Lugia, the Diving Pokémon. It sleeps in a deep-sea trench. If it flaps its wings, it is said to cause a 40-day storm.
Overview
Lugia returns once again to reprise its role for sheer walling prowess in the ninth generation. Even after eight generations of powercreep since its introduction, Lugia’s bulk is fantastic. 130 Defense and 154 Special Defense are incredible by even modern standards, and 106 HP is well above average. Accenting all this bulk is the absurd Multiscale, halving damage if Lugia’s health is full, making Lugia incredibly difficult to take down in one shot and greatly blunting any opening shot against Lugia. Multiscale isn’t one and done with Lugia either; with its access to reliable recovery in both Roost and Recover, Lugia can easily re-establish Multiscale and stick around for the long game. Lugia is also shockingly fast for such a defensive Pokémon; an incredible base 110 Speed allows Lugia to outspeed numerous threats, allowing it to reactively recover or preemptively boost to blunt damage, making it all the bulkier.
Sadly, despite all these fantastic traits, Lugia finds itself in dire straits. The generation shift has been brutal to Lugia, removing both Dynamax and Toxic, depriving it of a fantastic way to boost and its best way of spreading around damage by itself respectively. Now to deal damage, Lugia must either rely on allies setting up hazards for it to shuffle, or its own meager offenses. Base 90 offenses are barely usable in formats without legendary Pokémon, which just highlights how underwhelming Lugia’s offensive presence is against its fellow titans. This turns Lugia into an incredibly passive Pokémon that requires multiple turns of setup, with the only thing stopping Lugia from being completely exploitable is its access to pHazing in Whirlwind and Dragon Tail. It doesn’t matter if you can survive Miraidon’s Specs Electro Drift if you can’t threaten it back in turn. As a result, Lugia finds itself on the backseat compared to more less passive defensive staples like Necrozma Dusk Mane, Arceus Fairy, Gliscor and Eternatus. Even Lugia’s strongest point, its defenses aren’t immaculate, with Flying and Psychic being riddled with weaknesses and Lugia’s general reliance on Multiscale to tank attacks is very exploitable. While the Guardian of the sea can weather any storm, Lugia’s counter offensive leaves much to be desired.
Positives
106/130/154 defenses are utterly insane, being some of the highest in the game, allowing Lugia to endure all sorts of attacks and repeatedly at thanks to Recover and Roost.
Multiscale further increases Lugia’s bulk, making it impossible to OHKO from full health.
Base 110 Speed is impressive for a defensive Pokémon, with Lugia acting before most Pokémon even without investment making it that much more bulky.
Negatives
Base 90 offenses are underwhelming to the point of passivity, and Lugia lacks any explosive boosting move to make up for it.
The loss of Toxic prevents Lugia from applying passive damage, leaving it reliant on teammates for setup or forced to use its offenses.
Flying Psychic typing is lacking defensively, granting Lugia numerous exploitable weaknesses.
Movesets
Do Not Disturb the Harmony
-Charge Beam
-Aeroblast
-Earth Power
-Recover
Ability: Multiscale
Item: Heavy Duty Boots
EVs and Nature:
252 HP / 4 Def /252 SAtk
Modest Nature
A more offensive alternative to traditional Calm Mind sets, Charge Beam Lugia plays offense while setting up, chipping opponents down while boosting to the point where Lugia can start dealing significant damage. This allows Lugia to act as a hybrid wall and setup sweeper, sponging attacks in the early game while chipping opponents down for a game ending sweep. Charge Beam does have some benefits over Calm Mind, allowing Lugia to setup and not be completely shutdown by Taunt, while hitting opposing Flying Resistant Flying types immune to Earth Power, such as Corviknight and Skarmory. Aeroblast is Lugia’s signature move and a good offensive STAB allowing Lugia to take advantage of Flying’s wide neutral coverage once it gains enough boosts. Earth Power is recommended, hitting all of Flying’s resistances super effectively and leaving fewer safe answers to switch into Lugia once set. Recover is invaluable for Lugia, helping it stick around long enough to accrue multiple boosts and survive its opponent’s assaults.
Tera Types:
Lugia loves Terastalizing due to its lacking base typing. Flying Psychic opens many problematic weaknesses to Electric, Ice, Dark and Ghost while its resistances tend to be more niche. Tera Fairy is immensely popular given the strength of Fairy as a defensive typing, along with providing Lugia an important resistance to Dark, while the immunity to Dragon is fantastic against Miraidon, Koraidon, Dialga, and Giratina, especially to block the latter’s Dragon Tail. Tera Ground is another popular option, providing immunity to Electric attacks from Miraidon, Magearna, and Regieleki, while boosting Earth Power’s damage to be in line with Aeroblast. Tera Steel is another defensive option worth considering owing to the sheer number of resistances it supplies, including Rock and Ice.
EVs and Items:
A bulky attacker spread of Max HP and Special Attack is recommended here, allowing Lugia to play at both defense and offense. Max Special Attack is highly recommended for Charge Beam sets given Charge Beam’s unreliability all but mandating Lugia needing fewer boosts to start applying offensive pressure. There is still plenty of room for flexibility in EV investment. Some Speed investment can be considered to combat some of the faster threats running around. 92 Speed EVs ensures Lugia outspeed Max Speed Modest Kyogre, a massive breaker that can easily 2HKO Lugia while 100 Speed EVs allows Lugia to get the jump on defensive Arceus forms looking to outspeed Kyogre. If running Calm Mind, one can shift Special Attack Investment to Defense to make Lugia nigh unbreakable once setup and act as a late game win condition. Heavy Duty Boots is strongly recommended at the item so that entry hazards don’t break Multiscale, allowing Lugia to reliably pivot into attacks repeatedly. Leftovers is a popular alternative given Lugia’s staying power, allowing it to reap a lot of passive recovery while it sticks around.
Partners:
:
Boosting Lugia appreciates wallbreaking allies, due to their ability to obliterate defensive Pokémon that often carry subversive moves like Taunt and Encore that can completely ruin Lugia. Miraidon is a key fantastic example drawing in Ground types (and Ground attacks) that Lugia can use to freely come in, though this works better when running Calm Mind over Charge Beam. Chien-Pao and Normal Arceus love Lugia for its ability to effortlessly soak up Fighting attacks from Koraidon, while Charge Beam Lugia is adept at removing physical walls like Corviknight and Skarmory that otherwise give them a tough time.
Other Options:
Calm Mind is a fantastic boosting option that makes Lugia all but immune to Special Attacks while pushing its Special Attack to respectable levels and is recommended in most cases.
Air Slash is a far weaker alternative over Aeroblast but does not suffer from the same low PP issues that will plague Lugia given Lugia’s penchant for drawn out battles.
Psyshock and Psychic Noise are Lugia’s best STAB options for Special walls like Clodsire and Blissey that can soak up even boosted attacks with ease.
Ice Beam offers incredible coverage against the many Dragon and Flying types Lugia must contend with.
Chilling Water is niche, but can make Calm Mind sets all but unbreakable while setting up.
Whirlwind is great if Lugia finds itself faced with another setup sweeper, allowing Lugia to wipe away their boosts before they inevitably overwhelm Lugia.
Abyssal Curse
-Curse
-Brave Bird
-Dragon Tail
-Recover
Ability: Multiscale
Item: Heavy-Duty Boots
EVs and Nature:
252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SDef
Adamant Nature
A blast from the past, Curse Lugia is an interesting pivot from the normal Calm Mind sets, shoring up its lower Defense and blowing past Special Sponges expecting to handle the normal Calm Mind variant. Brave Bird is Lugia’s most powerful physical STAB attack, requiring fewer Curses to be effective, and boasting wide and uncommon coverage. Dragon Tail is a secondary attack that gets boosted by Curse, but we are here for the pHazing effect, allowing Lugia pile on chip damage between Dragon Tail and Entry Hazards in the early game, bluffing a defensive set. Then in the late game, start boosting up with Curse, ward off opposing setup sweepers with Dragon Tail, and start laying in with boosted Barve Birds and Dragon Tails. Recover gives Lugia the necessary longevity to pull all of this off, shrugging off the damage and reestablishing
Tera Types:
Lugia loves Terastalizing due to its lacking base typing. Flying Psychic opens many problematic weaknesses to Electric, Ice, Dark and Ghost while its resistances tend to be more niche. Tera Fairy is immensely popular given the strength of Fairy as a defensive typing, along with providing Lugia an important resistance to Dark, while the immunity to Dragon is fantastic against Miraidon, Koraidon, Dialga, and Giratina, especially to block the latter’s Dragon Tail. Tera Ground is another popular option, providing immunity to Electric attacks from Miraidon, Magearna, and Regieleki, while boosting up Earthquake if running it. Tera Steel is another defensive option worth considering owing to the sheer number of resistances it supplies, including Rock and Ice.
EVs and Items:
Max HP and Attack investment are recommended for Lugia to require as few Curses as possible to be threatening while maintaining its impressive bulk. Alternatively, one can invest in Special Defense instead of Attack to fully bluff a defensive set and make Lugia as unbreakable as possible when it starts setting up Curses. Due to Curse’s Speed dropping effect, Speed investment is not recommended at all for this set. Heavy-Duty Boots are again the recommended item. Lugia needs Multiscale to be as effective as possible and losing a fourth of its health to Stealth Rocks on top of that is just too much. Leftovers can also work if one has excellent hazard control, considering the passive recovery it can provide.
Partners:
If running Dragon Tail, hazard setting allies are of vital importance, greatly increasing the passive damage Lugia accrues. Arceus Ground is a notable ally for being able to setup Stealth Rock, while not sapping too much offensive momentum while being a good check to Miraidon and other Electric types. Other Ground type setters like Ting-Lu, Gliscor, and Clodsire can work too, but are far more passive. Due to the prevalence of Heavy Duty Boots, an ally with Knock Off like Necrozma Dusk Mane, should be considered. Iron Treads is notable for providing role compression with access to both Stealth Rocks and Knock Off.
Boosting Lugia appreciates wallbreaking allies, due to their ability to obliterate defensive Pokémon that often carry subversive moves like Taunt and Encore that can completely ruin Lugia. Miraidon is a key fantastic example drawing in Ground types (and Ground attacks) that Lugia can use to freely come in.
Other Options:
Earthquake is a fantastic coverage option, providing Lugia vaunted Flying Ground coverage that is very hard to resist.
Dual Wingbeat is an alternative over Brave Bird that offers much lower recoil, though the power drop is significant on a Pokémon already starved for power.
Doubles and VGC Options
Defensive Pokémon rarely excel in Doubles formats. Their passiveness makes them easy to ignore, and multiple opponents offers far wider coverage and the multiple attacks makes walling all but impossible. As a Pokémon that thrives on its defensive prowess, all these issues apply to Lugia as well. Lugia has one recourse; to use its titanic bulk to accrue enough boosts that it becomes such a huge ball of stats that the opponent can't overwhelm and Lugia can start picking up KOs left and right. Even in this role, Lugia is outclassed by Terapagos, who starts off with a much more impressive Special Attack and can scale faster as a result on top of having viable spread STAB for reliable damage. The loss of Dynamax is really felt as a result, where Lugia no longer has the same boosting prowess max Moves provided and Weakness Policy is far harder to safely trigger without Dynamax’s HP doubling effect.
Silver Server
-Calm Mind
-Recover
-Aeroblast
-Earth Power
Ability: Multiscale
Item: Scope Lens/Covert Cloak
Tera Type: Grass/Dark/Normal
EVs and Nature:
252 HP / 4 Def / 252 SAtk
Modest Nature
Lugia's Calm Mind set plays much the same as Terapagos, using its great defenses to accrue Calm Minds before blasting the opponent to pieces. Lugia does differentiate itself from Terapagos in several matters. Lugia has potent self-healing with Recover, giving it far greater longevity than Terapagos. In return, Lugia’s lower Special Attack does mean it requires more Calm Minds for the same effective damage. Aeroblast stands out from Tera Starstorm in that it must be single target, leaving Lugia more vulnerable to Protect or redirection, but in turn is the superb Flying type hitting many popular Pokémon like Rillaboom, Amoongus, Urshifu, Ogerpon, Volcarona and Koraidon. Earth Power compliments Aeroblast beautifully, hitting all Aeroblast's resists, especially Miraidon, Raging Bolt, Zacian Crowned and Tera Steel Pokémon.
Scope Lens is recommended for its synergy with Aeroblast, giving it a natural 50% crit rate, allowing Lugia to pick up surprise knock outs and enables stunts like OHKOing Amoongus without any boosting whatsoever. Covert Cloak is another incredibly popular option, preventing surprise status drops and Fake Out cycling from completely crippling Lugia. Lugia’s Tera Type largely comes down to preference. Tera Grass prevents Rage Powder and Amoongus’ Spore from being issues while granting invaluable resistance to Electric attacks from Raging Bolt, Iron Hands and Miraidon hough the shared weakness to Ice is unpleasant considering Calyrex Ice Rider. Tera Dark is great at stopping Prankster Taunt and Encore, two moves that ruin any attempts at setting up, while turning Lugia’s Ghost and Dark weaknesses into resistances. Tera Normal is namely for Calyrex Shadow Rider, giving Lugia immunity to Astral Barrage while synergizing nicely with its base typing’s quadruple resistance to Fighting.
Other Options:
Protect is one of the best moves in Doubles and is worth consideration on Lugia, though Lugia’s already glacial pace and cramped moveset can make it hard to justify.
Icy Wind offers valuable Speed control but further worsen’s Lugia’s passiveness.
Weakness Policy is a fantastic boosting option that gives Lugia a lot of power from the word go, but requires an ally for reliable setup and will break Lugia’s own Multiscale.
Preferred Partners:
Lugia is incredibly reliant on team support to last long enough to get the boosts it needs. Incineroar and Rillaboom, are common and excellent answers for this, providing Fake Out cycling that reduces the number of attacks sent to Lugia while Incineroar’s Intimidate, Will-O-Wisp and Parting Shot provide further damage mitigation and Rillaboom’s Grassy Terrain provides passive healing if Lugia Terastalizes.
Comfey is one of the best partners for Lugia, offering Triage boosted Floral Healing to keep Lugia healthy and re-establish Multiscale without Lugia having to stop boosting, speed control with Tailwind and Trick Room, and can even trigger Weakness Policy with Triage Boosted Draining Kiss if Lugia is Tera Dark.
Whimsicott is another fascinating partner, capable of triggering Weakness Policy with Fling, offering Tailwind support, facilitates setup with Encore and Light Screen, while allowing Lugia to go on the offense sooner with Fake Tears.
Countering Lugia
With Lugia’s meagre offenses and frankly absurd defenses, any battle with it is about efficiently subverting those defenses. If Lugia is in a position where it is threatening a Pokémon offensively, the battle has gone on far too long or Lugia is exploiting a massive type advantage.
As overwhelming as Lugia is defensively, it is not immortal. Specs Miraidon is notable for being able to OHKO any Lugia not running Max HP and Special Defense investment. Miraidon in general is fantastic for being able to reliably 2HKO Lugia even if Lugia uses Recover after the Multiscale hit. Kyurem-Black and Kyurem-White with their pseudo Mold Breaker abilities can bypass Multiscale and have a small chance to OHKO Lugia, though the resulting damage is enough to compromise Lugia regardless.
Status moves are generally the best way to deal with Lugia. Taunt locks out any boosting aside from the unreliable Charge Beam, while Encore turns Lugia into a sitting duck for several turns and can waste invaluable Recover PP. Arceus Dark is easily the best example, possessing super Effective STAB and its own recover to outlast Lugia. Iron Bundle can trap Lugia in either Taunt or Encore, but its special frailty means even a +1 Air Slash can OHKO and it cannot break through Lugia on its own if it Encores Calm Mind. PHazing with Haze or Dragon Tail can put a stop to boosting sets, and Lugia’s glacial pace means clawing back those boosts is agonizing. Toxapex can wipe away any boosts with Haze and place Lugia on a clock with Toxic though it cannot safely switch into a boosted Earth Power. Giratina Origin and Dialga can wipe away boosts with Dragon Tail as well as break Multiscale, though this will fail if Lugia is Tera Fairy. Ho-oh and Ting-Lu’s Whirlwind can achieve similar effects and can turn off Multiscale with a Sacred Fire Burn. Toxic users like Clodsire and Gliscor are great at ruining Lugia, all but disabling Multiscale and placing it on a timer, though they abhor Psychic Noise and Ice Beam respectively.
Preventing Multiscale is generally the best way to deal with Lugia as its bulk is far less impressive if Multiscale isn’t active. Stealth Rocks is fantastic at this, but Lugia usually runs Heavy Duty Boots as a result, mandating Knock Off before hand.
Locations in Games
Red/Blue/Yellow:
Not in game
Gold/Silver/Crystal:
Whirl Islands
Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald:
Navel Rock (Emerald)
Trade from FireRed/LeafGreen/Emerald (Ruby/Sapphire)
FireRed/LeafGreen:
Navel Rock
Colosseum/XD:
Snagged from Cipher Boss Greevil in Citadark Isle (XD)
Diamond/Pearl/Platinum:
Trade from HeartGold/SoulSilver
HeartGold/SoulSilver:
Whirl Islands
Black/White:
Transfer from Generation IV
Black 2/White 2:
Transfer from Generation IV
X/Y:
Trade from Alpha Sapphire
Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire:
Sea Mauville (Alpha Sapphire)
Trade from Alpha Sapphire (Omega Ruby)
Sun/Moon:
Trade from Ultra Moon
Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon:
Ultra Space Wilds (Ultra Moon)
Trade from Ultra Moon (Ultra Sun)
Let's Go, Pikachu!/Let's Go, Eevee!:
Not in game
Sword/Shield:
Dynamax Adventures (Shield)
Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl:
Ramanas Park
Legends: Arceus:
Not in game
Scarlet/Violet:
North Province Area One
Anime Appearences
