October 22, 2016, 2:04am
EeveeTrainer
well if youre not gonna set up suicune why not at least set up gliscor against blaziken
JumpXVI
dude
EeveeTrainer
you can toxic sub stall
JumpXVI
can you step back for a second
i dont really need a critique right now
and no, i couldn't
blaziken used blaze kick on turn two against suicune
why am i risking a burn (which actually happened, in practice)
lol i have to average 140 wins a day now to get to 3669 before nov 18
EeveeTrainer
good thing you are completely free
JumpXVI
this is a nightmare man
i dont even think you'd be able to say the right thing
i wanted to go to sleep
"just one more battle"
it's just hell
waste of time is a massive understatement
EeveeTrainer
why do you think i dont want anything to do with it
you are literally asking for that shit to happen
JumpXVI
huh
EeveeTrainer
just by playing over and over and over
JumpXVI
anything to do with what
EeveeTrainer
i find the whole maison culture fascinating but very very very very masochistic
JumpXVI
whatever, i should have the record
nine battles
then i dont lose for six months because i dont play 100 battles a day
i'm only doing this because TDP didn't post, it's really simple
yet i'm borderline insane
"i guess i could have rested with suicune"
"and then gone to gliscor"
but it subbed against gliscor, "did it do that because it was out of leaf storm pp"
it subbed on suicune twice and it can hit it for SE
whatever
i dont think anyone will ever understand my torture
-----
You have no idea how much I've climbed.
Fast-forward a bit with me, to a mid-November night on the upper west side of Manhattan. I'm at, let's say, 3,200 wins and counting. My legs aren't tired, though I'd traveled so far on them, literally and figuratively, under literally unspeakable pressures that would make other legs buckle or not even want to brave the excursion. The pressure to win 3,669 battles straight in 25 days.
27 days. As detailed above, in my conversation with Ian (happy 30th birthday, man), I lost a streak of 1,144 on Saturday, October 22, to Brightpowder Contrary Serperior3 (Leaf Storm/Hyper Beam/Substitute/Toxic). Due in part to substandard sloppy play and not setting up my Suicune fully on Blaziken (for fear of a burn from Blaze Kick which happened anyway), and in part to two misses and a CH on Gliscor.
Oh yeah. For those of you who don't even know who the fuck this dude is, talking all this last-gen nonsense:
Kangaskhan (F) @ Kangaskhanite ** Melbourne: Return/Power-Up Punch/Sucker Punch/Earthquake, Adamant, Scrappy -> Parental Bond, 252Atk/4SpD/252Spe
Suicune @ Leftovers ** Holy Water: Scald/Icy Wind/Calm Mind/Rest, Bold, Pressure, 236HP/212Def/60Spe
Gliscor (F) @ Toxic Orb ** pH Balance: Earthquake/Toxic/Substitute/Protect, Careful, Poison Heal, 236HP/4Atk/4Def/252SpD/12Spe
Kangliscune, the best team I've ever used. It's virtually perfect. I know it like the back of my hand, and with virtually every loss, I feel like I let it down, due to my own imperfections or misplays. My reputation used to precede me, I guess. My proficiency with Kangliscune, passion for playing, and encyclopedic knowledge of the Maison threats conspired to make my mad, "borderline insane" genius a genius that would be dissatisfied with nothing short of the #1 spot. I
had to trudge on.
And so I did the math. 27 days, 3,669 battles. Really 136 battles a day, not 140, but that 4-battle difference would be a trivial difference at the end of the day. Only slightly less trivial than the ~17 battles a day I averaged from mid-April to mid-October, after losing at battle 3,659 (6MRG-WWWW-WW5A-RBPF), a week before I posted my 3,633 streak proof by way of a
YouTube video. I was no stranger to this math, after the night of October 11, that mid-October day referenced just above, where I lost, in Battle 3,170 (N7MG-WWWW-WW5A-RC38), the literal only battle in Kangliscune's 15,000 battle history where I could not blame myself and/or otherworldly hax (think Hurrnadus or Serperior3 going on confusion, Brightpowder, CH sprees) for a loss. After that October 11 loss, the math said 100 battles a day in 37 days till Sun & Moon were to debut. Simple math, not so simple task. 1,144 battles and 10 days later on October 22, that 100 figure ballooned to 136.
You'll note two battles there. Stay with me. Krookodile1 (Crunch/Bulldoze/Taunt/Counter), in the 3,659 battle, was April, and that's the only relevant bit of info before I continue my October 22 conversation with Ian.
Let me say this—my instinct is to apologize genuinely for the length of this chatlog, and also this post, but...my first post in nearly a year was never going to be short. And given all that happened, I think it's fair for me to say "blame TheDutchPlumberjack for how long this post has to be", lol.
-----
JumpXVI
do you get me though
that krook, i tried something i wouldnt
i switched in when i thought it would taunt
twice
it used crunch both times
even though it had taunted gliscor 3-4 times (protect)
i dont lose that battle if i know the record is nine battles away, i literally 100% don't
i just stall out its taunt, 20 pp but who cares
that is why "lol 3659" isnt fair, objectively
"lol didnt you know the record was nine battles away?"
um, no?
i believe ive done the noble thing
actually trying
while not complaining
its cost me so much time
EeveeTrainer
what can you possibly complain about tho
JumpXVI
that i wouldn't have lost those nine battles
EeveeTrainer
hes not required to post anything
JumpXVI
you're supposed to post losses
yeah you are
you can't just be a moving target
this team sucks rofl
ninja/megasala/chansey (timid, sub/minimize/soft/toss) [different quick team i was using in the first ~100 battles to maintain my sanity]
everything sucks compared to kangliscune
"My mourning period isn't quite over yet, but since there's this one thing that I recall a certain man writing about fortrightness and leaving people in the dark about chasing moving targets, I feel I should post now anyways. Jumpman16 I'm sorry, about my own stupidity."
he knew
its actually worse than if it were explicitly in the rules
because he acknowledged this himself, thinking i hadn't actually lost
he didnt think that his lack of forthrightness had ACTUALLY caused me to lose
EeveeTrainer
meh
what # did u think he was @
JumpXVI
i thought he was lower
the record he'd posted was like 3450
and i thought he would have stopped
obviously i wasnt half-assing my battles
EeveeTrainer
yeah i think you showed me the krook battle
i dont remember how you lost tho
i remember you doing some risky shit tho
that you def wouldnt have done if you knew you were 9 away from record
"but still"
you cant do that if you dont know he lost
JumpXVI
lol
you have no idea
play literally every battle like it's a must-win?
its insanity
and remember
EeveeTrainer
isnt it though
JumpXVI
the only reason we found out he lost
EeveeTrainer
this isnt the playoffs where you can lose a game
JumpXVI
is because i posted
which is the only reason i posted
EeveeTrainer
esp at 3500
JumpXVI
i could have played perfectly till 4,000
and still have no idea where im at
i dont think you know how "torturous" that is
EeveeTrainer
oh i do
but
JumpXVI
torture works because you have your opposition believe that it wont stop
EeveeTrainer
you cant play risky at any time
if you dont know you have the record
JumpXVI
lol
listen Ian
i'm going to give you a pass here
because you haven't really tried this
but this is the least constructive thing you could possibly be saying to me
by a mile
if i think you're wrong
i'm going to "argue"
and waste time/energy
and if i think you're right, so what?
congrats you're right
i threw away a streak of 3,659 nine battles before the record
now what
this is the most hindsight = 20/20 shit imaginable rofl
you do see that, right
EeveeTrainer
are you mad at TDP?
JumpXVI
its not so much i'm mad than i am cognizant that he know he was disingenuous
he posted it in the very first paragraph of his "#1" post
and posted BECAUSE i posted
and posted NOT because i had lost (he didnt know that)
if i had lost at 3672 or whatever
he would still have been disingenuous
but literally no one would care, because it would be moot
and you could argue what you are now, six months later
and i would say "lol fuck off, i got the record anyway, who cares if you're right"
right?
just please dont lose sight of the fact that i only knew because i posted
fishing for info i should have had
i should not have had to do that if he'd lost
EeveeTrainer
yeah he had no motivation to post once he had the record
why ever post that you lose otherwise
JumpXVI
to avoid the torture im going through now?
EeveeTrainer
i think that you should probably have the record
he should have posted that he lost
you would have known that you were 9 away from the record
JumpXVI
and if he "knew" i was lurking, that's why he should post
EeveeTrainer
and you would have played appropriately
but you not knowing when he lost, youre just playing forever,
JumpXVI
yep
EeveeTrainer
in your mind, youre not playing for a certain number
JumpXVI
nope
which is "torture"
EeveeTrainer
its like swinging at a pitch without knowing the strike count
JumpXVI
more "insanity"
EeveeTrainer
if you dont know the count how do you know how conservative to be with your swing
JumpXVI
yeah exactly
EeveeTrainer
or whether to swing at all
-----
But swing I did, borderline insanity be damned. I swung day after day, knowing I needed to average 136 battles—funny how it's "battles", not "wins", huh? Swing and swing my legs and my body and everything I had to getting that #1 spot. Swing until realizing, that mid-November night on the upper west side of Manhattan at ~3,200 wins, that I had already done something amazing.
I had pushed myself, through doubts of the future and discouragements of the past, to do the unthinkable, in actually winning 3,200 battles in a row in 25 days.
After losing a 10-day, 1,144 streak, I somehow had put on my blinders, and tapped into my passion for this game. My love of my team and the desire to give it its rightful due. The repeated, aloud self-encouragement of "this is fun", said with a smile that became less and less forced the higher my streak grew through the hundreds in to the thousands.
I had learned a very valuable lesson, no matter the outcome. It was a truly amazing feeling, one of accomplishment much deeper than that you normally get from a game. Much more meaningful than any of my past #1 records. And I had just a few hundred battles more to go.
So when I lost, somehow, despite no assumptions of my "deserved" crown, on November 16 at battle 3,552 (DP6G-WWWW-WW5A-RC2Y), a battle I would not have lost if my dear Gliscor were male and not female despite some moves I could have made differently, you now
do have an idea of what I was feeling. Like I took three separate streaks over 3,000 for nothing. Nothing but that personal valuable lesson that I can take with me and apply elsewhere. For whatever that's worth.
-----
TheDutchPlumberjack, I accept your apology. You have no idea what you were apologizing for, but I accept.
Do I have a flair for the dramatic? Sure, why not. But it wasn't supposed to be this way, I don't think. I was supposed to get to 3,670 sometime on Thursday, November 17, the day before Sun & Moon were to be released. Make this grandiose post about how my assumed top spot wasn't claimed quite the way you all would have thought.
I feel like that fancy, French Maison rug, my red carpet and the waltz of triumph I'd earned so, so badly, was swept right under my legs. Legs fine, but time no more to climb. Because who cares?
Mount Maison is dead. Red is stuck there, and people forget. They move on, to new games, new generations. They remember him, sure. But the memory of a silent once-champion can only linger for so long.
And I've wanted to cry out for so long, about so much else...one of you would surely hear the echoes in Mount Maison, and lend your ear. I've missed that more than anything, but I think you now know why I held my tongue.
For what it's worth, I'm at battle 110 with a team I'll detail later (this is battle 100: GECG-WWWW-WWW4-MX2S). Haven't lost in the Tree yet, for whatever that's worth. It doesn't quite feel like climbing to me, though....not yet. I'm sure you all now have an idea why.