Pokémon Go Moltres 5-Star Dynamax Impressions

On this Max Monday, my regular group of four Pokémon Go players managed to defeat Dynamax Moltres on our first try. Here's how it went:

As before, we had two players with mostly 3000 CP Pokémon, one player with 2000ish CP Pokémon, and one player with slightly less than 2000 CP Pokémon.

My lineup consisted of a 3000 CP Excadrill, a 1600 CP Gigantamax Kingler (from over the weekend) and a 2500 CP Gigantamax Lapras. My defenders were not ideal (neither are resistant to fire) but that's what I had. Our main tank was a 2300 Gigantamax Blastoise with Level 3 Max Guard.

Typically, you want to re-roll the boss (run away and start the battle again and its attacks change) to avoid Overheat and Heatwave as both do a ton of damage. We actually got both and all four of us lost our initial defender Pokémon on the first attack (an unavoidable AOE). We got to the first Dynamax before the next attack and used 3 Max Attacks for three players and Max Guard with one player.

After the first Dynamax was over, our tank ate it because he decided to use Hydro Cannon and couldn't dodge the targeted attack. Fortunately, we made it to the second Dynamax shortly thereafter and again went "bombs away" with all Max Attacks.

After the second Dynamax phase, my Lapras (my remaining defender) was target and I manage to dodge. The attack still took my Lapras from full health to having just a mere sliver left but at least it didn't get knocked out. The third and final Dynamax phase was next.

With the boss nearing a quarter life left, we again went all in with Max Attacks and won the day. One of us got a Hundo (max IVs) Dynamax Moltres out of it but mine was only two stars (the other two were three stars).

Some takeaways from our Moltres fight:

You don't need a high-level/high-CP attacker in your lineup (as you should only be swapping it in for the Dynamax stage and swapping it out right after) but you should prioritize raising its Max Attack to level 3 if possible. We had two Gigantamax Kinglers with Level 3 Max Attack (and two with Level 1 Max Attack) and that's probably why we won under less-than-ideal conditions and despite some setbacks. A Level 1 Max Attack on a Gigantamax Pokémon is equivalent to a Level 3 Max Attack from a Dynamax Pokémon.

If you have a good number of high Max Attack attackers with water or electric Max Attacks, you can probably get away with using poor defenders as long as they have quick Fast Attacks to charge the Dynamax meter as fast as possible.

If you're new to Dynamax fights and want to know where to begin and what to prioritize in prepping your Dynamax Pokemon, I would focus on building up the Max Attack over CP/level for your attackers and to focus on CP for your defenders. Max Guard and Max Spirit are not necessarily applicable to every battle and you can work on them when you have a better feel of how the Dynamax battles work as they're very different from raiding and PvP/Team Rocket battles.

Photo via Pokémon Go.