It was just yesterday, when people wondered what was next for Legendary raids Pokémon Go. We had the extension of Ho-Oh. That ended at 1pm (PST) on December 14th. Many expected Groudon to show up right away. When he didn’t, many people in my local discord channel were shocked.
Enter Groudon
image courtesy of pokemon.com © 2017 Pokémon/Nintendo
Earlier today, it was announced on Pokemongolive.com.
Trainers,
Groudon, the Ground-type Legendary Pokémon originally discovered in the Hoenn region, is now appearing in Raid Battles around the world!
I quickly logged onto my local Discord group to see that others, like myself, had already reported the news.
The catch, Groudon is only available till 1:00 p.m. PST on January 15, 2018. Still plenty of time to get out there and Catch’em.
Time for Research
As with any of the raid bosses, I always do a bit of research. I like to find out the weaknesses, and what other people are using to battle.
I played through all the Pokémon games in the past. I knew things like Groudon is a ground type Pokémon. Things are not always 100% the same in the orginal games, and Pokémon Go.
Places I like to check are sites like pokemongohub.net. They usually have a good breakdown for counters to use. Suggestions like Gyrados with Waterfall/Hydro Pump.
Another good resource is TheSilphRoad. A very good resource for all things Pokémon Go.
From there you can find things like what the 100% CP is for Groudon Top 50 Groudon CP Table post by puu.sh
A normal 100% Groudon is CP2328. Weather boosted, the CP2910 is your 100% target.
Raid time!
Raids get release. We get reports of level 5 raids popping up in downtown San Jose, but nothing up in the Milpitas area yet. Of course, it wasn’t long before they were all over here too.
Naturally, I was out getting lunch with the family when the first wave came in. I was watching discord, and seeing if there was someplace I could get to.
Finally, I saw one coming up about 15minutes from me. I got there before the timer. One group showed up just as it hatched. They said they tried to do one raid with 8 people, and was unable to beat Groudon. No idea what levels they all tried with.
Now it was time. there was a big enough group to go for it. I believe we had 16 or so people, and more on the way. We beat it, and I caught it. CP2274 80% 12/11/13. Not too bad, and I was glad to have caught one on day 1.
I was going to head home after that, but stopped off to grab a few Pokémon. I noticed in discord that another raid was about ready to hatch. So off to that one I went.
I got there a little after hatch time, and one group had already started. I was a littel worried, but soon plenty of other showed up. We finished that one, and I caught that Groudon as well. CP 2296 87% 14/11/14.
Others from the group were heading off to their “lucky” gym to raid. One guy had gotten 3 EX raids from that gym, so pretty lucky to him I guess. I didn’t want to head off that far. There was a closer raid going to happen in about 20 minutes. So I headed there next.
I was early, and there were a few Pokéstops around. I grabbed those, and tried to gauge if we had enough people around to do the raid. I posted in Discord to see if people were coming.
Have no fear, we had plenty show! I had forgotten to try recording my previous raids, but this one I did record it.
Once again, I was able to catch this one. CP2323 98%! 15/14/15. I almost got that 100%.
I went home after this. Figured I would call it a day. I couldn’t believe I had caught each one so far.
A bit later, I went out with my son to catch a few Pokémon. As luck would have it, I saw one more raid being formed up at a nearby Starbucks. This one has had EX Raids at it as well. My son hadn’t raided Groudon yet, so off we went.
Once again, plenty of people even with it being later on in the evening. There was enough that people did a split group. Ours has 10. We beat it, and I caught it again. CP2276 78% 15/10/10. Unfortunately, my son was unable to secure Groudon. So we will have to try again.
I went 4/4 today, so I will probably have the next batch all run from me.
Final Thoughts
I was glad to see I got to use my small army of Ho-Ohs for this. The fight seemed good enough. Once again, with server lag, dodging is hard to do. Catching Groudon did seem more difficult. Ho-Oh provided it’s own difficulty by being so close. Groudon is farther back. He doesn’t jump. His attack can be harder to time. I mostly just spun and threw when I thought he wasn’t going to attack. Different from other Legendaries where I would wait to throw until after they had the attack animation.
I would imagine we would see Kyogre as the next Legendary after Groudon. The one I am truly excited for though, is Rayquaza.
Tateland.com 
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