Player of the Week 35: Sken

[GOAO]

Favorite Pokemon: Rapidash
Most used Pokemon: Porygon
Most Known for: recently drafted in SPL, 3-2 in LCPL and 4-1 in SPLC.
​

Tell us a little about yourself.
I'm a 17 years old student from Spain and I'll go to university in September. When I'm not in school or playing mons I usually watch some movies because I love cinema, and also some series on the Internet. I like listening to music too, I’m a big fan of Oliver Heldens and EDM in general, so I’m often listening to some sessions while playing or doing stuff. Outside of my house I use to go on party on weekends or just chilling out with friends, and I sometimes play basketball too.

How and when did you get your start in LC?
Well this is something I’m not really proud of but I have to say the truth so whatever. It all started back in 2014, around March or so, when I was chilling in the Spanish PS room. My bud Alastor Law was still a moderator there and he said that he was going to make a tour. Goddess Briyella, who was an owner of the room by the time joined and asked Alastor if the tour was going to be a LC one, and he accepted. I made a team quickly but the tour never got to start. I wanted to try my brand new clamperl team though, so I talked to Briyella because it was the only recognised LC player I knew. We played and I swept her, and I got pretty hyped. I jumped on the ladder and got a decent w/l ratio, but once I saw a Pineco I fell in love and built another team around it, and you already know the rest of the story.

What is your favorite aspect of LC?
I love how a lot of things are viable but nothing’s broken at all. Practically every playstyle is viable, from heavy offense to semistall, even some full stall teams are able to work, along with weather offenses, baton pass, etc. I also like the level 5 mechanics, which are just a question of habit imo.

Is there any mon, playstyle, etc that you feel is underrated in LC?
Elekid is an awesome mon with a huge moverpool with a massive coverage (stab thunderbolt and volt switch, hp grass, psychic, cross chop, fire/ice punch, sub…), 20 speed and good offensive stats, and it’s also able to hit 19 hp for LO numbers. It’s a monster.

Anything you find overrated?
I’ve never found cottonee to be that good tbh. I understand what makes it good but it’s a bad defensive mon with no recovery that only switches in, takes 25% from any u turn and switches out. It has a x4 weakness to poison which makes it really easy to lure in (eg. pjab drilbur and carvanha or pjab mienfoo and timburr). It has a cool function but I don’t think that’s enough to be that used/high in the viability rankings etc.

If you could change something about the current metagame, what would you change?
I really really like the metagame right now so I don’t wanna change anything. I still don’t know how I feel about wisp floon though, but it might be a possibility if it keeps on being this good.

What players do you look up to / are good friends with?
I do have a lot of good friends in lc so I’m not naming them all (sorry lfc), but I’d say Levi is one of my best friends in smogon and very likely one of the guys who has more lc knoweledge in the whole webpage. He’s an awesome builder too and he will always offer to help you. About the players, I have always looked up to heysup and blarajan to be honest, and I really like star and zf now too. Madoka is a great player as well although she sometimes uses teams that I don’t like at all, but I guess it’s a matter of tastes. I’ve always liked fatty too although he’s kinda dead right now, but I think his way of playing is pretty similar to mine and I really enjoy watching him play.

What's your favorite playstyle and why?
Bulky offense is by far my favourite one, I like trying to cover everything defensively in teambuilding while having solid offensive presence, and this is what balanced/bulky offense consists of. I also like semistall teams but they are often not as effective as I’d hope.

How did you feel when you got drafted for SPL? Did you expected it?
I didn’t expect it at all as I got drafted the last day before the deadline and I hadn’t really talked to Funk or Mizuhime, but I woke up and saw a hundred of notifications in my phone and smogon (people texting me, sending me skype pms, smogon alerts, even twitter notifications and shit), and I felt really hyped for having that chance.

Is there any advice that you'd like to pass on to new LCers?
I’d tell them to get used to LC mechanics playing and building as much as they could and not to be afraid of asking anybody for help, people in this community are great and they will often be willing to help people. And if you want to make yourself a name here be have well and let your wins in different tournments talk by yourself more than everything else while not being arrogant.
And finally I use to recommend my tutees reading this article to know some basic stuff about LC: http://www.smogon.com/smog/issue43/understanding-numbers-in-lc

Lastly, do you have a team you'd like to share with us?

Hide

Porygon @ Eviolite
Ability: Trace
Level: 5
EVs: 236 HP / 196 Def / 76 SpD
Calm Nature
- Psychic
- Ice Beam
- Thunder Wave
- Recover

Timburr @ Eviolite
Ability: Guts
Level: 5
EVs: 116 Atk / 156 Def / 236 SpD
Careful Nature
- Drain Punch
- Knock Off
- Mach Punch
- Bulk Up

Elekid (F) @ Life Orb
Ability: Vital Spirit
Level: 5
EVs: 36 Atk / 236 SpA / 236 Spe
Naive Nature
IVs: 0 HP
- Thunderbolt
- Psychic
- Cross Chop
- Volt Switch

Pawniard @ Berry Juice
Ability: Defiant
Level: 5
EVs: 156 Atk / 36 Def / 116 SpD / 196 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Knock Off
- Sucker Punch
- Iron Head
- Stealth Rock

Staryu @ Eviolite
Ability: Natural Cure
Level: 5
EVs: 156 Def / 116 SpA / 236 Spe
Timid Nature
- Scald
- Thunderbolt
- Recover
- Rapid Spin

Larvesta @ Eviolite
Ability: Flame Body
Level: 5
EVs: 76 HP / 236 Def / 156 SpD / 36 Spe
Impish Nature
- Flare Blitz
- U-turn
- Morning Sun
- Will-O-Wisp

This is an old team I built more than half a year ago iirc, but it’s one of my favourite teams ever. I built it around the elekid-timburr core because I’ve always loved pairing random fast special sweepers with timburr, and I wanted to prove that elekid can fit in balanced teams as well. Then I added ice beam psychic trace porygon because it helped me against a lot of stuff like fletchling, diglett, croagunk, starmie, shell smashers and chinchou mainly. Pawniard was chosen to have another flying check while giving me some support with sr and knock off (elekid is awesome with knock off support). Berry Juice was chosen later because it helped against magnemite which is troublesome. Staryu is there to give me a corphish/fire types check and it helps to rk slower stuff like gastly and so on, and it spins hazards away too. Larvesta was the glue of the team because it helps a lot against fighters and pawniard, and it cripples a lot of physical attackers with flame body/wow burns. That’s all, and remember to be really careful when facing BU timburr because it’s the biggest threat to this team.

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goao note: sry for the delay ^_^

 

[Sken]

 

[Star]

thanks for the shoutout.

ofc the guy with his toddler picture as his skype avatar got his start through briyella LOL

srs question: would u vote ban on diglett?

 

[sam-testings]

What is your favorite lead?

 

[TruSwagblu]

Why the name "sken"?

 

[Cheryl.]

What do you think is a good "anti-meta" mon in the current metagame?

 

[Nudisto]

Sken is bae

 

[Sken]

thanks for the shoutout.

ofc the guy with his toddler picture as his skype avatar got his start through briyella LOL

srs question: would u vote ban on diglett?

Dude it was an obvious shoutout to my friend Star lol what an attention whore

I voted no and I'd still vote no.

What is your favorite lead?

Why the name "sken"?

I wanted a fresh nickname with blaziken but nothing really came to my head so I took sken from combusken.

What do you think is a good "anti-meta" mon in the current metagame?

As I don't wanna say elekid again so I'd say frillish. Frillish is awesome.

Sken is bae

Only yours

 

[Fiend]

Sken es malo.

 

[TheFenderStory]

sken es el peor.

 

[Merritt]

are you going to keep your name forever

thoughts on other name changes we've seen recently

What kind of playstyle do you think is subpar right now? What mons do you think have gotten worse?

How do you normally build teams?

Thoughts on GEN 7 and how much do you dislike that the RBY transfer thing is going to do almost jack shit for LC?

Grats Sken es linda!

 

[Melon]

You're cute

 

[Coconut]

(pooplarty)

Can we build sometime, this time something that doesn't have Fire Blast Togepi?

 

[Sken]

Sken es malo.

sken es el peor.

Confirming

are you going to keep your name forever

thoughts on other name changes we've seen recently

What kind of playstyle do you think is subpar right now? What mons do you think have gotten worse?

How do you normally build teams?

Thoughts on GEN 7 and how much do you dislike that the RBY transfer thing is going to do almost jack shit for LC?

Grats Sken es linda!

I had thought of changing it but as long as I have no cool ideas I'm keeping it.

I only want Lord Minds back.

I think that volt turn is not as good right now as it used to be some months ago. Dweeble.

I always start from an offensive core of 2 or 3 mons with good sinergy (eg timburr-gastly) or which lure some counters they both share (eg drilbur carvanha), and then try to cover the things which stop the offensive core to sweep. I generally add offensive mons > pivots > defensive backbone and it uses to work.

I agreed with Quote yesterday night that it should be called SuMo so that fat Asian people like Kingler12345 gets a shoutout. Who cares about RBY?

Thank you! \n_n/

You're cute

A thief believes everybody steals

(pooplarty)

Can we build sometime, this time something that doesn't have Fire Blast Togepi?

(pooplarty)

I don't think I've ever built with you or used togepi so I'm not sure what are you talking about but sure, pm me whenever :)

 

[Alastor Law]

How much do you like cinema? Is your favorite film the one we recorded in my room last Christmas' night?

What's the player you find the most inspirational in LC? And at building in LC?

Would you pay 69k on merche?

Are you going to fallas with user M Dragon?

Te amo sépalo

 

[Sken]

How much do you like cinema? Is your favorite film the one we recorded in my room last Christmas' night?

What's the player you find the most inspirational in LC? And at building in LC?

Would you pay 69k on merche?

Are you going to fallas with user M Dragon?

Te amo sépalo

I thought it was a secret huh ????

Basically the ones I said in the 7th answer.

Merche sounds terrible tbh

No I'm not

<3

 

[Vileman]

I made a team quickly but the tour never got to start. I wanted to try my brand new clamperl team though,

I can confirm that's how legends are born
Love sken btw

 

[Vubon]

Gotta say you've really made good use out of pineco, how did it come across your mind ?

 

[Fresher Than You]

First of all sorry for cutting off our tutor sessions,you made me a much better battler in a short space of time and I really appreciate it and I can't thank you enough.

Now to an actual question: what's the best match you've had (in SPL or anything else) and what happened in it?

 

[Sken]

I can confirm that's how legends are born
Love sken btw

I love you too vilememer n_n

Gotta say you've really made good use out of pineco, how did it come across your mind ?

I wanted to use a hazard setter but I didn't like dweeble so I dexsearched a spikes, sr and spin pokemon in lc.

First of all sorry for cutting off our tutor sessions,you made me a much better battler in a short space of time and I really appreciate it and I can't thank you enough.

Now to an actual question: what's the best match you've had (in SPL or anything else) and what happened in it?

It's ok bud don't worry about that, if you ever had a doubt pm me :)

And about the match I've been thinking about it but I don't really think there is one in particular, maybe the ones in splc/lcpl and the heysup game in spl but none especially. For example, I really liked my lcpl week 1 game against Speto and I think I read it pretty well and could take the advantage from a terrible matchup with water spam against no water resists, but it's not better than other ones.