Jacky 'EternaLEnVy' Mao first broke onto the scene back in 2012 when he announced that he would take leave from his undergraduate studies to pursue competitive Dota full-time. First playing with No Tidehunter, the team that would eventually become the Alliance, he was removed from the team and joined Kaipi. Kaipi would go on to be sponsored by Chinese organisation Rattlesnake, and later renamed to Speed Gaming. After a much publicised fiasco with their manager Marco Fernandez, the team was eventually picked up by the Cloud9 organisation.
Finishing 5th/6th at TI4 was a notable achievement for the young team, and spiritual captain EternaLEnVy has had a large role to play in this - from drafting to his mechanics-focused play, Cloud9 have emerged to become one of the top Western teams in Dota today. With the recent addition of Adrian 'FATA-' Trinks to their roster, it was inevitable that we would speak with EE-sama to gather his opinions on the team and everything else Dota.
This interview will be available as a video after the conclusion of the event.
Hey guys, this is Skim from GosuGamers, I'm live here at the WEC 2014. With me is EternaLEnVy - how's it going?
It's okay.
Okay? You are in the Grand Finals, it should be better than okay!
It should be, but I usually don't feel too much before the tournament is over. Then it's usually the emptiness when you've lost, or the happiness when you win. I don't feel too much during the tournament, unless you play like a really hard, difficult game, but the last two games we played were kinda like, easy-ish, so you don't really feel that happy when you win those games.
It was pretty convincing. Did you expect to go to the Grand Finals so easily, almost?
Against VG? Hmm. No I didn't, but after that first game... I actually thought we were going to lose. Before the games, Iceiceice, we both have different rooms to practice - you can switch though, but like we're there and they're there. I was practicing for like three hours because I came really early, and no one was there. And then like the fourth hour I started thinking about picks, writing them down, and iceiceice was standing right behind me. He actually looked at my picks for like a good minute before I realised anything, so I was like, "Oh, we're actually fucked."
My team didn't show up till like 12.40, and everyone was stressing me out like at like 11.30, "Where's your team? They're supposed to play soon, they're supposed to play soon." And I was like, "I don't fucking know!" And when they came they had like diarrhea and everything, and I was stressed out, so I actually lied on the floor and was listening to music on max and I was like "Fuck this!" for like ten minutes. I was relaxed after that, but I thought we were gonna lose.
Maybe you should do that more often, show your picks to your opponent, you know?
They didn't realise what we wanted, they didn't ban the heroes I was going to pick. They should have banned Visage Tinker, I purposely wrote Visage Tinker!
Oh wow. Maybe he didn't use it, he thought it would be unfair to do it after he saw it?
Nah, that's just dumb. I think it's like you just go for a win.
Well, you're in the Grand Finals, it's looking to be like your second title only with this team, I think? So far it's been only second places with this team.
Yes.
Any pressure at all?
I don't know. I felt a lot of pressure today in the morning, from all that. It really depends like, you wake up, maybe bOne7 wakes me up with a nightmare again - he woke me up two days ago actually, he was screaming again. He will wake me up, and I forgot to charge my phone or something, and pie is sick. I don't know, maybe something like that will happen. Everytime I come to China, something terrible happens.
"Everytime I come to China, something terrible happens."
But if you compare this trip to your other trips to China: is it worse, or better?
It's a lot better, because the team is handling the pressure more. They're not making excuses when let's say someone is sick, they feel down and we lose because we're sick or whatever. Everyone's really motivated to win, so it's going a lot better. But as for everything else, the hotel's a lot nicer, but for us gamers, we don't really care about all of that except Internet, but the Internet's never working for me, so...
Yeah it's pretty bad, it's pretty bad. I see you also built your own ghetto set up with the box of cans and stuff and your computer on a box as well. At what point are you going to travel with your own chair?
I really should, I've been thinking about it. But it's so silly that you play without armrests on your chair, and the chair's not adjustable height and the monitor's not adjustable height so I always have to like bring pillows or cans and boxes to sit on. Even on the main stage, the monitor wasn't adjustable so I had to flip mousepads the other way.
As long as it works out I guess. So this is your first major tournament with your new player, FATA-, how is he intergrating into the team so far?
I think the last two days, the integration was mediocre, but today, what he showed in scrims... He was ownage in scrims, so I was really happy, but then I think he was kinda choking the last two days, so we did okay, and today he destroyed.
In terms of individual skill or in terms of interacting and communicating with the team?
He has pretty damn high individual skill, 6.9k MMR and stuff like that. But definitely the big upgrade is the communication. It's not just the communication, it's more like he will be more responsible for the play. Like if we lose a game, he will blame himself and try to look at things he did wrong to improve. Or he'll practice heroes we want to practice and he will think of new ideas to incorporate into our team, and he will talk about our team.
I mean, he was from another team obviously, so not only does he incorporate stuff from us, we incorporate stuff from him as well. He tells us stuff like "We shouldn't talk this way, we should talk this way", or like "We shouldn't think this way, we should think this way". He just talks more during the game as well, so it's much easier to play.
In your announcement when you announced him as your new player, where he will take on more like a captain, in-game caller kind of role, is that true?
He's definitely talking in-game, but he did picks in scrims and he wrecked. But our first two officials I thought we were going to crush, we were playing against Alliance and VP, and we beat everybody in scrims except EG - we're even. And then, I told him - I didn't want to help him too much since he was the new captain, but I told him specifically what they're looking at, because we've played against them in scrims. I checked in scrims like what we did, and I told him they'd ban Rhasta. And they banned Rhasta and our bonus time went to 60 seconds in the first phase and I was like, "What the fuck dude, you weren't prepared at all".
And then the second game, against VP, the only hero they play good is Tinker, and they got Tinker first pick, we didn't ban it. And when they picked Tinker we panicked and we lost bonus time again. Like even though FATA- was confident against Tinker, it was not like he had a plan against it anyway. So, just too lazy, so I'm back to drafting.
Yeah I was just about to say that's why you're back to drafting. Looking back on TI4, how did you guys handle being eliminated there, especially considering the Game 3?
When you get eliminated from ESL or Dreamhack, one of the first things that come to your head is like, "Oh, we lose like this, how the fuck are we going to win TI?" But when you lose TI, even though we lost like that, it's over. It's kind of hard, especially bOne was pretty angry, but still it's over-over. You feel really relaxed, it's kind of weird, you feel really sad, but you also feel really relaxed.
"When you get eliminated from ESL or Dreamhack, one of the first things that comes to your head is like, "Oh, we lose like this, how the fuck are we going to win TI?" But when you lose TI, even though we lost like that, it's over."
Was there anyone specific on your team that was able to lift your spirits, or were you all collectively thinking, "Okay guys, we have to move on, we have to aim for TI5."?
That's so stupid, if someone said that to me I'd have slapped him. For everyone, for Dota players, the year is over when TI is over, there are a lot of thoughts on your mind and everyone has their own to work out. Like I just went alone and walked around, everyone's emo.
So I want to have your opinion on the new teams, since Cloud9 and EG are the only teams that did not change too much. What do you think of the new teams? Especially Alliance, basically your former teammates, they changed around.
I consider Misery to be one of the best players in the world, but that's skill-wise. I don't consider him that, personality-wise? So he's pretty ownage, but long term... I'm not sure? But he's a really good pick up, I think he's really good.
And Chessie... He tried out for EG and didn't make it, so obviously he needs some time. He was the best HoN player, like one of the top HoN players from forever, so he's definitely really talented and he's quite young I think? And he's motivated, so we'll see, but like s4 is so fucking good, so we'll have to see. Chessie maybe has the talent, but he's going to need the right atmosphere and stuff. It's kinda hard playing for a team that has won TI, because when you lose, everyone's going to look at you since your team is supposed to be so good.
Yeah, I think they are under a lot of pressure. What about the other teams? The Secret Team, for example, or Team Tinker?
We haven't scrimmed once against Team Tinker, we have tried but they don't wanna play.
Why?
I don't fucking know. And then for Team Secret, we're like 8-1, 7-1 against them in scrims. Against us, they're not very good, I actually think they're really bad, but I talked to them but they are doing really well in scrims against everyone else. You see their players, they're like fucking good, but no one's used to their roles except Puppey? Like Puppey is playing his old role, and Kuroky and Fly are like switching every now and then, between support and carry. It's kind of difficult for them, they're going to need a lot more time.
"You look at Secret Team's players and they're fucking good, but no one's used to their role except Puppey."
What about the new Na`Vi? They were pretty strong online, but at this LAN, they didn't really impress.
Well, obviously they are not the old Na`Vi, like second-place TI or whatever, but in comparison to the old Na`Vi of this year...
It can only get better?
Well, they're replacing Kuroky and Puppey, so. But they're scrimming? Like, what the fuck, we're scrimming against them, I don't think that actually makes sense. Like we see them looking for a scrim and I was like 'All right! Na`Vi's looking for a scrim!' Because they didn't look for scrims before TI - before really important tournaments, they might scrim, they might not. But right now, even before important tournaments they have a set schedule it seems, everyday at 16CET.
I talked to FNG actually, because I wanted to scrim them at 19 CET, and they had a match at 18 CET. So I was like, "Are you sure, don't you want to take a break after your match?" And FNG was like "No, we play, for sure." I was like, "Okay!"
Well I guess he was pretty motivated with Power Rangers as well, so maybe he brought that onto his new team?
That guy - I have a lot of respect for him, he tries really hard, and he's really smart, I think.
Do you actually think that Power Rangers, without him, still have a chance?
Well, they went 1-1 against Tinker recently. I'm not sure what that means, actually. Tinker, they 3-1 Na`Vi, so I was pretty impressed with them and they were the first team to win a tournament since TI. And then recently I think they went 1-2 against Moscow 5 and 1-1 against PR, so I'm not sure what's up with that.
They actually have like some ...
They won us in scrims.
Oh really? Wow, nice.
Everyone does well in scrims - everyone is even in scrims, except us? But even us, we're like barely ahead.
Do you have like a team that nobody has on their radar that you think would do well? Because the public never sees what people do in scrims, so you may have some insight.
We don't really scrim against teams that aren't in the know. I think the Chinese teams, like LGD.CDEC, but that doesn't really count. But for the western side, I don't really have anyone.
Okay so what's your impression of the Eastern side then? Because so far, Vici Gaming has also been rather impressive, LGD.CDEC does well online although they didn't do well this tournament, but obviously they're still unexperienced, I guess?
I think NewBee, Rabbit's a better player than Xiao8, but you can never know what Xiao8 brings to a team. That guy is infamous for his leadership, and that's usually more important, I think? That's really difficult to find, someone who's well spoken and knows what to do. But Rabbit's fucking good. I don't know what the trade-off is, actually.
For the other teams, if you look at LGD's lineup, they're fucking good, like Sylar, Faith, MMY. Injuly I don't really know much about, but he seems pretty good. Yao - that guy's good. So I looked at their team and I was like, "Damn, this is going to be a scary team." But they've been losing, so, yeah.
As for VG, I think iceiceice is a lot better than rOtk, skill-wise. Once again, rOtk is the captain, I don't know what that means. But seems like Fy- is doing a very good job picking, except that I don't like their picks against us, so it was kind of weird. I think the first game was like, they had zero chance of winning, I didn't see them winning at all. In the second game, their picks were actually pretty good.
As for Black^ versus Sylar, I respect Sylar more, but Black^'s a good player, he's pretty good but I'm not sure how long term it's going to go because I guess he'll talk to iceiceice and iceiceice will translate, for ideas around the game? For in-game you only need like "Go go go", and "back back back", so that's fine.
Do you actually think that will be an issue long-term, the fact that he can't actually properly communicate with them?
Well, if he fights with iceiceice, then yeah. I mean, if iceiceice is his only way of communicating right? But if he and iceiceice are friends then I think it will be fine.
Well, thanks for the interview. Do you have any shoutouts?
Err, shoutout to the interview, at one point you think it's overdue. And shoutout to Cloud9, my team, HyperX, Logitech, Alienware, NeedForSeat, Air Force Reserve, and shoutout to my stream - I haven't been on my stream recently, whatever. Shoutout to my stream moderators!
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