A Pokemon Scarlet & Violet player taking on seven-star Cinderace Tera Raids has discovered a strategy that utilizes a severely underleveled Shinx.
Pokemon Scarlet & Violet’s Tera Raids make for the bulk of the post-game content, much like Max Raid Dens in Sword & Shield before DLC. But the Tera Raids of Gen 9 pose a much greater challenge than the Gigantamax Pokemon of Gen 8.
As such, players have to build near-perfect Pokemon, learn new type matchups, and coordinate with their teammates to assemble a full-proof team. This also requires players to focus on different aspects of team building, such as prioritizing a support role over DPS.
Another facet of Tera Raid battling – likely the most obvious – is staying alive. A timer continuously counts down from the start of the raid, and if it hits 0, the raid is over, and you lose. However, if a Pokemon faints, a portion of that timer is drained, making it crucial that very few Pokemon faint. But one player discovered a Pokemon build intended to die multiple times in a single Tera Raid.
The level 1 Shinx Tera Raid build
This discovery was made by Reddit user DBrody6, who deemed the level 1 Shinx a “budget support Pokemon.” One of the most effective strategies of Tera Raids is having Pokemon that can lower and buff stats, and this Shinx can do both without having to worry about keeping it alive.
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Brody discovered that Pokemon with a higher level, like the level 100s people often bring to raids, tend to take out larger chunks of the timer when killed. However, when a level 1 Shinx faints, the timer isn’t affected at all.
All this Shinx needs to be effective is the ability Intimidate and the move Helping Hands. Every time the Pokemon faints, it will re-enter the battle and lower the Tera Raid boss’s attack stat without affecting the Raid timer. Helping Hands can then be used to boost the power of an ally’s offensive move.
Replies in the comments confirmed that they had tested the strategy and that it works, making this ridiculous strategy one of the easiest to prep. Instead of dumping bottle caps, ability patches, XP candy, and TMs into a single Pokemon, all trainers need to do is breed for a level 1 Shinx.
Brody goes into more detail in his post, explaining what Pokemon pair well with his Shinx strat and specifically how it can be used to deal with the seven-star Cinderace raids.
