@Noqanky:
I think it's what made gen. V so likable for me, even though some of them seemed like logical evolutions to past pokemon. Like I thought Alomomola was an evolution of Luvdisc, and Sigilyph the evolution of Unown.
Excadrill was the fix Sandslash has always needed. If you go back and look at early threads from years ago where I had giant lists of suggestions on how to fix old things on Sandshrew, it every single thing I ever wanted for Sandslash it has.
Better stats- (particularly attack and hp) Check.
Better defensive subtyping- (steel, which was actually the ideal) Check
Better ability-Raise speed OR attack in a sandstorm. Both of them are better than Sandshrew's evasion. Check.
Naturally learn some actual ground moves like dig and earthquake: Check. It was less of a deal after TMS became infinite, and with BW2 they finally tweaked Sandslash's move pool, but until then he didn't have a single natural ground move aside from the terrible sand tomb.
Of course, since Excadrill got all those fixes, sandshrew never will, and is just always going to be the inferior to that thing. Finally giving it earthquake after 15 games is nice, but… a little late.
As a sad sad result, even though I should love Excadrill as the Sandslash I always wanted, I just... can't like it.
@Crossword:
I just took a grand tour of all of the Hidden Grottoes, and only got a couple Poke Balls and a Potion to show for it.
I feel like Charlie Brown in the Halloween special.
You did know to check the grass even when its empty for hidden stuff right? (Your dowsing machine will show them.) Since as long as something is there, nothing new will spawn.
What are you hunting for? Yes they all have their dream world abilities, but on a lot of things their dream world abilities aren't that great. Ditto obviously has the best one, it's worth grinding for, Moody Bidoof is ban worthy, and I've gotten a lot of fun out of the prankster Liepard I accidentally found, but, most of the abilities are kind of meh, some are worse than their natural abilities.
Just go to a grotto that has a thing you want, and bike back and forth endlessly for a couple screen widths for a while and check it ocassionally. Its kind of boring, but it'll make the stuff in it pop eventually, and it'll respawn the other locations while you're at it.