How to unlock Darmanitan
Darmanitan is not sold directly, so the only route is the Unova banner, where it occupies a 3★ slot. The 3★ band takes 17% of all pulls and holds 248 partners, so one specific Darmanitan works out to about 0.0685% per draw. The 70-pull pity counter only applies to 5★ results, so Darmanitan has no floor of its own and no targeted pull. A duplicate Darmanitan refunds 60 coins at the 3★ rate.
Darmanitan stats and rank
Darmanitan reads 117 HP, 118 speed, ×1.47 attack, ×1.47 physical, ×0.86 special, 55 defense and 55 special defense, for a 480 base-stat total. On the three-stat percentile this is 89.6 out of 100, which puts Darmanitan at rank 16 of 966 and in tier S. The relative picture matters more than the total: its strongest slot is physical multiplier (98th percentile) and its weakest is special multiplier (4th percentile), so it is a specialist rather than an all-rounder.
Best moves in Darmanitan's pool
At move level 5 the pool is led by Body Slam at 75.6 damage per 0.71s (156.0 effective DPS, ×1.47 multiplier), then Tackle at 33.6 damage per 0.38s (131.7 effective DPS, ×1.47 multiplier), then Quick Attack at 44.8 damage per 0.56s (117.1 effective DPS, ×1.47 multiplier). 7 of its 14 damaging moves scale with the physical multiplier and 7 with the special one, alongside 4 support moves. Its physical multiplier is the higher of the two (×1.47 against ×0.86), so physical moves convert better. The top option beats the second by 24.3 DPS, which decides slot one and leaves slot two as a judgement call. Effective DPS is damage over cooldown times the matching multiplier; it ignores range and area, so a lower-DPS cone can still clear faster than a single-target melee.
Evolution cards for Darmanitan
Its starting move, Ember, evolves into Fire Blast once the move is at level 5 and you hold the Power card, which boosts attack for that run. Menu upgrades use a separate system and never stand in for Power. 14 of its 18 moves carry an evolution card, across 6 distinct cards (Vigor, Sprint, Power, Reflexes, Armor and Synthesis). The strongest of them is Body Slam at 156.0 effective DPS, so that is the one worth holding a card for first.
Darmanitan compared to similar partners
The two closest stat lines in the roster are Excadrill (+3 HP, -3 speed, -0.03 attack, +28 total) and Cetitan (+29 HP, -9 speed, -0.15 attack, +41 total). Against Excadrill, Darmanitan is 3 speed faster and Darmanitan hits harder by ×0.03, and the rank gap is 9 places. Read those deltas as swap costs, because a gain on one line is usually paid for on another, so neither side is a strict upgrade and the move pools have to break the tie.