>>32835392I prefer the original as well but there are several little reasons that add up to make A-Marowak just plain better.
First typing, which alone would not be much difference. Pure Ground is a bit too bland, the upper tiers are oversaturated with Ground types and it's easy to shut down its STAB by sending Flying types. Meanwhile Ghost/Fire is a pretty well rounded STAB combo, allowing you to hit hard most things. Marowak's primary gimmick is abusing its thick club to hit hard enemies, and in meta that is always getting bulkier a 50% boost can make it or break it easily.
Secondly, Abilities. Lighting Rod is redundant on Marowak while it's an excellent tool on A-Marowak, allowing you to switch it in on threaths to your Water and/or Flying types, I remember using it with success pairing him with Pelipper for this reason. Normal Marowak can only run Rock Head, which it can use only to abuse his STAB-less Double-Edge, also Normal is not very good coverage, while A-Marowak can run Rock Head as well and it has Flare Blitz to abuse it with.
Finally, signature moves and moveppol in general. Marowak blatantly gets the short stick on this one, three, THREE fucking signatures and NONE of them is particularly good other than Bonemerang for ok damage and breaking Substitutes, and then again it's easy to shut down by sending a Flying type. Meanwhile, A-Marowak gets a reliable physical STAB Ghost move (something a lot of physical Ghost types would give their soul for) in Shadow Bone, 85 Power, 100 Accuracy, chance to drop enemy's defense.
There you have it.
Personally I dislike base Marowak being so blatantly underpowered compared to its alolan cousin, it could easily being fixed by:
1) giving him some decent moves A-Marowak can't get;
2) give him a Ground move with recoil, could be called Bone Smash as a parallel to Head Smash, so that at least it can hit as hard as A-Marowak's Flare Blitz;
3) Make Bonemerang able to hit Flying types so that it can be Zygarde junior.
