Quote:
Originally Posted by Fat Alice in Strings
Honestly, I'd rather put up with twenty or so levels of Growlithe in order to get both Flamethrower and Crunch and evolve it into Arcanine rather than evolve it straight away and get...Extremespeed. Not to mention you can Relearn Extremespeed after you evolve it. It's perfectly reasonable to have E-Speed, Flamethrower, Thunder Fang, and Crunch as your endgame movepool.
Though, that's just me. Growlithe has fine stats for waiting twenty levels, though Flare Blitz I'd rather not use, simply because Flamethrower is good enough for Arcanine, and the recoil isn't worth the boost in power for it. Outrage isn't all that impressive, either.
Sandshrew - Low Tier
-Availability : Desert Resort. It'll probably be the first thing you find. It's that freaking common.
-Stats : 100 Attack and 110 Defense is great, but...that's kind of the extent of the good things. 45 Special Attack and Special Defense means it can't take ANY hit from a Special Attacker without taking a boatload of damage, and with 75 Base HP, it's probably not going to survive. Sandslash is also pretty slow, having a 65 Base Speed stat.
-Movepool: Simply atrocious. Most of the game you'll be using Magnitude, Rock Tomb, Shadow Claw and Swords Dance as your four moves simply because it doesn't get ANYTHING else worthwhile. Sure, you could slap Aerial Ace on it, but most Grass types will outspeed you anyway, so what's the point? Putting salt in the wound of having to deal with Magnitude for thirty levels is that it can get Earth Power by Move Tutor. Yes, Base 45 Special Attack sure makes that worthwhile, doesn't it? It does get Crush Claw, I guess...and Dig, though I'd rather be dealing with Magnitude than use Dig.
-Major Battles: Sandshrew would have been nice for Roxie...but you can't get it until AFTER Roxie. You can use Sandshrew to counter Dwebble in Burgh's gym, I guess. It does great in Elesa's gym, due to the gym now only having ONE Emolga rather than Emolga up the wazoo. Clay's Excadrill poses no problems for Sandslash, and it can do reasonably well against Skyla using Rock Tomb. Sandshrew really doesn't have the defense to deal with anything in Drayden's gym, and it REALLY doesn't like Marlon's gym. E4's kind of a crapshoot for Sandslash. It can get Shadow Claw, but the things it could use Shadow Claw on are not only faster, but use Special Attacks. It can kill Grimsley's Bisharp, but what Ground type can't?
-Additional Comments: With Sandshrew, it's just been a long, hard journey. It hasn't really shone in any of the Generations it was in, and although getting Magnitude was nice, I had to put up with it for thirty levels before it got Earthquake. In this generation, Sandslash is completely outclassed by Excadrill, who is bulkier and has a movepool, and by Krookidile, who has two great abilities and a decent movepool (and fake bulk if you have Intimidate). It simply isn't worth the effort to bring Sandslash to the top, as it's great for a total of one gym and just...doesn't do anything of note. It has a terrible movepool and stats that don't let it do anything to a majority of the game.
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You forgot to mention that Sandslash gets rock slide, which is available as a tm in Mistralton Cave, and Excadrill isnt bulkier than sandslash on the physical side. But yeah, Sandslash is pretty terrible, so i agree with the tier placing.
Drifblim
Availability: You can catch drifblim starting from Reversal mountain, which is pretty late.
Stats: 80 attack and 90 Spattack is decent, while 80 speed is pretty good. Its torrid defences at 44 and 54 respectively are alleviated by its 150 base hp.
Movepool: Drifblim's movepool is fairly shallow, with only a few good tms it can learn. Drifblim learns Acrobatics and Fly, both accesible at this point. Fly is good for utility, while Acrobatics is pretty powerful if you are willing to forego having Drifblim hold an item. It gets shadow ball not long after capture at level 40 as well. Drifblim can learn Will o wisp to cripple pokemon in major battles, and it also can be used in conjunction with Hex for some form of strategy. In terms of attacking diversity, you can use Psychic and charge beam to get physically bulky fighting types and waters respectively. If you are desperate for something to use against Drayden or Iris, Icy wind(tutor move!) is always an option.
Major battles Drifblim functions badly against Drayden, because 3 of his pokemon carry a move to hit Drifblim. Against Marlon, Drifblim can't do anything either because Carracosta has Smack down and Crunch, Wailord has rollout, and jellicent can do more damage to you than you can do against it. In the E4, Drifblim is a mixed bag against Shauntal, with all her pokemon being vulnerable to drifblim, but at the same time being able to hit back with Shadow Ball. Against Grimmsley, Drifblim can't do much against Liepard, but can actually burn Scrafty and beat it with Acrobatics. Krookodile and Bisharp both destroy Drifblim though. Drifblim functions pretty well against Caitlin, with her pokemon being weak to it. Drifblim can beat Musharna and Reuniclus, but must be wary against Gothitelle(which can set up on it with CM), and Sigilyph(who can use ice beam against it). Drifblim does excellently against Marshall, even though his Sawk and Throh carry Payback and Rock Tomb respectively, they are beaten by Acrobatics. Mienshao can't do anything against Drifblim, and can even be beaten by switching Drifblim in onto HJK, causing it to take recoil damage. Conkeldurr beats it with Stone edge however, so keep drifblim away for that. Drifblim is horrible against Iris, as almost all her pokemon hit Drifblim super effectively, with the exception of Haxorus, who can kill it with +1 Dual Chop.
In conclusion, Drifblim is bad pokemon to use in game, due to late availabilty, relative ineffectiveness in major battles, a fairly one-dimensional movepool, and mediocre stats besides HP which is made a moot point by its bad defences.
But I used it anyway because it's cute :3
Low tier