Download Printable High-Res Infographic

Interactive Custom Raid Guide Registeel

Interactive Custom Raid Guide Regice

Interactive Custom Raid Guide Regirock

How to use this infographic:

Slight methodology change this time around. Due to everyone leveling up as time goes on and based on the fact you can catch level 35 Pokemon in the wild, we have moved the analysis for this infographic up to level 35.  When ranking ordering change dramatically at level 40 we will note that but it did not occur this time.

Based on level 35, the best overall counters are the first row with their best move types below. These counters will give high dps and last a reasonable amount of time in combat. Specific counters in certain situations, such as against certain move type or in certain weather, are listed on the second row. For more specific info with different levels or your own Pokemon, use our custom raid guides linked above.

 

 

The ‘Regis’

The next three legendaries are here and we’re… sort of excited? Let’s be real, the Regis aren’t exactly Raikou or Kyogre. They will not dramatically change the game for you or become super useful in future raids and gym battles. But of course, all of us hardcore and semi-hardcore players will be out there trying to catch at least a few good versions of each of them, so it’s still useful to know more about them and what counters to use against them. These raid bosses will take between 4 and 5 well prepared high-level players and will be quite tough compared to other raids.  Note that if Niantic decides to allow these Pokemon in gyms they could be interesting for novelty reasons if nothing else.

Availability: Not entirely clear right now. Regice should be in North and South America until July 19. Most likely the other 2 will be Europe and Asia with a one month rotation.

Regirock

 

Regirock is a cool looking Pokemon with a rather high defense and a low attack. Not very useful in the main Pokemon games and definitely not very useful in Pokemon Go. It’s like a bad Blissey that you cant put in a gym.

• Zap Cannon – A single bar electric move that counters Kyogre slightly. By slightly I mean it does less than half of Kyogre’s life. Regirock does not exactly hit like a rock. Sorry that was bad…
• Focus Blast – Another strong single bar move if it was on another pokemon. Theoretically, the best move for gym clearing if you want to waste stardust on a terrible Pokemon.
• Stone Edge – A great fast single bar move that does nothing to help Regirock vs. its primary counters.

General Counters

 Groudon

A Mudshot/ Solar Beam Groudon is your best bet for taking down Regirock. His very powerful Solar Beam charge move is super effective against rock. The low incoming and often resisted damage means Groudon is going to be able to use a lot of these.  Groudon is a useful Pokemon in general so it makes sense to have at least one powered up. Note that Groudon is not the highest DPS option but is a lot tankier than the other options. If you have too many players and plenty of revive’s, feel free to use Kyogre and maybe Machamp. General rule of thumb, if you have to rejoin, you should have used more Groudon.

 Kyogre

The strongest water Pokemon also rocks Regirock’s world with its super effectiveness against rock and its resists. Unfortunately, it is slightly weak to electric so Groudon is a generally safer bet. Kyogre’s DPS is higher than Groudon though if you really are fighting for the damage balls. But again, he’s a very strong mon in general so you should already have a few of your best Kyogre powered up. Kyogre is expected to be the #1 water Pokemon for awhile so it’s a pretty safe choice for rare candy. You want his double water moves which are his best moves anyways.

 Machamp

If you’ll notice on the infographic, there is one Pokemon that shows up as a strong general counter against all three ‘Regis’ – that’s right, it’s good ol’ double fightin’ moves Machamp. He’s super effective against rock. And since the game had tons of fighting mons to be caught back in May, you should have plenty of candy to evolve and power up some of your Machamp. So if you’re feeling lazy about building out your counters for all three ‘Regis’, you could just use a Machamp army and call it a day and would still get pretty good results. Not the BEST results, but pretty good. And maybe that’s good enough for these meh Regis. Definitely not the tankiest of the options, Machamp sits between Groudon and Kyogre on the DPS scales.

 Metagross

If you’ve managed to get enough candies to power up a decent Metagross, here’s a time to use him.  As we’ve said before, steel Pokemon, in general, have bad moves and bad stats and aren’t useful very often, which is why we really despise when autoselect keeps choosing crappy Aggron for like every bloody raid. But we digress, Metagross is super effective against rock, making him decent here. So if you are dying to use him, now’s the time!

 Venusuar

If you managed to powerup some good Venusaur from the community day a few months back, then you’ve got a strong counter against Regirock. An especially great option in Sunny weather like we have here in Los Angeles where Pokebattler is made.

 Hariyama

Fat Machamp and his double fighting moves are decent against Regirock. He’s not as fast as Machamp but makes the counter list with fighting moves being super effective against rock and his greater bulk.

Specific Counters

Versus Focus Blast

 Ho-Oh

Steel, Solar Beam Ho-Oh makes an appearance as a strong counter against Focus Blast Regirock with his Solar Beam being super effective against rock and his very high tankiness. Definitely not your fastest type to win but if you are going to be 5 manning anyhow, might as well use your shiny Ho-Oh if you got it.  That said, I haven’t powered up a single Ho-Oh but if you have, here is a chance to use it! I suspect the auto select might even tell you to use it which would be smart of it.

In Windy

 Latios

Hurrah, a use for that recently caught Latios. In windy weather, a Dragon, Solar Beam Latios is useful here as Solar Beam is super effective against rock and dragon gets a boost.

In Sunny/Clear Weather

Exeggutor

Sorry, it’s just normal Exeggutor. Not freaky long neck Exeggutor. His grass moves get a boost in sunny weather, making them extra strong and super effective against rock.

In Sunny/Clear Weather or vs. Electric

Exeggutor – Alola

Here is daddy long neck. If you got Alolan Exeggutor in the short week it was out, you can use it here! Its long neck is also super effective against Regirock.

In Cloudy Weather

 Breloom  Blaziken

With a boost from cloudy weather and super effectiveness against rock, these double fighting Pokemon can be a nice change of pace in cloudy weather.

In Snowy Weather vs. Electric or Rock (yes really)

 Aggron

It pains us to say it, but with a boost from snowy weather, Aggron finally has a place to be almost usable coming in at #3 in snow vs electric or rock specials moves!. So if you are in the southern hemisphere, and it’s snowing, and you want to troll your friends while getting 3 damage balls, here is your chance! Just pick this terrible Pokemon and pray there is no Focus Blast. Or just use Groudon and get 3 bonus balls without rejoining. Best of all, he doesn’t get any better from 35 to 40 (while other Pokemon pass him in effectiveness) so you don’t need to burn stardust.  I expect some trolls in New Zealand or somewhere to post an all Aggron 5 man just to trigger me.

 

Regice

 

 

Regice is unsurprisingly an ice pokemon. As with all the Regis, Regice has high defense and mediocre attack. The one thing going for Regice is flying dragons take double super effective damage from its Frost Breath Blizzard move set and other ice Pokemon are pretty weak currently.  The time to win vs. Dragonite is only a second or two slower than Articuno but Regice is a bit tankier and requires less potions to heal, making it the new Overall #1 counter to Dragonite. So if gyms ever revert to 10x Dragonite again, be ready with some good Regice. Note that in raids, the time to win difference becomes larger and Regice is not as good a counter to Dragonite. Still #4 though which is respectable.

• Focus Blast – A fighting move that hits pretty hard, technically the best gym clearing option for Regice but since his attack is so low, ots’s really not worth using to clear gyms. 
• Earthquake: A ground charge move that could be good for other mons, but is lousy for Regice.
• Frost Breath/Blizzard: For taking down Dragonite in the gym and hopefully future raids, this is ideal moveset. And since this is the only current possible use for Regice, this is the moveset to get!

General Counters

As Regice is an ice Pokemon, his big weaknesses are fire and fighting, making his best counters fire and fighting mons because duh.

 Moltres

This firey mon puts up a strong fight against Regice, and as one of the strongest fire Pokemon in the game, it makes sense to have at least one or two powered up.

 Ho-Oh

Ho-Oh was just out and about so hopefully you caught as few as he shows up as the second best counter against Regice. But not just ANY Ho-Oh, you need a steel and fire Ho-Oh to take down Regice.  Ho-oh is very tanky and can get 3 bonus balls without rejoining in a 5 man raid which is quite efficient. Remember that Time To Win does not include rejoin time and if you don’t have the mon’s to do a 4 man raid, Ho-Oh is absolutely a good choice in a 5 man raid to save a couple revives.

 Entei

Another strong fire legendary makes an appearance against Regice, to the surprise of no one. Both slower and less tanky than Moltres, it’s still a good option. Entei is faster than Ho-Oh but a lot less tanky, while also being worse than Moltres making it easily #3.

 Charizard

If you managed to get a few good Charizard at the recent community day, then now’s a good time to put him to use. Blast Burn is a very powerful move that puts Charizard as the #1 non-legendary Pokemon against Regice.

 Machamp

Like we mentioned before, double fighting Machamp shows up as a strong counter for all three Regis, so if you’re feeling lazy, just use your Machamp army against all three Regis. They will make a strong team.

 Heracross

For the lucky bastards who have managed to catch the one regional mon that actually shows up on our infographics, here he is again, double fighting Heracross. As we have zero Heracross, we will be over in the corner feeling bitter about the whole thing.

Specific Counters

In Windy or Cloudy Weather and Against Focus Blast

 Mewtwo

With the seemingly never-ending ex-raids, chances are you definitely have some Mewtwo by now. Mewtwo is strong under several conditions against Regice, making him almost, but not quite, a good general counter, but definitely a good specific counter. Note that Focus Blast Mewtwo is what you are looking for here. If you happen to have Shadow Ball like I recommend, Mewtwo is usable in Foggy weather. But that’s not in the infographic because that would be way too confusing and Fog is far too rare to justify taking up that much space.

In Clear Weather

 Flareon

This weaker fire mon gets a boost in the sun making him a good counter against Regice. And he’s such a pretty little kitty… doggy… foxy… whatevery thing. Note: yes my wife wrote that, I’m going to leave it.

In Rainy Weather

 Kyogre

Rain will give beefy Kyogre a big watery boost to take down Regice. I might be partial to Kyogre due to lucking out with 2 perfect weather boosted Kyogre in normally dry Los Angeles. Unbelievable.

*NEW UPDATE*

In Party Weather

 Tyranitar

With his new Smack Down move from the recent community day, double rock Tyranitar becomes a strong competitor against Regice in partly cloudy weather with the number one TTW in that weather.

Registeel

 

 

We had to double and triple check the CP on this dude for the infographic. It is super LOW for a legendary and continues with the Regis theme of being medium defense, low attack and low stamina. His defensive stats in the main game are both set to 150 which results in the mediocre defense here. He’s even less interesting and useful than the other two.

 Hyperbeam: This normal move could be decent on other mons, but Registeel’s attack is so low, it still sucks. 

Focus Blast:  A fighting move that hits pretty hard, normally. But again, Registeel sucks too much to matter.

Flash Cannon: See above. And what’s with giving a steel Pokemon zero steel moves? It’s like they were trying to make him as awful as possible.

General Counters

With a few exceptions, these are pretty similar to Regice as fighitng and fire are super effective against steel as well.

 Moltres

Moltres makes number one counter again, making spending stardust on this guy super efficient. Fire is super effective against steel making him kick some Registeel butt.

 Entei

Second, strongest fire mon is the second strongest counter against Registeel. Makes sense to us. Obviously both of these fire pokemon are great in clear weather too.

 Machamp

We said it once, we said it twice, and now we shall say it thrice. Fighting Machamp is strong against all the Regis.

 Hariyama

As fighting is super effective against steel, the second strongest fighter in the game makes the cut as a general counter against Registeel.

 Blaziken

With both fire and fighting being super effective against steel, and him having a fighting quick move and fire charge move, Blaziken comes out guns blazing against Registeel.

 Charizard

Charizard makes another appearance against the Regis. He’s not the strongest option, but he’s decent enough against Registeel. You want Blast Burn of course

Specific Counters

Versus Focus Blast and in Cloudy

 Heracross

You South American bastards get the advantage against with this actually useful regional mon against a Registeel with Focus Blast.

In Clear Weather

 Groudon

Clear weather gives double ground Groudon a lovely boost to take down Regice. And if you don’t have any powered up Groudon by now, who even ARE you???? Note that if earthquake ever gets a buff or Groudon gets his signature ground move, Groudon will be a strong contender for best ground pokemon.

In Rainy Weather

 Kyogre

Those summer rains will give Kyogre a beautiful boost to take down Registeel. Too bad it NEVER rains in the summer where we live. But if you happen to live in a city with thunderstorms, this is your lucky day to use your Kyogre.

In Cloudy Weather

 Breloom

Cloudy weather puts some extra fight in this double fighting Pokemon making him useful against Registeel.

Closing Thoughts

Regice, Registeel and Regirock are not good Pokemon making the upcoming next few months for raiding potentially pretty meh. We will see what Niantic does to keep things interesting until gen 4 is released. We have multiple different events coming up, hopefully there will be something exciting raid related to distract us from how bad these Pokemon are.