Pokémon Scarlet and Violet’s extreme Starter raids are back but aren’t hitting like they used to

After a brief break from Starter raids over the last several weeks, Pokémon Scarlet and Violet are returning to its seven-star bread and butter, leaving some players disappointed with what looks to be a long slate of upcoming content.

Blaziken is the next Pokémon to be featured in seven-star Tera Raids from Jan. 12 to 14 and Jan. 19 to 21. This is the first time a non-Hisuian Starter has been featured in the most extreme SV raids since Rillaboom back in August, and it is a bit surprising to see considering the game’s recent DLC content. 

In The Indigo Disk, you can upgrade the Blueberry Academy’s Terarium while playing through the story. This will eventually let you encounter every Starter Pokémon from Gen I to VIII in the wild. As a direct result of Pokémon like Blaziken being naturally obtainable in SV without this raid event, some players view it as a bit lackluster considering we are coming off of a recent Dialga and Palkia event and a special Iron Bundle seven-star raid run. 

When Charizard started the Starter seven-star raid trend in December 2022, SV was still a new game, the Tera Raid feature was fresh, and featuring a popular Pokémon made sense. That held through most of 2023 since players could use seven-star events to catch Starters not native to a Nintendo Switch Pokémon title, such as Greninja. But now it seems a bit dated for anyone who has played through the DLC and can just catch or breed for whatever Starter they want.

Sure, some players are disappointed that Game Freak is back to running Starters instead of doing more Legendary or Paradox Tera Raids. Still, there are plenty of people excited to test their might against the Flying Tera Type Blaziken. It is also important to note that the Tera Raid event distribution method needs to appeal to the widest base of SV players possible. 

Starter Pokémon are always among the most popular creatures in any given generation, making them the perfect choice to market to new and old fans. It is also the only way for players without the DLC to catch many of the Starters without going back to previous games, trading, or using Pokémon HOME. 

Unfortunately, if you aren’t happy with Blaziken popping up in raids, you might want to buckle up since this will likely start a new wave of Tera Raid events throughout 2024 for all of the returning Starters. This doesn’t mean that some of the Legendary Pokémon that haven’t appeared in SV like Xerneas or Zygarde won’t be added in future raid events, but those special instances will likely be sandwiched between Starter Pokémon.