AMA Explorer of Time's AMA [Round 2: 1000 Posts!]

[Explorer of Time]

I'm going to join in on the trend, but I haven't done one of these before so I'm curious what you guys are going to ask.

EDIT: As of today, I now have 1,000 posts on PokeCommunity! I'm going to bump this thread to celebrate!

 

[𒈟Lavemu𒐫]

What's you favorite type of monotype team to use?

 

[Explorer of Time]

What's you favorite type of monotype team to use?

I like all of them, haha. But if I had to pick only one, I'd pick Poison since it usually has plenty of Pokemon available early on, has lots of dual types you can use to build a good team, and only has two weaknesses*. Of those two weaknesses, Ground is really easy to build around since there are a lot of Poison/Grass Pokemon available, as well as the Ground-immune Crobat in most games, which really only leaves Psychic as a mono-Poison team's major weakness. Even then, if you have a Poison/Dark Pokemon like Drapion available, you're all set.

*3 weaknesses in Gen 1 only, where it's weak to Bug, but it hardly matters there since Bug has so few attack moves in Gen 1 and no boss battle specializes in the type.

 

[Aquacorde]

what's a typical day look like for you?

 

[PoryKid575]

What's your favorite PC theme (Johto Elite, Blossom, etc)?

 

[Lapis_Laz95]

Given your username what's your fav PMD game and hero + partner Pokèmon?

 

[Explorer of Time]

what's a typical day look like for you?

Pretty boring, all things considered. I've already graduated from college and I work from home, so I don't get out much.

What's your favorite PC theme (Johto Elite, Blossom, etc)?

I like Johto Elite since I find dark themes easiest on my eyes and it's simple enough for me. Yggdrasil and Blossom Shower [Night] are both good as well but have a bit too much unused space at the top and I want to look at things quickly without as much scrolling down.

Given your username what's your fav PMD game and hero + partner Pokèmon?

My favorite PMD games would be the Explorers games, of course. My hero and partner in both Time and Sky were Pikachu/Raichu and Piplup/Empoleon. I usually pick Pikachu in PMD games because it has only a single weakness, Agility for boosting speed, and, in any game other than the original Rescue Team, Discharge for clearing monster houses. That being said, I usually switch to other Pokemon once the story is complete. In Blue Rescue Team I used an Articuno that I got to Level 100 and in the Explorers games I used Palkia because it's the only Pokemon that gets the Absolute Mover IQ skill.

 

[Nah]

If you could change one thing about the world, what would it be?

Favorite video game character?

Do you have any pets, and if so, can we have pictures of them?

 

[Alex_Among_Foxes]

What makes you an "Advocate of Ideals"? (this could potentially be read in a rude tone, that's not my intention, just asking out of curiosity)

 

[Explorer of Time]

If you could change one thing about the world, what would it be?

I'd make it so that humans don't need to sleep, at all. It's annoying that we spend eight or so hours out of the day just laying down and doing nothing, and I'd rather have the extra time to do stuff like read or play Pokemon. Plus I've always struggled with insomnia and often can't get enough sleep, which leads to me feeling tired all day, so if we didn't get tired in the first place then that wouldn't be a problem anymore.

Favorite video game character?

This is a hard choice... my favorites are all player-created characters, which I get quite attached to since I made them myself. I guess my F!Robin from Fire Emblem Awakening or one of my various Commander Shepards would be my favorite, if you count them.

If not... I guess Dr. Eggman from the Sonic the Hedgehog series? He's a villain and only actually playable in one mainline game, but he's really cool, has lots of fun boss battles, and has excellent voice actors. It's always a delight to fight him no matter the game.

Do you have any pets, and if so, can we have pictures of them?

I have two cats at home, but I don't like taking or sharing pictures so I apologize for not giving them out.

What makes you an "Advocate of Ideals"? (this could potentially be read in a rude tone, that's not my intention, just asking out of curiosity)

I got the inspiration for the user title from my rival Sweet Serenity, whose user title is Advocate of Truth, since I like Zekrom a lot and she likes Reshiram.

If you want to get more philosophical about it, we all need ideals to motivate us. Could be a philosophy, religion, ideology, or even something simple like "I want to be the very best, like no one ever was". I am myself a Kantian ethicist, but I admire those who stick to their ideals under pressure, even when I do not share said ideals. (Unless the ideals in question are something inherently unethical like bigotry, of course.)

That being said, Truth and Ideals, despite Reshiram and Zekrom being opposed legendaries, are not opposites. They are necessary for each other. Ideals without truth lead to detachment from and denial of reality, which can lead to atrocities if the one who values ideals without truth is in a position of power. On the other hand, truth without ideals would lead to one being knowledgeable, but not motivated to do anything with said knowledge, leading to apathy and neglect.

 

[Alex_Among_Foxes]

There's other stuff I'd love to reply to, but I didn't ask those questions lol.

I got the inspiration for the user title from my rival Sweet Serenity, whose user title is Advocate of Truth, since I like Zekrom a lot and she likes Reshiram.

I knew about Serenity's title, but I wasn't sure if you'd picked yours just for fun with her or if there was something more than that to it, which brings me to another question.
How did you end up becoming rivals with her?

If you want to get more philosophical about it, we all need ideals to motivate us. Could be a philosophy, religion, ideology, or even something simple like "I want to be the very best, like no one ever was". I am myself a Kantian ethicist, but I admire those who stick to their ideals under pressure, even when I do not share said ideals. (Unless the ideals in question are something inherently unethical like bigotry, of course.)

I've never heard of Kantian ethics before today, (and I honestly thought you were referring to something related to Kanto from Gen 1 at first) but I looked it up to learn a bit more about it.
Wow, just the fact you can even understand what that's all about is impressive on it's own! Though I'll also admit I'm not the smartest person in the room, so a lot of what I read few waaay over my head in terms of the wording that was used on the wiki. But even though I didn't really understand much of it, I appreciate the philosophy around it, at least as far as I understood from what you typed.

That being said, Truth and Ideals, despite Reshiram and Zekrom being opposed legendaries, are not opposites. They are necessary for each other. Ideals without truth lead to detachment from and denial of reality, which can lead to atrocities if the one who values ideals without truth is in a position of power. On the other hand, truth without ideals would lead to one being knowledgeable, but not motivated to do anything with said knowledge, leading to apathy and neglect.

Now this I completely understood and completely agree with. As the saying goes, (I think) 'too much of anything is never a good thing' or something to that effect anyway.

I'm going to go for a second question this time. As someone who's favorite Legendary Pokemon is Zekrom, what was it that made it one of your favorites?

 

[Explorer of Time]

There's other stuff I'd love to reply to, but I didn't ask those questions lol.

No, feel free, it's totally fine.

I knew about Serenity's title, but I wasn't sure if you'd picked yours just for fun with her or if there was something more than that to it, which brings me to another question.
How did you end up becoming rivals with her?

I had notice that the two of us took diametrically opposed stances in a lot of Pokemon-related topics, plus the fact that we focus on entirely different things (she's mainly into competitive battling and newer games, whereas I focus on self-imposed single player challenges and older games), so I offered to be her rival via PM and she accepted. We fought a few Pokemon battles since then on Showdown, but she hasn't been that active recently so I haven't done more. I did manage to beat her ranked doubles Trick Room team on my first try and I'm extremely proud of that.

I'm going to go for a second question this time. As someone who's favorite Legendary Pokemon is Zekrom, what was it that made it one of your favorites?

I looove its Dragon/Electric typing and it has an amazingly cool design. When I was a kid I used it all the time in White 1's postgame. Plus, if I'm making an all-legendary team, Dragon is one of the easiest types to build a monotype team of and Zekrom always has a place on said team if I can get one.

 

[Alex_Among_Foxes]

No, feel free, it's totally fine.

As you wish.

This is a hard choice... my favorites are all player-created characters, which I get quite attached to since I made them myself. I guess my F!Robin from Fire Emblem Awakening or one of my various Commander Shepards would be my favorite, if you count them.

As someone who does the same thing, I'd say they do. (though I am biased on the subject lol) And that makes me want to ask you, what is your favorite playthrough of a game where you used your own character, and what about it made it so special?
(I also wanted to mention that the first thing I think of when I read Eggman is the 'snoo-PINGAS usual clip, but that's not a question lol)

I had notice that the two of us took diametrically opposed stances in a lot of Pokemon-related topics, plus the fact that we focus on entirely different things (she's mainly into competitive battling and newer games, whereas I focus on self-imposed single player challenges and older games), so I offered to be her rival via PM and she accepted. We fought a few Pokemon battles since then on Showdown, but she hasn't been that active recently so I haven't done more. I did manage to beat her ranked doubles Trick Room team on my first try and I'm extremely proud of that.

That's really cool, I'd have never guessed you two were so different. Was that the team with the Indeedee(f) on it? And congrats on the win!

I looove its Dragon/Electric typing and it has an amazingly cool design. When I was a kid I used it all the time in White 1's postgame. Plus, if I'm making an all-legendary team, Dragon is one of the easiest types to build a monotype team of and Zekrom always has a place on said team if I can get one.

Its typing is great indeed, and I love the really nice blue-ish white electricity it uses in attacks. I do wish White had the difficulty of Black though, because the harder game was really enjoyable to go through cause I found White to be too easy, but it just wasn't the same without getting Zekrom at the end.

 

[Delta Crowned Sword]

1. Which ideal(s) you follow, but feel that it is difficult to achieve regularly?

2. Are your judgements affected by emotions?

3. How much lazy you can be ?🙃🙃

4. What are your views regarding Tyranitar, and what if it retained Ground typing upon evolution ?

5. Which fruit and flower you like, and why ?

 

[Explorer of Time]

As someone who does the same thing, I'd say they do. (though I am biased on the subject lol) And that makes me want to ask you, what is your favorite playthrough of a game where you used your own character, and what about it made it so special?

I still have a hard time deciding, but probably Lord Viria Nysko, my Sith Warrior from SWTOR back when I still played it. I don't play a lot of villain characters, so she was really interesting to play since the Sith Warrior's storyline was built from the ground up for an evil player character, and I was able to make her the exact kind of Lawful Evil Sith Lord I wanted through dialog options and stuff. Bioware games always have great storylines and this one also gave me a lot of room to build a backstory without overriding it with a preset background. Even though I played a non-silent protagonist, it rarely if ever felt like like my dialogue was out of character for Lord Nysko and she even had an excellent voice actor, too.

I've also played a lot of Skyrim and it's very good for making preset characters, but it doesn't offer a lot of decisions to make beyond "choose which side quests to do".

(I also wanted to mention that the first thing I think of when I read Eggman is the 'snoo-PINGAS usual clip, but that's not a question lol)

I've never seen that clip, so I can't say much about it.

That's really cool, I'd have never guessed you two were so different. Was that the team with the Indeedee(f) on it? And congrats on the win!

No, this was the team with the Clefable and Malamar leads. I saved a full replay of the match, coincidentally. It's attached to this reply in a zip file if you're interested in watching it.

 

[Explorer of Time]

1. Which ideal(s) you follow, but feel that it is difficult to achieve regularly?

I know it's ironic for a Kantian, but honesty. There's a lot of situations where a completely true answer would be complicated and difficult to communicate while a simplified half-truth answer would get the intent across faster and easier.

2. Are your judgements affected by emotions?

Everyone's judgements are, whether they admit it or not. I try to keep track of my emotions rather than suppress them completely when making judgements, so that I can say "I might be biased on this topic because of circumstances XYZ" if I feel strong emotions about the topic.

3. How much lazy you can be ?🙃🙃

A little lazier than the average person, I'd say. I do go for walks most days but I don't do much more exercise than that, apart from martial arts practice every week or so.

4. What are your views regarding Tyranitar, and what if it retained Ground typing upon evolution?

Tyranitar is overall a pretty good Pokemon, but I find it quite annoying that it needs an egg move (Dragon Dance) to reach its fullest potential in Gen 3/4/5/6/7. As for retaining the Ground type upon its evolution, that depends on whether it would stay Rock/Ground or become Dark/Ground. I wouldn't like the former since we already have a lot of Rock/Ground Pokemon and it's very bad defensively, but Dark/Ground would be an interesting type combo that's only shared by Ting-Lu and Krookodile. I'd personally like it more because Rock is my least favorite type for battling.

5. Which fruit and flower you like, and why?

Apples and tulips, respectively, both because they come in many different varieties. There are a lot of different apple cultivars that are all good for different things, but my favorite to eat on its own is the Cosmic Crisp.

 

[Diamond 97]

Pineapple on pizza, yes or no?

 

[Explorer of Time]

Pineapple on pizza, yes or no?

It's my favorite topping. That being said, I don't like tomato sauce so I probably don't have the same kind of pineapple pizza that most people try.

 

[Aquacorde]

what challenges have you done that have felt like really unique experiences?

 

[Explorer of Time]

what challenges have you done that have felt like really unique experiences?

I'd say that the Wind of Change challenge we did for Valentine's Day last year was a great one, since we had to rely on other people to select our Pokemon and I couldn't build teams the way I normally do. Devalue did an excellent job picking my Pokemon and I had a lot of fun picking a team for Confused_Piplup too.

Last years GT challenge was also really fun, although I couldn't get it done in the GT itself because I had to keep switching team members. I think I'd had 29 different team members used at some point in the challenge.