I wanted to hold off on giving my opinion on Melmetal, since I didn't want to just repeat the same talking points that everyone has heard by now and my opinion on the pokemon has changed over the last few months. I'll be briefly talking about how I feel on Melmetal itself and what a potential metagame would look like post-melmetal, because at this point its just arguing over plays and calcs instead of addressing the larger picture.
I have mixed feelings on Melmetal, but I think a suspect test is warranted.
Melmetal's restrictive nature in the teambuilder is felt on all playstyles and threatens even the best defensive cores in the game, with substitute devastating stall and some balanced builds, where assault vest heavily pressuring what would be Melmetal checks on offense and choice band is another case of a mon clicking buttons until they win. We all know the calcs and the power level that Melmetal brings to the table and its been talked about to death. Steel perfectly supports this mon with the immunity core backing it up (I still don't think the core is broken, melmetal just makes dealing with it worse, there are better cores in the metagame besides this one defensively) + spikes, rapid spin and healing wish support.
On the other hand, Melmetal's pitiful speed stat and the wide spread of steel resists makes choice banded melmetal exploitable especially since banded trades off a lot of melmetal's longevity on a mon that dislikes spikes heavily. Yes, melmetal has plenty of coverage to take on what would be coming in on double iron bash, namely celesteela, toxapex etc. which makes the problem harder to deal with, however the set that melmetal ends up running really makes your approach to handling melmetal's coverage different.
I do have concerns on how this will effect the rest of the metagame and how it will shift after a Melmetal ban, because I do believe that banning Melmetal will see the rise of a ton of specially oriented threats that may warrant future suspect tests. I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing, but if the goal is to create a better metagame it helps to think of what that meta would look like without melmetal.
Moltres-Galar instantly becomes far more deadly if it does not have to worry about melmetal staring it down and having to rely on flinches or switching out and losing momentum. Moltres-Galar also has options to shut down defensive counterplay with taunt and substitute or being able to cleave through offense with agility weakness policy sets, which will most likely pick up more usage on teams aside from screens dark. I definitely can see this mon getting a suspect test in a melmetal free metagame.
Kyurem would thrive in a post-melmetal metagame, not having to worry about getting smacked into oblivion behind a substitute or having melmetal survive a choice specs earth power or focus blast if its assault vest (yes, AV melmetal survives specs focus blast from kyurem, I am as disgusted as you are reading this). Dragon in general would appreciate having steel brought down a few notches, and perhaps having kyurem as a larger part of the metagame would keep dangerous types like flying in check and we may see more experimentation with some of kyurem's coverage options depending on the set.
Spectrier will most likely see more usage since substitute sets with mud shot can get past mons like bisharp on steel in the wake of a melmetal ban. Spectrier in the past was a very centralizing threat that will probably see a rise in ghost usage since blacephalon may see a small dip as more teams use other options that ghost has to offer. Its hard to say whether or not Spectrier would rise again to the point of being suspect worthy since most steel teams patch up their weakness to spectrier with AV melmetal since Bisharp can fold to +2 mud shot or risk getting burned by will o wisp. Melmetal also doesn't like being burned, but even with only a 116 attack investment on melmetal, it still can force a 2hko on spectrier after rocks and two layers of spikes while dealing damage to spectrier behind its substitute.
As an offensive threat, Zapdos appreciates a bit more freedom in spamming thunderbolt and heatwave in the steel matchup. I'm mostly putting it here as an obligatory special wallbreaker that melmetal can survive a few hits and force out Zapdos if it goes for tbolt. Defensive/non specs sets on zapdos may appreciate melmetal being gone a bit more, but thats a bit of a stretch.
Ok free my boy nidoking he did not deserve to be put in a metagame with melmetal. It hurts my soul watching melmetal survive this thing's earth power or playing sacking games vs substitute. Yes I'm salty about it.
I would like to hear more on what people think a post-melmetal metagame may look like, as I'm sure that I overlooked a few things on my brief thoughts.
