5-Star Tera Dragon Shiny Rayquaza Raid (Dec 20- Jan 5) & More

[AztecCroc]

Now what are they gonna do after this is done? Are we gonna get repeats of past 7 stars like they did with Charizard (though, to be fair, that was for Pokemon Day)? Then again, we are getting Legends Z-A next year so they might be more focused on that. Then again again, it's not like we actually know when it's coming out. For all we know it could release more than half way into the year.

Probably the other legends that are in SV but not catchable.

 

[okispokis]

Well that was anticlimactic. I went for a trial run with my standard raid Florges, threw on Covert Cloak to prevent confusion shenanigans- and easily solo'ed in on my first try. Gardevoir was my one useful partner, it's not even an optimized spread or anything.

Set just for reference; didn't even have to click Synthesis.

Florges @ Covert Cloak
Stats: (294/164/170/227/340/171)
Tera: Fairy
-Calm Mind
-Moonblast
-Draining Kiss
-Synthesis

Now what are they gonna do after this is done? Are we gonna get repeats of past 7 stars like they did with Charizard (though, to be fair, that was for Pokemon Day)? Then again, we are getting Legends Z-A next year so they might be more focused on that. Then again again, it's not like we actually know when it's coming out. For all we know it could release more than half way into the year.

All I know is they better do RagingCrown and GougingBoulder at some point. Please just let me have all of them at once for the love of Arceus why did you split up the trios like this my OCD is going-

 

[R_N]

Just used my Arceus and caught it in a Safari Ball

Took a longer battle than it should have since I had some bad rolls on Hurricane so I needed to use heal cheers but pretty simple

 

[Worldie]

I ended up just going with Clefable on the main game and Zacian on the other. Had to take a death on Zacian just to terastal out of steel type but heh.

Overally a pretty easy raid even to do online as long as you don't get that one guy locking in Baxcalibur and spamming Glaive Rush (???? bruh why)

 

[doipy hooves]

Since Nrom7 on discord has been doing some clears with Tera Ice Marill and Draining Kiss Igglybuff already, I wanted to find my own unique approach to an Azurill solo clear and decided to go for the speedkill/not quite OHKO I was denied earlier, even despite the early shield at 75% timer/80% HP, on top of the stat resets tied to both triggers.

https://stevecooktu.github.io/sv_raid_lookup/ helpfully shows Rayquaza's total time is 450 seconds as a reference point, with the relevant resets/shield going up being at just over 100 seconds.

The Goal​

​

Here is Azurill's base damage output with just the typical Belly Drum:
+6 252+ Atk Huge Power Tera Fairy Azurill Tera Blast (80 BP) vs. Lvl 75 0 HP / 0 Def Tera Dragon Rayquaza: 1708-2012 (18.4 - 21.6% of 35x hp boss) -- possible 5HKO

(Technically this Rayquaza has a fair chance of rolling imperfect bulk IVs but I don't have a good way to tell or rely on that.)

Azurill isn't too far from an ideal kill range by stacking enough multipliers, but it does require spending turns on an attack cheer and quite a few defense debuffs, though the latter can be compressed by Leer AI like Arcanine and Weavile.
+6 252+ Atk Huge Power Tera Fairy Azurill Atk Cheer Tera Blast (80 BP) vs. -4 Lvl 75 0 HP / 0 Def Tera Dragon Rayquaza: 7720-9084 (83.2 - 97.9% of 35x hp boss) -- guaranteed 2HKO

Unlike most 7-star bosses, Rayquaza’s shield has an 80% damage rate on matching tera moves instead of 70%, so I figured -4 would be enough after hitting the 80% shield and letting the AI chip and maybe getting a high roll. But in this attempt Arcanine actually managed to Leer every chance he got, and so I actually got Rayquaza down to -5 defense to seal the deal.

+6 252+ Atk Huge Power Tera Fairy Azurill Atk Cheer Tera Blast (80 BP) vs. -5 Lvl 75 0 HP / 0 Def Tera Dragon Rayquaza: 9064-10664 (97.7 - 114.9% of 35x hp boss) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO

​

Offense/Moves​

Azurill maximizes Attack with 252 EVs/Adamant/Huge Power/Belly Drum as usual.

Unlike most pokemon with actual movesets like Marill, Azurill has to rely on Tera Blast as its best physical Fairy option and damaging move in general to kill Rayquaza with. This forces Azurill in the more unique dilemma of scrounging up 3 extra turns to charge tera within time, on top of Defense debuffs, Belly Drum, and an attack cheer, but fortunately Mud-Slap can do its job and also give Azurill a chance to survive all these turns. Combined with the 75% time limit for the boss debuff reset, it doesn't seem like there's much leeway to fit in an early kill, but it turns out the turns can work out if the AI just cooperates.

I personally noticed Azurill can exactly fit in the 7 turns of setup at worst before the Draco Meteor/reset triggers to end the run. The worst attempt I recall only got in 6 turns, but I think I was trying to fit in Draining Kiss as my charging move and taking on full animation time.

I use Tail Whip over Tickle just to save time from the extra -1 Attack message. I don't know if it's totally necessary but the AI covers attack debuffs well enough anyway.

Defense/Item​

I just left Azurill with the same defensive EVs as I left for Torterra. It is worth noting that 40 Speed EVs allows Azurill to outspeed a paralyzed 31 Speed IV Rayquaza, or you could work with a lower speed IV Rayquaza as well which I accidentally found at first until the day rolled over.

I think Eviolite is still Azurill's best item here, because while Azurill wants to avoid hits to save time and HP, Turn 1 is basically a guaranteed hit anyway, so taking less damage upfront helps the chance of success when Azurill can take another hit or two while staying in Belly Drum range. After turn 1 you have the AI defense cheer to help further, and having AI like Sylveon's Charm/Moonblast in my case can also help mitigate both sides. I noticed generally Azurill can afford to take two hits even near the start.

Lvl 75 0 SpA Tera Dragon Rayquaza Hurricane vs. 12 HP / 176 SpD Eviolite Tera Fairy Azurill: 96-114 (39.3 - 46.7%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
-1 Lvl 75 0+ Atk Tera Dragon Rayquaza Earthquake vs. 12 HP / 68 Def Eviolite Tera Fairy Azurill: 51-61 (20.9 - 25%) -- 0% chance to 4HKO
-1 Lvl 75 0+ Atk Tera Dragon Rayquaza Extreme Speed vs. 12 HP / 68 Def Eviolite Tera Fairy Azurill: 41-49 (16.8 - 20%) -- possible 5HKO

AI setup​

As usual, I locked in a favourable AI setup by using the group raid trick. My goal here was generally just to find Arcanine for a Leer user as the first thing I needed, since I worried about Weavile going for too much damage. I ended up getting slot 1 Arcanine/Dudunsparce/Sylveon which I found workable.

Arcanine in slot 1 is not ideal because it will forgo a T1 move for a defense cheer, but I felt the other two mons here make up for it.

Ideally Arcanine would use 2 Leers while I use Mud-Slap x2 and Tail Whip to get to -4 Defense right as the shield goes up. Unfortunately I kept noticing it going for 1 Leer and 2 Bites more often than not and seeing the shield go up anyway at -3 Defense. On one occasion the AI somehow didn't chip it into the 80% HP shield, maybe because of Hurricane confusion, but I was once able to provide 2 Tail Whips on my own which would be nice if it was more reliable.

Dudunsparce was a pleasant surprise for me. It pretty much always Glares T1, which adds another 25% chance for Rayquaza to miss a turn, stacking on top of Mud-Slap making it a 9/16 coinflip. If Azurill outspeeds after paralysis as mentioned, setting up the next Mud-Slaps without taking damage becomes more reliable as well, though it can still randomly go for Extreme Speed. Maybe without Dudunsparce I also might have been able to get to -4 defense more reliably on my own without it always going for Hyper Drill.

Sylveon can kind of contribute early with Charm and Moonblast to ward off both offenses as well. I think it's a pretty alright support. Charm really helps lower Attack more than Arcanine's Intimidate in the long run, since Rayquaza doesn't end up causing much death, and it definitely mattered in the final run to let Azurill take a few hits with ease.

Strategy​

Getting hit by T0 Dragon Ascent is a reset.
Azurill uses Mud-Slap 3 times. Generally I would just start paying attention/clipping from Mud-Slap 2 to see if Arcanine Leered and Rayquaza hit.
Azurill uses Tail Whip, hopefully getting Rayquaza down to -4 Defense after Dragon Ascent and Arcanine moving 3 times by now. The shield usually goes up either way at this point and this is where I most often reset because of Arcanine using 2 Bites after a Leer.
Azurill casts an Attack Cheer (for more AI chip) and Belly Drums (ideally having the spare HP for it).
Azurill finally terastallizes and uses Tera Blast to end Rayquaza.

Unlike Torterra, there's not really much to adapt to in terms of respawning and the attempts go by quickly, so I followed a pretty rigid set of moves. I had one run early on while I was trying Bright Powder over Eviolite and actually afforded using a heal cheer to make it to Belly Drum while Rayquaza was at -5 defense, but it didn't kill because I had to forsake the attack cheer instead.

Successful run​

I started fighting Rayquaza pretty late in the night and had to go find a new Rayquaza after midnight rolled over. It wasn't slower than me after paralysis, but I ended up winning right afterwards. I actually managed to get the whole run clipped so I can provide a full log of events here.

T0: Dragon Ascent targeted Arcanine. (-1)
T1: Rayquaza led with Earthquake (185/244), Dudunsparce Glared, Sylveon Moonblasted.

T2: Rayquaza outsped with EQ and missed, AI used Leer/Hyper Drill/Charm (-2)
T3: Rayquaza EQ missed, AI used Leer/Hyper Drill/Charm (-3)
T4: Rayquaza Extreme Speeds (159/244), Azurill Tail Whips to -4, Arcanine Leers for -5, Dudunsparce Hyper Drills, Sylveon Moonblasts, shield/buff reset goes up on HP

T5: cast Attack Cheer, Rayquaza hits Extreme Speed (135/244)

T6: Rayquaza misses EQ, Azurill Belly Drums
T7: Rayquaza misses Hurricane, Azurill teras and wins.

Overall figuring out an actual challenge out of Rayquaza to push Azurill with was a nice way to cap off the year. I can't blame gamefreak for making this fight lighter even after all the promotion, but it goes to show you can still make your own fun, and I have to admit it's still better than another setup spammer. Hopefully gamefreak still has more interesting boss ideas to release in 2025.

EDIT: I think Extreme Speed feels like a faster animation than Earthquake too for what it's worth.

 

[Jungle cruiser]

Phew, took a few tries, but I managed to win with my favorite bread doggo!

Dachsbun
Ability: Well-Baked Body
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature
- Charm
- Snarl
- Play Rough
- Wish
Originally had howl as a general support and self setup option, but as I did the raids I noticed special attackers turned out to be way more common and hurricane did way more damage than desirable, so I replaced it with snarl. Honestly I couldn't really decide on an item, so I left the mirror herb in, but I do want to change it moving forward.

 

[DougJustDoug]

As many have said, this Rayquaza raid is not too tough. Pretty much any Fairy should be able to power through, even if not optimally built. I’ve been using Azumarill, Hatterene and Primarina mostly. Also I’ve been using Alcremie in online raids doing Decorate to help teammates clear the raid faster. I’ve only lost one online raid, and that was with some almost shockingly bad randoms that didn’t look too bad in the lobby: A Sylveon that Calm Minded a few times and then turned out to be Tera Water and used Play Rough as its only attack (wtf?), and an Azumarill that Belly Drummed and spammed Swift (WTF!?!). Sometimes I am amazed at the stuff you see in these raids…

This raid doesn’t need anything specifically built for it, but I like designing stuff for raids and using less-obvious mons, so this is what I made specifically for this rayquaza raid… just because:


Beartic @ Shell Bell
Tera Type: Ice
Ability: Snow Cloak
Adamant Nature
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk
- Icicle Crash
- Chilling Water
- Snarl
- Swords Dance

I wanted to use an Ice mon for this, since the Fairy design space on this raid is well-traveled already. Beartic fit my criteria almost perfectly, because it has great balanced defensive stats to deal with Ray hitting with both physical and special moves. Also, Beartic has the nifty combination of Chilling Water and Snarl, so it can lower Ray’s damage on both sides as well. That’s how I start the battle, using CWater and Snarl to build tera while waiting for the player stat reset. After the reset, I Swords Dance three times and then spam Icicle Crash for the rest of the battle. Shell Bell recovers health as you go.

I initially wanted to go with Loaded Dice and Icicle Spear, since it does a lot more damage than IceCrash and is 100% acccurate. But the animation time on Spear is ridiculous, and without Shell Bell then I’d need to do cheers or rely on someone else for healing. Crash misses are not too bad (it’s 90% accurate) and the animation time benefit is well worth it, imo.

All three of Beartic’s abilities are weather-dependent, which means against Rayquaza’s Air Lock, Bear’s ability is basically irrelevant. But, since I am making this optimized, even though optimal solutions are unnecessary, here’s my reasoning for Snow Cloak — if, by some bizarre chance, an online teammate gets rid of Air Lock and sets Snow, then I reason that Snow Cloak would be optimal since it increases the misses of Rayquaza’s Hurricanes, and their subsequently very annoying confusion, which a +6 Attack Beartic REALLY doesn’t wanna deal with. Yeah, it’s a huge stretch to think Snow Cloak might come into play, but hey, this whole thing is really just a thought exercise in designing a good solution for a raid that has little need for a good solution in the first place!

 

[SadisticMystic]

Even my trusty sidekick gets through with little trouble.


Suicune @ Covert Cloak
Ability: Pressure
Bold Nature
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 242 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD / 12 Spe
- Ice Beam
- Calm Mind
- Rest
- Scald

Ice Beam instead of the usual Substitute to actually have hitting power, and Covert Cloak to prevent Hurricane confusion and not waste time with recovery animations every turn. Rest alone is enough healing for the 1-2 times that the damage adds up to be threatening; following it up with a heal cheer can save 1 sleep turn each time.

I start with Scald just to fish for the burn and have a source of chip damage; you could also use it to build tera charge (preferably with a better tera type) but I went into this figuring we could do this tera-less, an assessment which proved accurate. There's no need to start boosting until after the wipe, for less maintenance in making the boosts stick.

With all the boosts up (and the shield certainly up by now as well), non-STAB Ice Beam from a pretty tame attack stat deals unimpressive damage even at +6, but between that and whatever piddly damage the teammates chip in, keep at it and it'll add up. If you get to 6 PP left on Ice Beam with two cheers in reserve, or 3 PP with one cheer, might as well use attack cheers to maximize the impact of those last few PP so it can deal enough damage in time. Because getting PP stalled by the massively inflated health bar is just not how you operate.

Isn't it?

 

[doipy hooves]

With all the boosts up (and the shield certainly up by now as well), non-STAB Ice Beam from a pretty tame attack stat deals unimpressive damage even at +6, but between that and whatever piddly damage the teammates chip in, keep at it and it'll add up. If you get to 6 PP left on Ice Beam with two cheers in reserve, or 3 PP with one cheer, might as well use attack cheers to maximize the impact of those last few PP so it can deal enough damage in time. Because getting PP stalled by the massively inflated health bar is just not how you operate.

Setting the attack cheer uses up a turn, so normally you only personally get 2 boosted attacks out of each cheer at most in solo, though the AI gets to chip over 3 turns I guess. At least with the defense cheer you can still get a benefit from the turn you set it on.

 

[DHR-107]

Also cleared no problems with Azumarill, but I was mostly in the supporter role to two excellent Sylveons this time around. Just chipping damage and using Charm after resets. All four of us were Fairy's and after a Charm/2 Ray's physical attacks didn't do all that much at all.

Well worth farming this one for the Herba if you're not already bulging with the stuff though, a few drops from each raid (And I've seen online of up to 5?) and its a pretty non scary clear too.

 

[Omastar68]

It sounds easy for people?!

Odd I'm just losing. I have nothing at all built for raids specifically, but I do have an ok ish mon in magnet rise Klefki(Draining Kiss but only lvl 85 rofl.) BD Azu doesn't seem flawless at all here, so randoms aren't much help...

 

[Worldie]

Odd I'm just losing. I have nothing at all built for raids specifically

Well you see where the issue with not finding it easy is.

If you want to run BD Azu, wait until the buff clear, just spam draining kiss to build tera until then

 

[R_N]

It sounds easy for people?!

Odd I'm just losing. I have nothing at all built for raids specifically, but I do have an ok ish mon in magnet rise Klefki(Draining Kiss but only lvl 85 rofl.) BD Azu doesn't seem flawless at all here, so randoms aren't much help...

In addition to what worldie said you should also probably dump exp candies into your attackers so they're level 100. This will also raise the CPU levels accordingly.

 

[Omastar68]

Ok yeah. I actually decided to skip it after all like I was gonna, using reg Ray next reg. Well, return to reg g. Shiny woulda been slightly neat, but overall not worth the hassle ty though!

 

[Arcticblast]

Ok yeah. I actually decided to skip it after all like I was gonna, using reg Ray next reg. Well, return to reg g. Shiny woulda been slightly neat, but overall not worth the hassle ty though!

If you train a Sylveon, Primarina, or Azumarill to level 100, then fight and defeat Rayquaza three times, you will probably have earned back all of the resources you used, either literally through candy drops or by selling the Proteins, extra Exp Candy, or Dragon Tera Shards. It's actually very much worth your time to farm Rayquaza if you want to build competitive teams on cart.
I can't recommend you use the Rayquaza in Reg G though, it's not broken enough. Send it to BDSP and get a bunch of ribbons on it for show, maybe?

 

[reaverz]

While the live event is technically over, this is one that is worth keeping by staying offline, at the very least until the shiny snake outbreak event begins. To that end, for anyone who still has the event and enjoys collecting marks, there are a couple of weather marks that I believe are exclusive to this outbreak event.

• Cetoddle: The event is currently the only way to have the Sandstorm Mark on the line since it can outbreak in Asado Desert. I initially thought that the Rainy Mark and Stormy Mark were exclusive as well, but while checking some outbreaks I realized that Cetoddle and Cetitan can already appear in the snowy part of the North Province (Area One), to the northeast of Glaseado Mountain, where it will occasionally rain but never snow.
• Carbink: While Sword/Shield already allows for Carbink with most weather marks due to a quirk (see below posts), I believe that the event is the only way to have an SV-origin Carbink with the Rainy Mark, Stormy Mark, and Misty Mark. Carbink only spawns normally in Kitakami caves, where the weather is changed upon entry depending on the weather outside. If Kitakami's weather is the default clear, then the weather in the cave will be considered to be clear as well. If it is overcast, raining, or storming, the weather will be changed to overcast when entering the cave.
• Fraxure: The event does not provide any new possible weather marks for it as its line can already spawn in Paldea, specifically in areas where it can either rain or snow. Sword/Shield also allows for most weather marks on the line.

I know this info may come too late for some unfortunately, but I figured I may as well go ahead and post it for those who still have the event and may also be interested in novel weather marks.

 

[AztecCroc]

Carbink: I believe that the event is currently the only way to have the Rainy Mark and Stormy Mark on it, while it is definitely the only way to have a Carbink with the Misty Mark.

Nope, only way with the SV origin mark maybe, but Carbink was in SwSh.

 

[R_N]

Nope, only way with the SV origin mark maybe, but Carbink was in SwSh.

Judging from what reaverz said about its spawn quiirks I believe that because Carbink only spawns in Caves in SWSH, it couldn't spawn with marks there either.

Serebii's SWSH mark legality page seems to corroborate this, assuming it wasn't an error on his part.

 

[AztecCroc]

Judging from what reaverz said about its spawn quiirks I believe that because Carbink only spawns in Caves in SWSH, it couldn't spawn with marks there either.

Serebii's SWSH mark legality page seems to corroborate this, assuming it wasn't an error on his part.

Roaring-Sea Cave has weather dependent encounters, its absolutely possible to get weather marked Carbink from there at least. Though likely tedious.

 

[R_N]

Roaring-Sea Cave has weather dependent encounters, its absolutely possible to get weather marked Carbink from there at least. Though likely tedious.

If we're just basing this on encounter tables then the surfing encounters are influenced by weather, but the cave's land encounters aren't.

I think that leaves open the possibility that Serebii's legality page is correct and that the behavior of cave spawns in SV might indicate similar behavior in SWSH's wild areas having its own mark spawn rules.

I actually did try to check around to see if anyone else had a page on these kind of quirks, but beyond serebii's (which didn't even show up on the search for me, I only found it while checking his general page on marks in SWSH) no one seems to have even asked about it.

 

[reaverz]

As it turns out, the Roaring-Sea Caves in the Crown Tundra have an entrance (the one leading to the NPC that makes the Galarica Wreath) where spawns within the cave can happen while standing just outside. Since your map location is still Frigid Sea while standing just outside the cave in this manner, Carbink and others can spawn with weather marks corresponding to the current weather of Frigid Sea, including the Rainy Mark, Stormy Mark, and Misty Mark.

I have updated my original post accordingly. Thank you AztecCroc and R_N for the heads up!

 

[R_N]

As it turns out, the Roaring-Sea Caves in the Crown Tundra have an entrance (the one leading to the NPC that makes the Galarica Wreath) where spawns within the cave can happen while standing just outside. Since your map location is still Frigid Sea while standing just outside the cave in this manner, Carbink and others can spawn with weather marks corresponding to the current weather of Frigid Sea, including the Rainy Mark, Stormy Mark, and Misty Mark.

I have updated my original post accordingly. Thank you AztecCroc and R_N for the heads up!

So it did wind up having a quirk, it just wound up working similarly to people using the mist on the outskirts of kitakami? That's fun, I love that stuff.