The Titanova

Different people for different reasons.

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I like Sam/AgentWhite because he's smart and he doesn't mind me talking game critique or philosophy or things like that with him. I also think, having known him longer than anyone else I really stream with, we have a natural chemistry. I think people underestimate how hard it is to be a good 'straight man' in a comic duo and I think he is so amazing at that 'role' if you will. He's also got a wide bank of references he can draw on and he can deadpan so hard it's unreal, and that particular kind of comedy makes me laugh a lot. We don't have a tonne of games that we both play these days so you might have missed him on stream but he's a treat.

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Toby and Danielle (TobyTechs + Darella74 respectively) are people I've started streaming a fair bit with in the last few months, and they're good fun. It gave rise to my favourite joke ('why you heff to be mad') and my favourite game to stream (Town of Salem) and I probably don't thank 'em enough for either. I want to get into streaming more games with them but all of us are poor so we're waiting on that one haha. I think the stream really changes when they're around and it feels more welcoming compared to when I have anyone else on, so that's real nice. Danielle's also a big personality in the actual twitch chat even when casting with me and that makes a huge difference, especially as she's a filthy filthy memester so twitch eats that up all day

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There's also Declan, PiercedPagan, who is really good at playing off of someone else. He's done a lot of streams with an ex-friend of mine and he has lowkey got really good at just playing off of another caster/commentator. I could probably never tire of streaming with him because of that. Because he so naturally plays off literally anyone or anything, he's a great guy to go to with stupid ideas (For example I plan to stream runescape for 12 hours for charity with him sometime soon). Often when I make joke ideas at least 1% of me wants to do it, and Declan is the "yeah let's do it" guy. He also brings like zero negativity to the stream literally ever, the guy is remarkably upbeat, which has helped me during some of my long charity streams when I'm getting a bit downtrodden near the end.

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Literally none of these people own the game SpeedRunners and it makes me cry because I so desperately want to stream that game with friends and I'm pretty sure all of them would love it (MAAAAAAYBE not Toby? Idk)

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Those are my top picks for now. I sometimes wish I could stream melee with my nephew but I don't know how the eff I'd do that, but he's amazingly funny so I think twitch would be all over that

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Of course! It's more a matter of whether the poly-person actually WANTS to be like that. I generally find that poly people want a bigger range of experiences that you get from dating completely different people. Ya know... poly people, in my experience (which I admit is limited) rarely date multiple VERY similar people. The poly person has to figure out whether they truly want something monogamous or whether they just want SOMEONE who happens to be monogamous. Which are totally different, I think. I tend to believe people are selfish and, normally, can only do very difficult things (like being polyamorous but sticking to one person) if you want it yourself. I tend to think trying to do it for someone else's sake is way too hard for people. There's exceptions, but it helps if YOU want it, I think. So take this polyamorous person, see if their polyamorous feelings are genuine and they're committed to that kinda philosophy and lifestyle or whether their previous polyamorous relationships were motivated by other feelings (a desire to be loved by multiple people, commitment issues, etc). I think figuring that out will help. And again, this isn't to say you can't go from genuinely polyamorous to monogamous, that is totally possible, but some people upon self-examination will go "actually, I'm not polyamorous and it wasn't proper love with both people back then, I just wanted to have someone to party with and someone I could confide in" or something like that and it'll be fine. Trying to be ultra-careful because a lot of people think stuff like that is what ALL polyamorous relationships are and I'm not like that, but at the same time I do think a few people kid themselves over it for one reason or another. UGH, hopefully this isn't mega-dismissive.

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TL;DR yes it is absolutely possible, just requires a bit of an iron will. I even think it's possible for people who are still polyamorous, although obviously that's much harder.

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I'm gonna go for "right now" as opposed to a yearly rank, unlike MIOM

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1) Armada (has a winning record over literally every other player in 2015, $90k in winnings, 1st in Summit/Evo/DreamHack/TBH5/Summit, 2nd at CEO and Apex, basically no counterargument to Armada at #1)

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Then a big gap

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2) Leffen (yes Leffen can beat Armada one on one but the big gap is due to Armada-Leffen, a matchup in which Armada is positive, is Armada's worst matchup in the entire game, and it's one of Leffen's best among 'big 6')
3) Hungrybox (despite Fox-Puff being AWFUL for Puff, Hbox has done very well for himself this year as recently as MLG worlds, which he won. As foxes become more happy to do the uber-campy playstyle which Armada and Leffen have pioneered, I expect him to drop)
4) Mango (I think consistency is a big part of your rank and even BEFORE 17th at HTC, and only has 2 tournament wins this YEAR where multiple other Gods were in attendance, which is fine for Hbox who is basically only losing to other top 6 members in a fox-dominated meta, but not for Mango who is semi-regularly bustering out against people he shouldn't lose to). Also I would not be surprised to see a Mango retirement soonish (next year or two)

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Bit of a gap

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5) Mew2King. For a long time I've always said that a confident Mew2King is the best player in the world, better than Mango-in-crews, better than Armada-in-teams, better than a mentally-healthy-PPMD. I think this is no longer true. I don't think M2K is getting worse, he is just getting better at a slower rate. I'd also not be surprised to see an M2K retirement soonish
6) PPMD. Hurts as he's my favourite among the big 6 in terms of personality and I love his playstyle so much. He has too much personal stuff getting in the way of his game. I'd love for him to come back strong early 2016 and make the Apex 3-peat.
7) Axe. I rank Axe over Plup/Westballz on consistency, and also Axe is developing a character basically single-handedly. A lot of people, in particular Marth players, claim pikachu is the worst matchup. I do not know if that is true, but I will say this: Axe gets a lot more Marth experience than Marths do pikachu experience. I think Axe stands to drop significantly as people figure him out but they've not done so yet
8) Plup. I think Plup is probably going to be the next person to break into the very top echelon of competitive play if he wants it enough, given how quickly he has risen. I would say that Plup's 'ceiling' of talent is actually higher than Hbox/Mango/Axe's, too, so any of them on a good day vs Plup on a good day could very possibly be a Plup win

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Bit of a gap

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9) Westballz. I actually don't think Axe/Plup/West are as close as people make out. I still think West is the next best but Axe has consistency and Plup seems to be rising. I don't think either of those is true for West
10) PewPewU. The guy who always gets 9th is the 10th best in my eyes.

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