Greninja Seven-Star Raid Guide: Which Pokemon to Use

The next seven-star raid is coming up Pokemon Scarlet and Violet this Friday, January 27th with a poisonous Greninja. The first round will run until Monday 30th January and the second round will begin approximately two weeks later, from Friday 10th February to Monday 13th February. Like the other seven-star raid Pokémon, Greninja will have the most powerful mark, and you can only catch one per save file. Based on previous seven star raidsthe Pokemon will need some careful strategies to beat it.

We don’t know all the details of the Greninja raid yet, but we can make some guesses based on previous seven-star raids. Firstly, since Charizard and Cinderace both came equipped with their hidden abilities, it’s pretty certain that Greninja will have his hidden ability, Protean. Luckily, this doesn’t affect the raid itself, as terastalization negates the effects of the mutability ability. We can easily plan around the Tera type.

Greninja has been confirmed to have a Poison Tera type for the raid, leading us to speculate on likely movesets. Assuming it uses moves that match its natural typing and Tera-type, we predict a moveset in that direction, assuming it’s a physical attacker:

• Liquidation.
• night line.
• gunk shot
• ice punch.
• sword dance.

A special attacker build could look like this instead:

• Water Shuriken / Hydro Pump.
• dark pulse
• Tera Blast (Poison).
• ice beam.
• rain dance

Keep in mind that seven-star Raid Pokémon can use more than four moves – Cinderace, for example, used four attacks and Bulk Up, although the latter wasn’t in its moveset once it was caught. Swords Dance would make Geninja a terrible threat in a physical attack build, while Rain Dance would make his Water-type attacks extra menacing, similar to the Charizard seven-star raid with Sunny Day.

Best greninja counters

We won’t know the perfect Pokemon or builds for the raid until full details are live, but here are the Pokemon that seem well positioned for the raid. To give you the best chance of victory, make sure your Pokémon is level 100 and has a Nature that increases its relevant Attack stat (usually Humble for special attackers and Adamant for physical attackers).

Vaporeon

Tera Type: Steel
Ability: Absorb Water EV Spread: 252 HP / 252 Special Attack / 4 Special Defense

Movements:

• Saved power.
• Calm mind.
• acid armor.
• Wish.

The Water-type Eeveelution is an early favorite for this raid thanks to a variety of perks he has, especially when Greninja is using a special attack build. Vaporeon’s normal ability is absorb water, which allows it to regain health when hit by a water-type attack. This turns one of Greninja’s scariest setups (rain-boosted water attacks) into an advantage. These seven-star raids are wars of attrition, and having reliable health-restoring methods is important. Vaporeon also has access to Calm Mind, which boosts his Special Defense and Special Attack, and Stored Power, a psychic attack that hits the Greninja Poison-type for double damage and deals additional damage based on your increased stats (in addition to the Special Attack Boost you gain it receives from Calm Mind). With Vaporeon’s decently high Special Attack stat and Water Attack Immunity in addition to massive HP, stacking Calm Minds in Stored Power should be a reliable way to drain the raid boss’ health. The biggest danger with Vaporeon is that it doesn’t naturally resist Poison, and a Greninja with Gunk Shot could threaten Vaporeon’s underwhelming Defense stat. However, a Steel Tera type would help overcome this problem.

Klefki

Tera Type: Steel
Ability: Prankster EV Spread: 252 HP / 252 Special Attack / 4 Special Defense

Movements:

• Saved power.
• Calm mind.
• Iron Defense.
• Sunny day.

This Pokémon benefits from its Steel/Fairy typing, giving it resistance to dark attacks and full immunity to Greninja’s Tera-boosted poison attacks. Klefki also has access to the same Stack Calm Mind into Stored Power combo as Vaporeon, although it can’t hit quite as hard as Vaporeon. Still, natural immunity to Poison can be worth the trade-off, especially if Greninja ends up performing Gunk Shot. Sunny Day combined with Klefki’s Prankster ability makes it particularly effective at protecting against Greninja settling in the rain. The biggest downside for Klefki is the lack of access to a reliable recovery move, since Draining Kiss deals minimal damage to Poison-type Greninja. Klefki also boasts a relatively high Defense stat, which it can boost with Iron Defense (which also supports Stored Power), making it a better choice when Greninja is built with physical attacks.

Bronzong

Tera Type: Steel
Ability: Levitation EV Spread: 252 HP / 252 Special Attack / 4 Special Defense

Movements:

• Saved power.
• Calm mind.
• Iron Defense.
• Sunny day.

Bronzong works similarly to Klefki: immunity to poison damage, good natural defenses, and the Calm Mind + Stored Power combo. The biggest difference is that Bronzong is weak against Greninja’s natural Dark type, which could make Bronzong a less reliable choice when Greninja is running Night Slash or Dark Pulse. However, it gains an attack bonus of the same type or STAB for Psycho-type moves, allowing it to hit harder than Klefki.

King Ambit

Tera Type: Steel
Ability: Defiant EV Spread: 252 HP / 252 Attack / 4 Defense

Movements:

• Zen Headbutt.
• sword dance.
• Iron Defense.
• Sandstorm.

A slightly less obvious choice to counter Greninja, Kingambit is another Steel-type that benefits from Poison Immunity. A powerful physical attacker, Kingambit can perform Swords Dance to boost his attack and unleash super-effective Zen Headbutts on the Greninja Poison-type. The downside is that Kingambit will be slightly worse when Greninja does Rain Dance and special attack water moves that deal neutral damage to Kingambit. However, Kingambit can cast Sandstorm to negate Rain Dance and somewhat offset that risk. It’s worth noting that Zen Headbutt only has 90% accuracy, making this strategy more risky than Vaporeon or Klefki. Kingambit’s lack of recovery moves means you’ll practically have to run Shell Bell as your held item to survive the heist.

Clodsire

Tera Type: Ground (although you may want to avoid a Terastallation to maintain your dual poison resistance)
Ability: Absorb Water EV Spread: 252 HP / 252 Attack / 4 Special Defense

Movements:

• Earthquake / Bulldoze.
• Helping hand.
• recovered.
• Cooling water / haze.

Clodsire is an unlikely hero for the raid and will be virtually impossible for a Greninja special attack to take down. The Absorb Water ability allows Clodsire to turn a traditional weakness (water attacks) into HP regeneration, and its natural typing means it only takes 25% damage from poison attacks. Clodsire is slightly worse when Greninja performs an Ice Attack, but otherwise it’s a powerful special tank with massive HP, strong Special Defense, and the ability to recover as an Egg move. Clodsire cannot boost its own attack like the other Greninja counters, but it learns Helping Hand through TM, which allows it to boost its teammates’ attacks. (Helping Hand can cause a properly stacked stored power to deal massive damage.) Earthquake is your main damage move, although you could instead Bulldoze for speed control at the cost of less damage. Bringing Clodsire to the raid means you won’t deal the most damage in the group, but will stay forever and prevent your team from wasting time getting knocked out.

Other Greninja Raid Tips

You can always opt for a more supportive build rather than an offensive build, as many of the counters listed here have solid defensive stats. However, if you bring a support Pokemon to a seven-star raid, you’re counting on your other three teammates to deal a ton of damage, which can be a gamble with random teammates. In pre-made groups, the most consistent composition is two or three Sweepers and one or two Support Pokemon. But after losing many Cinderace raids due to lack of damage, I recommend offensive builds when relying on unknown teammates.

If you have the benefit of planning with other teammates, I’ve included two support builds here. Remember that the clock is your real enemy in Seven Star Raids: the only way to win is to efficiently take out your opponent’s HP. Large bursts are most effective for this, which is why we recommend combining Calm Mind with Stored Power for the most reliable way to combat Greninja. But staying alive is also important, as being knocked out by Greninja will instantly remove some of the remaining raid timer, putting a greater drain on a limited resource. Pay attention to how much damage you take with each attack, and use your recovery moves and cheers to keep your Pokémon healthy enough to survive the next attack.

Vaporeon support build

Tera Type: Steel
Ability: absorb water
EV Distribution: 252 HP / 252 Defense (vs. Physical Greninja) or Special Defense (vs. Special Greninja) / 4 Special Attack

Movements:

• Cool water / surf.
• Charm / Fake Tears.
• Helping hand.
• Wish.

Klefki support build
Tera Type: Steel
Ability: Prankster
EV Spread: 252 HP / 252 Defense or Special Defense / 4 Special Attack

Movements:

• clairvoyant.
• metal sound.
• Reflect / light screen.
• Sunny day.