Last slate, there were nominations for Toxapex to rise to S and it very nearly happened, since it only needed one more vote to be S. Personally, I stayed neutral on that particular nomination but I did find the notion of it’s rise nearly being accepted very interesting in itself. Hence, I decided to test Toxapex out during the previous week and I’ll post my thoughts here.
First, let’s take a look at A+, sans Toxapex. We have Mega Alakazam, Mega Mawile, Ferrothorn and Tornadus-Therian. From these 4, Mega Mawile has been getting the most consistent results (and a couple of nominations to S) for a while now, stretching back to the Zygarde meta. Ferrothorn was slightly worse than the rest of that bunch, but after Zygardes ban, it has caught up and now has roughly the same viability as Mega Alakazam and Tornadus-Therian. Now I want you to compare them to Toxapex, which frankly is also A+. If we were to compare the previous 4 Pokémon to Toxapex, purely based on viability, Mega Alakazam, Ferrothorn and Tornadus-Therian completely fail to equate their viability ceiling to that of Toxapex. Not only is Toxapex a lot more frightening on team preview (I’ll come back to this later on), it also has to be accounted for in the teambuilder a lot more if you don’t want your entire team to be a complete sitting duck. As for Mega Mawile, I’d say it comes closest to Toxapex’ viability, but for an offensive mon it has a cripplingly low speed and a mediocre base form that doesn’t give a lot of defensive utility for its team, which is completely fine on Mawile Balance, but in other structures like Trick Room, it is a factor that keeps Mawile in check. The fact of the matter is that for an offensive Pokémon, Mawile still has its flaws, while Toxapex is a near flawless defensive behemoth. So what I’m basically trying to say is that in the end even Mega Mawile cannot stand up to Toxapex viability-wise.
Now let’s take a look at S: Heatran, Ash-Greninja, Magearna and Landorus-Therian. Before I go into anything deeply, I’m going to ask a question. Does Toxapex compare to the current S ranked Pokémon? Even though Toxapex doesn’t choose it’s checks and counters and even though it isn’t exactly versatile or threatens to clean up the opposition, those are more or less criteria for offensively inclined Pokémon to fit the bill in S. However, Toxapex is completely defensive. As a matter of fact, in the past four of five meta’s, Toxapex is the only purely defensive Pokémon to ever make it to S. Since it’s roles do not compare to the current S mons, I will advocate for it with the use of reasons based on a more general point of view.
Toxapex is a very unique defensive Pokémon. First of all, Toxapex is very threatening from the get go in a battle. Why is that? Let’s elaborate on Toxapex’ obvious purpose in battle, which is basically countering 25% of the meta, checking another 40% and blanket checking another 20%, which leaves 15% of the meta that can directly threaten Toxapex out. These in itself are the most impressive numbers I have ever seen for a defensive Pokémon and form a ladder to Toxapex’s second purpose in battle, and the reason why it is so threatening, which is the ability to successfully use one of the most constricting moves in the game in Toxic Spikes, every time it can come in, which amounts to a lot of opportunities. This is the reason why Toxapex stands out from other defensive Pokémon; because it has the ability to use it’s opportunities to the fullest and most dangerous potential. The fact that it is such a mainstay throughout a battle puts a lot of pressure to the teams hazard remover, since no hazard remover is as resilient as Toxapex is. This in turn enables the Toxapex team to consistently threaten the foe’s hazard remover and take it out a majority of the time, before stacking its own hazards and very likely winning the game. Hence, what you should conclude from my first argument is the fact that a Toxapex team indirectly has a big advantage over a non Toxapex team in the hazard game, a notion I have never heard that often and one that is very interesting.
Let’s move on to the next main reason why Toxapex stands out so much from other defensive Pokémon, and you can probably see this coming but it’s the fact that Toxapex is not passive or setup bait for anything relevant in the tier because of Haze, except Calm Mind Tapu Lele. This is a godsend for a defensive Pokémon. This combined with its ability in Regenerator gives it another rare trait for a defensive Pokémon: it very rarely is a momentum drain.
So, if we go back to the question whether or not Toxapex can compare itself to the S-ranked mons, I feel very inclined to say yes. Toxapex has always had an enormous impact on the gen 7 meta and after Zygardes departure, it has as much of an impact on the metagame as any S rank Pokémon claims to have right now and it does in fact match up with them viability-wise.
Hence, I say
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