2nd Gen Let's Talk About GSC Scizor!

[bez850]

Scizor makes the top 100 in every pokemon related poll (fan or media released) that I was able to find.

He makes the top 50 in roughly half of those as well! For good reason!

* Quick note, all polls I am referring to were found variously on the internet, and the vast majority of them were fan polls voted on random websites by fans. Only a small amount were from the likes of media outlets like Nintendo, or TPCi themselves. All told, I spent maybe 20-30 minutes browsing through to see where Scizor fit overall. *

Scizor has always been on the upper side of the battleground in pokemon games and offers one of the best typing matchups (in terms of creativity and type pairings).

But in particular, Gen 2 was where Scizor truly shined. And if you were lucky enough to be able to trade for one back then, it was likely you didn't lose battles often.

Scizor in gen 2 was the first ever steel/bug type (introduced along with Forrestess)The combo eliminated numerous weaknesses for both typing, and garnered new resistances.

Scizor is resistant to 9 typings, and only has one real weakness. Fire. Yes, it is a 4x weakness, but being resistant to half of all other types was ludicrous back then.

To be exact, Gen 2 Scizor was resistant to these types:

Normal
Bug
Steel
Grass
Psychic
Ice
Dragon
Dark
Ghost
And immune completely to Poison types.​

So that's 10 types that it didn't have to worry about while naturally being STAB effective against Grass, Psychic, Dark, Ice and Rock.

It's moveset wasn't much to be desired in Gen 2. With that being said, you only needed 4 moves, and Scizor would naturally learn 3 of them. A TM could be obtained for the 4th.

SWORD DANCE - Will boost ATK power vastly
STEEL WING - A nasty Physical ATK
GUILLOTINE - One Hit KO move
FURY CUTTER - BUG move that gets stronger with each ATK. ​

With a level 55-60 Scizor with that move set (and some eithers) you could easily solo the original E4 in the GSC games. I'd argue if you started the E4 battles at level 50 with Scizor, you'd still win all 5 battles. The only pokemon you'd encounter that Scizor wouldn't have a resistance or type effective attack against would only be the fire types Houndoom and Charizard, if I recall correctly.

Bruno would be daunting if the Bug resistance to fighting didn't kick in.

Gen 2 Scizor was a perfect example of what an exclusive or rare pokemon and typing intro should be, hence why no one has used a Scizor on their team before other than E4 Aaron in gen 4 (I believe) and Bugsy in HGSS in a rematch. Otherwise, I believe one or two random rematch trainer has him in gen 4.

The only real downfall was not being able to trade to obtain the pokemon back in 99/00! Which was a personal problem! Especially when they made all the other new types basically post-game pokemon only! Anywho...

As the games mechanics has evolved over the years, and the increase of pokemon in general, has weakened Scizor just a tiny bit. But we can't just forget how absolutely brutally powerful he was in gen 2.

What do you all think???? Did any of you ever use Scizor back then???

​

 

[Sheep]

Scizor looks great and has always been one of the coolest-looking Pokémon introduced in Johto.. but how in the world did I not realize Fury Cutter was the only bug move it learned back then? Yikes.

Sadly I never used it since I was relying solely on my starter back then. :sweat:

 

[Janp]

I wanted to use one so bad back then. It had interesting typing, was nice upgrade from Scyther and looked so cool in the anime. I wish I had friends with Game Boy that I could trade Pokémon with.

 

[Nah]

My usage of it has been somewhat limited given that it's a 'mon you get via trade evolution, and I tend to avoid those when doing more casual playthroughs. Might have one lying around in some box in some game though, I probably raised one at some point for online battles/battle facilities.

 

[Corveone]

I only had one Scizor on my team, and it wasn't in Gen 2.

What truly made Scizor shine to me is Technician (one of my favorite Abilities all around), without that I never found it so interesting.

Sure, it has an awesome design and great defensive typing (kinda broken, actually, especially before Gen 6), but offensively it didn't have much to offer in its early days. It lacked good moves, and both Bug and Steel were pretty awful offensively. It could tank a lot of stuff, and it was a nice counter to early gens Psychic abuse, but strong moves and good offense has allways been more useful in-game.

Up to Gen 3, Scizor's best STABs were Metal Claw / Steel Wing, and 10 BP Fury Cutter (and it didn't get Technician until Gen 4). Totally outclassed offensively by Heracross, which at that time already had access to Megahorn and Brick Break.

 

[bez850]

I only had one Scizor on my team, and it wasn't in Gen 2.

What truly made Scizor shine to me is Technician (one of my favorite Abilities all around), without that I never found it so interesting.

Sure, it has an awesome design and great defensive typing (kinda broken, actually, especially before Gen 6), but offensively it didn't have much to offer in its early days. It lacked good moves, and both Bug and Steel were pretty awful offensively. It could tank a lot of stuff, and it was a nice counter to early gens Psychic abuse, but strong moves and good offense has allways been more useful in-game.

Up to Gen 3, Scizor's best STABs were Metal Claw / Steel Wing, and 10 BP Fury Cutter (and it didn't get Technician until Gen 4). Totally outclassed offensively by Heracross, which at that time already had access to Megahorn and Brick Break.

The main reason I was so focused on Gen 2, aside from that being my favorite region, was because of the lack of abilities and nature's. Gen 2 was basically the blueprint for all future games, and Gen 3 perfected the original model, in my opinion.

With that being said, Forrestress is the perfect encapsulation of the Steel/Bug typing, especially with your descriptions of the typing, forrestress even thematically fits. However due to my experiences directly with my many many playthroughs, sword dance makes Scizor viable in the early Gen 2 days. Extremely so. Slash/MetalClaw/FuryCutter all become extremely powerful moves. Fury Cutter would be the only one that isn't a 1 hit ko, and it would be on the second hit.

And if we look at the Elite 4s move pools, it becomes apparent that Fury Cutter can be affective cause the only dark or psychic types you'd use that on anyways would be pure typing, so just umbreon.

If you think about it, Gen 2s E4 left a lot to be desired.

But, alas, you're right. Scizor got nerfed big time, and without Technician and the improved move set, he really wouldn't be competitive today. But back in 99/00 when I was rocking it on the gameboy, he was nearly invincible.

That's what the post is mostly about. Now that I think of it, a lot of early mons got some serious nerfs. Lol I like talking pokemon theories with you!