The Greatest FPS Player Of All Time Tells Us How It's Done - Rapha's 15 Year Legacy

What is up everybody I'm back with Rafa yet again Rafa Rafa I'm trying to say it like cuz everyone always criticizes how British people say say it and now I'm like it's in my head so I'm I'm just as long as you're not adding an invisible ER at the end I think you're okay oh man I don't know well if you guys aren't familiar I've had ra raap oh God this this I'm G just call you Shane everyone knows your your name is Rafa Raa Whatever this is really weird now but uh everybody knows you

in we'll get through this we can do this together um you are I I would say the most accomplished FPS Esports player of all time uh you've you've been winning trophies since 2008 and taking first placees repeatedly so many trophies lifted it's it's kind of wild U so it's a huge Legacy that that you've created and so for those people that aren't um involved in Quake maybe have heard of it and are not familiar With the pro scene I'm talking to to literally the goat of of quakes so there you go so I think we

should start things off with uh the fact that we've got you know you're just winning a tournament which seems like normal business for you um you know winning Kem con over in Barcelona so uh firstly you know what was what was your experience like with with that Victory and and King con um obviously they're somewhat newcomers I would say onto the the competitive space So you know how how's King Con been Oh I thought King Con went really great uh it was about as jam-packed of a weekend as you could have in terms of the

amount of games that you had to play in the the schedule um but yeah think in perspective to what you know we've had to play the last like four years uh for qpl and uh what was it the ironfist format uh a couple years ago and then even um just playing what is it the The Foundry that team endpoint put up a week Before I like that the format was a little different and I like that you brought up the fact that there are some newer players coming up within the Quake scene because I think

the format that we had for this tournament was about as good as you can get yet to try to cultivate and help those type of players grow uh because it started off with four groups of eight uh which meant that everybody is guaranteed to play seven games whereas you you know as well As I do most of the time in the past for Quake you know tournaments you go to a tournament you may play like two games and that's it like at minimum like you lose twice and you're out whether it's group stage or double

a limb uh and then we even used to have the problem of single olymp tournaments uh in quick Liv sometimes due to like scheduling stuff but um but I think like just allowing people to be able to play more on land where the game is like actually played And you really learn like what positions actually matter and the impact that every weapon has When Everything feels super smooth I think that is just invaluable for people like you can only learn so much playing online but then when playing online under pressure um you just typically that's

like where I would make my biggest jumps like before I started winning was just how I would like play at the land and then I would just have this jump in Skill like afterwards like things would just start to to click subconsciously and just start to get a better feel for what the game is actually meant to be played like yeah that's that's that's really awesome especially because I I like he sort of referring to as well with with qpls a lot of online players a lot of inconsistent playing environments and I I know even

from just like the the really old days in the Quake 3 days there was kind of like a built-in um I I Actually don't know if this is true or this is just stuff people said now that I think about it I've never questioned this piece of knowledge until this moment but um there's like a built-in 50 Ms DeLay So when you actually got onto Landing Quake 3 it was like a completely different experience and even even in games currently where the net code is really good you know you know games that people are used

to playing like Counterstrike and valorant and so on There is a complete difference between the Lan experience of the game and the online experience in terms of what angles are good to hold the peer Advantage all these these very you know basic sort of principles of the mechanics of the game change on land so so it's really cool that um that that you're mentioning that because it is something that I think you know people don't consider as much these days um but and speaking of which you know uh you Know you mentioned newer players there

there of course been a lot of newer names that have become Staples in Quake Champions and you know you face another one of them in uh in the finals who has been in many finals against you but can't quite really often never seem to beat you which is raisy so rais always second against Rafa is is there something uh in particular with that matchup that for you has it just you feel com like some particular comfort in That in that approach against rayy is there something that you feel like Ray just needs to fix something

about his game to kind of evolve to the next level what do you think's holding rais back in the matchup and why is does it feel or I don't know how it feels but why is it an easier matchup for you in and you know because you're able to repeatedly seemingly quite confidently win these matches um that's a that's a very layered question uh and it's not as Though it's impossible for him to beat me he's beaten me a few times just um uh as far as like beating me when when it's in the finals

it's been a long time uh I and I think um I think you have to the easiest example was uh to like kind of understand this is in Quake live there when we had the big four of myself Cipher cooler and Avic there was like this variance of which play style was more difficult to each player and um a lot of that has to come down to like Sometimes there's just certain people the way that they Dodge the timing of which they rep peek you know just certain little nuances of their game is just so

foreign to you and just really difficult it just really matches up well against what you do so like for example uh a was really really hard for Cipher and cooler to deal with in terms of like overall raw fighting but but for me for some reason just ax like style came a bit more naturally so in those type of Matchups like I tended to have a little easier time playing him where he gave them a rougher time type thing and then vice versa with you know myself against Cipher and then just depending on you know

what the matchups were like that's just kind of the same example with with raisy because there's been tournaments where you know raisy has looked Unstoppable like how he's playing against everybody else like they just have no answer for him but then when him And I play like I I just I don't know I feel like I have this better sense of the type of fighting style that he likes to have and I think the biggest thing that gives me the advantage over him over other players is my timing my timing is I think probably one

of the strongest things compared to uh the other top players that have been in Quake Champions and I think the biggest thing is when he plays this like medium paced game against people and like both Players are making smaller mistakes like together he adapts better there but like I find more situations where because I'm timing so much better I'm not making the same mistakes of leaving certain items up or I'm finding better advantages to and I notice in fights because of the rotation because of the timing oh I should actually leave him Alive Now whereas

other players wouldn't and they just instinctually fight and kill him because they're not focused on the Bigger picture for as long and I think that's that's probably the biggest thing uh the other thing is I think there have been some finals more so a few years ago then recently where I think champion pool has kind of um has kind of given me the advantage there's a few Champs that he just uh it's not as though he doesn't play them he just isn't as good as them like I think it's it's pretty it's pretty obvious that

out of the champ pool like Clutch is one of his strongest like options uh he's one of the best clutch players in the world um but then there are a few others where like I'd say his Athena his scale Bearer um and until this last year his slash which he took a while to work on he had like a few extra Champions which he just couldn't really bring out the most of it so in the draft like he would either like have to ban them and so then you get an advantage on other Maps or

he would just feel like he Has to take it because you're so good on it but then he's not good enough on to kind of like Take It to the Limit and to be able to beat you and get the victories that he should in certain matchups so um so yeah because obviously dud raisy is super super talented it just he just reminds me of another evil like in the sense of where it did feel like for a few years evil was able to beat pretty much everybody in Europe and then we would come to

Quon and I would Somehow manag to find a way to squeeze out the victories and and overcome him time and time again uh um but it's not as though like I don't know I think it's just a a style difference and my style just proves like really really difficult for him uh to overcome it's uh you know what this it's it's funny because I feel like I'm about to kind of delve into some of the more kind of Performance Based questions I think which because you mentioned you Know you mentioned practice and I think um

or or rather you mentioned that there are certain weaknesses which is something that can be addressed by practice and you know I think a lot of the time people look at a players performance and they they're like ah this player's just good at this or or bad at that and they don't necessarily think about how does that player approach their practice because that is often the difference between well that Should in theory be the difference between everybody is how you train because that's what you know when you're on turning up on the day you know

there's there's you know a million different versions of that that quote that you know you you you've you've already won or lost a match uh that you know before you've actually the week before the weeks leading up to um the actual game day itself so i' love let's let's pick up that conversation more so In a bit because I'd love to talk more about your practice philosophies how you think it might differ what you think you know over time how that's evolved for you and what has worked but I want to I want to quickly

talk about because we were talking about Keon you a week before keemon the very uh difficult news came that qpl was not going to be renewed for 2024 and I know this is something that you were you had said to me um you know A couple years ago even that you were suspicious that this this this you know the time was definitely limited and you were worried that it would be sooner than later and so here we are now it's that was announced before King Con so did did this give you a different feeling or

a bit of a a boost in a certain sense um was there any different difference in feeling going into kingon with this knowledge first of all yeah I I can't say that there wasn't Uh and you know none of us knew uh what the news was going to be until I think probably like 5 to six hours hours before they made the tweet that they were not going to wow you know run the event yeah so it's not like we had been hiding this information for weeks or a month at a time um we found

out almost at the same time as everybody else and so it just kind of it was like a really you know somber feeling um and obviously you know I'm pretty sad about it it's Been a very special time in my life um but I just looked at it like okay you know there's going to be an awesome tournament coming up there's going to be 32 people there I just need to bury the feelings deep inside and I need to buckle down for one more week and try to just do my best to end the year

you know as best as possible to have done it to where every event I went to I made it to the finals I gave myself a shot and obviously it worked out even better than That you know I was able to walk away with the tournament and something I've rarely ever been able to do is to be able to win it without dropping a map uh that was a real shock to to me but um but yeah cuz I I thought everybody was playing at an amazing level at the event there were some of the

craziest games we've seen uh across the whole tournament but I don't know I somehow managed to bring out the best of myself to um to end the year on the best Note Possible um so yeah so I just kind of looked at the weekend like hey I just want to go in I want to play my absolute best and give it my all and then but also just kind of be present and just enjoy the moment enjoy the time with everybody you know just laugh a lot hang out um just have a good time yeah

well Barcelona is an incredible setting for that it's a beautiful it's one of the best cities in Europe I think it's it's an incredible City so glad that it was In a really awesome location um but yeah it's yeah very very sad news because I think I mean it's we don't know what's coming next I think that's one of the biggest questions and I think obviously it's it's not that I think people have been really I suppose fatalists or something with quake or or defeatists but it's just that obviously you know it's being you know

there in reality Quake hasn't had the relevance that anyone any of us who enjoy Quake would Like or feel like it's fair or or just given that it is really the in many senses the grandfather of FPS Esports uh you know Quake itself you know so many games came from that engine all the the major orts we know now and appreciate it's it really fed so many things and was there right at the beginning so it's it's a very it's it's definely very sad Prospect and it forces us to you know have have that uh

sense of looking forward you what's next but also um you Know before we go there you know let's let's look at let's look back a little bit in terms of your career so you know I mentioned of course you know you've been winning trophies since 2008 um you know Quake live to begin with and then you know uh going forward oh sorry Quake 3 and then going into Quake live and then going into Quake Champions obviously each game quite different in the way that it it functioned um let's what have been some of the high

the high Notes you know what strikes you when you when you think about the things you are most proud of when you look back on your career um I know it's a long time so you can take your time with um yeah I don't know uh I get I I have so many to be thankful for uh that it's hard to choose uh uh but yeah I I think um I think one of the one of the biggest Ones for me was uh was winning Quon the first time um when you know uh first of

all like I I went down like 02 in the finals against Sparty and then to be able to come back and to win but the biggest thing for that for me was you know quickon is where it got started for me uh where my dad took me uh in 2002 and uh some of you don't know some of you do my dad passed away in 2007 so for me like winning that and I like really Pushed myself to like win it you know for his memory um it really really meant a lot uh so yeah

as well as probably then um the uh the season one finals of uh of the Quake pro league you know with um what happened with my ex and everything but uh I don't know I think um those two probably stick out the most and then other than that I think um winning IEM the first time uh with the whole fact that we got to have like You know qualifiers like globally that led up to you know a World Finals um the road that I had to take to get there and I had to I had

a cooler stermy uh trying to remember who pant and somebody else who was really strong all in my group and then to make it through the playoffs I had to played to hang Cipher and cooler all in a row um so essentially I ended up having to play like the top six players in the world um all in the same tournament and having to Beat them to win it U was really really special uh for all the hard work that I had put in that year and especially just because of you know knowing you know

the guys that I'm going against and how how much time that they put in and how good that they are um yeah so that's why it probably feels that special to me yes it's it's really interesting too because you know that that list of players it's you know for for those of you that don't know um There Was An established you Know established players going into into Quake 3 the best Jewelers you know your zero fours you know your coers um and and you know Cipher although you know as a younger player comparatively to a

lot of the other ones at that point was was also like you know like getting pretty established as as a you know very good daughter as well and so and and so it's you know I feel like it's it's really awesome because that that moment also really solidified You as you you're you're one of the greats like the actual Quake greats at that point like truly um you've done a lot already at that point but it I feel like that really helped to cement it especially going into the era of quick life as well you

know really setting a a new meta as it were in in who is the most elite and who is going to carry that torch through so really awesome because yeah people like you know jibbo for example that was in a group I Because I I just opened it up and like oh my God I totally forgot jibbo was in that tournament there's a lot of like old names that kind of got phased out a little bit um and you were one of the people that ended up kind of replacing some of these these older names

so uh really really historic stuff uh for sure and I actually find it really impressive that you you even remember the order of the matches even though this is like over a decade ago um so that it's Getting harder to remember them but yes yeah sometimes I can get it right in terms of like other high points you know I feel like we've hit some sentimental ones ones that you know definitely make a lot of sense as to why they would be high points the ones you've mentioned are there any high points that reflect more

about you kind of reaching maybe breakthroughs in your own performance um maybe after you know struggling for a bit or needing to Reinvent yourself or perhaps finding some new way to apply yourself that that helped you to feel like I am now like really a step ahead of people um in a new way that's a good question um I think um I think there were various bouts of that through Quake live and Quake Champions uh because uh like uh for the for the best example I was winning pretty much everything from 2009 to 2010 and

then uh there started to be like changes to the game in terms of uh like lightning gun damage changes and then there were hitbox changes and there were some slight movement changes to the game and things like that um where for a little while I did struggle because the game uh like my play style wasn't based on AIM and I would say like for a long long time until probably like halfway through like my Champions career that I would say like pretty much everybody Else aimed better than me in like the top eight like I

had to win because I had to really really work for everything and try to outsmart my opponents and there was like a brief period where the game became more uh like catered to to aim because of like certain changes and so I really did I had to like really look at like how I was playing the maps and um a try to you know better improve my mechanics as well as um just try trying to play Even smarter and faster than before uh to be able to overcome the inconsistencies within my own game um so

there was like a period where Cipher was starting to win again and then um for like about like half a year to a year and then I started to win again in 2011 then that kind of happened again for like 2012 uh where he had a phenomenal year uh I think in 2012 uh he won Quake con and dreamhack winter uh no evil won that year but yeah so I I won Dreamhack Winter 2012 Summer 2012 then Cipher won Quon and then evil won um 2012 and then with the rise of evil uh within the

scene I know that sounds funny but yeah so the rise of Evil Within the scene and like trying to etch his name within the top uh then I I like kind of had to um to like find a way to push myself again to make it even higher because you know as I said with the whole like raisy question earlier like there was a period where evil was Beating everyone in EU like he was looking almost Unstoppable and and it was such a weird dynamic then because unlike Quake Champions like you could not play with

highing so there was like no way for me to practice against Europeans when I was living in in America and I had to like based off of Just review alone and just trying to like literally think about like how to beat this play style and try to simulate what those situations would be the best I could in practice and to try to overcome it and I managed to be able uh to do so thankfully uh which led to you know uh winning Quon as many times as I have today because that could have been totally

different you know um evil could have won a few and had his name etched up there as well so um and then in Quake Champions probably the biggest one was uh cuz I did struggle in duel for a little bit in the beginning um I don't think that I was playing The Meta of the game necessarily wrong but I I had some matches where you just feel it as a player like you feel like man I'm really playing like really well but just wow like there's just some really few like key fights where people are

just playing a level Beyond and they're hitting so hard they're hitting so many clutch shots out of position that it just changes the game um and so I just I had a I feel like I just had a few bad runs in run-ins with that uh notably uh Like when dang played me at the first Quon and and knocked me out uh I felt that he played a phenomenal you know uh two maps to come back and and to beat me there were some crazy situations where anybody else I would have secured frags and I

would have won uh but the way that he turned the games around you know ended up me being uh top eight instead of in the top four and then the same happen you know uh against nocus where I think within one match alone he probably Hit like six or seven midair rockets and it's like how how do you how do you account you know for that you know type of factor so type thing but then U but yeah I just really just kept my head down I didn't get uh didn't get down on myself about

it didn't get depressed I just kept looking at like okay well I still need to find a little something extra to overcome this and to to get even better and I know that I can do it I know that I can become a Champion again and um and I think that turning point of doing that at pgl really set the tone for getting that confidence and that momentum and from there was so I I won that and then I got second uh to raisy of all people um at this uh tournament in Italy shortly after

and then at dream hack uh winter 2018 uh I managed to to win d The Duel again and thankfully in that tournament I won both that and then 2v2 with with the hang and that really capped off the Year quite nicely so um I think those were like really big turning points and then during the qpl era just the win the first win in kavit like I don't know just something before that tournament just clicked in terms of like understanding The Meta that I thought was going to work and that I thought I could do

that others weren't and just pushing my game to the next level I think I really opened up like how time limit duel should be played more Consistently uh in terms of um I feel like The Meta in what is more important on what maps for like items en chant match ups and how you should play the rotation because the game is different from quck live like you can't just you can't just control everything it doesn't work that way you can't just keep collecting items because of the soft cap and I tried to find a way

to like best make it as close as possible by playing a more aggressive style than I had ever had to before um which was a complete change because throughout the first half of my career people would probably say I'd be more so on the defensive side uh of of a play style and I would have some games where I would play a bit aggressive but more often I would be more like stable position based and and play defensive a slower Pace game and just try to whittle out small advantages over time where uh where I

really picked up the tempo in Quake Champions in terms of uh playing a much much more aggressive game uh to where if you looked at like who I was back then and then you look now it might look like two totally different players yeah that's really interesting this is a a few points I want to touch on and that that actually reminds me of CPM duel because CPM duel is probably the first well I guess Quake world is actually the first that has that cap on Armor um in that way where well it's it's functions

A little bit differently but ultimately it's kind of as similar as a situation where um in CPM unlike Quake worlds um you can you actually really need to get like super aggressive um to really maximize the the value there and if you have the mechanics and the smarts to do it it's uh it's really powerful um so you reminded me of that a little bit uh but but I I wanted to uh go back a little be and I think we want to I want to talk about rivalries a bit Some of the best rivalries

you kind of T touched on some of this a little bit already some of the names that are popping up um so uh first firstly um you mentioned simulating you know you couldn't simulate or where you couldn't practice specifically against evil due to the the the practice circumstances you know stuck in the US the way the net code worked it just wouldn't really work out you had to simulate some some stuff about his play style and kind of Essentially theorize it analyze it and demos how did you actually manage to do you have any examples

of of what exactly you you simulated in your own practice where you know where you know you you took some stuff from the the vs and you're like I need to have an answer for this you know how did that process work do you have any examples yeah um I think the biggest difference was trying to find mind in like watching evil um like what was Making him special compared to everybody else and uh there was just this weird thing that he had where you know when you as a player like you enter rooms and

you're taking damage like when you're trying to attack or to take position in a room and how aiming becomes more difficult because you're taking that knockback whereas so like you could kind of anticipate that where if you have good positions and you're hitting good like spam and shots and you get good Like um even like lightning gun like burst of damage where you know that their movement is going to be predictable but it also might affect their Aim so then that can also like if they want to keep pushing then you could maybe turn the

fight around worth with that guy man it's like nothing affected him nothing it's just like it did not matter if he was taking a bunch of damage or getting knocked around he would still hit so hard so I I tried to Simulate that in some of my practice where like the mindset going into it would be okay I just need to try to build this internal feeling of yes I'm not playing him but if I was playing him would I still stick around in the fight or would I give it up give up position and

have to play the longer game and look for something else like how would I approach it and then try to like just already internally build like this like I guess this alarm in my mind of I Actually can't be around here because against him it's not going to work out like it's I'm actually being baited into uh into a death so really trying to look for that as well as just um I think just through review looking for other instances where maybe uh like you could be more ready for certain like rep peaking angles that

he likes to do uh or just situations where you might catch him with more free damage compared to others like the Biggest weakness I found in his game was players that were super rail heavy he struggled a bit so like kilson he would struggle against Cipher he would struggle against against uh so even though G like rail wasn't a big part of my game I had to make it more of a part of my game against him specifically and like just get a feeling for when he would eventually Give Up free shots that like actually

turn the tide of the game uh and and open it up uh so that's like The best that uh I could describe what I could do and then it's just about like once you're playing him and in the game like trying to play the first five minutes in like a touch and go and then start feel get a feeling for what he's doing and then adapt throughout the set as it goes and then try to uh try to take advantage of things that weren't there before it makes a lot of sense definitely pretty consistent i

i i with What I was witnessing I remember when evil came onto the scene it was kind of crazy itel felt like he changed the kind of formulas uh because the way that duel is played uh I guess one way to describe it for people that aren't familiar with it is that when you're you know you're finding for item control you want you know having a bigger stack size allows you to have more of an edge in a fight because you got more health and assuming you both hit roughly even amounts of Damage in exchanges

if you have more stack size you're going to win those exchanges so so it's that battle of of you know mechanics as well as you know having control and good position and so on and and so whenever you're taking or deciding to take a fight over an item or otherwise in Quake you kind of have this sense in your head of like how much damage you're going to take in a fight because you kind of have to do this math ahead of time and you've got all this Rehearsed all these rehearsed situations so you roughly

have this evidence to know okay I'm going to take this much damage and so and and then the Assumption of that then kind of tells you how good your play may or may not be um you know going into the into the future like how that may set you up for the next situations but when you're playing as you know players like evil he was hitting so much more damage than anybody else in like situations which You wouldn't expect it was just like kind of jarring and suddenly you're in these spots where you're you didn't

necessarily plan for it I felt like he really shocked a lot of people with with how he kind of changed some of the these like these formulas in people's heads that's kind of that's kind of how I felt about it I don't know if that that resonates at all um yeah that sums it up perfectly okay that's good good I'm not full of sh um fantastic um so so what's Really cool there is is that you know and the the tale you've already told I think through going over your career is how you know you've

had to overcome all of these various opponents and and the ways in which you had to be creative to to solve for these different opponents is of course you know you've leveled your s up through the opposition so do who have been in your eyes the most important Rivals and the most and some maybe some of the most enjoyable Rivals That you've had in your career that you feel like you know have have helped you to to get to really where you are now uh there's a lot uh I can't name everyone obviously but uh

I think like probably the biggest rivalries to push me through the Quake live era obviously viously you have to say cooler um I think just the Clash of because I think that our styles for a long time were pretty similar you know I Had a little mix of my own uh I I felt like I tried to frame my game as best I could with a mixture of cooler Style zero4 Style and a bit of my own like that's how I tried to develop as a player um and I think it really led to some

really enjoyable matchups like I always love playing uh Anton come playoff time um and just how intense it was uh obviously Cipher I think the a big thing was between Cipher Avic and I we were all like sequentially a year Apart so I'm two years older than ABC a year older than Cipher and we were like the new generation of Quake back then and so you know we we had a pretty friendly rivalry between all of us but I think it was more of like trying to push ourselves into that upper echelon to be like

you know talked about and remembered like everybody else that came before us like 04 CCM cooler uh talk toxic you know uh and then even names before that like Laker and and thresh And all that right um but so I think that really helped a lot and then I think a big one as well was dang like dang rising up as a presence within na to like to keep me like having to stay in constant shape and I I think like uh it was probably what we didn't like to practice against each other a lot

to be honest but I think the times that we did the type of play style that played helped me to be ready for everything because um he played a much more timing Uh based play style he played like time based and a little more aggressive whereas like a lot of the Europeans played more off off of feel and trying to utilize their mechanics more um so trying to get a good balance of playing both like really really helped um and obviously you know that battle of trying to stay ahead like who's who's the best in

na at the time myself or or Tim you know I think that really really helped for a while and then um going into the Quake Champions era um I think looking at the success like Claus had in the beginning and then trying to match him every time that we played um and then uh then I think obviously you know then the fact that cooler and I played again in um at the pgl finals uh uh but then after that I think going into qpl just seriously I was so impressed with seeing how kilson was kind

of able to push himself past the barrier of being Like kind of in the top eight within Quake live and then having like some success here and there but he was always like a pretty streaky player right he had the potential to be the best but it was really hard for him to bring out his best game over and over again uh but to see him you know rise to the occasion within Quake Champions and be up there um I think like near the near the end of round duel he was getting like top four

like pretty consistently and then for Him to win the kickoff event for qpl and then uh how many times has he won no he won three qpl events to my I think it's five um but yeah to see him constantly being at the top during the qpl era of time limit duel um was really impressive and to and I think the biggest thing that a has talked about is the difference in our Styles because I like I had said before like I really tried to push the game and be super super aggressive like just really

Pushing it to the Limit almost every time um not so much playing as defensive as I did before whereas kilson was playing like almost the opposite he was playing a super calculated like Center based map style gameplay like just trying to play a very slow paced game very bity very trap heavy and just playing at a very smooth Tempo and the fact that like such two varying play Styles found such Su such success um is pretty interesting to think about uh and Then obviously like um you know um what else uh venger and and raisy

for being at the top as well and then there was even periods uh uh obviously before the the uh the ban to the CIS region um where Cipher was getting to his like top form again and it was so much fun to be able to play him like that again because it had been quite a few years um yeah that that I don't know there's a lot there's a lot that have like oh hold On my dog is yeah sorry about that she just started like moving in her sleep and started started kicking the uh

the webcam no worries no worries on accident so I just had to get her to move a little bit no it's all good and I think we're sort of at a natural stopping point I think you would sort of just like close down that thought too so um so yeah with all these rivalries it's really interesting because you know this Is something where you know I think we already sort of talked about it you know there's a lot of players that have their Styles and they will play to their strengths and that's kind of of

course how their Styles generally tend to develop and you know you've you've managed to find success against so many styles and so many different versions of the Quakes like you mentioned there's changes to the damage and you know in like for the lightning gun or like Movement changes there's you know meta changes that that come about people you know will come up like evil who have a different approach to the game and people might kind of model themselves after this this person and so you know the consistent thing is that you've had to uh be

able to adapt over time while still being able to innovate in your own game and also continue to play to your strengths but at the same time to beat these people to as you mentioned when we Talked about evil in that matchup be able to also incorporate as quickly as possible the the ways to adjust to these to these different opponents and that seems to be something that you know I mean I think it's fair to say you are the best at um because you've been able to have so much success against so many different

opponents what do you think like why is it that you are better at this than than everybody else that you've sort of come against over time What is what is is it about your practice and approach is there something have you have you thought about this um I think uh to answer it I'm my goal is to bend like like I said uh before yes I played a more defensive play style in most of Quake life but my goal is always to to be about as balanced as possible like yes I have a few strengths

here or there with uh certain weapons or certain like fighting styles or whatever but I really try to Be ready for everything because at the end of the day you know after so many tournaments you're going to have to run into everyone anyway so you need to be doing the best that you can to be able to handle everything um I think a really big thing that's helped me with that are two things the learning experience of knowing that I needed to do that by uh I think it was my first International land uh eswc

master of Paris uh that's like kind of when when I was like coming up Yeah when I was kind of coming up in the scene uh but like right before then because I had already qualified through na so I was going to you know uh try to compete and try to place as high as possible uh and to prove myself uh whereas before then 04 still needed to qualify so he needed to place like so high to be able to make it to the finals later in the year and I had went to boot camp

with him for like probably like a week week and a half uh before um before We went to the event and I learned that like playing one play style too much too often leads you to creating bad habits of trying to just beat that play style yeah and so it it was a valuable lesson because uh like when I went to the to the event um I I lost a couple Maps where I probably shouldn't have because I was playing like more so I was playing just one way rather than trying to like kind of

feel the opponent out and adapt Mid game and play to their strengths and weaknesses um and so I just after that event I just learned that like you know what I need to be as balanced as possible and uh I just need to be able to adapt like I need to not just play my game I need to play the best game against who I'm playing whether that means that I need to pick up the tempo because they're not I noticed that they're not timing well enough and I can catch them out on rotation or

they just They crumble under that aggressive pressure and if they're allowed to play slower then they're super super strong you know and then other players where you need to play slower because they lack patience and you start to feel that as like you you're playing them etc etc so um that's that's a big part of it and I really made you know it a big goal for me to become that to become balanced and then the next step of it is I think that I just review better than anybody else Has done I've been been

able to pick out not only things in my own game but watching the play styles of others and figuring out the small little things that need to take me to the next level whereas um I kind of supplemented a lot of review time for playtime because I feel I feel like with quake and this probably even applies to like Counterstrike because it's the type of game where you're doing the same thing Over and over and over you're doing these like situations 100 hundreds if not thousands of times so it's not as though you need to

keep like updating yourself on the meta constantly like let's say a mooba where it has like 100 plus Champions and then a new Champion comes out and item changes happen all the time where you have to like stay up to date where it's more so like once you reach like a really high level and you understand the fundamentals of the game And you really get like to a high level in terms of your mechanics the like the margin of increase in your skill is so minuscule that practicing over and over and over and over again

isn't what's going to to break you through it's going to be how you're thinking about the game and also then like just thinking like uh just Theory crafting and really figuring out what's the next step and what can and kind of like stepping outside of yourself and viewing yourself as if you Were your own coach and being brutally honest about what you need to do differently to be better and I think a lot of that comes just from being able to watch others and to review yourself in a brutally honest take and uh and then

making your practice more so um like quality practice over quantity but I I've always made sure that when I'm practicing like I'm not just messing around like even if I'm just playing for two hours that two hours I'm acting as If it is match time if I if I lose in practice it's okay I can learn from it but getting in the mindset and the mentality that this is match time kind of like always puts you you in the state of being ready to play when it's time like you don't ever start thinking about other

stuff like you you set up things for yourself like in that practice regimen so let's say like I'm G to play like 14 maps in a day and the goal is if I lose more than five then for example I Have to do x amount of push-ups or sit-ups or the the nice the nice treats that I were going to have for myself I can't have no because I spent too much time thinking about other [ __ ] during the game like I was being distracted and it like you know or like I just uh

I allowed my emotions to get the best of me and and I'm losing because of that and it really forces you like look if I don't want to do all this like negative stuff I really need to stick to these Goals and be honest to myself and try to bring out the best of me and the whole point is being focused and in the moment the whole time um yeah those are probably the three things I think that have helped me the most in terms of uh being able to handle uh multiple play Styles throughout

the years and to arguably be the most adaptable player uh for Quake I I love all those points so much there's uh it's actually really funny Because the first the first thing that that I want to mention is because because um I think we were in different groups at masters of Paris so I I think we got to play but um the thing that you mentioned about the issue you had going to that tournament I actually learned the same lesson at that exact tournament and I I called it like practice partner syndrome and it actually

it actually kind of keys into some of the other things you just said too where I just Cuz I went into that event and I I did all my practice like primarily like 90% of my practice was against one player uh and and it was against Fuki who was at the time like one of the best Swedish play he one of the best Jewelers in the world at that time he's a very very good player he's very top player and uh so I was playing him because I was friends with him and I was playing

him like you know up to like four to five hours a day so quite a lot of practice against him And then maybe I do a little bit afterwards he would then practice against like two other opponents for another four or five so he was practicing like up to like 12 hours a day yeah he was practicing a lot and uh I wasn't able to practice that hard as him and so and and so I started getting really good results playing against him but I didn't realize at the time that one that was just really

comfortable because um and I was tricking myself Because he's a really good play like if I can beat him then I can probably beat like almost everybody else because he is so good um so I started being able to beat him in practice and have really good results but it's cuz I was cutting so many Corners because I know how he plays so I can take risks that don't actually make sense or are fundamentally kind of bad but I just know too much about how he plays um so so I got really comfortable there because

I'm like I got To have those good feelings of feeling like I was really good and at the same time I I got to you know play in this more comfortable environment and then I was uncomfortable actually practicing against other people because I didn't want to have that reality check um so like subconsciously that kind of stuff was happening and after that event I like really realized that because of some of the results that I had and I'm like this is really disappointing U so That was a really big wakeup call for me in that

in that sense and it goes it also goes to the point that you're saying about being able to deal with uncomfortable emotions because when you're when you're practicing um you know you're you have to push yourself you have to challenge yourself and there has to be like like you know you are setting up consequences for yourself like you know that's very hard for people to do that because you're you're You know you're like and and you're not getting coaching doing this and like you said like you have to be a coach for yourself and so

I think this is like a really interesting thing because in Quake um everybody had to figure everything out themselves you had to be everything for yourself your own performance coach your own strategic and tactical coach all of these things so you managed to do that stuff pretty effectively obviously given your results And and the these are things now that I think are becoming more common practice that people are beginning to understand this stuff but it's still hard because you're still having to deal with being a human being and having to deal with negative emotions and

having to not necessarily play for fun but play for the vision and the goals that you have and it's very hard for people to consistently do this um that that you know that you were able to set up for Yourself to have consistency there to be able to get some results because like you said I think and this I think people um they don't necessarily put enough weight on this with with practice if you you're practicing to be consistent you have to practice consistently and you know you have to have the same amount of effort

and and all the rest of it and it has to be as close to the match environment as possible and so if you're practicing and having fun well that's a Completely different mindset than if you're actually there in Match Day totally different so no wonder you know you might struggle on Match day you're not prepared so um I wanted to just kind of you know rehash some of those points because I think I think the stuff that you said was really really key and important for people to to know who want to get better in

competition so um amazing uh actually so we we talked we talked now about some of the past stuff Um there might be some future for Quake um that we know about now obviously there might be some other stuff that we don't know about yet but there's been a lot of teasing from people seen on Twitter from Project velocity they're looking to seemingly do you know fill some of the vacuum and bring Quake to to an audience professionalize the broadcast and and have Quake live I think is what they're going to be doing coming back um

you know what are your Thoughts on this would you be interested in competing in this where are where's your head out with something like this just popping up now it's quite an interesting time for it to pop up uh and as well because people people have still been asking me over the last few years like uh they would be like you prefer Quake live over Quake Champions blah blah blah like just assuming that I I would whereas no I I've actually preferred as much as I Loved the Quake live era and playing it I've loved

the Quake Champions era because of uh I love the fact that all the different movements from all the Quakes are in there and that like it just is so nice to be able to play the different styles and like the the difference that it brings in terms of like how you have to play matchups um but yeah I guess so there's news with the velocity thing right that's what it's called yeah project velocity is What they're calling it project velocity yeah so because as I as far as I know uh King Con said that they're

going to try to run some online stuff for Quake champions from like February to October I think and then have another land next year um I don't know like what the prize money is going to look like I know Maestro announced that they're going to run um uh they're going to run Iron Fist 2 but there's no like uh exact date yet There's no price details so there's some FY like tournaments that are happening and then who knows what's going to happen at Quon like who knows what the game will be what what what it

will you know what the prize money will be what that type of support will be and then now that this Quake life stuff is coming up as well like um I think right now I would be a little more open to playing it than before because I think the amount of time that I had to spend to Consistently practice for qpl because of the weekly matches like over and over again it's not as though like I didn't want to play like Quake live as well it's just I didn't feel like I had the time that's

like the same when diabotical came up I felt like really motivated and had the time to play the team like tournaments for it it but I was like I'm already investing all this time in Quake Champions duel I don't have the time I I I'm a human after all I have to I I just don't have the energy to be able to then also play the other Duel at the same time with like the type of schedule that I had but like now depending on like how things go this year uh yeah I could possibly

see myself like playing in both um because um as you know we talked before the the interview here like I'm going to be in Europe for the next year I got approved to go uh move to where my my girlfriend lives so I'll be there for probably one To two years um so yeah so I I think at least for like the next six to 12 months I could still be playing Quake we'll see what happens from there uh because as I've talked before um I think the natural progression in orts when I'm done playing

is probably coaching like either like coaching directly for a team or just I think something I'd be really good at is just like mindset stuff like mindset and what are you you doing in terms of like U so like kind of like A like a psychiat like yeah like a sport psychology psychology yeah sports psychology type stuff because I think there's a lot of ways that people don't realize that they're holding themselves back from bringing out uh their ability to play at an optimal level more often in terms of how are they sleeping how are

they eating like what is their practice regiment like uh and then that's another interesting thing because I like uh That's going to be probably one of the toughest things for me to tackle like in the future when I go down that route is for team play like like the biggest example from Quake here is for me I like I've said I I enjoy quality practice over quantity whereas there are some players that they just they need to they're a grinder poer is one of those players and there there would be a couple like boot camps

before tournaments where we would go land Together uh in Germany like because uh SK and M Sports used to share like the same offices and so we'd play and I would be satisfied with playing the map pool once maybe twice in a day against him and I'm I'm done with him I I would be done and I would want to play other players even if it's playing online like we just talked about in the previous I need to play multiple play Styles over like just kind of play as broad of a range as I can

to try to be ready for Everything whereas he just wanted to play oh that's like I just couldn't do it I couldn't sit there and play like 10 hours straight but he's somebody that could do it and it helped him like if he didn't play that much um he didn't feel like he could get the best out of his game so I think that's also like something like in terms of the future of trying to figure out the balance of finding that between players within team Esports because some players they just Can't they playing too

much like burns them out or they start going through the motions but then other players they need that time so you need to figure out a way to get them to to supplement that time elsewhere whether it's through ranked or through other like training regiments uh to be able to bring it up uh to try to bring out the best of them uh but yeah but so for right now though I I don't I don't fully know what the plans are for next year I I would like To play I think that's the goal is

to uh to keep playing you know Quake Champions and possibly Quake life at the same time for this next year we'll see how it goes uh but then who knows depending on uh if certain opportunities rise or not so um so yeah I can't really answer more at this time gotcha yeah know that's it makes total sense it's it's funny you're talking about the coaching angle and the all of the performance stuff is is that's that's been my my obsession of Course so I'm sure we could have like a completely separate podcast about about more

stuff and kind of drill deeper on some of those ideas uh but um and I think we can touch on some of that especially as it relates to you know your career and your thoughts um you know you know going into the more performance Realm of the discussion now um you know one thing that You' you've made mention of multiple times and I think everyone has come to know you for And I think from even really the very beginning because I I remember like you mentioned that you modeled yourself uh after you know a bit

of cooler and and Z4 and I think that's really how people you know especially who were in The Quake scene at the time when you were coming up really remember you because you you mentioned it you mentioned that you studied cooler a lot um back then and one of the things too for extra context for people Uh back in well I think really since 2003 I suppose the level of uh let's say that the the talent pool between North America and Europe it started dwindling massively for North America you there was a much smaller talent

pool overall a lot less players and it's such a big country of course it's much harder to get like consistent practice in terms of the latencies and the netos are way worse back then yeah so so you know you had to be creative and and you know you I think already from the beginning you were you were that kind of play and it's something you said that you you've done better than other people um and it probably explains at least why you're so good at articulating I think I think you're of all of the players

at least you're the the player with the best ability to articulate the theory of the game and of course you're pretty well known too for doing that uh that that bit of content with karmac that people Absolutely love the ESL Classics when you reviewed the the dm6 match against cooler in an IM finals I believe which is which is an absolute kind of a great piece of Quake history that people enjoy to this day so when it comes to breaking down the theory of of Quake of Quake duel like if you could break down the

theory of Quake duel in a couple minutes what does that sound like the theory of Quake duel um I mean obviously the the answer is Simple uh die less than the other guy within like depending on the era whatever the amount of time limit is to win the match uh so but then it's like how do you achieve that and it's all about combining the overall base you know mechanics of the game and the fundamentals um to understanding uh how to utilize the items on the map to your advantage you know when you're in control

and when you're out of control Um so it's just a constant EB and flow of decision making in terms of who has the advantage based off of positioning and weapons to where then do certain people have certain Stacks to overcome the typical advantage that somebody has at a position um so yeah it's just uh I don't know I feel like feel like I'm doing a bad job explaining it actually when usually no I think you've done a good job in the sense that you just you just identified The very base principles there like Advantage versus

disadvantage and that's coming through the filter of the mechanic of the game so you're seeing it from like a first principal level basically like that's positive expected value versus negative expected value that is constantly changing within the game um but yeah I think and it's um quake and also that I think a big factor about Quake is like the will of your mind because it's such since it's All on you it's such an easy game to like crumble under the pressure um I think duel is like a really good challenge of like pushing yourself to

always believe that you can somehow make the right plays and to come back and to do it uh compared to other games um so yeah but I don't know if I it's kind of harder I feel like it's actually hard to like simply explain it compared to like breaking it breaking it down step by step now that you've asked me yeah no I Think I I think that makes so that kind of put you on the spot there but one thing I do really like that you mentioned that that reminds me of something I was

thinking when you were talking before about when you noctis you know had this game against you where he hit like you know all these like insane shots and and and and sort of I think you repeatedly brought up the the mental aspect the mental resiliency aspect of of quake in general and duel and and Really competition and and and I think you know from my experience of competing in like various Quakes and different games Quake duel is by far the most difficult game mentally to compete in I've always found because it's just like you said

if you have a moment's lapse in terms of your your mental you can just lose just straight off of that you don't get like around to kind of refresh or a timeout to bring it back like you do in a lot of ESP other Esports or teammates To kind of bring you up um which you may need at various points in qu in Quake du like you have to fix the problem and and it's not just that necessarily it's about withstanding the difficult situations and then actually staying present because i' I found that in duel

one of the big things I ran into I think everybody goes through this I think this is just a human thing through different competition all different competitions is that you generally go into any Scenario with a projection as to what's about to happen or going to happen in the future based on the information you have now I have these sa sizes I have these positions I have these sa sizes and weapons and these positions um like you know in in the round it's this much time in round it's a 4 V3 and these are the

like it doesn't really matter the situation but you you have this model and then you then you make this prediction and that's how you come up With your play because then now have assessed what the best play is going to be and some sometimes what happens is the formula just changes and in Quake it's can be so frustrating if you feel like you have a play or you set yourself up well then the other player does something whether it's an over performance or like whatever it might be they change it like evil we mentioned he

hits so much damage you didn't calculate or you know for that in in the play you Had set up for yourself now you have to just let go of that and change it even if that guy's just been destroying you you know and that you haven't had a spot you haven't had a good spot yet sometimes the frustration boils over and you're like ah [ __ ] it I'm just going to I'm just going to go for it anyway even though that's the wrong thing to do you're constantly having battle it yeah yep yep you're

like you're gambling to make back a lost opportunity and it goes Both ways it's like uh sometimes it's when an opponent pulls off something amazing or it's sometimes like you had such an easy fight or scenario and you botched it so then you double down as if like oh I can make that moment back and so then you gamble and then you end up failing and it just gets even it gets even worth so and then and that's the thing about Quake 2 like uh I mean I think compared to the Quake 3 era and

even before then like Quake 2 and and Quake world I think spawn killing has gotten much uh less prevalent because of how they've changed the spawn system over the years but like the whole thing of like you double down on an action like that and you gamble and you lose but then to which then leads to another potential instant death you know what I mean and then it just gets worse and worse it's like oh but I'm not gambling now well that doesn't matter you're spawning you're just you're happening to Spawn here it's too bad

it's too bad for you you should have thought about that earlier you know like this this could have been a consequence and then it's all on you yes oh man it's it's so hard it's really hard to deal with that stuff and it's very hard to like uh it's very hard to identify it takes it takes experience and time to identify some of those mental leaks I think um and because the frustration can be it's so difficult because it you're not getting This like constant feedback that can feel kind of positive in in Du sometimes

you're just getting shut down and shut down and they're just playing the map correctly and you're not getting a spot because you're playing really good players and sometimes it can be like minutes and minutes till you get like a spot that you can play and if that gets robbed from you it can just really can be very tough uh to deal with so yeah I think that the mental aspect is really Interesting with quake and and how it how it or duel in general to be honest I think um I played Starcraft um Starcraft 2

not at a like Pro level but I I got got to like the Master's level and so I was playing like you know decently against like decent opponents at the time and it's it's kind of there kind of similar to be honest there is there is that similar sense that that that you know you can lose a spot and things might not work out and that that in that Just that one lapse can just lose you a match so it's uh it's very interesting how that Dynamic Works in these 1 V one titles and and

I I hope that we get more because we I'm hoping that we'll get more of a maybe a Resurgence of quake as well and 1 V One games in Starcraft as well not Starcraft but there stormgate which is made by the kind of OG developers you kind of brought Starcraft 2 um into into existence so I'm hoping we'll get more of that in orts um in PC Esports but um you know moving moving forward a little bit picking up on an earlier Point we've mentioned um you know rayy and and his his uh struggle in

some of the finals I think I actually think that if if you if we go if you are listening and you're going going back into this uh this this hour that we've been talking already I feel like there's all the clues perhaps as to what maybe raisi could be doing differently possibly cuz we talked about how you Know you talked about the mental aspect we talked about the review aspect that being one area that you feel like you're just better than everybody else um when it comes to your practice approach you've already mentioned that you

practice with intention and you kind of you really highlighted that point so do you feel like practice is really what differentiates you your ability to deal with negative emotions or or the neg or the negative aspects of kind of putting Yourself through such a rigorous intentional Focus practice is that what change um is the difference between you and maybe some of the opponents that that struggle to beat you um I think so and I think U another good example too is um and to be honest I I was in favor of this change because you

know like back in the day sometimes like when people were losing in a match they would GG early right whereas like I in The yeah in the qpl I we had a rule that we were not supposed to do that and it and it was looked at from the perspective of like you know you go to you go to a sports game you go to watch football basketball American football whatever right uh the game doesn't end early like you're spending your time there to watch and enjoy the game like when we show up for our

matches it's like no this is the time that's allotted you're going to play this time Regardless of whether you're getting smacked around or not right but that also leads into like mentality stuff for practice where um because even in Quake live there was some sometimes where like I would quit games early like in practice but in Quake Champions I really was like okay I'm gonna like go into this like Allin in terms of unless the game is like you know I'm lagging like crazy and I'm already down 10 frags within like two three minutes then

I'm Gonna just play it out I'm G to play it out to like really force myself to like if I'm in a bad situation the only way to like get good at coming back is to be like doing it consistently a to like work on what it is to to make that grind to make crazy comebacks and give yourself a chance to win games that should be improbable to win as well as what's it what do you need to do to make sure that it doesn't happen to yourself you know like uh so that you

don't just Like laxidasical be like oh they've given up and then you just stop caring but you're like you're in the game and present the entire time um that's something that I really really focused on and I think that helped a lot like um that I think I did more more than other players is just even if the game was going like [ __ ] in practice just like take it to the end just take the beating and and just learn from it and like try to use it as okay if this was a match

And I was getting beat like this I still want to like try to gain like some momentum for myself and get a more of a feeling of the game or and and in sense of like how they're playing on the day and what I should do then for the next map as well so I think that that helped me a lot uh over the last few years um it's just also making my practice like that which goes into the whole every practice needs to be like it's a matth type deal and having that mentality all

The time yes it's uh it's so interesting because I feel like there are some there are some simple things people can do to to get really like a lot of just a lot of gains in in these areas I think it's and I think this is why review is so important because it gives you that time when you're not playing to then give yourself something to focus on next time you play so because you can sit down and identify that you know you're I mean if you're honest with you you have I mean That's the

trick you have to kind of be honest with yourself and some people do struggle a lot with that can be difficult that's why coaches can be particularly helpful but but just like the having a reframing of the situation that you can do ahead of time can be really useful there's there's a really great uh are you familiar with Joo willink um uh no no I'm not oh I'll have to send this to you there's there's this uh there's this Great Clip he's a Navy Seals um commanded like a pretty pretty famous one he's written a

bunch of books at this at this point and um about leadership and various other things but there's this really cool um thing from one of his podcasts um where essentially the gist of it is that um B basically everything that happens you know the response is the same it's good it doesn't M like you lost your job you know good more time to you know get better you know you you're getting Destroyed in a jeel like good you have time to practice being out of control and being in a really [ __ ] spot you

know like everything gets reframed instantly into this into this place positive outlook yeah instead of like yeah always trying to find the silver lining in something rather than getting down about it yeah and and it speaks so much to how you're looking at things you're always like I feel like you're always pulling you're always like looking at things Through the perspective of well I want to win in at the tournament so so you're not just like thinking emotionally first like oh this feels really [ __ ] and you're like getting frustrated like you're it feels

like your your vision your goal U of of you know winning and good quality practice that just supersedes the shitty emotions you might be feeling at the time which for a lot of people is is hard to overcome that and that's I think where the the problem Can come is just the emotional battle you know the emotions often tend to win because people are not it's very hard to get that that control and and it's you have to be even aware of them like what's happening first which can also be difficult I think uh I

well I even had to like relearn it again to be honest uh I would say from like 20 was it probably it start it started to feel like this in like uh 21 and then most of 22 where uh just to be honest like some Of the Quake Champions like uh matches felt super inconsistent like there would be like crazy desync sometimes uh sometimes it would be for an entire game and then other times it' be like oh it'd be for a few minutes and then for you and then it would feel like it would

be for the other guy and I you just have to look at the stats sometimes from matches like through these periods where it's like guys who consistently LG 40 plus or rail In the 50s and that and yet for the first five to you know minutes of the game or even some whole matches they only hit like 20% it's like something's not right and it's very very frustrating to to experience that and know like that you feel like you're being held back from hey even sometimes like if you realize what's going on you feel like

you can't even defend positions sometimes and so there was like times where like I was getting like pretty Pretty ET like and like through practice and just um upset at the game because it felt like you know an out an external Factor outside of how the other person is playing and what I'm doing is like causing issues right and there's there doesn't feel like there's like a fix for it um but like having to kind of like reframe my mental perspective in practice again even with that so that like if that's happening in a game

don't just give into that frustration and give Up to to to like take a deep breath and to reframe it like okay look if the game is going to feel like this and feel like [ __ ] like for whatever reason look if I can make the results of this game super super close where it's like they only win by one or two frags and like the the disparity of the feeling of the game was that great then that means that I actually was playing really really well I still gave myself a chance to win

or even in the odd game where it doesn't Feel good it feels like it's really lagging and you still pull out a victory and anyway then that shows that you have the mental toughness to make it through even when things are going right and like it just helps you like as you get into tournament mode time and it's something that you know I was struggling with for a little bit and like I really had to like step back and be like look you need to stop like you need to stop you could complain all you

want like you Can vent it but you can't give into it internally you have to keep going and keep thinking in the moment and keep problem solving and thinking about what's next and like just look at it like like uh you know just I don't know just even though you're handy you feel like you're handicapped for a little bit it doesn't matter nobody cares but you need to overcome it anyway yeah I like I like what you're I think one of the ways I I'm enjoying Right now the way you're talking about this is just

it's sometimes when people say you know mental toughness or like you know you just got to have the resiliency and so on it it's a very it's kind of a a fairly ambiguous way of talking about the mental toughness so I really like that you're talking about well you yeah you have to have some ability to withstand the the actual just negativity the negativity the the negative emotions But here are also some tools you need to have you know go and get some tools to help you deal with it you have to think about how

you're going to deal with these situations there is some awareness component about yourself there is you and you mentioned before there is what physiological realities you know sleep nutrition you mentioned those things as well like it's all these things kind of come together for that that thing that people might just say oh you just need Some more mental toughness um so I think I think you know one thing that you know it's pretty consistent for you know for for for you as a player in your career it feels like is that it really seems like

you do really drill down to the the fundamentals to as much as possible which is you know then what how you're able to have comprehensive approaches to get the most out of what you're doing which I think is really a great talent that you have um and So um I actually so this is something actually that came up earlier as well you mentioned that stylistic switch when it comes to uh playing Quake Champions and I and I've I've seen of course you know for for those that haven't seen your stream you you stream basically two

things you stream Quake Champions duel in practice and then you stream like Doom aernal where you're you know just destroying everything and and what what struck me When you said that it's like oh it just clicked for me I'm like well the way that you play that game is obviously it's you know you're just going pretty aggressive aggressive in that game that's kind of the point um so is is is that part of the reason that you just get into more of that mindset of just going really fast and just you know confidently kind of

just you know crushing stuff is there any connection am I just pulling it out out of thin air I think you're pulling a little bit uh I I've more had to like uh say since Quon and before The Foundry and King Con came up a lot of people were taking like you know a break we just had a long season you know we'd been playing for like eight months so it was harder to find practice and uh the connection I was on was like pinging much worse to EU for some reason uh I don't know

why I just started having bad routing so I was like I was like for my mental sanity I just Need to not play high ping for a little bit like really limit the amount that I do that and so finding practice in na was a little um was a little more difficult leading up to these two events so I was like okay because the thing is like when you when you stop playing for a while and you come back to a game you'll notice the game feels so much faster than usual it takes like your

mind a bit to like start to slow it down in certain things to just be instinctual Again uh whereas I notic like if I'm just playing Doom Eternal and I'm playing on like the hardest difficulties so like Ultra Nightmare and stuff like that it's more of like that's a way to like keep my mind constantly thinking as well as aim training at the same time because you have to think about so many factors to where like then like if I was doing that and then I got a little bit of practice of Quake Champions the

game didn't feel like it was slowing like Like uh that it was speeding up it felt like it was at the same speed if not a little slower because my mind had been thinking about something more quickly um so then it I was able to like maximize that practice even if it was like a minimal amount so I was just doing that and reviewing and uh and then playing the amount that I could um and then what what was the I had more to say but I can't remember part of the question what was the

other oh I was just essentially Drawing the connection between doom maternal and and and Del practice yeah oh okay well as far as like the aggressive play style switch uh I felt it was for a few things I could play almost every champion at an elite level in the game I'd say the one champ that I kind of have shied away from is uh over the years is clutch and it's not because I can't play it it's because like sometimes so so you're already establishing that hey I'm gonna I'm Gonna play with the biggest hit

box in the game so you're gonna be able to hit me no matter what and if you get some games where like you just really are not hitting as well it just adds and just makes it so much harder to win whereas like if you have games where it feels like pretty smooth and pretty good and you're playing your game like you could really make that champion work but I felt like it just relied on you playing at your very best so that's Pro that's Why like I shied away from playing it more often than

not but I could play 15 out of 16 at will like didn't matter right so like okay I have all these stylistic options available to me and then I just started thinking about the game and like uh how I felt like how it should be be played compared to like the round duel era um was I just looked at it like look at these like soft caps on Armor that you have and more often than not in these matchups it just felt like Controlling all the armor on the map felt more uh more beneficial and

it felt like it applied more pressure to the opponent than controlling the mega Health uh and a big example is corrupted keep so corrupted keep has two light armors it has one near the nail gun it has one near the rocket launcher then it has the heavy armor and then you have the mega Health whereas if you keep creating these type of fights uh like little fights over and over you make More value out of the armor because then like if you're creating situations where they have to fight you or they die you're taking damage

and you can keep soaking up the light armors before you grab the heavy armor and you could create this cycle where like at the end so let's say the cycle ends boom you're 100 Health let's say you're two medium Champs you're 100 Health 175 armor compared to somebody that's now 175 Health Zero armor so if that keeps Happening you're eventually G to find them and you're going to kill them you're G to find a situation where they make one small mistake where they needed to make the choice between door number one or door number two

and they chose the wrong one and now it's over right and you just keep creating this constant impending doom of pressure and uh and it creates it also only really works if you're timing really well so if you're not timing really well then it can lead To like sometimes like you overcommit for light armors and then you end up dying because of it or like you get caught out uh and then take too much damage and they can get control back but I felt like with the way that I timed and trying to play this

style like really felt like as close to trying to have full control and Quake live as you possibly can within Quake Champions it's something that you could kind of apply for like two to four minutes at a time Sometimes but eventually if somebody realizes what's going on and they play correctly they have to avoid you for like two full Cycles so that at the point it becomes like okay now it's like why should I damage myself so much with rockets just to steal these light armors uh when they could be waiting for when I do

that and then deal damage after and now I've just negated everything so it be and it's something that's really hard to do it's really hard to stay Completely hidden for like one two minutes and deal no damage unless somebody just makes a huge mistake and runs into you for free like it just it makes it so hard and I felt like a lot of the Champions with movement helped you really push the tempo so that you could create fights over and over again uh to create those scenarios and another part of why I felt like

that was the best is because um if you have two guys uh that are so let's say you have a guy That's 175 Health 100 armor you have another guy that's 100 Health 175 armor the way that the the damage ratio works because armor is 2/3 to 1/3 for health if you uh get in an all-in LG battle and you deal the same amount of damage the guy with the mega health will actually win because he'll be left with some health whereas like the guy with the armor he'll actually die with some armor left over

so so playing the style of trying to control the armors more often And taking smaller fights over and over and recouping your health around the map which spawns faster than the the items in general like just creates like more and better opportunities for you whereas if you have the situation where you're the mega Health guy you have the full stack and you have armor you want to create more Allin opportunities uh which is much harder to do compared to creating smaller fights over and over and and so that's what I don't know I Just felt

like my movement was really really good my timing was probably better than everybody else and I just felt like I could do something that others didn't and and yeah and I think my aim picked up throughout Quake Champions uh to the the mice that I was switching to as well as just I think playing more team modes in the beginning really helped my combat skills in general and so I was able to extract more out of my game as well in terms of The fights that I was able to take more consistently and um and

yeah and I think that's why I I I just made the switch and just felt that it was it was the best play style for me to do and thankfully it's uh it's really worked out yeah no and it sounds I mean for me that's that's that's the most fun way to play in fact that was actually the reason why I always had less fun dueling why I always prefer the team modes is because in the in the you know Historically like you mentioned in Quake uh Quake 3 Quake Quake live it's a lot more

about trying to play defensively there's like more defensive play I mean you have to go aggressive but you can't like I preferred CPM juel and like you know because it's kind of similar like you're always able to put the pressure on you're able to actually do more with movement and and mechanics in those games you don't have to be as as super efficient um in in in the in the in in The more defensive way so um I I actually wish IID played Quake Champions dual more if IID had the time and if the engine

was I think a bit like more approachable uh I think you know there's been some sticking points there but um moving on there's there a question I have to ask you and and I want to ask about the setup of stuff as well because I've done so much content um lately and I've delved massively into them to the world of mechanics and aim aiming and Aiming communities and stuff to to find out and extract the gems of knowledge that they've they've discovered over time but um I have to ask you about age because you know

this is something that's that's very often a conversation I have to I have to yeah people talk about this all the time um they think you know there's this old thing oh you know your reflexes get too slow and obviously it's very just you know people are just pulling this out of their asses They just something that they you know think is the reason why you would be better or worse as you age but what has your experience been as someone that's been playing for so long and you're in your 30s now have you noticed

age being a thing in any way at all for you uh in some way not so not so much uh from a day-to- byday basis I think the biggest thing is uh you can't take as much time away from the game like the biggest example is sometimes um there was a Period or two excuse me in Quake live where like we had played like a bunch of tournaments in a row and then there'd be a big gap like three four months before the next one I would take like one to two months off I would

just not play I was like I'm burnt out I just want to live life hang out with friends play other things and I could come back and practice like it's nothing uh and it would take like one to two days to get back into the Rhythm where like the game Slows down and you're back into like learning and getting the most out of your shape and what you need to do whereas now if I take like two weeks off and I don't play at all I think it takes longer it takes longer for the the

game to slow down I notice that okay it's a little bit more difficult like some sometimes I'll come back and I'll be like okay my aim feels fine but now it's like it's harder for me to mentally time as many items so then I have to like Specifically focus and practice like not giving a [ __ ] about combat skills but just like for like two three days just focusing on timing that's it just getting like back into the habit of continually doing that and processing and then I can do it again and it's no

problem so I think it's just as we're aging it's not necessarily that like our reflexes are going or that we're thinking slower like like dude I I've been aiming some of the best I've ever Aimed the last couple years you know like at at certain periods of time as well as like I think I think maybe I timed a little bit better in Quake live than I have in Quake Champions but not to the degree where it's obviously impacted me like I I think that I've I've still timed really really well it's just uh Quake

Champions is this weird thing where like I said with the Cycles sometimes you just end up having to stop timing the lights because there's this Weird situation where neither player wants to take them right so it's not this constant timing of four to five items at a time all the time um so yeah so I think it's just if if you're able to be able to play enough you feel like you can support yourself like finan like financially responsibilities and stuff and you have the time like age isn't the problem it's just like the older

we get the more things like get into our life In terms of those in terms of responsibilities and decisions we have to make to where maybe we can't allocate enough time to be able to maintain that level to combine the experience with our reflexes still and then the drop off happens a little more drastically in terms of not playing as consistent uh I think that's just the biggest thing so I I think that's something that'll be interesting to see over the next let's say like um because obviously at some Point I'll end up stop playing

and I I'll move into the next role you know with an Esports like I said like when it comes to like coaching or something like that right um but it'll be really interesting to see like how many players are able to kind of extend what has been the like the kind of cap limit of Esports ages across uh different genres uh over the next 10 years I think it's just if you if you are good enough and you get Enough support where you can support yourself I think that c players could probably keep going um

as well as um like I definitely have to eat better now than I did when I was younger uh so diet is much more important uh actually something that I've done is kind of handicap myself in a way where like I will eat like [ __ ] for let's say like a month and then and try to like practice and and play the best that I can through that but then once like tournament time Comes up and it's like you know three to four weeks before then then I start eating much much healthier and then

up until like you know the last like one to two weeks you really feel the difference mentally and you're like wow like I'm playing so much better and like thinking so much clearer like and you just it just feels like weights are being lifted off and so then you go into the tournament like really fresh uh by like Eating well hydrating really well drinking water is super important you can't just you know as even though I'm sponsored by monster from you know because they sponsored Team Liquid you can't just drink energy drinks all the time

you have to be drinking water as well uh you have to be taking care of yourself you have to sleep well um and then something else I noticed um a few years ago is I I can't just play with whatever mouse that I want to play with Anymore I have to make sure that the shape kind of fits and is more ergonomical for me I noticed that if I start playing with a lot of mice nowadays that are um symmetrical um instead of ergonomic I just can't play with them they don't fit my hand well

enough and like my pinky wants to naturally like rip to the mouth and so then it's like in a constant state of like tension which then leads to like carple tunnel problems but if I Play with like an ergonomic shape then my then that part of my hand is at rest and is is fine uh so then I don't really run into those issues and I can play as much as is needed for practice and whatnot as well as just you know it's just simple like just look up stuff on YouTube like if you're having

some hand problems like look up hand stretches massages things like that like to take care of yourself like uh as fun as gaming is it is it is not healthy to Just sit there all day play like you need you need to be doing something like take care and maintain your body even if it's just a little bit um so yeah like um and then funnily enough I was talking to uh to Victor the CEO of liquid recently and talking about how like this year in particular cuz like I said like I I've been eating

like crap and then then I'll start eating better like leading up to tournaments and something that I haven't really been implementing For myself is like better like workouts I haven't really worked out much at all but I want to see like okay now that I know like this as I'm getting older and how I'm feeling how much better do I think I can feel if I work out in a specific way like uh focusing more like I think on like let's say cardio and then like uh resistance training and strengthening for areas that like help

deal with like posture and like your neck and like maintaining like your Wrist and your forearm which is heavily involved within gaming and see how much like it really helps bring out the small extra percentages of your game like over the next year and see how that helps I don't mean like working out in terms of like let me get as bulk as I can because I don't think that that's like effective for what you need to do um but something just like nice and simple and easy like to maintain and just an overall healthier

lifestyle and see like how Much better that is yeah it's it's actually really it's PR interesting um um firstly if you guys are hearing some of this information for the first time I have an episode with a performance dietician specifically about drinking water um on the on the channel and also also about nutrition and match day nutrition and and and performance you know he's a performance dietician and and you know that's his thing so we talked a lot about that so if you're Looking for protocols or want to go really deep there and and something

that you'd probably have to pay a shitload of money to you know for otherwise you can get it for free on on um if you find the videos I've done with Casey um all that stuff is super important the excise thing I just uh I just saw um a quick clip from a hubman clip today as well where he actually spoke specifically about how you know you can't just lift lifting is not just going to help you Actually it's it's it's the cardiovascular work that actually has the greatest C cognitive benefits um but at the

same time you want to lift because you want to make sure you you know you are actually resistant to injury because you know injury aches and pains this is actually something that's super common with people that just do cardio and just do running and don't train you know the you know the the you know but do you know resistance training Where they're stimulating muscle growth and and and more bone density and and the rest of it so so you want to have a bit of everything and but it does all add up it absolutely all

adds up and I think another aspect to it is treating you know your treating yourself like an athlete can can also add up as well I think I think uh some people don't identify enough with this high performance machine that they're trying to create just by playing um so I love I Love that I love that um okay uh so I think I think one thing I I want to ask is in terms of performance when it comes to some of the pros what do you think is the most common sticking point that holds people

back that you may have observed that you look at and you think ah you know if they if they just sort of focus their attention here is is the area the practice approach is it the nutrition like what do you think is the most common sticking point that question Um I think part part of it is like uh trying to bring out the best like listening to your body like nutrition uh and the biggest thing is uh like and I could give like two examples um because I think a lot of it is like how

you eat regularly and even like when you're practicing compared to once it's like tournament day and you're nervous and anxious dude I've been competing for so long and still even at King Con I Could barely eat at breakfast I'm like forcing myself to eat like as much as I can stomach just because of you know tournament nerves but like understanding that and like how to work around it and what you need to do to make sure that you're not like crashing mentally during the day I know like I think fatalities talked about it before where

for him he kind of did like the intermittent fasting and that's like what worked for him where he would eat a lot like uh in The evening like after the tournament was done but like in the morning he would like barely have anything he would have something healthy maybe like a banana or like you some oatmeal or something but then throughout the whole day he's like not eating he's just drinking water because he felt like you know the TP for his body like digestion just would slow him down so much so he just was like

this is just how I'm going to like set it up but he would do it During practice as well you know like that was like the kind of routine he would get himself in to try to simulate you know what it's like being at a tournament um and so that's kind of like like I don't do the exact same but I I try to as as it gets closer like the two weeks before the tournament I start to try to eat at the times that I'm going to need to eat during the tournament as well

as like just paying attention to like I know that I'm not going to be Able to eat a lot at breakfast time so what do I need to do I need to find good healthy snacks like nuts bananas uh apples things like that uh to eat during the day little bits or even some like bits of like chocolate that might have fruit in them to give a little like boost during during the day when I can't eat as much and then you know just try to force myself to eat like a nice like healthy salad

of some sort nothing greasy like for lunch and if you don't Eat at all it's okay you're just still doing something to keep yourself going I think a lot of people kind of either underestimate that or just don't pay attention to like what their body needs uh and they could they could play even better um yeah other than that I think just uh outside of that I think just trying to do what I've done is just take practice a little more seriously it's not as though I'm saying that like People have taken it as a

joke you know you know what I mean but I think like just creating more what is the tournament environment going to be like and being in that mindset as well as just I think reviewing like people really trying to get better at finding the things that they can through review I think would help a lot and that goes across all Esports I think uh review is something that's not done enough uh and I think needs to become like more of a Precedent you can learn so much from watching yourself uh and other players and teams

I think it's invaluable and uh I'd have to say like the biggest example for me like why I felt it was so positive was uh my favorite NFL player growing up was pton Manning I loved watching pton Manning I thought he was the best quarterback obviously you know Tom Brady has the most titles uh and he's also amazing but like when watching them and seeing what made them feel Special uh the whole thing with pton was review and uh him trying to be adaptable like trying to change the meta of offense in the NFL in

terms of you you would go to the play you'd have a play at the line of scrimmage but then always constantly auding like if it doesn't look good don't run the play change that [ __ ] and always doing that knowing that based off of certain like subtle reads and cues from the defense and their setup positions to be able to be Adaptable uh and to be balanced uh and that's something that I noticed and like what made him so successful over the years and I felt like I could do the same like for Quake

like just demo review or nowadays fod review unfortunately because Quake Champions hasn't had demos but yeah it's the same thing I just think reviewing is just so so important and if you look at all sports like all of the major sports the teams that are doing the best the most Homework yeah Amen to that um one quick thing I'll add as well is U that I learned from Casey I I dude I learned so much having the opportunity to work with some of these people that I got to work with when I was a general

manager 100 these um but all the performance staff uh you know I I made really good I'm like close friends with with basically all of them now because I'm so nerdy about this stuff and they obviously love talking about it too but you know one Thing that he he mentioned is that you know fatty fatty foods like you know you mentioned greasy stuff that kind of has a pretty it makes you very sluggish cognitively so it's like something you really need to avoid on those match days and it's interesting too because there's other things that

I didn't really ever quite think about but it's kind of obvious when you do when like you already mentioned you have a lot of adrenaline um on a match day and that Changes the way that your body you know interacts with with with food you all the the blood's going to your extremities and like you know your your nervous system gets died up in certain ways so so all of the you can't just like it's just not it's not normal anymore and it's funny what you said with with what fatality was doing because one of

the things the casee you uh you know told me about having these the this eating protocol and the kinds Of things that you would eat in the in the kind of depending on on the window before the performance starts he would say that okay after the performance okay then you know then yeah have a big meal where you're going to have some of that fatty stuff that you know get some of that good stuff in that you wouldn't be able to eat beforehand so it kind of sounds like fatality was actually you know happened on

a lot of best practices when there wasn't really maybe the Awareness whatsoever or research around some of that stuff so it's really quite it's quite cool um to see that because for those of you that don't know fatality is like one of the absolute First FPS professionals PC I mean he might be the the biggest name First FPS professional uh player I suppose um so absolute Legends in that sense um and I think part because I agree there wasn't a lot of that in terms of like uh trying to bring that out in terms of

Esports Players back then and and fatality was a little bit just this like literally just before my time in terms of like getting to play uh and whatnot but I think the biggest thing is because he always loved playing sports if I remember right he played a lot of tennis tennis yeah uh I know he loves playing golf now even still or and he's always been down to like play whatever he's a very competitive person and I think just I think being as competitive as he is and Being that athletic when he was young just

kind of made him realize like how important that was as well you know and uh I mean even growing up uh like through the Quake live era and you look at the Counter-Strike era there were a lot of players that like had like uh you know a sports background in terms of like growing up and were always competing in that and then it's the same like I loved playing basketball growing up like I loved playing sports I loved Being active but I think it's just the the competitive drive that you feel from the game is

like better if it's like the same if not better sometimes I think that's what draws people that have been in athletics to Esports it's not as though that you have to have done it I think it just it just helps in terms of um understanding practice structure how to learn how to deal with others type thing it it also helps and so that's why I think you naturally see like some Athletes do really really well when they you know when they play Esports yeah and and it sounds like too for you um you like obviously

you jumped into OverWatch briefly um I know that wasn't really ultimately a fit I suppose because you didn't stick around but but based on the because because when you when I asked you to like to describe like Quake Theory you Bas you immediately went to the first principal stuff and so that leads me to believe that you could apply All of this all all all of these approaches to pretty much any game and you would probably be able to get very good at it uh pretty quickly because you're looking at it just in the right

in the correct fashion um do do you feel like that's true do you feel like you know if you had the interest you could jump into a different FPS genre and and and get very good at it I think if it's something along the lines of like Quake OverWatch something that's a little Faster I think yes because I think it it the way that I think about the game and how quickly I think about things I think that helps whereas like uh as well as those games typically don't require as much uh Precision aiming so

as like Counter-Strike or valerant for example I could probably play those games and after a few months I could get pretty good but as far as like reaching the super Elite level a I think it would Take a long time and B it doesn't necessarily fit my skill sets you know like the games are a little bit slower and so what my strengths are in terms of like creating more situations more frequently and quicker to try to gain little advantages that doesn't happen as often it comes down to like a a willy won't he situation

like does he hit the shot does he not and my aim is pretty good but I I definitely think that there are people out there that aim better Than me so in terms of like even when I played over watch like my aim isn't terrible at all but I think that something that set apart like the other DPS from myself when I played like DPS Flex is because they they hit like the hit scan shots for like head shots and stuff just a bit better and just bit more consistently than I did and I think

that's what like made them more successful at it but in terms of like getting a base level and being pretty Good at games like that yeah I think I could I think I could do it are you able to talk about or reference the the mouse that you have I noticed earlier you know and I don't know if if there's like a sponsor clash and you're not able to say the name or if you just didn't choose to are you able to say like what what mouse you switched to uh I can kind of talk

about that yes uh okay so when I went into Quake Champions at the time uh Team Liquid was Sponsored by Razer and so I had to swap and I was using the Razer abysses V2 for a bit um and I was doing okay with it it felt pretty good but then uh there definitely was a tournament where I had and unfortunately it was the biggest one in the beginning the million dooll tournament where the drivers it was like okay I had to choose uh do I want my sensitivity to feel normal but not play with

the Drivers and only play with 125 Mouse Hertz so then flicking is horrible or do I want to play with the drivers but the drivers have messed with there's like Excel problems Within synaps at that time and so then the Herz would be fine but then the everything felt all over the place so I had to play I decided to play without the drivers and it definitely impacted my play a bit I was not able to to like aim as well as usual um but then I think like at the end of That year so

yeah going into 2018 like Alienware decided they wanted to fully commit with Team Liquid and like a larger aspect they wanted to be like not just their computer supplier but like everything so like headsets mouse keyboard all that stuff monitor everything but they knew like at the time that their like peripherals were not good enough so they let us use whatever we wanted and uh so I I was like looking around at the time at like What some other players were using and uh I saw that Waz and a few others had been playing with

the zoi ec2a white and I wanted and I so I gave it a try and I loved it like it took a little bit of adjustment time but I started using that in I think it was like a April of 2018 so like a month or two before our first like 2v2 tournament that year and I think like with playing all the 2v2 that year like having uh to play Such combat intensive like team mode really helped Me adjust in time and obviously I was really successful with that Mouse for quite a few years and

I really liked the sensor in it because it felt very one to one if I move it quickly this way or I move it smoothly it will always go the same distance whereas like other sensors you feel that there's like latent positive Excel or negative excel in them and that's why I stuck with that sensor for so long whereas like sensors now don't feel like that at all and that's Why I stuck with the mouse for as long as I could but then it just got to the point where it's like it's too difficult to

find replacements anymore when it does break down just from overuse um so then I switched uh September of 2022 so very shortly after the qpl final for season 3 uh I switched to the Razer Death Adder V3 and that's what I've been on since then um but even that has taken me some adjustment because that has its problem where it has negative Excel Within the sensor so I went for years without playing with it with such a weird thing where in Quake live I was somebody who played with so much Mouse Excel but then in

Quake Champions I actually liked playing without it because of the different type of uh mouth movements that you needed for the game with different like champ Styles uh like primarily the uh CPM movement felt much better without Mouse Excel than with uh so I had played Without Mouse Excel for quite some time uh but I had to like relearn and try to fine-tune and find something that felt as close as possible um so I've obviously played like really well with the mouse but I still feel like I could get a little bit more out of

it um and also I was willing to make the switch at the time because I finally felt like when trying different Wireless mice um cuz I had been trying different mice like even still while I was using the the sa ec2a white uh the Previous couple years before but I could still kind of feel and it might just be like a quake Champions engine thing but I could still kind of feel just the slightest delay with like Wireless stuff but where by this point in 2022 it didn't feel it anymore it felt like really good

and I was willing to make the switch to playing on wireless stuff um I will be switching to something else uh this next here I cannot talk about it at this time but uh but yeah but uh I've I've I've done pretty well with this mouse so I I can't complain like the the death ater V3 has been really nice um so yeah and I think there's like a there's like one or two other players in the qpl that were playing with it I think uh I think maxter was also playing with it uh and

there there were a few others I just can't remember who and then the others that seemed they liked most others were playing with the the G Pro Wireless from Logitech And then I think kilson was the odd one out of all of us still playing with a Wired Mouse I can't remember which Logitech he was playing on uh I think it was mostly due to the shape like he liked the shape better and that's why he was playing playing with that but uh but yeah I think pretty much everybody else is on is on wireless

now so that's that's what I've used over the last uh like six years the the I went from the abysses V2 to the Z EC 2way white to the Death Eder V3 Pro and uh and I and I like the and there's another thing too which some people don't know when buying a mouse and unfortunately sometimes you can't fry them before you buy them depending on like if they're just sold online or not uh the the color actually like I I would pick a different color but the texture actually changes based off the color you

have because typically let's say like like the black version of the the wireless uh Mouse is probably The default like material that they use whereas the white is like a painted like coat on it where it changes the texture and like how it deals with like your grip so like that's and I like the way that this feels as well as like the ec2a white also had a black version but the the white version I liked the glossier feel to it than than the Black Version whereas like some other mice like the black version of

the mouse feels better with how like the texture is compared to The the different colored version for example so I think that's something where if you can try a mouse like and you can actually see whether like the different like affect like how you like the feel you should at least hopefully like hold it in your hand and use it a little bit before you before you buy it it does make a difference in terms of you're going to use the mouse for quite a quite some time you want something that's very comfortable for you

for the Long run it's it's uh it's super interesting because um oh actually before I say this uh what what pad preferences do you have in terms of oh uh I've been on the so what I do and this is also for like prepping tournament environment I use two mouse pads actually because sometimes you don't know when you go to a tournament what type of desk it's going to be on and if your pad is kind of thin and the desk is not like super flat and stable Sometimes the surface actually interferes with how you're

moving around and it can cause like inconsistencies whereas so I have like a big razor goliathus pad on the bottom which is a bit thicker it's a cloth pad and then I use the Artisan hen mid on top which is a it's a cloth Pad but it's like a textured cloth pad um and I've liked it because I feel like it reads a little bit more accurately with the way that it's uh the way the texture is designed So it does feel a little faster than what people are used to if they're just on like

regular cloth pads um but yeah so I that's why I've been using Artisan for a long time uh I think link Lincoln the phenomenal uh quick team player I was the first to introduce me to it and I liked it so much when trying it I can't remember which Quon he showed me uh it was like 2013 or or 2014 and then ever since then I I've been using them I I love the pads yeah they really blew up A lot um these like Japanese pads very expensive because of the Imports but they're actually very

cheap over there but but I think especially lately last two three years I think there's like a lot of cloth pads now that feel feels like they're kind of breaking in uh to that to to that territory CU I think like once people did find out about the AR I I I have one too they're actually really exceptional it's it's pretty impressive although I'm on a glass pad Now Sky pad SK I think effortless and Saab were playing on glass pads as well I still don't know how they Aim so well tried and it's it's

so fast so yeah takes I'm getting used to that's for sure are you doing the uh I can't remember you'd have to talk to effortless just message him about it but I know that there's this like technique like this like type of material you put on the the the feet so that they don't wear out as quickly on the glass pads Like there's just like and it's like pretty cheap to buy and then you just put them over them and then yeah you use and it like feels pretty much the same in terms of like

the you know like how you swipe it I know like every time he gets it he uses them and it's super cheap to replace like every few months or whatever instead of like you know the feet go bad and then you have to deal with constantly replacing the feet itself it's you know what it's so Interesting because I've uh because I've been deling into the the aim training communities and they're all of course obsessed by all these things um they got me onto the the dots um I don't know if you even heard heard of

those but there's like these the skates Mouse skates that are just dots and because they're just very small little Teflon dots PTF dots that you know that changes the amount of like surface area so that the feel is different in terms of Whether it's like more or less control and so on and I never even thought about the surface area of the mouse feet because of course you know lots of different brands will have you know way different Mouse Fe some have like really huge ones like the like the you mentioned the uh the GPR

for example that one has like really huge um feet so it's like you know just they're almost the size the width of the actual Mouse and some have like very small you know Small surface areas so I had never considered that so there's so many things that I've been learning but no yeah you'll have to you'll have to share it with me later I haven't I haven't heard about it definitely because because they're quite cheap and they're very easy to replace quickly because they're just dots so so yeah I'll I'll send you the info but

one thing that you mentioned again which is cu I've been trying to test a lot of these Assumptions that we had about aiming um over them over the various years against what the aiming communities have found to be and and tested to to be somewhat you know the truth and through evidence and what's really insane I I don't know if you if you've really seen some of these guys but some of the best aim training players and you know aim training really is just Mouse control um they they have a range of sensitivities that they

can play on between like 20 cm To like 80 100 CM where one person can can change the sense wildly and be exceptionally good um on all of those different sensitivities which for me that that was like one of the you know that that was a huge thing I like oh you have to play in the same sense right and so that was a myth that got destroyed to me and I was like oh okay this is very interesting what other things misconceptions do I have and it's it's been interesting going down this rabbit Hole

because because one thing that you mentioned you mentioned a couple things with your selection of amounts where you said that you know essentially you prioritized the shape and that that seems to really important because the grip's not really that important what's just important is the Comfort on the shape and then tension and you mentioned oh you know you mentioned the tension being part of the driver behind behind how you Decided which shape to choose and one of the things that um you know the aim training coaches will will you know try to suggest people do

is using aim trainers because you're only focused on you're focused on you know almost nothing compar comparatively to like you know any game where you have to be juggling so many different focuses and tasks you can actually train your tension management so the amount of tension in your arm when you're aiming You can actually train that so it's it's interesting that you know you selected for a mouse where you considered tension because that's actually such an a critically important aspect of aiming that a lot of people don't really think about so I found that quite

interesting that you mentioned that so um I probably wouldn't have asked these any of these questions relating to setup had I not been so you know in in depth on into the into that community at the moment but I'm sure a lot of people really appreciate um hearing about how you've made some of these decisions and and what you've been using um yeah and I and I think just in general people should and it goes along with the tension like control just think about whether you're holding the mouse like in the way that you should

I feel like some people the claw grip works for others it probably just hurts their hand like overtime and they're just doing it because they don't Know any better that they should be playing differently because maybe when the the mouse that they grew up with was super small and so that's how they had to play whereas like now they have options they can do something different that feels more comfortable and is more reliable for them overall uh so yeah cuz I have this weird like I don't play with a claw grip and I don't play

with a pal grip I have this like in between like uh like grip whereas I used to have with The wmo in Quake Liv like I used to have a clog riip with that mouth like definitely like I think I pretty much everybody that played with it did I know Jibo had a big clog RI with it I know cooler did Fox might have been a little different but uh but yeah but then once I've like have gotten to different mice and played like no that that doesn't feel as good and as and brings out

as much from my game uh so I've like just adapted to playing differently and uh Yeah like in between in between the two now awesome yeah I love that too because it's it's kind of it reminds me actually um there because this another thing too is that people obsess over grip and so on and it's you can classify them but like you said everyone's hand the physiology and interactions are all a little bit different and it's you know so it's it's uh ultimately not super important and it reminds me I used to have this mechanical

issue with my Squats and I went to this uh this uh physical therapist because I had all these shoulder ISS issues so I was having a lot of trouble with like having to kind of relearn uh squatting and and he he he said okay just jump for me just do a jump and so I did a jump and he's like that's how you squat it's like it's just you know it's just very simple but I was over complicating it and and my body was was basically knew how to do the movement but I was kind

of you know [ __ ] with it essentially by over focusing on the injuries and these different things and I was messing up my own mechanics I think grip is kind of similar just grip the mouse does it feel comfortable or does it not there you go there's your grip and you don't need to obsess over it but it's very easy to do that when we're so we want better performance all the time so um right all right so we we touched on the on the coaching stuff a little bit and I Got to say

you know when I was I don't know if this is um if I've spoken about this much I mean I feel like they have in some podcast somewhere maybe but but for all of you I I actually tried to bring rapper over to be like a a performance coach for 100 th whilst I was working with them because I I was thinking to myself okay there's someone that knows how to win it's it's Rafa and someone that would have the respect of the players too because that's also hard To come by and I think everybody

sort of even if they don't even if they're kind of you know new Zoomies and they don't you know necessar neily uh they don't know anything about Esports history before the year 2018 or something I feel like there is still a sense as to what Quake is uh for a lot of people and a lot of inherent respect which is really cool um so I was trying to get RAF I tried to convince him I I tried to whine and dine him I nagged him multiple Times to try to get him to to join the

team but didn't work out because he wanted to play he's you know so selfish but um either way uh you know do you know how many titles how many trophies have you won how many lands have you w do you know the number you must know the number maybe do you know the number are you looking at it now so so I don't know I was going to I was like I'm going to count and I was like you know what I don't know if if if this is all accurate I might maybe I should

just ask him because there there's a lot of first places um um it's got to be it's got to be at least like do you have the do you have the link I can look at it now so I have I have the liquipedia but I don't know if that's going to have everything on it I'm going to going to link it to you there it is yeah all right Started From The Bottom hold On uh okay so [Music] far so far so good I mean there's like probably like a very small like Lan or

two that's not on here and that's totally fine like it's not a big deal but uh let's see yep I was there at uh wvg Louisville uh for the pizza box situation with Avic and cooler before they knew who I was so that's funny to think about um let's see so how many First places that's what that's what we're going with yeah okay hold on there's at least like 50 or or 50 60 here there's there's that's my guess is like between 50 to 60 based on my quick kind of scan through the liquipedia um

yeah uh because I'm looking up here as well there's also there was like um it looks like because for Quake live there was a a couple online tournaments that EG threw where there Was like at the time like laptops worth like $3,000 nice and that's a guess uh they're not listed here but pretty much pretty much everything seems to be listed it's a lot I lost count I'd have to start over it's funny because I thought my I wonder if rap is like the guy that like after tournament he's like okay 62 you know like

no the only the only one I I was doing that for was Quon because of and And the thing I just I I'm just really thankful that I a have had the opportunity to do so for something that I love to try to compete and to even be in the mention of being the best at something in the world I think uh so few people get a chance to pursue that dream for themselves and uh I've been really thankful for that and I know like the first goal that I had in mind was because he

was my mentor and he had won At that time he had won the most Quake on titles was was 04 that was the first Benchmark was like I wanted to see if I could equal him in terms of eventually winning as many titles and then once it got to that point there was a race between Cypher and I because we seemed we had this weird thing going I I don't know it's also been this weird thing with kilson which I I'll get into but where like at uh at Quon ciper and I would somehow never

face each other in The final but we would swap years winning like I I it started with he won in 2008 and then I so he would win every even year and I would win every odd year for like a long time until like I finally broke like the curse for for Quon and one uh back-to-back years but yeah we then we were racing each other for who could have the most and uh and yeah and then eventually you know leading up to this last Quon to be able to get the seventh just U that's

you Know what I was counting and trying to get to and yeah the fact that I've even gotten to seven is really it's something you know that I'll always feel really special about because there's more there's more to it than just winning there's always like the the memories of everybody that you've competed against everything that's gone into it like all that stuff it's um yeah it really means a lot it's it's really special and qu Quake on for those that don't know it's Kind of it's it's kind of like the equivalent to to like the

the csgo major it's it's like the the the event of the year um and do you know who else has won seven titles um I guess would be somewhat equivalent in their sport Tom Brady Tom Brady he's 17 Tom Brady Michael schearer leis Hamilton yeah oh you already know you so you do there okay there is some kind of like you know counting comparison here of the of the achievement but that but that's awesome And this is this is the you know this is the reason like kind of going into the real reason why I

felt like it was really important to or why I wanted you to kind of come to the team was because there there is this there's this vision for what I wanted the team to achieve and I think it's something that's quite rare in orts um especially in the team team Esports I think in in 1 V1 maybe not quite as much because there's not as many variables um um as there would be In some of the team games but but there's this sense that many teams will chase that first Trophy and then when they get

the trophy they they kind of just they just struggle after that they don't they're not able to replicate it they're not able to necessarily create you know the quote unquote eror um of dominance and and it's a it's a really big shift and and so I was curious with with with you know you how you interpret this whole process because you have been The best you've got the Target on your back essentially how do you think about this this this this competitive conundrum um I think there's a there's a few things I think one of

the biggest key factors that kind of Switched something in my mind was oh what event were we at I feel like it was some Quon I I want to say 2010 and that was a year that I did not do well there was like a a huge patch change which like changed how Mouse Excel worked and I did not adjust well and I was not playing like optimally and and uh and I got knocked out at like top eight level or something like that and just in casual conversation something like where stery stery said to

me and it's nothing against him but it just really fueled something in me and he said like you can't expect to win every time blah blah blah and my and instantly I thought well why can't I What's what's maybe that's like your mindset but what's what's stopping me from from doing everything I can to to win over and over again like I feel like if you have the right mindset for it and you prepare properly you can win as often as possible and it's up to you you know um and as I'm like I'm like

looking through this like yes there's a lot of first but as well as there's you know I've lost to and like you just why do we fall down Master Wayne so that we can Learn to pick ourselves back up again right um but yeah I think it's just I don't know like you just want to win man like yeah it's just not something about like I want to win one time no I want to try to be the best every single time and to do that is like kind of like taking a mentality of yes

in the grand scheme of things they may matter eventually but in the short term people just remember who won recently and that's it like people have very Short-term memories and that result in terms of like shape and and what's going on so I think as well as that kind of like okay there's a new tournament the this light is clean again I have to start over like that's the B like the mentality but I think kilson did say it best this last year as well like I think performing really really well for a year is

possible performing really really well backto back years is so hard I think just because of not necessarily Like motivation it's just it is very draining uh to to be in that mindset day in a day out and doing what you need to do to to take care of yourself to practice to prepare the stress of competing itself everything that goes with it like it's really hard to maintain that over and over again like two years in a row I think that's also why like the same thing with kilson I I don't we haven't played in

a final of the qpl it's been This like trading titles thing right where it's like for some reason just not able to maintain that shape consistently to be able to to meet each other even though we're both Champions and the same thing with Cipher when it came to Quon we met each other in finals at other tournaments but for some reason at Quon like trying to win backto back it just just took out so much and was really really hard to do um but it's not as though we never had the goal of doing That

you know what I mean I still had the mindset of like I can do it every single year I think that you have to and it's no disrespect to anybody else like I've always said it's competing is such a fine line and balance of of ego and humility like you need to be able to believe that no matter how good everybody else is you can still somehow figure out a way to beat them but still realizing and having the humility of knowing the Time that you need to put in knowing how you need to prepare

and and what you need to bring out of yourself to win because of how good that they are not ever looking at it you know in the terms of I'm better than everybody else like this is what it's going to take to beat them you know and to having that mindset over and over um yeah and I I think I think a lot of people like you said like the problem with Team stuff like you you they they they go so much for that one Title and then I think they they stop once they've done

it they feel some some people feel like okay I've reached what I've wanted and that all they wanted to do is win once but then others I think it's not necessarily that they don't want to win again but they don't put in the the same work to do it again because I think it's much different chasing a title for the same time and the type of motivation and drive that you have inside to do that Compared to the feeling of you're the one on top and now everybody is chasing you to pull you down it

is a very different feeling and experience and like uh the way that you need to mentally prepare yourself and uh and continue to play it's a different thing and I think some people just really struggle to to adapt to that um yeah it's why I think it's not it's not super common to constantly see like people winning back to back over and over again Regardless of esport yeah yeah I think it's it's it's really interesting to look at I think it's totally fascinating it's obviously again uh with the general manager role it's it's the thing

that as far as you know you're looking you your job is to make the team win win long term um that's the only that's like one of the only things you're really thinking about is how do I achieve that and it made me it's interesting because when you have more like a bunch of Different players there is this kind of diffusion of respons ability almost where where you you need to have people unified in a way which is it's it's kind like like you know for you as a One V one player it's easy for

you to be like I get I'm deciding W I think but you know in a team setting you have to have everybody thinking in the same way so that everyone's you know pulling in the same direction um with the same level of operational standards and effort and and And values and that's very hard to achieve and that's what team culture is and building that team culture is quite challenging especially in Esports environments that are quite volatile where you might have players coming in and out you might have coaches coming in and out and um there's

a book that I think everyone should read who are interested in team sports and and the book is is called um Legacy by James Kerr and the book is an expiration um Into well it's more actually it's less of an expiration it's more of just essentially saying what the principles are of the of the New Zealand All Blacks because they're the most winning team in sports history so the the whole kind of exploration the you know what's being detailed is is all of the different values that they have and how they achieved an incredible team

culture and how they've done so in in in over such a long period of time where there are Coaches and players changing all of the time but it doesn't matter because whoever comes in is coming into a team culture that's been established correctly and very well for a long time and so that culture is everything and it's it's really interesting once you yeah you have that diffusion uh you know there's multiple people it's gets really complicated gets really complicated pretty quickly yeah and I and I think you can see it sometimes just in in Other

sports in general like where um you see teams have like a dynasty era for a while but then the the team culture of trying to hold on to that is done in the wrong way where sometimes I think people feel like certain things are expected to happen you know what I mean and so they don't yeah even subconsciously they may not be giving their 110% and it ends up leading to small mistakes here or there which let your opportunities you know just slip Through your fingers um I'd say like a big a big thing a

big example is here from two two two perspectives uh one from the NFL from being from sh you know the Chicago area and how Bears fans built up and uh loved the 85 Bears right that's all you heard about for years and like I don't know there's this weird cultural expectation of it to happen again just like it's just meant to happen when that's not how things work out yeah the same the same with here Being in Dallas and the Dallas dynasty of the 90s like and this I don't know I just feel like the

culture of that organization has been like kind of falling into the same Pitfall of trying to recreate it but recreating it in all the wrong aspects you know um so yeah I think that you have to create it in in a sense of you need to motivate and try to create a culture where people people want to give their all to To be mentioned and be thought of in that sense where like not just like like the the title that you won in this era and this era are separate but that they're one you know

what I mean and I think just I don't know some people don't realize the sacrifices that you have to make to make those things happen yeah and and it's it's particularly difficult too because it does take a let's say like a modern team environment in the Top Flight Esports games like Whether it's you know a mobile like you know League or Dota or Counter Strike or valerant like these these games have like pretty specific schedules and so looking at it practically speaking is kind of different too compared with a one a 1 V one title

in the sense that because again you're having to deal with an entire team of of players and all these different individuals who have their own needs you you have like you have your your offseason so you got this Like point of time where you can implement or spend the time like figuring out what the changes are you know after reviewing the season what are the changes we we need to uh you know what are the things that that we need to fix what are the things that we we want to keep what do we want

to throw away all these different thing conversations you have in the offseason and then you can then set a new framework for everything you know whether it's like The practice regimen the Player Development or the talent like what whatever whatever it is all the different areas you can set a new framework but but once you actually get into the season again or close to it you can't really you're kind of locked in you can't suddenly just change stuff you need to see things play out so because of that the way that changes happen is incrementally

you know Season to season and so there's and there's no NE I mean You know there's obviously examples from traditional Sports as to how you should do this but it does still take time to figure it out and and I think probably like three years honestly to establish a a high level culture that really will generate you know backto back you know champions in the team setting is probably what's needed in most cases to to really get to that and I don't think we have that in orts because if you if you look at all

all the top team Esports The it's kind of rare that you get consistent people winning every like trophy again and again again the only team I can think of that did it was astralis and CS where they actually managed to do that at a very competitive level and is because they had the best culture like they were they were doing everything right and all of the practices that they had in terms of how they Incorporated uh and and like I mean it goes down to How the team is structured where all the power is the

responsibilities like who is empowered to do what how how people um you know how the players are empowered to take responsibility in certain ways there's so many different nuances to it they were the first ones that kind of establish those best practices I would say in a team setting but but since then it's been so hard to replicate it's rare that you see in these team modes uh the success so with That said like I feel like you you'll have a definitely a place you know if Esports has a really recovery out of this recession

um which I think that it will and I think that we'll probably see a lot of trimming of fat and you know CEOs that know what they're doing more uh investors that have a better sense as to how they should be investing you better business practices overall more sustainability less volatility I'm hoping that you know people well people Like you should have I think a place in in building these kinds of programs because we haven't got there yet in Esports yeah I and I hope so I hope that's uh that's what ends up happening because

I kind of agree I think from talking with players from different uh different games different teams like the biggest thing right now is like you like you were saying like you need to have a team that respects what the that the coach knows what they're talking about And believes in their message at the end of the day whereas I think like what I've noticed like the last like 10 some years is that coach first of all coaching is becoming a thing in Esports but then not necessarily everybody that should be a coach is available some

of the the people that will be outstanding coaches are still playing you know they're still they're still playing and uh and then part of it also comes down to like can the team Afford uh what's necessary like can the team afford a coach does the coach also need like an assistant coach somebody that's specifically scouting and doing reviewing so that it like takes less time for the team to do and can like help create plans to like like better Implement like goals to set on on improving and stuff like that because all that stuff takes

time like I can give the best example from OverWatch like when we when we got a Coach and I had switched to support right so I had played the game for like six to eight months at a totally different position playing so many different like Heroes blah blah blah and then I needed to switch to Heroes that I had never been playing before so I had to like essentially learn that position from scratch focus on shot calling do all the scrim time then also play like by myself like for like solo que uh to like

learn other Heroes and just get Like more efficient with them as well as like at that time I felt like yes we were playing a lot and scrimming a lot and the coach was there for the practices and to try to give like uh some you know some direction on where we're going wrong what we need to do like things to fix and stuff like that but then another area I felt like we didn't really have somebody to do was like review so then also like I felt on top of everything that I was doing

that I had to be reviewing like not only like our scrims but trying to see what the other teams were doing so that we could find like a sense of direction for whether we felt we needed to match the meta whether we felt we needed to like try to create a new meta like what we could do like what are we doing wrong that these teams are doing successful and like eventually like for me as a player like that was burning me out like I was spending like 16 hours a day doing Stuff because I

just I just had too much on my plate whereas if if we had like a better coach at that time like we had like a coach and then we had somebody that's doing the analysis for us and finding the differences within data or in general and finding friends between teams then it I think it would have helped a lot but it just wasn't accessible at the time now hopefully like within the future for for uh as as players start Retiring and they can start moving into like this aspect of of coaching and people that actually

know what they need to know they know the highest level of what players know and they can translate that then I think that it's going to help a lot I really do as well as then there's the interesting thing like look at uh look at sports like coaches are involved in sports like all the time like during the course of play whereas in Esports it's been a very it's like They've tried to distance their themselves from that like coaches are not allowed to be involved like while players are playing like some Esports may allow like

a timeout at some point where the coach can then interject but the coach doesn't isn't able to like be there for the team so like trying to prepare the team to like be able to handle it all themselves and that the coach can't do anything while they're playing it's also a different Dynamic to To like overcome I think there's like quite a few different challenges um over like I said over the next like five to 10 years that we'll see within Esports and hopefully there'll be like a better change of culture and and uh yeah

that we'll see teams have more success and like you said building that winning mindset and culture behind the teams itself and uh really getting the most out of everybody yeah it's it's it's very it's Really fun exploring exploring all of this and and there's there's so many uh like I mentioned Australia's kind of brought a lot of stuff from traditional Sports to to be you know to become you know Common practices or more common practices in Counter-Strike at least and then that's kind of bled over beginning to bleed over more and more to valerin because

valerin kind of started actually you know where CS was in like 2016 it kind of started started there despite Obviously it being 20 you know 2020 21 at the time um but now the people are more so adopting some of those best practices and this and you know one for example um thing that's being utilized more and more is there's there's this thing that aalis did that's in traditional Sports and in rugby they call it stab me in the belly not in the back or um it's also called the backpack it has different names but

essentially there's this idea that have you heard of This I I think I can get it from the name but please go on okay yeah so so you know when you're when you're in a team environment and you're you're losing you know losing is for anyone that's lost in something competitive something you basically put your entire identity on the line for it's it's it's it's essentially like a mini trauma that you're experiencing all the time and you can get a lot of negative associations interpersonal issues can start to appear Like lots of lots of like

negative things can start to appear between the players that damages trust and respect um and and ultimately that has a lot of other Downstream effects that are very negative to a team being fully functional at a high level so this is a response to that where you get everybody in a room so you create a an emotional safe space essentially like a psychological safe space you have someone that can kind of that gives the Communication tools you know typically this would be your sport psychologist hopefully they can give the the the the communication tools and

kind of give the rules for the session and essentially allow with that safe space where people can be vulnerable for people to actually say hey I actually just don't trust your calling I think your calling is [ __ ] or you know like be able to really unpack a lot of the the negative stuff that's built up because the thing is is that This stuff is happening and for a lot of the younger players what's interesting is they don't necessarily have any of the awareness to to know really that this stuff might be they might

be harboring some of the negative thoughts so that in of itself can be kind of complicated but this was a practice that has helped many teams because it allows te because in historically teams would just break up you know there's this there's this sense that they should Break up but and and there are always changes that you could make but but this is you know one of those tools that came across that has been helpful for teams to try to manage that aspect because it's not it's not just oh we've got an interpersonal issue sometimes

it can be a bit deeper from where that interpersonal issu is actually coming from so we need to have different mechanisms for dealing with it we can't just pretend it doesn't exist so um that Stuff to me is really interesting and quite fascinating to learn about and to to see how teams are trying to improve performance through through these kinds of measures yeah I and I agree it can be sometimes it could be a touchy subject to bring up and having a coach is a really good mediator between that as well like in terms of

like you said the the unb backpacking of the issues and it's better to it's better to do that Than to let those problems Fester because eventually during the court like your example of somebody doesn't trust somebody's shot calling well you need to talk about it and you need to talk about why you don't so that you can hopefully come to a solution because otherwise you'll be in the course of a game and then the player will just subconsciously make a play that is complete opposite of the shot call and then that gets even worse most

of the Time it's like it's better to follow a play call even if it's bad so that then you can figure it out like if everybody's committed sometimes even a bad play call Works compared to like multiple people doing whatever they want then that's just chaos and and more often than not that just leads to disaster uh and I think like one of the best things that we did like during the sacrifice era for was it myself winds dang and and Wes and then even like with D hang through the 2v2 era is we were

very very good about like you know if we're talking at all about anything that's wrong like that we feel like between for like somebody individually or the team everything is we all have the same main end goal we want to win we want to bring out the best of ourselves and and talking about these things is the best way to do so it's the only way that we're going to all reach like what we think collectively is the the right Plan of action and and the right way to play together to build that team chemistry

like I know like we would do like pretty much like once a week we would have like okay we're GNA make some notes some some weeks it would be me other weeks it would be like somebody else like what do we think that we're doing right as a team and wrong as a team like collectively and then what individual issues from each person do we want them to work on this week and for Me I think that's just the way that you have to you have to run theme stuff you have to to be able

to have the mindset to be able to accept constructive criticism and move forward like if if you can't you can have all the skill in the world but if you really struggle with that and you get too emotional it can lead to like you said like teams breaking up or just you just end up losing out on on winning tournaments together because you know of you not Being able to control like your emotional state I think it's really really important to be able to talk with each other as a team and to be open and

honest about it it's and it's so challenging too because there are lots of people that come from either families or cultures where the emotional stuff is more like naturally repressed like for me for example both of those things British and also like famili familial examples for Me were just really of repression of emotions so you know that is a I think one of the big uh difference makers between um like for great players is is that level like having the ability to have awareness because it it can be that your emotions drive your behavior but

you don't realize it's coming from certain emotions that you have because you're repressing them and whether it's frustration or or something else and so being able to be deeply honest with Yourself is pretty key because you can also have a coach you can also have a coach who's actually able to see this stuff and they can tell it to you but you but you may still not really be able to see it or understand it and that's that's uh there is there is a lot that coaches are extraordinarily helpful for but there is definitely it's

always like that that thing where you know at the end of the day you know can go to a billion different you know therapists But but they can't fix your life doesn't matter if they can tell you all of the right things to do you have to be the one to execute and to do that you got to be able to be honest and to be able to be honest you have to have the data and and that's what the awareness is you know what's going on um it's that's hard that's that you know for

me that's been a lifelong journey just just generally you know through life and so in competition it's that's that's where I See a lot of young players I'm like man this guy's so talented but they just don't understand they just can't see that there is a problem here that they that you can tell it to them but but there's a difference between them taking out information and rationally and then themselves you know understanding oh this is actually the truth I see it now and now I can look at everything you know from a different perspective

that's so hard to achieve that with the young Players because they they're new humans yeah and it it just takes time everybody needs to learn in their own way you know like uh and I think that's the the awesome challenge of being a coach is to try to or even just a leader in in a team in general is trying to find a way to bring everybody together because you you have to talk with everybody differently you know like uh even just like like the example of sometimes like in a in a match like some

Players don't need like feedback in terms of like you like telling them that they're doing really well or or just like calling them out on like something they did wrong they can take care of it themselves other players really need it like when they feel like they have a teammate like really getting amped up for them that it makes them play even better like they feel more cohesive within the team and just like learning that you know like how you need to Communicate with each other is like super super important so but like you said

like that that'll be a fun challenge too because young players are young they still got to learn they're still growing as people um but yeah I think it's just hopefully people will listen to experience you know like I'm trying to prevent you from having a hard time like I did you know but but we'll see yeah definitely it's it's a lot of fun it's a lot of it's it's one of the Things that's really rewarding like you said to see that development take place with with players and you know I'm curious like you know is

is that is that something you know we talked about the coaching thing a little bit earlier is it is it something that you see like this would be what you'd want to do sort of like like would you always want to remain in competition do you think and would that be in the place of of of being you know somewhere in the coaching Staff I think it's probably where I'd be at my best like in some form or another um I think just helping the next generation of players in some way whether it's coaching or

um even if it's at some point like not being let's say like the main coach but being like somebody who um because I seem to do a good job and this is I think comes from like reviewing a lot is being able to find The little the little things from somebody individually that they can improve themselves which help the greater hole so and sometimes like that's that's really hard for like a head coach to have the time to be able to do that where they have to be focused on the overall big picture but having

somebody that can take the time to take like the Minor Details and give them like individual plans and goals and things to work on and like to see them Through it individually so that also like you're the person that's going to them and telling them and talking them and working them through it rather than having a teammate just like you know because like there's the difference between a teammate calling somebody out like randomly or having like the organized session like you were talking about in terms of being able to talk about things sometimes you need

an outside individual to just tell somebody Straight up like look this is what you're doing it's wrong and it's holding the team back but it's okay like we have a plan for trying to fix it like and it's going to take some time but this is what we need to do and this is your responsibility blah blah blah and just being somebody that's like understanding with them you know I think that I would be like really really good uh at doing that so in one form or another I think that I'll be involved You on

the competition side yeah that's I mean that's awesome because because I think one of the qualities that you have which is and again I mean this is this is again something that I think you already mentioned like a lot of the great coaches are probably still playing um there there are lots of people that are really expert in terms of their knowledge of the strategy or the tactics they don't have a lot of the the other aspects like the the emotional Intelligence or they don't have the leadership skills and and leadership in of itself is

an enormous skill set that can be done well or very poorly and it can just absolutely destroy everything if you're if you're the head coach I I I found at least in valerant and and Counterstrike it tends to be the case that the two most important people are the head coach and the in-game leader which makes sense and it's it's kind of for the re like largely for the reasons That you were saying you've got your leader out of the game and your leader in the game and both of those two people have to be

pulling in the same direction and have to be aligned on everything and there's and and at the same time because they are both in positions of power um there's a lot of pressure on them from the outside and and for themselves that what you know it's I'm the one that's going to get the the blame if if we you know if we're not doing well if we the Wrong comps or this or that the pract if the you know what the practice regimen is it's like these things you know I have the ability to decide

these things so they are in almost protective protective Place sometimes where they might be a bit stubborn about things they might not be as easy to work with on certain things so you need to have the the two leadership figures aligned cuz if they're not even a little bit all of the other people on the team see it Even if you don't think they do and they pick up on that and that that's hugely damaging I've seen it happen um in my own experience I've seen you know the problems that can come from that and

so the leadership in of itself is huge and there's um there's a thing from the the Navy Seals which is you know you know everyone is a leader and everyone can be led which is this this also this sense of of everybody having ownership on the team even if they are in a position of Not having leadership um but they're empowered to be be given the responsibility to act like leaders and and to to be trusted in that way and all these like small little things are super important and this is just leadership you know

there's there's so many different areas man it's really cool yeah I I think you'd be good at that yeah I think the big uh the biggest challenge for like you said because that Dynamic of the all the blame comes to You Etc uh between like the in-game leader and and the coach but as well as it's like I think the biggest challenge is understanding that it's it's okay to not know everything all the time even if you're in that role right but it's um learning the balance of because obviously you have to be the one

that leads and make the decision most of the time but having the the wisdom and humility to understand that sometimes you need to let somebody else make the Decision or like like you were saying the stubbornness of trying to go One Direction like sometimes like you just need to take a step back and realize okay like I need to stop going after what's sunk sunk cost fallacy right you need to then we need to look at it from a different approach we need to trust what somebody's feeling like intuitively within the team in the direction

that we should go things we should try and let them let them do it type thing I think That's probably like one of the biggest challenges that people have um because of like you said the pressure you know because it it is it also is a risk like if that fails too then you you know it's whatever but that's that's all part of competing like you have to take risks as much as I've played like to to play by the percentages you still have to take risks at times you do it's just all part of

it and it's it's it's uh it's really uh interesting too because from a um Like setting up the practice Dynamics too one of the things I think is really challenging is maybe the most challenging thing and it it was for me one of the most frustrating things is as a GM because it's kind of it's not it's not if you've hired someone to do to do the job of of let's say like doing all the practice um like basically managing all of it trying to make it optimized that's you know you're handing that that job

off to the to the head Coach that's the head coach's responsibility so if if you don't necessarily agree with all those approaches you can't just change it in the middle of the Season like we said you know you have to you have to give uh the responsibility to people and you have the chance in the offseason to iterate but if if something's been decided upon at that point you cannot change like these things for the players because it's just too much of a of a It's too much of a big change in the middle of

the season and so you know but but you already talked so much about the practice optimizing your own practice and that is so huge and this is another area where lots of teams fall behind there's lots of inefficiencies to the practice strategies and and for every team is a little bit different based on the players that you have um and I think I think that's hard to to determine as well without the experience um of of Playing yourself I think it can be very challenging to know how to do that and how to also quantify

cuz you cuz in team setting you want to be able to try to use data as much as possible so you can kind of understand what to tweak so you want almost everything that you're doing to be objective based so you can kind of measure against the objectives that you're you're looking for which can be how you quantify it so I think that would also be something that that you'd Be really good at which is which is definitely something that head coaches need to to be to be experts on how do you optimize the practice

because otherwi because I've seen so much practice time get wasted uh for so many different reasons and it's everyone feels it again all the players feel it um even if even if they're just you know the support player and they don't have they have the person with the least responsibility on the team they feel it Because people get frustrated you pick up the vibe like you don't feel good you don't feel as prepared it's like you were talking about with cooler earlier you needed to play 10 hours um to have that sense of feeling prepared

um and and so if you have teammates or team members that don't feel prepared or they feel like their practice is not good they're probably not going to play as well so that's a pretty huge element too yeah agreed and uh obviously thanks for Saying such nice things about me yeah of course of course they're trying to get you get you a job here no um but I I I do I do hope that Quake gets to gets to have a year here and it sounds like you're still in interested in competing for literally as

long as you can I guess financially make it also is is that is that is that a big part of it how financially viable it is yeah it it it definitely will be um like I said I I would hope to like uh cuz I've looked at It like I'd like to play as long as I can until I can't you know in the terms of knowing that I can compete and and and win because eventually there will come a time with age where I am not able to keep up anymore it's the same thing

with like trying to do what Tom Brady and LeBron have done is go as long as you can until you can't anymore um because yeah once that day is done then I know that my like full-on competing days will be over and I'll have to I'll Have to do something else uh so hopefully it's not forced upon me earlier than I'd like because I obviously well there's the train I talked about earlier um the um I can't really hear on my end actually okay good obviously on after the results from from this year from these

three tournaments I still have it and I still have the drive to keep going and to want to see how far I can take it um so yeah so hopefully I'm Able to keep doing that um but yeah we'll just we'll just have to see so but yeah this year will be interesting and probably won't know like fully for quite a few months I'm guessing until probably like springtime in terms of like what the full plan of the year is and uh and what I'll likely be doing are there any are there any like books

or resources like that that have had a big impact on you and your development or you just find find you know Important um I wish I could say I read more but I have not that is that's something that uh as as I like transition into coaching and stuff that I'll probably start doing is is reading more um in terms of you know just all sorts of different subjects in regards to just competition and and everything in general um and I think it'll be a good like comparing and contrasting of like my personal experience compared

to others but yeah no unfortunately I don't Have something for you uh as a recommendation at the moment okay all right well I can uh I can definitely give you some if you're if you're looking just let me know okay um right I think I think that's uh I think that's about it really I need to wrap things up here um it's been an absolute pleasure having having having you on to to chat again I think the last time was a couple years ago you're actually in this room um last time um do you have

Any any any final thoughts or shout outs anything like that you know where can people find you stuff you're doing all that kind of stuff um I mean people can find me on Twitter and and my twitch um I don't really use Instagram very much uh but uh so my twitch is what yeah twitch.tv profa and then Twitter uh is at liquid Rafa uh or X as it's called now whatever it is you know like uh but that's that's pretty much it other than that I think the only other thing I'd Like to say at

the end here um is obviously thanks to Team Liquid for all the support over the years uh and then even my time before that my time with SK I've had I feel like I've been really fortunate uh with things that I've heard sometimes from various teams across Esports that I have had such a good like uh experience with Team organizations and just running things professionally and had good relationships overall um it's it's been really really nice and I'm really thankful for it as well as you know I know that there's been this trend recently the

last like year where people are like you know what you know I want a game where it feels like it's on me that like my teammates aren't the reason that's holding me back and being stuck in Elo hell and stuff and then even the Resurgence of seeing people having interest for playing games with Movement Like Quake is there like it's still here like if you want to come play A game where you can challenge yourself and feel like like not only the need to be a bit of a masochist uh but like the feeling of

self-improvement and the fact that the results are on you and you alone like it's there for you as well as like a game that's fast and has really unique movement I know like Quake jaffan more so than let's say like Quake life provides that but it's there so if people want to play it like you're more than welcome or not just myself I try to Be as friendly and as helpful as possible but so many people within the Quake scene are more than willing to help you like if you have questions about where you should

go to like learn certain things or just in general like if you play somebody and you're getting your ass whiffed like and you ask like hey what's what's wrong with my game what's something I should work on people will usually be pretty friendly and tell you most people won't like try to put You down or keep you down like overall it's a pretty good environment to try to just play and be involved with in general so and uh and obviously Dan it's been great talking with you um we should do this more often so thanks

hell yeah that sounds amazing I love I love to hear that we'll definitely do we'll do more we'll find find an excuse to sit down again for sure thank you so much um and thank you all for listening I'll see you see you all on the next One