Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl (BDSP) are very faithful to the original Sinnoh games, Pokémon Diamond and Pearl. These remakes may be faithful to an annoying extent, when you consider the infamously hard-to-find Feebas, and Munchlax too, that Barry somehow managed to luck out and catch himself (the rival with no patience to boot).

There’s a couple tricks that make finding these two Pokémon easier. And we don’t just mean trading, which isn’t so easy either if you don’t happen to have a Nintendo Switch Online subscription!

Finding Feebas

In Sinnoh, Feebas can only be found by fishing in one lake within Mount Coronet, which you pass by on your way to Snowpoint City. However, it cannot be just simply found anywhere in the lake. Out of the 528 tiles making up the lake, it can only appear in up to four of them. And it’s not a 100% chance it will appear when you fish in the correct tile as well – if you’re unlucky you may skip over it! This continues from Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire where it could only appear on six tiles making up a massive river.

Also, in BDSP, these tiles change every day.

However, there is a way to determine which tiles contain Feebas! This useful website hosted by Lincoln-LM on Github allows you to enter in lottery numbers from the daily competition hosted in Jubilife City’s television station, which is what the game uses to determine the tiles. Currently you need two days worth of data as of version 1.13 to determine these tiles.

Remember to use at least a Good Rod, and fish a few times on the tile. If you use a lead Pokémon with the Ability of Illuminate, Arena Trap or No Guard, you can also ensure each time you use a fishing rod that you will encounter a Pokémon.

Finding Munchlax

In the original Sinnoh titles, Munchlax was only available via Honey Trees, which only produce an encounter 6+ hours after slathering Honey on their bark. The catch here is that only four ‘Rare’ Honey Trees will actually have Munchlax, and that’s at a 1% encounter rate. And these trees differ for each Trainer! That’s a lot of Honey usage and waiting to do.

Luckily, even though this same system is in place in BDSP, the trees can be figured out. It’s linked to your in-game Trainer ID, and this tool, also by Lincoln-LM, will tell you where the Rare Honey Trees can be found. (Another resource is on the Cave of Dragonflies website, at least for the original Sinnoh games.) You also cannot, by the way, soft reset and save just before the encounter to change what Pokémon you get. Sorry!

There are two other ways to get Munchlax, but one of these involves trading a Snorlax over and breeding it while it holds a Full Incense. At which point, you might as well trade a Munchlax! Happily, BDSP does provide a way to encounter Munchlax in the wild – in the Grand Underground! In a few biomes (Sand, Grass, Snow, Grass/Water, Still-Water Cavern and Sunlit Cavern) it can be found as a rare encounter, provided you’ve obtained Defog. You can exit and re-enter the above rooms to reroll what Pokémon appear, and increase the chance of Normal-type Pokémon appearing by placing Normal-type Pokémon statues in your Secret Base. Just be careful – there’s a chance Munchlax could know Self-Destruct.

Other tips

There are a few other Pokémon that are tricky to find or evolve. Gible, for instance, is only found in the secret entrance for Turnback Cave, which can be found below the Cycling Road Bridge toward the north-east part of the Route below it, not the entrance on the right-hand side. You’ll need Strength to access the lower level which contains Gible. Alternatively, you can find it and its mid-stage evolution in the Grand Underground.

Heracross is another Rare Honey Tree-only Pokémon. It has a 5% encounter rate, which is better than 1% – but on the flip side, you cannot find it in the Grand Underground. (And Barry found it and Munchlax!)

There are other Honey Tree-only Pokémon, but they are easier to find (for one, they can be found on most or all trees). Combee is one of these, and notably only female Combee can evolve into Vespiquen. Combee has a mere 1 in 8 chance to be female! Luckily, you can soft reset for gender for any Honey Tree Pokémon.

Then there’s Drifloon – it can be only found outside of the Valley Windworks on Fridays during daylight hours, and not the same day you rid the place of Team Galactic. Check out our other article for more details there.

PSA: Being smart with your addition in BDSP can delay postgame progress

Do you have any other tips for finding rare Pokémon in BDSP?

Edited by Arcaneum and Sheep.