Project Doubles Player of the Week v.2 - #2 zeefable

[Toxigen]

approved by Yoda2798
art by 13ulbasaur

Welcome to the Doubles Community Spotlight! This project is meant to be a way of getting to know better the most prominent Doubles players. A new interview every week, will hopefully keep you entertained and teach you something new!


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[Toxigen]

Interview #1 - Nido-Rus​

Hello Nido, and welcome to this interview! You've been here before, but can you introduce yourself a bit for our readers?
Hi y’all, Nido here. I’m a 21 year university student in my final year for a Computer Science degree. Pretty wild to think that the last time I did this interview was 6 years ago as a high school sophomore.

Where does your username come from?
When I first joined PS/Smogon in 2013, I was a big fan of the ability sheer force and how it negated LO recoil, so I decided on a random combination of lando-I and Nidoking that looked decent enough as a username. Looking back I’m surprised I stuck with this username since I never particularly liked either of these pokemon, but here we are 8 years later.

Congratulations on winning OSDT! I'd imagine it's a great feeling, can you tell us a bit about your run?
It really is a great feeling to win something big after participating for all these years. I don’t want to call my run a lucky coincidence since I did have a reasonably tough bracket and won my matches mostly fair and square, but I do think I just happened to have the right idea at the right time. Near the end of the spring seasonal and early rounds of OSDT, we started to see more meta development as people prepared teams that had good matchups against Z Strats Offense. Semiroom pretty much disappeared and people started to run weird pokemon and sets like moltres-g, comfey, ribombee, latias, etc just to win the speed control war against Z strats offense. And here I noticed that rather than trying to beat the team defensively, which really wasn’t going too well, it was much easier to beat it with offensive pressure. And so most of my run was just me abusing hyper offense having an amazing matchup against current meta teams. I did have to adapt near the end (with the DD KyuB team) when I expected opponents to actually prep against me, but it was still pretty much a matter of abusing common weaknesses to spore and setup.

What do you think was the most difficult aspect of the tour?
For me, probably my waning interest in pokemon as real life responsibilities started to pile up. I’ve always had a great time socializing with other dou players on discord, but I really started to lose motivation to actually practice and play games during OSDT. Teambuilding helped me a lot with this. I’ve always enjoyed building, and it really helped develop motivation to actually play games and test the new teams I built.

If you were a Tournament Director, would you change something about OSDT? And if so, what specifically?
Frankly speaking, a single elimination unseeded tournament is a Bad Idea. I get that the goal of not seeding the tournament is to give every player an absolutely fair run at winning, but the tournament runs the risk of having considerably lower quality games in later rounds compared to seeded tournaments. OST manages this risk by having an absolute ton of players, so the likelihood of very good players getting eliminated early might be comparatively lower. Having said all this though, I’m not sure if there’s a reasonable solution to OSDT without significantly changing tournament structure.
Since OSDT is part of the DOU circuit, one solution is to just seed based on circuit rankings, but one major issue with this is that this makes the tournament less accessible to players on the site that haven’t been participating in the circuit.
Another possible solution could be to change the structure of the tournament to swiss, majors or double elimination, but they all have their own share of issues and would take away from OSDT’s simplicity and its name relation to OST. In the end I really don’t think there’s a fix to this without giving up some other important aspect up, and it’s just a matter of figuring out which aspects of the tournament the community values more.

Kartana is now banned from SS DOU. How will it affect the meta? What Pokemon/team styles you think will benefit from this ban?
The biggest winners in my opinion are tapu fini and bulky compositions. I think offense will still be very good with urshifu around, but with kartana gone, fini no longer runs the sheer risk of 50% crit chance invalidating any attack drops. As such, fini can safely use intimidate to help deal with a good chunk of potential checks like rillaboom or zeraora. I don’t think it’lll be broken since it still does get beat down pretty hard by rillaboom and other mons like naganadel, genesect, metagross, etc, but it won’t be the liability that it’s been in recent months. Semiroom and bulky compositions all also get quite a bit better. Diancie, incineroar, metagross, amoonguss, volcanion, necrozma etc can all more reliably work in bulky semiroom/bulky offense teams. Most other steel types get better. Shift gear genesect likely gets worse since it focuses on working in a HO meta, but AV genesect gets better and metagross gets better. Zapdos-G gets worse as scarf doesn’t match up too well against semiroom. All in all, there’s likely a lot of interesting changes on the way, and I’m looking forward to seeing how the meta develops.

The first edition of the Smogon Champions League is approaching, and looks like you're not gonna be a part of it. Who do you think are the players that are going to perform best/some surpirise picks?
First of all, congratulations to everyone who got picked for SCL! It’s great to see such a large number of players get picked. Frankly I think pretty much all of the starters have established themselves already, so there isn’t much to say on that end. I really do like the system of having established players start and having newer players provide teambuilding and testing support. Creates a nice system where newer players get to experience team tournaments and get used to them, setting them up to join as starters in later years. Actuarily/zeefable are the only team of fully new players for smogon team tours (and they both have very much earned a spot in this draft), so I’m definitely excited to see them on this stage and not sure who would be the starter between them. Similar confusion about starters with Memoric + YoBuddy, where we have a long-time established player without much recent SS dou participation/results, along with a newer player who just won the most recent dou seasonal. Of these teams, I think nails + umbry stands out as the strongest pick going in, with both being very good established players and builders. I’m a bit worried about stax + lunarr, if only because I’m not sure how much SS dou the two of them have played. In terms of pure playing ability I’d put this team right near the top, but again I’m not sure how much of a factor gen 8 rust will be.

There is a sentiment going around that the Doubles OU community is not as active as it once was. Do you think there is something that should be done or is it just the natural course of events (older players losing interest/getting older, Doubles generally being more unaccessable to singles players, etc...) ?
I think most of it is just the natural course of events, with older players losing interest/not having as much time to play. This is also further pushed by interest in pokemon waning in general. It really has been a long time since a new game came out, so hopefully the new Arceus game should revitalize interest in pokemon. I don’t think the lack of activity in DOU is really a problem though. If anything, we’ve started to get more active recently with pretty active forum projects, revitalized dou c&c efforts, and a lot of new players taking interest and talking in the DOU discord. I don’t know if we can hope to reach gen 6 levels of forum activity, but it’s definitely a nice shift compared to the decline in activity in recent years.

Can you give us a team that resembles your playing and building style and your thought process behind it?
https://pokepast.es/833a9644b875e04c

I’ve recently been using a lot of HO, but it really isn’t my preferred playstyle. This team is probably pretty representative of the kind of teams I like to build:
- Team must be BAD. You can tell at a glance that this team is gonna struggle and will very much need to rely on breaking expectations with non-standard sets to win. My kind of team.
- Somewhat off-meta. I really like to build teams with pokemon or compositions that perform particularly well against the meta. Here, coaching + Gourgeist is amazing at dismantling the standard offense meta, while the rest of the team pretty much supports these mons and covers weaknesses.

Is there anyone you look up as a player?
There are a lot of users I look up to as players, but the ones that stick to me the most are those I look up to as people. Enormous s/o to Majorbowman, talkingtree, and kamikaze for making a huge difference in the DOU community, making it an accepting, safe place without the toxicity and drama that the rest of smogon deals with. Will miss having you as TL, bowman, and a big congratulations to Paraplegic!

Whats an underrated piece of advice you would give to newer players?
This has probably been mentioned many times already, but absolutely try to ask for help and advice. Most people are very willing to help, and while it’s daunting to ask someone out of the blue, you’ll find out that people really don’t mind. At worst they’ll say they’re too busy and then you can just ask someone else after that. Learning how to build and playing good players is invaluable in getting better as a player yourself. Paraplegic explains it really well in his answer to the same question in his interview here: https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/player-of-the-week-karnisbroke.3670240/#post-8600244

What are your hobbies and activities outside of Pokemon?
I mostly spend my free time playing games or reading manga. I probably enjoy a bit of everything in terms of games. I used to play smash ultimate quite a bit, but recently I’ve been spending more time on Genshin Impact and Hades. s/o God Gamer Croven for getting me too invested into Hades and also holding the hades any% speedrun World Record (No Big Deal pshhh). I also enjoy hiking and table tennis.

Is there anything else you would like to add?
Big s/o to Toxigen for picking this project back up, and thank you for interviewing me! This was really fun

 

[Yellow Paint]

FITE
Y/N

 

[Croven]

when are you joining me in the retired pkmn player to full time hades speed runner pipeline

 

[Toxigen]

Interview #2 - zeefable​

Hi zee, and welcome to this interview! First of all, i understand you're well known in the community already, but can you introduce yourself a bit?
Hi I'm zee, otherwise known as zeefable, or you can call me Ryn. I'm a 19 year old girl from the US South studying computer science. I've played VGC since 2015 and worked my way up to the VGC leader position on Smogon when I started getting involved with the site. As far as DOU goes, a few years ago I remember my friends Spurrific, Animus/mint16, MajorBowman, emforbes, etc talking about their adventures in DOU often in various VGC chats but I could never quite get into it. When Crown Tundra came out, I picked up the tier a bit and put it down a few weeks later until I got picked up in DPL thanks to Grandmas Cookin and Z Strats hyping me up. While my season kinda sucked, our team ended up winning the tour, with me winning the deciding game of the finals series, and I've been hooked in DOU ever since.

Where did your username come from?
zee was the name I picked out for myself when I needed a new name online for personal reasons. Around this time I was playing a draft league in a discord. It was VGC rules which meant Minimize was legal. When the team I drafted turned out to suck way more than I had intended, I resorted to spamming Minimize Clefable for the league and I just kinda chose to run with that for my theming. Zee was also taken on Smogon and PS so I had to be a bit more creative.

Congratulations on getting drafted for your first major team tournament! How are you feeling going into it?
Honestly feels so surreal, huge thanks to shiloh and Gingy for picking me up, I've already had a load of fun so far in our team chat. I'm beyond excited to be honest. Actuarily isn't someone I've built or practiced with much before but we're obviously familiar with each other and have had some productive discussion already. I hope I get the chance to play a game or two at some point during the season, and I hope I can not go 0-x should that happen.

You don't have to go in depth, but can you give us your SCL doubles power rankings?

1. Qwello
2. Nails
3. Z Strats
4. Spurrific
5. stax
6. Mishimono
7. Memoric
8. frania
9. Paraplegic

Hope that's not too taken personal for anyone, I have a lot of respect for all the players drafted.

This year you've established yourself as a very capable player. What are your personal goals as a Doubles OU player?
Win a tournament. I got close with summer seasonal but ultimately my motivation hit a low point in lower rounds and I kinda sandbagged my top 4 set. Looking back I wish I took myself more seriously. Becoming one of these people who can routinely disappear and be drafted repeatedly in official team tours seems like a long term goal, since I'm able to do that with VGC's NPA currently.

Of course, we have to talk about your contributions to the VGC section of Smogon. You played a big part in reviving it, what were the biggest steps in doing so?
I just had the motivation. I'm not particularly good at writing convincing paragraphs and I think my leadership skills are honestly pretty poor, but I said I was going to do it anyways and I'm glad I did. My connections to the greater VGC community definitely helped to pull people in for tournaments like the Smogon VGC Major or VGCPL.

tl;dr just set your mind to a task and keep at it, things will pay off even if you don't have innate talent for it.

We've had great VGC players approach DOU in the past and with a lot of success, do you think more players will take interest in Doubles OU, especially thanks to the VGC section you helped to rejuvinate?
I've definitely talked about DOU to a few Smogon VGC regulars and I think those that are interested have either entered a tournament or are looking to do so in the near future. I'm sure the crowd will enjoy spectating SCL as well.

Can you give us a team that resembles your playing and building style and your thought process behind it?

https://pokepast.es/755a8964ec9cbc07


I used to prefer teams that used heavy setup Pokemon such as Azumarill, Snorlax, and Xerneas. In generation 8, my preferred playstyle has definitely switched to just all out aggression. I've posted almost all my original DOU teams in team dump or team bazaar threads, so instead I'll highlight a VGC 21 team I made last month. Scarf Zard in Sun + Tsareena is a very safe way to blow things up... I heard from the grapevine that this might sound familiar to DOU players who played DLC1 meta...

Is there anyone you look up as a player?
emilio and only emilio. Everyone else I view as a partner or an opponent, but emilio will forever be the person I aspire to live up the most in terms of accomplishments and just overall skill.

Whats an underrated piece of advice you would give to newer players?
Competitive Pokemon has a massive learning curve. To be the best, you really need to find a way to overcome this. I did it by playing a lot of games and watching probably 5x that amount, literally any VGC tournament top cut vod and now high-level DOU replay available, I try to watch. Once you pass that curve, then, and only then, can you start building your own teams and try to get ahead. Pokemon is a beautiful game with a complex formula, best of luck trying to solve the puzzle.

What are your hobbies and activities outside of Pokemon?
I got into anime at the start of the covid lockdown era like a lot of people. My favorites are Yuyu Hakusho, Evangelion, and Trigun, though I'm currently making my way through Bleach and Inuyasha. Other than that I like listening to all types of music, though I'm currently stuck on weirdcore/dreamcore. I also like to read about computing and science when I don't have academic burnout, and I like playing games from the 2000s.

Is there anything else you would like to add?
do not give emma anymore badges, thank you very much for the interview

 

[Yoda2798]

1. Which programming languages do you know and what do you plan on doing after graduating?
2. What are the biggest differences between DOU and VGC, as a tier and community?
3. What's your Power Rankings Power Rankings and why is mine number 1?

 

[zee]

1. Which programming languages do you know and what do you plan on doing after graduating?
2. What are the biggest differences between DOU and VGC, as a tier and community?
3. What's your Power Rankings Power Rankings and why is mine number 1?

1. Java and Python only atm, baby steps! I learned a bit of C++ early on in high school but it's been so long that I've mostly forgotten, but can probably pick it back up when the time comes. I'm not quite sure what I'll be learning next. I'd like to work as a software engineer, but I'm not quite sure if a Masters degree is in the plans before I enter the job search. Anything further into academia is likely out of the question, I really liked theory in subjects like math and chemistry but for CS I really enjoy the hands on stuff more. Picking up game dev on the side is something I've also considered but I'd never go straight into the industry.

2. The fact that DOU actually tiers things is hard for a VGC player to adjust to, surely you remember my pretty dumb takes in the shadow tag test thread. I think in a competitive sense, DOU requires more long term planning but less conditioning since you're either playing one-offs or switching teams in a bo3 setting. You can also take way more risks in DOU since you aren't locking in a team for multiple games on end.

Community wise, DOU is super small in comparison, but that's not quite a bad thing. I've been 'active' in the community for like 8 months and feel like I know almost everyone that's been around in my time, which is just straight up impossible in VGC. People are also just way more stop and go with DOU compared to most VGC players who play near constantly, which I think you can mostly attribute to the difference in ladder quality and activity of unofficial tournaments outside their respective official circuits.

3. I don't think anyone's PRs were straight up unviable but I also take them with a grain of salt. Pokemon is a game with a lot of variance and upset potential, so the impossible is always really possible in my eyes.

 

[Grandmas Cookin]

Is there anything else you would like to add?
do not give emma anymore badges, thank you very much for the interview