As the thread title says, the National Dex Monotype Council decided to ban Toxapex from the tier.
Why Review Toxapex?
People have complained about Toxapex's presence in the metagame due to its amazing defenses, access to Regenerator, and fantastic utility, making it too overbearing. While we dismissed this earlier, the council decided to do a deeper dive into what effect Toxapex has on the metagame.
Rereading through the Discord chat and Pokemon Showdown Room, it has been clear many newer users have pointed out Toxapex's indestructibility, and we are inclined to agree with them. Our tiering philosophy, the second rule is: Do not favor any one type. To uphold this, the council can no longer favor Water and Poison teams like it has been by removing Spectrier from the metagame via suspect test and rebalance the metagame by banning Toxapex.
Instead, to ensure the tier is as balanced as possible, the council decided to ban Toxapex instead of holding a suspect test formally.
Why Ban Toxapex?
Lately, as a council, we have been talking internally about this, and we decided to ban Toxapex due to its natural defensive, phenomenal recovery. It can easily wear down teams and tank far too many attacks with little to no consequence. It can also remove items from foes such as Bisharp's Black Glasses or Urshifu-S Choice Band, preventing them from taking out Toxapex with their STAB. On top of this, its ability to freely set Toxic Spikes and absorb them for Water teams shows us just how much of a nuisance it has become.
For Water teams they can no longer freely send in Toxapex to get rid of Toxic Spikes and tank attacks; instead, they need to think about turns against tough offensive foes. The Council believes Water teams will be fine because they still have access to Tentacruel, which controversially is better than Toxapex anyway due to its ability to get rid of other hazards with Rapid Spin and better take on threats such as Tapu Bulu.
On the matter of Poison teams, they still have a Water-type in Tentacruel, so losing Toxapex will not hurt them much either way. While Toxapex can remove Toxic Spikes does not matter to Poison much, Poison teams can still use Pokemon such as Mega Venusaur and Tentacruel to switch into powerful Water-type attacks; the latter can also take on Fire-types for the team. Tentacruel can also take on Pokemon such as Gliscor that threaten Poison teams with fast Ice Beam, which Toxapex was unable to do. Tentacruel with max Speed can also take out Sand Rush Excadrill outside of sand, which greatly benefits Poison teams.
Why Not hold a suspect test?
Originally we were planning on holding a suspect test for Toxapex. However, since Monotype WCOP was going on, we decided it would be best to balance the tier as quickly as possible. We may hold a suspect test to bring it back into the tier later down the road.
Looking to the future, we will, of course, still be hosting public suspects for most tiering decisions. The council reserved the right to use quick bans in the tiering philosophy. With a unanimous vote, we are exercising that right to ban Toxapex from the metagame.
So, feel free to use this thread to discuss this decision. This thread is not for tiering philosophy discussion. Tagging Kris to implement. Thank you!
