Drilbur

[iss]

Drilbur​

Approved by macle​

Overview

Drilbur is certainly one of the main threats in the Little Cup metagame at the moment. With an automatic +2 Speed boost in Sandstorm, Drilbur reaches 32 Speed before it does anything as long as Sandstorm is active. To top that off, Drilbur also has a massive 19 Attack with an Adamant nature, and also gets Swords Dance. Access to Earthquake and Rock Slide means it can OHKO nearly the entire tier after a Swords Dance. However, Drilbur has a very shallow movepool, with Shadow Claw, Return, and X-Scissor being its only real coverage options. Its defenses are rather average, but not low by any means. Drilbur can even function in a support role, with its massive speed and access to Rapid Spin making it a good, but underutilized spinner. Let me put it this way: if you're playing a well built sand team and you don't have a counter to Drilbur, you're going to get swept.

Stats and Movepool

HP: 60
Attack: 85
Defense: 40
Special Attack: 35
Special Defense: 45
Speed: 68
BST: 328

Movepool:
Level-Up
1 Scratch
1 Mud Sport
5 Rapid Spin
12 Fury Swipes
15 Metal Claw
19 Dig
22 Hone Claws
26 Slash
29 Rock Slide
33 Earthquake
36 Swords Dance
40 Sandstorm
43 Drill Run
47 Fissure

Egg
Crush Claw
Earth Power
Iron Defense
Metal Sound
Rapid Spin
Rock Climb
Skull Bash
Submission

TM/HM
01 Hone Claws
06 Toxic
10 Hidden Power
17 Protect
21 Frustration
26 Earthquake
27 Return
28 Dig
31 Brick Break
32 Double Team
36 Sludge Bomb
37 Sandstorm
39 Rock Tomb
40 Aerial Ace
42 Facade
44 Rest
45 Attract
48 Round
56 Fling
65 Shadow Claw
75 Swords Dance
78 Bulldoze
80 Rock Slide
81 X-Scissor
84 Poison Jab
87 Swagger
90 Substitute
94 Rock Smash
H1 Cut
H4 Strength​

Sets

[SET]
name: Swords Dance
move 1: Swords Dance
move 2: Earthquake
move 3: Rock Slide
move 4: Protect / Shadow Claw / Return
item: Eviolite / Life Orb
ability: Sand Rush
nature: Adamant
evs: 36 HP / 236 Atk / 212 Spe

The premise here is pretty simple: Grab a Swords Dance with Drilbur's decent bulk (especially with Eviolite), and OHKO nearly everything. The first three slots are pretty self-explanatory. Protect is by far my favorite option for the last slot. Eviolite Drilbur will take nearly nothing from priority not named Aqua Jet. Protect allows you to beat Fake Outers, most teams' only way of even hoping to take down Drilbur. In my opinion, Life Orb is somewhat unnecessary, as without it you still can sweep very well and it is much more difficult to get a Swords Dance in. If you choose to use Life Orb, Return or Shadow Claw are the best options, although keep in mind a super-effective Shadow Claw is still weaker than a neutral Earthquake. Life Orb does allow you to OHKO bulky waters like Slowpoke and Frillish after a Swords Dance, however.

Hippopotas is obviously a necessary partner, as sand is essential to this set's success. It can also set up Stealth Rock, which removes any potential Focus Sash holders as well as giving Drilbur some additional damage. Diglett and Wynaut can eliminate many of Drilbur's checks and counters, like Slowpoke and Frillish. Wynaut, in particular, can Encore attacks for Drilbur to set up on. Fire-types, like Ponyta can OHKO Drilbur's nemesis, Bronzor, but fall rather quickly to Sandstorm, Life Orb, and Flare Blitz recoil. Eviolite and Morning Sun (despite the recovery loss) are recommended. Lileep and Chinchou can destroy bulky waters. Drifloon is an interesting lure for Bronzor, as many team use Bronzor as their only counter to Acrobatics Drifloon. A well-timed Destiny Bond can open up a sweep for Drilbur. Finally, hazard-setters like Ferroseed or Dwebble will make Drilbur's sweep much easier. Magnemite is also quite amazing for killing Bronzor and Ferroseed.

Snover is a fairly tough nut for Drilbur to break. While it can't directly switch in due to the threat of Rock Slide and is actually slower without a Choice Scarf, it takes away the sand instantly and with it Drilbur's main advantage in its speed. Choice Scarf Diglett can switch in and OHKO Snover with Rock Slide. Wynaut can trap a Snover and kill it with Mirror Coat or pass it on to Diglett if it tries to Substitute. The main thing is to not let Hippopotas die if you see a Snover in team preview. As long as Snover is dead and sand is up, you're fine.

Rapid Spin and Substitute are also options for the last slot. Drilbur, if switched in appropriately, can force a switch to your opponent's counter. This can allow Drilbur to grab a free Rapid Spin. Substitute gives you protection against status, and can allow you to get a Swords Dance. Keep in mind though that Drilbur is vulnerable to Stealth Rock and Spikes, and has no recovery.

Teams with Drilbur

These teams were all very successful on the Little Cup ladder, and are a good display of how to support Drilbur.

Team Desert Storm by comatthew6
Lil Kidz On The Block by D4RR3N
maybe a little different than what you expected by kd24​

----

Is Drilbur Broken?

iss: Personally, I feel Drilbur is broken because Bronzor is the only true counter to it. Bronzor can't be trapped by Diglett, and is somewhat tricky to kill with Wynaut (you'd have to be playing pretty dumb). Furthermore, a huge amount of speed right off the bat makes most sand teams not have to carry a Choice Scarf user, as Drilbur is a pretty nice revenge killer with that 19 Speed. It doesn't have problems switching in, as it only takes one damage from Stealth Rock and Spikes is usually limited to one layer if at all (and Drilbur can Rapid Spin those away too). With excellent two-move coverage in Earthquake and Rock Slide, it can afford to use Protect to be safe from Fake Out.

The bigger underlying problem here is Scraggy. Most teams have been forced to overprepare for Scraggy, as it has been the hyped-up supersweeper of Little Cup. Nearly every team has one of bulky Mienfoo, Croagunk, Tailow, or Doduo. All of those are pretty much destroyed by Drilbur. It's a rather odd dilemma: either we overprepare for Scraggy and feel Drilbur is broken, or we overprepare for Drilbur and feel Scraggy is broken. Right now the former is much more true. It takes a very good teambuilder to counter both these threats and still have a solid team against a team without either. Bronzor is dead weight in this metagame aside from setting up Stealth Rock, but nearly every team needs it due to the threat of Drilbur. Being #5 in the statistics should not be happening for a Pokemon like Bronzor. Drilbur has a huge effect on the Little Cup metagame, and it is broken because of how much we need to prepare for it.

Vader: I am PRETTY sure if you are "unprepared" for a major threat, you deserve to lose, straight up.

I don't like banning stuff that isn't Scyther-level in power. Drillbur is decidedly not that powerful. Neither is Scraggy. The problem here, in my opinion, is that we are trying to deal with problems by removing them. That is not the way we should try to respond to threats in the metagame. In fact, the term metagame arose from when players changed their playstyles and tactics to deal with major threats in competitive gaming. The metagame shifted to deal with Scraggy, but is now centered around Drillbur.

What this means is, good players will use what beats Drillbur because it's powerful and popular. If it requires two Pokemon for your team to beat, so be it. It is childish to expect that you will always beat a Pokemon even if you "prepare" for it, too.

And if you want to argue that Scraggy or Drillbur "imbalance the tier," then you're absolutely right. But a perfectly balanced metagame is boring and stale. A balanced metagame has no shifts because every archtype is represented. The metagame's overall power level has been tanking throughout this entire generation, and it always feels to me like the Pokemon are not too strong, just stronger than they were before but players didn't want to adapt.

While I would rather have steered the discussion away from tiering issues, I guess that's what you guys wanna talk about, and Drillbur is a pretty good representative of what I would consider a stupid ban.

Thanks for reading!

 

[comatthew6]

Drilbur is very strong; no one is going to deny that. Even so, that's not to say that Drilbur can't be stopped, since it certainly can be. Bronzor is a hard counter, able to switch in without any trouble (as long as it doesn't try to be fancy with heatproof) and only fears xscissor. Lileep isn't OHKOd by eviolites earthquake at +2, and croagunk does a fairly good job at revenge killing it if it doesn't have protect.

Tl;dr, drilbur is very powerful, but far from broken.

 

[Good_Luck!]

I agree with commathew6.

I run a sandstorm team without Drilbur; while I struggled a bit against it when I started to play I quickly learned how to counter it by scouting its moves. Maybe I've been lucky but Chinchou can use Surf while it tries to grab a free SD on a switch; opposing Hippos can give Drilbur headaches too; Lileep's Energy Ball...

I don't think it's broken.

P.D. Don't laugh at me for not runnig a Drilbur; I play for fun.

 

[Ray Jay]

People have over generalized as of late by arguing Bronzor is the only counter to Drilbur. This has caused Bronz to rise crazily in the usage stats. In reality, there are multiple viable answers to it, such as Cottonee (who Em and I have been testing for this) which, with Encore and Giga Drain easily takes it down. Slowpoke also handles it sufficiently if played well. There are also more unorthodox choices as Turtwig.

In my opinion, we really shouldn't even be discussing whether it's broken, people need to just be open to not using solely Bronzor to handle it.

 

[Heysup]

Well the reason is that Bronzor can't be nailed by anything super effective, Drilbur can carry Return, Rock Slide, or even X-Scissor to beat on those Grass-types.

 

[Furai]

The thing with Drilbur is that it kinda overcentralizes the metagame; just like Deoxys-S in OU I think it should go. If you are not prepared well enough you're wrecked. It's not like we're talking about Scraggy, Scraggy can be revenged so easily by many Scarf users. Drilbur is the fastest Pokemon out there (under SS), so there is no point even trying to try revenge it with a Scarfer.

 

[comatthew6]

The thing with Drilbur is that it kinda overcentralizes the metagame; just like Deoxys-S in OU I think it should go. If you are not prepared well enough you're wrecked. It's not like we're talking about Scraggy, Scraggy can be revenged so easily by many Scarf users. Drilbur is the fastest Pokemon out there (under SS), so there is no point even trying to try revenge it with a Scarfer.

Then again, the same thing can be said about Scraggy and Clamperl. Though they might not be as popular as Drilbur (or as deemed broken), many teams either directly or indirectly carry 2-3 checks to these two. That being said, there have to be Pokemon that have the ability to check Drilbur, but won't rise crazily in usage. I don't know what they are, though.

 

[tennisace]

The thing with Scraggy is that it kinda overcentralizes the metagame; just like Deoxys-S in OU I think it should go. If you are not prepared well enough you're wrecked.

The thing with Clamperl is that it kinda overcentralizes the metagame; just like Deoxys-S in OU I think it should go. If you are not prepared well enough you're wrecked.

Welcome to offense in LC! Glad you like it.

ps maybe if you didn't ban every decent check it wouldn't be a problem

 

[Rakan]

I'm not much of a LC player myself, but wouldn't Scarf Snover be a nice check to Drilbur? Switch in, eliminate sand, and blast Drilbur with a STAB super effective Blizzard.

 

[Good_Luck!]

tennisace has a point. If you're not prepared for X then you'll loose.

By your reasoning, every obscure underused Pokemon or Moveset would be broken because not everyone would be prepared for it.

Also, I don't feel it overcentralizes the current Meta; Bronzor is a check for other threats and a great supporting poke in general. Let's say I play with Double-Screens Bronzor, that doesn't mean it HAS to be a counter to Drilbur. I think it would be overcentrilizing if Bronzor had no other uses other than checking Drilbur or if every winning team has a Drilbur on them and every other team without Drilbur would be peaked low.

The examples of teams who use Drilbur are good because they're used by players who are good, not good by running Drilbur ipso facto.

Again, Drilbur is good: hits hard, takes hits and is fast, but the same goes for Scraggy after a boost. There are ways around Drilbur with pokes who check him along with other threats.

Also, Snover is a check but with rocks from Hippo is not THAT reliable.

 

[Brambane]

I find Cottonee, Duskull, Snivy, Slowpoke (+2 EQ still hurts though) and Turtwig to be effective in taking out Drilbur along with Bronzor. And Bronzor is more useful for a lot more things than just Stealth Rock. I've been playing around with Recycle Toxic Bronzor and find it incredibly useful for stalling out Pokemon like Lileep, mostly due to its own immunity to Toxic. And, of course, getting rid of Sandstorm makes Drilbur pretty mediocre.

All in all, I've never had any issues with Drilbur. It can get irritating at times, but I've found ways to work around Drilbur that doesn't require a super specialized counter.

 

[Pen Ink]

the thing is Drilbur isn't even powerful if you don't set up SD. his eq's are not that threatening when half or more of your team is carrying Eviolite. bulky Staryu forces him out easily without an SD up, and priority is a bitch to deal with (croagunk, offensive snover). scarf snover completely forces him out, and LO snover 2HKO's with Ice Shard.

honestly, most things that counter Drilbur can be useful for other reasons too on your team.

 

[Crux]

Lickitung (M) @ Eviolite Trait: Cloud Nine
EVs: 116 HP / 156 Atk / 156 Def / 36 SAtk
Quiet Nature (+SAtk, -Spd)
- Ice Beam / Substitute
- Power Whip
- Earthquake
- Fire Blast


Have a Lickitung set. It beats Drilbur and most of the metagame bar fighting types. Run it with a Taillow or something and you have most of the metagame covered.

 

[Methmite]

ISS brought up a good point in that it's not that drilbur is inherently broken in its own right; as people have brought up there are a lot of checks and counters that force drilbur into a 3 moveslot syndrome Swords Dance is necessary for sweeping damage, EQ for stab, rockslide for coverage, and the last move needs to cover additional threats, be it shadow claw for frillish (iunno) or X-scissor to deal with the grass types that wall it or protect to scout and troll HJK users.

The big issue is that people aren't preparing for Drilbur because of how hyped (I'm hesitant to say "over" hyped because scraggy *can* destroy unprepared teams) up scraggy is. A ban isnt necessary, in my opinion, but there definitely should be some discussion as to how to deal with both of them with minimal investment from your team (ie, least amount of slots).

It's also worth mentioning the big thing that Drilbur has over it's big brother when it was in OU, for discussion's sake at the very least. In Excadril OU there was really 2 big weathers - rain and Sand. Sun was a close 3rd; and hail wasnt really seen (I assume people were abusing being able to use Obama in UU for a while). The point I'm getting to is that one of the best and most efficient way to check Excadrill was to simply *remove* it's assets. Choice Scarf Politoed, for example. Ttar wouldn't enjoy switching into the stab Hydro Pump (even with his higher SpD thanks to SS) to get the sand back up, and Exca will almost always be OHKO'd by it.

In LC there is only one legal permanent weather besides sand: hail a la snover. There are 2 big issues with this: 1) most of the hail "abusers" in LC suck. 2) Snover can really only force out drilbur and then switch out from the fighting type Drilbur teams are bound to carry. Drilbur is also faster than snover, even in hail, unless snover is scarfed, giving a Drilbur a chance to kill snover even in a last versus last situation (though snover will most likely OHKO if it isn't).snover's weakness to fighting doesn't do it over in a metagame where the strongest attackers are fighting type. Makuhita (I know it's not exactly popular, but it's just to prove a point) can switch into it's stab Ice attacks thanks to thick fat and threaten it out with Stab fighting. I havent ran any calcs, but I dont think CS blizzard can OHKO the much more common eviolite Mienfoo, who can recover any lost life with a combination of drain punch and regenerator.

Anyways: TL;DR Drilbur isn't broken in it's own right. it's wrecking because people are over preparing for scraggy, and that the same methods for dealing with Excadrill are less to non-effective for dealing with Drilbur.

 

[v]

I am PRETTY sure if you are "unprepared" for a major threat, you deserve to lose, straight up.

I don't like banning stuff that isn't Scyther-level in power. Drillbur is decidedly not that powerful. Neither is Scraggy. The problem here, in my opinion, is that we are trying to deal with problems by removing them. That is not the way we should try to respond to threats in the metagame. In fact, the term metagame arose from when players changed their playstyles and tactics to deal with major threats in competitive gaming. The metagame shifted to deal with Scraggy, but is now centered around Drillbur.

What this means is, good players will use what beats Drillbur because it's powerful and popular. If it requires two Pokemon for your team to beat, so be it. It is childish to expect that you will always beat a Pokemon even if you "prepare" for it, too.

And if you want to argue that Scraggy or Drillbur "imbalance the tier," then you're absolutely right. But a perfectly balanced metagame is boring and stale. A balanced metagame has no shifts because every archtype is represented. The metagame's overall power level has been tanking throughout this entire generation, and it always feels to me like the Pokemon are not too strong, just stronger than they were before but players didn't want to adapt.

While I would rather have steered the discussion away from tiering issues, I guess that's what you guys wanna talk about, and Drillbur is a pretty good representative of what I would consider a stupid ban.

 

[Ray Jay]

Vader kinda hit on a point I've been curious about myself: if you're going to argue Drilbur is broken because it shot Bronzor up in usage, why aren't you going to argue that Mienfoo is broken because it shot Larvesta up in usage (even though now most Mienfoo carry Stone Edge, but whatever)

 

[Crux]

Hi, have another Drilbur counter on the house.

Lickitung (M) @ Evolution Stone
Trait: Cloud Nine
EVs: 196 HP / 156 Def / 156 SDef
Careful Nature (+SDef, -SAtk)
- Dragon Tail
- Curse
- Rest
- Sleep Talk

Yeah I used this set to beat sun, it also destroys sand! This is c/p from my old RMT you may want more def investment now.

EDIT: Also rain is the best playstyle in Little Cup at the moment due to the way the metagame has shifted, as its biggest counter (ferroseed) is now never used. Also rain always, always, always beat sand (and don't tell me lileep, if you lose to lileep you are silly as you should have 4380957938 fighting types on your rain team.)

Here are some sets I like using on my rain teams which always beat sand teams because sand teams are weak. :)

Staryu @ Eviolite Trait: Natural Cure
EVs: 36 HP / 200 SAtk / 240 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Hydro Pump
- Rain Dance
- Thunder
- Recover


Mienfoo (M) @ Eviolite
Trait: Regenerator
EVs: 156 Atk / 196 Def / 156 Spd
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Drain Punch
- Knock Off
- U-turn
- Rain Dance

 

[AOPSUser]

Are you sure Hippo is legal in LC? The page with all the analyses says it's UU.

 

[Pen Ink]

Little Cup tiering doesn't care about the real tier set-up, which is why we can also use stuff like Ferroseed. As long as it can be level five and we haven't deemed it banned, it can be used.

 

[iss]

Notice the tab named "Little Cup".

 

[Furai]

Bring Magnet Rise Magnemite with you and GG.

 

[danilo]

Bring Magnet Rise Magnemite with you and GG.

Magnetmise and Air Ballon Magnemite are sets that destroy sand, and it can combat a weakened Drilburr. Drilburr certainly doesn't need a ban, it just needs some innovation to fight it!

 

[Pen Ink]

Magnetmise is pretty good on its own anyways... it's free set up against Bronzor and gets around 20 Def and Sp.Def, so he's pretty bulky. If you get him set up Drilbur is going to dread coming out. The only problem with the set is that it has horrible four move-slot syndrome when deciding to run Sub or Flash Cannon.