[shrapn3l]

metagross very rarely ends up being a huge threat on its own, since things like milotic, swampert and forretress are on every team, but it is the reason that every team needs a bulky water, even more so than the likes of aerodactyl, tyranitar, and salamence, who have other counters in pokemon like claydol. even skarmory, whose only real threats to metagross are impending spikes and whirlwind or roar, is rather susceptible to attack boosts or even crits when taking powerful choice banded meteor mashes. the most threatening thing about metagross is certainly explosion. metagross rarely pulls off a sweep on its own, but it is incredibly good at clearing the way for one of your other threats to get off a sweep. explosion can pave the way for a sweep by itself, but given metagross's solid special attack the susceptibility of some of its counters hidden power grass and fire, metagross is often capable of using the threat of explosion to tear apart half of a team with a mixed set by the time it's blown up. using lum berry to feign the common choice band set can help you get an easy kill on any gengar that tries to stay in to will o wisp you or tries take advantage of seeming choice banded earthquakes. metagross is also capable of using STAB psychic or pursuit to get gengar out of the way. hidden power fire can land a surprise ohko on forretress or a 2hko on skarmory. hidden power grass is a clean 2hko on swampert. after getting rid of metagross's other counters with hidden power and/or magneton support, metagross is free to blow up on something else, likely a celebi or a zapdos trying to tank meteor mashes and wear you down. with important and common defensive pokemon like zapdos, gengar, swampert, celebi, and skarmory out of the way, something like salamence or gyarados will have a much easier time with the opponent's team. of course, due to its excellent typing and stats, metagross also provides your team with important resistances to rock, flying, and normal attacks, and because of the threat of explosion and/or choice banded meteor mashes, it has an easy time scaring off common threats like celebi and curselax, making metagross a great fit for many teams as an efficient offensive threat and a solid defensive component.