Smogon: Why you came here and why you stayed

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Xia

On porpoise
is a Contributor Alumnus
Pokemon first came into my world on Christmas day. My younger brother (who now HATES Pokemon, because it's childish >_>( got Pokemon Blue, never played it, and was then lost. I never played Pokemon, though, until I got Pokemon Blue for my birthday. I was used to playing platform games like Megaman, so I was afraid to go down the stairs (they looked like spikes to me, and spikes=death). I spent literally two hours in my bedroom before going downstairs, and it's been a continuous adventure from there. =]

I found out about Smogon from the Serebii forums. Someone there was rating my first team (sucked), and tood me to come check out the Smogon Strategydex. Well, I did, cam across these forums, and realized that I fit in here better than Serebii, because all I ove is the game. The anime sucks, the TCG was confusing, and Serebii ALWAYS CRASHED!!!
 
When I started Pokemon: Started playig since it first came out in 1994. The idea of having little animals trapped in a mechanic ball and just let them out to fight till death became appealing to me :P​
How/When I found this site: Found then site back on NB playing on the tournaments and clicking on the links. One of the best communities for pokemon I know.​
 
How I Got Into Pokemon: AND How I got here:

Hahaha!! Id really like to tell you my story, I got into pokemon like back in grade 4, It was my first time playing Yellow/Gold/1st. gen etc.(It was in a "all in one" cartridge) and back when Ruby/Sapphire was famous at our school and I only got a ROm of it and had no GBA/Sp back then,I really wished I had a GBA back then, so when my aunt bought me one, by the time my cousin had emerad and I also bought Fire red, I really got addicted to pokemon,and learned about Iv's Ev's on Serebii, looking at Pokemon of the week and look at the game mechanics, It wasnt that hard learing about pokemon if you really like it, thats when I saw Marriland's videos and he mentioned about "Going to smogon or something" in his vid. and asked myself "whats with smogon anyways?" so I registered and Here I am! :D
 
Show came on when I was three. Dad played the videogame. Got Yellow when I learned to read when I was seven. When I was about 11 my dad (lol) tought me about EVs. We were both playing Pokemon at the time. Found Shoddy on the TRSRockin forums and then joined Smogon because I can't join the Shoddy forums. And all competitive battling forums arrent competitive. Except for this one and Shoddy, I guess.
 
To be perfectly honest, I've been made fun of a lot for liking pokemon. I've come here to learn more abut the game I've come to stand up for for the past three years, and have endured harsh comments, and something that I'd rather not talk about...but, I just want to be able to prove those kids wrong, and show them Pokemon's way more than what meets the standard eye.
 
Because I sucked at 3rd gen.

When 4th gen came around, I got into it pretty quickly. I started posting analyses later on. Now I am basically here for Firebot and Congregation; Pokemon is not as fun as it used to be.
 
Well, a really long story made sort of short, i really loved playing pokemon with my friends but i was never able to win any battles with them. So, i entered the magical world of internet and read about iv's, ev's nature, etc. i also read up on the analysises of nearly every pokemon. soon i was able to beat every kid at my school. so, for more competitive play, i entered the world of smogon's shoddy server. i had some epic battles there, and i loved the chat, when Gen Empoleon posted his warstory. I read it, and i loved it, but i was sad i couldnt respond. Soon, i was reading all kinds of threads here, and i finally figured out how to be a member thanx to my shoddy friends. And, BTW, this is my first post. ^^
 
I browsed the strategy dex here a few times to help me with battling online, but rarely visit the forums. "You last visited: July 16th, 2006 at 11:04 AM"

I'm rather of an old school user. The current gen isn't too interesting to me. Very hard to find GSC opponents, it probably has the least popular competitive scene of any gen.
 
A lot of my friends were into Pokemon in 1st and 2nd grade. I eventually wanted to give it a try and at the same time, my cousin was trying to get rid of his Pokemon games. He gave me his Yellow and I was hooked.

A couple generations later, I was looking for a good set on google for a porygon2 and a garchomp. I clicked on a few before trying smogon.com. I looked at the analyses and eventually decided to join.
 
I started in Red, then Silver, then Ruby, Emerald, and Pearl. By Pearl I was a disciple of a little site called www.serebii.com. I'd read up on the pokemon and tried to pick strong ones and create good sets. I read some of the articles on the site about competitive battling, and wanted more. I googled competitive pokemon battling and found the number one result, smogon.com.

For a while I just read the movesets, but then I started Shoddybattling, and then i made a smogon account and now i'm (almost) a respectable member of the smogon community.

Yah, i've been on shoddy for years... since like october
 
How I got into Pokémon:-

When I was a little (can't remember exactly how old I was), my brother gave me his Game Boy Color as a gift (and the fact he sort of didn't want it anymore). Of course, he had already bought games such as that war game and other stuff. One of those games was Red(or Blue..not sure), of all those games I liked playing Pokémon the most (and the longest). There was a while where I paused from playing Pokemon Red(or Blue), and watched the Pokémon Anime. After a while *not that long*, I went to a video game store, where it features "Pokémon Yellow", I heard that it had all starters and it's based on the Anime, so I bought. At that time, I really enjoyed playing it, going with a super noobish team, but who hasn't? later on I got into a second pause (this one is longer), until I got ~12 I bought me a GBA Advance Sp, and later on saw "new" Pokémon games at the store, there was Sapphire and Ruby right in front of me, I bought Sapphire, got hocked up, bought Ruby, then Leaf Green, then Emerald (at this time I sort of got into competitive battling).

How I started playing competitively/found Smogon:-

After I finished playing Emerald *the first time*, I started reading about competitive battling on Serebii, I read the article about EVs, nature, but not IVs (cause at that time, for some reason I thought EVs=IVs :\). Got me an Adamant Metagross EV trained it, and on Leaf Green I SRed a Modest Porygon EV trained it (max SpA only lol) and evolved to Pory2 and leveled it up +90. Later on, while the long wait for d/p I read about IVs, and also at that time, my friend J. (known as Absol 20/20 both on Serebii and Smogon), told that there's a great Pokémon site for competitive battling; Smogon. At first, I wasn't drawn, but when I saw the analysis on the main site, I started reading them and help some guys on Serebii with them (when they ask what's a good moveset for X). Over the time I got into Smogon and started reading articles (Guides, X-Acts articles..etc.). While reading through the topics, I saw many mention this "Shoddy", I knew it's a simulator because of the lines they say it in, but I wasn't sure where to get it from, so I searched through the topics until I found a link and found Shoddybattle.com and I downloaded Shoddy. Ever since, I've been building/testing/playing there.

Why I stayed:-

This one's simple, pretty much the same reasons that got me into Smogon, all the info about competitive battling.

***Thank you Smogon***
 
When/How I Got Into Pokemon:

I was very, very young when Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow came out, but I watched the show every morning, before school (I'd wake up extra early so I wouldn't miss anything). The idea of strange creatures that you could capture and befriend piqued my interest immensely, and the Pokemon battling was the icing on the cake. When I was about six years old, my older cousin started babysitting me, and she would let me play Pokemon Yellow to keep me quiet, and that got me hooked on the game series. I remember, by the time I was seven, I had beaten the Elite Four and started training my Pokemon to L100. When the Gold/Silver/Crystal era came, I was a bit discouraged by the Pokemon designs, so I stopped playing. A bit before the third generation, I was fully convinced that Pokemon was just for little kids, which I wasn't, because I was ten. When the Diamond/Pearl era came around, the beginning of Middle School, I watched a peer of mine training his Piplup for the first GYM, and my interest was hastily snatched. I asked my younger friend if I could borrow his Pearl (he had Diamond as well), and he said I could, as long as I didn't save. I started a new game, as a rush of nostalgia swept over me. I bought Pearl, which I lost, and then bought Diamond. Skip a year or two into the future. I was in the backseat of my dad's car, with my aforementioned younger friend and his cousin, and we were on our way to our first Pokemon tournament!

Younger friend gave me his AR, which I used to Rare Candy all my Pokemon up to 100. Of course at that time, I hadn't an inkling of what IVs or EVs were, so I figured if you catch a Pokemon at L1 (AR) and Rare Candy it to 100, it would have relatively high stats. Fast forward to GameStop, on my first round. Fast forward again, to my house. I was massaging my sore anal cavity. Needless to say, I was raped horrible on the first round. I needed to get better, and fast.

Fast forward to the official Nintendo World Tournament (or whatever the hell it was called). I had signed up for it, and having learned of breeding for natures, egg moves, and EVs, I was breeding and EV training like mad. I didn't make it to the tournament (only had 100 or so spots for the qualifiers, and they picked at random out of 9,000 or so people), and even if I did, I wouldn've gotten horribly raped. I still didn't know about the metagame, building good Pokemon, and building good teams.

Why I Came Here:
"Scrub, go to www.smogon.com." So I did. And I was simply blown away. I spent hours going through each Pokemon's overview, and with the help of some more experienced players, I made my first-ever competitive team.

As for these forums, I lurked for a good five months (as I do for any forum), and a few days ago, I joined. It's as simple as that.

Why I Plan On Staying:

A large information database. Members. The drive to improve my game. Mekkah. Need I say more? Also, I hope to join a few of Smogon's tournaments, and perhaps become somewhat known. As for now, I'm just a faceless newbie.

But enough about me, Smogon. What about you? How are the wife and kids?
 

vashta

"It was pretty cool to watch Tim Duncan from afar"
is a Smogon Media Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
How I got into Pokémon!

I got into Pokémon non-competitively at the age of four when the trading cards were just introduced - it was a hit in my infant's school and I just had to have them! I was a keen collector and carried on collecting for a solid four years. After the "Poké-craze" seemed to have slowed down, I decided to embark on Playing Pokémon via Gameboy Advanced - Pokémon Gold. After playing from 2002-2003, I finally took a break and decided to get into collecting Digimon cards, thinking I'd never get back into Pokémon. However, in the latter of 2004, Pokemon came back into my life after the release of Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire: I found these games highly entertaining and quickly got back into the swing of Pokémon. During this time, I had taken an interesting liking to the cartoon series which was being aired here in the UK and stuck to Pokémon right the way through to Pokémon Pearl and Diamond's release. This was a must buy game and was something I absolutely needed, and finally, in 2007, I got the game! :D

Since late July 2008, I have been playing competitively on Pokémon Shoddy once paired with my first tutor, Schaft.

How did I get here?

A friend of mine from YouTube linked me to this site for Pokémon set recommendations. I grew to visit Smogon daily, looking for movesets and reading articles. In August, I finally decided to join after wanting to become a member of this community. Unfortunately, it is only as of late that I have decided to start posting! :|

Why did I decide to stay?

I saw the contributions members of Smogon had brought forward to the site for "the Pokémon public's" needs for moveset help and articles on how to build sucessful themed-teams and other things of the sort. I, in the near future, wish to also contribute and help those who are in the same needs as I was some months ago.
 
When I got into Pokemon:

Back in August of 1999, it was my cousins 6th b-day (I was 7 at the time and I'm now 17) and he was talkin about Pokemon. I was like "whar's that?" He got Red Version for his b-day and popped it into his Game Boy Color. I was in awe and got Red myself the next week. I got into competitive battling in June of 2007 when my friend and I heard about EV's and were lookin for sites to battle people.

How did I get here?

That same friend and I found new sites and stuck with them for a while. I heard about Smogon from that friend and decided to join.

Why'd I stay here?

There is almost always someone lookin for a battle and a lotta members.
 
How I got into Pokemon?

Well, It all started one day about 2 years back, the time when I really got into pokemon. Before that I was hooked to the anime and loved it from 2002-2004. Then the day arrived 2 years back, before which I started losing interest in pokemon, that night my parents had invited my school friend for dinner, and he took hit GBA SP and started touring me around pokemon ruby and its elite four. Five minutes into that game, and I started to master it, it felt as though pokemon and me were bond together with destiny. I begged him for lending me the cartridge, only to be refused. I then bought it on the internet and sinse then...Well, what can I say, Pokemon was,is and always will remain great.

How I found Smogon.

I actually found out about smogon from Serebii, who I found from MArriland, who my little sister found. It started when I was on Serebii Wi-Fi chat, battling on Wi-Fi, without a clue what tiers are. So I started out using Garchomp and Wobbuffet, when this meanie came and said they are banned, I said they aren't. Then he said "go l00k on sm0gon".

I went and immediatly hated it for this was the site that banned my favorite pokemon from competetive play. But then I started checking it more often, and stumbled upon the forums, which is a great place.


Though I still hate it that Garchomp is uber. '__'


Why I plan on staying

Its a cool cool place, with people who almost created the metagame to be balanced ( Jumpman, Mekkah, caelum, X-Act etc.)

And, I plan on becoming the pokemon master!
 
How I got into Pokemon

I was that kid that never had the money or the parents indulgent enough to actually get the game or even a Game Boy back in primary. So basically, when the craze swept through I became the expert by memorizing everything I saw the kids with the games do. Eventually I had a friend who introduced me to No$GB, and a Japanese ROM of the Yellow Version. I had to teach myself every single move and item, but god, I'll never forget it.
I did the same with Silver in the next gen, then for a couple of years forgot about the whole craze. Then I got given a Sapphire ROM and VBA by a different friend, which reignited the interest along with a Gym Leader strategy guide a girl in my class let me read (I still have that copy on the shelf). I went from there to Emerald, then had to wait for a DS emulator that worked well enough to run Diamond. I downloaded it (!!!) within six hours of its release.
I finally got off my arse and saved enough money for a DS and Diamond a couple of years ago, and imported Platinum, partially to make up for years of piracy.

How I found Smogon

I've been interested in competitive battling since late 2000, when I learned about EVs and IVs in a magazine, and have been looking at instances of it from then on. I'm not sure how I ended up on Marriland's YouTube channel, but he mentioned Smogon as a place with some seriously good battlers in one of his videos. I've been lurking here for a while now, maybe a year and a half?

Why I'm staying

1 part terminal boredom with life;
3 parts competitive spirit;
2 parts appreciation for the rare internet commodity that is intelligence.

Shake with ice and serve garnished with mint.
 
How I Got Into Pokemon:
Well, I was at my Grandma's house visiting her when I was 7 or 8. Ii was watching YTV, as having over 3 channels is a rare commodity at my house (fuck, I only have 2 channels now), and Video Arcade Top 20 comes on and it shows Pokemon Yellow. I was like "Fuck yeah!" seeing a little yellow rat that you owned beating the hell out of Eevee.

Christmas then came, and I wrote to Santa for a Game Boy Colour and Pokemon Yellow. I never got them because my parents hated video games or didn't want me playing it until I was older or something like that.

I them started scalping game time off classmates in Grade 4 when Gold and Silver came out. I learned every trick out of the book and hell, I even knew how to do the cloning method in GSC.

My neighbour then got a GBA, Ruby, and Sapphire. I asked him if I could have a file on his Sapphire, and he gave it to me. I played it and beat the Elite 4 , but I never hit any Pokemon to Level 100.

Then in late spring-early summer, 2007, I bought myself my own DS with Pokemon Diamond.


How I Found Smogon:
In June, 2007, my favorite wrestler, Chris Benoit, died. I had no contacts IRL, so I resorted to going on the internet to connect with people. As I was using GameFAQs for a long time, I felt like joining the boards there. Due to my rural position, GameFAQs didn't recognise the ISP as a legitimate one, so I was stuck with the shitty Level 1 account until a week ago.

I then thought to myself, "Now that you've been rejected from GameFAQs, so I'm going to go where those little motherfuckers hate." Because I lurked so much in the Diamond forums in GameFAQs, I knew where to go.

Smogon University.


Why I Stayed:
After getting infracted twice on the first day, I started to think that I wasn't wanted. That is, until the first round of the DP Apprenticeship. I became a decent battler, but then I started to get bored, so I stopped battling on a regular basis.

Next came the Mafias in Firebot. I enjoyed watching the mafias being played out, but then I wanted to be in the action, so I signed up for Jackal's Zelda Mafia. I wasn't picked, so I thought on how to get in easier. I remembered from one previous visit from Giga-Punch at #smogon that you could play mafia at #fluodome.

Nowadays, it is Firebot, #fluodome, and #space that keeps me here. I became more better known thanks to Junior, Aamto, gk, Jumpluff aka Misaki-chi, Max, Goborage, Gmax, Rev, Jackal, Thunda, and a few more people that don't really come to my mind right now.

So yeah, that's a bit of my life's story (and I also fucking suck at ending) and also:





lynching Junior D1 (<3<3<3<3)
 

Theorymon

Have a wonderful day, wahoo!
is a Site Content Manageris a Forum Moderatoris a Community Contributoris a Smogon Discord Contributoris a Pokemon Researcheris a Top Contributoris a Top Smogon Media Contributoris a Social Media Contributor Alumnusis a Community Leader Alumnusis a CAP Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
How I got in to Pokemon
Lord, all I renember is that I played red version when I was four and named my Charmander B, lol.

How I found Smogon
I decided one day that I was finally going to play competitive pokemon sometime in 2006, as the only thing preventing me from doing so was breeding. It just so happened that I found Smogon via google during the time Stark Mountain was called Uncharted Territory. Thus I lurked smogon everyday untill this month, when I decided to get off my lazy ass and join!:toast:

Why I stayed
I'm staying in Smogon because it's about the only thing I care about Pokemon, battling! Oh, and because Smogon is a great community. :heart:
 
I started playing Pokémon games about ten years ago, starting with Red. My version was seriously glitchy, almost to the point of defective, but I liked it even more for that. I had battles once in a while with my neighbour, Scott*, who's about a year and a half older than I am, and was my best friend at the time. We were both complete idiots when it came to Pokémon (I distinctly remember him saying that Bubblebeam was a great move). After a while, I got Silver and started being even more of an idiot (I ran away from Ho-oh and Lugia, lol). A few years later, I got Sapphire when it came out, and Scott got Ruby. I was still an idiot (I used my only Master Ball on Kyogre, and watched Scott catch Groudon in a regular Poké ball) though I was getting better. We would have battles every now and then, and we were about equal. I decided I wanted to be better, so I turned to the internet for advice. A Google search brought me to Serebii and I found out about the competitive Pokémon community (well, Serebii's community, anyway). I learned a lot from the Pokémon of the Week section, and visited the forum, though I never bothered signing up, and I still don't have an account there.
One day, when I was reading the Pokémon of the Week, I saw a mention of Smogon. I had no idea what it was, and I didn't think anything of it. But then he mentioned Smogon again, and again, and I realized that I had to find out what it was. That brought me here. For some reason, I didn't bother making an account here either, but I was reading the forum and studied the Pokémon analyses thouroughly. Essentially, (though I wasn't thinking of it at the time) I've been lurking since the days of R/S.
I downloaded Netbattle after I read about it everywhere, and started kicking ass. I actually came up with what I still consider to be a pretty strong team, consisting of Skarmory, Umbreon, Blissey, Suicune, Celebi, and Breloom, which happen to be some of my favourite Pokes. (Well, not SkarmBliss, but who wasn't using them in ADV?)
When D/P came out, I was quick to get a copy. It's pretty great, and I actually started EV training for the first time. My current in-game team is something like Empoleon, Infernape, Azelf, Garchomp, Swampert, and Sceptile, though I don't own Battle Revolution or anything, so I won't be using it competitively.
I'm staying here to improve my skills further. I'm always looking to improve and I know I won't get that from anywhere else. I also love this community, some of the people here are simply awesome and it's about time that I became a part of it. Lately, I decided that if I'm going to come here, I need to get to know every aspect of it, so I started lurking on the IRC. I've probably lurked enough everywhere else to make up for it, but whatever. It's complicated. There's a pretty fine line between not lurking enough and not contributing enough. I've just seen so many people get mocked (or worse, get their topics moved to Trou) that I'm always reluctant to post. At the same time though, that seems to show that the mods here have an amazing sense of humour.

Sorry for posting my life story, lol.

Edit: I agree with cyberzero here. CAP is the main reason I come to Smogon every day. I'm always looking forward to the next stage in the process, or maybe my next battle on the ladder. I'm fairly well-known there, and I tend to battle quite a bit better in CAP than in Standard.

Bitches need to try out Doug's CAP server sometime.
 
How I got into teh mons.
Around 12 years ago my mom and me dad gave me a gameboy and a copy of blue. I was addicted from the beginning. I just loved this little world of pokeymans where I could from this stupid small town I live in that it just never left me. I'm now 20 and still loving and probably will never stop.(oh btw, pokemon pwns any RTRPGs anyday)

How I came to smogon.
After being on pe2k for 2 years (still there), I really wanted to go to a good site where I can brush up on my competitive battling skills. I really do it for fun, but I want to become good so smogon here I come.

Why I stay.
When I first logged on here I looked at who was on. I said "OH, SH*T. THATS A LOT OF PEOPLE." and I was looking for a good active site with a lot of people. Also, I luuuuv to kick little kids asses at this game B)
 
How I got into Pokemon: My friend were into it in RBY and we played it back then. I played through GSC, but fell off the train before ADV came out. For some reason I decided to pick up Pokemon Diamond after it came out. To this day, I don't know what made me want to buy it, but I did.

How I Found Smogon: I dunno. I started out at Gamefaqs, and somewhere along the way, I stumbled across smogon.

Why I stayed: Because I did research and got a shiny Green Badge. (Side Note: I like math and am planning on being a math teacher) Then I hung out with people on IRC and it turned out that I was actually useful.
 
How I got into Pokemon: I actual started a bit late, I was playing RBY when RS were out then I got GS and finally got into adv, quit for a year sold all my games returned to 2nd gen, then 3rd, and now 4th.

How I Found Smogon: Serebii was super ghey, too many idiots, though I was one of them.

Why I stayed: People here are generally smart, it's fun.
 
How I got into Pokemon: I started playing pokemon at about kindergarten, but I never really got into it. It was at around 9th grade that I started to take interest in competitive battling, thus I decided to join smogon.

How I Found Smogon: My friend suggested this site to me, so I went there and I joined.

Why I stayed: There are a lot of pokemon strategies that I didn't know of. I decided to play pokemon with the more competitive players since they always give me a challenge.
 
Hello!

How I got into Pokemon: I have always been a fan of strategy games and role playing games, and it was during my first year of college that I saw my roommate playing Pokemon XD. I was interested in the overall mechanics of the battles and the collection / assortment of Pokemon that were available in the game. It was at the point where I bought a GBA and Pokemon Emerald and got to work in learning the game. Over the next year or so I completed the R/S/E saga and proceeded to the FR/LG generation of games. I have spent the past year or so tweaking my collection of the 1st - 3rd generation of Pokemon and now have a fully complete and legit set of the 386. I am now in the process of playing D/P at the moment and looking forward to expanding my collection. I hope that I can take part as an active breeder / battler in the Smogon community as the approaching of Platinum draws closer.

How I found Smogon: I was looking through different Pokemon sites and resources and found a link to Smogon. I've spent some time reading over a couple of treads / articles / and watching several Shoddy battle and am glad that I found this site as I progress in my playing of the game as a competitive battler and breeder.

Why I stayed: Well...not too much to say here right now, so far I like the overall environment of the community and the research being conducted atm. I hope that I will add my support to the community and learn and give back to this site as I wait for Platinum to arrive!

---------

<Off-topic> I hope everyone that is capable of getting a Shaymin is having luck with getting one that they want! I am currently working on my Manaphy / Darkrai / Shaymin in hopes of getting ones with great IVs and Natures; I'll post any really good ones if I get it.
 
How I got into Pokemon: I watched the anime when I was a kid >_>. I was like 6, that was the age that you liked whatever you saw, so I was into every show that was on at the time.

How I found Smogon: I forgot about Pokemon, 9 years later, but I still secretly played the games. I overheard a conversation that my friend was having with a n00b with Pokemon cards, and he said that SD Feraligatr was better than DD Feraligatr, and I inconspicuously walked by and said "No it isn't." Then he showed me Smogon and voila, I was right and he wasn't.

Why I stayed: CAP. I love the community, I love the Pokemon, I love the process. CAP is why I stayed on Smogon, always gives me something to look forward to unlike most other forums.
 
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