climactic

of, relating to, or being a major turning point <the French Revolution is usually regarded as one of the climactic events in modern European history> Synonyms apocalyptic (also apocalyptical), climacteric Related Words apical, apogean, crestal, crowning, culminating, high, highest, meridian; critical, crossover, crucial, fateful, life-and-death (also life-or-death), vital; cataclysmal (or cataclysmic), earthshaking, epochal, momentous; deciding, decisive, payoff, pivotal, watershed; go-no-go, make-or-break Near Antonyms anticlimactic (also anticlimactical); inconsequential, indecisive, insignificant, noncritical, trivial, unimportant