Pokemon GO is filled with plenty of challenges that players can take on for themselves in order to earn a variety of valuable rewards. One of these challenges is facing the various leaders of Team GO Rocket in order to defeat them and rescue their Shadow Pokemon. There are three leaders that players can face with one of them being Cliff.

Like all of Team GO Rocket's leaders, Cliff can provide quite the challenge for any unprepared Pokemon GO player. Luckily, all of his Pokemon have known weaknesses that can be exploited in order to make the battle go much more smoothly.

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As with any other trainer battle, Cliff will send out three Pokemon that players will have to take down. However, while his first party member will always remain the same, his second and third Pokemon will be selected from two sets of three Pokemon. This means that unless players are rematching Cliff within the same encounter, there is no way to know for sure what Cliff will use for the later parts of the battle.

Cliff's First Pokemon - Seedot

Starting off the battle, Cliff's first Pokemon will always be the pure Grass-type, Seedot. This Pokemon is weak to Fire, Flying, Poison, Bug, and Ice-type moves, but also resists damage from Water, Grass, Electric, and Ground-type moves. Out of all of Cliff's Pokemon, Seedot is the weakest. Players that just want to get this Pokemon out of the way as soon as possible are recommended to use:

Galarian Darmanitan - Ice Fang

Reshiram - Fire Fang and Overheat

Chandelure - Fire Spin and Overheat

Unovan Darmanitan - Fire Fang and Overheat

Yveltal - Gust and Hurricane

Cliff's Second Pokemon - Hariyama, Poliwrath, or Kingler

Pokemon Hariyama Poliwrath Kingler

Moving forward, Cliff's second Pokemon has the possibility to be either Hariyama, Poliwrath, or Kingler. All of these Pokemon will provide a huge spike in difficulty in comparison to the fight with Seedot, making it all the more important to play against their weaknesses.

Hariyama is a pure Fighting-type Pokemon, making it weak to Fairy, Flying, and Psychic-type moves. It also resists damage from Bug, Rock, and Dark-type moves. Luckily, there are plenty of powerful Pokemon that also serve as perfect counters against Hariyama such as:

Staraptor - Wing Attack and Brave Bird

Ho-Oh - Extrasensory and Brave Bird

Granbull - Charm and Play Rough

Galarian Slowbro - Confusion and Psychic

Blaziken - Counter and Brave Bird

Another Pokemon that Cliff can use second is Poliwrath. This Pokemon is a dual Water and Fighting-type, making it vulnerable to Fairy, Flying, Psychic, Electric, and Grass-type moves. It additionally resists damage from Steel, Water, Bug, Rock, Ice, Dark, and Fire-type moves. With this in mind, some Pokemon recommended to use against Poliwrath are:

Attack Form Deoxys - Zen Headbutt and Zap Cannon

Mewtwo - Confusion and Psystrike

Therian Thundurus - Thunder Shock and Thunderbolt

Alakazam - Confusion and Psychic

Electivire - Thunder Shock and Wild Charge

The last Pokemon Cliff could use as his second party member is Kingler. It is a pure Water-type Pokemon, so it is weak to Grass and Electric-type moves. Additionally, it resists damage from Steel, Water, Ice, and Fire-type moves. In order to prevent it from taking too much health from the players' own Pokemon before it's defeated, players are recommended to use:

Therian Thundurus - Thunder Shock and Thunderbolt

Zekrom - Charge Beam and Wild Charge

Attack Form Deoxys - Zen Headbutt and Zap Cannon

Electivire - Thunder Shock and Wild Charge

Roserade - Razor Leaf and Solar Beam

Cliff's Third Pokemon - Torterra, Sharpedo, and Tyranitar

Finishing the battle up, there are still three more possible Pokemon that players have the chance to battle before defeating Cliff. All of these Pokemon can provide quite the problem, so players shouldn't hold anything back in order to achieve victory.

The first of the final Pokemon pool that Cliff can use is Torterra. This Pokemon is a dual Grass and Ground-type, making it vulnerable to Ice, Fire, Flying, and Bug-type moves. It also resists damage from Rock, Ground, and Electric-type moves. Because of this, the best counters to use against Torterra are:

Galarian Darmanitan - Ice Fang and Avalanche

Mamoswine - Powder Snow and Avalanche

Weavile - Ice Shard and Avalanche

Glaceon - Frost Breath and Avalanche

Articuno - Frost Breath and Ice Beam

Up next is Sharpedo, a dual Water and Dark-type Pokemon that carries a lot of weaknesses and resistances. For weaknesses, Sharpedo is vulnerable to Fairy, Bug, Electric, Grass, and Fighting-type moves. It meanwhile also resists damage from Ghost, Steel, Water, Ice, Dark, Fire, and Psychic-type moves. With this in mind, some highly recommended Pokemon to use against Sharpedo are:

Therian Thundurus - Thunder Shock and Thunderbolt

Machamp - Counter and Dynamic Punch

Raikou - Volt Switch and Wild Charge

Sirfetch'd - Counter and Close Combat

Electivire - Thunder Shock and Wild Charge

Finally, the last Pokemon of Cliff's to cover is the fearsome Tyranitar. This Pokemon is a dual Rock and Dark-type, making it weak to Fighting, Fairy, Ground, Bug, Steel, Water, and Grass-type moves. It also heavily resists damage from Dark, Normal, Poison, Ghost, Flying, Fire, and Psychic-type moves. Out of all its weaknesses, its Fighting-type weakness hits it the hardest. Because of this, the recommended counters to use against Tyranitar are:

Lucario - Counter and Aura Sphere

Conkeldurr - Counter and Dynamic Punch

Breloom - Counter and Dynamic Punch

Machamp - Counter and Dynamic Punch

Blaziken - Counter and Focus Blast

Pokemon GO is available on Android and iOS.

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