TL;DR: These sites will help you know what attackers to invest in. But be aware, the best does not mean highest CP. The best is determined by what moves it has, how great of an attacker it is, and how fast it can do damage to its opponent.
Best Pokémon By Typing And Moves
We all had to start somewhere right? With so many trainers starting out and returning I thought it’d be a good idea for us to have a list that includes pokémon that will have some use in raids since the best in the game such as raikou, rayquaza and dragonite just to name a few are either no longer obtainable (for the moment) or just really hard to come by. So here is a list of the best obtainable pokémon depending on where you live. Keep in mind that these choices are not the currebt best but at the very least will allow trainers who don’t have the best to be somewhat competitive until better options come into play. Feel free to add what you feel will be beneficial too so that I can adjust this, guys!
Biomes, weather conditions and events. Ultimately where you live, the weather and events will help on your journey to find decent pokèmon to add to your roster. So be aware of what you see spawning around you.
Raid bosses. If you are lucky enough to have access to a raid group then I encourage you to go for anything that hatch from level 3 or 4 eggs that are good for attacking. I recommend gengar, machamp and tyranitar.
Dual types. They can be the best of two different types depending on their moves, stat ratings (attack, defense and HP) and what you personally need on your roster.
Bug. Look out for scyther, pinsir and heracross if you live in an area where they spawn**. All are top tier attackers and will make good additions.
Dark. If you’re lucky go for absol or especially tyranitar raids. Community Day will be on the 16th of June 2018 so if possible please focus on nothing but larvitar for those 3hrs. It’ll be a great rock and dark type attacker. Houndour, carvanha and seedot evolutions make good runner-ups.
Dragon. Great generalists. It is possible to hatch bagon, dratini and even trapinch but horsea (kingdra) and now exeggute once all Alolan forms are released are more likely to be found in the wild.
Electric. Before raikou we had jolteon but they are hard to come by since the name trick for eevee works once for each type. The next best choices I would suggest are electrike, pikachu, geodude (Alolan golem) and both magnemite and electabuzz for gen4.
Fairy. Not at all very useful now but farming up jigglypuff for wigglytuff and even better snubbull can be a good idea since clefairy and more importantly ralts do not spawn much for everyone. A fairy fast move is still unavailable for Pokémon Go.
Fighting. Poliwag and mankey evolutions if you can’t do better than the makuhita, torchic and best of all machop evolutions.
Fire. Eevee to flareon is the best here. Next is charmander, torchic and cyndaquil lines. Growlithe and houndour evolutions are a good choices also.
Flying. Like fairy, not useful currently so no need to focus on them at all but if I needed them I’d focus on scyther without a doubt. Doduo evolution hit hard enough and pidgey was everyone’s best friend when leveling up was hard. Its evolution got me through a lot of snorlax way before gen2 was released. Very useful pokémon.
Ghost. There’s no beating the gastly family if you can find them. Shuppet evolution is nodworthy as well. They spawn more at night. If you’re not seeing them then I’d assume your area probably is lacking spawn points.
Grass. Quite a few here that will be useful to you depending on what you can find. Top families are exeggute, shroomish, treeko, bulbasaur, bellsprout, cacnea and seedot. Like I said. Quite a few to choose from so it shouldn’t be hard unless you don’t get grass spawns.
Ground. Sandshrew is probably the most common and they actually have really nice stats and moves. Better options that you may find are rhyhorn, golem, mudkip, swinub, phanpy and trapinch. Rhyhorn and golem for the win.
Ice. Currently lying dormant now. While we wait for them to come back articuno in style articuno is available through Field Research for June 2018. Jynx is the best attacker but not very common for all which leaves us with the spheal and shellder families. If you come in contact with swinub consider yourself lucky. Very important in gen4.
Normal. Starting off with eevee. The most useful normal type in the game at any level you are. If you have never used the name trick before try it to evolve one of each eeveelution currently in the game. Just rename the eevee that you want to evolve and it’s smooth sailing from there. Sparky for jolteon, Rainer for vaporean, Pyro for flareon, Sakura for espeon and Tamao for umbreon. There is also the walk your buddy trick for getting extra espeons and umbreon. Walking for 10km and obtaining 2 candies will grant you an espeon if you evolve it AS YOUR BUDDY during day time in the game. Walking it at night will get you umbreon. Teddiursa evolution can be useful as a poor man’s filler because ursaring happens to hit hard, has good stats and won’t take Super Effective damage from anything aside from fighting types. Keep them in mind. Slakoth family. IRRELEVANT.
Poison. Another type that isn’t needed. But if you’re me you’re going to want to focus on bellsprout evolution due to its posion moveset. Nidoran male as a runner-up is also good.
Psychic. Another group of great generalists in battle despite only being really useful against fighting and poison types. Mewtwo is quite common now and available if you have access to an EX gym that hosts mewtwo raids and a raid group. If you are not yet fortunate then espeon to the rescue in the form of eevee. If you can muster up abra candies then alakazam alo the way. Other honorable mentions that you can find are exeggute again, jynx with luck. Mew of course is available but there are much better options.
Rock. Not at all plenty to choose from which can make things difficult if you have not been around for the past few months but fear not. Again, larvitar will be spawning more on June 16th, 2018 for 3hrs. Even with poor IVs it will still outperform the best geodude evolution you have. So stock up on those candies and evolve at least 1. Rhyhorn and especially the geodude line are always great for choices and will become better on the future.
Steel. Yet another typing that is of no use to us currently. Evolutions for magnemite, scyther and aron are amongst the only ones that are worth investing some sort of time in. Magnemite the most important for gen4 because of its other typing electric. Beldum is extremely rare but like the 3 before it they’re not at all useful currently.
Water. Get those water type candies from spawns while you can if you’re unable to do kyogre raids. Magikarp evolution is a fantastic choice. Then you’ve got the feebas family. Other water types you can use are krabby, carvanha, mudkip, totodile, spheal and again eevee evolutions. Plenty to choose from.
NOTE: Level 30 should be your ultimate goal. You can easily find a level 35 pokémon with good or bad IVs with a high attack stat that you can just use without spending dust. Catch these pokémon in the wild, evolve them and make sure they have the right moves against what you face. When you appraise it and the attack is one of its best stats then it should use it while you slowly build your teams while better pokémon become available for you in which they will if you’re patient.
