Ask a shiny-hunting grad student

Been going back and forth about posting one of these (since I know I won't be super fast about responding), but I decided to go ahead and do it so you can get to know me better and vice versa. Although I'm down for answering fun and lighthearted questions, I highly encourage serious ones as well! In my experience a good balance is nice.

With that said, I wanted to go ahead and preemptively answer a few of my own questions!

What country are you from?

Spoiler

The United States, specifically the region referred to as "the South." While I haven't been influenced a ton by my region, I do think it's part of why I value hospitality so much.

What general age demographic are you in?

Spoiler

I'm in my early twenties, right around the point where you stop hitting the "exciting" ages like 16, 18, or 21 and are just another year older. Don't let the age intimidate any of you, though. I'm still very much a child at heart

What are you studying?

Spoiler

Christian theology and biblical interpretation! I hope to become an undergrad college professor one day. Used to want to work with middle and high school age students, but I realized my passions were more in teaching than event coordinating. Feel free to ask follow-up questions for this one, but know that I will openly admit if I feel under-qualified to answer any especially complex topics lol.

1. What was your first shiny? (not counting red Gyarados)
2. What's your favorite shiny?
3. What's your favorite shiny that got introduced in Gen 7?
4. Do you shiny hunt all the time because you have tons of free time?

Spoiler

1. Shiny Shinx! It's adorable and took forever to find because I was doing the PokeRadar chaining method in Pokémon Diamond, which is super easy to mess up.
2. You might think Flygon based on my username, but it's actually probably a tie between Aegislash, Haxorus, and Rayquaza–the common thread being that they're all black and gold. I've actually personally hatched the first two!
3. Probably Minior. I'm a sucker for alternate/collectible Pokémon forms (I got all the Vivillon patterns in Gen 6), so I already loved Minior even before I found out there was a black Minior with specks for all the other colors. I had to have one, and as of a week or so ago I finally do!
4. Only over breaks from school, which I am currently still on. Once I go back to school towards the end of the month I will have significantly less free time and therefore will likely all but stop shiny hunting for a while, sadly

I think that's enough primer questions for now. Feel free to ask me anything else you might want to know! Also, what is everyone's favorite shiny Pokémon, and do you own it?

 

See, this if why I need to figure out how forum notifications work lol. One day, later...

1. Haven't thought about it before. It might be pretty cliche, but probably a lion!
2. Hard to say since I've never even left the US before, but maybe England? I watch BBC sometimes so I feel like that would be fun.
3. It's a tie between tan and orange. My mom has interesting color choices for her guest room lol.

1. That's a tough question. A lot of people from the grad school/seminary I attend were really devastated by Donald Trump's election, and I have a sneaking suspicion that at least part of the reason they feel that way is because it made them come face-to-face with the fact that the US isn't as perfect or idealistic or welcoming as they would like to believe. So for a lot of them it has inspired them to use their faith as a platform for speaking out against injustice in our country and political sphere. For me personally, although I did not vote for Donald Trump because I can't stand his bullying personality, I found solace in that I still think God is in control no matter who is in charge of our country, and that things are unlikely to be nearly as cataclysmic/apocalyptic as some of my peers are afraid it might be. That said I think Christians should definitely feel compelled to call out politicians and leaders in general for bad character, especially if said leaders identify as Christian like Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Donald Trump all have. So yeah, I guess for me it's a balance between holding leaders to a high standard, both for Christian and secular reasons, while still trusting that things will turn out for the best in the long run. Keeping a sober view of what's going on without letting it overwhelm you and drag you down into despair, so to speak.

2. On a comparatively lighter note, I've never had the bad luck (or luck in general) of running into a shiny that I wasn't able to catch (which is saying something considering I ran into a shiny Geodude in an SOS chain a couple weeks ago!). That said, the times where I attempted PokeRadar chaining in Pokémon Diamond and DexNav chaining in Pokémon Omega Ruby were super stressful, and in both cases I managed to completely break my chain several times before I finally found the shiny I was looking for (Shinx and Ralts respectively). There's a reason I've only ever succeeded in finding one shiny each through those methods lol.

 

I'm not sure I understand the question. Do you mean like super patriotic and one of those "yay America" people? Because if so then not really. I mean I appreciate the country I grew up in and the opportunities it afforded me, but I feel like even before this year's presidential election I had a pretty sober view of how imperfect and flawed our country and political system tends to be. Nowadays I think I identify more with the specific state and region I grew up in than my country as a whole.

 

I live in a dorm on my grad school campus about 8 months out of the year, and spend breaks either at home with my parents or with friends from college, who only live about one state over from my home state. Although this summer I'm hoping to get an internship so who knows where that might take me.

 

That's a surprisingly difficult question. I might have to list a couple somethings since I miss them all fairly equally lol.

I had always loved the concept of secret bases ever since the original Ruby and Sapphire, so I was glad they brought those back in the remakes but sad they didn't continue into Gen 7. While it's true that secret bases were supposed to be part of the Hoenn theme, I always liked how they encouraged you to explore the region so you could find cool secret base locations (and the locations of other people's bases). Plus bases allow for all sorts of creativity with decorating, and they allowed players to challenge one another in a more casual setting which let us show off the teams we were proud of. I just felt like it was a great social feature, and I wish they hadn't left it only in Hoenn.

I also miss the DexNav for several reasons: 1) It's more interesting to chain things, even if SOS chaining is more reliable and consistent. 2) It's infinitely easier to find Hidden Abilities with the DexNav. 3) You could also get egg moves from the DexNav, which was especially cool during the main story. 4) I personally have a love-hate relationship with features that encourage searching for rare Pokémon, 'cause it takes some level of skill to achieve.

I really miss Mega Evolutions. Sure they didn't get rid of the feature entirely, but the fact that they didn't introduce any new ones, that you can't get any until the postgame, and that you don't have access to all of the currently existing mega stones (at least in Sun and Moon) is frankly insane to me. Like they just introduced this feature last generation and it already feels like they've given up on it. Maybe they were just worried that it would overshadow Z-moves, but that still seems like a terrible reason. Plus honestly I prefer Mega Evolution over Z-moves any day.

Lastly, while this once again isn't something they got rid of, i don't like how they overhauled the trading system. While the Festival Plaza is fun and all, I feel like it resulted in making online trading way less user-friendly, which, like the removal of secret bases, hurts the social aspect of Pokémon in my opinion.

 

I enjoy hiking a lot, but sadly I haven't really had the chance to do this anywhere other than local parks, which aren't particularly challenging lol. I'm not super into nature compared to some of my friends, but I have been fishing and have camped overnight multiple times. For me outdoor activities like that are as much about who I get to do them with as anything. I'm definitely not the kind of person who would want to go out into the great outdoors all on my own just to hang out.

 

Definitely the very first shiny I ever caught (not counting Red Gyarados), Shinx. Since I was using the PokeRadar method in Pokémon Diamond, which is super hard since you have to keep recharging the radar and make sure you pick the right patch of grass, I kept accidentally breaking my chain. I honestly can't even remember how long it took me to finally find it but it must have been weeks of effort.

Similarly, finding a shiny Ralts in my Omega Ruby was a lot of effort and pretty stressful since I was using the DexNav. But that was still way easier compared to Shinx, even if the process itself took nearly as long.

I've used Facebook since late high school, although nowadays I mostly use it to keep up with friends and family who I live far away from, or to share dumb memes with my friends at school lol. I had a Twitter that some friends convinced me to get but I decided to stop using it both because I was getting bored and because it was getting SUPER political (and therefore overly stressful) during the presidential election.

That's a really interesting question that I've never thought about. Off the top of my head I would probably say either Hoppip or Magikarp. The former because it's canonically so light that even a gentle breeze can blow it away, so I feel like it would be too small and light to do anything major. For the latter I feel like it's because the vast majority of them only know Splash, so they literally can't do anything. Heaven forbid it should evolve though...