[OVERVIEW]
Dracozolt has a minor niche in DOU as as a secondary attacker on sand teams, supplementing Excadrill as a Sand Rush sweeper with Bolt Beak's high power and Electric-type coverage. Enabled by Sand Rush, Bolt Beak makes Dracozolt a threatening attacker, as its massive power makes it somewhat difficult to handle for fast offensive archetypes. Dracozolt stands as one of sand's better answers to Water-types, such as Volcanion, Tapu Fini, and Urshifu-R, as it is decently capable of switching in on their Water-type attacks and threatens to KO them back—a niche over its main competition in Dracovish. Dracozolt's biggest downfall, however, lies in its reliance on Bolt Beak to be useful. While its Electric typing does let Dracozolt beat some key threats, it's also easily answered by too many popular Pokemon in the metagame, such as Rillaboom, Amoonguss, Landorus-I, Zeraora, Zygarde, and Assault Vest Kyurem-B. Bolt Beak's conditionality, which also effectively makes Tyranitar a compulsory teammate, is also easily circumvented by speed control such as Tailwind and Trick Room, and without Bolt Beak's doubled power, Dracozolt is simply mediocre due to its actually paltry offensive base stats. Ultimately, Dracozolt can be hard to fit onto sand teams because of the stiff competition among Sand Rush attackers and how having multiple together puts too much pressure on Tyranitar. Additionally, Dracozolt is the only one truly vulnerable to getting slowed down by Intimidate, as it is unable to get through Incineroar and Landorus-T, unlike Excadrill and Dracovish.
[SET]
name: Sand Attacker
move 1: Bolt Beak
move 2: Draco Meteor
move 3: Substitute
move 4: Protect
item: Life Orb
ability: Sand Rush
nature: Naughty
evs: 252 Atk / 4 SpA / 252 Spe
[SET COMMENTS]
* Bolt Beak is Dracozolt's main attacking option, used to deal massive damage to most neutral targets, such as Heatran and Mew, and OHKOing Water-types, such as Volcanion, Tapu Fini, and Urshifu-R.
* Draco Meteor covers Dragon- and Ground-types that can easily take a Bolt Beak, such as Kyurem-B, Zygarde, and Landorus-I.
* Substitute lets Dracozolt further capitalize on defensive plays that it forces, giving it a shield against Fake Out and Intimidate, which lets it play aggressively.
* Protect keeps Dracozolt safe for a turn, letting teammates cover it against particular threats and stalling out unfavorable field conditions such as opposing Tailwind and Trick Room.
* A Naughty nature and Life Orb maximize Bolt Beak's damage output without weakening Dracozolt's Defense against priority attacks, while full Speed investment and Sand Rush lets Dracozolt outrun key threats to sand teams in Choice Scarf Urshifu-R and Genesect. An alternative spread 252 Atk / 112 SpA / 144 Spe can be used to let Draco Meteor OHKO Zygarde, though this only lets Dracozolt outrun Pheromosa at most.
[STRATEGY COMMENTS]
Other Options
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Taunt stops attempts from bulky Trick Room setters, such as Porygon2 and Diancie, which can stomach a Bolt Beak while healthy. Sets with Hustle give Dracozolt some usability outside of sand, but they are generally mediocre because of the inconsistency from the accuracy drop and Bolt Beak's typing being easily exploitable. A Choice Band set with Hustle commits fully to Bolt Beak's power but is outrun by too many threats, and a Choice Scarf set only alleviates this weakness somewhat as its Speed is still mediocre, failing to outrun Dragapult and beaten by every other Choice Scarf user in the metagame, such as Urshifu-R and Genesect.
[CREDITS]
- Written by: [[Memoric, 215000]]
- Quality checked by: [[Yoda2798, 243661], [dnagerbdager, 531334]]
- Grammar checked by: [[UT, 523866]]
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