously, a great option here. Bet you thought you’d never see the day. (So’s Iron Hands, but c’mon, give Great Tusk a chance!) Just put up with having to alternate Bulk Up and your main attacks thanks to Torment, and kill him quickly. If he’s Flying Tera and thus immune to Great Tusk’s Ground attacks and resistant to Iron Hands Fighting, just run Iron Hands Electric. Though I’ll give you style points if you do it with something silly like Regice.

The fun thing about Tera raiding is that the partners really do make a ton of difference. Gardevoir alone can change a raid from a loser to a winner. I basically never lose Tera raids (unless I’m testing out a build in intentionally suboptimal conditions, like what’s seen here) but there’s been so many times where I won a test run that I should have lost because Gardy stepped in with Life Dew.

Ninetales

Game: Both
Base Type: Fire
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)
Extrasensory (10% chance to cause flinch)
Will-O-Wisp (85% chance to burn target)
Burning Jealousy (100% chance to burn if target’s stats were raised)

Additional Moves:

Heat Wave (10% chance to burn target)
Sunny Day

Actions:

90% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Uses Heat Wave
40% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
25% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
10% Time Remaining: Uses Heat Wave

Tips:

Not a particularly hard raid if you have Calm Mind and aren’t weak to Fire. Pick any Fire type from the list, take note that your stats will get wiped pretty fast into the raid, and you’ll be alright, really. Ninetales is a heavier hitter on Fire-type attacks, so you may have to play some weather wars with him, but most special attackers should be fine. One time, just for fun, I brought Incineroar Fire against a Water Tera. I had to get x3 Swords Dance under me before attacking, but I actually pulled it off. And I had quite a bit of fun with Iron Valiant Fairy, as Spirit Break’s Sp. Atk drop never gets wiped so after you hit it three times you’re practically invulnerable. Basically, he’s not a hard raid.

Funnily enough, where most raids that inflict a status move seem to have some variant of the Snowscape glitch, this one doesn’t. If you run Gholdengo (not that you ever would, as Ninetales’ a Fire type) you’ll find he doesn’t have the same Will-O-Wisp requirement that other raids have with their status moves.

Politoed

Game: Both
Base Type: Water
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Chilling Water (100% chance to lower target’s Attack by one stage)
Surf
Ice Beam (10% chance to freeze target)
Encore

Additional Moves:

Amnesia

Actions:

85% HP Remaining: Uses Chilling Water
70% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
30% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
29% HP Remaining: Uses Amnesia

Tips:

Palkia. No, really, Palkia Water just solves this entire raid. At first glance you’d see the Chilling Water, which lowers your Attack by a stage, and think that you’re doomed to run a special attacker… but Palkia’s never going to get hit by Chilling Water! He quad-resists Water, so Politoed will only ever shoot Ice Beam aside from the scripted Chilling Water at the beginning of the raid. I tested this thoroughly, it’s hilarious that the AI doesn’t consider anything beyond what’ll do the most damage. To make matters nicer, Politoed will give you free rain at the beginning in case you’d like a boost for that Liquidation. Yes, Encore’s a pain sometimes, but you’ll be running x3 Bulk Ups on Palkia anyway so it’s not a huge problem so long as you plan ahead of time what you want to run the next three turns by checking the turn counter with Y on the menu. If you don’t have Palkia, get something that resists Water (Dialga, for example), and bonus points if it can set Sunny Day.

Oh, and Gholdengo does very well here too if Encore has annoyed you that much.

Poliwrath

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Fighting
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Brick Break
Liquidation (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Focus Blast (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Haze (resets all stat changes)

Additional Moves:

Rain Dance
Bulk Up

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
70% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
45% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up
20% HP Remaining: Uses Bulk Up

Tips:

I don’t have a great answer for you. Poliwrath is absurdly hard unless you’re bringing something like Palkia Water or Rayquaza. Poliwrath is one of the handful of raids I just haven’t quite figured out completely yet, and that’s because of the sheer overpoweredness of Haze. You can bypass Haze somewhat with terrains and weather to boost your attack, but only some types will be useful and that’ll depend on your Tera. I’m considering Pecharunt here, but haven’t had another Poliwrath raid spawn so I can test it.

Quagsire

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Ground
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Earthquake
Liquidation (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)
Toxic (badly poisons target)

Additional Moves:

Curse
Rain Dance

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
70% HP Remaining: Uses Curse
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
30% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance

Tips:

SLEEEEEEEP. Annihilape with Vital Spirit pretty well solves this raid, as Bulk Up provides defense to both Earthquake and Liquidation, and he’s immune to sleep. I will say, the Toxic is extremely annoying (Toxic is cheating on the part of the developers, I feel, as you’ve no choice but to Heal cheer or eventually die.) However, you can manage that with Drain Punch and cheers. Annihilape’s not an easy solution to this raid, but he’s the best one, and so long as you don’t have Normal Tera, Rage Fist can do plenty of damage for you. Normal Tera is harder, as you have to first Drain Punch until he wipes his and your stats early on, then Bulk Up x4 to start whaling away. Problem is, you’re batting away Toxics as well, and the animations take forever. Results will vary based on the Tera.

Shiftry

Game: Both
Base Type: Grass/Dark
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Leaf Blade
Sucker Punch
Fake Out (100% chance to cause flinch, only works on first turn)
Extrasensory (10% chance to cause flinch)

Additional Moves:

Sunny Day
Trailblaze (100% chance to raise user’s Speed by 1 stage)
Swords Dance

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
90% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
70% HP Remaining: Uses Trailblaze
50% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
30% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance

Tips:

There’s a neat AI error where if Sucker Punch is the move that’ll do the most damage against you (because you’re weak to Dark, probably), but you only use status moves, the Shiftry AI will keep spamming it only for it to fail over and over. Problem is, the devs knew this and has him wipe your stats pretty early so you can’t set up for free. Still, it’s useful to set weather/terrain if you can since you won’t get much out of attacking early on. Shiftry’s not otherwise too hard, as he doesn’t wipe your stats after that 90% HP point so you can just get through the stat wipe and then self-boost to last until the end of the game. Easy raid.

Sinistcha

Game: Both
Base Type: Grass/Ghost
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Energy Ball
Shadow Ball (20% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Stun Spore (75% chance to paralyze target)
Scald (30% chance to burn target)

Additional Moves:

Grassy Terrain
Matcha Gotcha (20% chance to burn target)

Actions:

85% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Uses Grassy Terrain
40% HP Remaining: Uses Grassy Terrain
15% HP Remaining: Uses Matcha Gotcha
10% Time Remaining: Uses Matcha Gotcha

Tips:

If you’re not a Grass or Electric type, expect Stun Spore to get thrown around a lot. He gets STAB on it and fishes for that paralysis as much as he can. Gholdengo can’t be used to avoid it, as he comes packed with Shadow Ball too. Between the Grassy Terrain boost to Grass, the Scald and Shadow Ball coverage, there’s not a lot of options available. Wo-Chien resists all three options and is immune to Stun Spore though, and is worth considering as a Giga Drain spammer. Dialga’s fine as well if you don’t mind the paralysis, but you run the risk of a Shadow Ball stat proc early on. Failing that, Raging Bolt is pretty good as he’s also paralysis-immune and is hit neutrally only by Shadow Ball, as are most other Dragon types. The good news is that it’s paralysis, not sleep, so it’s manageable, and he doesn’t reset your stats so you have complete freedom to stat boost as needed. So he’s not particularly hard.

A total side note, but I once saw an interesting glitch in this raid where I KOed Sinistcha right as it triggered the Matcha Gotcha 15% HP threshold, so it gave me the unique “KOed” health bar shake, and then he gained back HP from using Matcha Gotcha. Then I hit him again and the sliver of health he’d gained back never disappeared, it just gave me the text saying he’d fainted and transitioned to the fainting animation. Kinda funny.

Snorlax

Game: Both
Base Type: Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Facade
Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)
Heavy Slam

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
70% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
50% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
20% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

SLEEEEEEEEP. And you can’t just Gholdengo your way out of this one, either! (You totally can, Yawn suffers from the Snowscape glitch and Crunch doesn’t hit too hard, but Snorlax’s Sp. Def is bulky enough that you’ll cut it close still). Fortunately, he’s somewhat physically weak and all his attacks are physical, so just about any Bulk Up user will do the trick, so long as it has Electric Terrain. My prescription here is Iron Hands Electric or Vital Spirit Annihilape Fighting (not Ghost – we don’t want the Crunch hit). Normally I’d shy away from going straight to a top-tier solution, as that can get repetitive, but I’ll make an exception just to stick it to Snorlax.

Seviper as a raider is inherently funny to me. It’s such a terrible Pokemon yet it’s rescued by Stockpile and only being used in very specific conditions.

Trevenant

Game: Both
Base Type: Ghost/Grass
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Wood Hammer (33% recoil damage)
Shadow Claw
Forest’s Curse (adds Grass type to target)
Will-O-Wisp (85% chance to burn target)

Additional Moves:

Grassy Terrain
Disable

Actions:

100% HP Remaining: Uses Grassy Terrain
75% HP Remaining: Uses Disable
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Wood Hammer

Tips:

I don’t get a lot of Trevenant raid spawns, so I can’t research this one too deeply, but I noticed that, after Terastallization and hitting the 50% HP mark, he has an AI problem with Forest’s Curse. I used Seviper (that’s not a typo, I literally used the Gen III snake just to see if I could pull it off) and after Tera, found that he spammed nothing but Forest’s Curse for the rest of the game. I suspect it’s like the Snowscape glitch, or at least there’s a condition that requires him to use it on the player past a certain threshold and the AI doesn’t check if it’ll actually work. Anyway, it’s a fairly difficult raid unless you resist Grass, in which case it becomes a walk in the park. Hell, I beat it with Seviper against a Water Tera! (That fight is memorialized in the header image of this post, by the way.) You will spend the whole raid having been burned, but that’s not a huge deal, and getting hit with Forest’s Curse doesn’t actually harm you… at all. Couldn’t be less relevant of a move option for him.

Yanmega

Game: Both
Base Type: Bug/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Bug Buzz (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Air Slash (30% chance to cause flinch)
Quick Attack
Ancient Power (10% chance to raise all user’s stats by 1 stage)

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Uses Ancient Power
85% HP Remaining: Uses Ancient Power
50% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Ancient Power

Tips:

The hard part about Yanmega is that he’s faster than you, and that Ancient Power has a chance to proc him a massive stat boost. If he gets any of those, it’s like fighting a legendary Pokemon. Fortunately, Steel resists, well, everything he has, so at least by picking a Steel-type you can limit his usage of Ancient Power to the scripted three times. Expect Bug Buzz to be the attack he uses if you’re neutral or resistant to everything. This raid is so RNG-heavy it’s not even funny, I’ve had runs where I breezed through with a bottom tier and runs where he got the proc early on and destroyed me. No shame in resetting this one if you lose.

The Indigo Disk Raiders

Alcremie

Game: Both
Base Type: Fairy
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Dazzling Gleam
Psychic (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Encore
Psyshock

Additional Moves:

Acid Armor

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Uses Encore
50% HP Remaining: Uses Acid Armor
25% HP Remaining: Uses Acid Armor
30% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
20% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Gholdengo. Pick whichever type’s better. Alcremie is, like the other Encore raids, a loud “F you” to the player, but Gholdengo’s immune to that and resists everything Alcremie can throw at you. Acid Armor is also ignored here as Gholdengo’s a special attacker, so that’s not a problem either. Congrats on the easy win… though it’s easier for Gholdengo Steel.

I will add, he doesn’t use Encore all that much, but he’ll use it at least twice during a raid in my experiences, plus the scripted one at the beginning. It’s unpredictable, so plan on that first Encore being when you self-buff and everything after that being when you attack. If you’re not planning to run Gholdengo, Volcarona Fire is a decent example of how this works: Quiver Dance repeatedly while your teammates whittle him down to 90% HP (though he usually Encores on Turn 1), checking the menu each turn so you don’t miss your turn of freedom, and then everything after that is an attack. That way you’re boosted, you stay boosted, he’s not really hurting you and Encore stops mattering because you have like four Quiver Dances under your belt with nothing left to do but finish him off.

Alolan Dugtrio

Game: Both
Base Type: Ground
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Bulldoze (100% chance to lower target’s Speed by 1 stage)
Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)
Ancient Power (10% chance to raise all user’s stats by 1 stage)
Metal Claw (10% chance to raise user’s Attack by 1 stage)

Additional Moves:

Sandstorm
Earthquake

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
80% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
25% HP Remaining: Uses Earthquake

Tips:

Yes, they can hit a lot of things super effectively… but they’re not hard. Just don’t be weak to Rock-type, as if they use Ancient Power and get the boost you’re in a world of hurt. The AI will only use whatever does the most damage to you (besides the Additional Moves) in 99% of situations, so don’t let them have an excuse to use Ancient Power and you’ll be fine because he never wipes your stats, so… just build up your stats and whale away at him! Straightforward… usually.

Duraludon

Game: Both
Base Type: Steel/Dragon
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Flash Cannon (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Dragon Pulse
Breaking Swipe (100% chance to lower target’s Attack by 1 stage)
Metal Claw (10% chance to raise user’s Attack by 1 stage)

Additional Moves:

Stealth Rock
Light Screen
Reflect

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Stealth Rock
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Uses Light Screen
35% HP Remaining: Uses Reflect

Tips:

(I love that he uses Stealth Rock right off the bat, that’s actually quite helpful depending on who your NPC partners are.) Duraludon’s hard. He’ll hit you from both physical and special attacks, and the only type that resists both is Steel. Fortunately, there’s a Steel type that has Cosmic Power! Dusk Mane Necrozma resists everything that Duraludon can throw at him, and happens to be a great raider. Failing that, Jirachi’s also an option as a special attacker, though not as good. If you’re fighting a Tera where Steel-type attacks just won’t cut it, Kyogre can also pull some duty, as he’s a special attacker so Breaking Swipe is irrelevant and Dragon Pulse runs into your boosted Sp. Def from Calm Mind. Worst case scenario… Giga Drain spam. There’s always Giga Drain spam.

Electivire

Game: Both
Base Type: Electric
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Discharge (30% chance to paralyze target)
Thunder Punch (10% chance to paralyze target)
Earthquake
Brick Break

Additional Moves:

Electric Terrain

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Electric Terrain
70% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Electric Terrain
25% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Latios solves this raid. Levitate, Electric resistance and a resistance to Brick Break? You’ll get the kill slowly but it’ll happen. Once he wipes your stats feel free to drop x3 Calm Minds and start grinding him down. Easy money. If Latios isn’t an option, get something that resists Ground and Electric, like Grass Ogerpon or Ground Swampert.

Exeggutor

Game: Both
Base Type: Grass/Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Dragon Hammer
Extrasensory (10% chance to cause flinch)
Seed Bomb
Hypnosis (60% chance to cause sleep)

Additional Moves:

Trick Room

Actions:

80% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
65% HP Remaining: Uses Hypnosis
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Uses Trick Room
33% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

SLEEEEEEEEP. Enamorus-Therian and its Misty Terrain is an almost-complete solution to this raid… but there’s actually an AI glitch (as far as I can tell) where if you’re running Gholdengo and thus can’t be put to sleep with Hypnosis, the opponent will spam Hypnosis turn after turn to no avail, giving you an easy win. It seems to be a condition like the Snowscape glitch, but with Sleep. If you don’t feel like cheesing it then run Enamorus-T. But really, you should cheese it. Sleep raids are lazy on the devs’ part.

Excadrill

Game: Both
Base Type: Ground/Steel
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)
Earthquake
Drill Run
Slash

Additional Moves:

Sandstorm

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
25% Time Remaining: Uses Sandstorm

Tips:

Step 1: Don’t end up fighting the the Fly Tera. Step 2: USE PHYSICAL DEFENSE-BOOSTING MOVES. Step 3: Win. Two Bulk Ups or an Iron Defense is probably mandatory here, though you also need to consider the flinch chance from Iron Head and pick something that’s going to be neutral to Ground so as not to give Excadrill cause to prefer Iron Head instead. Sandstorm honestly won’t be much of a concern unless you’re unlucky enough to be hit within an inch of your life, in which case yeah… you’re out of luck. Special attackers need not apply, as he hits like a truck without Defense boosts. My favorite for this raid is Groudon, but there’s plenty of options within the criteria given here.

If you do have the Fly Tera, your life’s a bit harder as there’s nothing super effective against it that he can’t hit super effectively, so you’ll have to opt for neutral damage. Still, he never wipes your stats and he waits until halfway through the raid to put up the Tera Shield, so you’re not going to struggle too much.

Flygon

Game: Both
Base Type: Ground/Dragon
Ability: Standard

Moves:

Earthquake
Dragon Claw
Quick Attack
Breaking Swipe (100% chance to lower target’s Attack by 1 stage)

Additional Moves:

Dragon Dance
Draco Meteor

Actions:

80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
79% HP Remaining: Uses Dragon Dance
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
45% HP Remaining: Uses Dragon Dance
5% HP Remaining: Uses Draco Meteor

Tips:

Well this ain’t easy. Really early on he gets Dragon Dance and then gets it again, which means you’re outsped AND outgunned. Conveniently, he does have all physical attacks, so just about anything that runs Breaking Swipe or Chilling Water and isn’t weak to Dragon and Ground can work here, theoretically. Oh, and Enamorus is Fairy/Flying, which is immune to everything besides Quick Attack. Depending on the Tera, you’re probably best off running Enamorus-Therian. Do NOT run Enamorus-Incarnate here. If it’s a Tera that resists Fairy, then try for something with either of the Attack-lowering moves mentioned earlier. This raid is hard so I don’t mind recommending something like Arceus or Arceus-Grass if need be.

Alolan Golem

Game: Both
Base Type: Rock/Ground
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Heavy Slam
Body Slam (30% chance to paralyze target)
Rock Slide (30% chance to cause flinch)
Discharge (30% chance to paralyze target)

Additional Moves:

Giga Impact

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
80% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Rock Slide
25% HP Remaining: Uses Giga Impact

Tips:

You’d think he has Earthquake, but he doesn’t! I manhandled A-Golem with Okidogi once, it was hilarious. So long as you’re running a physically defensive build, or something that’s tanky like Wo-Chien, you’ll be alright. He’ll clean your clock if you aren’t physically bulky, so be careful about running a frail special attacker here – Calm Mind won’t help you avoid getting shellacked by physical attacks. Also, make sure to bring a heavy raider, as Heavy Slam gets pretty potent against anything that weighs less than 234 lbs, or about 106 kg, give or take. At that threshold it’s a 60 base power move, and you can handle that.

Golurk

Game: Both
Base Type: Ground/Ghost
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Dynamic Punch (100% chance to confuse target)
Shadow Punch
Heavy Slam
Ice Punch (10% chance to freeze target)

Additional Moves:

Curse

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
95% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Curse
35% HP Remaining: Uses Curse

Tips:

You’re not likely to see that Ice Punch, so don’t sweat the chance for a freeze here. Against most types he’s throwing out Shadow Punch. Your big concern is simply charging your Tera on the first and second turns, as all stats are wiped basically immediately, and then just building momentum to prepare for that double-Curse. Curse is just Bulk Up but you lose a Speed stat. Bear in mind that Curse works differently on non-Ghost Teras than it does on a Ghost Tera, so results may vary. I’ve not actually encountered a Ghost Tera Golurk (Golurk is one of the rarer opponents) so I can’t tell you if it works when he uses Curse or not as a Ghost Tera.

Do bear in mind that his moveset covers an extremely wide range of types, so if you’re picking a raider that isn’t Fighting, Poison, Fire, Bug, Water and Electric, you’re going to be hit super effectively. In situations like this I encourage a safe option like Palkia Water for most Teras, but you have room to be creative. Just remember to boost your own Defense.

Kingdra

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Dragon
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Draco Meteor
Dragon Pulse
Water Pulse (20% chance to confuse target)
Flash Cannon (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)

Additional Moves:

Focus Energy
Rain Dance

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Focus Energy
65% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
5% HP Remaining: Uses Draco Meteor

Tips:

See that Focus Energy immediately upon entering the battle? That means that every move he uses for the entire raid has a 50/50 shot of being a crit. Crits also ignore stat drops. What this chalks up to is that you have to bring a Pokemon that can withstand sometimes back-to-back critical hit Draco Meteors. He also packs Water and Steel attacks, in case you have the bright idea of going in with a Fairy type to nullify Draco Meteor. Your only really good bet is a Steel type like Gholdengo or Dialga or Lugia, as Steel resists Draco Meteor (the biggest concern of the raid) and Flash Cannon, and Lugia Flying benefits a lot from ridiculous bulk (he’s able to withstand two critical Draco Meteors in a row without needing to self-heal) and being able to invest in a Calm Mind that won’t get wiped later. Better to be hit by Water Pulse than Flash Cannon, because a single stat drop from Flash Cannon often means a Draco Meteor crit becomes an OHKO, especially if it’s a Dragon Tera. I’m not kidding when I say Kingdra is an extremely solid contender for the most difficult 6* Tera Raid. I hate this guy. Even Bellibolt doesn’t work on him unless he’s weak to Electric.

I will say though, that if the Tera is weak to Poison, and you Stockpile smartly and quickly, Curse enough and get just a bit lucky on crit timing, Muk can beat this raid. Great way to impress girls.

Kleavor

Game: Both
Base Type: Bug/Rock
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

X-Scissor
Close Combat
Air Cutter
Night Slash

Additional Moves:

Stone Axe (50% chance to set Stealth Rock)
Swords Dance

Actions:

95% HP Remaining: Uses Stone Axe
75% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
35% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance
30% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Magearna or Palkia make this pretty straightforward (not Dialga this time, surprisingly). Magearna resists everything but Close Combat, which is fine as we’d like for him to please lower his defensive stats, thank you. Palkia’s just a great overall option for most Teras, but realistically any high tier that’s not weak to Bug, Fighting, Flying and Dark who also has Bulk Up or Iron Defense (for that Swords Dance at the end) should be okay. Honestly the most important thing is baiting out that Close Combat stat drop for a quick win.

For posterity’s sake, I’ll record here that I’m pretty sure this is a raid where the RNG is rigged somewhat. Air Cutter has a +1 critical hit boost, rendering it a crit about 1/8th of the time, but in the three raids I tested against Kleavor using Volcarona Fire (another viable Pokemon for use here, so long as you’re using Harden after he wipes your stats) it crit in 12 out of 14 uses. That’s obviously way above odds.

Lapras

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Ice
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Blizzard (10% chance to freeze target)
Hydro Pump
Body Slam (30% chance to paralyze target)
Sing (55% chance to cause sleep)

Additional Moves:

Snowscape
Rain Dance

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Snowscape
50% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Rain Dance
30% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

SLEEEEEEEEEP. Fortunately, this raid is basically free with Gholdengo, because Lapras’ Sing AI seems to suffer from the Snowscape glitch. His Hydro Pumps do make it a 3-hit KO battle for you if they’re rain-boosted, but he’ll spam Sing so often you’ll have plenty of time to self-heal between them. So pick the money guy and enjoy the easy raid drops.

Magmortar

Game: Both
Base Type: Fire
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Lava Plume (30% chance to burn target)
Psychic (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Scorching Sands (30% chance to burn target)
Taunt

Additional Moves:

Sunny Day

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Taunt
95% HP Remaining: Uses Sunny Day
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
20% HP Remaining: Uses Lava Plume

Tips:

Kyogre. Kyogre is so absurdly tanky to everything that can be thrown at him that your biggest threat is the Taunt and the Psychic. Kyogre’s a clean 10-hit KO, too. So throw up a Rain Dance once he puts up Sunny Day, be wise about when to use Water Spout versus Surf, and you’ll be fine. Failing Kyogre, Latios is an acceptable option, though not as reliable. Latios resists Lava Plume and Psychic (until he Teras, at which point he loses one resistance) and is immune to Scorching Sands. Latios just doesn’t do as much damage, so take the time to set up. Because of the prevalence of Burn here, physical attackers won’t do well. Oh, and expect that the first attack from him will be Taunt if he doesn’t hit you with the scripted one.

Malamar

Game: Both
Base Type: Dark/Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Psycho Cut
Night Slash
Foul Play
Pluck

Additional Moves:

Taunt
Topsy-Turvy (reverses target’s stat changes)

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Taunt
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Topsy-Turvy
25% HP Remaining: Uses Topsy-Turvy

Tips:

I hate Malamar, and I hate this raid because of Topsy-Turvy. And because of the Taunt. This is one of extremely few raids where stat boosting isn’t always that great of an idea. Fortunately, if you prepare your boosting and hit him so freakin’ hard that you knock him straight from 50% HP to 25% HP in one turn, you don’t have that problem! And he’ll only hit you with Psychic, Dark or Flying, so just about any raider that has that kind of damage output will suffice. Unless it’s Slither Wing. So my advice here is to take your first few turns using a secondary move like Chilling Water, Acid Spray, etc. that isn’t affected by Taunt (if Taunt hits you, that is) to Terastallize, and then self-boosting so you can smack this stupid squid-type thing into the next week and we can all go home. If you find yourself stuck between the Topsy-Turvy uses, fear not as your NPC partners will do damage on their own and Attack cheers can help with that. Just focus on continuing to do damage to stay alive until you get your stats back.

Metagross

Game: Both
Base Type: Steel/Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Zen Headbutt (20% chance to cause flinch)
Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)
Heavy Slam
Aerial Ace

Additional Moves:

Agility
Hone Claws

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Agility
80% HP Remaining: Uses Iron Head
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Uses Hone Claws
20% HP Remaining: Uses Hone Claws

Tips:

This raid looks really, really hard on paper… but Gholdengo Ghost solves this most of the time. Gholdengo resists everything before he Teras, and Metagross never wipes your stats or his, so you can just Nasty Plot to your heart’s content and take chunks out of Metagross. You don’t even have to be super effective! If it’s Tera Normal, just use Gholdengo Steel instead. The RNG for Iron Head flinches is sometimes a butt, but it’s not more than an annoyance. Alternatively, Solgaleo Steel can do it, though Heavy Slam is more useful against him.

Alolan Muk

Game: Both
Base Type: Poison
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Hex
Gunk Shot (30% chance to poison target)
Flamethrower (10% chance to burn target)

Additional Moves:

Toxic (badly poisons target)

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
80% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Toxic
25% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Not especially hard, but the possibility of a Defense drop or a Poison status does suck. Pick something neutral to all this nonsense if you can, or at least something that can reverse a Defense drop. Dialga practically invalidates this raid’s existence, and Groudon or just about any other relatively decent physical attacker is useful, but you’ll have the most fun bringing a Kantonian Muk, self-buffing with Curse x6 and Poison Jabbing to victory. Muk vs. Muk. Jimothy Cool would be proud.

Alolan Ninetales

Game: Scarlet
Base Type: Ice/Fairy
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Moonblast (30% chance to lower target’s Sp. Atk by 1 stage)
Blizzard (10% chance to freeze target)
Ice Shard
Dazzling Gleam

Additional Moves:

Aurora Veil
Calm Mind
Snowscape

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Aurora Veil
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind
24% HP Remaining: Uses Snowscape

Tips:

She’s not the hardest thing in the world, but man is she annoying. As always, Gholdengo’s an easy solution here (as would be any of the other Steel types) by virtue of resisting all her attacks. Alolan Ninetales raids start out harder than they finish because of the immediate Snow + Aurora Veil boosting her Sp. Def pretty darn high, so if you have a physical attacker handy who can stomach special attacks, now’s the time. If you need a specific suggestion, I’ve had good success with Baxcalibur Ice, who is weak to Moonblast before he Terastallizes but loses that weakness, and it’s about a 4-hit KO from Moonblast so you can just drop a Swords Dance and then start whaling away. He benefits from the Snowscape usage with Ice Body and by virtue of being an Ice type, so that’s nice too. You’ll probably get frozen from Blizzard at least once if Ice is his better attacking option if not using an Ice type, so drop a Heal Cheer and drink hot cocoa to shrug it off.

Overqwil

Game: Both
Base Type: Dark/Poison
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Barb Barrage (50% chance to poison target)
Crunch (20% chance to lower target’s Defense by 1 stage)
Pin Missile
Fell Stinger (raises user’s Attack by 3 stages if it KOs target)

Additional Moves:

Toxic (badly poisons target)

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Toxic
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Toxic
25% HP Remaining: Uses Barb Barrage

Tips:

This is one of the raids where the devs get to sit back, smoke a stogie and say “Man, I sure hate my players. Let’s hit them with Toxic, twice, in a game that requires them to stay alive for ten to fifteen turns. That’ll make me feel powerful, and I’ll be a stallion with my wife tonight as a result.” And then they did.

Seriously though, Dialga solves most of the difficulty of this raid, as he’s immune to the Poison stuff, resists most everything else and only has to worry about Crunch. Crunch will be a pain by procing a Defense drop, but you have Bulk Up, so it doesn’t really matter. If Dialga’s not an option to you, then your easy options drop off dramatically. You can still cheese the raid with some top tier and by Heal Cheering whenever you get Toxiced, it’s just not as consistent and you have to be REALLY judicious about how frequently you Heal Cheer, because you’re going to get poisoned a lot by Barb Barrage. Mad respect to you if you beat it with Seviper or Muk.

Porygon-Z

Game: Both
Base Type: Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tri Attack (20% chance to burn, freeze, or paralyze target)
Discharge (30% chance to paralyze target)
Agility
Psybeam (10% chance to confuse target)

Additional Moves:

Thunder Wave (90% chance to paralyze target)
Trick Room

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Uses Thunder Wave
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Trick Room
45% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Not the hardest raid if you have Calm Mind. Yes, there is a good amount of RNG here between each move having a chance to inflict status, and he’ll almost certainly use Agility to move first, but otherwise you should be okay. This is a good raid to run Gholdengo or Heal cheer if you get statused. Otherwise, play it like a normal raid.

Porygon2

Game: Both
Base Type: Normal
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Tri Attack (20% chance to burn, freeze, or paralyze target)
Discharge (30% chance to paralyze target)
Agility
Psybeam (10% chance to confuse target)

Additional Moves:

Thunder Wave (90% chance to paralyze target)
Trick Room

Actions:

95% Time Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
75% HP Remaining: Uses Thunder Wave
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Trick Room
45% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

The biggest obstacle here is constantly being statused. Tri Attack will hit you with Paralysis, Burn or Freeze at random, and his other moves have their own status gimmick as well. If you can, run Gholdengo. There’s no Tera Type that won’t be neutral to both Ghost and Steel, so grab the Gholdengo type that fits and start whaling away. It’s not a particularly hard raid, just an irritating one.

Reuniclus

Game: Both
Base Type: Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Psychic (10% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 1 stage)
Fire Punch (10% chance to burn target)
Swift
Rock Tomb (100% chance to lower target’s Speed by 1 stage)

Additional Moves:

Reflect
Light Screen
Calm Mind

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Reflect
80% HP Remaining: Uses Light Screen
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset
35% HP Remaining: Uses Calm Mind

Tips:

Surprisingly, he doesn’t have Trick Room. He does, however, get a script with both screens, Calm Mind and even STAB Psychic, so… that’s fun. Going with a Dark-type is an easier choice because it neuters his Psychic option, but he’s not difficult enough that you can’t beat him with something that only hits him neutrally. Most of the tier list could take him out, besides the ones weak to his attack types, of course. If you’re struggling, and I mean STRUGGLING, Urshifu Dark should make it pretty easy on you.

Iron Valiant as a raider is so cool to me because of Spirit Break. Don’t get me wrong, if you bring him against a physical or mixed raid opponent, you’ll get crushed. It’s not workable. But against a special-only attacker? Easy victory. It’s such a unique moveset that I honestly don’t know where to place him on the tier list page.

Rhyperior

Game: Both
Base Type: Ground/Rock
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Earthquake
Rock Wrecker
Megahorn
Rock Polish

Additional Moves:

Sandstorm
Iron Defense

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Sandstorm
50% HP Remaining: Uses Iron Defense
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
25% HP Remaining: Uses Rock Wrecker
5% HP Remaining: Uses Earthquake

Tips:

Special attacker. Get one. You’re not going to realistically be neutral to everything he’s running but you can be tanky enough to not care, so I encourage Kyogre or Shadow Rider Calyrex in most cases. Most of the other top special attacker tiers are going to be weak to him, and that Iron Defense invalidates a lot of physical attackers, though if you’re feeling adventurous you can try Zamazenta Body Press, Groudon or Palkia as they’ll at least have an easy time dealing with it. Not a hard raid if you’re not dying, but this one is definitely intended not to be easy. Difficulty will depend heavily on his Tera, too.

Oh, and when he uses Rock Polish he uses it on all the battles, so he’ll suddenly be +6 Speed and outspeed you without warning. Have fun!

Alolan Sandslash

Game: Violet
Base Type: Ice/Steel
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Ice Spinner
Iron Head (30% chance to cause flinch)
Earthquake
Triple Axel

Additional Moves:

Snowscape
Swords Dance

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Snowscape
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
80% HP Remaining: Uses Swords Dance
35% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

The downside here is the Ice/Ground/Steel type coverage… and the flinch chance if he’s using Iron Head on you. Expect Earthquake to be the typical attacking move though, as if you’re neutral to all three that’s the one with the most damage. Fortunately, Normal, Water, Bug, Dark, Fighting, Ghost and Psychic are all neutral to each of those three attack types, which leaves you a pretty sizeable chunk of the top tier raiders to choose from. Alolan Sandslash is pretty frail on the special side but you’ll want to consider just bringing a neutral top tier or Body Press Zamazenta because Swords Dance getting used right off the bat will mean you’ll need some Defense here.

Skarmory

Game: Both
Base Type: Steel/Flying
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Drill Peck
Steel Wing (10% chance to raise user’s Defense by 1 stage)
Night Slash
Slash

Additional Moves:

Taunt
Iron Defense

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Taunt
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
45% HP Remaining: Uses Iron Defense
44% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Iron Defense is, ironically, a great counter to everything Skarmory can throw at you. If you have Iron Defense and are super effective, you basically win. Yes, there’s a 1 in 4 chance that the Taunt on Turn 0 will be aimed at you, but you’ll be okay so long as you get a few shots in to self-heal and you’re not weak to him. Skarmory does have sky-high Defense, and the Iron Defense halfway through doesn’t help, but he’s beatable so long as you’re super effective.

Galarian Slowbro

Game: Both
Base Type: Water/Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Shell Side Arm (20% chance to poison target)
Zen Headbutt (20% chance to cause flinch)
Chilling Water (100% chance to lower target’s Attack by 1 stage)
Rock Blast

Additional Moves:

Toxic (badly poisons target)

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
80% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Toxic
25% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

God, I hate the devs for including this raid. Poison is basically cheating in Tera Raids because you have to survive 15+ turns, and Shell Side Arm seems to just poison way too frequently for a 20% chance. Oh, and you get Toxiced no matter what halfway through. Fortunately, Steel types invalidate… well, everything besides Chilling Water in his moveset, which is a pretty sweet deal. Gholdengo Steel is the easy pick for this raid, but if the Tera resists Steel, then it depends on your Tera. Worst case scenario, go for something like Dialga or Kingambit which gives you neutral damage but keeps the immunity. By the way, his Tera breaks right before that 25% HP stat wipe.

Galarian Slowking

Game: Both
Base Type: Poison/Psychic
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Eerie Spell
Power Gem
Yawn (causes drowsiness, sleep next turn)
Acid Spray (100% chance to lower target’s Sp. Def by 2 stages)

Additional Moves:

Toxic (badly poisons target)

Actions:

90% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
80% Time Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
50% HP Remaining: Uses Toxic
25% HP Remaining: Player Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

SLEEEEEEP. Man, that Acid Spray is rough to deal with. Poison and Steel types are definitely helpful here, though not required. Most Teras can be dealt with handily by Parabolic Miraidon, but the ones that resist Electric need to be hit by the most OP neutral damage you can hit them with, so long as it also has a solution for Sleep. Again, Gholdengo is the solution here. You’ll get nailed by Eerie Spell’s PP-reducing moves so you may have to use both Make It Rain and Shadow Ball if it goes sour on you. I’m fairly sure that Yawn suffers from the Snowscape glitch, which is part of why Gholdengo is so useful here.

Whimsicott

Game: Both
Base Type: Grass/Fairy
Ability: Hidden Possible

Moves:

Energy Ball
Moonblast (30% chance to lower target’s Sp. Atk by 1 stage)
Encore
Hurricane (30% chance to confuse target)

Additional Moves:

Taunt

Actions:

100% Time Remaining: Uses Taunt
80% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset
40% Time Remaining: Reduce Tera Orb Charge
40% HP Remaining: Stats & Status Reset

Tips:

Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but Dialga solves this raid. He tanks like nine Moonblast hits before getting KOed, and he’s a physical attacker so Moonblast cutting your Sp. Atk doesn’t matter. FYI, the Taunt at the beginning will sometimes be aimed at you, but sometimes at a teammate. Otherwise, your only annoyance is Encore spam, but since he never wipes your stats it’s not a big problem. Be patient, don’t mess with any moves besides stat raisers and your attack moves (this means no getting fancy with Thunder Wave!), and you’ll blow him away easy.

If Dialga isn’t appropriate for the Tera, you also have Skeledirge Fire, whose Torch Song basically does all the work of stat-raising for you, and it helps that he’ll be forced to use the unreliable Hurricane. Whether you’re Encored or not, you can just spam Torch Song in that circumstance. Alternatively, if you’re running one of the Metronome sets that use a self-healing move like Parabolic Bellibolt (not Miraidon though – see the Moonblast, and not a Giga Drain spammer – see the Hurricane) that oughta work too. Whimsicott’s pretty flimsy.