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AND WE'RE BACK! Welcome to OU's Player of the week, a thread 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!

reyscarface
Winning the Smogon Frontier, collecting salt from people with the Power Rankings, being one of the few mods in smogtours that mutes annoying kids
Favorite Pokémon:
Absol
Most used Pokémon:
In ADV its Suicune, in DPP its Rotom, in BW its Kyurem, and in XY its Excadrill
Where did you get your name from?
Used to hang around Serebii IRC chat trading for Event Pokemon so I used the name EVENT_HUNTER_REY. Then that changed to Scar I dont really remember why, then I changed to Rey because its my IRL nickname, then fused them into ReyScarface. Finally dropped the caps
How and when did you get into competitive battling?
Summer of 2008 I joined Serebii chat to fuck around. Got into the clan scene in purplesurge server where I met a people that are active on Smogon today like user Reverb. Other Smogon users from there (albeit after I had left the scene) are ppl like aim and Tsunami. I then joined Xats in which I met a lot more players with higher level. Finally found Smogon in late 2008.
What is your favorite playstyle and why?
Back when I started playing my favorite style was Hyper Offense. Just using a Dual Screen lead and 5 physical sweepers like Lucario, Mence, and company, as thats what my tutor Stathakis taught me. I then moved onto more balanced teams, finally setting in with what is known as "semistall" today. Stall and more offensive variants of it (like "semistall") are my favorite styles, though I dont use it a lot in XY because its easier to just fuck around with offense.
Aside from Greninja, is there anything in OU that you feel may be potentially banworthy?
I fucking hate the ability Regenerator. I guess its a necessary evil nowadays due to the much bigger power of certain threats, but I miss the days in which defensive teams didnt get a free pass due to Regenerator. Now youre left with "oh shit I switched in Slowbro into something I shouldnt have because my opponent read me well, whatever who cares ill just switch out and it doesnt matter", as opposed to before in which you had to carefully think about your moves.
Also Mega Diancie is busted.
If you could change one thing about any generation of OU, what would it be and why?
ADV is good as it is, I wouldnt change anything. In DPP I would bring back both Latias and Salamence, shit was way more fun with them around even if they could be seen as broken. Get rid of Drizzle and Drought, but maybe get rid of Sand Rush too as otherwise Sand would be too dominant. And in current XY id bring back Aegislash as I really liked that mon.
Also perhaps get rid of U-Turn entirely.
What is your favorite generation of OU and why?
ADV. Its a perfect combination of nothing being overcentralizing, being able to be creative with your teams, and shit like Regenerator and U-Turn not being around. I feel like you can play offense, stall, whatever and not be at a disadvantage. I also like no team preview because it creates mind-games between the players. Do not keep your Skarmory in on Metagross on the first turn if its your only answer to stuff like Snorlax or youll get Magneton'd. Many good players understand this, bad players dont, so more often than not the better player will come out on top barring luck factors.
As a manager for the Cryonicles in SPL, what were you looking for in players when you were deciding who you wanted to bid on?
Obviously you want good players. But the thing with SPL is you want to create a group of people who can work together as a team. A very good example of this would be what I did in SPL. People would probably consider TV-Rocka to be a better DPP player than Go10, but Go10 is a much better fit for my team because of his friendship with Ojama, Reymedy and giara as well as having BKC to help out with DPP. A manager has to take into account this kind of stuff, you dont want a team full of people that hate each other. The healthy team aspect is probably more important than general skill at the end of the day. Thats the reason why tele didnt get bought.
Do you have any advice for people who want to have a shot at being drafted in the midseason?
Regarding the Farm League, if you already lost a game, consider not wasting more time on it if your sole purpose is to get noticed rather than "have fun". You wont get drafted if you dont have a perfect record 99% of the time. The best you can do is basically try to climb the ladder, as even though most managers despise the ladder as a tool to find people, some others will not hesitate to take in people they consider good. Its cliche but "do well in tournaments" is the basic answer, although 4 weeks for that is really little time.
So id say become friends with a manager and catch their attention by playing against him or whatever.
Do you have any advice for newer players, and for Smogon in general?
If your end goal is to be a better player, then definitely join tournaments in order to improve. Theres only so much the ladder and analyses can teach you. If your end goal is to make a lot of friends (in tourneys at least), consider using IRC, as thats the best way to meet and interact with people. If your end goal is to fuck around, CAP ASB is the place for you. RiCH HOMiE CA$ED can help you out with that.
What players do you look up to / are good friends with?
Most of the players I used to look up to are long gone from Smogon. I guess they would be goofball, as he was the person who got me into ADV and helped me out with it, as well as gave me my first ADV team. Gouki and Loki were great guys and players from whom I learned a lot just by watching them play, as was Earthworm. panamaxis would be my last shout, as he is often forgotten when discussing top players.
As for friends, most of mine dont play mons anymore, instead we play League which is a much better game. Folgorio, Rewer, harsha, and others, while other friends have quit the game entirely, like tito and the nowhere crew. The football boys like Floppy, Heist, and Atticus are pretty tight. Dice is a homo
Finally, can you provide us a team that’s a good fit for this metagame and reflects your playstyle?
Lopunny @ Lopunnite
Ability: Limber
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Fake Out
- High Jump Kick
- Return
- Ice Punch
Greninja @ Life Orb
Ability: Protean
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Hydro Pump
- Gunk Shot
- Ice Beam
- Extrasensory
Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 52 Def / 200 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Leech Seed
- Protect
- Power Whip
- Gyro Ball
Landorus-Therian (M) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Knock Off
- U-turn
- Stone Edge
Latias (F) @ Life Orb
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Modest Nature
- Draco Meteor
- Healing Wish
- Recover
- Psyshock
Heatran @ Leftovers
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpA / 116 SpD / 136 Spe
Calm Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Lava Plume
- Roar
- Toxic
Ability: Limber
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Fake Out
- High Jump Kick
- Return
- Ice Punch
Greninja @ Life Orb
Ability: Protean
EVs: 4 Atk / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Hasty Nature
- Hydro Pump
- Gunk Shot
- Ice Beam
- Extrasensory
Ferrothorn @ Leftovers
Ability: Iron Barbs
EVs: 252 HP / 4 Atk / 52 Def / 200 SpD
Relaxed Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
- Leech Seed
- Protect
- Power Whip
- Gyro Ball
Landorus-Therian (M) @ Choice Scarf
Ability: Intimidate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Knock Off
- U-turn
- Stone Edge
Latias (F) @ Life Orb
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 4 SpD
Modest Nature
- Draco Meteor
- Healing Wish
- Recover
- Psyshock
Heatran @ Leftovers
Ability: Flash Fire
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SpA / 116 SpD / 136 Spe
Calm Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Lava Plume
- Roar
- Toxic
No idea if this is a good team (probably not) and its not something that is very much my style but I dont build teams nowadays and I just made this to check out how ORAS OU was. I dont remember what I had in mind with this but I think it had to do with using Greninja to wear down Lopunny counters and then come in hot with it. Recover / Healing Wish doesnt make much sense but its necessary to cover Keldeo for the whole game and then Healing Wish once its not necessary anymore. Defog is probably better because Spike stacking teams are really annoying but w/e. Heatran is for SR as well as Poisoning Bulky Water switch-ins that also trouble both Greninja and Lopunny. Scarf Lando is the standard revenge killer. On second thought its probably better to have Spikes on Ferrothorn if I have Recover on Latias but I havent really used this much.
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There it is. If you have any questions for rey, leave them down below. I'd like to thank him for doing this, and see you next week!