Let's examine Darkrai's priority weakness.
252+ Atk Choice Band Rillaboom Grassy Glide vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Darkrai in Grassy Terrain: 205-243 (72.9 - 86.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Grassy Terrain recovery
Tera Grass has an 81.3% chance to OHKO, which costs your Tera while Darkrai can Tera Poison.
252+ Atk Choice Band Tera Normal Dragonite Extreme Speed vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Darkrai: 240-283 (85.4 - 100.7%) -- 6.3% chance to OHKO
Requires hazards to reliably kill from full, hope the Darkrai isn't Boots.
252 SpA Choice Specs Tera Fighting Iron Valiant Vacuum Wave vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Darkrai: 272-320 (96.7 - 113.8%) -- 75% chance to OHKO
Valiant is obviously used with Booster more, but Specs is a real set and Darkrai's presence might necessitate Vacuum Wave teched on. Unfortunately, it requires Tera like Rillaboom and Darkrai can Tera right back out like Rillaboom.
252+ Atk Black Glasses Supreme Overlord 5 allies fainted Tera Dark Kingambit Sucker Punch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Darkrai: 170-200 (60.4 - 71.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
Not even close. Ironically, Tera Poison hurts Darkrai in thi--what's that? Tera Fairy Darkrai (or just not Tera-ing at all) also bitch slaps 85% of the tier with not nearly enough overlap with Poison?
So all the priority that I've seen mentioned in the last few pages that really threatens Darkrai requires Tera on the user's side to threaten an OHKO and the most reliable can be blocked by Darkrai's own Tera. Unless you're extremely confident in your ability to make your opponent press their funny button first, this sounds like a resource exchange heavily lopsided in Darkrai's favor.
like i dont know why Darkrai has such a high bar to clear. The vast majority offensive threats do not get OHKO'd by priority. But suddenly this is an exchange "heavily lopsided in Darkrai's favor" like losing most of your HP in a metagame infested with hazards is something a sweeper wants to be doing ever. The mental gymnastics being preformed here is comical.
hypnosis is bad and has been talked to death. Please stop bringing it up.
talk about potential sets that would be actually used, like NP 3 attacks or choice specs/darkrai. They are good and potentially broken.
This argument has fallen into a fallacy I like to call "Always has the optimal set". This happens a lot when a pokemon has multiple viable sets. It is always presumed when arguing about a pokemon that it always has the best most viable set that it can run, which is not how it works in reality. Darkrai loses to fairies without a poison move. Darkrai loses to bulky steels and darks without a fighting move. Darkrai really needs a boosting move or Item to break through common walls. Darkrai needs boots to not get worn down quickly. All of these cannot be true at the same time, but everyone here just picks and chooses the best set that proves their point.
NP 3 attacks and choice specs are really good and threatening, but is highly vulneranble to revenge killing from the plethora of fast attackers and priority moves in the tier.
Choice scarf is excellent speed control and a great revenge killer, but is highly vulnerable to both hazards and priority, and struggles in breaking walls.
lifeorb does heavy damage but gets chipped into oblivion
Every set is strong, but has solid counterplay from meta pokeomn already in the tier
Last edited by a moderator: