Melmetal

Making use of its excellent bulk, powerful attacking options, and strong defensive type, Melmetal is a dangerous threat that demands the respect of every serious team, capable of trading hits with almost the entire tier and coming out on top. Its obscenely powerful Double Iron Bash and coverage options combined with its amazing bulk make Melmetal capable of checking and forcing out threats such as Tapu Lele and more softly Weavile and Kartana, while taking the opportunity generated by switching in on these threats to dismantle the opposing defensive core cores with relative ease. Melmetal is also highly customizable, making great use of status moves like Toxic and Thunder Wave to facilitate not only itself but teammates as well. However, while it does not outright crumble to any stray special attack, Melmetal is still quite vulnerable to many super effective special attacks coming from the likes of Heatran, Blacephalon, Volcanion, and Volcarona and even common coverage options like Tapu Lele's Focus Blast and Dragapult's Flamethrower. This problem is further compounded by Double Iron Bash's limited PP and the common Water- and Steel-types that resist it, as well as the constant Spikes and Knock Off found within the tier. Furthermore, Double Iron Bash's nature as a multi-hit contact move also makes Melmetal quite exploitable by things such as Ferrothorn's Iron Barbs, Zapdos's Static, and Heatran's Flame Body if it is not running Protective Pads. However, despite these flaws, Melmetal is still one of the most powerful forces in the tier, ready to drive anyone foolish enough to underestimate its presence, for a lack of a better term, nuts.