Post your searing hot takes

Adeleine said:
I actually somewhat care about defending Seaking. It does some things right.

1) Recognizable design. That black and bright orange sets it apart, even today.
2) Color balance. The mottled intense colors at the center, with much softer white and specks of blue at the periphery, make it genuinely very pleasant to look at, dynamic and striking without being too busy and cluttered.
3) Shape. With its rounded, stouter, compact figure instead of a koi fish, it both looks more Pokemon-like and more active, more full of agency, more like it would strike or hit at something.
4) Transition. All these three advantages are more pronounced because Goldeen doesn't have them. Goldeen is paler, balances color differently, and, thanks to its tail, longer. A more basic fish design leading into Seaking make its good traits stand out and feel like an improvement.
5) The horn gives it something to do that isn't just swimming. I know a lot of Gen1 Pokemon have this horn somewhat arbitrarily, but it's especially great for Seaking (who has less obvious ways to interact and engage otherwise), and they've used the horn to give Seaking cool goodies like Megahorn, Drill Run, and Lightningrod.
6) After enough generations, it's in a pretty neat spot in battle, with Swords Dance, Swift Swim, Lightningrod, and a colorful coverage set letting it do a lot of cool things. It is far from good, but it is unique and cool, and that's what I care about in battle.

Seaking's no Gengar or Charizard, but I'm legitimately glad it's here. Personally, it's my 5th favorite Water-type and in my top 100 overall.
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this may be the first time I've given seaking this much thought, and it does give me some second-hand appreciation lol. Water itself was originally this umbrella typing for both things that have water-related powers and things that live in water. With so much competition, a lot of unremarkable, average Pokemon are going to get ignored unless a particular design speaks to you.

But that's not it. Like there are some "mid" Pokemon that you're going to use out of curiosity like Butterfree or Jigglypuff. But the thing with water pokemon is that they're annoying to encounter. Either you're spammed with them when surf (half so underleveled it's not worth the PP to KO), or you have to go fishing which is an annoying mechanic.

I feel fish get the shortest end of the stick because they're more "natural" and less fantastical.

I've been thinking a lot about Golduck lately. I tried it out in a Nuzlocke against some made-harder version of Giovanni's Gym where it sacrificed itself after living and taking out most of his team. I wanna use it for real. Also Snubbull on my next playthrough of Johto. And Girafarig in Gen 2 because I liked it in Soul Silver. but at this point I'm rambling. but i think a lot of Snubbull. I rotate it in my mind and stuff.
 
Agree that this is what trolling means, but i kind of hate trolling now, so i'm kind of on the fence here.

There's lots of fun in messing with people, elaborate cons, tricksiness, playfulness, what have you.

But much trolling these days is just 'Pretending to be a moron to strangers.' It's shooting fish in a barrel. It's just too easy - it doesn't require craft or whimsy - and it discourages treating strangers with good faith. There's no "Lol you got me!" after the reveal. It's "Why... did you do that?"

Most (not all) people I would call trolls, I would also call aggravating asshole, regardless of whether the intent is sincere foolishness or the manufactured kind.
 
Adeleine said:
Agree that this is what trolling means, but i kind of hate trolling now, so i'm kind of on the fence here.

There's lots of fun in messing with people, elaborate cons, tricksiness, playfulness, what have you.

But much trolling these days is just 'Pretending to be a moron to strangers.' It's shooting fish in a barrel. It's just too easy - it doesn't require craft or whimsy - and it discourages treating strangers with good faith. There's no "Lol you got me!" after the reveal. It's "Why... did you do that?"

Most (not all) people I would call trolls, I would also call aggravating asshole, regardless of whether the intent is sincere foolishness or the manufactured kind.
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the thing is, is that i've seen people justify borderline trolling as just ragebait, and i feel like this generation is way too willing to turn a blind eye on people being assholes. though to be fair, you're not wrong in saying its just another synonym for troll, which i didn't really consider before posting.

The ADHD meds are supposed to make me think before i do things, and yet here we are.
 
In my view, ragebaiting is a kind of trolling, but the two terms are not synonymous. Not all trolls set out to make people mad, and not all trolls who set out to make people mad do so via ragebaiting, which I use to refer to the specific practice of posting opinions/media that the ragebaiter doesn't necessarily endorse purely to get a rise out of other people. You might look at this as needless pedantry, and you wouldn't be completely wrong, but it helps me to clarify why I have a particular dislike for ragebaiting: It's a low-effort and uncreative form of trolling. All you do is type out some bullshit, hit send, and watch the negative reactions flow in. It's on the same level as joining a Discord server and spamming flashing images or gore until you get banned. I'm not above deriving some entertainment from a good troll, but I like my trolls elaborate, committed to a bit for months or years, and only aggravating in incredibly petty ways. Ragebaiting is basically the antithesis of this.
 
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