Project Player Interviews V3 #3: Monky25

[Aqua Jet]

Approved by UU moderation & inspired by Feliburn's project
Amazing Art by Magnum
OP ripped from Moutemoute's​

Welcome to "UU Player Interviews", a project where you'll be able to discover or re-discover some well-known players in the UU community. Those people may be known thanks to their high-skilled level, their achievements on the strategic scene, or thanks to their dedication to the tier or within the community.

How are you?

Doing good. Cold weather is starting to kick in so I need to buy some new jackets. Uni is ramping up but I’m still able to make time for myself.


Cold weather really sucks, doesn't it? Other then that, I'm glad you're doing alright. Tell us a bit about yourself.

Hi I’m Monky, I’m currently attending college on the west coast to become an orthopedic surgeon. I joined smogon around a year and a half ago and became an avid contributor to UU. I like to go on drives, hang out with friends, and run in my free time

That's very interesting! What made you want to become a surgeon?

Orthopedic surgeons specialize in treating muscle and bone complications. When I ran cross country and track in high school I dealt with lots of injuries but didn’t really have anyone to help me go through it. I’ve always wanted to be a doctor to help people and give back for my relatively good upbringing, so I decided to study to become an orthopedic surgeon to help treat aspiring athletes who were in my shoes.

That's very nice of you to want to help people. What got you into UU?

I used to play OU mostly because it was the main smogon tier, though I dipped into UU when isle of armour happened considering some really cool Pokémon like tyranitar and aegislash dropped. Eventually, my interest dwindled and I stopped playing for a bit before rejoining when crown tundra happened. Since OU was a mess with stuff like pheromosa and Spectrier running around I decided to play UU until it calmed down. I soon fell in love with the tier and began maining it due to the high power level it has without the same stagnant feel OU has. I was able to get decent success here through events like the UU rating competition and decided to be a full-fledged member of the discord. Fast forward to now I’ve joined the UU QC team, hosted several forum projects, and competed in several UU tours and made a fair name for myself in the community.

Yeah I feel that. As a member of the UU Teambuilding Lab, you've proven your proficiency with teambuilding. Is there a team you'd like to share with the audience?

Sorry I don’t have anything as of now lol, all my teams are being saved for majors

That's fair, I wish you luck in that tournament! Speaking of tournaments, what do you think about the teams that have been brought so far in SCL? Are there any team(s) that you're rooting for?

I haven’t kept up too much with the overall teams but I would say I’m rooting for players like Adaam, Askov, and Accel to do well in the tour

I'm sure they're very happy to hear that! Now I gotta ask, where did the name Monky25 come from? Does it have anything to do with Infernape?

Ah no nothing with that lol. I’m really bad with usernames so I just thought of something random like Monky (from the funny monke memes going around) and slapped a random number after it. It kinda just stuck so I went with it

That's kinda funny! Now for our last question: as a member of the VR team, you help rank Pokémon. Can you give us any spoilers as to what may or may not be moving around this slate?

Plenty of things are being discussed, the great thing is to see the diversity in all of our opinions and have conversations with each other on the viability of certain Pokémon. Some stuff we can obviously expect like a keldeo drop and a conk rise but other topics like a bulu rise a few sub ranks, the ranking of heracross, and nuking a lot of the C rank have been very popular as well

That's wonderful to hear, and I want to thank you on behalf of our readers for doing this interview!

It’s no problem

Feel free to ask Monky25 any questions you want!
If you have some recommendations for an interview, feel free to DM me!​

 

[pokemonisfun]

Favorite Pokemon?

What do you have to do after college to become an orthopedic surgeon?

Favorite pre October shift team you’d like to share?

 

[StarFalcon555]

Why haven't you changed your avi from the default? (Don't get me wrong I've come to associate Chingling with you a lot because of the avi and you being so prominent but at the same time... it's still Chingling)

If you could choose one Pokemon to bring down from OU to UU, what would it be?

 

[Celebiii]

Favourite real-life monkey?

As a more serious question, your webs team-pre shifts was very successful on ladder. How did you feel about it receiving high usage? Do you prefer to build these HO-style teams, or did the stars just align to make a very successful one this time?

 

[KM]

how does it feel to have been .2% usage away from singlehandedly altering the pu metagame by stealing ribombee

 

[BigFatMantis]

Hi,

I've had severe upper back problems for several years now. The pain is mostly localized in that area under the shoulder blade, but only on the right side. I have an electric gun massager but that only relieves the tightness/discomfort temporarily. This has been chronic for at least 10+ years and it seems to get very slightly worse as time goes by. What treatments would you recommend and what is the best way to keep this under control?

 

[Band]

Hey Monky :)

1- Any dream vacations?
2- What games other than Pokémon do you play?
3- Did you always like biology/anatomy before deciding to be a surgeon or was it something you had to learn to like when you chose your profession?
4- Have you grown to like Chingling after using it as your avatar for so long?

 

[Monky25]

Favorite Pokemon?

What do you have to do after college to become an orthopedic surgeon?

Favorite pre October shift team you’d like to share?

- When I was younger my favorites were either tyranitar or garchomp, I just really liked their designs and how strong they were showcased in the show so I always wanted to use them when I played the handheld games. As of now I've begun to like more obscure Pokemon, and Dracovish is def up there as one of my favorites now. The way it looks so goofy yet is so broken is just so funny to me.

-Once I get my bachelors I have to take the MCAT exam to get into medical school, where I complete another 5 years of schooling there. Once I finish med school I have to complete 2 years of residency which is basically like an internship to finally be an official surgeon. I wont be done until I'm like 30 lol but the pay off for the work is definitely worth it.

(click on sprites for the paste)
I'm planning on making a team dump post in the bazaar once majors are done with anyway but here's a team I used to play around with a fair bit pre shifts, I doubt anyone minds me sharing it since it's basically outdated now. US West built this for UUWC and mushamu even used it and won with it. Even after our team got out I still kept this team and used it for fun in roomtours and on the ladder. It was built around LO shao because mush liked it, and in general it's a very strong breaker. Blaze Kick was a cool lure for amoonguss. We had Rhyp and AV amoong as the backbone to check many threats like the previously legal thundurus, entei, and keldeo. The wonky spread on amoong let it break CM prims sub even at +3 I believe. Goltres was a cool aegislash answer and just a solid offensive presence that never dies. I used to hate mixed aegi until I tried this team, it adds good wallbreaking power and has very nice defensive utility as an offensive mon. Lastly rotom wash rounded the team off as speed control. It was unfortunate that my last time using it I lost with it in the pools round of majors but in general it was a very fun team and serves as a reminder of one of my first team tour experiences even as short as it was.

Favourite real-life monkey?

As a more serious question, your webs team-pre shifts was very successful on ladder. How did you feel about it receiving high usage? Do you prefer to build these HO-style teams, or did the stars just align to make a very successful one this time?

- I like all monkeys but my favorite has to be gorillas.

-I honestly really liked my webs team having lots of usage. I love using HO and just turning off my brain to win on the ladder. I used many types of HO like psychic terrain and screens in the past but once light clay got banned I needed a new way to cheese the ladder. I turned to webs and began making my team. Bee is the best setter over dogass shuckle since it could actually keep webs up. NP thundurus is a webs staple, scary breaker and offsets the speed issues it had with stuff like keldeo being very common. NP azelf was actually jesus and using it on webs really sold it as a good mon to me. SD diggersby was just nutty to break stall, necro was a great late game cleaner that didn't rely on webs much, and buzzwole patched up my MU against boots zarude. My record is #2 on the ladder at around a 1720+ rating on an alt at the time and had 3 accounts including my main hit top 10 using this team at a point. Its def been my most successful team to date but I've had some pretty nice successes in this meta as of late.

Why haven't you changed your avi from the default? (Don't get me wrong I've come to associate Chingling with you a lot because of the avi and you being so prominent but at the same time... it's still Chingling)

If you could choose one Pokemon to bring down from OU to UU, what would it be?

-Idk I've always just liked the default avi, I didn't really need to change it and it stuck around to the point where I want to keep it.

-This is def a tough question. My safe answer would be scizor since it was a cool mon to use and balanced in the tier, so bringing it back would create some nice team options without fucking the tier over. More creative options would be Rillaboom, Bisharp, or hippo. Rilla is kinda down bad in OU rn so having a more offensive bulu that fits on HO better would be really cool. Bisharp is scary but I never really got to use it in UU so id just want it back to have fun with. Hippo would provide a lot of defensive utility in the tier and be an actual good ground type since it has recovery. It also would make sand very legitimate. But yeah, final answer has to be bringing scizor back.

Hey Monky :)

1- Any dream vacations?
2- What games other than Pokémon do you play?
3- Did you always like biology/anatomy before deciding to be a surgeon or was it something you had to learn to like when you chose your profession?
4- Have you grown to like Chingling after using it as your avatar for so long?

-I've always wanted to go to Dubai, its such an amazing city with lots of great sights and an amazing culture there. I've also wanted to visit places like Paris and Italy, my gf and I are touring Europe this summer for a bit so I'm very excited for that.

-I used to play Mario a lot when I was younger. Now I still play games like COD and rainbow 6 with my irl friends.

-I was interested in it for a bit but after a shitty biology course in high school I began to rethink my profession. Eventually I decided to not let that class get to me and continue working to become a surgeon. All the other classes I've taken relating to my major have been fine since.

-I have actually grown to like chingling. In general I've grown to like very weird mons like vanilluxe so chingling sorta just grew on me

Hi,

I've had severe upper back problems for several years now. The pain is mostly localized in that area under the shoulder blade, but only on the right side. I have an electric gun massager but that only relieves the tightness/discomfort temporarily. This has been chronic for at least 10+ years and it seems to get very slightly worse as time goes by. What treatments would you recommend and what is the best way to keep this under control?

-Over the counter medicine has worked to help reduce stress in patients. Good exercise habits, practicing good posture, and ice / heat packs always seem to work as well. If its that chronic a chiropractor should be seen.

how does it feel to have been .2% usage away from singlehandedly altering the pu metagame by stealing ribombee

- I honestly would feel kinda bad lol. I love that my webs team got a lot of usage but I knew it wasn't going to last with excadrill dropping, so I would feel bad taking an integral part of PU only to have it barely used and returned after at least a month. I wouldn't want that to happen to UU so I wouldn't wish it on lower tiers either.

Thanks to all who have asked me questions! Its def been fun to answer them all