All Gens Ruins of Alph Player of the Week: Fear

APPROVED BY JELLICENT

Hey guys, you may have seen around the forums "Player of the Week" threads for various tiers, where top players of each tier are interviewed. There was never one for RoA though which i found odd, not only is there a much larger pool of players to interview but a lot of past gen players have really interesting insight into the game, or history playing, and it seemed a shame not to interview them or interview them within the context of a tier they don't play regularly or to as much success. This project aims to fix that by interviewing players that have had success in past generations or are more well-known for their achievements there than they are in XY / ORAS.

For now to avoid forum clutter I'm going to keep the interviews in the same thread. While this may make it more difficult to find the next interview, I will change the title, add the post number and provide a link to the post in the OP here to make it easier. This hopefully shouldn't lessen interest as it has been working fine in the Pokemon throughout the ages thread. Regardless, let's start.

Interview - Player

Week 1 - Atticus
Week 2 - idiotfrommars
Week 3 - babidi1998
Week 4 - McMeghan
Week 5 - gene
Week 6 - Smurf.
Week 7 - Jirachee
Week 8 - BKC
Week 9 - Lavos
Week 10 - boudouche
"Week" 11 - panamaxis
Week 12 - ToF
Week 13 - Borat
Week 14 - Earthworm
Week 15 - Heysup
Week 16 - august
Week 17 - Floppy
Week 18 - SOMALIA
 
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Atticus
Favourite pokemon?

GARCHOMP

How did you get involved into competitive Pokemon?

I bought myself a copy of Pokemon Pearl and was intrigued by the WiFi support. I wanted to learn how to get good at the game so I headed towards Serebii to learn about ~advanced tech~ like IVs/EVs and natures. I performed the noob’s journey of traversing around cesspools like Gamefaqs and Marriland before finally joining Smogon in 2007. I enrolled in the tutoring program and got paired with JabbatheGriffin. I really like to think Jabba is the one who transformed me from being a Wifi scrub into an actual competitive player that steered away from gimmicks like Trickroom in the sand. Jabba then introduced me to Shoddybattle and without sounding cliche, the rest was history.

What past gen tier are you most known for playing, and what are some of your greatest achievements in playing (in either this tier or in general)?

DPP without question. My single greatest achievement is undoubtedly being the first person to win the Smogon Frontier. Back then the Frontier was actually considered to be invincible and nobody thought it would ever be beaten. (ha!ha!ha!) I was so proud of myself for winning and it really put my name on the map in terms of being one of the elite DPP players.

What are your favourite old gen tiers and why?

Well DPP goes without saying but I’m also a huge fan of RBY and play it whenever I can with scrubs like kd24. I think people really need to cut RBY some slack. It’s an RNG fest but much like poker, the better player usually ends up winning in the long run. DPP UU is also one of my favorites, that tier really did encapsulate the essence of what competitive mons was all about. The fact that the DPP UU still has a cult following doesn’t surprise me at all, it really was one of the greatest tiers of competitive Pokemon that I’ve been involved with even if I didn’t get to play it much.

What are some of your most often used Pokemon in the tiers that you play?

Some of my personal favorites include: YacheChomp (does this even count), Flygon, Gengar (I always felt gar’s typing and offensive prowess fit my style very well), Kingdra, Heatran, Azelf and honestly it would be easier to name stuff I rarely used.

What type of playstyle do you enjoy using the most in these tiers?

Offense without question. I’ve always felt my style reflected a more of turn by turn basis of thinking rather than planning for the long haul and that’s where I excelled. Making extremely risky moves early in the game to keep the momentum is what I always liked to do. There’s no better feeling than consistently out predicting your opponent and making them look dumb. Do I think this style is optimal though? Of course not. Guys like Earthworm and McMeghan who try to make the ideal move every turn were obviously more consistent than me. But there is one thing cool about my style and that is I could beat anyone on any given day even if it meant losing to guys I technically shouldn’t have lost to like tito.

Do you consider yourself having innovated or popularised any sets throughout your time playing?

ChestoKingdra, hell the site’s analysis still uses my shitty inefficient EV spread.. I swear to God, you have no idea how many games this set won for me back when it was relatively unknown. I’ll talk more about this below :)

Are there any specific games you've played that you consider really great?

As for specific matches I think beating VIL in an extremely intense World Cup match is one of my favorites. It meant a lot to me considering I was still relatively unknown at the time and wanted to make a name for myself. I managed to pull off a ridiculous comeback after being down pretty much the entire game. There’s actually a log of it floating around somewhere if anyone cares enough to read a pastebin of a match.

Are there any changes to older tiers that you think would be beneficial?

Unbanning Latias from DPP would be a good start. I’m not really OK with unbanning Salamence but if it meant more activity on the DPP ladder fuck it, bring on the fat bastard.

Who do you look up to as a player and/or person, and which players are you close friends with?

I always admired Gouki’s style. There was something about him Earthquaking a roosting Crobat in an old DP UU tour that triggered the competitive spark in me. Not to mention I was actually really good friends with him before I won a single tournament and continued to be for a while until he went to Hong Kong or some other Asian country. [I haven’t spoken to him in years :( ]

As for friends I wouldn’t know where to begin and I’m not really in the mood to create a shopping cart list full of names, let’s just say you know who you are.

Are there any old players who you wish would come back, either to play again or just to talk to?

Tons. goofball, loki, hanke, grizzly bear, gouki, brian mccann, earthworm, baris just to name a few. I understand why they left, there just comes a time when Pokemon becomes boring and you move on from it. Those were just the guys that were active in the era I played in. Wishing for them to come back is kinda like asking a bunch of 80s rock bands to start playing again just to nostalgiagasm me.

How do you feel about the comparatively larger successes of newer players recently, for example, in this year's OST?

I have the utmost respect for the newer crop of players. I’m gonna go on a bit of a soap box here but think it’s really naive and kind of condescending to suggest one era of the game was better than the other. Will we ever know if McMeghan in his prime could beat husk in his? No, but to suggest one is clearly better than the other is absolutely fucking retarded. It would kinda be like comparing Michael Jordan to Lebron James, you’re just never going to know who was better. Sure you can number crunch their tournament stats and that kinda crap but you’ll never truly know and that’s OK.

With that said though I have no idea who any of the players are in the final 4 of the OST other than the mighty WhiteQueen. I’m sure they’re all good though, unless they get advice from sogeking. jajaja

How do you feel about smogon as a whole right now?

It certainly feels different, but I’m sure it’s the same. There’s that old adage that the names may change but the streets remain the same. I think that sums up my thoughts on the matter perfectly.

Any teams you feel fit you as a player particularly well?

Azelf @ Choice Band
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 16 HP / 240 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Explosion
- U-turn
- Zen Headbutt
- Fire Punch

Heatran (M) @ Shuca Berry
Trait: Flash Fire
EVs: 108 HP / 148 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Earth Power
- Fire Blast
- Stealth Rock
- Will-O-Wisp

Gengar (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Shadow Ball
- Substitute
- Pain Split
- Focus Blast

Kingdra (M) @ Chesto Berry
Trait: Swift Swim
EVs: 144 HP / 160 Atk / 40 SDef / 164 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Dragon Dance
- Waterfall
- Outrage
- Rest

Flygon (M) @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 244 Atk / 12 Def / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Earthquake
- U-turn
- Outrage
- Thunderpunch

Jirachi @ Leftovers
Trait: Serene Grace
EVs: 252 HP / 4 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Calm Mind
- Psychic
- Thunderbolt
- Wish


This team absolutely destroyed 2010. I went something like 4-0 in SPL1 and 3-0 in WCoP with this. Not to mention the entire Brazilian team copied my team with hilarious EV’s and had some moderate success with it. This was without a doubt this was my most successful team. It wasn’t anything special honestly.

If there was a lesson to be had from the structure of the team it would be that even the most plain bread and butter OU team with one surprise mon (in this case ChestoKingdra) can really do well in a tournament setting. At the time I took advantage of the fact that the main way people handled Kingdra was by statusing it and hoping that itself would completely shut it down. Now I’m not saying to use HP Ice on Garchomp or something that far out there but just be creative. Find out what the most common ways of handling the best threats are in the current metagame and exploit that. I always find myself thinking “fuck if he has <uncommon MOVE X> on that I’m gonna get bopped.

Final question - do you have any interest in playing again seriously in the future if you could say that you've quit?

I’ll always love Pokemon and will occasionally play on the ladder when I’m bored. As for playing in a tournament setting though I don’t think I could have asked for a better swan song than the spring of 2014 where I somehow managed to win SPL and OST in the same month. Without trying to sound gay, although the competitive spirit in me died a long time ago, the friendships I’ve made within the community will live on for as long as I have mIRC installed on my computer.

Thanks a lot for the interview Atticus, and feel free to ask questions below =)
 
Atticus

Who are the best players from your time and what makes them different from the others?

In your opinion, which was the best team tournament that you had the pleasure to play/watch in smogon?

This one might be a pain to answer, so don't mind answering if you don't feel like it. I have a hard time building teams in dpp. Even though I have a decent knowledge about the metagame, I always feel like that I'm not able to build my team the way I really want it to be. Did you go through something like this in your early days playing the game? Long story short, what is your team building process?

Which were the bests editions of ost and smogtour that you played or watched?

And finally, I'm a huge fan of your playstyle, I hope that you are still going to play tournaments like wcop and spl :]
 
Happy to read you. We never played against, last Frontier I have played (and lost) vs Phlips and DracoMalfoy.

By the way, they are some questions for you.

1) What is your match that you remember as prodigious?
2) Around Sash Lead, do you prefer Aerodactyl, Heatran, or Machamp?
3) How much is constraining choose your leader team? And how much do you think it's constraining for a BW/XY player who use to uptake from wifi-clause?
3) Weather in DPP. Is it a good strategy in your opinion?
 
Hey Atticus. I wasn't around when you were at your prime but being the first to win Frontier looks like quite an accomplishment.

  • What would you say the best way to improve DPP metagame and team building knowledge is ? Maybe you could give me some tours to watch the logs/replays of or something, that'd be much appreciated.
  • In your opinion, what is different when it comes to in-game plans between DPP and ORAS/BW ?
  • What does VIL mean ? Who might have the pastebin ?
  • Were you a tutor at some point ?
  • Why did you lose the competitive mindset ?
Thanks a lot :)
 
Great interview Atticus. You've always been one of the few DPP players I look up too. I miss Shoddy battle so much. Not sure if you'd remember, but my name used to be TwiiSTeD. Anyway, my question is in what way(if any) do you think DPP is different now than back then?
 
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MoxieInfinite

Banned deucer.
lol im loving this idea

Top 5 DPP players at the end of the era (basically when BW took over)? And yes you have to rank them :D

do borat sometime please
 

Lavos

Banned deucer.
who is the best team in the AL east and why is it the red sox?

most cancer meta?

why dont you talk in #scooters?

favorite pokemon from a purely aesthetic standpoint?

are you a nice guy?

aside: this is a great idea, please interview more people in a similar style.
 

Ojama

Banned deucer.
GeeMick ViL=Veteran in Love, a great player of the past.
For Atticus, many questions will be asked, but none like this one:
What's the origin of the name Atticus?

Requesting trc to include this in future interviews.
Atticus is a yugioh GX character.

You know why I'll always consider you as a very special friend and as a very special person in my career. You're one of the 5 best players ever in my opinion and it's a shame the new generation of players doesn't consider you as one of the best players when you won OST + Frontier in the DPP era + 2 SPL...

I have several questions:

- Do you consider yourself a better player than Earthworm or Gouki? Those are the names that are always mentioned when talking about the old best players. You've always been discreet like panamaxis so people sometimes forget about you but do you think you'd be considered as a better player than Gouki/Earthworm had you been more "active"/ had you posted more?

- Why did you never play the Smogon Tour seriously?

- How do you explain your OST victory? Not saying you won it by "accident" but it was clearly a surprise to everyone because you didn't seem to practice a lot in this tier.

- Is there any solution to bring back the very competitive Ladder we had in DPP on Shoddy?
 

Sapientia

Wir knutschen
is a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Dedicated Tournament Host Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnusis a Past SPL Champion
Just posting to say, that you're a quality guy and player.

Since I'm supposed to ask questions: Are you still salty because of OST6?
 

Atticus

Atticus
is a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnuswon the 10th Official Smogon Tournamentdefeated the Smogon Frontieris a Two-Time Past SPL Champion
Atticus

Who are the best players from your time and what makes them different from the others?

In your opinion, which was the best team tournament that you had the pleasure to play/watch in smogon?

This one might be a pain to answer, so don't mind answering if you don't feel like it. I have a hard time building teams in dpp. Even though I have a decent knowledge about the metagame, I always feel like that I'm not able to build my team the way I really want it to be. Did you go through something like this in your early days playing the game? Long story short, what is your team building process?

Which were the bests editions of ost and smogtour that you played or watched?

And finally, I'm a huge fan of your playstyle, I hope that you are still going to play tournaments like wcop and spl :]
The best players from my time were Gouki, Earthworm, and husk. There were tons of other amazing players like panamaxis, august, Loki and ToF but I always felt those 3 were in a tier of their own.

Good question, I'd have to say SPL3 Scooters was my favorite which sounds weird considering we ended up losing. It was an amazing roller coaster where we went 8-1 in the regular season after getting blown out by the Ruiners in week 2. We won something like 4/5 tiebreakers and just seemed to be clutch all year. IMO we should have won but shit happens. It was just a quality team full of guys like rookie BKC, am, majintupac, floppy, franky and Bluewind (rip) as my assman.

My process is I have no process. I'm not gonna sit here and pretend like I was an amazing team builder because I was far from it. Laziness and just not being creative enough were my main downfalls. My model has always been to look at an existing team that was already successful, and tailor it to the modern metagame. Even the ChestoRest Kingdra team I built was based on a team by Remlabmez if any of you know him. So I guess my advice for inspiring team builders is to analyze what already works, and see why it works. There's a funny analogy between team building and starting a small business. People always want to reinvent the wheel with some new innovation nobody has ever seen when they could just as easily be successful by slightly modifying a product or service that already exists.

God, I wouldn't even know where to begin with the Smogon Tour. My favorites were probably from the time Earthworm won up until DarkLucario.

Happy to read you. We never played against, last Frontier I have played (and lost) vs Phlips and DracoMalfoy.

By the way, they are some questions for you.

1) What is your match that you remember as prodigious?
2) Around Sash Lead, do you prefer Aerodactyl, Heatran, or Machamp?
3) How much is constraining choose your leader team? And how much do you think it's constraining for a BW/XY player who use to uptake from wifi-clause?
4) Weather in DPP. Is it a good strategy in your opinion?
1) I mentioned in the interview that the VIL match was very important to me but some others could include my SPL finals game vs Ciele, and my last frontier match vs Gouki

2) Ha, funny question. I think sash tran is terrible and I'm not really a fan of Aero so I guess I'll say Machamp

3) Choosing a lead is always difficult. The best leads constantly change depending on the metagame. When I was active CB Azelf was really good because lead SR tran and other bulky SR leads were common. Being able to trade a lead for an SR mon always put me at an advantage. WiFi clause makes it so that traditional leads aren't really necessary so you can be build more "standard" teams in that scenario.

4) Depends really. I'm only going to talk about the non Sand weathers since Sand is just anything with TTar or a Hippo stall team.

Rain is really good if you know you're facing someone extremely offensive. Standard rain can just shit all over cookie cutter offense teams.

Sun sucks, don't use it

Hail is meh. Blizzard Mamo was kinda good in earlier DP since you could catch Skarmory's off guard with a nice meaty Blizzard but overall I think Hail kinda sucks too. Abomasnow is a good Pokemon though, I'm strictly talking about your conventional Hail team with Mamo/Walrein and the usual suspects.
 

Honus

magna carta
is a Top Team Rater Alumnusis a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnus
that playstyle you describe is really intriguing, i always kind of was under the impression that you cant win that way. you say you don't 'plan' for the long haul but i imagine you consider the win conditions and outcome of each move on that given turn, right? i'd like to hear more about your methods

who are some newer players that you rate highly?
 

bruno

is a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Past SPL Championis a Past WCoP Champion
World Defender
big fan.

Kind of a weird question, but when you're in a situation where you used rapid spin with your defensive Starmie and your opponent brought in Tyranitar(which you know that is scarfed based on his build / plays b4), and you know Starmie can be important later in the match, do you generally stay in predicting pursuit or switch? What do you think that is generally the best course of auction on the mentioned scenario? I kinda always doubt myself on it heh.
Also, any Pokémon you think that are underated in DPP?
 

PDC

street spirit fade out
is a Team Rater Alumnusis a Top Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Smogon Media Contributor Alumnusis a Four-Time Past WCoP Champion
this is actually a really cool idea and i like it quite a bit, always cool to ask older players and bring their insights on the game and the past community to light.

1. how different is the community back then from today? people always say that today the community is far more toxic than it had been previous, do you have any reason why this would be, if it is true at all?
2. favorite albums?
3. how nervous did you get during your biggest games (say the final game vs gouki)?
4. do you have any favorites to win smogon tour this year, or any people that you think would deserve to that are in the running?
 
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Atticus

Atticus
is a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnuswon the 10th Official Smogon Tournamentdefeated the Smogon Frontieris a Two-Time Past SPL Champion
Hey Atticus. I wasn't around when you were at your prime but being the first to win Frontier looks like quite an accomplishment.

  • What would you say the best way to improve DPP metagame and team building knowledge is ? Maybe you could give me some tours to watch the logs/replays of or something, that'd be much appreciated.
  • In your opinion, what is different when it comes to in-game plans between DPP and ORAS/BW ?
  • What does VIL mean ? Who might have the pastebin ?
  • Were you a tutor at some point ?
  • Why did you lose the competitive mindset ?
Thanks a lot :)
I'd recommend watching recent DPP matches from SPL (Past 2 years should be rather good) As cool as some pre 2012 matches are the fact of the matter is those teams are outdated and the game has changed.

There's a lot more planning that goes on in ORAS/BW. You also risk getting predicted a lot more easily early game simply because your opponent knows your team. DPP is more about scouting for information and learning on the go. ORAS/BW on the other hand is more about evaluating both teams and figuring out what your goal is right from the get go.

VIL = Veteran In Love, an old school player known mainly for ADV but he's also really good in RBY/GSC and DP

I was a tutor, albeit a poor one. I only had about two apprentices and I can't say I put in my best effort.

I got older and the game became more stressful than fun.

GeeMick ViL=Veteran in Love, a great player of the past.
For Atticus, many questions will be asked, but none like this one:
What's the origin of the name Atticus?

Requesting trc to include this in future interviews.
Atticus is the main character from the novel To Kill a Mockingbird. I signed up for Smogon around the time I was reading the novel in high school. Good book btw, if by any chance you didn't get a chance to read it I'd highly recommend giving it a shot.

Great interview Atticus. You've always been one of the few DPP players I look up too. I miss Shoddy battle so much. Not sure if you'd remember, but my name used to be TwiiSTeD. Anyway, my question is in what way(if any) do you think DPP is different now than back then?
Oh yes most definitely. Much like how modern ADV never had as much +Speed nature base 100's DPP has drastically changed over time. A lot of it has to do with banlist changes though. I started off in a metagame with Garchomp. Then played another with Wobbuffet and Deoxys-s before they were eventually banned. Finally we unbanned Latias before banning her and Salamence. If you're talking strictly about DPP post dragon bans there's also been a fair amount of change. I've noticed a definite increase in Zapdos lead usage, whether it's Specs or the Magnet set. There are tons of other little nuances like Dugtrio getting popular and TR Bronzong but at it's core the metagame has more or less stayed the same.

lol im loving this idea

Top 5 DPP players at the end of the era (basically when BW took over)? And yes you have to rank them :D

do borat sometime please
I don't really remember that time period very well. Some guys that I remember emerging though include Ojama, Bloo, McMeghan, and BKC.

what is the most fun gen 4 era? (dp w/ chomp, latimence, current)
I absolutely hated the LatiMence meta despite a lot of former DPP players saying it was their favorite. As much as I loved the Chomp meta Garchomp was one of the most unfair and punishing mons to ever exist in this game. Missing a +2 Chomp in the sand is straight up unfair. With that said I think the current Meta is the best one I've been involved with, or at least the most balanced.

who is the best team in the AL east and why is it the red sox?

most cancer meta?

why dont you talk in #scooters?

favorite pokemon from a purely aesthetic standpoint?

are you a nice guy?

aside: this is a great idea, please interview more people in a similar style.
It's either the Jays or Sox, if we had Stroman I'd take us but since our pitching is so questionable I'd probably give a slight edge to the Sox. Don't get cocky though, the Red Sox rotation is also pretty meh so to quote a wise man "it could go either way."

Good question, I'll go with that really early BW meta that had Darkrai and Shaymin-s, man that shit was bad.

I do talk in #scooters! Maybe we just don't get on at the same time

Pidgeot is fresh

I'd consider myself nice but fair
 

Clone

Free Gliscor
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Team Rater Alumnusis a Social Media Contributor Alumnusis a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Smogon Media Contributor Alumnus
Since I didn't get to interview u for POTW, I have a few questions:

  1. What playstyle do u feel is the best, or most consistent in DPP?
  2. How do u feel about how balanced ORAS is compared to other gens? Compared to XY specifically?
  3. Who's the dude in ur avi?
  4. If Garchomp did not have sand veil and instead only had rough skin, would it have been balanced in DPP or no?
  5. When is the best time to reveal your Lucario?
  6. Do I double to Crobat predicting the Breloom switch into my pert or do I go for rocks? TTar is on the field, loom isn't revealed, and Crobat is.
  7. Best way to play around looms spore in every generation it's been relevant in?
Come back and play ORAS so I can interview u for POTW imo =]
 
good interview :o

1. do you think there have been any recent trends in dpp
2. do analyses serve as a good enough reference atm or do you feel like they are outdated

I personally have trouble building in DPP due to the tier being hard to learn, but it seems like a fun tier o_o
 

Atticus

Atticus
is a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnuswon the 10th Official Smogon Tournamentdefeated the Smogon Frontieris a Two-Time Past SPL Champion
Atticus is a yugioh GX character.

You know why I'll always consider you as a very special friend and as a very special person in my career. You're one of the 5 best players ever in my opinion and it's a shame the new generation of players doesn't consider you as one of the best players when you won OST + Frontier in the DPP era + 2 SPL...

I have several questions:

- Do you consider yourself a better player than Earthworm or Gouki? Those are the names that are always mentioned when talking about the old best players. You've always been discreet like panamaxis so people sometimes forget about you but do you think you'd be considered as a better player than Gouki/Earthworm had you been more "active"/ had you posted more?

- Why did you never play the Smogon Tour seriously?

- How do you explain your OST victory? Not saying you won it by "accident" but it was clearly a surprise to everyone because you didn't seem to practice a lot in this tier.

- Is there any solution to bring back the very competitive Ladder we had in DPP on Shoddy?
- No, I think they were just better than me. Although I will say this, my record vs Gouki has always been around 50/50 whenever we played in tournaments and friendlies so take that as you will. He was always more consistent in other tournaments than me though. I never got to play Earthworm that much. I think we've faced each other like 3 times max.

- I played seriously in a couple tours. One when I was very young. (the one Earthworm won) I think I was like 15/16 at the time and I needed points from a particular OU tour which was by far my best tier as I wasn't really experienced in Ubers or UU. Anyway about that OU tour, I was at the beach with my family and all I remember thinking on the car ride home was "I can't believe I missed the last OU tour." Moving on I did play seriously in one Tour, I believe it was when IPL won. I made top 16 and got eliminated by Lady Bug. I thought I was fairly consistent in the Tour even though I didn't play in it much. I had something like a 60% win ratio in it and got far in plenty of tours. The reason I didn't play it as much was simply because I'm a fairly lazy person and 9 weeks of work + playoffs is really exhausting.

- It was a combination of luck, convenient pairings and I guess a bit of skill. As I've stated before my first 3 matches were a bye, Oglemi and macle, neither of which are really known for tournament play as much as they are in other facets of the site. I'm not gonna pretend I steamrolled both of them though, if you look up my match vs Oglemi I played extremely poorly and was bailed out by some luck. As the tournament went on though I just got better and more in form. It also helped that SPL was going on at the same time so you could say I was getting back into "match fitness". I had tons of help when it came to team building as guys like CTC, PDC, Dice and BKC all gave me an ample amount of teams to work with. It was just a perfect storm really, a lot of stuff went my way but I did play pretty well in the later rounds.

- No, unfortunately. I've had days where I tried to play DPP on the ladder and even with both Showdown and PO open looking for a match, it still took me like 5-10 minutes just to find a single match.

If you're talking about ORAS OU having a competitive ladder I'm not sure. A lot of that has to do with the culture. Back when I started playing although official tournaments were big, the ladder was definitely the core of competitive play. Nowadays it's all about getting that trophy and the goal is entirely based around winning big tournaments rather than laddering. I don't think it'll ever go back to the way it was simply because "team play" where a bunch of guys get together and discuss moves turn by turn to help a single individual has become the norm. Laddering was all about proving you, yourself was the best since ghosting was impractical, and I really doubt we'll ever have a ladder as stacked as it was in 2008 because of that. The ladder has been exclusively relegated to a testing ground and nothing more. I find it really sad when people say "oh you're first on the ladder, who gives a shit, try and win a tournament," when back in the day being first on the ladder was analogous to being the best player. With that said though I appreciate the efforts of the Tournament Directors with that recent ladder tournament, I thought it was a fantastic idea.

Just posting to say, that you're a quality guy and player.

Since I'm supposed to ask questions: Are you still salty because of OST6?
haha, I think that's the most salty I've ever got over Pokemon except the time where I raged at hanke. (I'm sry hanke if you ever get a chance to read this).

I'm not salty at all, in fact I've been over it for years. Although you did luck the shit out of me I remember haxing reachzero the round before so I should have just been fortunate to make it that far. You're a cool dude too and it's always nice to see the oldschool guys keep in touch.

that playstyle you describe is really intriguing, i always kind of was under the impression that you cant win that way. you say you don't 'plan' for the long haul but i imagine you consider the win conditions and outcome of each move on that given turn, right? i'd like to hear more about your methods

who are some newer players that you rate highly?
I may have overstated the emphasis of that style. I mainly played like that during my frontier run since I was still relatively young as a player. Over time I adapted the more "long run" approach and it definitely made me better. Also keep in mind that a turn by turn approach is wayyyy more viable in DPP since you have no idea what their team is where as in BW you're kind of forced to plan a strategy right away.

With that said though I'll explain what I mean by my "style." I jokingly refer to it as high risk-low reward. Take for example a friendly XY game I had with BKC. He had an Excadrill out and I had an Aegislash. Now I knew for a fact BKC likes to make solid predictions and I figured he'd go for a spin since he was running a Charizard team. I stayed in with Aegi and Shadow Ball'd, even though Aegislash was extremely important to winning and getting EQ'd there would have cost me the match. The very next turn I switched to Latios as BKC EQ'd and I remember him distinctly saying "your moves make no sense." While I kind of agreed with him, those couple of turns put me in an extremely good position to win, even if it meant risking an extremely important mon in Aegislash. I always maintained this mantra of even if you risk losing the match right there if you are 99% sure your opponent is gonna use a particular move just predict it. Fuck the risk involved, if you're confident in your ability just do it.

Ojama, BKC, and McMeghan are all guys I respect a ton and their consistency speaks for itself. I would have put Bloo in their too but some recent revelations have caused me to lose a lot of respect for said individual.
 
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So pretty much everyone agrees Gen DPP OU on Shoddy was the pinnacle of competitive pokemon? Damn I'm glad I played during that time then. Too bad I stopped doing it around the time Johto was confirmed.

Did you ever do Wifi battles on Serebii? Did you ever feel like you were the best evah owning 9 year old scrubs on there? Be honest, because I did. Smogon/Shoddy humbled me really fast

And last question, did you ever qualify for a vote for Garchomp's suspect test? If so what did you vote?
 
What is your opinion of the move Stealth Rock being present in basically every DPP OU team? Do you think it is good or bad that a move is so dominant? And how do you think the DPP metagame will be without Stealth Rock (and obviously Focus Sash)? More balanced perhaps?
Personally I don’t like one move having so much impact on the metagame. I don’t recall any other move having that big of an impact in gens before and gens after DPP, except maybe Stealth Rock in later gens lol
 

Atticus

Atticus
is a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnuswon the 10th Official Smogon Tournamentdefeated the Smogon Frontieris a Two-Time Past SPL Champion
big fan.

Kind of a weird question, but when you're in a situation where you used rapid spin with your defensive Starmie and your opponent brought in Tyranitar(which you know that is scarfed based on his build / plays b4), and you know Starmie can be important later in the match, do you generally stay in predicting pursuit or switch? What do you think that is generally the best course of auction on the mentioned scenario? I kinda always doubt myself on it heh.
Also, any Pokémon you think that are underated in DPP?
I mean I guess it depends. If Starmie is at 100% you could play it safe and recover. I don't remember the exact damage Crunch or a switch out Pursuit does but I think it's like 75% so at the very worst you switch out as a ~75% Starmie. I think if your opponent knows you're a bulky star they'd be more likely to crunch you at a high HP. If he doesn't know your spread then everything is up in the air. At the end of the day though this is just a complicated 50/50. Go with your gut.

As for underrated mons I'm not sure. Maybe Snorlax? Curse sets in particular can do a lot of damage depending on how you build around him.

this is actually a really cool idea and i like it quite a bit, always cool to ask older players and bring their insights on the game and the past community to light.

1. how different is the community back then from today? people always say that today the community is far more toxic than it had been previous, do you have any reason why this would be, if it is true at all?
2. favorite albums?
3. how nervous did you get during your biggest games (say the final game vs gouki)?
4. do you have any favorites to win smogon tour this year, or any people that you think would deserve to that are in the running?
1. I've always felt the usage of the word 'toxic' is just an internet buzzword for someone whining about something they don't like. I don't think the community is that much worse than it used to be. Contrary to popular belief, assholes and trolls still existed on Smogon 5 years ago.

2. Not really an album guy, I've always been the type to download individual songs that I like.

3. Incredibly nervous, I remember shaking trying to click the accept tab when I got the challenge. When the battle started though I settled down. I've always been more prone to pregame jitters rather than during the actual match.

4. Nobody in particular, I know this is a rather boring reply but I'd expect the usual top tier dudes to take it. (McM, Ojama etc)

do you have any of your frontier logs
or anything noteworthy rly
Unfortunately most of them got deleted when I upgraded my computer. There could be some pastebins floating around out there but it would be a pointless exercise for me to try finding them. If you want some games of me though I could link you to some Youtube matches.


This is a battle of the week match I had with Pana back in 2010. It was a pretty good game and I felt I played well all the way through: If you want some more recent games though I'd recommend looking here. All of my SPL logs from last year are in this topic.

Since I didn't get to interview u for POTW, I have a few questions:

  1. What playstyle do u feel is the best, or most consistent in DPP?
  2. How do u feel about how balanced ORAS is compared to other gens? Compared to XY specifically?
  3. Who's the dude in ur avi?
  4. If Garchomp did not have sand veil and instead only had rough skin, would it have been balanced in DPP or no?
  5. When is the best time to reveal your Lucario?
  6. Do I double to Crobat predicting the Breloom switch into my pert or do I go for rocks? TTar is on the field, loom isn't revealed, and Crobat is.
  7. Best way to play around looms spore in every generation it's been relevant in?
Come back and play ORAS so I can interview u for POTW imo =]
1. All of them! The best players are the ones that mix up styles so that they can't be counter-teamed easily. Being a master of all them makes you the most consistent as a player.

2. I honestly don't know, I stopped playing XY after OST so I never really got a chance to evaluate ORAS.

3. Colby Rasmus, I should probably change that avatar though as he's no longer a Blue Jay

4. Good question, I think if we're talking DP it should still get banned. Sand Veil was like the cherry on top of an already incredibly broken mon. The Yache set in particular absolutely destroyed late DP, not any of the Brightpowder or Sub sets to take advantage of Sand Veil. As for DPP though I'd be inclined to say it should still be banned, but I wouldn't be opposed to a suspect test.

5. When it's time to win the game

6. Your first mistake was using Swampert, but anyway I'll play along. If you don't know he has Breloom why wouldn't you go for rocks, shit is free. Even if you knew he had a Breloom I would still SR. Let's assume you correctly predict Loom and go to Crobat, now what? Are you gonna U-Turn to keep momentum or Brave Bird, it's not like you're in that good of a position by doubling as opposed to SRing. Also are you really gonna walk on eggshells all match doubling to bat every time you switch to Pert, you're gonna need to get SR eventually... Getting rocks ASAP should always be your goal, unless you know they can get a spin off of you easily.

7. I'm sensing a recurring theme here. Just have a mon that you think won't help you take the spore. After that switch to something that's either faster than loom and can kill it, or something like Celebi that can just tank all of his attacks. I will admit though, I hate Breloom, he's such a pest.
 
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Free Gliscor
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6. Your first mistake was using Swampert
whats wrong with pert? hes always served me well so im curious as to why using pert is a mistake (dont take this the wrong way -- if theres a legit reason to not use him then itll only help me in the long run).
 

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