Greetings! I am Olivia Moledzki, also known as aboxoftimbits on most social media platforms. I have competed in the Video Game Championships from senior division onwards since post-Worlds 2017. This year I competed in multiple regionals and internationals with placements such as Top 32 at Portland Regionals and Top 64 at a handful of others. All these placements, while not the highest, can definitely be attributed to my friends and building partners in the Smoliv Garden Group! The best friends I could ask for.

Smoliv Garden Pokemon VGC Group — Smoliv Garden at dinner during the Milwaukee Regional

My season has definitely been a rollercoaster of ups and downs. I’ve had great events such as Louisville regionals and Portland regionals but mediocre ones such as the Milwaukee regionals and Global Challenge 6. I ended up filling up my BFL list with all Top 64s and a Top 32 outside EUIC, which had been a day 2 performance but ended with a poor run within the Top 256 instead. Despite how it sounds, I had a blast competing this year and getting to experience events I never thought I would, such as traveling out of my region for locals for the first time, as Toronto is incredibly difficult to succeed in. This led me to travel for 4 or 5 hours north to Ottawa/Gatineau for 2 cups the week after Milwaukee regionals and let me obtain an extra cup win as well as see some good friends who live too far out to normally visit. As for major events, I had gotten to travel to Europe for the first time for EUIC 2025. I had qualified for Worlds 2022 in London, but due to Covid and personal reasons, I had to skip that event.

I had met wonderful people throughout this season, such as Dominic Vogel, my round 4 opponent at Portland regionals, who had been such a joy to talk to even after the set was over. Talking about high-level VGC and checking in on each other throughout the day and even celebrating each other’s Worlds invites at NAIC 2025. This season has led me to meet great players and people such as Anthony Londergan. We both had a rough run at Milwaukee regionals and had met through our mutual friend Stefan Mott. We then decided to spend the rest of the day hanging out and got to share a fun meal at Jimmy John's and just vibe together. The last player I want to shout out is Kian Sayan. I had been in a Discord server with him for several years, but during day 2 of Louisville regionals, a fellow mod played me in round 9 and said I should become active again. While I was there for a bit, this led me to meet Kian, who also happens to be one of both Stefan and Anthony’s local players. Over the span of a year, we would be each other’s biggest supporters, and it was definitely one of my favorite parts of the year. Seeing his insane success at Atlanta regionals solidified in my mind that he was a fantastic player, and his day 2 finish at NAIC 2025 really backed that up.

This season I definitely had three big team archetypes I had used between Regulation H, the second run of Regulation G, and Regulation I.

For Regulation H, this would be Kingambit/Rillaboom/Sneasler/Follow Me Balance. For most of the Regulation, I was very big on Magmar as my main redirector but had shifted towards Electabuzz by the end. This core 4 pokemon made me feel I could really play at my best in VGC and almost showed that way as well. This team took me to a win and in at Louisville versus top player Yotam Cohen. Yotam had built with Wolfe Glick and used the same team he did with Yanmega. This was a very uphill matchup I was very proud of playing into, but unfortunately I lost in game 3 to a very sad and funny RNG and ability interaction. I would need to respond in a very specific way to turn playing out, and because I had procced a sleep with Dire Claw, I had gone with a separate line, but because Yanmega is slower, it got to immediately burn a sleep turn and then, after, get a boost in speed with its ability, Speed Boost. This would allow it to outspeed my Sneasler and wake up to Air Slash, flinch it, and then snowball me from there. Looking back, I’m not mad at all since I played how I believed I should have in that scenario, and it was just a very funny interaction that cooked me and my top cut dreams, but luckily I was able to bounce back later in Portland this same season.

In the second iteration of Regulation G, I had been looking into Roaring Moon + Calyrex Ice about a week or so before the San Antonio regionals and been told by a few players it was kind of mediocre, only for it to get both 1st and 2nd thanks to the very talented players Justin Tang and Shiliang Tang. I had taken the team in a different direction originally with Rillaboom and Raging Bolt over Ogerpon Hearthflame and Landorus Incarnate but had pivoted towards their team afterwards. For almost all of Regulation G’s second run, I had run this team near nonstop and had Day 2’d both EUIC and Vancouver. This team was very out of date by both events and was very uphill into most matchups, especially Calyrex Shadow + Clefairy. However, this didn’t stop me, and I kept working at the team nonstop to create what I felt was the best possible version of it by the end of the format. Most of my Championship Points this season definitely came from this team. It was such a fun team to me and was definitely my highlight team of the year, as well as featuring my MVP in Roaring Moon, who had won me so many sets with unique lines thanks to its strange but strong stabs and stats, such as into Pengy Rain, which would see me leading Roaring Moon + Amoonguss, which made the matchup go from terrible to even. Definitely my favorite team of the year and up there for one of my favorites of all time.

Finally, for Regulation I, this was definitely a variant of MDB’s Screens Leech Seed Calyrex Ice + Miraidon team. My season was supposed to end with Milwaukee, but because of a great opportunity given to me by one of those friends I mentioned from Ottawa, I was able to attend both the Portland regional and NAIC at the very last minute. For Portland regionals, I had played a cup the Tuesday leading up to this event, and on my way home I was playing some high-ladder Best of 1 to kill the time and had stumbled upon a Glimmora Screens variant that was running around that top player Alex Underhill had ended up bringing to the regional the same week. I was very set on running it until I had gotten to the airport going to Vancouver, and I had started to feel very iffy on this team. I had talked to my prep partners, Emily Parson (ZanzibarVGC) and Donghun Youm (ThePlaymaker), and they were pretty set on running MDB’s team from the Utrecht special event the week before. The day after my flight, I drove out of Vancouver with some locals there at 5 in the morning and decided to pick up their team the same day to play a bit and play at the cup the same day that was somehow removed from the regional and was just coincidentally happening at the same time. This even led me to changing Urshifu Rapid from Choice Band to Choice Scarf, which was very instrumental in my regional run the day after. I had ended up making day 2 and my first Top Cut, losing to the great Len Deuel on stream. This whole regional, I had only really used 4 of the Pokemon non-stop. I had previously mentioned Dominic Vogel in the 4th round, and by the end of it, between him, Emily, and myself, we had brought Landorus around six times. This would lead me to my NAIC run, where I couldn’t find a team until the night before, when I had locked my Portland team at the last minute but with an Ability Shield Pelipper over the Landorus, which would help patch the very bad Koraidon Weezing matchup. While I ended 5-3 because of poor play, matchups, and RNG, I definitely felt Pelipper was a fantastic inclusion and had made many matchups easier. It was a very fun team for me, and while it didn’t feel too great at NAIC, I had a great time in New Orleans and was able to secure my invite despite the poor finish.

Over the season I have realized I like to build my teams in very specific ways: easy-to-execute game plans. I use the Pokemon Showdown ladder as a litmus test where I play from 1000s to wherever the mid-level rankings are in that format and see how hard I had to think during that run. While it is very important to think critically during every set, I have severe ADHD and will have rounds every tournament where I am almost mentally checked out, so any way to have an easier game plan/archetype to pilot with surely benefits my runs. This can be shown in the teams listed above, with Kingambit + Rillaboom setting up and snowballing, Roaring Moon + Ice Rider + double redirection allowing me to have very solid lines and play into those if I’m not feeling my best, and finally, my Portland regional team, where Choice Scarf Urshifu + Assault Vest Incineroar + boltbeam coverage allow me to play out of nearly any situation.

This season made me realize I have the ability to do very well. I have always felt like a good player and had an understanding of the game but never had the confidence to do so. Leading up to the Portland regional, I had forced myself to be more confident, which both made me focus my entire run for the first time and led me to my highest placement yet. Gameplay-wise, I have noticed I definitely lean into more aggressive balance variants when preparing for an event. This is not to say I won’t play Incineroar and Amoonguss, for example, but I believe it can get much easier to snowball slower balance teams, so I feel I get more value out of balance teams that can be very aggressive as well as have great defensive tools, such as Gouging Fire balance in Regulation F, possibly my favorite team of all time.

Mentioned above was what I had brought to NAIC. While the result was not great, I found it very fun to pilot despite falling off in meta favorability.

This year I had a decent run at several events. I come from a very competitive family, such as my world-class martial artist grandfather Sam. This leads me to be a lot more competitive and push myself to improve as much as possible. I usually write down notes about every round I play after it’s over to reflect on my battles to see if I can improve my gameplay wherever possible. With my regionals this season, I never felt like I could have gone as far as I know I can, and I use that to try to push myself to get better and push for the highest level VGC I can get. That's where the fun is for me! For lessons I learned, it would definitely be to not push too hard, though. While I enjoy the grind of improving for competition, it can be very mentally exhausting. Please take breaks, reader!

With the NAIC team being decided so last minute, I kind of just took any previous knowledge from Portland and factored in the aggressive game plan switching I could create with a surprise Pelipper, such as versus Alex Underhill in round 5. I went into NAIC thinking I was in danger of not making worlds and couldn’t figure out what team to run until 8 pm on Thursday. I ended up with 5-3 and getting 0 points because my lowest BFL I could replace was getting top 128 at NAIC for +20, but luckily 970 championship points was very safe and secured me my invite even within the original Top 75 before auto invites.

In the future I think I would like to go with my gut and take the risk of believing in meta calls I make going into events. This season I have hit the nail very accurately on what would do very well but have never committed to a risk due to the fear of failure, especially in a season with a Top 75 Worlds race. I'm very excited to see where those calls may take me in the future if I commit to them from time to time!

I believe playing less ladder before events is beneficial. I am the type of person to panic, playing battles through the Pokemon Showdown ladder quite a bit the day before a regional, and it definitely has a negative effect on my tournament run 9/10 times. There is a saying that goes, “Sometimes less is more,” and the mental reset of not playing VGC for a day or two before a regional can be very helpful. When it comes to preparing for major events, I definitely may go off on my own and build and prep once or twice. My building partner Emily is a fantastic player, but there are times I feel I want others to agree with my ideas to feel good about a concept. Going into next season, I definitely want to try and build up my own team, such as going into Worlds, where I have had an idea since early in the second iteration of Regulation G that may finally be time to work on.

Overall, my experiences this season have been very positive! Despite the ups and downs, I genuinely feel I have grown as both a player and a person since I am still a very young adult. Especially when I turned 20 halfway through the season! I want to give a big thanks to the Smoliv Garden, HIVE, and other groups of people that have made me feel really at home this year and constantly around friends, even at events I know fewer people at, such as the West Coast Regionals. I also want to give a big shout-out to my girlfriend, Evelyn. She has been my biggest fan since day 1 and has always been there for me. I can’t ask for a better person in my life because that would be impossible. Another big shout-out to my parents, Amy and Mike, and my stepfather, Rick. They are all fantastic people and have been very supportive with both my transition as a trans woman and my endeavors in Pokemon. My sister Ava is definitely the main reason I push myself so hard and even use the name “aboxoftimbits.” She has lower-functioning autism as well as global developmental delay. She is the sweetest kid on the planet and pushes me both in and out of Pokemon to be the best person I can be. Finally, a big thank you to everyone in the community that has come up to me at events! I have had a few people every event who come up and ask, “Oh, are you Timbit?” and it’s been a very nice experience to meet people and interact with them in future events since I will be able to match a face to a name.

Qualifying for Worlds this year will be my 5th invite and 3rd time attending. Am I nervous? A bit. I also feel very excited going in, as I feel I am definitely in a better place than I was last year with the game and definitely will be prepping as much as I can (with breaks!) to push myself. I look forward to playing against strong players by far the most, even if I go 0-3. Top-level VGC is by far the most enjoyable aspect of the scene to me!

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