Niantic secretly updates Raid Move durations, massively shaking up Raid Battles

Niantic has released a secret, potentially massive, change to the Raid Battles system has that is just getting discovered by Trainers around the world. If this change is not an unintentional bug introduced on Niantic’s server side, we are looking at a fundamental shakeup of the raiding meta – so large that this may be the biggest move shakeup in history of Pokémon GO’s raids.

Please be aware of one thing – Niantic is getting ready to release the all-new Max Battles, which feature Dynamax Pokémon and new Raid mechanics. This feature is during the new Max Out season, and it is possible that what we are reporting here today may be an unintentional bug introduced by the new type of battles.

A reddit user called Flyfunner broke down the new changes in painstaking detail, but we will be focusing only on the change we think is most important:

• Raid Battles now operate based on a 0.5 second cycle
• Duration of all moves has been rounded up or rounded down to the closest multiple of 0.5 seconds. Some moves are faster, some are slower, some are unchanged
• This has had massive effect on best moves, best counters, and best Raid Attackers of every type

Raid Battle Changes

A half-second cycle rules the game

As we said, Raid Battles now completely operate on a half-second cycle. Damage is dealt at regular 0.5 second intervals, moves generate and consume full energy as soon as they are activated, rather than observing the “damage window start” and “damage window end” timers.

Move duration has been rounded to the nearest multiple of 0.5

Flyfunner reported that all moves durations are now rounded to the nearest multiple of 0.5 seconds, with some move durations being rounded down (made faster), and some being rounded up (slowed down). 

This affects both fast and charge moves. Here is a few examples:

• Sucker Punch (0.7 sec → 0.5 sec)
• Fury Cutter (0.4 sec → 0.5 sec)
• Poison Jab (0.8 sec → 1.0 sec)
• Stone Edge (2.3 sec → 2.5 sec)
• Bug Buzz (3.7 sec → 3.5 sec)

As you can imagine, this is quite a change. What we also know is that there has been no change to the underlying move data that is visible in the Game Master file. The data is the same, but it seems as if the game is using a different battle system / engine for Raid Battles.

With that being said, here are the biggest winners and losers of this new change.

Winners, losers, and the Unchanged

We will be listing just the move winners and losers below, but you should be aware that these changes directly affect the counters, best per type charts, best raid attackers, etc.

You can find all of those updated on our Pokémon GO Database website, and we are providing the quick links here:

Best per type

Winners: Moves that got faster

Loosers: Moves that got slower

Unchanged moves

• Acid Spray Poison
• Acrobatics Flying
• Ancient Power Rock
• Bite Dark
• Brave Bird Flying
• Bug Bite Bug
• Bulldoze Ground
• Charm Fairy
• Cross Chop Fighting
• Cross Poison Poison
• Crush Claw Normal
• Cut Normal
• Dark Pulse Dark
• Darkest Lariat Dark
• Dazzling Gleam Fairy
• Discharge Electric
• Double Iron Bash Steel
• Double Kick Fighting
• Dragon Ascent Flying
• Dragon Breath Dragon
• Ember Fire
• Focus Blast Fighting
• Foul Play Dark
• Frustration Normal
• Fusion Bolt Electric
• Geomancy Fairy
• Glaciate Ice
• Gust Flying
• Heat Wave Fire
• Hidden Power Normal
• High Jump Kick Fighting
• Hydro Pump Water
• Hyper Fang Normal
• Ice Fang Ice
• Leaf Storm Grass
• Leech Life Bug
• Lick Ghost
• Liquidation Water
• Luster Purge Psychic
• Magma Storm Fire
• Mist Ball Psychic
• Mystical Fire Fire
• Oblivion Wing Flying
• Overheat Fire
• Peck Flying
• Power-Up Punch Fighting
• Powder Snow Ice
• Psycho Boost Psychic
• Psywave Psychic
• Razor Leaf Grass
• Sand Attack Ground
• Sand Tomb Ground
• Scratch Normal
• Shadow Ball Ghost
• Sky Attack Flying
• Spacial Rend Dragon
• Sparkling Aria Water
• Spirit Shackle Ghost
• Splash Water
• Struggle Bug Bug
• Superpower Fighting
• Tackle Normal
• Techno Blast Normal
• Techno Blast Fire
• Techno Blast Ice
• Techno Blast Water
• Techno Blast Electric
• Thunderbolt Electric
• Trailblaze Grass
• Transform Normal
• Tri Attack Normal
• Triple Axel Ice
• Water Gun Water
• Water Gun Water
• Yawn Normal