Massively on the Go: A practical guide to Pokemon Go gym defense

    
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One thing I learned while at Pokemon Go’s Las Vegas Hoenn Tour and traveling in Japan recently was people still aren’t great at defending gyms, but it’s not all their fault. Not only is Niantic infamously bad at onboarding (even with its own IP), but a lot of English gym guides out there are just plain dated, if not bad too. Don’t get me wrong, some of them explain the mechanics well or have some good tips, but most feel theoretical rather than practical.

The gym meta really hasn’t changed much since the 2017 changes, so there’s no excuse for this. Yes, some people may not think much of the system, especially given that it facilitates stalking, but for those participating, using junk pokemon both threatens people’s ability to collect their daily coins and is a bit disrespectful in terms of providing poor berry feeding options.

Oddly, the best pokemon for defense at launch are the same ones at the top now, while the most common prime attacker (if you’re not using default teams), Machamp, is even more likely to be maxed out these days. With coins being arguably more valuable now that people are trying to give Niantic less money for the company’s errors, I figure we should tackle this issue. That’s why this edition of Massively on the Go is going to not only giving you some good options for your gym defenders but calling out the most popular defenders that trainers should stop using.

9/25/2023 Update: Although Timburr Community Day means a more powerful Fighting-type that’s reasonably accessible exists, we will still focus on Machamp here. Machamp may be a bit less powerful as a Fighting Pokemon, but it still has a more diverse move pool with largely more powerful attacks and counters. It also has a Shadow variant that outclasses Timburr’s final form, Conkeldurr. In that sense, while Conkl may take Machamp’s Fighting throne, Champ still has a better overall use in terms of flexibility.

Now, before we start, I want to note that to help make this guide more accessible, I’ve hidden large portions of it behind spoiler tags. If you need or want to know more, simply click to reveal them. The idea is that the base guide will be visual, short, and to the point for new or less knowledgeable players looking to hold a gym for 8+ hours worth of coins rather than make a drop-off and ignore it, but can be ramped up to a level where players can use PokeBattler’s gym simulations for themselves either to check my work or work out solutions to their local metas as the game ages. I noted that even legendaries wouldn’t do much to shake up the scene beyond giving players easier access to Legendary candy, so this guide should stay relevant for a long time.

Attacking Strategies

Click to reveal more background info

Assuming you have the basics down, we need to talk attack strategies. Many casual players don’t seem to understand that there are really two prime strategies for taking gyms. Strategy one is “Fight’em All,” from the first pokemon to the last. It’s the most common because that’s the default system the game is set up for. If someone is just using the default teams, even better, as the game has odd suggestions. Sadly, though, Machamp is both accessible and often best without its Community Day move, so any serious player who isn’t multi-accounting has no trouble harassing gyms with a top-tier pokemon.

The second strategy, however, is “One by One,” where you concentrate on taking out just the first pokemon in the gym before battling the next one. For example, if a gym has Blissey, then Chansey, then Snorlax all at full motivation, what you would do is battle Blissey, defeat it, and then decline to battle the next pokemon (Chansey in this scenario). Instead, you would simply jump back into the gym and fight Blissey again and again until it’s kicked from the gym. Then you would battle the next pokemon (Chansey) and decline to battle the next pokemon (Snorlax) until Chansey too is gone, and repeat this for each defender.

The reason to use the second strategy is to avoid defender detection. The game sends a single warning to a player when their pokemon is low on motivation. By using the “Fight’em All” strategy, there is potential to send out six warnings to six players that you’re attacking a gym. If the gym is low on motivation or filled with weak targets, this isn’t much of a problem, but if the defenders are strong, if it’s owned by a multi-accounter, or you know one of the players often uses Golden Razz Berries to restore pokemon to full motivation, you should stick with “One by One.”

Click to reveal more tips for attackers and defenders

Defense factors

Click to reveal more background info

Once you know a bit about how the mechanics work, we need to discuss gym defense psychology. This is split into three factors. The first is “Intimidation by Size.” By creating a tall gym, you create the appearance of the gym being difficult. Some players won’t even click to see what they’re up against; they’ll simply look for a short gym, which indicates lower CP defenders. This is one of the reasons many people make poor defender choices, and I would recommend against this strategy because it largely only affects the laziest players. Any reasonable player that sees, say, Tyranitar, Rhyperior, and Slaking will know the gym will be theirs in no-time flat.

That’s why the second factor, “Intimidation by Type,” is far more effective. Again, if we see Blissey, Chansey, and Snorlax, we know we’re in for a bit of a fight. However, if the other pokemon cover their weaknesses, such as with Sylveon and Florges, which are Fairy types Machamp is weak to and rarely is equipped with a counter for, there may be a hesitation to engage with that gym. Many of those pokemon can boost a gym’s height reasonably well but without bluffing the difficulty of their battle, making it largely a better strategy than Intimidation by Size.

Vaguely related to this would be theme gyms. Attackers with a heart may see the work a team put into coordinating a gym theme and let it stand a bit longer for others to enjoy. The biggest weakness to this, though, is that randoms may not participate and ruin the theme (I’m looking at you, Tyranitar and Rhyperior people who keep putting those two in when my group does an ice cream theme at the ice cream shop!). Admittedly, I have had other teams shave out pokemon that didn’t fit the theme, but don’t expect that.

Finally, there’s what I like to call “Ally Incentive.” You can include yourself for this. It’s quite simple: drop a pokemon you or your teammates are likely to want to feed berries to. It’s difficult to make a list that’ll stand the test of time, but think of pokemon you need candies for. Maybe it’s the Vivillon family, due to its 18 variants and the postcard system making demand for its candy quite high. Maybe it’s the previously mentioned Jangmo-O due to its rarity. Or maybe you somehow live in an area that’s Rhydon-poor and locals really need that candy. The idea is to drop off whatever pokemon motivates people to feed berries to order to get other players to place strong defenders and frequently check the gym to feed berries.

I know this may confuse some people, so quick anecdote. As some people know, I had major Pokemon GO stalking issues for well over a year. Briefly speaking, gyms would fall in minutes or hours as I was physically or virtually followed, depending on the location and stalking group (there were multiple).

The only thing that would make my gyms last hours or even overnight was if I found a decently built gym and placed the previously mentioned Jangmo-O. Being a new and rare pokemon even now, people in the gym would actually berry defense, not to help me as a stalking victim (if they knew) but out of their own candy-greed. On a less dramatic note, I did the same thing with some of the more remote gyms at the Vegas Hoenn Tour with similar results: Despite people not often going to the far-off gyms, other people were feeding little Jang and the rest of the gym for about half of the event. It’s not something many players consider, but it’s also because many players forget they can get berries from feeding, so this works best with a more informed community which, again, should include yourself.

Now that we’ve got our defense strategy outlined, let’s go over the pokemon that are better kept out of the gyms.

The rejects

Remember how I said many lists focus on defending gyms from Fighting-types and the “Fight’em All” approach? The most glaring weakness of those lists is including pokemon with a 4x weakness. It would be one thing if it were pokemon like Exeggcuter, which takes quad-damage from the horribly underused Bug-types most players still lack even after the first Elite Raids, so that would be more forgivable. But Dragonite, which is 4x weak to Ice, which is very useful against legendary pokemon that also have that weakness? Or Gyarados, which is 4x weak to the series’ mascot, Pikachu? Again, largely no reason to risk using these pokemon.

Part of these “errors” are most likely because the meta is largely focused on being weak to Fighting. That makes Fighting counters like Flying, Psychic, and Fairy more appealing than anything that’s weak to Fighting. Unfortunately for those who write those guides, the highly accessible Machamp can counter all of those types but is largely built for either Flying or Psychic countermeasures. It’s an oversight, but a glaring one, especially at this point in the game’s life.

Going back to Dragonite, yes, taking about 30 seconds to be beaten by Machamp sounds good in a vacuum with the “Fight’em All” approach, but having Dragonite lose in under 12 seconds to Mamoswine is embarrassing. Hypno (which didn’t even make our list) has far lower CP, but it lasts longer not only against Machamp by a full second and lasts 3 seconds longer against its most common counter, Gengar. Not only that, but the lower max CP also means it will last longer and stay stronger in gyms compared to the Dragon.

That may not sound like much if you’re simply dropping pokemon off in a rural area you’re not worried about being attacked, and that’s fair. In fact, Gamepress has one of the more detailed lists on complex gym situations, but it too ignores the One by One method and mostly seems theoretical (though the author places it up there with Blissey, I’ve never struggled with Mandibuzz despite some locals trying to apply the guide’s suggestions, and my casual friend didn’t even realize it was supposed to be good when she took one out without a care).

Gamepress’ tier list does explain some lesser explored ideas, but when you’re defending a gym during an event, in a city, or just have someone picking on you, you need something less theoretical and more practical. That extra time from using something with bulk can make or break the odds that you or someone else in that gym can berry up and ensure that you get your daily coins/keep the gym.

The most practical picks

To note, the pokemon above were chosen not just based on my personal/locals’ experience playing in cities, suburbs, hiking trails, and a major Niantic event, nor just on the previously mentioned Silph Road bulk list; they were also tested out on Pokebattler’s gym simulator against a level 50 Machamp as a level 50 themselves to show best case scenarios for both attacker and defender. For simplicity, feel free to ignore the bottom two tiers, as they have some very specific uses.

Click to reveal more methodology tips

I’d also like to note that, while many guides may encourage “recycling” pokemon as both attacker and defender, I recommend not doing this: your best attackers should be available to you at all times. Putting a strong attacker in a gym that may suddenly no longer be attacked or bug out deprives you of a tool for raids, Rockets, gym attacking, and possibly even PvP. Much as with raids, start out just by getting pokemon with the desired CP, but eventually start building defenders.

As some people may have guessed, gym defense does have meta-aspects. I’m acknowledging things like gyms in areas with poor reception, dropping off when servers are bad, or just knowing that gyms far from parking areas have a better chance to survive than those accessible by car. Not much can be done about that aside from acknowledging the issue. However, Golden Berries greatly extend a gym’s longevity, so even if you have a bad defender, frequent Golden Berries while being attacked may discourage some attackers.

But at the end of the day, if people are attacking and they want it bad enough, there’s a good chance they’ll get it. We just need properly built pokemon to help remove that desire, so below, I’ll briefly address each pokemon on the list, its approximate survival time in combat at full motivation, move picks, and add some additional notes under the spoilers.

The top three

Now, these three shouldn’t surprise anyone, but as a reminder, you do not want them back to back. For example, if you see Blissey in the first gym slot when choosing a fellow defender, choose a pokemon from the lower three levels of our pyramid, meaning don’t do Blissey-Chansey-Snorlax but rather do Blissey-Florges-Chansey. This helps slow down “Fight’em All” players by quite a lot, while also leveraging some psychological intimidation, and I say that as someone who uses the “One by One” method.

Blissey: ~36 seconds to lose to Machamp (can faint it). Use Zen Headbutt and Psychic or Dazzling Gleam

Click to reveal more Blissey tips

Chansey: ~27 seconds to lose to Machamp. Use Zen Headbutt and Psychic or Dazzling Gleam. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Chansey tips

Snorlax: ~23 seconds to lose to Machamp. Use Zen Headbutt and Body Slam, Return, or Outrage. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Snorlax tips

Survivalists

Snorlax is basically barely part of top three based on theoretics. In practice though, most gyms are poorly built and often quite vulnerable to Fighting-types Snorlax is weak to, requiring those who wish to keep a gym to pick more diverse pokemon. If you have Blissey and Chansey in the gym, that’s going to help, but (outside of theme gyms) you’ll want something between them to really make your gym work. That’s where this tier comes into play.

Florges: ~44 seconds to lose to Machamp (can faint it), 19 seconds for Metagross. Use Fairy Wind and Psychic. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon.

Click to reveal more Florges tips

Sylveon: ~43 seconds to lose to Machamp (can faint it), 20 seconds for Metagross. Use Charm and Psyshock or Dazzling Gleam. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon.

Click to reveal more Sylveon tips

11/3/2023 Update for Clodsire: ~45-48 seconds to lose to Machamp, ~19 seconds for Mamoswine. Use Mud-Shot and Sludge Bomb for damage or Acid Spray for survival. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon.

Click to reveal more Clodsire tips

1/22/2024 Update for Annihilape : ~56 seconds to lose to Machamp (can faint it), ~18 seconds for Espeon. Use Counter and Shadow Ball. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon.

Click to reveal more Annihilape tips

Whatever Motivates Berry Feeding: There’s no easy way to break this one down, but this is perhaps one of the most fun and rewarding gym defender options. This goes back to the “Ally Incentive” strategy I discussed above, where you drop in a pokemon based on getting people to watch the gym and feed berries instead of considering the ‘mon’s mechanical defenses. Need Vivillon candy? Drop one in. Playing with friends who have tons of berries but need rattata candy? Drop one in. You can debate CP and motivational decay until you’re blue in the face, but a gym that’s constantly watched and fed is an attacker’s worst nightmare and your berry-hoarding allies’ best friend.

It may sound odd, and does require you to know your local community’s wants, but with the right choice and community, candy motivation can turn a so-so built gym into something that’s nearly always topped off. That can really discourage gyms attacks, and I’m speaking from experience here.

Click to reveal even more Berry Feeding Motivation tips

Toxapex: ~40 seconds to lose to Machamp, 16 seconds for Espeon. Use Bite and Brine. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon.

Click to reveal more Toxapex tips

Muk: ~40 seconds to lose to Machamp, 15 seconds for Espeon. Use Lick and Thunder Punch or Return. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Muk tips

Nidoqueen: ~38 seconds to lose to Machamp, 22 seconds for Vaporeon. Use Bite and Earth Power. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Nidoqueen tips

The other gap fillers

In most ideal situations, the above three tiers are the only ones you need. Something like Blissey-Florges-Chansey-Sylveon-Snorlax-Muk would make it so the gyms looks like a Muk raid lazy players won’t even click – it’s too high for lazy attackers to want to mess with, too tough for the Fight’em All attackers, and too annoying for the One by One attackers.

But that’s ideal. If you’re at a popular spot in town right before the Wednesday Raid Hour and trying to get some pokemon locked into gyms so you’ll be safe and get an hour’s worth of coins, you’re probably dealing with gyms full of Rhydons and Pikachus. Gross. You may need some additional curve balls to help reset the balance of some gyms.

Jellicent: ~39 seconds to lose to Machamp, 16 seconds for Gengar. Use Hex and Ice Beam or Shadow Ball. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon.

Click to reveal more Jellicent tips

Cofagrigus: ~39 seconds to lose to Machamp, 15 seconds for Gengar. Use Zen Headbutt and Psychic. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon.

Click to reveal more Cofagrigus tips

Drifblim: ~38 seconds to lose to Machamp, 16 seconds for Gengar. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Drifblim tips

Runerigus– ~38 seconds to lose to Machamp, 16 seconds for Gengar. Use Shadow Claw and Shadow Ball. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon.

Click to reveal more Runerigus tips

Galarian Slowking: ~40 seconds to lose to Machamp (can faint it), ~16 seconds to lose to Gengar. Use Confusion and Shadow Ball or Surf.

Click to reveal more Galarian Slowking tips

Galarian Weezing– ~38 seconds to lose to Machamp, 15 seconds for Metagross. Use Fairy Wind and Play Rough. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Galarian Weezing tips

Vaguely useful

This is where some long-time players and even guide makers may see some more familiar faces. These pokemon very much have been left behind on their own but serve very specific purposes in filling gaps. The game in many ways has moved past them. For example, there are few reasons to use Gardevoir when Florges does almost everything it does but is less familiar/predictable for casuals, lasts longer on average against popular Machamp builds, and will most likely attract more berry feeding. Gardevoir is also better to build for actual raid use.

That being said, Gardevoir and others on this list can still be confidently used in gym defense under certain conditions, especially since most of these are also more accessible to casual players. When possible, you probably don’t want more than one of this tier in your gym, if that.

Azumarill– ~35 seconds to lose to Machamp, ~18 seconds for Venusaur. Use . Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Azumarill tips

Primarina~36 seconds to lose to Machamp, 18 seconds for Venusaur. Use Charm and Psychic.

Click to reveal more Primarina tips

Venusaur: ~36 seconds to lose to Machamp, 18 seconds for Charizard. Use Razor Leaf and Frenzy Plant. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Venusaur tips

Wobbuffet: ~38 seconds to lose to Machamp, 18 seconds for Gengar. Use Charm and Mirror Coat. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Wobbufett tips

Tentacruel– ~37 seconds to lose to Machamp, 15 seconds for Espeon. Use Acide for its Fast Move. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Tentacruel tips

Gardevoir– ~36 seconds to lose to Machamp, 14 seconds for Metagross. Use Charm or Confusion and Dazzling Gleam, Synchronoise, or Psychic. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Gardevoir tips

Exeggcutor– ~34 seconds to lose to Machamp, 16 seconds for Gengar. Use Confusion and Psychic or Zen Headbutt (legacy move). Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Exeggcutor tips

Musharna– ~36 seconds to lose to Machamp, 16 seconds for Gengar. Use Zen Headbutt and Dazzling Gleam, but Zen Headbutt and Psyshock are OK. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon.

Click to reveal more Musharna tips

Gourgeist (small+)- ~35 seconds to lose to Machamp, 16 seconds for Charizard. Use Hex and Shadow Ball. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Gourgeist tips

Togekiss -~33 seconds to lose to Machamp, 17 seconds for Metagross. Use Charm or certain Hidden Powers and Dazzling Gleam, possibly with a second Charge move. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Togekiss tips

Clefable (double fairy)- ~36 seconds to lose to Machamp, 14 seconds for Metagross. Use Charm and Dazzling Gleam. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Clefable tips

Vaporeon– ~30 seconds to lose to Machamp, 23 seconds for Venusaur. Use Water Gun and Aqua Tail, Water Pulse, Liquidation, Scald, and/or Last Resort. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Vaporeon tips

Weezing– ~31 seconds to lose to Machamp, 21 seconds for Vaporeon. Use Infestation and Shadow Ball. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Weezing tips

Metagross -~30 seconds to lose to Machamp, 19 seconds for Charizard. Use Zen Headbutt and Psychic. Best placed between tier 1 or 2 pokemon. Best in last position when featured in raids.

Click to reveal more Metagross tips

Hopefully this guide has helped give both new and returning players some ideas on how to spice up their local scenes, or at least get a wider view of the gym defense meta. While it’ll be updated if we see any major shakeups, but I suspect gyms would need a major overhaul before any new Pokemon really shakes-up this tier list, especially in terms of what not to bring.

Massively OP’s Andrew Ross is an admitted Pokemon geek and expert ARG-watcher. Nobody knows Niantic and Nintendo like he does! His Massively on the Go column covers Pokemon Go as well as other mobile MMOs and augmented reality titles!
Pokemon Go studio Niantic is considered a controversial gaming company owing to multiple scandals and deceptions, starting with the Wi-Spy privacy scandal; over the years, it’s repeatedly failed to secure player data, endangered players during the pandemic, and refused to address documented stalking in POGO. It also rolled back popular accessibility features to incentivize data collection, faked data, and lied about event results. Following 2021’s community-driven Pokemon No boycott, Niantic vowed transparency and communication; it has not delivered.
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