Sun / Moon In-Game Tier List

I doubt the shifts will really be that pronounced - Abra and Cubone may go up a tier, but the rest is just Battle Spot stuff. And Abra was doing pretty well already.
 

DHR-107

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Cubone shouldn't be affected by it. Unless they outright change the level that Shadow Bone is learnt by Marowak. The problem there is Marowak learns it a level before Cubone can evolve. Shadow Bone is 27, while Cubone evolves at 28. Unless they marry them up, theres no way for Marowak to learn the move without a Heart Scale.

Which is stupid as all fuck and whoever decided that should be fired. If someone can check this though it would be ace :)
 
Given the advent of 1.1, I actually would suggest that the Pokemon that get affected by it should have both a 1.0 rank and a 1.1 rank. I know that sounds a bit silly, but given the fact that a lot of people probably intend to use this thread as a resource, I think that doing so would be the most useful for newcomers while also serving as a reminder for Abra users to update their game. Plus, it's not like it's impossible for people to play through the main story without updating, as the update is only required to go online.
 

Codraroll

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Given the advent of 1.1, I actually would suggest that the Pokemon that get affected by it should have both a 1.0 rank and a 1.1 rank. I know that sounds a bit silly, but given the fact that a lot of people probably intend to use this thread as a resource, I think that doing so would be the most useful for newcomers while also serving as a reminder for Abra users to update their game. Plus, it's not like it's impossible for people to play through the main story without updating, as the update is only required to go online.
Nah, it would be sufficient to put a text (disclaimer/warning?) in the OP that all tiers are relevant as of update 1.1. If people are savvy enough to find this thread and use for reference, they should have no problems updating their Pokémon games.
 
I know in most of the old in-game tier list we gave each pokemon a small write-up. Don't know if we'll ever get to that, but if we could just put details like update requirements, Island Scanning or Poke Pelago in the writeups it could make tiering less complicated.
 
Given the advent of 1.1, I actually would suggest that the Pokemon that get affected by it should have both a 1.0 rank and a 1.1 rank. I know that sounds a bit silly, but given the fact that a lot of people probably intend to use this thread as a resource, I think that doing so would be the most useful for newcomers while also serving as a reminder for Abra users to update their game. Plus, it's not like it's impossible for people to play through the main story without updating, as the update is only required to go online.
What is the point of this, exactly

The game actively yells at you to update and gives a direct option to update right then and there. And there's no reason not to? Unless they drastically changed a laundry list of pokemon between 1.0 & 1.1 there is no ~efficiency~ reason to NOT update. The only way 1.0 Abra is relevant is a scenario where you just got the game and suddenly can not update conenct to any wifi hotspot for the 2 minutes it takes to download the update at any point while you want to do your run. Which is, let's say, probably not the big case study here.

e: Case study what am I even talking about
Not the most wide spread scenario
 
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Alolan Raichu to A.

Pichu is a complete asshole when it comes to evolving, but do it as fast as possible. Pikachu gets Electro Ball at Lv 13, which sweeps A LOT in Alola. Everyting is slow. Psychic is a great STAB move that can come in handy against Hala in the E4. Thunderbolt is hard to get. You need a Lv 43 Pikachu, OR you relearn it, OR you get the TM... which is post-game. Relearning is the best option. In Seafolk Village, you can show someone your Raichu and you get the Aloraichium Z. This move... whoops ass. 180 BP. If they tank it, they'll get paralyzed. ALL. THE. TIME. Great Z-move if you don't wanna use Specs. The last move is personal preference. Nuzzle if you don't have the Z-crystal, Fake Out for support, Volt Switch for momentum, or Grass Knot (or wait for a Surf event or something) for coverage against Ground. Raichu is great, Pikachu is as strong as your starter, but the HUGE drawback... you gotta evolve the Pichu. Well, there's Refresh and a Soothe Bell on Route 3...
Pichu is practically dead weight outside of Charm I guess. It's a pain to evolve (Refresh does affection, not friendship) and even with Soothe Bell it's not efficient. You also have to get a 5% chance of catching it. Not only did they make this Pokemon rare, but a pain to evolve too.

Pikachu isn't much better. You'll probably be evolving it after Level 13 (unless you go out of your way to evolve it, which should count against it more than it should count for it) in which case you're stuck with Thundershock, and Electro Ball isn't that good. You have to wait until Konikoni to evolve Pikachu, which is quite late for such a terrible Pokemon. Not to mention Pikachu still has the bulk of a wet paper bag. Pichu/Pikachu don't have many great matchups either.

Gumshoos/Raticate-A: Too frail
Hau: He gets an early Pikachu when you're most likely a Pichu. Neutral Match Up VS Rowlet/Litten, good against Popillio
Hala: Too frail (Charm can be useful but Pichu still gets 2HKOed, it has one of the worst Physical bulks in the game, Pikachu is better if you have it but still frail)
Washi: Actually a good match-up, especially if you have Electro Ball
Salazzle: Again, too frail
Lurantis: Too frail, Solar Blade rips you to shreds

Simply put, Pichu/Pikachu requiring a lot of babying and drag down the viability (only really good against 1 major battle), but Raichu-A is pretty good, at least. That's why it's current placement is fine, I think.

Also "everything is slow" is a little overhyped, there's more than just Alola Pokemon you know.
 

Colonel M

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Only ranking with current patch.

With that said I dont think I raised Butterfree last time even though I meant to. Kadabra will also rise freely with the fix. I will raise it a tier for now.

I'll do updates later today. Got rather swamped in the competitive mons.
 
I believe Mudsdale should go up. Bray is pretty good, and gets Horsepower pretty soon. Double Kick and Heavy Slam are good coverage, and Stamina is awesome against physical attackers. if you can tank it once, you can use potions to stall easily. Let's see the matchups:

Wishiwashi - no. Although you can outspeed It.

Gladion - DKick hits Null kinda hard, although the ZMove is wasted on It.

Salazzle - ez oneshot gg lol xd. Can tank both of her attacks even with a -SpD nature.

Lurantis - no. But again, that Lurantis kills half the game.

Plumeria (i dont really remember where she is): SALANDIT

Olivia - Pretty useful, although not an easy win.

UB 01 - gg ez $$ roflmao. Same as Salazzle.

Vikavolt - can tank everything thrown at him and Rock Tomb does serious damage. Rockinium Z is Easy Money.

Mimikyu - Heavy Slam. Z-move to overkill.

Ya boi - Can tank Shell slash and outspeeds. Rock tomb for bit of them

Nanu - DKick

Faba - nor great nor bad.

Destruction in human form - Pretty much the same.

Lusamine - Decent against Bewear and HSlam flattens Clefable. Coincidentially, they're her best mons.

Hapu - Decent

Kommo-o - Decent

Lusalego - Same as before.

Gladion - Weavile (DKick) Lucario (Quake) Crobat (RTomb ) Can be killed easily, but it can only take on Fire Silva.

Hau (All battles) Raichu dies a hopeless death.

Hala - Needs some healing to get the Def Boosts, but can Sweep

Olivia - rock

GhostGirlICantRememberTheNameOf - Gengar is dead if It doesnt kill you first.

OtherGirlNobodyCaresAbout - RTomb may help.

Kukui - Incenaroar, Lycanroc and Snorlax are killed by CCombat. Magnezone... well.

Mudsdale is one of the best pokes ingame and one of the coolest. A tier imo.

As for catching, great against physical attackers and Xurkitree.

(This is also my first post!)
 
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I think I'll double post (sorry) to give my two cents about my team.

Decidueye - Upper mid. Good learnset, Sucker Punch screws would-be counters. Kinda boring mid-game, but has it's uses.

WishiWashi - Top. Nukes hard, "evolves" early and Scald makes it great. Plus, it was always the highest leveled member of my team, thanks to its fast exp. growth.

Muk - High. It did take a lot to evolve, but it's good goverage + black sludge/eviolite made him useful for all the game. It also helped me by toxicing Lurantis with Poison Fang.

Mudsdale - High/Top. Need i talk about it agains?

Ribombee - Upper Mid. Outsped everything, nice coverage, but, even with a SpA boosting nature, often missed on the kill.

Snorlax - High/Top. Brick Break murders the first trial in Moon and helps in Sun. Mine evolved in the Diglett Cave, and murdered half the game. MVP in the E4, BBreak GImpact HHorsepower Crunch coverage is crazy, although it's useless against Hala.
 

Karxrida

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Colonel M B Tier is incorrectly labeled as B Mid.

Also can we talk about Magearna? The QR code can apparently be redeemed until the end of time so it's pretty much permanently available.
 
I don't see Fletching/Talonflame being A-tier, more of a B-tier.
It's good at using Acrobatics and that's where it stops. Secondary typing of fire does it little to no justice since you all you get is Flame Charge untill you move relearn it Flare Blitz.
Neutral Acrobatics actually hits harder than a SE Flame charge.. Advantage of setting up with Swords Dance is disregarded by the fact that any pokemon can do so with X Attack and it has next to no good coverage moves.
Fire typing is mostly there to remove weakness to Ice and make sure any Rock move that hits you is a certain death.
I know the existance of another pokemon shouldn't influence the tier rating of another but in the same tier is Crobat.

Crobat has more:
- Attack
- Bulk
- Speed

Way better secondary attack in Cross Poison and has other useful moves like U-Turn and Leech Life.
Zubat's early few levels is pretty poor but starting level 13 it can hold its ground with Wing Attack, it doesn't require excessive babying.
I think Crobat is actually so good it could go up to S-tier. If it doesn't I would at the very least say that Fletchling drops to B-tier.
Am I missing something here?
 

Adamant Zoroark

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I'm playing through Pokemon Moon at the moment with a team of Primarina / Gengar / Mudsdale / Lilligant / Muk / Hariyama, and I just want to comment that I'm perplexed as to how Grimer is so high in the rankings.

Sure, it pretty much bodies any Psychic- or Ghost-type, but it suffers from one critical flaw: It evolves at Level 38, which is way too late for a Pokemon that's obtainable as early as it is. As such, it's stuck with LC stats for a significant chunk of the game (mine was OHKOed by Totem Mimikyu and didn't evolve until Po Town - it was the last Pokemon on my team to reach its final evolution stage) and therefore finds itself simultaneously too weak and too frail. I found it pretty much benched for almost all of Akala Island, excluding Mallow's Trial where it was used to fish for Poison on Totem Lurantis with Poison Fang, and almost all of Ula'ula Island.

Once it finally evolves, it's great, but there's just too significant of a chunk of the game where its stats are decidedly underwhelming. As such, I'd say it should drop to B, but definitely not lower (it at least gets decent STAB right away unlike many of the things sitting in C)
 
gotta disagree, grimer has a higher attack stat than talonflame along with an excellent movepool. it's also the perfect pokemon to give the eviolite to, letting it soak up a ton of punishment and leech away at opponents with poison. when i used it it seemed to be able to beat nigh anything one on one
 
If you ask me, Diglett should be way lower. Alolan Dugtrio is sooo frail and 100 Attack usually doesn't do the trick unless you're one of those EV training people, which, if you're using these in-game tiers, I'd assume you're not.
 

Adamant Zoroark

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gotta disagree, grimer has a higher attack stat than talonflame along with an excellent movepool. it's also the perfect pokemon to give the eviolite to, letting it soak up a ton of punishment and leech away at opponents with poison. when i used it it seemed to be able to beat nigh anything one on one
I'm just not seeing how Grimer could "beat nigh anything one on one". Lilligant was the only thing on my team that was more of a let-down.

Also, it doesn't help that its best Poison STAB is Poison Fang until you can get Poison Jab on... Route 17. Right before Po Town. And that's exactly the problem I had with it - Grimer's damage output was so underwhelming that I had to bench it unless I was facing a Psychic-type or Ghost-type, and the only reason I relied on the Poison Fang badly poison chance for Mallow's Trial was because I didn't have any other option for beating Totem Lurantis, and, at least in my view, when you have to beat something by relying on a non-guaranteed badly poison chance and then proceed to stall, there's a problem. To be frank, I'd be hating on this thing harder if Muk weren't as great as it is.

Also, you're actually wrong about the Talonflame comparison - Talonflame has a higher attack stat than Grimer (81 > 80) but this is mostly splitting hairs at this point as both attack stats are mediocre at best.
 

Darkmalice

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I'm just not seeing how Grimer could "beat nigh anything one on one". Lilligant was the only thing on my team that was more of a let-down.

Also, it doesn't help that its best Poison STAB is Poison Fang until you can get Poison Jab on... Route 17. Right before Po Town. And that's exactly the problem I had with it - Grimer's damage output was so underwhelming that I had to bench it unless I was facing a Psychic-type or Ghost-type, and the only reason I relied on the Poison Fang badly poison chance for Mallow's Trial was because I didn't have any other option for beating Totem Lurantis, and, at least in my view, when you have to beat something by relying on a non-guaranteed badly poison chance and then proceed to stall, there's a problem. To be frank, I'd be hating on this thing harder if Muk weren't as great as it is.

Also, you're actually wrong about the Talonflame comparison - Talonflame has a higher attack stat than Grimer (81 > 80) but this is mostly splitting hairs at this point as both attack stats are mediocre at best.
I used Grimer; it Evolved into Muk during Route 16 / Po Town. It was useful throughout the game.

80 base attack is still ok. It's only bad endgame but it'll be Muk by then. You get Crunch at level 32 which is around the time Bite / Poison Fang become insufficient. Team Skull also had many Zubats/Golbats which are great for Rock Tomb (which you thankfully get early) - even if you haven't evolved by the time you reach Po Town, you should be able to evolve it here before taking on Aether Foundation (which thankfully has many Psychics). Rock / Poison / Dark coverage is respectable. This in addition to its bulk (amazing early game, and Eviolite does patch it up to become respectable until it evolves) and one weakness. I found it to be a safe lead against most trainers. Worse to worse like against a Ground-type, switch out.

To be fair, Lurantis is quite a difficult Totem fight. If you're relying on a Poison Fang badly poison, that means your team as a whole is insufficient to handle Lurantis - you should not be relying on one Pokemon solely to beat it. Grimer has Poison Gas and Rock Tomb for speed control which can be useful for weakening it for another Pokemon to finish off.

It's weakest phase is shortly before Eviolite when its bulk is falling behind, but that doesn't last long, and it was never at the babying stage throughout the game.
 
I used Grimer; it Evolved into Muk during Route 16 / Po Town. It was useful throughout the game.

80 base attack is still ok. It's only bad endgame but it'll be Muk by then. You get Crunch at level 32 which is around the time Bite / Poison Fang become insufficient. Team Skull also had many Zubats/Golbats which are great for Rock Tomb (which you thankfully get early) - even if you haven't evolved by the time you reach Po Town, you should be able to evolve it here before taking on Aether Foundation (which thankfully has many Psychics). Rock / Poison / Dark coverage is respectable. This in addition to its bulk (amazing early game, and Eviolite does patch it up to become respectable until it evolves) and one weakness. I found it to be a safe lead against most trainers. Worse to worse like against a Ground-type, switch out.

To be fair, Lurantis is quite a difficult Totem fight. If you're relying on a Poison Fang badly poison, that means your team as a whole is insufficient to handle Lurantis - you should not be relying on one Pokemon solely to beat it. Grimer has Poison Gas and Rock Tomb for speed control which can be useful for weakening it for another Pokemon to finish off.

It's weakest phase is shortly before Eviolite when its bulk is falling behind, but that doesn't last long, and it was never at the babying stage throughout the game.
I believe Grimer to be one of the best Lurantis counters. As you said, speed control, poison, and maybe hyper poison can really cripple that monster. I've never had too many problems with the bulk, Black Sludge is there before you get Eviolite, and having only one, not too widespread in-game weakness really helps. I actually forgot to give it Rock Tomb, but it was good anyway.
 
Cutiefly: A rank -> B rank

I think that this tier list is overselling Cutiefly too much just because of its impressive speed (especially for an alolan Pokémon) and early game performance while ignoring its many flaws.
While I can kinda see some of Ribombee's qualities such as some rather good matchups against a few important battles in the game like Totem Raticate, Hala (both first and E4 battles), Totem Lurantis, Nanu and Totem Kommo-o alongside its blazing speed and the sometimes helpful Stun Spore, I must say that it still has some glaring flaws which makes me question how does this thing even shares a spot in A rank alongside Wishiwashi, Abra and other absolute powerhouses.

Its typing leaves a lot to be desired both defensively and offensively, while Dragon immunity and 4x fighting resistance are very appealing, its weaknesses to the common Rock, Fire and flying types really push it back, and to add insult to the injury, bug and fairy STABs offer very poor coverage together, add that to this bug's rather shallow movepool, with its offensive options being basically Bug and Fairy type moves with its only coverage options being Psychic, which quite honestly won't be very useful for later important battles, and Energy Ball which doesn't have that much synergy with its STABs, all of this making this mon way too matchup reliant.

Its base stats, bar its incredible speed, are certainly nothing to write home about as its 95 Special Attack, while good, will leave a surprising lack of neutral OHKOs, that wouldn't be that much of a problem with a Pokémon that can afford to take a hit, which is not the case for a Mon with paper-thin 60/60/70 bulk and a bad defensive typing. It is possible to say that Quiver Dance fixes this issue but Ribombee gets it so late in the game (level 49) that it won't matter much. Its bad bulk is also pretty troublesome if you are playing at "set" mode because the pixie has a really hard time switching into anything without letting any of its teammates faint.

This Bug also suffers in the E4 battles, with Hala being the sole exception, it does a very poor job against Olivia despite having access to Energy Ball, because she has not one but two sturdy Pokémon (being Alolan Golem and Probopass) which survive anything it throws at them to smack it with a Rock type move. The bee does nothing against Kahili even after setting up Quiver Dance (if you even manage to do that in the first place). On the other hand, its matchup against Acerola, while not bad, is not great either.

Again, I see why people think this mon is so appealing but it has way too many flaws to be worthy of the A rank.
 

Tomy

I COULD BE BANNED!
Ended my first playthrough of Moon with Decidueye / A-Marowak / Rimbombee / A-Raticate / Lycanroc / Toucannon.

About Decidueye, A-Raticate and Toucannon: Nothing to argue there, most have been said and their tiering is accurate imo.

Ribombee: Limbo A/B tier. I'm torn on this one. Its typing is interesting offensively with useful dual STAB, but a bit lacking defensively, with some really nasty weaknesses. And it's not like it has the bulk to stomach a hit.
On the other side...It has interesting options on its movepool (most notably Psychic and Stun Spore) and Quiver Dance is its saving grace in the end game, fixing a lot of its issues where 95 Sp.ATK starts to falter. So yeah, I'm okay with either of them.

Lycanroc: B tier. I had, as I played the Moon Version, the Night form, and I liked it. STAB deals a large chunk of damage, are upgraded decently fast (Rock Throw -> Rock Tomb -> Rock Slide -> Stone Edge) evolves early, has some interesting coverage (Brick Break, Crunch), can place a Bulk Up because it has actually some sort of bulk, and 82 Speed is enough when Alola is a region where everything is slow as molasses.

A-Marowak: C tier. The unfortunate situation of Shadow Bone is something that really hinders its effectiveness, but its typing alone is a giant roadblock against a lot of opponents (The electric trial, for example, is nothing shot of laughable). Stat-whise, its Attack is decent (becomes massive with Thick Club) and its Defense is massive, tanking a lot of powerful hits. You are stuck with Flame Charge (which can fix its Speed) until Elite 4, but its coverage moves are more than enough to be an active member (Brick Break, Bonemerang, Rock Tomb). I agree it has some flaws, but D is underselling it. It's not optimal, but it has definitely some good things on its own.
 
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