Team Liquid had just won another one of their matches and they were quickly being shuffled onto the main stage to play against eStar. A game no one recognized was currently being played on the main stage (think the most brazen LoL clone you have ever seen) so the rush was really for nothing. Lowell asked if anyone wanted something to drink, the rest of the team took a seat and got comfortable, and I seized the opportunity for an interview:
How can you explain your incredible performance so far at WCA 2015?
Vortix: CN and KR teams are much easier than we expected. I think Europe is on top right now. Even NA seems stronger than what I’ve seen this tournament. I before thought Asia was one step ahead but it doesn’t look that way.
GerdamHerd: I think our play at Dreamhack looked a lot shakier. It was the first offline for me and I’m a bit less nervous now. With that said, CN and KR still feels like less competition
Why then, are the CN and KR teams weaker than you expected?
CrisHeroes: I think we are smarter when it comes to gameplay and drafting. I don’t mean to sound conceited, but it just seems like we are a bit smarter. I personally believe that we think a bit more and we view the game from a different perspective.
GerdamHerd: Yeah and …it's really confusing to me when Korean teams don’t play Sylvanas or Falstad at all. They say straight to my face that they think those heroes are weak. We get them for free. And Falstad? He is insane. Every 50 seconds you can decide if you want to fight or not fight. And they are telling me that is bad? On top of that, you have his flight passive? That is bad? Korean teams pick him sometimes, but Chinese teams completely ignore him. It seems like our meta is working out much better than theirs. I mean, ultimately our drafts are much easier because we understand the hero's strengths.
In the middle of the interview, WCA tournament organizers passed on a message to see if they were willing to draft against eStar before they went on the main stage. After some deliberation, Team Liquid decided that they wanted to draft on stage, citing that they prefer a standardized time that teams should have to comprehend each others drafts. They have confidence in their draft against eStar and as long as everything is standard, they think they will maintain that advantage.
All right, back to what we were talking about.
Lowell: At some point you have to be realistic, no team has played perfectly this tournament and I think we have learned a lot in the past weeks from EU teams. At this point, we believe our vision of the game is the strongest.
Vision of the game? That is an interesting concept. Can you elaborate?
Lowell: I said that in the most general way. Right now, it’s all about combination of heroes that we think are strong. It’s about how a team uniquely approaches the game- We are doing something that a lot of teams are not doing. We approach the games totally different by taking our specific players into account.
For example, take a battleground like Battlefield of Eternity. We have played many games on that map where we identify early that we can’t win a single fight before 13. We know that early so we totally avoid it. We play around that lose condition because we know our team and our players.
Most teams try to do the same thing regardless of their drafting. We have realized that, as a team, we are not perfect so we don’t strive to that. We try to strive towards playing around our selves and our weaknesses.
A lot of teams have told me they think Muradin is the strongest hero. I’m guessing you disagree?
Vortix: The strongest is Tyrande.
Lucifron: Definitely.
GerdamHerd: She is totally broken. There is no way that any team would say Muradin is better than Tyrande. Not in EU.
See, There are enough strong tanks that can make plays. Tyrande basically shreds every tank with her passive; it’s that good. Other heroes get her trait at level 16- how insane is that?
What heroes are being overrated right now?
Lowell: It’s not about overrating it’s about underrating.
Vortex: If I had to say, I think Jaina and Valla are really overrated.
Lowell: But It’s really about underrating heroes that are very strong at what they do. Take for examples tanks; people are valuing E.T.C or Muradin over anything but if we get Diablo, or doesn’t matter to us. he does the same thing.
Will Lunara change the meta?
Vortix: She seems really squishy, but I think she is really good. She does lots of damage.
CrisHeroes: She probably won’t change the meta a lot, but she is another ranged assassin.
Vortix: She is just so squishy. It’s hard.
Any last words for your fans?
GerdamHerd: Thanks to everyone, thanks to WCA for this amazing reception. We will trash talk back when we are in Germany and have twitter again. Shout outs to everyone in China that are helping us.
It has been extremely chaotic and sometimes it feels like we are being trolled constantly. Things like 4 hour photo shoots for only a couple photos where I had to wear so much makeup my eyes stung, to 12 hour layovers, and a long delay on the first day, it has been tough.
But still, shout outs to everyone trying to help us.
Would you like to come back to China?
All look around with a bit of nervous laughter.
Vortix: Sure!
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