Underwhelming Single-Staged Pokémon

Since this thread now have a positive counterpart, I’ll bring something from Generation 5.

:ss/basculin: :ss/basculin-blue-striped:
Sure, there might be chances that the two forms aren’t single-staged anymore if Basculegion turned out to be a traditional cross-generational evolution, but I’ll put them in anyways since they were single-staged in Generation 5, and possibly still are if Basculegion turns out to have a regional variant of Basculin as pre-evo.

*Clears throat* So why Basculin is among the worst of single-stages? It was for the fact that nothing interesting about them outside of nearly-interchangeable Blue-Striped form that only differs in design and Rock Head instead of Reckless.

You know something will go wrong when one realize they are late additions in the development just because Game Freak wanted a common fish Pokémon.

As themselves, they are decent and Adaptability comes with a pretty strong edge. Problem is that they are also everywhere when surfing in water, meaning that they get annoying really fast. 92 Attack and 98 Speed are acceptable, but falls off late game.

The bigger problem is that Water is already by far the most numerous Pokémon by quite a large margin. Just BW already offers good Water-type options, from Oshawott line, Frillish line, Tympole line and the Tirtouga line having their own distinguishable niches. B2W2 also adds more Water-type powerhouses in the form of several previous generations Pokémon in the main campaign.

Worst part is that a Water-type Pokémon with Adaptability not only already exists as their Hidden Ability, but is still much better user of it. We are talking about the Corphish line, where while it is their Hidden Ability, they are potent with it thanks to Dual STAB as Crawdaunt and higher Attack. While they are slower, it can be circumvented with Aqua Jet becoming effective 80 BP, as strong as pre-nerf Sucker Punch, and post-buff Knock Off offering wallbreaking and item removal in one button press!

It is a good thing that GF realized how disappointing Basculin is in the long run, if Basculegion is anything to go by.
 
Basculin at least gets a niche of "not having to rely on a hidden abilitiy" (just, broadly speaking) and the trade from BW1 has the crosssection of:
-easier to be physically oriented than Simipour
-If you didn't get simipour as you free monkey, it's more readily available
-You will get it before Frillish (& Alomomola)
-Your Palpitoad hasn't evolved yet and Basculin is kind of comparable to Seismitoad anyway

Like honestly it's a perfectly serviceable water type that has various niches depending on when & where it shows up. I would really not call it a failure at all....it's doing exactly its job as a single staged pokemon. Reasonable stats for when you get it, a slight niche on the side, and just generally usable while being outclassed by those that evolve or come with different stuff.
 
R_N said:
Basculin at least gets a niche of "not having to rely on a hidden abilitiy" (just, broadly speaking) and the trade from BW1 has the crosssection of:
-easier to be physically oriented than Simipour
-If you didn't get simipour as you free monkey, it's more readily available
-You will get it before Frillish (& Alomomola)
-Your Palpitoad hasn't evolved yet and Basculin is kind of comparable to Seismitoad anyway

Like honestly it's a perfectly serviceable water type that has various niches depending on when & where it shows up. I would really not call it a failure at all....it's doing exactly its job as a single staged pokemon. Reasonable stats for when you get it, a slight niche on the side, and just generally usable while being outclassed by those that evolve or come with different stuff.
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Well, it isn’t a failure in term of in-game usage, as you said. Got unreasonable with that category.

Except, there’s must be a reason why some people disliked it. It’s more to do with their relatively underwhelming design that doesn’t standout too much from other fish Pokémon outside of their green scales. There’s also the fact that there is such a minimal difference between the Red Striped and Blue Striped variants, only the design and first Ability slot being different, that they are nearly interchangeable.

It’s no failure in battle, sure. But when it comes to mediocre design and a form that only serves if you happens to prefer blue, it is safe that the two forms do have wasted potentials. I wonder if the two forms will have to do with the upcoming Basculegion...
 
Samtendo09 said:
Well, it isn’t a failure in term of in-game usage, as you said. Got unreasonable with that category.

Except, there’s must be a reason why some people disliked it. It’s more to do with their relatively underwhelming design that doesn’t standout too much from other fish Pokémon outside of their green scales. There’s also the fact that there is such a minimal difference between the Red Striped and Blue Striped variants, only the design and first Ability slot being different, that they are nearly interchangeable.

It’s no failure in battle, sure. But when it comes to mediocre design and a form that only serves if you happens to prefer blue, it is safe that the two forms do have wasted potentials. I wonder if the two forms will have to do with the upcoming Basculegion...
Click to expand...

Personally I've always felt that the poor design makes people underestimate it. I mean, statwise it's decent and on par with Pokemon like Mr Mime (BST 460), but it's so little and so unassuming and feels so much like a novelty mon that you'd assume it to be on par with something like Farfetch'd (BST 377). The lack of form differentiation aside from the one ability is disappointing even though it's not the first Pokemon to have a cosmetic form difference. But it does compound how dull it is.

Add on to that relatively uninteresting lore (when different coloured Basculin meet, they fight, except for when sometimes they don't. Huh?) and the fact they openly admitted it was chucked in at the last minute.

Basculegion on the other hand looks great and I already really like it. Very cool lore and hopefully great battling capability.
 
:gs/gligar:


Now this. This is a failure. In theory, it should be fine. 85 speed is ok, especially in gen 2, 105 defense is great.
It does come late in GS (Route 45, 8th gym) but GS does at least have Kanto so ok, I guess....and 20% encounters there's much worse.
Cool Typing!

But

Well, 75 attack could be better. There's certainly Pokemon during this era with lower.

more importantly they forgot to give it a move pool that did things. It has one stab move, Wing Attack, and it only gets it through breeding. Earthquake is exclusive to Stadium 2, which is insane. It doesn't even get Mud Slap.
The rest of its move pool just isn't good! Like half its move set is just things 90% of the pokedex gets, extremely weak moves and hell in terms of "gimmick" moves it only gets Guillotine but ....

IMO the appeal of something like this, a "bulky" Pokemon with an interesting type combo is it can come in relatively safely, take a hit on the chin, and then start retaliating in some fashion. In Skarmory's case, it's using set up opportunities. In Shuckle's case, it's being incredibly annoying. Mantine may be hampered by an electric weakness, but it has a higher Sp Def and a slightly higher special attack stat, a plethora of water stab and ice moves on the side (it also learns wing attack naturally! i'm just saying!); it also is not Great but it could do something in theory.
Gligar does none of this.


Gen 3 had the sense to give it more options: Dig, Earthquake, Aerial Ace so you don't have to breed up wing attack...FRLG move tutors even gave it Rock Slide which isn't a terrible thing to have in your pocket. But it's post game in FRLG & Emerald and Coliseum has its own issues. And TMs are always so limited....


Gliscor really was the best thing it could ask for.
 
Samtendo09 said:
:eiscue:
Eiscue, while appealing for a few, comes off as ridiculous in a bad way for many others. The design doesn’t do much to disperse predator - it might instead gather their attention due to how big the Ice Face is - but the titular Ability is situational at best. It provide a single immunity against any physical moves, and can recover its Ice Face upon using Hail (shall that move succeeds) or if a Pokémon with Snow Warning switches in. Problem is that Special Attackers can just ignore this Ability, and it’s Defense (110) is unnecessarily high as it will block a single physical move anyways in it’s Ice Face form. While it may be a threat if allowed for Belly Drum, its limited learnset doesn’t allows it to wallbreak against many defensive threats.
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Can't really speak about its performance in-game, but from my experience using it in Random battles, Eiscue is actually insane with Dynamax. You basically set-up the Belly Drum for free thanks to Ice Face, and you can immediately recover Ice Face with a fast Max Hailstorm. If they break Ice Face again on the second turn, you can do something like Max Geyser -> Max Hailstorm, letting you recover it again.
 
Samtendo09 said:
Since this thread now have a positive counterpart, I’ll bring something from Generation 5.

:ss/basculin: :ss/basculin-blue-striped:
Sure, there might be chances that the two forms aren’t single-staged anymore if Basculegion turned out to be a traditional cross-generational evolution, but I’ll put them in anyways since they were single-staged in Generation 5, and possibly still are if Basculegion turns out to have a regional variant of Basculin as pre-evo.

*Clears throat* So why Basculin is among the worst of single-stages? It was for the fact that nothing interesting about them outside of nearly-interchangeable Blue-Striped form that only differs in design and Rock Head instead of Reckless.

You know something will go wrong when one realize they are late additions in the development just because Game Freak wanted a common fish Pokémon.

As themselves, they are decent and Adaptability comes with a pretty strong edge. Problem is that they are also everywhere when surfing in water, meaning that they get annoying really fast. 92 Attack and 98 Speed are acceptable, but falls off late game.

The bigger problem is that Water is already by far the most numerous Pokémon by quite a large margin. Just BW already offers good Water-type options, from Oshawott line, Frillish line, Tympole line and the Tirtouga line having their own distinguishable niches. B2W2 also adds more Water-type powerhouses in the form of several previous generations Pokémon in the main campaign.

Worst part is that a Water-type Pokémon with Adaptability not only already exists as their Hidden Ability, but is still much better user of it. We are talking about the Corphish line, where while it is their Hidden Ability, they are potent with it thanks to Dual STAB as Crawdaunt and higher Attack. While they are slower, it can be circumvented with Aqua Jet becoming effective 80 BP, as strong as pre-nerf Sucker Punch, and post-buff Knock Off offering wallbreaking and item removal in one button press!

It is a good thing that GF realized how disappointing Basculin is in the long run, if Basculegion is anything to go by.
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It’s okay if you find Basculin underwhelming but most of the other Unova waters don’t knock it out of the park either. Water is among the least useful types in Unova in my opinion, only beating Clay and virtually nothing else unless your name is Palpitoad which also gets Elesa. I like Basculin though, Adaptability Waterfall is great.

In the in-game tiers for BW1, all the Water types save Oshawott and Simipour ended up in C or lower - most of them did not have overwhelming stats, and even if they did like Carracosta, they couldn’t use them effectively due to weaknesses and Speed.

Tympole tries to be early but fails in practice because it’s TOO balanced, doesn’t get Dig until Seismitoad (Mud Shot is bleh) and doesn’t even get EQ before beating the game. The only reason it’s not completely outclassed is because most of other Waters also have 80-90 offenses.
 
I think the real problem with Basculin isn't that it's not effective and more that it's just really boring and plain. Adaptability STAB Aqua Tail/Waterfall and Aqua Jet do allow it to be a competent battler in-game but it's just...not very exciting whatsoever. It's a pure Water-type, and it does not evolve into or from any other Pokemon and so is not exciting in that front. Design wise...it's just a mean fish.

In other words, there's really nothing that really makes me want to use it. No unique typing, no exciting evolution prospect, nothing interesting to really get the curiosity going. It's just a plain Water-type overgrown green fish. There's nothing particularly standout about it. Even if you didn't look up its stats in battle when you look at it in a vacuum just staring at it...it's just a fish. Catch it, and you see that it's a plain Water-type and nothing else. It's just not exciting at all. Lore wise it's just two different color-striped Basculins who don't get along. Not very interesting.

Compare that with actually popularly used Unova mons: you have stuff like Darmanitan, Excadrill, and Scrafty who are not only powerful but they have great and striking designs. They evolve from something relatively cute and then become something strikingly awesome. Or stuff like Krookodile, which is a desert crocodile with sunglasses, going from cute little Sandile to the relatively cool Krokorok to the amazing and epic badass Krookodile which is striking red, has an awesome ability with Moxie, and all in all a unique typing with Ground / Dark. All of that combined makes it an incredibly exciting and fulfilling Pokemon to use. Or stuff like Chandelure which has a unique typing (at the time) and hits hard as hell and is a ghost chandelier which is cool as hell. Not to mention going from a ghost candle to a ghost lamp to a ghost chandelier, and lore wise it's the most sinister with them stealing energy from humans or burning their spirits alive. Haxorus has a standout type and evolves from a cute babby mon to a powerful axe dragon who hits like a truck. Even something as simple as Zebstrika is commonly used because hey, electric zebra and that's epic. I could go on and on, including stuff like Volcarona and Hydreigon. When you compare Basculin to those...there's really no way it can compete.

The creation of Basculegion in Legends inherently not only makes it a stronger mon but it now turns Basculin into something greater and more exciting than a generic fish. Now it's a Water/Ghost type. It's formed from a Basculin who fused with the souls of its dead comrades who died along the journey to Hisui. It's bigger, cooler, and stronger, and it's an evolved form of Basculin making it an exciting prospect. Legends isn't out yet, but I'm sure many will actually be compelled to use a Basculin in that game moreso than in the past because it's now an exciting prospect to turn it into an epic Basculegion that will just feel awesome to use. It's like how Seadra is fairly unexciting (despite not being single stage) but Kingdra made it a lot better with a Water/Dragon typing and a cooler design. Basculin's lack of popularity is frankly irrespective of it being single stage alone: that's part of it for Basculin, but overall its biggest issue is how mundane it is. I think there's no question that an average Pokemon player will probably go for more standout, striking, and unique Pokemon rather than the mundane, and Basculin falls into the latter without Basculegion in the picture.
 
:sm/pyukumuku:
I'm sorry, but you can't get me to like a Pokemon whose only ways to deal damage to opponents are Counter, Bide, Mirror Coat, Toxic, or activating Innards Out (a.k.a. Final Gambit as an Ability). Not that it would've mattered much even if Pyukumuku did get any other attacks, since 60/30 offensive stats are abysmal, and a base Speed of 5 means it's getting outsped by anything it sees. It may have occasional usability in online battles, but it's a complete flop in-game.
 
PokePoindexter said:
:sm/pyukumuku:
I'm sorry, but you can't get me to like a Pokemon whose only ways to deal damage to opponents are Counter, Bide, Mirror Coat, Toxic, or activating Innards Out (a.k.a. Final Gambit as an Ability). Not that it would've mattered much even if Pyukumuku did get any other attacks, since 60/30 offensive stats are abysmal, and a base Speed of 5 means it's getting outsped by anything it sees. It may have occasional usability in online battles, but it's a complete flop in-game.
Click to expand...

At least it could use the Normal and Fighting Z-moves in Gen VII(It didn't get Mirror Coat until Sword/Shield) if you REALLY wanted it to deal direct damage. Granted 60 attack isn't good and the whole idea is a waste of a Z-move, I was just saying it was something that existed.
 
You can't call Pyukumuku a failure because it succeeds at what it's designed to do: walling and stalling. It's stats and (great) movepool are geared toward that purpose. Of course it's a nightmare to use in-game, but so are Wobbuffet and Shuckle, and any other tank-build Pokemon for that matter.

It's not obscure in Alola either and has an entire minigame centered around it, so it has relevance outside of battle. Comes late game in Galar though

And to top that off, it's a super cute and funny design! quite popular as a plushie no? Like other squishy 'mons Snom and Pincurchin.

I will say that a kamikaze ability like Innards Out is a terrible ability for a defensively oriented Pokemon. But Pyukumuku gets Unaware which makes up for it!
F91D111A-2A3E-4BF8-AFD6-8CFFB86F72C4.gif
 
BTW we can talk about formerly single-staged Pokémon, those that were single-staged in their debut generation prior of getting a non-regional evolution in a later generation.

Let me provide an example for a former single-staged Pokémon that failed to serve it’s purpose.

:ss/tangela:
Back in Generation 1 and up until Generation 4 where Tangrowth is introduced, Tangela feels… just there. 115 Defense is impressive for a Grass-type Pokémon, and it is also pure Grass so it never has to worry about getting hit by Psychic super effectively unlike almost half of Grass-type that have also Poison-type, and have a reasonable 100 Special base stat means it could confront Pokémon with high Special stat just fine. So what went wrong?

Take a look at it’s movepool in Gen 1. None of the moves it learns naturally are of worth noting except Bind, Poison Powder, Stun Spore and Sleep Powder. It’s only Grass-type STAB learned naturally is the ultraweak Absorb in RBY, and then the not much better Vine Whip is added in Yellow. Sleep Powder alone does make it worth using, but outside of a traded Tangela, other Grass-type with access to Sleep Powder are likely to perform better, making it difficult to justify Tangela over them.

It’s not availalble in main-game during Gen 2, and the 40 Special Defense is a massive nerf when you consider that an Ice Beam from a Water-type will knock it out for sure. It did get to learn the okay Giga Drain... as a TM move.

In Let’s Go where Tangrowth is not available at all due to abritary ”no cross-gen evos” rule, Tangela did have niche of access for Confusion naturally to deal with Poison-type early-game, and Mega Drain in this game is upped to 75 BP to substitute the non-existing Giga Drain. Other than that, nothing of too much note. Let’s Go is understandably but overwhelmingly easy once you exploit the Candy stuff, to the point even Tangela itself become a monstrous threat.

Having Tangrowth as an evolution is for the better. Attack raised from 50 to 100 allows it to use physical moves properly, have an overall better bulk despite its Special Defense didn’t raised, and in Generation 5 onward, access of Regenerator give Tangrowth better survivability, especially when combined with Leech Seed. Regardless of your opinion on Tangrowth, a physically bulky pure Grass-type with near matched good attacking stats makes for a very interesting tank.
 
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It is available in the main game of gen 2, actually. It's on Route 44, the one just before Ice Path.
Not that that really helps it any, I suppose.

Gen 1 also has the issue of availability: you can only get it after getting surf, either by trade in the Lab or the patch of grass just south of Pallet. It's not a great Pokemon to begin with, much less one you get so late.
 
R_N said:
It is available in the main game of gen 2, actually. It's on Route 44, the one just before Ice Path.
Not that that really helps it any, I suppose.

Gen 1 also has the issue of availability: you can only get it after getting surf, either by trade in the Lab or the patch of grass just south of Pallet. It's not a great Pokemon to begin with, much less one you get so late.
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Well, availability issues for something that have 435 BST in Gen 2 and something already okay being actually obtained late in Gen 1 really did hurt against it.

I got another former single-staged Pokémon that was considered as a severe disappointment, despite success in Gen 2 competitive.

:ss/misdreavus:

The only Ghost-type introduced in Generation 2, it already have competition with the well-liked Gastly line for Ghost-type competition. One thing Misdreavus do have over the other line, which is pure Ghost-typing, meaning that it isn’t weak to Psychic.

It got 85 Special Attack, Special Defense and Speed, while having less impressive 60 HP, Attack and Defense. It suits best for mid-game, or even before Whitney. The problem is that it is obtained at Mt. Silver at night, at a 10% encounter rate in Silver Cave (or paltry 5% in Crystal) and 30% at the much later Waterfall Cave.

The worse thing is a paltry level up learnset, with the only damaging moves are the inconsistent Psywave and, at level 26, the somewhat weak Psybeam. While it do learn Psychic through TM, Haunter already hit harder thanks to 115 base Special Attack and is slightly faster, and Gengar especially blows it away. I think Morty not having Misdreavus on his team is not that bad of a thing thing because good grief, this really suffers from being overshadowed completely.

Misdreavus really stands out as “one of those truly disappointing single-staged Pokémon” introduced in Generation 2, and it shows. It gaining Mismagius in Generation 4 did great for it, as it higher Special bulk, more reasonably higher Special Attack, the lack of need of trading unless it is version exclusive and lack of Psychic weakness give it an use over Gengar in term of in-game usage.
 
Samtendo09 said:
Well, availability issues for something that have 435 BST in Gen 2 and something already okay being actually obtained late in Gen 1 really did hurt against it.

I got another former single-staged Pokémon that was considered as a severe disappointment, despite success in Gen 2 competitive.

:ss/misdreavus:

The only Ghost-type introduced in Generation 2, it already have competition with the well-liked Gastly line for Ghost-type competition. One thing Misdreavus do have over the other line, which is pure Ghost-typing, meaning that it isn’t weak to Psychic.

It got 85 Special Attack, Special Defense and Speed, while having less impressive 60 HP, Attack and Defense. It suits best for mid-game, or even before Whitney. The problem is that it is obtained at Mt. Silver at night, at a 10% encounter rate in Silver Cave (or paltry 5% in Crystal) and 30% at the much later Waterfall Cave.

The worse thing is a paltry level up learnset, with the only damaging moves are the inconsistent Psywave and, at level 26, the somewhat weak Psybeam. While it do learn Psychic through TM, Haunter already hit harder thanks to 115 base Special Attack and is slightly faster, and Gengar especially blows it away. I think Morty not having Misdreavus on his team is not that bad of a thing thing because good grief, this really suffers from being overshadowed completely.

Misdreavus really stands out as “one of those truly disappointing single-staged Pokémon” introduced in Generation 2, and it shows. It gaining Mismagius in Generation 4 did great for it, as it higher Special bulk, more reasonably higher Special Attack, the lack of need of trading unless it is version exclusive and lack of Psychic weakness give it an use over Gengar in term of in-game usage.
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Well, "success" is one way of putting it...
  • SleepTrap Clause: Having a sleep-inducing move and Mean Look or Spider Web on the same moveset is not allowed.
Mostly because of this:
Misdreavus @ Leftovers
Ability: No Ability
- Hypnosis
- Perish Song
- Mean Look
- Thunder/Protect/Confuse Ray
Even with SleepTrap clause in effect, Missy is still OU-viable because it's a bulkier Gengar, and can therefore spinblock or absorb booms way better. I think this is a case of a Pokemon just not being suited to in-game play with its given movepool, and for in-game purposes I think it would probably be fine with 1-2 extra moves in its level-up pool. Its stats are good enough for the time, and certainly compare favourably with loads of other Gen 2 single stages (and even some FEs like Nidoking and Clefable), though Mismagius in Gen 4 is a welcome upgrade due to the power creep.
 
You know, there is another Hoenn single-stage that got a horrible misfortune of not just rarity, but also all-round problems.

:rs/tropius:
Tropius runs the same problem as Gen 1 Onix in that it is a fearsome looking Pokémon but with horrible statline and awful defensive typing for it to deal with.
1658506832406.png

Entirely reliant of the Sun, yet no stats or type to fully back it up. Seriously, how a BST of 460 make sense of a big, ferocious looking Pokémon? A base Attack this low means it can’t use Earthquake or Stomping Tantrum to reliably fend off Fire-type threats, either.
 
You're absolutely not wrong it's an unfortunate pokemon. It's cleraly design to be something fast in the sun and then has...some...bulky and attack that can possibly do something in between "defensive strategies" but it has none. Especially in gen 3.

460 isn't/wasn't thaaaaat uncommon for "big" standalone pokemon like that (its equivalent to several 2-nd stage pokemon) and I'd argue it doesnt look ferocious at all. Even in the original sprite work it was just a cute dino
 
Tropius is an awkward Pokemon for sure, but I wouldn't call it a failure. Examples like this make me question the premise of the thread a little, because it seems like I define success very differently from lots of other Pokemon fans when it comes to individual designs. Me wishing a Pokemon were stronger doesn't make it a failure, unless it's so bad or so inaccessible that it's completely unusable in battle while also contributing nothing of note to the worldbuilding of the franchise.

In RSE, Tropius does exactly what you expect a midgame single-stage Pokemon to do. It's got a cool design, it likely has slightly higher overall stats than any of your party Pokemon at that point in the game, and as an added bonus it can learn every non-Water HM move. It's underwhelming in battle, sure, but so is like two-thirds of the Hoenn dex, single-stage or otherwise. Since its debut gen, it's gotten just enough new tools to keep it interesting without it ever being competitively viable, which is completely fine.
 
Cobalt Empoleon said:
Tropius is an awkward Pokemon for sure, but I wouldn't call it a failure. Examples like this make me question the premise of the thread a little, because it seems like I define success very differently from lots of other Pokemon fans when it comes to individual designs. Me wishing a Pokemon were stronger doesn't make it a failure, unless it's so bad or so inaccessible that it's completely unusable in battle while also contributing nothing of note to the worldbuilding of the franchise.

In RSE, Tropius does exactly what you expect a midgame single-stage Pokemon to do. It's got a cool design, likely has higher overall stats than any of your party Pokemon at that point in the game, and as an added bonus it can learn every non-Water HM move. It's underwhelming in battle, sure, but so is like two-thirds of the Hoenn dex, single-stage or otherwise. Since its debut gen, it's gotten just enough new tools to keep it interesting without it ever being competitively viable, which is completely fine.
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I know it’s not related to the thread topic but I totally agree on two-thirds of the Hoenn dex being underwhelming, ESPECIALLY in RSE. Wingull is oddly good, Torkoal is alright, there’s some things you can use like Absol if you look close enough…

and then you have the garbage. Lotad is borderline memetically bad until Ludicolo, Shiftry is in a similar boat of being underpowered, Electrike famously needs to not be caught on its debut route in order to not have a Pansear-esque 7 or so levels until Spark or whatever, both forms of Wurmple suck and Nincada isn’t great, Skitty is utter trash, Kecleon nearly broke an RSE in-game poster with its borderline un-usability, Claydol takes forever to get to and when you get there it just kinda exists and does nothing, Whismur would be halfway decent if you got its final form before Unova froze over, you got underwhelming Wailord and the weird post-Dive stuff like Clamperl and Relicanth, Aron has a hilariously bad movepool until later generations, Crawdaunt and Sharpedo were some 90 base offense-ish mediocrity until DPPT, Mawile literally gets no STAB in Gen 3 and Sabelye lives and dies by having no weaknesses at the time, Chimecho and Grumpig have only okay firepower, the list goes on - heck even some of the well-known “cool“ Gen 3 mons like Flygon and Milotic are too much of a pain to fully evolve and/or obtain that they aren’t really worth it.

Like my first Pokémon game was Emerald and even I know half the stuff in that game just is every flavor of “bleh.” At least it doesn't compare to how like, only 23% of Johto Pokemon are usable I suppose.
 
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Cobalt Empoleon said:
Tropius is an awkward Pokemon for sure, but I wouldn't call it a failure. Examples like this make me question the premise of the thread a little, because it seems like I define success very differently from lots of other Pokemon fans when it comes to individual designs. Me wishing a Pokemon were stronger doesn't make it a failure, unless it's so bad or so inaccessible that it's completely unusable in battle while also contributing nothing of note to the worldbuilding of the franchise.

In RSE, Tropius does exactly what you expect a midgame single-stage Pokemon to do. It's got a cool design, it likely has slightly higher overall stats than any of your party Pokemon at that point in the game, and as an added bonus it can learn every non-Water HM move. It's underwhelming in battle, sure, but so is like two-thirds of the Hoenn dex, single-stage or otherwise. Since its debut gen, it's gotten just enough new tools to keep it interesting without it ever being competitively viable, which is completely fine.
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I changed the forum title into “Underwhelming Single-Staged Pokémon” which is more encompassing, that ranges from single-staged Pokémon that turned out underwhelming despite showing promises, gets overshadowed by something else that existed alongside or before it, or that are flat-out duds.

My Tropius nomination barely fits on underwhelming in terms of what it have but unable to do it well, but it is not a flat-out dud since it proved to have some use in-game, at least back in RSE.
 
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