After some thinking, I've discovered the true purpose of the Dreepy line. If you pay attention to its Shield Pokedex entry: "If this weak Pokémon is by itself, a mere child could defeat it. But if Dreepy has friends to help it train, it can evolve and become much stronger. "
Its true. Dreepy has horrible stats, and learns no moves through level up other than the ones previously mentioned. Its TMs and TRs, only consist of status moves and Round and Swift. The ideas of this family is that you have a very weak Pokemon and then it evolves into something amazing as a reward for your patience.- I mean Dragapault, is one of the fastest attackers in the game.
And comparing it to the other Pseudo-Legendaries it is weaker in both BST and has the lowest defenses (plus significant or at least easily encountered weaknesses).
However, there are two problems with this:
#1: Dreepy evolves at Level 50. In Sword and Shield, that's the past 8th gym's highest level Pokemon. You really expect someone to use this Pokemon with these atrocious limitations until that point, where there are better, more reliable Ghost and Dragon types out there, such as Ghastly and Axew; who evolve much easier and sooner?
#2: The only place to find wild Dreepy is in the Lake of Outrage, which despite getting access after the 7th gym, you can't catch anything. So you can only catch it after the 8th gym, just when its about to evolve. Not to mention that you have to wait for it to be a Thunderstorm to have a chance to capture it, where its a 2% encounter. And the worse part of this is that its evolve form can be found in the overworld during said weather. I managed to catch Drakolak long before I found Dreepy.
What was the whole point of this line? Its found so late in-game to the point that I say, "spare me the trouble and give me a Dragapault. " And even if it was available early, its stats and movepool are so bad and it evolves so late that its not worth the trouble over using Axew or Ghastly over it. I guess if you want to be technically fair, Den 64, which can be found in Rolling hills can potentially spawn Dreepy if you are lucky. But keep in mind that's a purple beam, so chances are if you are completely going this game blind you won't know to look there unless the purple beam spawns. This is why I dislike the Dreepy Line. Not because I think its bad, but because someone came up with a concept of "high patience, high reward", only to be dashed by someone else's poor design choices of SwSh.
1. Late Evolver: The high evo level thing is a problem for pretty much all the pseudo Legendaries. But I think that's the point if you look at it from a story perspective. Because for the most part, who's using the pseudo Legendaries? Mostly Champions or other end game bosses:
- Lance, last member of the Gen I Elite Four, uses Dragonite.
- (Oddly I can't think of anyone who uses Tyranitar)
- Drake, last member of the Gen III Elire Four, uses a Salamence.
- Steven, RS Champion & Emerald Secret Boss, uses a Metagross.
- Cynthia, Gen IV Champion, uses Garchomp.
- Ghetsis, main villain and last boss of BW & B2W2, uses Hydreigon.
- Diantha, Gen VI Champion, uses a Goodra.
- Kommo-o is the last (SM)/second to last (USUM) Totem Pokemon which gets a +1 to each non-HP stat.
- Leon, Gen VIII's Champion, uses Dragapult.
While there are some games where you can catch and possibly get them to their final stage before facing the boss that uses them, that's just a bonus. Their main purpose is to be a strong Pokemon that one of the end game bosses use to show that things have ramped up. And since many you catch late game and their first form isn't all that strong and won't evolve for a while many first time players may want to use a Pokemon that becomes better earlier and can get them through the main game. That all said, for my Ultra Moon playthrough I decided to train up both a Beldum and a Bagon, and while they pretty much stunk early on, when they evolved to their mid-stage they became decent and when they evolved again they became GODS (Metagross was the one I used to defeat Ultra Necrozma as it's crazy high defenses let it take 2 or 3 hits (after a Roto Boost) before I needed to heal it).
2. Pain Getting It: That all said, getting a Dreepy is a MAJOR pain due to having to wait for a thunderstorm (and having a low encounter rate). Seriously, who thought that was a good idea for it or similar Pokemon? Like, I get the idea of wanting to make the certain weather conditions in the Wild Area feel special, but I don't think this was the way. Like maybe instead making Dreepy a 2% encounter rate at Lake of Outrage during a Thunderstorm, it can be a 5% someplace else (like in the Slumbering Weald) BUT during a Thunderstorm is like a 20% at the Lake of Outrage.
The outrage over Charizard getting special attention is a hypocritical farce and I guarantee that if it wasn't given the status of Starter Pokemon nobody would care.
Eh, the outrage over Charizard getting a Gigantamax is more due to factors outside of it and it's just been made the poster 'mon for it due to getting a major Gigantamax form.
Let's bring this all the way back to XY as I feel this is where this started. XY was when they introduced Mega Evolutions, neat! And while Mewtwo was technically the first Mega we saw, when they fully introduced the concept they showed many other Megas which weren't Gen I like Blaziken and Lucario. Everything alright. But then they revealed the Kanto Starters were getting Megas plus you can get a Kanto Starter as a "second starter" in XY. Cool! But wait, they then revealed Charizard was getting TWO Mega Evos. AWESOME! In XY there was no major problem as the Mega Evo concept was being spread to a lot of past Gen Pokemon with the Kanto Starters getting them being looked as just a bonus (Mewtwo getting a second Mega Evo also made Charizard having a second not seem to strange, rather just a marketing stunt but hey at least we get a Dragon-type Charizard so all's good).
Then came SM and it did two fumbles. First, no new Mega Evos, infact GF looked to have no more interest in Mega Evos though they're at least in the game. Sad, with Z-Moves feeling like a downgrade though can at least be used by all Pokemon. But the big problem came with Alolan Forms being restricted to Gen I Pokemon. What! Why? Johto was just as much present in Alola's culture as Kanto. Actually, there's a notable amount of Gen I references in Gen VII due to it being Pokemon's 20th anniversary, but it's kind of to an annoying degree as it almost ignores all other regions seemingly and it's doubtful GF it gonna celebrate their gen's anniversary with the same fanfare.
Then we had a batch of side games which was either released with Gen I first or Gen I only: GO, Pokemon Quest, and Let's Go. ALRIGHT! What the hey GF? What's with the Gen I deluge? Can you cool it?
So, here's Sword & Shield. And they just revealed Dynamax and Gigantamax Pokemon. Very cool, but how will this mix with Mega Pokemon... what do you mean GF just announced they removed Mega & Z-Moves? Well that stinks, but I guess it'll give the new Gigantamax Pokemon a chance to shine which will no doubt go to Pokemon who don't have a super form... WHY DOES CHARIZARD HAVE A GIGANTAMAX?! YOU GOT RID OF ITS TWO SUPER FORMS JUST TO GIVE US ANOTHER LESS IMPRESSIVE SUPER FORM?! And, actually, a notable number of Gen I Pokemon got Gmaxs including three not fully evolved Pokemon! And a lot of the Galarian Pokemon are also Gen I! Now, yes, they do have Gigantamax and Galarian Pokemon from other regions... but Gen I does still take a more notable chunk even though it oddly doesn't do so for the Regional Dex.
But, yeah, it's not Charizard itself the issue but all the Gen I spinning and getting rid of Mega Evos which Charizard got two of which made people feel sour it got a Gigantamax. And GF double-down on this by making it the ace of the Champion so it was front and center a whole lot. I would also say Gengar is on the same boat as it also had a Mega Evo previously (though not two like Charizard) but slips under the radar being the ace of a version exclusive Gym Leader.