We interviewed Roman 'rmN' P. after his new team PANZER successfully qualified for the GosuCup #4 groupstage two days ago. In the chat, he shares the experiences he made with GGnet while playing stand-in, as well as details around his personal development as a player.
Thank you for joining me today and congratulations for qualifying to the groupstage. How did you find the competition in this qualifier? Has it been a walk in the park or rather tough?
Hello, first of all. When we saw the brackets, the only enemy we were scared of was SGC, but after a quite hard game we managed to win. I would say this was the toughest game in the tournament. Overall, it was more challenging than we expected it to be, even if I think it was stupid to put us together with SGC in the brackets.
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It has become easier to understand how the game works after my time in GGnet”I knew that this question will come (*smiles*). It's hard to say because you cannot tell what the future brings, what kind of team is interested in you and so on. But actually, my plan is to stay in this team for as long as possible, though the future is unpredictable so I will not promise anything.
You have shortly helped out the Ggnet team but left again after some time. Why didn't it work out? Was there anything that you learned or made your time worthwhile in this period?
Since we both wanted the best for the team, Kuro explained to me that he likes to play with me but feels that I'm too inexperienced and that there is not enough time to shape up for the upcoming tournaments. I respect his decision, he still supports me to develop further as a player. Hopefully I can impress him in future.
In addition to that, I've learned a lot in this team and it's become easier to understand how the game works, when you should execute what action et cetera. I learned more than in the last months, playing with others and I'd like to thank GGnet for giving me this opportunity, even if I couldn't perform the way I wanted to.
As a player with some insight, where do you think will the team head now? What are their chances of finding other capable players?
I have been bugging Kuro to give me answers; he is very reserved about these kind of things. Just one day ago, he told me his plans. He informed me of his wish to retire or stay teamless for some time, until he sees a chance to compete at a top level again. He is the kind of guy who is unsatisfied with anything but first place. The future of AZEN and Miracle is still unclear as far as I know, but I wish them the best of luck in their future endeavors. Kebap- is most likely heading to play HoN again.
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If you are playing with a team or a player with LAN experience, you clearly hold an advantage over the „less experienced“ players.”These are two different things. You have to know where you're aiming to be with your team. When I played under Kuro's lead, he told everyone of us what to do and what he expects. He had put his full trust in us, since his goals were to aim for the top. This is totally different in our team, where nearly everyone says what's our next step ingame. We don't have any 'big' hopes, but as long as we're having fun together and winning some matches, everything is fine. It's really hard to say, but Kuro tought me to love playing "professionally" and I would do that again.
You mention KuroKy a lot; he seems to take a big part in your career. How did you meet and what was the most valuable thing you learned from him?
Phew, it was a long time ago when I met him. If I remember correctly, I've met him at the time when I was playing with the German team dmZ. We got in contact through Kebap-, when we played fun maps in the night time, where we had a lot of fun together. We also played in some German IHLs, thus had the chance to get to know each other. And yes, I have learned a lot from him - but only when I was under his leadership because the other games we played together, it ended pretty much in a massive troll game (*laughs*). It's hard to say exactly what he tought me when I played for his team, but you're feeling these things when you're ingame. You understand the game much better when you start doing certain actions. To summarize it: Advanced DotA knowledge which affected my playstyle and my ingame mindset a lot.
You experienced The International at Gamescom as a playing participant. To how many LANs have you been so far and what did you take from this first top-level tournament in your life?
If two-men LANs do not count, I would say this was my first LAN. I wasn't really nervous but I knew the pressure would be really big, since it was my first event and it had the highest price pool in the DotA history. This event was very well organized (even if I can't compare it to other LANs) and the booth was nicely built up, with the big beamers on both sides, the isolated room as stage, the player lobby where every participant could lean back, relax and watch the games. It was also nice to meet the people you played and talked with and I do not regret one day of this event, even if we got kicked out by other teams too early. This event showed me how much I love this game and I'm looking forward to visit other LANs with my current team if we find decent sponsors.
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Overall, GosuCup was more challenging than we expected it to be”Of course! For an average DotA player without any LAN experience, such a big tournament is pretty unfamiliar and so it has been to me. Even if it felt great when people stood behind you and watched you playing, it kind of disturbed me, since it was really loud there and we couldn't really communicate with each other, unless we played in the isolated room. So yes, I would imagine if you are used to these circumstances and you are playing with a team or a player with LAN experiences, you clearly hold an advantage over the „less experienced“ players.
How do you see the situation in which the German DotA scene finds itself at the moment? Teams do not seem to recieve much support and are not given sufficient motivation to keep playing together. Would you consider Germany as "tough ground" for DotA players?
It's nothing new that the German DotA scene doesn't get any big support. And the reason is simple: because German teams are more or less unstable and are losing motivation after some time - and it didn't change during the last years. I wouldn't say that German DotA is currently finding itself in the scene. There are just few German teams that are actually playing decently but you can't compare these teams to the top teams which are ruling the scene atm. I would not say that this country is a "tough ground" for the DotA players, but the history of the German teams itself tells why this country doesn't get support outside of the German scene. However, I'm not losing faith into our team and if you keep the motivation and the mentality up, you can reach alot.
in our team*
What is your opinion on Dota 2? How well did you get used to it? Will it become a good successor of the old custom map?
My first impression of this game was kinda negative, because nearly everything seemed so different and unfamiliar to me. Since I was absent for 3 weeks, I started to play this game later than the others, but I got used to it pretty fast (after like 5-10 games) and started to love this game. Valve and IceFrog tried to make the game as similiar as possible to the DotA based on Warcraft 3. I would say that this game is even better than the current DotA when it comes to functionality. They established almost everything which was not possible in Warcraft 3/DotA e.g. the reconnect function when the game crashed, the item-search function and all the other functions which where shown at The International, even if some heroes seemed a bit to strong to me, but hey, it's still in beta. I'm pretty sure when this game is finished it will take over the spot of our current DotA and will earn much more attention and gets fully accepted, because such a big company as Valve stands behind this game.
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The International: Even if it felt great when people stood behind you and watched you playing, it kind of disturbed me, since it was really loud there and we couldn't really communicate with each other”I didn't put that much effort in playing on "high" level. I just loved to play the game and became better and better over the years – I started somewhere in 2005/2006 if I remember correctly – and now I'm standing here. The future is unpredictable but I really cannot imagine myself to play professionally since I'm still attending school etc. and, as far as I know, it is impossible to live here in Germany from gaming only for now. I will keep the focus on this game like I did before and just play the game and see what the future will bring to me.
Then best of luck to you in the future and we'll see the tanks rolling in the groupstage. Do you have any final words?
Thanks to GGnet for this good time I had and to everyone who supported me. Shoutout to my mates and to my clan: #panzerdota - der Panzer rollt durch
