## Timeless Travels
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### [][@:Aescling]
at some point during timeless travels i began to build to build
pulled it as many times as i have, to the extent that i now actively
look out fur the oppurrtunity.
+##### _Meta-ish MBCed_{as=cite}: closing thoughts
+
+on the friday just befur the sinnoh tour weekend, just over a week
+ befur the close of the season, yr cat just barely crossed the
+ 2500 elo threshold of veteran rank.
+i have stopped making a concerted effurt towards laddering (even as
+ stardust rewards are still boosted fur the remaining week of the
+ season, which is a shame to miss out on), and i would like to
+ purresent some closing extra thoughts on the team and my skills as
+ a player
+
+i find it interesting that i managed to ladder so far---at least 700
+ elo---with a lanturn/umbreon core; both mons are absol-utely strong
+ in the great league but it is not exactly an obvious pairing, since
+ umbreon does nothing to deal with lanturn:U+2019:s ground weakness.
+ (again, grass is currently uncommon enough to mostly ignore.)
+it is not lost on me that my push to veteran did involve covering
+ ground, even if not with the most obvious choice of skarmory, who
+ i do not have (with great league stats, at least)
+
+i think of the significant changes i made that allowed me to reach
+ veteran was a reevaluation of how to play froslass.
+while it *is* true that froslass heavily benefits from shield (or
+ energy) advantage, sometimes it is still the best play to bring it
+ out even in two shield scenarios (though this must be done
+ decisively; froslass gets destroyed by minor energy disadvantages.)
+i found myself :U+201C:safe switching:U+201D: against mud boys very
+ often; against whiscash (who is often left in) this play will
+ actually usually force the oppenent to give up their shields
+ (especially as i lead a good mon hard countered by ground.)
+(umbreon is a losing switch into whiscash if a scald burn ever
+ happens, and that usually does happen)
+
+a consistent weakness i have recognized in my play while laddering
+ to veteran is my poor sense of alignment: i often recognize
+ situations where i have a hard counter to one or more mons in the
+ opposing team, but have many times failed to force the team to
+ have to deal with the disadvantage by giving up switch.
+similarly, i have forced myself into bad matchups in many situations
+ by switching aggressively to purrevent energy disanvantages, which
+ i really should have learned better than to do a long time ago.
+so it goes.
+
+i am not sure what the next season will look like fur me, what with
+ any pawtential balance changes and a general lack of extra mons to
+ play with.
+i do have an rank 9 lickitung i intend to build eventually, as well
+ as a rank 40 (non-shadow) dragonair, as well as a reasonably good
+ chargabug and (eventually) azumarill; and, of course, the cresselia
+ from the road to sinnoh raid challenge (who i would like to trade
+ fur better IVs).
+but it is not immediately clear to me that i have mons that would
+ solve my current purroblems when it comes to overall teambuilding.
+i also do not have much stardust left to build mons with either, not
+ to mention elite TMs
+time will tell what the future hath in store, i suppose!
+
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