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Welcome to the OU Player of the Week Project: Rebooted! For those of you that don't know, this is a project where I interview a tournament player and have you, the readers, leave any questions you may have down below for them to answer. The ultimate goal is to gain insight as to how they play this skillful and strategic video game. If any of you have a suggestion for who I should interview, feel free to VM/PM me, and I will take your suggestion into consideration. Now, enough of this boring intro. Let's get to it!
cosine180
Most Known For:
Being a newcomer and doing well in Smogon Tour and WCoP
Favorite Pokemon:
Probably Rayquaza because its the most nostalgic to me
Most used Pokemon:
Tyranitar
Can you tell us a little about yourself?
I'm 17 years old, German, just finished school and love to play basketball and table tennis.
Where did you get your name from?
Honestly, i don't really know, I like math a lot and thought most words from that area sounded pretty cool. I think 'axiomalpha' was my first name, then i switched to cosine.
How and when did you get into competitive battling?
I started with trying to build the perfect team in one of the cartridge games and competed on Twitch, while doing that i did a ton of research and stumbled upon some Youtubers who played on a simulator which i found quite interesting. I played a bit casually on PO, then switched over to PS because i liked the design more, but it wasn't until 1 year ago that i found Smogon and the competitive side of the game, the first OLT really got me started.
How do you feel about how ORAS plays compared to XY?
As opposed to many other players, I quite enjoy ORAS. Theres so many strategies and possibilities you have which weren't there in XY, so as someone who loves building i like ORAS more.
To add onto the above, thoughts on the team matchup issue?
This one is tough, because the presence of so many new threats makes it harder to be able to beat everything. When building, theres so much to watch out for, and its quite easy to lose turn 0 if you're not careful. All of that aside, i think that matchup is just an excuse for bad teambuilding.
Do you feel that there is anything that is suspect worthy at the moment?
Shadow Tag is a tough one because it unbalances the meta regarding the fact that it pretty much solely beats full stall, making it almost unviable. As of now, it doesn't have to highest usage but I'm sure that it deserves a suspect.
What's your favorite playstyle and why?
I try building and playing all playstyles, but i mostly enjoy Balance and Bulky Offense, because you can play safe and switch into most pokemon, as well as have the option to outplay your opponent when you're behind.
What's your favorite generation of OU and why?
I really like the DPP metagame, but my favorite has to still be ORAS, just because of the unlimited option you have.
How do you go about preparing for tournament matches? Does the process differ depending on the tournament?
It's important to me that I play a team I'm comfortable with, I can't use something that I don't know in and out, so I play a ton of games before just to know every little weakness. When the game starts, I usually listen to music to help me relax. This goes for every tournament except for Smogon Tour, where I choose about 10-15 teams of all playstyles, so that my opponent won't know what I'm gonna bring and scouting becomes impossible.
Favorite to win STour?
There are obviously some great players playing this year, like BKC, Bad Ass and Sweepage who all have good chances, but I wouldn't count out my friend XRay who's definitely going far this year.
If you could change one thing about OU, what would it be and why?
I'd love if there was some nerf to the move Defog, for example, that the ability Hyper Cutter not only stops the evasion drop but also the removal of hazards. That would open up a lot of cool new strategies.
Do you have any advice for newer players for playing, and for Smogon in general?
The most important part of course is to have fun. That's pretty much the main reason everyone plays Pokemon, and this really shouldn't be forgotten. Don't take it too seriously when something doesn't go your way and try to keep your goal in mind. When you lose, try to figure out why (it can't always be luck or matchup lol) and try to improve accordingly.
If you could change one thing about Smogon as a whole to make it better, what would it be and why?
Imagine if there was prize money for big tours like OST or Smogon Tour, that'd be amazing but it's probably never gonna happen lol.
What players do you look up to / are good friends with?
There's a lot of people on here that I'm good friends with. It'd probably take forever to list them all but I'll try.
Lets start with some german friends:
CBB, Aurious, Get this Money, Fakes, Quaggster, Bluri, UCan'tSeeMe and Steve Angello
Some people from twitch, which is basically the place i grew up:
Dark380, Megastaruniverse, Teremiare, Epicalman01 and Hwoophz
Next up some people from bof:
Geemick, ABR, Ox the Fox, FNH, Tom Bus and Zamrock
The whole VoD crew of course:
TDK, Shake, Omfuuuga, Anti, Radianthero, Tesung, Blunder, Cased, FLCL, Moony and Valentine
Other people:
Masterclass, Somalia, xtra$hine, High Impulse, PDC, TheEnder, MDragon and Soulwind
Special shoutouts to XRay, Denissss, Prankster and Reverb who are best friends on here and also the people i spend the most time with. Also shoutout to Kevin Garret who's a really good friend.
I hope I didn't forget anyone, I'll add them in the comments if i notice :)
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?
http://hastebin.com/riguxawavi.md
This is a cool HO i made for OLT and smogon tour. The idea was to rely on sashes to beat most threats in the current meta, along with 4 SD mons to break balance and stall. Diancie and starmie helps keep hazards off the field, which is the most important thing when playing this team. You have 3 great leads in Diancie, Breloom and Chomp. Even Bisharp works sometimes if you predict a Lando lead which is very common. Talonflame is there to sweep lategame and also likes to have rocks off the field. The team is very easy to play and great for both laddering and official tour games.
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leave any questions you have below. see you next week!
