S
Mr. Mime is the best pokemon in the tier, we all know this. I really dislike the type of gameplay mime introduces by so often trading with itself and occasionally haxing one playing into a massive lead which never feels deserved from either side. It probably should've been banned but with this meta (sadly) coming to a close, it's pointless to do so now.
Charizard is the other S tier mon. With great speed swords dance and strong stab, it's useful in every game. Unlike mime it isn't mandatory to use on every single team, but you can do so and not be punished super hard because even in the face of its worse matchups it's still useful.
A
Ranking poliwrath at #3 is a bit of a weird call but let me explain. No matter what if you want to consistently win you will need to land sleep and so the choice is to gamble with venomoth or poliwrath. Venomoth does have a higher accuracy sleep move, stun spore, better speed, ect, but poliwrath is a much better pokemon after landing sleep, especially if it lands sleep on the first try. That's not to slight venomoth because it is still good after landing sleep but it's just to say I believe poliwrath to be better, and while hypnosis accuracy is a huge bummer, that isn't something to hold against poliwrath because it's a sleeper and it's job is to land sleep, It's not like I'm going to make a team without sleep so this doesn't impact viability, so to speak. The extra 15 accuracy venomoth has on poliwrath isn't noticeable enough for me to call venomoth a better mon when both can totally fail at their job and the upside to poliwrath of being a secondary, more disposable water, is better on average.
Blastoise is a pokemon that can lock down endgames with relative assurance, because of its great matchup again many late game threats, like charizard, seadra, and fearow. Earthquake is especially nice to hit magneton if you don't fancy bringing a ground on that team, and there are even some niche moveset choices like rest, counter, and my favorite tail whip. Much like zard this mon is useful in nearly every single game, though the potential upside to this is a lot lower compared to zard who can just rob games with lucky crits or sword dance on chokes.
Venomoth is a good pokemon, there's a brave take for you. In all seriousness venomoth is great at landing sleep and can paralyze stuff afterwards. Though you can tell I'm not the biggest fan here ranking this mon at #5. My issues come from stun spore accuracy and low damage output, let's start with low damage output. Even pokemon venomoth should be theoretically beating have odds against moth because it just does so little damage with psychic and really kinda needs those drops, low damage also makes it a lot harder to double switch because the opponent might just stay in and eat the hit because it's not immediately threatening, and when it's attacking and not clicking stun spore it has a nasty tendency to let in so really scary mons like mime, fearow, or zard. Stun spore accuracy also really sucks because it will often just miss and completely fuck over the user, like allowing a fearow free entry instead of paralyzing it. And I don't afford moth the same leniency as I do wrath because sleep is more often than not necessary, paralysis is just nice to have but not always worth the risk of missing. And this especially hurts because moth is supposed to be the consistent sleeper but if you have to land a sleep powder and then a stun spore, I'd really rather take poliwrath who just needs to land hypnosis.
Tldr moth is good, very good even, but both sleepers are inconsistent as hell and wrath is better.
A-
I really don't have much to say about fearow that isn't fairly obvious, it's a very good revenge killer that struggles into rock types. The main thing I like about fearow as opposed to other matchup fish mons is that it can overcome its poor matchups with good play and/or crits, so it isn't nearly as helpless as say magneton into a ground.
Arcanine is the best lead in the tier, no debate. Because you are clicking body slam you can cheese through any lead, and it's not even that unlikely because of arcanine's good attack and crit rate. The only lead that you don't have decent odds against is poliwrath because they are just so bulky. Now lead charizard also exist and your odds against that are also pretty low, but that's why I always run poliwrath in the back to switch in and claim my free sleep. Even past the lead slot arcanine is extremely useful, it can switch into both moth and mime then click body slam to chip down and hopefully paralyze some water type, obviously it isn't always good to let these water types in but if you build a sturdy enough team against waters than this isn't the biggest issue, especially because poliwrath helps with that a good amount. I've also been running leer arcanine a lot recently and it can be very useful against paralyzed pokemon or porygon.
B
Seadra is maybe the most "whatever" mon in the tier for me, it does its job well but not like super well. It's beaten by other waters which are on every team but if you can remove them seadra is a force to be reckoned with. It's much less splashable than blastoise or poliwrath but firmly the third best water type in my opinion. It also gets some funny options like rest or smokescreen, but I haven't played around with these too much.
This is the ultimate high risk high reward pokemon. It loses real bad into grounds but is very happy into everything else, it's especially nice into porygon which has been on the rise lately. Ground types have been a bit more popular recently, especially nidoking, but even so magneton is always worth considering for a team and must be kept in mind whilst building or else you might just get steamrolled.
Porygon has been on the rise, and this has led to a lot of crazy meta developments, now every team must have a plan to take this duck out. During Rbypl I ran a lot of niche options to take out porygon, leer arcanine, tail whip blastoise, golduck over my standard blastoise to amnesia and kill it, even some of my nidoking were chosen more with the intention of playing around porygon rather than for magneton. I didn't run a lot of porygon of my own because It's unreliable and I don't at all like the type of gameplay it brings, but I loaded it a few times and while I got unlucky more often than not this pokemon still has a lot of merit.
Raticate is a super lame pokemon to use but a necessary evil if you want a fast normal type and don't want to load a fearow into rocks every game. It really only succeeds as a revenge killer because of its poor bulk, but it does do that pretty well.
B-
The most mediocre water type in the tier, it does have some nice moveset options but the loss in bulk makes it so much worse than blastoise. The only reason I ever find myself running this is when I have a team that is weak into porygon so I throw this on over blastoise and call it a day.
Graveler isn't great but being able to check fearow and counter magneton in one slot is insane role compression. I'm never over the moon about loading graveler but I have had great success with it because it has a high chance to face something it wants to, and it isn't even useless if it doesn't get the matchup. While not something I specifically run this mon for, graveler can survive +2 charizard earthquake and rockslide it into dust, unlike a certain other rock type who can't ko zard in one with its stab move. It also has explosion which isn't always useful because you want to remain alive to check stuff, but it's very good when you can click it, I also always run substitute to punish chokes late game.
Nidoking is the last pokemon on my list that I would consider genuinely good. Ground typing is of course nice for magneton, but its other attributes are what make it good. While not amazing its speed tier is solid getting the jump on porygon and the most relevant water types, it also has thunderbolt making it the only ground actually capable of fighting waters if it really comes down to it. Its movepool goes even further with blizzard, rockslide, and substitute all being solid, it even has leer if it really wants extra insurance against porygon, which is another good matchup for it because it can dodge twave and fish for crits or just pivot out. Nidoking does still have a lot of problems with things such as water types and really anything faster than it, but it's great into magneton and useful elsewhere.
C
Poliwhirl only exists as a cheese lead with a high potential upside and the risk of missing hypnosis and being completely useless. If you like gambling this is the mon for you, it just isn't the mon for me.
Moltres has been on a major downtrend ever since fire spin was banned, but the fact it even needed that to hang in the first place shows how awful it is.
C-
Aerodactyl is not a good pokemon, nor is it even really viable, but it has a niche that can be used for those so inclined.
Everyone is going to call me crazy or idiotic for putting kabutops this low, even below famous shitmon aerodactyl, but just hear me out so you can properly make fun of me. Kabutops is meant to be a fearow check, and while it does win 1v1 it does so little elsewhere that I'd actually be happy to take the chip on kabutops and then just switch in something that forces kabutops out, and finding something that forces this mon out is pathetically easy because it's the entire tier. Kabutops literally cannot afford to take any damage from anything that isn't a fearow or else it just crumples, especially because it can't one shot fearow, or even come close enough that fearow it in range of its own recoil. Kabutops only other positive matchups, acanine and moltres, are not super relevant because moltres is a bad pokemon who's usage is dying, and arcanine is a lead who outside of myself has never had high usage, and there also aerodactyl but that mon has almost zero usage these days. Outside of these mons kabutops is useless because it can never afford to take an attack when it gets the fearow matchup and if it doesn't than you wasted your team slot, which to be clear was wasted on kabutops regardless. Oh yeah and just to pile on kabutrash some more it is the easily the most counterable (the move) mon in the tier, if the opponent has counter blastoise or god forbid poliwrath you might as well gg because you sure as hell can't scout for that with kabutops's paper mache body.
I've used this mon once in a tournament game and it won, I've always wanted to use scyther again but just haven't gotten around to it.
D
I've also used this thing once and it won, but unlike scyther I don't see as much value in this guy because other fires are just better mostly.
Just like the last two I brought this guy once, however it didn't win so it gets the lower spot.
I used to use this a fair amount, then I stopped and my brain grew three sizes that day. Jokes aside gastly will die if it misses hypnosis and it has really rough matchups outside of that.
Maris brought this once and it won in style so that automatically makes it better than all the mons below who lose constantly and even when they do win they have to drag themself to the finish line.
Technically has some advantages over other ground types but they are so minimal that you'd never notice.
D-
Please stop using this I'm worried about you.
I don't drink diet soda and I don't use diet arcanine.
Good pokemon if you like losing 1v1 to the things you check.
Despite what you may believe this pokemon is not a star.
Unranked
These pokemon don't count for the ranking, all of them are just mons I've seen used or considered using but were too bad to justify ranking.
