Project Player Interview #12: atomicllamas

Feliburn

is a Community Leaderis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
RU Leader

Art by Kalalokki

atomicllamas
Favorite Pokemon: Wooper

Most used Pokemon: Rotom-Spin

Most known for: Being an ex-RU Tier Leader, playing and managing in official tournaments and an active discord personality

3 months passed after the incident with the mafia. I was back to doing my thing and started traveling again.

Minnesota was my next destination. After some days of walking around, I heard by many that there was a wise old man living around these parts, so I decided to check out this urban legend.

I arrived at a cave, where you could smell the crust from outside. As I entered, the words "You are tacky and I hate you" echoed throughout the cave. I was paralyzed in fear and confusion.

I saw this guy sitting on a rock watching America's Next Top Model. Then I approached....



Hey llamas, how is it going?


hey Feliburn, it's going well, how about you?


I'm fine thanks for asking
You are known as one of the older RU Tier Leaders and RU tour players, mind telling me a bit about yourself?


Sure!
I'm a 26 year old engineer working in product development at a large company in Minnesota, in my spare time I like to ski, play soccer, watch trashy reality TV, and hang out with friends
and play pokemon and other video games too ig


Nice, which TV shows are you into currently?


as far as trashy reality TV I'm really into Survivor and MTV's The Challenge, and sometimes America's next top model
for regular shows, I'm currently watching Handmaid's Tale and I just finished Sex Education


Damn bro u really meant it when u said trashy ROFL
So how did a guy like you get into pokemon in general?


Well growing up Pokemon Red was the first video game I owned, I think it came out when I was like 6?
I played Red, Silver, Ruby and Diamond and then I stopped playing on cartridge
when I was a sophomore in college I got into online forums and I found one about competitive pokemon which I did not realize was a thing
so I found PS! and played mons on it in my spare time and used smogon's dex in order to not suck
and then I got into posting on the forums p sure my first post on Smogon was about quagsire in the BW RU VR thread
and almost 7 years later
I'm still here
o_o


ROFL yea it's been a journey for you, how did you feel being a Tier Leader for a very long time? How was your experience then?


Hmm, that's quite the question, lol
I first got to be tier leader right around when ORAS was released, I was chosen as Molk's co-leader when Silentverse stepped down I was super excited and it was really awesome, Molk and I made a really good team in the beginning in my opinion.
Unfortunately about half way through ORAS Molk became inactive and a couple months later stepped down so I was left by myself
I wanted a co-leader, but senior staff didn't really approve of any of my choices as potentials co-leaders at the time and trusted me to do the job alone, so even though I wanted to have someone to work with I was doing it alone.
Honestly, that part sucked
being a TL by yourself is 1) a lot of work and 2) a lot of pressure
when you have a partner you at least have someone to be like "hey am I being a big dummy because people seem upset with me"
and they can say "no, that person's being ridiculous", or "honestly yeah, you should check yourself"
I don't think I was a very good TL by myself
after gen 7 started
I became less active I think partially due to burnout so I told Senior staff I needed a co leader
and -Tsunami- was the choice at the time
that was honestly really fun, I love working with shake cause he makes things fun even when they should suck
and then shake was dumb and got himself infracted and quit
so then spirit got added as a coleader and he was also a really good choice
because he cares a lot about the tier
so basically
being a tier leader with others is a really good experience
by yourself it sucks
haha
also sorry I just word vomited at you


no man this is golden ROFL, been having this question for so long cause u def had a very interesting TL life
And what about tournaments? How was your tour experience?


Tournaments was kind of a mixed bag for me, the only individual tournament I cared about was Grand Slam
I think making slam playoffs was the proudest I’ve ever been of myself in terms of individuals, I was in a three way tie with qsns and frizzy for 11th place (12 qualifiers) and I lost to qsns and beat frizzy so I made it in
I also lost the next round to Kushalos which was the third time I lost to him that slam (LC open NU open playoffs)
That was the slam that “no one” won
so that probably lowers its value in other people’s eyes but that’s the tournament I would choose to win if I could win one
Also at the time I quit I think I had a top 10 ru open record of all time cause I had made semis twice and got pretty far in another (and lost r1 once) which is another thing I am proud of
Team tournaments I love but I think I’ve had bad luck
First one I was in was spl 5, went 0-1 and was benched, my team got second place
Spl 6 I was a sub that got traded at mids and went 3-0, my team got second
Spl 7 I finally started and went 3-5, we didn’t do very well
Then I was the assman for the tigers in spl 8
That was the team that won and then had the trophies removed because of Mazar’s bot
which for the record, no one else knew was happening on the team, there were some signs in retrospect (and I don’t mean matchups cause who the fuck knows what ORAS Ubers teams should look like)
but they weren’t obvious signs screaming he had a team scouting robot
like it was weird he wanted op to use a specific lc team, but op ignored him anyways
so that sucked
that team was awesome though, some of the most fun I’ve ever had
SPL 9 I assmaned again and we did meh, but the tigers are always fun
I also went 0-3 in ubers in snake 1
which makes my team tournament record a sexy 6-9
I got subbed into ubers cause our player went missing with no notice
I would have gone 1-2 when I had 2 days to prep for 3 games but lost to a last turn crit
.salty
Also idk if it counts for much but I won RUPL once as a manager and that was my peak


Winning RUPL is the life, hardest tour to win ever
Do you have any favorite games you've played? What about teammates?


Favorite game is probably
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/smogtours-gen7ru-314750
This was RU open 6 semis, which I lost to welli0u
but I won this game and smog tours chat went wild when I revealed the tech
that was when veil was absurdly busted and spirit asked me how I knew which game to bring brick break doublade
I brought it to every game
-
As for teammates
Obviously tennisace
one of my favorite people on this site
Tamahome, McMeghan, Hikari, and Finchinator are the best teammates I’ve ever had in terms of contributing and still being fun
Nintendi made me cry from laughter probably 7 times
Eternal Spirit, Majorbowman, and OP are also some of my favorites
Oh and zebraiken!


Nice, so back to yourself llamas, what made you start playing actively again? To the point where you are even part of the new gen RU council


Honestly I quit cause of burnout, I didn’t want to be TL anymore, tournaments weren’t fun cause I was putting to much pressure on myself etc.
I came back cause I bought the new pkmn game and remembered how fun it could be to play pkmn without worrying about it
and I’ve been active in ru discord the whole time anyways cause I’ve been a part of the community for so long and I like it
and most importantly gen 8 is fun and different


yea it really is
What do you like about the new gen? What do you hate about it?


I like that there are fewer Pokémon so old Pokémon that I liked but were trash in previous gens can shine like Drifblim, Rotom-s, Silvally, etc.
I also look forward to mons released in waves
the tier will have a ton of experimental metas which are the most fun
I don’t hate anything about the meta yet, dynamax was banned, lol


Yeah no lie, been loving using stuff like Drifblim and Frostom
Which of all the gens has been your favorite RU wise and why?


Thats a tough question
gen 7 is probably the right answer in terms of being fun and balanced but I didn’t play the end of that one
Gen 5 is like the crazy red headed step child on cocaine
It’s crazy and fun but hard to get a handle on
ORAS is a very balanced meta with probably a lot more room to explore but it has a reputation of being boring and kind of stally
I’d say BW
is my favorite
probably cause of nostalgia
but that shits fun


Yea if u like missing and dodging every other move punk
What do you think of the current meta and the direction it will take with the DLC?


I think as the generation goes on the tier will get increasingly power creeped which should be fun but also will probably mean revisiting the ban list will be necessary in the future
I’m relatively conservative when it comes to banning things, I certainly can think of one Pokémon I think is problematic but even that can be dealt with
There’s a couple limiting things that I’d liked to see discussed but not sure about removed


Speaking of ur mentality when banning, is there anything you would change in the past generations in terms of bans?


No, I don’t think past generations should be messed with at all
I was the one no ban vote on gen 5 LC murkrow when voting in gen 6
got banned 11-1
was it unhealthy for the meta game? Probably but the meta was fun
and now misdreavus is broken but if they ban that mienfoo would be
people don’t play lower tiers enough when they’re done to make changes to them


I meant it more as if, if there was anything you could change from past tiering decisions in RU, what would they be¡


I mean I wouldn’t
maybe free noivern in gen 6?
haha


Crazy
Back to current gen, thoughts on the playerbase? Which players catch your eye?


Anyone in general or new people?


Anyone in general


Trick question, you’re all new to me


Bitch I joined the same year as you


LOL, I was joking
I mean I think everyone on the council is solid obv, bk Drew is a good contributor, sometimes those people end up getting really good like silentverse (or me
), bebo seems like a good player, idk there’s a lot of good looking up and comers!


That dude has a v inflated ego, this answer will probs make him explode and try to call me out again
Top 7 fav users?


u really gonna make me pick 7
Uhh
tennisace molk silentverse spirit omfuga Sam and (makeup)/Ryan/antemortem
they’re gay so they’re one user


That makes sense
Mind dropping your favorite team ever? Could be from any gen, and explain your thought process behind it


Alright so to preface this I changed computers in the middle of my "break" so any of my favorite teams ever would be recreates.
I chose to show the one from the replay even though it isn't a real meta anymore (it was like middle of gen 7 RU)

My thought process behind the team was that I really wanted to use Darkium Z Honchkrow, z-taunt gives you +1 attack while doing cool things like preventing Porygon2 or Milotic from using recovery, but it can also be used as a one time dark type nuke that doesn't need the opponent to be attacking to work.
This set makes the most sense on hyper offense, and with hazards as honchkrow forces a lot of switches, so that made the next 3 choices very easy.
Sharpedo was the face of RU HO at that time (it was just before it was banned). Nidoqueen and Froslass form the hazard stack core, easily setting up spikes and rocks while both preventing the most common defogger Gligar from clearing them, they both can also outmanuever Golbat. Honchkrow synergizes with them by taunting all the defoggers in the tier.
With Honchkrow breaking walls and a solid hazard stacking core, and Sharpedo to finish weakened teams, my last two slots could be used for glue.
Doublade is also an obvious choice on hazard stack, it provides a good switch in to threatening physical mons, while still putting offensive pressure on the opponent's team forcing switches that can be punished with the hazards, also a good wincon vs balance.
And its an extra spin blocker that doesn't really care about the fighting type spinners in the tier
Additionally, by adding brick break to it's moveset over the typical shadow claw, you had an auto win vs the very obnoxious and broken veil teams that were being spammed at the time.
Kommo-o was the only thing that made sense in the last slot, specs kommo-o also is very difficult to switch into, is the only thing that can switch into Exploud on the team, and the team's sole fire resist
(here are some more replays from my slam run that year)
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7ru-628528150
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen7ru-628536745

And here is a bonus theivul team I got to top 10 on the gen 8 RU ladder pre-home with the alt "thievul is good"

It's probably tweakable
to be good
still
!


Frick the lame VR people, Thievul is usable in this meta
What's the origin behind your name?


Lol, in high school my friend had a dog that went crazy with zoomies when you would say llamas for some reason
so I just added a cool adjective in front


You are tacky and I hate you


Best avatar


Any last words for the fans?


Being able to choose the NP songs really is as cool as it seems


I bet it is
Thanks for your time bro


Nah, thank you


=========================================================================================

Feel free to ask atomicllamas any questions you want!

If you have any recommendations I'll be more than happy to read them, just PM me!


Next time on FeliInterviews...

 

atomicllamas

but then what's left of me?
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Senior Staff Member Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
How can a llama play pokemon and why did u become atomic????
very carefully

I don't really have anything else to say other than i'm sorry i wasn't able to stick around in a meaningful way for longer man.
You definitely don't have anything to apologize for, at the end of the day this is just a pokemon website and real life should take a priority, while the situation wasn't ideal for me, I've always been glad that your real life has (seemingly?) gotten a lot better since we first met. Also you are the person who probably was the most helpful to me when I was getting on this site up through when I became TL and there is a reason you are one of my 7 favorite users, so stop apologizing molk!
 

lighthouses

Inordinary
is a Tiering Contributor
I think this is probably my favorite interview, llamas is cool

Would you ever consider being back as TL, considering spirit will basically never quit as he has a blood contract with ru so youd prob have a co leader

Thinking of tryharding for slam this year?

Would you be back to the tigers in the future as a co manager or even perhaps as a player?

Do you think lighthouses sucks

Maybe manage an rupl team? I think the manager pool will be odd to say the least this year
 

atomicllamas

but then what's left of me?
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Senior Staff Member Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
I think this is probably my favorite interview, llamas is cool

Would you ever consider being back as TL, considering spirit will basically never quit as he has a blood contract with ru so youd prob have a co leader
I think probably not? I had my experience as co-leader and it was great (and sometimes not), but I’m satisfied with that. Really happy to still be involved in the tier though.

Thinking of tryharding for slam this year?
tentatively yes

Would you be back to the tigers in the future as a co manager or even perhaps as a player?
as a player I’d love to, as an assman I’d do it if I didn’t think I’d get picked

Do you think lighthouses sucks
nah, lighthouses is a good user and teammate n_n

Maybe manage an rupl team? I think the manager pool will be odd to say the least this year
If I have the time, I’d loved to manage the Rillaboomers or the Washed Rotoms:pimp:
 

Users Who Are Viewing This Thread (Users: 1, Guests: 0)

Top