Pokemon Violet - 7* Iron Valiant the Unrivaled with Overqwil

Описание: [UNTIL IT WAS FIXED FOUR DAYS IN/ON MONDAY, YOU COULD NOT JOIN OPPOSITE-VERSION 7* PARADOX EVENT RAIDS ONLINE!]

Surprise! After the Treasures of Ruin raids, our next 7* raid is... a pair of raids! Roaring Moon in Scarlet, and Iron Valiant in Violet, alongside reruns of the 5* raids for the six other paradoxes per verion.

Roaring Moon seemed pretty straightforward (it has super-low special attack so you can assume it's a physical attacker, and presumably it would have Iron Head to counter any ice or fairy types) though since I only own Violet I didn't think too hard about an actual solo counter build (and was just gonna run a support 140 HP/116 Def/252 SpA Modest Iron Bundle, to outspeed and Snowscape/Chilling Water/Aurora Veil and then just attack with Blizzard), but... Iron Valiant's insane coverage was super-intimidating.

Despite having a physical attack in every type except electric/rock/ground/dragon, though, you can actually be not weak to anything:
mono-electric;
dragon/fire (just Reshiram and Gouging Fire);
dark/poison (just Alolan Muk, Skuntank, and Overqwil).
Of the three, it seemed like Overqwil would be most fun, and so I prepped it for this raid. Two sets, even! Adamant physical attacker with Swords Dance/Barb Barrage, and Modest special attacker with Acid Spray/Venoshock (both with 4 HP/252 SpD, and 252 in the relevant attack stat). Despite Overqwil's bad special attack, the special set still technically out-damaged the physical one due to Iron Valiant's also-bad special defense, which is pretty funny.

Anyways... Naive Iron Valiant (with x30 HP) is a 9-minute raid; it immediately starts off with Electric Terrain, activating Quark Drive (boosting attack, or if it's lowered then speed). Its regular moveset is Spirit Break (fairy, 150 BP, physical, -1 SpA), Aura Sphere (fighting, 120 BP, special, never misses), Zen Headbutt (psychic, 80 BP, physical, 90% accuracy), and Shadow Ball (ghost, 80 BP, special). A mixed set! Soon after that, at 90% time or 90% HP it puts up shield (covering 40% of its health bar); then at 85% time it wipes its own debuffs, and at 55% time sets Electric Terrain again. Meanwhile, at 65% HP it wipes player buffs, at 45% HP it wipes its own debuffs, and at 40% it uses Swords Dance (and starts using a second move per turn 50% of the time).

Arboliva can overwrite the electric terrain (and give some health regen);
Intimidate allies can prevent the Quark Drive attack boost to begin with, and also dissuade physical attacks;
Bellibolt can Light Screen to weaken special attacks;
Toxapex can poison through shield;
Gardevoir (as always) can Life Dew heal...
Plenty of AI allies are useful here.

...Despite the raid covering all its bases, my special Overqwil set ended up working first try! And I didn't even end up poisoning Iron Valiant (no Poison Point, no Sludge Wave, and no AI Toxapex), so this could've gone even better if I did (or just swapped to Sludge Wave), hahaha.

I got real lucky with two Zen Headbutt misses, though I also could've debuffed attack more and/or used Stockpile again after the buffwipe. Still, it works!


After a few days, the closest I've seen to a 'counter' to this raid is shell bell Bulletproof tera steel Ursaluna, who's immune to both special moves (until it terastallizes and Shadow Ball starts hitting again), and thus can safely focus on purely physical bulk while also buffing quickly with Belly Drum and then doing massive damage with Heavy Slam. Clever!

Other stuff can clear this, of course. I haven't seen anyone else try Overqwil, but there are plenty of other Acid Spray poison attackers (Galarian Slowbro, Pecharunt, Munkidori...), and people have also used neutral lifedrain special attackers (Magearna, Bellibolt, Serperior).