Mamoswine as an Ice and Ground-type raid attacker: Is 6*L50 Shadow Mamoswine worth it?

Edit: I forgot to consider Zygarde raids, which are also best countered by Mamoswine. It should still be duoable by L30 regular Mamoswines with best friends, but harder than Rayquaza and Landorus. More discussions here.

However, there are several downsides that are not frequently recognized, especially for regular Mamoswine. Within its own type, Galarian Darmanitan now slightly edges it out. When compared to others, even non-legendaries like Dragonite, Rampardos/Rhyperior and Electivire/Magnezone come on top, sometimes by a lot. The Rayquaza and Landorus duos, which do require Ice, are so easy that even L30 regular Mamoswine teams do the job. Ground attacker! Once you build it as an Ice type, you can unlock a second charged move or use Charged TMs to get yourself a top Ground attacker for free! It might have been harder to justify the investment as a Ground type alone, but treating it as a “Ground-type bonus” from a top Ice attacker makes this sound like a no-brainer.

• Shadow Mamoswine dominates Ice types, and is a top-tier counter against Dragon and Flying bosses, even though it’s often not the best (other types have better shadows and Xurkitree).
• While most uses for Ice types (Rayquaza and Landorus raids) are easy duos and only NEED L30 regular Mamoswines, having 6*L50 Shadow Mamoswines allows you to DUO MEGA Rayquaza!
• Shadow Mamoswine is also generally the best non-mega Ground type, edging out PB Groudon in practical use. However, it fares a lot worse when compared to competitor types, being worse than their shadows and legendaries. Luckily, there are several bosses where Ground is the only option.
• While regular Mamoswine is still a top-tier non-shadow Ice and one of the many great Ground types, it’s no longer competitive when compared to other types, even other non-legendaries. Evolve a cheap high-level non-shadow team if you don’t have one, but all resources should go into shadows.
• Even Ice-type Shadow Mamoswine can theoretically be outclassed by Galarian Zen Darmanitan, but its implementation is uncertain.[Part 3 TL;DR] The biggest and most realistic threat to Ice-type Shadow Mamoswine is Galarian Darmanitan Zen, which will be straight up better if it keeps the current GM moveset, but there’s a lot of uncertainty in implementation. On the Ground side, many shadows can surpass Shadow Mamoswine, as well as Landorus-T with a future signature move.
  • Ice-type and Ground-type charts
  • Pairwise comparisons involve Shadow and Regular Mamoswine
  • Details on Mega Rayquaza duo and Mega Garchomp solo with Shadow Mamoswine teams
  • Plots of Ice vs Dragon, and Ice vs Electric vs Rock
  • Selected future Ice and Ground attackers
  • List of my previous analyses, in Appendix
  Regular Mamoswine is worse than all good non-shadow dragons, even as “low” as Dragonite, unfortunately. I’ll answer these questions with the following parts: [Part 1d TL;DR] Shadow Mamoswine is worse than shadow Dragon and Electric attackers, as well as Xurkitree and Zekrom. But it’s ahead of all Rock types, and still a top-tier option overall (the most accessible of all these). Regular Mamoswine is worse than non-legendary Dragon, Rock and Electric types (Dragonite, Rhyperior, Electivire/Magnezone), and is more like a filler if you don’t have 6 others.

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  Galarian Darmanitan (Zen Mode) has the greatest potential, by far. It has higher base attack than Mewtwo, and is already assigned Ice Fang/Avalanche in the current Game Master. Obviously that can change, but if it stays… We have a new Ice king on our hands, immediately outclassing Shadow Mamoswine by quite a bit. Note that these are only base on Pokebattler estimators averaged across all boss movesets. For many of them, the threshold can be crossed earlier with an easier moveset, or unable to be met with a harder movest – examples below. I first did this comparison when writing my Primal Groudon analysis. In fact, I’ll present the same comparison chart and the same explanations as last time: The way I see it, Ground attackers are very clearly divided into two tiers: Shadow Mamoswine leads the “Tier 1 Ground“ (with Groudon being the only contender – aka shadows and legendaries), while regular Mamoswine is part of the many “Tier 2 Ground“s (aka non-legendaries).
  • When Ice or Ground is the only option, is a 6*L50 shadow team really necessary? Or can you make do with cheaper teams, even wild-caught Level 30s?
  • When Ice or Ground is not the only option, how does (regular/shadow) Mamoswine compare to attackers of other types? How often will you actually be using it on the field?
  If you don’t dodge… Earthquake and Fire Blast can’t be soloed even at L50. But Sand Tomb (the easiest) can be soloed at L40, MS/Outrage is fine at L40, and DT/Outrage barely falls out (1.03). Level 50 Shadow Mamoswines can reliably solo Outrage and Sand Tomb sets.
  • Part 1: Shadow and regular Mamoswine as Ice attackers
    • 1a: Ice-type charts
    • 1b: When is Ice required, and when is Ice usable but not the best?
    • 1c: Short-manning thresholds – How high do you need to power them up to?
    • 1d: Ice compared to other types: Dragon, Electric, Rock
  • Part 2: Shadow and regular Mamoswine as Ground attackers
    • 2a: Ground-type charts
    • 2b: When is Ground required, and Ground compared to other types
  • Part 3: Future considerations – Will Shadow Mamoswine ever be outclassed?
  Yes, you read that right – Mega Rayquaza is a Mega Legendary raid that CAN be duoed! But only if both of you have SIX L50 Shadow Mamoswines (and are best friends). If you’re on desktop and want to jump to a particular part, search “Part X” or “Part 1c”. There’s also “Part X Verdict”, which are more condensed but still somewhat elaborate sections with more advice. Here are the comparison plots: Here is a line chart that shows all Ground attackers, but only when Ground is the best attacking type against the boss (mostly electrics and double weaknesses). In this scenario, Shadow Mamoswine clearly comes out ahead of Groudon. There are also minor changes in the scores of other Ground attackers, most notably Garchomp getting worse and regular Mamoswine getting somewhat better. [Part 2b TL;DR] 6 legendaries can only be countered by Ground (electrics and double weaknesses), a surprisingly high number – almost half of Ground‘s use cases. However, whenever another type can be used, Shadow Mamoswine falls behind other shadows and legendaries, while regular Mamoswine becomes worse than even many budget options.

  Part 1a: Ice-type Charts

  What are you waiting for with a top of its type? Go grind as hard as you can! Get those 2160 XLs to build 6 Level 50 Shadow Mamoswine! See ya!

  The main role of Ice types in T5 raids is anti-Dragon and anti-Flying. But Ice is never the only counter there, and in fact, it’s often weaker than most other counters. And yes, that applies to even Shadow Mamoswine – it’s weaker than shadow Dragon, shadow Electric, and Xurkitree. (Tyrantrum and Terrakion are omitted on the chart for clarity, but they’re around Electivire.)

  Regular Mamoswine vs. Galarian Darmanitan

  First, I’ll mention an important caveat. Pokebattler does have Mega Rayquaza now, but it uses unnerfed stats. Most legendaries get a 9% nerf on top of that, but Primal Kyogre and Groudon only got a 3% nerf. Regardless of how Niantic deals with Mega Rayquaza’s stats, the actual raid will likely be easier than what Pokebattler tells you.