mew is practically god in this metagame, with the stallbreaking set just being so efficient but still effective vs offense. with a simple set of taunt / roost / wow / knock off it disrupts a huge amount of the tier as it takes on stall amazingly with taunt + wow + roost but also offense with wow + roost + knock off which does things like taking away azumarills av making it more vulnerable to keldeo or landorus's life orb so that it is much weaker and can be stalled out by mew itself. some people are saying conkeldurr is an answer to this thing but you still knock off its assault vest making it much less useful against like every special attacker in the tier that it would normally switch into. obviously mew also has a fantastic movepool and it can run whatever move it wants over knock off if it wants to lure in / take on something better. this is just one set and it can run like 3 others so theres not really that much more to talk about, a+ is a fitting rank. it's honestly really great just to see the huge impact aegislash leaving has had on the metagame.
no opinion on garchomp but honestly i dont think it can move down even though dice is right that a lot of its roles overlap with landorus as an offensive stealth rocker or a zardx check (even though it hates burn much more than lando).
i also honestly think it's time for mega charizard x to go down to a+ rank. no one is denying it isn't a powerful choice with a lot of sets but with the ubiquity if sand offense in this meta it definitely struggles. there are heaps of roadblocks to it such as scarf landorus-t which is by far landorus-t's best set at the moment and typical stallmons like quagsire, hippowdon, defensive landorus-t, slowbro, and offensive checks like prankster thund, azumarill, heatran. its defensive set is nice but its very easily revengeable by things like garchomp / lum dnite and the fact that it is yet another stall mon ohkoed by landorus doesnt really help. jukain is right in that it is incredibly vulnerable to passive damage through stealth rock and sand and fblitz recoil until it can actually get into the range of like an azumarill aqua jet or a breloom mach punch.
not sure about mega tyranitar, one one hand it gains the ability to use fire punch to bone ferrothorn which means it has less answers on balance but on the other hand with it means that excadrill doesn't get eight turns which i really dont know if i should count as a con. imo stay where it is for now.
EDIT: actually thinking about it with slowbro everywhere thanks to medi and terrak and heaps of revenge killers like scarf superpower landorus-t and scarf keldeo for even +1 variants, maybe a rank is more suitable.
i agree with mega gyarados for a rank simply because ferrothorn is absolutely everywhere on literally every single balance squad, it's on par with clefable in terms of its ubiquity on balance which is why every greninja / lati@s are running hp fire nowadays. i dont see any reason for this to be a+ when it has such a common roadblock against balance teams and add to that that ferrothorn isn't easy to wear down and can't be pursuit trapped or any other conventional means of wearing down bulkymons.
heracross is honestly the only of the 3 megas i can see in a+ only because it fucks stall hard with sd + 3 attacks while also fucking balance AND not being worthless vs offense. some obscure checks have been coming up like acro gliscor but that only serves to cement its dominance.
gardevoir also threatens offense since it can switch into keldeo and is fast and decently specially bulky but it has the issue of being incredibly easy to revenge kill by anything named talonflame / garchomp / any scarf physical attacker like excadrill, and lando-t. it also loses to jirachi which is becoming p popular. i see it fitting with the a rank mons.
i guess not being able to run one of the three megas makes venusaur inherently "worse" and with sand everywhere and hp flying thundurus everywhere meaning it cant decently check that anymore i think a is a good fit because it can still consistently check things like azumarill / breloom.
ferrothorn is the most amazing pokemon at the moment like it was in pre-mega gyarados meta when masterclasses team came out because it walls gyara, non hp fire gren, non hp fire lati, also like 326813 other things while also forming one of the most solid and difficult to wear down cores with alomomola and gliscor. a+ definitely. only issue is that it may need to drop with everything starting to run fire coverage.
sometimes i run hippowdon on sand offense over tyranitar if only because i like the extra bulk to cover certain threats like opposing excadrill. that being said, it is absolutely way too passive for the balance teams it fits on. it's very comparable to skarmory, thus, the same rank seems optimal.
the defensive landorus-t set isnt what warrants moving it up but the fact that the scarf set is so good right now (and even that the defensive set can bluff scarf) just makes landorus-t such a god. now i said before i didnt want it to rise since it gets worn down super quickly checking the things it needs to check but since the scarf set is so good but it still keeps heaps of the merit of the defensive sets (intimidate, one time m-hera check, still checks heaps of pokemon that trouble offense like exca) i definitely think that a+ is the rank for landorus-t right now.
i dont know what merits suicune rising at the moment as there doesn't appear to be anything different in this meta than the last meta (except MAYBE mega venu usage going down o_O)???
raikou with an assault vest is obviously a decent check to thundurus and even greninja in a pinch and according to tesung cm volt switch is nice but ive been using cm raikou and av raikou and even specskou for ages and i always found them way too weak and lose so much momentum vs the sand that is everywhere so idk.
i do like mega manectric though mainly because excadrill isn't a safe switch into it thanks to fthrower / overheat even though ttar is a bitch so it is still troubled by sand but definitely not as much as raikou is so this has to be at least 1-2 ranks above it. manectric is still very decent against offense teams and while it is rather easy to deal with on stall teams, at least it can scratch ferrothorn (unlike raikou).
mega aerodactyl is very good in this metagame and i really think it should move up to b+. the stallbreaker set with taunt + roost obviously troubles stall, as taunt + roost is a super potent combination. when invested with bulk it is a superb birdspam check that can't be trapped by magnezone. the offensive set is the most common set and it outspeeds almost the entire metagame while also having impressive coverage to threaten offense, sort of like greninja. with great coverage options such as eq, sedge, aerial ace, fire fang, ice fang, and aqua tail, this is something rising in popularity that should move up.
barely anyone uses regular scizor anymore and the only set anyone uses is CB. i guess it's somewhat decent vs sand teams but with things like latios and greninja running hp fire all the time it kind of loses most of its defensive merit of being able to take hits in a pinch and fire off a stab cb u-turn. yeah this thing should move down but i honestly think even b rank might be too high. the thing is, the main appeal of regular scizor over mega scizor is the fact that you have a super powerful priority but you sacrifice a large amount of bulk which i would always prefer in order to take on azumarill or bisharp much better.
manaphy is totally b+ it is so incomparable to the pokemon in a- i dont even.
mega alakazam is really good at the moment; its high speed as well as trace makes it a pretty much unparalleled revenge killer. its high special attack and stab psychic typing as well as movepool lets it revenge kill a miscellany of popular pokemon including keldeo, greninja, landorus, sand rush excadrill, swift swim pokemon in rain, +1 mega gyarados / tyranitar, lati@s, terrakion, garchomp, gengar, even adamant scarf landorus-t. it can run taunt or encore instead of hp ice to take on stall teams better. it can move up a rank.
lucario is a mediocre sweeper that in theory should benefit from the lack of aegislash, but it really doesn't. it wants 5 moveslots (sd / cc / itail / ipunch / espeed), hates the fact that srush exca is everywhere, hates the fact that slowbro is everywhere, hates the fact that terrakion is everywhere, hates the fact that scarf landorus-t is everywhere, in general a mediocre choice in the metagame because it loses to so many common pokemon and isn't even that strong after a boost, lol.
starmie should also move up to b+ because it's honestly a really good pokemon at the moment. now that aegislash is gone it is definitely a really great spinner; analytic boosted attacks are very hard to switch into for any ghost type not named something like gourgeist-xl which is a really bad pokemon lol. the defensive sets are a valuable asset on stall, especially stalls that rely on tspikes or really like to keep hazards up. it also has very large offensive presence for a bulky pokemon and recover + natural cure makes it pretty hard to wear down. reflect type is obviously really cool as well for pursuit pokemon or ferrothorn's leech seed and the like.
with aegislash gone celebi is sooo goood. like it can do so much stuff it's just really cool. defensive sets, offensive sets, support sets like sd and nasty pass, all complemented by celebi's insanely large movepool. nasty plot celebi in itself is really cool for its ability to setup on things like landorus and keldeo which it checks thanks to its stats / typing, and with recover you can't be worn down, espeically with natural cure mitigating toxic. i mean this thing can do anything, when going defensive to hard counter lando and keldeo you can stop them with toxic / twave, you can halt crocune with perish song. b+ rank in my opinion.
i agree with crashinboombang that staraptor should definitely move up to b rank if victini and magnezone get to b+ rank since it definitely just seems one rank below them. with no aegislash it doesn't have to worry about having its stabs + coverage walled and it can proceed to just break through everything. it is a huge problem for balance since it often lacks sufficient bulk or something like skarmory or the speed to get it so it can just use its amazing power and decent speed to break down bulkymons easily. band is obviously the most threatening set against balance but scarf is far better than offense, and can ohko heracross gardevoir and medicham while being faster. it is unfortunately very temporary, as it dies very early on with recoil + stealth rock, but it can definitely fuck up teams in the process so i think b rank is definitely there for it if victini and zone can move to b+.
as for victini you can obviously tell i want it in b+ rank because it's a very valuable asset on stall teams while also having a 180 base power move which is denting "switch ins" not named slowbro / suicune. it has a diverse movepool with bolt strike and even uturn to trouble the aforementioned water-types and a (suprisingly!) superb typing to check all three of the megas (emphasis on check; it isnt switching into hera rock blasts but it can wow it if it gets in on cc or simply vcreate). also substitute + power up punch is cool! with sub you avoid sucker punch and being toxiced from bulky water-types, while power up punch allows you to actually damage heatran and tyranitar, giving you a boost behind a substitute which you setup while they switch out. vcreate is obviously super strong especially at +1 and bolt strike hits slowbro / suicune / other miscellaneous bulky waters.
magnezone should also be b+ since it provides a ton of support to the best sweepers / wallbreakers at the moment (especially mega pinsir and other bird teams but also things like mega gardevoir that appreciate mega scizor gone). both scarf and specs are great, with scarf being able to check pinsir thanks to its 4x flying resistance and stab volt switch coming off an overlooked but high special attack stat that at worst provides free momentum. specs is less efficient at checking things but hits much harder with volt switch and is still amazing at trapping slower steels like ferrothorn that require a more powerful hp fire to take them out.
i've always been of the impression that mega garchomp isn't that good, it's slow and easy to wear down and while it hits hard (with sand support) it faces HUGE competition with the much better stallbreaking mega pokemon that are everywhere and are faster and stronger with more spammable stab moves. moving this down a rank seems definitely warranted.
i also think haxorus can move up a hefty amount since it's actually not a bad sweeper with swords dance against balance teams and even stall teams, with poison jab for clefable which hits at +2 thanks to mold breaker. it breaks down mega gyarados's checks and counters like ferrothorn which doesn't want to take +2 earthquake's coming off base 147 attack stats. i think it could actually rise quite a bit especially since it is also very nice on magnezone teams in order to just use outrage all the time.
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three pokemon have appeared to come up relevant to the s rankings, landorus and keldeo moving down, and clefable moving up. i cant honestly see clefable in s rank at all. no one is denying it is one of the greatest assets on balance teams with tools such as heal bell and the cm magic guard sets, but it isn't comparable to any of the pokemon in s rank or even some in a+ rank when talking about the relevancy of its niche and how effective it is in the current metagame.
landorus should still be s rank, its honestly just an amazing pokemon primarily as the offensive stealth rock set is just amazing and his insane power and coverage for a stealth rock setter. it has a HUGE offensive presence which makes setting up stealth rock super easy and it beats almost all of the hazard removers (epower exca, fblast balloon exca, fblast mandi, fblast skarm) while only possibly losing 1v1 to starmie and lati@s. its an insanely common pokemon for this reason, people only think about moving it down because they thing that stall now has ways around it but its still insanely threatening to balance and even the stalls that supposedly have answers to it like spdef gliscor or cbbnite or whatever end up losing to things like hidden power ice on 4 atks sets which is becoming common now since spdef gliscor is everywhere. it's still pretty comparable to most of the pokemon in s rank in terms of how well it performs its role, the relevancy of that role, and the efficiency in which it can prevent normal counters from stopping it performing its role. its also an offensive switch in to mega heracross once which is super amazing in this heracross metagame.
i probably will talk about keldeo later since i was a proponent of it to s rank in the mawile meta but i think that may have changed so yeah.
