Other OU Player of the Week #16: Stathakis

[Clone]

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Welcome to OU's Player of the week, a project
where I interview well known players to gain insight on how they battle, as well as get to know some things about them. The goal of this thread is to have these high level players give insight to other players in this community in hopes of creating a better overall experience in the OU environment. As always, if there's someone you'd like to see interviewed, feel free to shoot me a PM. So without further ado, lets get to it!

Stathakis

​

Most Known For:
“inventing” heavy offense, tutoring user: reyscarface, losing a bunch of times in OST to eventual champions, and being a dick to new raters in the RMT forums

Favorite Pokemon:
Heracross

Most used Pokemon:
in XY mega mawile and then eventually clefable, in ORAS hard to say because it’s too soon but probably mega metagross


Where did you get your name from?
It’s an homage to my younger brother who has been dead for 11 years now. His name was Stathis but you say it as Stathakis as a term of endearment. I miss that kid.


How and when did you get into competitive battling?
I got into it around early or mid 2007. I started out by looking at ev training guides on gamefaqs and supercheats.com because I wanted to learn how to EV train the deoxys-A that I had hacked into my ruby version, so as to have the unstoppable pokemon. Eventually I found marriland’s guides from one link or another, and through them his youtube videos. In one of his vids he said “you guys think I’m some kind of great player but really I’m not. if you want to find the best players go to smogon or something” so I found smogon somewhere around summer 2007, lurked for a while, then eventually made an account over Christmas break.

Back when I had an account on the supercheats forums, my favorite activity by far was helping people fix their teams and make them stronger, so naturally I gravitated to the RMT forums which then ended up being my home for several years.

How do you feel about how ORAS plays compared to XY?
roughly the same tbh. There are some new threats but it’s still balance everywhere. it’s just the most consistent play style, especially if you think your opponent is weaker than you as balance gives you the most “room to outplay.” I don’t like that balance has been weakened to the point where something is always capable of sweeping you, but it seems like the top players have kept their tendencies roughly the same despite it.

Is there anything that stands out as being suspect worthy to you?
honestly just mega metagross, that thing is absurd. not sure if it’s broken but it’s just so restrictive on team building. have fun trying to counter grass knot mega meta. really, have fun.


What’s your favorite playstyle and why?
Though balance is clearly the indisputable best play style in XY/ORAS as evidenced by its recent success, I actually have the most fun playing heavy offense. Having 0 switch-ins to anything really makes you think about how you’ll leverage your threats, how you’ll deal with your opponent’s threats, and all that. Sadly I don’t think it’s really viable anymore especially with team preview making your team strategy extremely obvious to your opponent on turn 0.

What's your favorite generation of OU and why?
By far DPP. I like DPP because it’s a lot easier to have success using HO there and there’s a lot of freedom with how to do it, due to lack of team preview making it easier to surprise your opponent with “gimmicky” pokemon and move choices. I also like the extra layer of thinking that comes with not knowing your opponent’s whole team and trying to figure out what their lasts are based on what a good team with their 3-4 pokemon would need. Actually, understanding your opponent’s team building and predicting their lasts is my single favorite part of pokemon, but that may be just due to the fact that I like team building and theorizing so much.

If you could change one thing about OU, what would it be and why?
Hard to really answer this question beyond “ban pokemon X” which was covered in earlier questions, but I think I would have a lot of fun with some of the most powerful sweeping pokemon banned + elimination of team preview. I know that sounds absurd but I think it’d be cool to play with all these new toys in that kind of environment. especially zoroark. that shit sounds hilarious.

Do you have any advice for newer players, and for Smogon in general?
The biggest advice I can give is to keep your mouth shut for a while, and if you must say something then it better be something nice. There will be plenty of time for you to talk and be an asshole when you’re well-known and “respected” but until people are taking you seriously, you have to be the epitome of a good user. If you’re new, chances are you don’t understand the culture well enough to draw the line between funny, annoying, cancerous, etc. so you’re much better off being silent. As you stay in the community awhile, win some games, and understand how it works, then you’re much safer to say the shit you’ve been thinking. It’s an unfair community we live in, where being “respected” is more or less free reign to act like a dipshit and you have to be way better than normal in terms of personality as an up-and-comer, but it’s probably not changing so you may as well succeed in it. Who knows, maybe you’ll end up like the next Krack, a player who was revered for his amazing skills but also well-known for only saying: “in,” “won gg,” and “lost gg.”

Beyond that, I think just take whatever abuse people throw at you knowing that 99% of the time the people don’t mean it unless you’re already a cancer. If you’re a nice guy, then the people who matter in the community will look with disdain at whoever is shitting on you. As soon as you show a sign of anger, you’ve lost. Just don’t get angry. This community is not out to get you, even if you think it is. Just be calm no matter how hard it may seem.

Gonna list a case study for you nerds. Look at user: praj.pran. My man goes from absolutely hated, and the butt of all jokes in june 2014 to getting bought by a top 3 team and nearly beating mcmeghan in jan 2015. That's not an accident Gs. Go check out my man's confirmation of his loss in ost 11. What does he say: "lost in 3 games, GGs and GL in the future" IDK if you bitches saw but he got the shit haxed out of him but that's all he said. THAT my friends is how you make friends. Be a motherfucking good sport and a jolly fellow, and nice to your fellow players, while also being good at the game. I should also shout out another case study: Finchinator. My man did the same shit. Got haxed, acted chill about it, and now he's 3-0 in SPL but before that nobody knew who the fuck he was. All you gotta do is be a nice guy while playing some good pokemon. It's literally that easy. Take it from ya bois finch and praj.pran, that's how you make friends in this game. (Note I'm fucked ass up rn but these examples should roughly coincide with the general shit that i said in the paragraphs before).

What players do you look up to / are good friends with?
I’ve got a lot of strange circles of friends, but I guess I’ll shout some of them.

friends

I’ll begin with the old players that I stalked relentlessly and looked up to as role models for my pokemon-playing skills: mystica, imperfectluck, and iggybot. I learned some unique things from each of them, even though I’m pretty sure each of them thought I was an annoying kid. Next, the people I laddered and grew up with: August, Reyscarface, Kevin Garrett, Limitless, and many other I’m sure I’m forgetting. Next, #lifting: Delta 2777, Lee, Uragg, Stallion, Stylish Interval, Windsong, Natgeo. Finally, team Uber and friends/fans: Faint, Stone_Cold, Iconic, Blue_Blur, and others I’m definitely forgetting.

Among my friends from today, the groups become far too big to shout out individual names. There’s IDM, VoD, TIC, my teammates from the Spartak Stunfisks, my fellow Scooters, the people I was a frontier brain with (mutual suffering, man….). I shouted out the people above because I for one reason or another don’t speak as much with them anymore as I used to, but I still love all of them. Know that if I talk to you on a semi-regular basis today, I love you. That should cover everyone.

good OU players

Naturally there are all the good picks you’d expect me to say: Bloo, Hugo, MCM, Bro Fist, CBB, Masterclass, BKC, Soulwind, all those absurdly good old gens players that pop up to be inactive shells of their former selves for SPL, as well as the new crop of players like Tesung, PDC, Chimpact, CTC, etc. etc. etc. Those guys don’t need any introduction. I’ll talk about a few dudes who I think might not be getting recognized as much that have really impressed me.

Mencemeat: though there was no doubt in the IDM and youtube community that this guy was good, his play in SPL has been particularly impressive. Though he’s had reasonably tough-to-lose match ups, he is able to grind out games in a safe way, risking as little going awry as possible. Other than some bad plays in game 2 of his OST series with Laurel, I’ve never seen this guy make many gross misplays.

The DragonKnight: I guess he’s more known as a builder but The DragonKnight is good at preparing for his opponents, getting good match ups, and grinding them out into victories much like Mencemeat. I know I’m not alone in thinking this as he impressed wolf pack as well with some good wins over their top players. He’s doing great in SPL too.

Liberty32: Dude’s a monster. He breaks free with the aggressive plays in a CBB-esque way. He just knows what “top” players are thinking it seems, and just punishes that. love watching the man play, hate playing against him. Dude’s lifetime record in SPL OU games is 4-1 and i expect more big things in the coming weeks.

Finally, can you provide us a team that’s a good fit for this metagame and reflects your playstyle, with a brief explanation of how it works?
I don’t have any ORAS teams that I like but here is a DPP team that I have used over the ages that pretty much embodies the type of offense that I like, stacked with threatening win conditions. In its heyday, this team was a monster and was responsible for my first deep OST run, taking out a random in round 1, then Reyscarface, Ace Matador, and Eternal before finally losing to a somewhat lucky Hanke in the round of 32. I’ve brought the team into XY and ORAS games with no changes and taken wins off a few people who were bought for ORAS in SPL but they will be left unnamed here, to save them the embarrassment.

WOOF

Azelf @ Focus Sash
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Psychic
- Fire Blast
- Explosion

Metagross @ Occa Berry
Ability: Clear Body
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Adamant Nature
- Meteor Mash
- Pursuit
- Explosion
- Bullet Punch

Gengar @ Life Orb
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Shadow Ball
- Hypnosis
- Focus Blast
- Explosion

DOG (Suicune) @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Hydro Pump
- Calm Mind
- Hidden Power [Electric]
- Ice Beam

DOG (Raikou) @ Life Orb
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
- Thunderbolt
- Signal Beam
- Hidden Power [Grass]
- Calm Mind

DOG (Entei) @ Leftovers
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 140 HP / 28 Def / 252 SpA / 88 Spe
Timid Nature
- Substitute
- Calm Mind
- Will-O-Wisp / HP Ground
- Fire Blast

If you want to switch it up, you can switch entei to rest talk CM lava plume, or if you want to get really crazy put grass knot on both azelf and metagross, solar beam power herb on entei, and make raikou rest talk cm thunderbolt.

---

There it is. If you have any questions for stath, leave them down below (be sensitive about his brother please). Id like to thank him for doing this, and I'll see yall next week!

 

[ium]

dog.

 

[-Tsunami-]

Top 10 tagpro players, not including yourself. go.

 

[Tesung]

How do you think RMT forums/ helping people in general should be revived?

Do you agree with people who say that top players from before are better top players now?

Do you think ladder will ever be good again?

Do you think Lando I could be suspected potentially?

Are you ever gonna build your own spl team?

How many vaginas would you trade for a trophy?

Was the textbook good?

Who are people who aren't in spl or maybe just got in (cough prajpran) who you thnk have a big future?

 

[Aurious]

Who's ur favorite to win OST / OLT?

 

[Stathakis]

dog.

dog.

Top 10 tagpro players, not including yourself. go.

1 TDK
2 Tesung
3 Shakeitup
4 Omfuga
5 Calloflochie
6 FLCL
7 Wepwn
8 blunder
9 reese wood
10 who else even plays? i been outta the scene due to lag on my school's net. gonna have to wait till i get home

How do you think RMT forums/ helping people in general should be revived?

it needs to start being cool again for top players to help out on the forums and post RMTs. Every top player used to contribute a lot and have tons of badges, but somewhere along the way it became uncool to contribute and therein lies the entire problem. A couple of really top dudes that everyone looks up to need to start doing more forum shit, and then everyone else will follow suit I think.

Do you agree with people who say that top players from before are better top players now?

I think the overall level of play has gone up a lot as time has progressed. the top players at their peaks were probably about equally as good as the top players today, but the non-top players of today are WAY better than the non-top players of yesteryear. hence the top players today don't dominate as hard as the top players of yesteryear, and I think people mistakenly attribute that lack of domination to the top players of today being worse, but I think they are equally good if not better than their predecessors. I'd take a peak bloo over peak earthworm, etc.

Do you think ladder will ever be good again?

probably not

Do you think Lando I could be suspected potentially?

probably not. it beats balance aka the playstyle everybody loves to use, but there are plenty of tools in the metagame to stop it. it's a huge beast right now because everyone is unwilling to adapt, but I doubt it'll stay that way

Are you ever gonna build your own spl team?

I've built a few over the past few weeks, just didn't really like any of them at the time I needed to fight. but after some edits I think they are starting to come together so i'll start using them.

How many vaginas would you trade for a trophy?

if we're talking SPL or WCOP since there are trophies for other people on the line I'd happily not get laid all semester in exchange for us winning just for the happiness it will bring my teammates. if it's an individual tour those are permanent so probably at least 4-5 lays maybe more, depends on how good looking the girls are I guess.

Was the textbook good?

it was giancoli physics so I guess that's why I love physics

Who are people who aren't in spl or maybe just got in (cough prajpran) who you thnk have a big future?

once they turn 15 or so, praj.pran and PDC will be the bloo and mcmeghan of the next generation

Who's ur favorite to win OST / OLT?

I'm my own favorite to win OST, and chimpact is winning OLT

 

[Clone]

favorite underdog in ost (ie someone not big in the tour scene)?

explain the dog meme in detail

how did you 'invent' HO?

why do you feel HO isnt viable in this meta? if it is somewhat, what are your favorite cores to use on such teams?

did you know that alomomomomomola counters GK megagross? or even float stone slowbro, as innovated by user -gizmo- ?

thoughts on mega sab?

 

[D4RR3N]

What kind of thoughts do you go through in a teambuilding process?
What kind of mindset do you think a great player should have going into a match?

 

[firehusky]

do you like cats? what about rabbits?

 

[jacob]

how far will i make it in ost?

who do you think the best player in the game is right now?

 

[daftmau5]

Do you have any tips for newer players looking to learn older gens (in particular DPP OU) and compete in ST19? I'm finding it quite hard getting experience apart from battling friends due to the ladder being inactive.

Thanks in advance!

 

[BlackBloodz]

Thoughts on how Smogon Tour isn't quite Asian/Australian time friendly? And do you think there should be at least one tour for such timezones?

 

[trc]

what's your teambuilding process?

 

[Kevin Garrett]

I never knew about your account's namesake. That's very honorable.

As someone who has made multiple deep runs for an individual title in the past, are you the type of person to try to take away lessons from those failed bids or do you choose only to look forward for your success?

 

[Lord Ninjax]

Which team is your favorite to win SPL? (aside from Scooters)
Top 5 Mons in the meta and your opinions on why?
Who are your favorite DPP players? (from years ago or current)
Is SD Gliscor really that threatening?
What is Tagpro?
Give me an honest assessment of my chances of shaking my current reputation (just wanna know, I've been trying)
What exactly is the dog meme?

Aside from that, just wanna say thanks for believing in me for the ghosting tour (shame it ended so badly), and putting up with me for this long. :)

 

[BKC]

did you ever try offensive cune over manaphy on the greek team? what about changing specs jolt to charge beam seeing as it doesnt break the sacred no-choice rule?

thoughts on scald?

would you support a stealth rock / latias suspect in dpp? what about the former in oras?

favorite dpp rmt?

favorite new mechanics/mons/items xy introduced?

favorite album?

favorite battle music, if any?

build a 2-5 minute balls-out hyper offense team for rby/gsc/adv with no knowledge of the metagames whatsoever

favorite bw team?

tell me about the pre-platinum metagame, I've never played it

would you ever try to pick up a girl using slayer lyrics?

write some stereotypical black metal lyrics

the story behind your name was v touching

 

[TheEnder]

can you teach me how to use togekiss?

thoughts on mega metagross?

what team wins spl?

will you bring a parahax team if paired with Tesung in ost?

why are corgis so amazing *-*? (dog.)

if you win ost will you record yourself rapping bars from ctc's verse in the pokemon cypher and post it?

 

[Stathakis]

gonna answer some of these with a reasonably large amount of detail because I want to. not bothering to correct spelling and grammar either

favorite underdog in ost (ie someone not big in the tour scene)?

Reverb

explain the dog meme in detail

there's nothing to explain. we just really like dogs and the amazing ium has cute corgi albums on deck

how did you 'invent' HO?

http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/heavy-offense.61631/

Disclaimer: I was only 14 and looking back I'm really embarrassed, cut me some slack

why do you feel HO isnt viable in this meta? if it is somewhat, what are your favorite cores to use on such teams?

it's viable but it leaves games won and lost at turn 0 imo so if you've brought the wrong flavor of CT then you're more or less sunk and there's nothing you can do. that's hardly an ideal situation for anybody trying to win consistently. I have experimented in the past with dugtrio volcarona diancie and that works okay

did you know that alomomomomomola counters GK megagross? or even float stone slowbro, as innovated by user -gizmo- ?

gastrodon and shedinja both counter kyogre

thoughts on mega sab?

decent mon, but incredibly overrated. You're slower than the entire metagame, including ferrothorn, and that makes it kind of tough to get off a recover in a lot of places where you really want to. Combine that problem with lack of leftovers recovery and the extreme resurgence of hazard layers including toxic spikes, the propensity of the 2 big toxic spikes users to carry moves sableye doesn't want to switch into (dragalge draco meteor and tentacruel scald), and you've got a mega with a much shorter lifespan than you want

What kind of thoughts do you go through in a teambuilding process?

disclaimer: this is way lazier teambuilding than I should do. 14-y/o DPP-playing me would be embarrassed at the nochalance with which I teambuild these days

Generally I start with an idea. If that idea is "bunch of shit that doesn't give ferro free turns so I don't have to defog" then I'll pick pokemon within those restrictions. If it's more of a "toxic spikes + heatran because of reasons xyz" or something like that where 2-3 spots are mandatory and the rest are free, I'll shotgun like 10 different versions of the idea, all going in slightly different directions, and then theorycraft and test on the ones that I like the best. to go from a core of 2-3 pokemon to a full team of 6, I'll generally include some small amount of thinking before choosing the members, beyond that I would say the process is honestly pretty close to random, which is definitely really lazy on my part. I make sure not to have glaring type weaknesses, then I make sure not to be glaringly weak to any of the really common powerful pokemon (landorus-i, ferrothorn, gengar, zard-y, etc...), and finally I make sure not to be glaringly weak to anything uncommon that my opponent has used in the past. Generally if in 15 minutes I come up with 10 teams, 3-4 of them will be close to fitting those criteria, and so I focus on those and tweak/test until I'm satisfied.

What kind of mindset do you think a great player should have going into a match?

if it's a match where you really care about the outcome (i.e. a tour match) you should, imo, start the game with your own gameplan i.e. ask yourself what needs to happen in order for it to become easiest for me to kill all 6 of his pokemon? this could be as simple as get x hazard up, kill/weaken x sweeper then this core of 3-4 mons walls the rest of his team, weaken x wall to y % hp so that sweeper z can sweep, leverage the fact that pokemon x can get a kill or at least force my opponent to predict every time or lose a mon and get pokemon x in as many times as possible to make that happen, etc. etc. etc.

I also think that if you're feeling really motivated you should probably do this reasonably from your opponent's perspective as well, as against good players that will probably help you best understand the types of plays they will make and perhaps disrupt them while advancing your own gameplan. Finally, at all times but especially in the midgame and onwards you should be looking to see if the game is simplified enough that you can outright win with a particular combination of moves no matter what your opponent's response.

stay tuned for youtube uploads of my SPL games with live narration, so you can see what I'm thinking in the moment!

do you like cats? what about rabbits?

cats are ok. rabbits are delicious

how far will i make it in ost?

if you're motivated enough to make a new team every week and make sure you're not weak to your opponent's favorite playstyles, make a reasonable game plan at the start of each fight, and not unlucky, there is no reason you shouldn't go far. OST is great because you can literally win the entire thing with 18 wins and 9 losses. There's no other tour where you can do it with that few wins and that many losses.

who do you think the best player in the game is right now?

it's hard to say because all of the "greats" of XY are managing in SPL right now. for old gens it's even harder to say because all those metagames are dead but BKC is really hot right now.

Do you have any tips for newer players looking to learn older gens (in particular DPP OU) and compete in ST19? I'm finding it quite hard getting experience apart from battling friends due to the ladder being inactive.

in addition to playing against your friends, during smogon tour stalk and watch like 20+ battles per tour, especially the ones between "good" players. get a feeling for what the metagame is like that way and once you have the feel for the meta general playing skills will get you most of the rest of the way there.

Thoughts on how Smogon Tour isn't quite Asian/Australian time friendly? And do you think there should be at least one tour for such timezones?

That's a tough one. The issue with your proposal is that it carries a very real risk of the "aussie friendly" tour being much less competitive than the other ones of the week, and thus being sort of a "free points" tour for those in the rest of the world willing to wake up in the middle of the night to play in it. I'd rather shaft one group of people that make up a smaller portion of the community than several groups of people that together make up a larger portion of the community. Also, tour is really inconvenient for everybody, not just aussies. My first smogon tour I ended up playing the semifinals and finals while simultaneously staving off drunk people who were coming my room to try and get me to party, because the tour had run well into Friday night.

what's your teambuilding process?

see my answer to Darren's question

I never knew about your account's namesake. That's very honorable.
As someone who has made multiple deep runs for an individual title in the past, are you the type of person to try to take away lessons from those failed bids or do you choose only to look forward for your success?

In the past I used to only look forward (looking back would usually just make me mad), but lately I have been trying to look back on every important game without getting mad/emotional and reflect on what I could've done better, even if I won the game. I'd like to think it's helping but I suppose we won't know until the conclusion of the 3-4 big tournaments that are coming up.

Which team is your favorite to win SPL? (aside from Scooters)

probably classiest. With shake's luck and a solid lineup anything is possible

Top 5 Mons in the meta and your opinions on why?

hard to say because no matter which mons I list, there will be other ones further down the list that beat them and hence are great to use in the meta, and that's a never-ending circle. I guess I'll list a few that are both good and get high usage:

1. mega metagross
2. hippowdown
3. landorus-i
4. ferrothorn
5. latios

no particular order. Metagross itself needs no introduction hippo is really good and people are rediscovering it in SPL, ferrothorn is obviously very important because of the ease and power of spikestacking, lando-i gets a kill every time it comes in vs certain teams, and latios represents the other side of that. scarftar's also really big and shapes the meta too.

Who are your favorite DPP players? (from years ago or current)

my #1 is Imperfectluck. such a cerebral player, rarely tried to make "flashy" plays but instead would just grind your team down until whichever key player was weakened enough such that he could sweep/wall/whatever

Beyond that, I really like heist and tv-rocka, they are all trying to innovate stuff and their creativity is always fun to watch. I like BKC when he's using shit that he doesn't normally use

Is SD Gliscor really that threatening?

people stopped packing ice moves on their sweepers in favor of other coverage/support. Guess they'll have to start packing ice moves again.

What is Tagpro?

Give me an honest assessment of my chances of shaking my current reputation (just wanna know, I've been trying)

there's no reason for you not to be able to. The smogon community is pretty forgiving as long as you don't complain about how unforgiving it is. Just be a model user, improve your game, be nice to others, and act as if you didn't have your current reputation, and soon enough everyone will forget about it.

What exactly is the dog meme?

dog.

Aside from that, just wanna say thanks for believing in me for the ghosting tour (shame it ended so badly), and putting up with me for this long. :)

no problem buddy. I hope to see you make big waves soon

did you ever try offensive cune over manaphy on the greek team? what about changing specs jolt to charge beam seeing as it doesnt break the sacred no-choice rule?

nah, the team was pretty bad in latias metagame so I never tried it outside of that suspect test

thoughts on scald?

I think a metagame without scald would be better than a metagame with scald, but it isn't inherently broken by any stretch so it's hard to make a case against it.

would you support a stealth rock / latias suspect in dpp? what about the former in oras?

yes to latias, no to SR in both gens. IDK though, I'd probably want to play ADV before giving my opinion on SR because I mentally can't fathom pokemon without it, but I feel like way too many broken things as well as sashspam would go unchecked without SR. ADV didn't have rocks, but it also didn't have focus sash, yanmega, volcarona, mega charizard, etc. etc.

favorite dpp rmt?

astral projection

favorite new mechanics/mons/items xy introduced?

I think this opinion is unpopular, but I thought the concept of a mega is really cool and adds something positive to competitive pokemon

favorite album?

don't really have a single favorite but i'm listening to daft punk's discovery right now and I listen to it pretty often so I'll go with that

favorite battle music, if any?

I don't listen to music while I fight

build a 2-5 minute balls-out hyper offense team for rby/gsc/adv with no knowledge of the metagames whatsoever

in ADV: magneton / agiligross / tyraniboah / DD fire blast mence / subsalac swarm SD heracross / CB aerodactyl

favorite bw team?

probably that sand team that hugo made that has kyurem-black and beats standard BKC stall ;)

tell me about the pre-platinum metagame, I've never played it

amazing. I truly think everything was viable. deoxys-s was kind of lame but when it got the boot everything was great. I didn't even think chomp was that bad but it did sort of murder balance so i support its removal. living in a world where salamence didn't get outrage and scizor didn't get bullet punch was simply sublime. I'm kind of hazy beyond that though. it was just so long ago...

would you ever try to pick up a girl using slayer lyrics?

give me some good ones and I'll give it a shot

write some stereotypical black metal lyrics
the story behind your name was v touching

rah rah rah death and destruction i hate everything and everyone rah rah rah bless satan rah rah

fucking slayer

edit: i realize black metal is probably not as angsty as i picture it to be but fuck it

can you teach me how to use togekiss?

leverage the threat of air slash rather than actually using the move itself and only go for flinches if you really need them or there's not a huge downside to going for it

thoughts on mega metagross?

restrictive on teambuilding but ultimately probably not broken. we'll have to wait and see i guess

what team wins spl?

scooters

will you bring a parahax team if paired with Tesung in ost?

I wouldn't use more thunder wave than I normally do, also he really likes lando-i so i don't think that would be super effective counterstyling since parahax teams are usually slow and get murdered by the genie

why are corgis so amazing *-*? (dog.)

dog.

if you win ost will you record yourself rapping bars from ctc's verse in the pokemon cypher and post it?

I wasn't planning on it but I guess I will now

 

[Aurious]

Do u think Megagross will get banned? If yes what 'mon do u think will rise up after its bann and what could be suspect worthy after Megagross is banned?

 

[brodean]

You being an avid veteran participator in Smogon tournaments which seem to require much time and commitment to be successful in, was there ever a time when your activity with Pokemon/Smogon interfered too much with everyday activities such as school, fitness, or irl relationships? How do you successfully balance your active Smogon lifestyle with your active collegiate lifestyle?

Looking back at Tele's OLT run, while he was derided for his snobbish attitude and poor sportsmanship, imo he brought levels of hype and excitement seldom seen in Smogon, bringing in viewers who would otherwise have little interest in Smogon tournaments. I feel part of the reason for the hype he brought was because he was a villain and all his battles felt like a hero vs villain story. Do you think "villains" such as Tele benefit Smogon due to the levels of hype and entertainment they tend to bring, or do you feel that such villain attitudes are toxic to the community?

Looking through the suspect threads, it seems that people have varying opinions on why a certain Pokemon should be banned, such as x Pokemon has 0 counters, or the metagame is stale because of x Pokemon. Being as specific as possible, could you explain your own criteria which you use to decide whether to vote for a ban or not?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Heatedline]

What pokemon do you find the most annoying in the current metagame?

Do you think all out HO can still be successful in ORAS despite team preview?

Thoughts on old school HO in bw2?

Potential retests?

How big is team match-up currently?

 

[TheEnder]

I wasn't planning on it but I guess I will now

good man

 

[Stallion]

Do you still dream of all of your #lifting boys standing on Mt. Olympus together?

How great would it be if Smogon had a OST style weight lifting tournament?

Do you remember me much as a Pokemon player?

 

[Stathakis]

Do u think Megagross will get banned? If yes what 'mon do u think will rise up after its bann and what could be suspect worthy after Megagross is banned?

I think (and sincerely hope) that mega metagross will be banned. When/if that happens, I think the next best pokemon will probably be mega diancie and possibly mega altaria, of which only diancie will be suspect-worthy. That's all conjecture though, and it's contingent on the removal of megagross who makes these pokemon severe liabilities in the current metagame.

You being an avid veteran participator in Smogon tournaments which seem to require much time and commitment to be successful in, was there ever a time when your activity with Pokemon/Smogon interfered too much with everyday activities such as school, fitness, or irl relationships? How do you successfully balance your active Smogon lifestyle with your active collegiate lifestyle?

I would say that before college, I had little enough to do that pokemon never really hurt me. I took a long hiatus that included the first half of college, and now that I am back I definitely feel like I have less free time than when I was playing, but I manage it decently well. Most tournaments require one to two games a week, each of which you can probably succeed in with 3-4 hours of preparation tops--not that much time per week for a serious hobby. As long as you focus your pokemon time well and make the most of it, you can succeed without sinking too much. Granted, I idle on the forums and IRC a lot, so I may lose 30 mins to an hour on any given day if something interesting is happening. I don't actually play the game all that much, but 3-4 fights a day doesn't take more than an hour. In total I'd say if you're spending less than 10 hours a week that's pretty easy to fit in.

Looking back at Tele's OLT run, while he was derided for his snobbish attitude and poor sportsmanship, imo he brought levels of hype and excitement seldom seen in Smogon, bringing in viewers who would otherwise have little interest in Smogon tournaments. I feel part of the reason for the hype he brought was because he was a villain and all his battles felt like a hero vs villain story. Do you think "villains" such as Tele benefit Smogon due to the levels of hype and entertainment they tend to bring, or do you feel that such villain attitudes are toxic to the community?

Tele as a person is interesting. I definitely didn't like his attitude, but I would be lying if I said his games weren't some of the most exciting tournament games I've seen, especially for the skill level at which he played (i.e. Bloo vs MCM might be more exciting, but Bloo vs. Tele was more exciting than Bloo vs. anybody else as good as Tele would have been). I definitely miss the hype that came with this villain persona, and it's something I wouldn't mind more of. That being said, I don't like shitpiles. It's kind of a bad for the individual, good for the group sort of thing.

Looking through the suspect threads, it seems that people have varying opinions on why a certain Pokemon should be banned, such as x Pokemon has 0 counters, or the metagame is stale because of x Pokemon. Being as specific as possible, could you explain your own criteria which you use to decide whether to vote for a ban or not?

If I think that two metagames exist, one without the pokemon and one with it, and one metagame is significantly better than the other, I will vote to keep the better metagame irrespective of a pokemon's broken status. This can be considered a backwards view on tiering, but I care only about the resultant metagame, not about whether a pokemon deserves to be banned. Generally that means I am more pro-ban than the average person who bans based on brokenness, but not always. For instance, I was a fan of the mawile/deoxys-s metagame even though both of those pokemon were obviously broken. On the other hand, mega metagross is probably not broken, but it makes the current ORAS OU metagame awful, in my opinion, in that you are either using it, dedicating a large portion of your team to beating it, or losing. I think McMeghan compared it to BW1 excadrill in its restrictiveness on teambuilding and that's an apt comparison, in my opinion. Excadrill probably wasn't broken, but the freedom that the metagame got when it was released from OU was clearly healthy as evidenced by the rise in diversity (or so I'm told) of teams post-ban.

What pokemon do you find the most annoying in the current metagame?

Mega metagross and landorus-I, because they're difficult to check without dedicating a lot of your team to beating them and can run strange/surprising coverage.

Do you think all out HO can still be successful in ORAS despite team preview?

I think it can be successful and is under-explored especially in the tournament scene. I'm trying to figure out a way to make a good ho team that I'd be comfortable bringing to a tournament. Little success so far, but I haven't given up.

Thoughts on old school HO in bw2?

I'm not the person you should ask about the bw2 metagame in general, but my impression from the games I played in smogon tour is that a lot of teams are roughly the same, with tons of sand balance. those should be pretty easy to take advantage of with a ho build, so I bet it works nicely.

Potential retests?

if I had my way we'd retest deoxys-s but that thing has been re-tested and re-banned so many times that it's not worth the time on the community

How big is team match-up currently?

pretty damn big. there are too many threats to prepare for and if you/your opponent brought the correct one, barring massive chokes or luck that person is probably winning very easily

Do you still dream of all of your #lifting boys standing on Mt. Olympus together?

I maintain that it will happen. Once those of us who are in school manage to get out, get some jobs and have a decent amount of cash on hand, I have no doubt in my mind that we will finally successfully organize a meet-up. Mt. Olympus is looking more and more like a pipe dream as the situation in Greece gets bleaker and bleaker, but I'm sure we can find a suitable substitute.

How great would it be if Smogon had a OST style weight lifting tournament?

My guess is Delta 2777 wins the OST lifting tournament and Lee wins the smogon tour lifting tournament, since Delta has the strength and lee has the endurance / I feel he is the most athletic out of any of us. It would be pretty damn great though.

Do you remember me much as a Pokemon player?

I respect your hustle!

 

[Caiahar]

Top 5 cancerous mons in OU (not including M-gross)