The boys of Naventic took some time after scrims Friday evening to talk to me about their preparation for this weekend. The team, previously known as Bob Ross Fan Club since November, signed with Naventic barely one week ago. We talked about their thoughts on the upcoming tournament, their confidence as a team and we start with their transition to signing with an organization and how that might feel different:
“There’s a stress that’s gone down now that we have some salary coming in and we’re worrying less about money.” Captain Ken 'Kenma' Beutcher said. They definitely sounded more (if even possible) determined to win, now that they have an official organization backing them up.
“We already want to win and be successful, but having an organization that wants us to be as well gives us more drive and motivation.” added Stafford 'McIntyre' McIntyre.
The team arrived in Burbank in Burbank Wednesday and has been busy non-stop since. Travel, media, scrims, and of course, Korean Barbecue. Kenma told us that so far their mentality is good and they've been prepping for all strategies.
“At this point we’re trying to stay relaxed. We practiced really hard coming here. We’ve practiced all that we could and right now we’re just doing a lot of last minute study, getting in a good state of mind and making sure we don’t burn ourselves out.” said McIntyre.
The team has come a long way since it’s creation: winning the first North American Enter the Storm Cup (which was also their first public tournament), then immediately moving on to qualify for North American Regionals (along with Cloud9) after only the first qualifier.
We talked a little bit about what point they all realized that the team was meshing together well and that the team would be synergizing together. Most of them agreed that playing well against Cloud9 was the moment they knew, especially with having a teammate that is a former Cloud9 player.
"Against [Cloud9] it felt like we matched up skill to skill. We thought we were better and after that win I knew we were gonna be fine.”
“The Heroes Rising game 2 against Cloud9 we were down 2-0 then we made a comeback on Infernal Shrines and we beat them the next two. We’ve ran with that ever since." Said McIntyre, "Because of that win we’re already pretty confident. That was the moment that I knew we were going to go places.”
“The first time we won against Cloud9 in a scrim." Added Fan, "Against them it felt like matched up skill to skill. We thought we were better and after that win I knew we were gonna be fine.”
Naventic is pretty much everyone's favorite to win it all this weekend. On the off chance that any of the other 7 teams takes even one win against them this weekend who would it be?
“If anyone takes a game over us, it’s because of us and the way that we play."
Immediately they all responded that no one would be able to best them, and their biggest obstacle, is themselves.
“If anyone takes a game over us, it’s because of us and the way that we play." said Kenma, "If Blaze wasn’t missing a player, if they were playing with their full five, I wouldn’t want to play against them, just because we don’t know what to expect from them. But because they’re down one we’re not worried. No one will bring any surprises.”
“Really the only way we lose is if we get out drafted.” McIntyre added as well.
The game is ever changing, with balance updates just about every other week and new Heroes dropping more and more often. With the game changes come meta adjustments as well. For some teams it’s difficult to immediately adjust to these changes with tournaments coming around the corner. Not Naventic. Kenma told us they focus a lot on game knowledge:
“A lot of players have been really good at seeing a patch and being able to adjust to it immediately. We’ve been good at figuring out the meta before other teams do and getting a jump on them.”
While this is a Spring Championship qualifier, this tournament is very different. It’s technically a LAN event, of course, but it will be held in a small studio in Burbank, with no audience. A lot of fans and players have expressed some upset about the lack of audience space. This scene is so new but LAN events help immensely bringing in fans to give them the ability to support their teams. When we talked about the lack of audience they expressed that they love having an audience and it will be weird competing without one. They said they knew many people that would travel for this and now they don’t have the opportunity to.
Mcintyre spoke frankly on the subject:
We then moved on to talk a little bit about game-day preparation. Some teams have lucky socks, others have special routines, we wanted to know if they had any rituals they did before big tournament days.
Kenma responded immediately:
“Korean BBQ. We always go eat KBBQ before an important game, it’s become a tradition. And sometimes I’ll try to go to the gym before an important game.”
“I don’t eat on tournament days." said McIntyre, "Most of us stay away from food the whole day and play on an empty stomach. And then we just gorge as soon as the day is over.”
Lastly we focused on the future for the team. If they were, in fact, able to punch their ticket to the Spring Championship in Korea, what team or region would be their biggest obstacle? Some were more focused on the weekend at hand and not worrying about other regions than their own. Kenma stated that he thought eStar and MVP Black would be their biggest challenge.
Fan simply added "EU is free", while the rest of his teammates agreed.
Before we left the guys to rest up and get some last strategies in, they wanted to add some big shoutouts to Naventic and HK Army for getting them jerseys so quick. Also to all the fans, especially helping get them to Heroes Rising at the beginning of the year and the support they’ve given the team.
Follow us on twitter @GosuGamersHots for more Heroes of the Storm esports news.
