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If you've just unlocked Dooley, this is one of the best builds to learn and try. power-drill is Dooley’s signature item. With enough triggers to charge it, it can rapid-fire at insane speeds and win matches against most non-instant kill builds.
Because you can reliably find it in shops at Bronze, you can have a functional power-drill build early on and cruise through the midgame. Typically, you can buy it early but keep it in your stash until you have enough Charge triggers for it.
When to Go for a Power Drill Build
New Dooley players are recommended to start learning the character by going for a power-drill build. It's easy to find in shops, and it can pop off with only a handful of support items. Still, it requires good choices and planning to get a Gold victory so it's always a challenge building it.
power-drill works best with an Ignition Core since both items can Charge each other. Companion Core can work to a lesser extent, though you’ll need to focus on having enough Friends to Charge it. The Core is trickier to balance, since you'll want fast items to the left of it and Power Drill triggers to the right.
If you chose a different Core, you can still go for a power-drill build once you have the necessary Charge sources.
Whichever Core you picked, you can drop it entirely once you feel your Power Drill is triggering fast enough (try testing in PvE encounters).
Best Power Drill Combos
power-drill wants as many low cooldown sources of Haste, Slow, Burn, Freeze or Poison as you can get. Which effect the item provides matters less than the number of triggers it gives and how quickly it goes off. The top Dooley items at this job are:
metronome, fiber-optics
Placing a metronome between the drill and a fast item, such as an uzi or Fang, is by far the best way to loop Haste triggers for a rapid-firing Power Drill. It’s often worth it to look into shops that can sell the Metronome even on later days. Enchanting it with an effect that can trigger the drill, such as Fiery or Toxic, makes it even better and is recommended over enchanting the Drill itself most of the time.
fiber-optics can enable some truly insane looping but only if the rest of the build can support it. You can either use it with an already fast-Charging Power Drill to Charge a strong item that doesn’t have a Charging ability (say, an isochoric-freezer or Gold coolant), or speed up a struggling Power Drill build with a fast item.
plasma-grenade, nitro, thrusters
Burning yourself and your opponent provides two Charge triggers for the Power Drill, making these small items highly valuable. If you’re using an ignition-core, it’s often better to place these to the left of the Core to get more Burn triggers for the Drill instead of scaling their Burn numbers.
Despite its long cooldown, plasma-grenade is well worth using since it Slows the opponent’s entire board, proccing multiple triggers. Try to increase its Slow duration and Ammo count with neutral items from the Curio shop.
soldering-gun, rocket-launcher
Three Charge triggers for the Power Drill make these worth trying to fit in your build. soldering-gun can be a bit awkward if you don’t have chris-army-knife or hammlet (the only two items that have both Friend and Tool tags), since we prefer the Power Drill adjacent to a Metronome.
While you typically drop it in the mid to late game due to its slow speed, rocket-launcher is extremely good in the early game, especially with the Ignition Core, The Core or Weaponized Core.
solar-farm, pylon
These large items are situationally good if you have enough Burn or Slow sources for them, respectively. solar-farm works well with an ignition-core and a few of the multi-burning items above. It’s tougher to make pylon work, as there are fewer Slow items in Dooley’s repertoire. However, a low-CD item (or Metronome) with a Heavy enchant can make this worth using.
Expansion Items
The new bugs seem to be the strongest enablers for Power Drill currently. They can chain off each other and Charge the drill very fast. blu-b33tl3 in particular is oppressive once upgraded to Gold or Diamond, as it can lock down the opponent's board with Fiber Optics or when placed adjacent to a Toxic enchanted item (like the Drill or Metronome) in addition to grn-w4sp.
Best Skills for Power Drill
In similar fashion, the best skills for Power Drill are those that can speed it up or Charge it, preferably multiple times or at the start of a battle. We list the top skills for Power Drill below, omitting uncommon skills such as those from PvE encounters.
hot-spot, grease-fire
These skills allow the Power Drill to Charge itself, making them one of the best ways to speed up a drill build at all stages of a run and without any other support.
sabotage, tools-of-the-trade
These work just like the above skills, though the limited number of triggers put them a step below.
anything-to-win, toxic-flame
These skills multiply the number of drill triggers an item provides. With anything-to-win, any non-weapon item Charges the drill an additional two times. toxic-flame works to a lesser degree, requiring the item to already be a Burn or Poison item.
knife-tricks, tiny-dancer
Lowering the cooldown of Power Drill is another way to speed up the entire build. knife-tricks enable really insane drill builds that spam hits multiple times per second.
Power Drill Example Builds
Below are sample Power Drill builds showing what they might look like with common and Dooley items and skills. With experience you'll be able to effectively gauge whether any particular item would work in your current or target build.
Early Game Power Drill with Ignition Core
Midgame Power Drill with Ignition Core
No Core Example
Power Drill with Solar Farm
Power Drill with The Core
Power Drill with Pyrocarbon
Power Drill with Pylon
Power Drill with Friends (Expansion only)
Power Drill with Off-Class Items and Skills
There are numerous non-Dooley items and skills that work well in Power Drill builds. While you'll only rarely get access to them, such as via monster drops or the Pearl's Dig Site encounter, try to keep an eye out for them and see if you can fit them in.
