"Worst Pokémon Ever"

to be fair there are so many fully evolved mons now, even with dexit, that being PU or even ZU doesn't feel as much of an indictment as it did before, when those lower tiers had a lot of NFEs. in RBY, being ZU means you're not very viable in a tier where staryu, gastly and drowzee are. in SV it just means you're not very viable in a tier where... mesprit, regirock and glastrier are
 
I agree the stat spread matches its design. However, I maintain that it's a design which would likely look miles better in the spriting era.

An easy comparison is Tyranitar. Tyranitar's RSE and DPP sprites are fantastic, IMO, because they allow it to look expressive and place it in an action pose. Conversely, most of its sprites from BW onward (and in Stadium/ColoXD to boot) are just bland and nondescript. They're a step away from being a plain T-pose.

A sprite would definitely give Baxcalibur more potential to look active and dynamic, but in all the official renders, unless it's literally mid-attack it's just stood stiffly and looks rather awkward. This is not something caused by it being kaiju-inspired. Slowbro still looks great even in 3D.
You can have expressive idle poses in 3D, y'know? :wo:
 

bdt2002

Pokémon Ranger: Guardian Signs superfan
is a Pre-Contributor
Hey, everyone. I'm back with some more nominations :sphearical: (Disclaimer: This Spheal is not one of them)

:sm/fearow:

In a day and age where most "regional bird Pokémon" have gotten some extra attention, Fearow has started to stick out more and more overtime alongside the similarly neglected Noctowl. Pretty much every other Pokémon you could put in this category aside from those two has gotten something to keep them relevant, some moreso than others I suppose, but I cannot think of any modern importance Fearow has had as a fully evolved Flying-Type for the past 14-15 years. The last time it was relevant was when Kenya the Spearow made a return in HeartGold & SoulSilver and was even made to be Level 20 this time around so it can easily evolve right away, but in every appearance it's made in Pokémon media since then, Fearow specifically (Spearow at least had that part at the beginning of the Alola games where they were attacking Nebby), it's either felt outclassed by its contemporaries or deemed as less important than other Pokémon that are also present. And the sad part about this? I don't blame them. Most of the newer birds and even some of the older ones have more of a unique flavor to them than this Pokémon does, and compared to what we have now, it can seem difficult at times to give Fearow the respect it deserves, because credit where credit is due, I think it's really under-appreciated as a Pidgeot alternative in its original games from all those years ago.

:ss/mr. rime:

I can think of a lot of Pokémon who gained newer evolutions in later generations that underperformed expectations, but as chill (pun intended) as its design is, I think Mr. Rime is probably the biggest offender of an underwhelming new evolution. Alongside the Sudowoodo evolution that I still hope we get one of these days (Bonsly and Mime Jr. were added in the same generation, so what the heck happened here?), Mr. Mime I felt like was an older Pokémon in need of some battle relevance to match its recently gained Fairy typing and multiple appearances in Generation 7 media. The addition of said Fairy-Type was a good start, but Mr. Mime needed more to stand out amongst other new Fairy-Types that got the same treatment. Instead, we got... this. Again, I really like its design, but I have no idea how a Trainer is supposed to use this thing. I would genuinely rather use a Galarian Mr. Mime, because at least that can make use of the Eviolite and a high Special Defense stat.

:bw/heatmor:

Time for the only actually bad Pokémon on my list, at least in my opinion. Heatmor is what I would consider to be one of the most irrelevant and redundant Pokémon ever released. The idea of an anteater Pokémon with a typing that hard counters its ant Pokémon counterpart is really neat in my opinion. But everything else about it is either underwhelming or outright bad. Why they waited two generations for a regional PokéDex that Heatmor wasn't even a part of to give it a signature move is beyond me, and even then Fire Lash was eventually given to other Pokémon like Centiskorch. In its home region, it comes extremely late alongside Durant, which again, I get the idea, but Durant can at least warrant its extremely late appearance. With Heatmor, every Fire-Type in the region- yes, even Simisear- feels like it has a higher ceiling in battle while most of them are also obtained earlier. Okay, so if it's outclassed in battles, maybe it excels elsewhere? Nope. It's had close to no reason to remember it in other forms of Pokémon media, its design while interesting feels a bit off-putting, and its Shiny, while not the worst Fire-Type Shiny by any means, is just okay in my opinion.

Edit: It’s coming to my attention with some of your posts that I might have been a little too harsh on Heatmor, which is completely fair. I would still argue it’s far from one of my personal favorites- Unova has some of the best Fire-Types in the series in my opinion giving it competition- but I can definitely understand the appeal and respect anyone who wants to give this Pokémon a fair shot.
 
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QuentinQuonce

formerly green_typhlosion
One other thing I love about Heatmor is that it's one of those Pokemon that just gets all sorts of funny moves you don't see that often. Bug Bite, Bind, Amnesia, Pursuit, Snatch, Curse, Tickle, Gastro Acid, Giga Drain, Stockpile, Recycle... like it could quite easily have been Gen V's Flareon and just had very little options outside of Normal and Fire moves but it gets a little of everything! You can do whatever you want with it! Gonna remember that if I ever get round to playing BW again, I want to trade one in loaded up with random tutor moves and just have fun with it.
 

CTNC

Doesn't know how to attack
:bw/heatmor:

The idea of an anteater Pokémon with a typing that hard counters its ant Pokémon counterpart is really neat in my opinion. But everything else about it is either underwhelming or outright bad.
Just want to point out that it's cool in theory, but fails in practice as far as gameplay goes. Durant outspeeds Heatmor and wherever it's found at levels where it knows a move that OHKO Heatmor with Dig or Guillotine. (It needs Hustle for Dig, but still. Being able to be OHKOed by your prey means you suck.) The one case where a wild Hearmor can't lose 1v1 to a wild Durant is Hordes in XY Route 18, which 1v4. I'm not placing money on the Heatmor unless the trainer who found them is joining on Heatmor's side.

Also, I heard that in the card game there was a Heatmor card made for the sake of countering competative Durant mill decks. It didn't work.


TL;DR: Heatmor sucks even at being its main characteristic, which is impressive when that's being the predator of a Pokemon its has a x4 advantage againt!
 
Hey, everyone. I'm back with some more nominations :sphearical: (Disclaimer: This Spheal is not one of them)

:sm/fearow:

In a day and age where most "regional bird Pokémon" have gotten some extra attention, Fearow has started to stick out more and more overtime alongside the similarly neglected Noctowl. Pretty much every other Pokémon you could put in this category aside from those two has gotten something to keep them relevant, some moreso than others I suppose, but I cannot think of any modern importance Fearow has had as a fully evolved Flying-Type for the past 14-15 years. The last time it was relevant was when Kenya the Spearow made a return in HeartGold & SoulSilver and was even made to be Level 20 this time around so it can easily evolve right away, but in every appearance it's made in Pokémon media since then, Fearow specifically (Spearow at least had that part at the beginning of the Alola games where they were attacking Nebby), it's either felt outclassed by its contemporaries or deemed as less important than other Pokémon that are also present. And the sad part about this? I don't blame them. Most of the newer birds and even some of the older ones have more of a unique flavor to them than this Pokémon does, and compared to what we have now, it can seem difficult at times to give Fearow the respect it deserves, because credit where credit is due, I think it's really under-appreciated as a Pidgeot alternative in its original games from all those years ago.

:ss/mr. rime:

I can think of a lot of Pokémon who gained newer evolutions in later generations that underperformed expectations, but as chill (pun intended) as its design is, I think Mr. Rime is probably the biggest offender of an underwhelming new evolution. Alongside the Sudowoodo evolution that I still hope we get one of these days (Bonsly and Mime Jr. were added in the same generation, so what the heck happened here?), Mr. Mime I felt like was an older Pokémon in need of some battle relevance to match its recently gained Fairy typing and multiple appearances in Generation 7 media. The addition of said Fairy-Type was a good start, but Mr. Mime needed more to stand out amongst other new Fairy-Types that got the same treatment. Instead, we got... this. Again, I really like its design, but I have no idea how a Trainer is supposed to use this thing. I would genuinely rather use a Galarian Mr. Mime, because at least that can make use of the Eviolite and a high Special Defense stat.

:bw/heatmor:

Time for the only actually bad Pokémon on my list, at least in my opinion. Heatmor is what I would consider to be one of the most irrelevant and redundant Pokémon ever released. The idea of an anteater Pokémon with a typing that hard counters its ant Pokémon counterpart is really neat in my opinion. But everything else about it is either underwhelming or outright bad. Why they waited two generations for a regional PokéDex that Heatmor wasn't even a part of to give it a signature move is beyond me, and even then Fire Lash was eventually given to other Pokémon like Centiskorch. In its home region, it comes extremely late alongside Durant, which again, I get the idea, but Durant can at least warrant its extremely late appearance. With Heatmor, every Fire-Type in the region- yes, even Simisear- feels like it has a higher ceiling in battle while most of them are also obtained earlier. Okay, so if it's outclassed in battles, maybe it excels elsewhere? Nope. It's had close to no reason to remember it in other forms of Pokémon media, its design while interesting feels a bit off-putting, and its Shiny, while not the worst Fire-Type Shiny by any means, is just okay in my opinion.

Edit: It’s coming to my attention with some of your posts that I might have been a little too harsh on Heatmor, which is completely fair. I would still argue it’s far from one of my personal favorites- Unova has some of the best Fire-Types in the series in my opinion giving it competition- but I can definitely understand the appeal and respect anyone who wants to give this Pokémon a fair shot.
I LOVE fearow when i do a gen 1 playthrough. this guy is pidgeotto's dad. Decent speed and strong attack with a great move like drill peck down the line? why does the pidgey line get any love over this guy? I really can't wait till it gets an evo with 500+ BST or something because fearow looks like such a middle evo mon. maybe a dark or ground typing? I would also take a cockatrice dragon type regional form, that would be neat.

really sad fearow got left behind in the slew of normal/flying types out there
 
Just want to point out that it's cool in theory, but fails in practice as far as gameplay goes. Durant outspeeds Heatmor and wherever it's found at levels where it knows a move that OHKO Heatmor with Dig or Guillotine. (It needs Hustle for Dig, but still. Being able to be OHKOed by your prey means you suck.) The one case where a wild Hearmor can't lose 1v1 to a wild Durant is Hordes in XY Route 18, which 1v4. I'm not placing money on the Heatmor unless the trainer who found them is joining on Heatmor's side.

Also, I heard that in the card game there was a Heatmor card made for the sake of countering competative Durant mill decks. It didn't work.


TL;DR: Heatmor sucks even at being its main characteristic, which is impressive when that's being the predator of a Pokemon its has a x4 advantage againt!
heatmore really need a secondary typing or a unique ability. I could really see the new "earth eater" as its ability because it digs for ants and it would help it live those pesky digs you were talking about.
 

QuentinQuonce

formerly green_typhlosion
Just want to point out that it's cool in theory, but fails in practice as far as gameplay goes. Durant outspeeds Heatmor and wherever it's found at levels where it knows a move that OHKO Heatmor with Dig or Guillotine. (It needs Hustle for Dig, but still. Being able to be OHKOed by your prey means you suck.) The one case where a wild Hearmor can't lose 1v1 to a wild Durant is Hordes in XY Route 18, which 1v4. I'm not placing money on the Heatmor unless the trainer who found them is joining on Heatmor's side.

Also, I heard that in the card game there was a Heatmor card made for the sake of countering competative Durant mill decks. It didn't work.


TL;DR: Heatmor sucks even at being its main characteristic, which is impressive when that's being the predator of a Pokemon its has a x4 advantage againt!
Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh excuse me but Heatmor and Durant are quite obviously locked in a perpetual evolutionary arms race against one another and we just happen to have stumbled across them at a time when Durant is currently in the lead so come back in 50 years when Heatmor has developed vastly better Defence and Speed as well as the Levitate ability and I guarantee you'll be eating those words, big man
 
Heatmor and Durant are both absolutely pathetic from an evolutionary standpoint. Durant evolved steel over itself to "help" protect themselves from Heatmor, probably the worst thing they could have done, and somehow Heatmor still loses the matchup against its prey.
maybe... a long time a heatmor was just mor, and it was a normal type. Durant evolved the steel typing to protect it and THEN heatmor picked up its fire typing.
 
Personally I've always liked to believe that durant and heatmor were in a constant "evolutionary race" of sorts (darwinian evolution btw, not the regular evolution of the series).

In a nutshell, the durants' ancient ancestors were originally pure bug. Heatmors' ancestors (maybe pure normal, or just any typing that bug/steel resists) would then start preying on them, leading to the durants developing their present day appearance and steel type in order to defend themselves. In response, heatmors would then develop their modern appearance and fire type to capitalise on the durants' quad fire weakness. In response, I assume the durants probably became faster to outspeed any heatmor and hit em hard with dig or just ohko with guillotine. I assume that in the far future the heatmor species could develop a faster speed than durant in order to strike them with a fire attack before the latter does anything. And when that happens the durants could probably evolve (darwinian way ofc) and acquire a bug/rock typing to defend themselves better. And when that happens, the heatmors' would.....uh, I don't know to be honest, I ran out of ideas.

That's just my point of view though, I could be wrong.
 
Let's look to SHUCKLE for the worst pokemon ever

This thing has both Sticky Web and Stealth Rock, plus Encore to prevent setup and Final Gambit for early momentum combined with Sturdy, this thing was born to be a suicide lead, so they give it good speed, at least base 100, decent attack and its bulk doesn't matter much bc it's gonna use Sturdy + Custap Berry anyways

Uhh.. You're not gonna give it good speed.. Oh but it has Shell Smash to make up for that like Torterra right?

Well at least this thing's gonna be impenetrably bulky right? I mean Bug/Rock's a terrible start but we can do something here

Oh you mean if I told you to put 480 points into a pokemon's bulk, Shuckle's is about as badly as you could do?

Well then surely you're gonna give it some powerful moves to take advantage of low HP/High defenses like Leech Seed, Strength Sap and Body Press?

Oh I see, you want shuckle to be a powerful trick room sweeper with power trick + rock slide in doubles, with Contrary getting Intimidate Atk boosts

That's nifty, one problem tho, shuckle's power trick leaves it at the same attack stat as a base 90 using Swords Dance and Swords Dance doesn't put you -6 defense. And afterall, it's not like we have another pokemon whose whole gimmick is switching between OP defense to OP offense with no free turn for the opponent

No, shuckle's not given any of that, but in fact it turns out that the lead thing is still pretty good and in doubles, shuckle isn't a tank or a sweeper, its best uses in doubles were to create a tank with Guard Split on minimize-spamming Chansey causing plenty of rage as the opponent realizes that they're Close Combat which they were so happy to land didn't even do 30%
 
Let's look to SHUCKLE for the worst pokemon ever

This thing has both Sticky Web and Stealth Rock, plus Encore to prevent setup and Final Gambit for early momentum combined with Sturdy, this thing was born to be a suicide lead, so they give it good speed, at least base 100, decent attack and its bulk doesn't matter much bc it's gonna use Sturdy + Custap Berry anyways

Uhh.. You're not gonna give it good speed.. Oh but it has Shell Smash to make up for that like Torterra right?

Well at least this thing's gonna be impenetrably bulky right? I mean Bug/Rock's a terrible start but we can do something here

Oh you mean if I told you to put 480 points into a pokemon's bulk, Shuckle's is about as badly as you could do?

Well then surely you're gonna give it some powerful moves to take advantage of low HP/High defenses like Leech Seed, Strength Sap and Body Press?

Oh I see, you want shuckle to be a powerful trick room sweeper with power trick + rock slide in doubles, with Contrary getting Intimidate Atk boosts

That's nifty, one problem tho, shuckle's power trick leaves it at the same attack stat as a base 90 using Swords Dance and Swords Dance doesn't put you -6 defense. And afterall, it's not like we have another pokemon whose whole gimmick is switching between OP defense to OP offense with no free turn for the opponent

No, shuckle's not given any of that, but in fact it turns out that the lead thing is still pretty good and in doubles, shuckle isn't a tank or a sweeper, its best uses in doubles were to create a tank with Guard Split on minimize-spamming Chansey causing plenty of rage as the opponent realizes that they're Close Combat which they were so happy to land didn't even do 30%
Shuckle's a fine lead if you use it right, there's a reason it's got Ubers analysis in SS.

Though even then I disagree with the conventional wisdom. Sturdy is a trap on Shuckle, nothing is hitting you down from full outside Ubers, and even then...Fun fact, Specs MewTwo Psychic against PhysDef Shuckle has a chance to 2hko. You need an SE STAB from something like Banded TTAR to have a chance to OHKO, and that's just not common. Run Contrary and laugh as Defog lets you set up even more hazards, or even Gluttony+Custap. It's rare that Sturdy is the worst of 3 abilities on a lead, but there you go.
 
I LOVE fearow when i do a gen 1 playthrough. this guy is pidgeotto's dad. Decent speed and strong attack with a great move like drill peck down the line? why does the pidgey line get any love over this guy? I really can't wait till it gets an evo with 500+ BST or something because fearow looks like such a middle evo mon. maybe a dark or ground typing? I would also take a cockatrice dragon type regional form, that would be neat.

really sad fearow got left behind in the slew of normal/flying types out there
Pidgey was easier to encounter, Blue used it, and Ash had the line in the anime, including the famous scene when he released it.

Also, Spearow served as the anime's first villainous Pokemon with Fearow playing a prominent role in Pidgeot's release episode.
 
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