Error on the Gym Defender Tier List
On the Gym Defender Tier List for Ampharos there is this line: Countered by Tyranitar and Rhydon.
The thing is that Tyranitar doesn't have any sort of type advantage against Ampharos. Tyranitar has Dark, Steel, Rock, and Fire moves but Ampharos only takes SE damage from Ground. Tyranitar is Dark/Rock, and neither of those types resist Electric. In fact Ampharos has a Fighting Charge move that hits Tyranitar for double SE damage.
I realize that Tyranitar can probably beat Ampharos just off of out CPing really hard... and I also realize that this won't actually change the tier list, but it bugged me.
Answers
Not an error. Tyranitar beats Ampharos faster than Golem does and ends with more HP remaining.
Of the attackers that I tested, Tyranitar and Rhydon were clearly superior to the rest.
You have to discard this notion that one Pokemon should or shouldn't counter another because of typing. Stats beat typing. The only way to know for sure whether a Pokemon counters another is to simulate battles.
Except that is not what counter means. Just because neutral mons like snorlax and blissey can beat most on defense, you don't describe them as a counter. The point of a counter is a specific matchup you'd like and can exploit, as opposed to a generalist attacker or sweeper. Golem isn't a great attacker but he excels against Charizard due to typing and attack types. Same with vaporeon. There may be other/better ways to beat Charizard (dragonite should work), but counters are based on playing advantages.
Again, not saying TTar won't win or even due better than a counter (golem) but calling it a counter seems misleading.
I don't see how it's misleading. If anything, it's misleading to call Golem a counter if it does much worse than another attacker.
Tyranitar and Rhydon had a better matchup than any other Pokemon we examined (including Dragonite), hence they are counters.
Your Charizard example is not analogous. Actually, let's look at Flareon instead, because I didn't examine Charizard's matchups in detail. Flareon loses slightly faster to Vaporeon, but Vaporeon beats it with slightly more HP remaining compared to Dragonite. They perform very similarly. So they are both counters.
