What it does on the ladder
Skeledirge appears on 0.05% of Regulation M-B teams, which
is 215th of the 277 Pokémon with enough games to measure.
The move it almost always carries is Torch Song, on 71.7% of sets.
The item is usually Leftovers at 57.1%.
The ability is split: Unaware on 91% and Blaze on 9%.
Those are Smogon's published usage figures, not anything measured here, and they describe what
the ladder plays rather than what is strongest. The full set is in the panel above.
The Pokémon itself
Skeledirge is number 911 in the National Dex, a Paldea Pokémon, Fire and Ghost
with a base stat total of 530 — 44th of the 234 Pokémon
legal in this regulation. Its best stat is Sp. Atk at 110, 43rd
in the format; its weakest is Speed at 66, 150th.
It can have Blaze and Unaware.
The Champions module tiers it UU.
It sits in a 3-stage line: Fuecoco → Crocalor → Skeledirge.
Not all of that line is legal in this regulation — Fuecoco and Crocalor are not.
What gets through
As Fire and Ghost, 5 of the eighteen attacking types do extra damage to it. It
resists 7 and is immune to 2. The board above
has all of it. 3 other legal Pokémon share the same typing and the same board: Ceruledge, Chandelure, Typhlosion-Hisui.
What threatens it
Smogon publishes no head-to-head checks-and-counters data for doubles formats, so this list is
computed, not measured: the most-played Regulation M-B Pokémon carrying a damaging
move of a type Skeledirge takes extra damage from.
- Kingambit — Sucker Punch (Dark, ×2), on 99.9% of its sets
- Incineroar — Throat Chop (Dark, ×2), on 51.4% of its sets
- Garchomp — Earthquake (Ground, ×2), on 85.1% of its sets
- Basculegion — Last Respects (Ghost, ×2), on 99.9% of its sets
- Blastoise-Mega — Dark Pulse (Dark, ×2), on 91.8% of its sets
- Venusaur — Earth Power (Ground, ×2), on 71.1% of its sets
Speed and weight
At level 50 with a boosting nature and full investment, Skeledirge reaches
129 Speed; left uninvested with a neutral nature it sits at
86. Invested, it outruns 5 of the 20
most-used Pokémon in the regulation when they are invested too — which is the comparison that
decides who moves first.
It weighs 326.5 kg, so Grass Knot and Low Kick hit it for 120 base
power. That is a real consideration in a format where both are common.
Its move pool
Skeledirge learns 65 moves in the Champions data.
46 of them do damage, across 11 of the eighteen
types, and 20 share a type with it and so get the same-type bonus.
Its hardest-hitting same-type move is Blast Burn at 150 base power.
It has no priority move, so it moves in Speed order every turn.
That pool is what the team builder reads from when you seat it, and the
damage calculator will take it as the attacker with
the form already chosen.
