Sandslash
Type: Ground
Stats: 75 HP / 100 Atk / 110 Def / 45 SpA / 55 SpD / 65 Spe
Abilities: Sand Veil / Sand Rush
Relevant Moves:
Earthquake
Gunk Shot
High Horsepower
Knock Off
Leech Life
Poison Jab
Rapid Spin
Rock Slide
Rock Tomb
Smack Down
Spikes
Stealth Rock
Stone Edge
Super Fang
Swords Dance
Pros:
- Sandslash is one of the few Pokemon currently available with Sand Rush, and has no competition from Excadrill as the Sand Rush user with STAB Earthquake.
- A good offensive movepool including Swords Dance, strong Rock moves, Knock Off, and various other options lets Sandslash make decent use of its Ability.
- Sandslash's pure Ground typing and good physical bulk let it find many setup opportunities, and make it somewhat hard to take down for many Pokemon that are effective at taking its boosted attacks.
- Sandslash can also partake in the hazard metagame, with any of Rapid Spin, Spikes, or Stealth Rock being options. Rapid Spin's Speed boost makes it a decent option even on offensive Sand Rush sets.
- While not bad, Sandslash's base 100 Attack is not exactly impressive either and will fail to KO many bulky opponents even after a boost. As a result, it will usually necessitate prior damage to get going.
- Many of OU's best Ground-immune Pokemon, such as Corviknight, Landorus-Therian, Gliscor, Rotom-Wash, and Weezing-Galar, take pitiful neutral damage from Sandslash's non-STAB Rock moves. While several of these Pokemon don't exactly threaten Sandslash either, they can hinder it strongly and stall out Sand turns.
- Sandslash requires Sand to be active in order to be a threat, which is very inconsistent in the current weather-heavy OU metagame and generally quite a high price to pay for such an average sweeper. It also has awful synergy with Hippowdon, limiting its teams to Tyranitar Sand.
- Sandslash faces competition from Houndstone, which is unable to boost but boasts a more spammable STAB and synergizes more effectively with Hippowdon.
- Sandslash's middling Speed stat means it will fail to outspeed any fast Choice Scarf or Booster Energy user in Sand.
- Grass is probably Sandslash's best Tera type. Tera Blast Grass can be used to dispatch of Rotom-Wash, the most threatening answer to it, and the typing makes Sandslash more resilient to the likes of Lando-T, Gliscor, Great Tusk, and Ogerpon other than Hearthflame, which Sandslash threatens regardless.
- Ground can be used to enhance the power of Sandslash's STAB, helping offset its middling Attack.
- Rock or Dark can also be used to boost Sandslash's best coverage moves, with the former also granting a Sandstorm Sp.Def boost.
- Ice can be used for the notoriously good Ground/Ice attacking combination, but has obvious defensive drawbacks.
- Water works nicely for defensive Sandslash, but there is very little merit to such a set.
Sets!
Sand Rush
Sandslash @ Life Orb
Ability: Sand Rush
Tera Type: Grass / Ground / Rock / Dark / Ice
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant / Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Stone Edge / Knock Off / Rock Slide
- Tera Blast / Knock Off
- Swords Dance
Most of this set is already explained above. If not running Tera Grass or Ice, obviously don't run Tera Blast. A Jolly nature enables Sandslash to outspeed anything up to and including +1 Garchomp, while Adamant caps out at outspeeding Scarf Lando-T.
A Less Great Tusk
Sandslash @ Leftovers / Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Sand Veil
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpD
Impish Nature
- Earthquake
- Knock Off / Smack Down
- Rapid Spin
- Spikes / Stealth Rock
Use Great Tusk.
Overall Thoughts?
You could do a lot worse than Sandslash, and it has its niche, but I don't think the team structure it requires can really hold up in OU at the moment. The lack of Gigalith in the lower tiers probably won't do it any good either. Maybe it's good enough to justify Hippopotas somewhere, but I'm extremely skeptical.
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