Approved by UU moderation & inspired by Feliburn's project
Welcome guys in the "UU Player Interview", a project where you'll be able to discover or re-discover some well known players of the UU community. Those people may be known thanks to their high-skilled level or their achievements on the strategic scene but also thanks to their dedication into the tier or within the community. Time to gossip !
Hi Hogg, it's good to see you.. How are you doing ?
Doing well, thanks!
Let's begin as usual with some common questions ! First of all, can you tell us what's your favorite Pokemon ?
Oh man I don't even really have favorites and always name something random every time I get asked this. Let's go with Sirfetch'd.
Alright and what is your most used Pokemon during the 7th generation ?
7th generation? I know it's boring but probably either Latias or Krook. Both of them had a really good mix of offensive and defensive utility and ended up on a really huge number of my teams, probably even moreso than Scizor.
You're not the only one for sure who played a lot with this Pokemon.. They were pretty amazing in almost all the metagame we got. Last boring question.. Do you have any idea about what are you the most known for ?
Probably for being UUTL. I've got other roles on Smogon (admin and TD) but I think most people associate me with UU, since I've been tier leader since early SM and was council and mod for a while before that.
Yeah you're the figurehead of the tier ! Now let's talk about yourself.. Can you tell us who's behind that crowned dinosaur picture ?
I'm definitely one of the older folks on Smogon. I'm 35 and I've been playing competitive mons on and off for something ridiculous like 16+ years, with some long breaks in between. I'm married with a five year old son (who has been getting into 'mons a bit himself, though he's still a long way off from being ready for Smogon), and I do health policy work for my state government.
Damn 16+ years.. that's 3/4 of my own age...! By the way, what brought you to Smogon and how did you become UU Tier Leader ?
Back in the day during gen 3 I used to play on the old IRC bots, which is how I met a lot of the folks who later went on to found Smogon. I was kind of a shitposter for a while in my early 20s, then took a pretty long hiatus from 'mons. I ended up coming back in 2014 after my son was born, since I was on family leave and not really sleeping much. Got drawn back in, and after messing around with a few different metas I started playing UU during XY and it stuck.
Alright thanks for this answer. If I'm not mistaken, you're a big fan of Sirfetch'd (and you confirmed that a little earlier) , excluding this mon what's your favorite Pokemon atm in UU and why ?
Hm.. In the current UU I really have been liking Roserade a lot. I think it's generally underexplored, with sets like Scarf and LO 3 attacks + Synth being really good in addition to the standard hazard sets that you mostly see.
I have great difficulty using Roserade effectively, overall I struggle with Grass-type and the only one I liked rose to OU (RIP Rotom-Mow).. Otherwise, do you have a tip for beginners who would like to be involved in UU ?
Right now with the limited distribution of 'mons it can seem like there aren't really a lot of options, but I would say don't be afraid to try new things and work with your favorites. Luckily we've got a pretty easy framework for a good defensive core (something like defensive rocker like hippo/rhyp + specially defensive water type like milotic/vap + fighting resist like geezing/noivern), so if you're not sure how to get started with a team, just try starting with that and go from there. UU has only been around for a month, and there is still a ton of room to play around. I'm sure it won't be long before someone makes the next dirty stall or crazy ass HO team that throws us all for a loop and turns the meta on its head, and in really short order we'll have Home coming out and upsetting the apple cart even further, so use what you like and have fun with it.
Talking about Pokemon HOME, do you believe it's going to be a good thing for the tier ?
It's really hard to say. I am not really looking forward to Toxic and Defog being back everywhere, because one of my favorite things about this gen so far has been having to approach common issues like how to deal with hazards and how to keep defensive 'mons from being too passive in new ways. But at the same time, I can't deny that it'll be nice to have a more robust teambuilder, and I think it could open up some really cool options for the tier.
Yeah I agree with that and I also think we kinda need extra Stealth Rock / Defog users since it's pretty limited atm. By the way, what do you think of the brand new council which have been made for the 8th generation ? Does it bring enough freshness ?
Yeah, I've been really enjoying the current crop of council members. There isn't a ton to do yet, since the meta actually started off surprisingly stable once Dynamax got the boot, but they've all been active and seem really excited to move things forward, and there's a pretty wide variety of viewpoints. I'm sure we'll get a lot busier once Home drops (and who knows how things will look post-DLC), but it seems like we've got a really good crew to deal with it so far.
Yeah the mood is dope between all of us, I’m proud to be a part of it ! Let's focus on the penultimate question.. where does "Hogg" come from ?
Um probably not worth googling that. It's from the title of a super controversial book by my favorite writer. Hogg itself is pretty close to an unreadable book where he was playing with the idea of disgust as literary affect, and the end result is... something, I'll just say that. Samuel Delany has written a lot of very good books and essays, but I think Hogg probably isn't one of them. As for why it's my username, I pretty much just picked it at random off of something on my bookshelf, meaning I now have to awkwardly explain to people why I picked that name every time I do one of these interviews.
Sorry lmao.. And now the last but not the least question.. what is your favorite ice cream flavor ?
Black cherry with chocolate chips/chunks, preferably dark.
Sounds nice ! Well that's all for today. Once again, thank you for freeing up your time for this interview, it's always a pleasure to learn some details about a well known member of the UU community. Have a nice day !
You too!
Feel free to ask to Hogg any questions you want !
If you have some recommendations for an interview, feel free to DM me !
