The Wilds is a vast outdoor area to explore in Pokémon Sword & Shield, and you’ll find a bunch of new mechanics within. There are Max Raids you can play online with friends, a new currency called Watts to collect, and loads of unique Pokémon to find in different weather conditions.
Once you travel deep enough into the zone, you’ll be able to find two humble NPCs that offer a very special service. For 500 watts, they’ll dig into a mine and give you a bunch of items. These are the Digger Brothers, and for a fee, they’ll become the closest thing to a slot-machine in Pokémon Sword & Shield. There’s a few wrinkles to these characters that the game doesn’t explain. Let’s talk about these characters, and why it’s actually pretty important to find them.
More Pokémon Sword & Shield guides:
How To Evolve All The New Galar Region Pokémon | Evolution Guide | What’s Exclusive To Each Version? | How To Catch Shiny Pokémon | Pick This Starter Pokémon For An Early Advantage | How To Easily Evolve Farfetch’d Into Sirfetch’d | Brilliant Aura System | How To Catch Improved Pokemon
How To Get Rare Items With The Digger Brothers | Wilds Mechanics Guide
The Digger Brothers are NPCs located in The Wilds, to the right of the Pokémon Nursery in the Motostoke Riverbank area. When you find them, they’ll be two outdoors NPCs in green standing next to each other.
For 500 watts, the brothers will dig up treasures for you. The treasures are random, but there’s a crucial difference between the two brothers.
- The left brother has low stamina, but is more likely to find rare items.
- The right brother has more stamina, but will find more common items.
Basically, the right brother finds more items, while the left brother finds rarer items. It doesn’t always work out that way — if you’re unlucky, you might not get anything rare from the left brother, and if you’re really lucky, the right brother might find something great.
The Digger Brothers can find items you won’t find anywhere else — including Evolution Stones and Pokémon Fossils. You can also find rare treasures like Star Pieces you can sell for cash.
How To Earn Watts: Checking Pokémon dens in the Wilds is a good way to earn easy Watts. There are two levels of dens — empty and Max Raid. Empty dens don’t have a beam of light, while Max Raid dens feature beams of light you can see from a far distance.
- Empty Den: 50 w
- Max Raid Den: 300 w
Dens refill periodically as time passes, so you can easily grab 1,000+ from checking on dens. You don’t have to actually fight the Max Raid. You can cancel out after collecting the Watts.
List Of Digger Bro. Items:
When it comes to the Digger Bros, they share most of their item pool. Because they share so many of the same items, you should always use the right brother. Only use the left brother if you’re looking for rare items that the right brother does not have.
Right Brother (More Items):
- Hold Items
- Damp Rock
- Float Stone
- Heat Rock
- Icy Rock
- Metal Coat
- Smooth Rock
- Evolution Items
- Fire Stone
- Leaf Stone
- Metal Coat
- Sun Stone
- Thunder Stone
- Water Stone
- Fossil Pokemon
- Fossilized Bird
- Fossilized Dino
- Fossilized Drake
- Fossilized Fish
- Treasure – Sell
- Rare Bone
- Star Piece
- Stardust
Left Brother (Rare Items):
- Hold Items
- Iron Ball
- Normal Gem
- Sticky Barb
- Evolution Items
- Dawn Stone
- Dusk Stone
- Ice Stone
- Leaf Stone
- Moon Stone
- Shiny Stone
- Treasure – Sell
- Bottle Cap
- Comet Shard (Trade in Icirrus City)
- Wishing Piece (Drop into Dens to Summon Max Raid Battles)
