Why Is Everyone Playing Smolder?

you guys good I'm I'm good okay cool let me know I'm so ready how long is this podcast supposed to be just so I can mentally prepare few hours hourss I think yeah yeah I don't think it was that long all right ready yeah hey guys medos here back with another Cloud9 forecast and today we're joined by the jungle and top laner for Cloud9 what's up guys hello what's up you want to do some quick introductions uh I am the top laner for Cloud9 uh fudge cakey um yeah uh I'm blower I play jungle for Cena wow that's everything we've ever wanted to know cool um so just tell me how did you get your start with League when did you guys start playing BL you go first when I start playing I started playing in the preseason of season one and I started playing because my brother introduced me to the game um he was playing and then uh yeah I kind of just played with him that's honestly the only way I got in but I was like nine at the time so I didn't play that much I played like maybe once a month maybe at that time you remember who your first champ was yeah I was a master you went trick for three years nice it was H fun just right click do nothing so 9 years old that's early how about you fudge um I was 11 it was season 3 uh when Zach had just came out and I found out about it through a Minecraft video cuz I was like Hardcore Minecraft player and they talked about League of Legends I was like oh my god let's play League of Legends and I played with my brother and we split time and then I played I think I made like Vain and then Riven and yasa and then ye see ho ego players over here I was G Snipes of 2013 all right when did you start playing jungle when I start playing jungle um well I played jungle when I first started because I was playing Master E but um I was always someone who really liked playing like the most OP character the most OP role um and like it was just more fun to me when I felt like my character was stronger than the enemies so uh in season six jungle was really op and then uh I played jungle only in season six cuz I wanted to climb and then that was like the first season I really played one role I would say um and then I I hit Challenger from gold I think in one season not bad thank you and fudge how did you get started on Top Lane Top Lane I actually started in season 7even I was a jungl main from like season 4 till six and then play Fiora cuz Fiora looked really broken and that was the first season I hit Challenger then I just played Fior and Camille those Champs were so Op with ferva in season seven ah I missed those days good times yeah good times I actually missed the old runes yeah the old runes are fun runes are forges so whatever to me yeah I agree all right anyway how did you get started with the whole Pro thing so when I hit Challenger for the first time I made like I made like a couple uh like friends that were in Challenger um and then I kind of just kept playing and then scy grounds came along in season 7 and then uh I didn't really want to go pro my parents really also weren't like that for me going pro cuz they were like no you didn't finish High School you like you should just go to school they weren't like too sure about Esports um but then I just ended up going to scouting grounds I didn't really want to go to scouting grounds I would say but like uh just some of the other Pros or like not Pros but other challenge players that kind of convinced me that I should go and then who was it who um at the time I was talking to like Damonte def defly licorice like zil uh and they they didn't really say too much they were just like might as well try it you know and I was like sure I'll I'll try it and then um I just ended up going and I really liked really like liked it and then um yeah I was just like I want to be a pro like this is what I want to do my parents didn't really trust me going to California by myself so they sent my brother with me um and uh I was like I really like this environment and this is what I want to do so after that c i drafted me and then my parents still wanted me to finish high school so I finished high school so I didn't play after c i drafted me um and then I guess they proned me like right after I graduated cool so your brother was here with you for scouting gowns SCS yeah in 2017 okay how long was he here for a week I mean he was here just with me like we were here for a week four scouting rounds oh like you left with them too yeah yeah like we yeah we it's kind of was only like a one we event and then we just came for a week and then we we left okay yeah and Cloud9 it's the only team you've played on cloud is the only team I've played on yes since then nice damn bro about you fudge how did it all start um I had social anxiety in school so I hated school okay fair uh I dropped out when I was 15 and at that time I was 15 with season 7 when I hit Challenger and I was like I I do not want to do anything but watching Pro players that looks pretty cool I like watching Pro play and I like playing League of Legends so then I got uh fantic who is now Richard fly Quest the coach um was like one of the best players in OC at the time and he added me and we got into like a similar friend group on Discord and then eventually asked me to play for his team in Academy which he was making and then he joined mammoth in 2019 and then I played with Mammoth then moved over in 2020 got scouted by C9 uh for the Academy team and slowly built my way up to LCS in 2021 which was a stressful year for my rookie year but we made it here now we're here we out here in at Los Angeles baby nice yeah you you had one of the biggest glow-ups I remember your first LCS debut was was it like Mal fight or something I don't remember I think I was playing like some Doug champ I remember I just remember like the uh playing lul it was the luck in tournament was it Lulu I mean I wasn't like that wasn't the CH you played but like you were playing a lot of Lulu and Mal fight and like uh I was a saint those two you were playing and then uh you were also playing Aurelia and Camille and yeah I think those are the CH I remember playing camil ver someday and going down like 70 CS in the first like 15 minutes yeah I remember at the time like we were trying to trade like the Camille Jack matchup and you were just losing both sides of Camille Jack so then we had a or Camille Reon or something I don't know and then we just banned both and then we played a Rel Nar versus uh tuni no Summit it was no not not alari alari was alari and you like one9 that game I remember that one and also we had to play Lulu top it was op alari was pretty good memory yeah I don't remember that honestly V I heard you have a really good memory for League games you're like Magnus Carlson I can remember most of my games and if I watched them I probably can remember them but I don't know if I've like watched all of them you know yeah but all the ones that I've watched I'm pretty sure I can like remember pretty well Baba loves going back on old games and then flaming his teammates that aren't there anymore and saying how bad they play to my new teammates specifically to his new teammates yeah just let him know it's like as soon as you're done here I'm gonna say this about you cool um I can't really ask you guys about how Cloud9 compares to other teams because you pretty much just been here um but I can ask how has it been like you know since you started on Cloud9 cuz I know you guys both started in the amateur scene and now you're in LC s and has it been pretty similar your whole time or have you noticed any changes or you know how's that been no they got the standards obviously for like an academy player versus an LCS player is a lot different I remember an academy like they just didn't even care that much about like oh the players were late it's fine like you know whatever like workout you're slacking your workout they're like oh it's okay like I remember it was me and anori in Academy in 2020 and we'd always just like completely slack at workout and do like nothing and they wouldn't really care until I mean at some point they did but when it got really bad but like as an LCS play if you do that sort of stuff you're just like flamed permanently you just have like extremely high standard on like being really professional which makes sense MH um that's like the biggest difference from like going from Academy and then to like obviously now from when I first started you don't get to slack out I I don't get to like you know you don't have like that g you can't be a gamer DJ you know you can't be a gamer DJ when you're an LCS player you can be a gaming DJ when you're an academy player though that's F okay okay Bob I I heard you're a bit of a workout slacker at least maybe you used no no not not true I'm not a work okay I slack a little bit in workout depends on the day just it just depends and also depends specifically on what we're doing okay like sometimes I actually try pretty hard and then sometimes I really struggle like for example with rowing and biking yeah um if I go hard I literally like feel like I can't function for the rest of the day yeah so I have to like go easy otherwise I feel like I can't function during scrips that's a really good excuse I'm serious I'm serious and then H sometimes I'm just slacking yeah yeah I mean I don't believe no no not true not true I mean we're Gamers dude like wants to work out I mean apparently it's helpful though I didn't believe it but since hi joined he's been going really hard at the workouts really yeah is he like showing you guys up uh I mean he's just I don't know he's trying to like trying G points with Jack by being really good at workout you guys have played together for a while now right yeah how long's it been since you started right this is fourth year fourth year this is fourth year we played for three years and this is the start of the fourth year holy that's like one of the longest Duos probably in the LCS right now I don't know for sure but I assume so probably yeah yeah I assume it's probably the longest how's that you guys still getting along well you guys beef often we don't we don't argue too much yeah I I usually don't argue with fudge that much I usually argue with my mid laners the most yeah like since we played together for like what three years it's like every time we switch midair I always argue with the new mire it's like me versus the mid laner um not not that we don't get along or like that we don't like each other it's just that like there's not really much to argue between me and fud just like okay we failed this top dive okay do that better or it's like put this word for me here it's like you don't interact with Top Lane like nearly as much top Lane's weak and he doesn't know a about me like that's what he's saying I mean I think it's just like a personality thing I think I just like I'm more agreeable than most midlaners where like most midlaners just want to like fight for like the ego I guess a little more well you were a mid laner briefly I was but when I was a mid Lan I had like I was like low ego because I thought I was dog mid lane and also when fudge was a mider he didn't play like like wind Lane Champs you know what I mean like he played more like rise like moving not really doing yeah or like he'd play like like full scaling so you don't do anything anyways either um or or like Victor like Victor can bu Lane but like mainly like fudge when he was playing mid lane was playing to either scale or like support me like he played or something like playing like crazy kill Lanes we never play like for example or anything like this you know what I mean true the blun I won my two Le blun games my two Le BL games in LCS I won just I don't think we play least of the BL was it AP Le blun or it was AP Le BL it was AP Le BL dude that that on hit LeBlanc is so gross it's actually good top Lan as well I mean it's not gross because it's bad it's gross because it's just disgusting game like I don't know I can't focus on that Champs in the game how would you guys describe the play style for C9 and how it's evolved over the years cuz I don't know if I don't really know how I would put a finger on the team I know when I played against you guys like I think I last played 2020 you guys were always the team that was like so annoying to Jungle against cuz I felt like you're somehow you got your whole team to to just jungle it felt like I was jungling against all of C9 when you'd play as like they midlaners warding my Raptors he's invading me at Raptors he's at my wolves you know how how would you describe your style now and or maybe how it's changed over the years uh I would say when we first started like especially um before Berserker joined when Z was ad we were very heavy like jungle focused it was like we play through jungle jungle is kind of like not not the carry but like dictates the game right um the dictator yeah and like everyone everyone still is everyone everyone plays for Jungle yeah um especially because I was playing with nisi for a whole year and he like he really loves playing for jungle and also zven specifically like I would say really understands the game well outside of like his like individual play so um they really like helped me I would say like I got helped a lot in my first year um in 2020 just with all the help I got from my ball in winning Lane every game nisi playing for Jungle uh I think like back then we played a lot more and then I think once Berserker joined uh we like saw how how like dominant he was right so it's been more like play for Berserker the last two years I would say just like he he's like a hyper carry we pick around him combined with the fact that Ben when he was playing support like was a lot I would say a lot better but he was just really good at enchanters and it was also enchanter meta so it was like a lot easier for us to like just drop around Berserker I would say um and that's like kind of how it shifted more and like I don't know F just just playing the same I'm just playing the same thing for three years I don't know to tell you nothing's changed do you feel like you need a certain mindset to play Top Lane in competitive like you know pro league cuz to me it always seems like the role where it's like even in Solo it's just the tough guy role you can't go there with a weak spirit cuz you're just going to be faced with so much different kinds of that you just have to deal with like oh I'm down three levels this game my Lane's Frozen no one's coming to help me sucks bro oh I'm winning My Lan oh there's the bot Lane everyone here her I'm dead like um how's that been for you I think it sort of depends on how your team plays I think some Top Lane is the like really like Summit for example is like a very like aggressive like Berserker style player where like you play for him and if you don't play for him he's going to in yeah and there's some top laners like that he will still in even if you play for I mean occasionally but usually he would play really well yeah um and I think majority of top Lan is are like kind of the opposite where they're more so like you just play for your teammates and I think that's how you sort of just have to play Top Lane you you can't really play car style the only car style Top Lane in recent times that's like won and played well is Zeus Zeus is the only one that's like actually carried games as a top laner like not by himself but he's had the most impact on the game as a champion like consistently over multiple games and I mean he's just good I don't know what to say like there's not really many top laners like him that are able to actually carry games um uh but most top laners are just sort of like yeah we'll win One V one and then we'll use our One V one to then help our team win the game rather than like me carrying the game solo as a top it's not really a thingy yeah recent times I I've seen that transition so many times where you know you have like an upand cominging player from solo cure or whatever who plays all carries top you see a lot of example of some recent ones would be like you know sniper uh tenacity and then they get into the pro scene they're like hold up like yeah it's not working anymore MH sniper is actually doing surprisingly well yeah snip doing really well yeah so maybe he doesn't fall exactly into that but you know what I'm saying right the skill set from solo qu to Pro play is so entirely different um I don't remember I was going with that anyway moving on moving on uh what do you think about the item changes this year has this a lot of people talk about this being like you know the year with the most changes we've seen in a while do you feel that way do you agree disagree like what are your thoughts on everything uh I mean for me like I'm used to it just because like I feel like every year Riot changes jungle in some way for I wouldn't say for no reason but just they just feel like they I wonder why no reason they feel like they want to change talking two jungles now they feel like they just want to change jungle and just like make it different um either they want to change can't respawn timers the fact that crab spawns different timers or like the map or whatever um they just want to change something and I'm just used to being changed all the time so I don't really like mind I would say the changes I'm CU I'm just used to it but um I didn't like I I know a lot of people didn't like Mythic items but like for me I didn't I didn't like hate Mythic items that much like I didn't really like care I wasn't like oh no Mythic items like that's so that's so cool yeah I was just like ruining I was just like okay I mean sure uh but yeah I didn't I didn't care too much about it I think the only thing that annoyed me at first was that the mid lane like the the lane itself from the bushes was so far so it was like hurting my brain looking at midane cuz it was so far apart and I it took me time to like adjust to that the the the ganks where you try to come from like you know that path where you could show up between their turret next thing you know I'm I'm walking through their Tower take like three turret just like what the hell was that yeah yeah yeah dude I don't know what that's about that that is actually a big change I feel like most Pro players kind of like don't really care that much about the changes like a lot of like streamers and just like players in general like they play for like the enjoyment of the game but like Pro players just play to get the best as they can at the game right all we're thinking about is how to optimize it so like we're not thinking about like oh is this fun or something yeah like you try to keep your yeah it's like it do what do we do now you know like we're just trying to figure out the game um for me it's like obviously Top Lane is harder to gank um which I think for top most top laners they enjoy that like I kind of enjoy that as well it's more so like your lane focused One V one focused not as involved with like jungle is not as involved most top laners would complain about jungle um I think grubs change it quite a bit bit and also just the removal of some items like Divine sundra just kind of guts a lot of bruises I feel like G Drinker I feel like that one to me is left the biggest hole like you playing jarvin or reekon you go from being able to like get half your health back in a fight to just sun sky like oh 100 HP yeah exactly exactly yeah yeah so I guess those were probably like the item like removal and then just the bush does change the way top laners play a little bit but I feel like it's know it's still the same game I like grubs honestly as an addition I think it adds some more fun I guess in the early game um although Herold was a thing but it was a little bit later so yeah I like I like grubs a lot more than Herold mainly just because I think that being able to take Herold when plates are up is like way too op like um they were like trying to like change and stuff like I thought the mechanic where like if you get solo killed or like the jungler kills you the fact that you can lose your whole Tower in five plates to Harold just is just dumb yeah like like the whole game was just lost cuz you died one time you know mhm at least for you it's it's lost yeah yeah for sure what do you think about level one invades this is something that I have a strong opinion on but I want to hear like you know as a jungler how do you feel about it and you know fudge you can chime into if you've got an opinion like like with the new map or just overall just in general it's still relevant in the new map but like you know uh level like late invades just like I I like level one invades just because I feel like it forces you to think about it like a lot of time laners just like go AFK in their lane or like they don't want to help you know and then it really either one the jungler or two like really like let you abuse Champs like let's say Zach because like or rexi like they're really weak level one right or and then if they kill three camps they can just you know run around the map who cares they can invade level three um but it it lets you like really punish these jungles that are weak level one I would say and um I feel like if you weren't able to like invade level one then you could always just pick something weak and you know fight a level three you know like there would be no real Advantage level one for Champs like NY or Graves that that can really like punish like I don't know zenja or something you know and at level three you don't win anymore so I feel like being able to like have an opportunity to actually punish is is good for some Champions I think my one opinion on level one like especially with buff STS I feel like leashing for red side is just bad almost always now cuz if you're the weak at top laner you have to run all the way around this huge ass wall and it's so annoying to have to wall is massive the wall so massive before you could just run through Tri Bush to run into your Lane right like just up but now you have to go all the way around because they can fight you if you run through the left path and that's like you just can't leash on red side without like getting a lane disadvantage automatically now as a top laner um which kind of sucks I feel like yeah I I've that's one of those leftover things in the game that I I definitely feel like they should change like the whole dynamic between leashing for junglers and I I expect they will at some point but they just haven't gotten around to yet cuz you know earlier blabber you mentioning how like you know you're always arguing with your mid laner and that that was an interesting note because I've always felt the same way like in my entirety of playing pro league and watching pro league there's been very few midin jungl that like actually get along really well just cuz know I mean I I don't think it's the players fault I think it's just like the the friction between the roles is so engraved in the game especially stuff when you had to like you know give your blue buff to your mid all the time like hey man I'm gonna like get this thing down to one HP then yeah come over when it's convenient for you I'll just stand here taking it come get my come get my buff and XP it's just like wow man like I'm the dog uh so there's always been like that inherent friction between the roles yeah I mean I would say like for me I've always been the closest with my millionair like even though I change every year like my relationship with my mire has always been like the closest um mainly just because I feel like you spend the most time like talking to each other like you're arguing because you're talking to each other right like I'm not going to be arguing with someone I'm not talking to and it's like as long as you're arguing and it's like you're getting conclusions or like you're just you both know you're trying to like improve then like it's not actually a bad thing and the reason there's the most arguments is mainly just because you have to make the most decisions together like I just can't argue with fudge that much because we just aren't interacting in the game like that much you know I wish I could argue with them more like there's nothing for us to like disagree on that often because we just aren't interacting whereas like I feel like I've always been like playing around with my mid laner more than I play around my other laners um overall not like always but like overall I would say in the last four years I've definitely like spent more time playing with my mid laner and that's just like you just don't always agree on what's best you know because I mean I think laners don't understand jungle very well and also I could understand yeah I could also understand Lanes better I will say a lot of Jung do not understand Lane very well I mean it's totally go both ways it goes both ways dude I I could rant on that forever man like I think Lane I think jungles actually understand Lane especially competitive jungles actually understand Lane is better than L's understand jungle though yes I I agree cuz I feel like you kind of have to as a jungler whereas as a Lena you kind can kind of like just let your jungler tell you where the jungler is and just like play the lane anyway I will say like mainly adcs and midlaners have a really bad view of jungle compared to like compared to like I feel like topler supports have a much better idea of jungle than yeah cuz they have to take the L's I I think in competitive it's like top jungle and support if there's a team disadvantage it's almost always going to be their problem their burden right whereas mids you can pretty much always wave clear you're never going to get like denied that hard 80 carries like you're just the the one all the resources go to so yeah it's true I know I've had to have a lot of conversation with people about like you know laners be like dude it feels like their jungler's always here and you're never here I'm like bro you see where I am the whole time so you know I'm not there like their jungler's not there just cuz you don't see him anywhere like you got you got to understand that it's what the dungle man where's my jungle where's my jugler you got to track the jugler better you you ever have to have arguments to minutes where like you're talking about a match they're like yeah you know it's I win this match with J with jungle pressure I'm like oh it's a good 2v one lane okay oh a good 32 match up Bond gotta like um man I don't think I like have those AR but it's like sometimes matchups get like really affected by a certain jungler for example like um I would say like Oriana as a champion is someone who like really thrives with a stronger jungler because Oriana mainly wins her 1 V one so you don't actually have to do anything for her but if you win and you can just find the enemy jungler then Oriana can most of the time just win her Lane by herself right yeah um and a lot of times she's afraid of getting ganked but if you just are able to be a stronger jungler then you can probably just match for her I would say but I never like I haven't have too many arguments where it's like uh you can only win Lane if I'm sitting right behind you yeah yeah we haven't all been on C9 the whole time there is some some teams function a little different uh um what do you guys think about the you know live patch stuff going on with LCS this year do you do you like it do you think it's a good opportunity to like play new stuff or does it seem like everyone would rather just play it safe you're like I don't know if this thing's good I'm not going to risk like hardening a game over it I think there there's different aspects to it like the live patch like promotes playing new Champions and it promotes like Innovative picks but at the same time because you have the pre-planned draft and more time to talk about the game mhm so let's say I play it udia top for the first time in LCS and no one knew what it was right or like Garen or some sh in the certain matchup uh you can just play The One V one on stage right before you play it so like that aspect hurts and like level one cheeses level one invades you have so much time now to talk about these like picks that you weren't expecting in draft whereas before you would have one minute you you also have your coach to tell you things too like your coach is there so like you have this Innovative you have this Innovative aspect of we're playing on the live patch we have this new patch we're going to play the new picks and stuff the same time you play these new picks they aren't as effective because people are more prepared because you have way more time to think about it you have way more time you even have I have time to play One V ones in a match I've never played in my entire life on stage with my midlaner you can just one V one them dude wow that's actually crazy so like if you don't know a matchup you're like oh do I want like bone planing your second wind here like ex what happened what happened with Jensen playing against Insanity he Insanity locked in Zack mid and then Jensen played oron of Zack one v1s into wher right before the game so like this matchup that Jens would not have known at all he all of a sudden kind of has an idea play which kind of sucks that yeah I kind of don't like that but if you're the first game you get even more time like if you play first yeah because you have more time to warm up oh okay yeah so interes I still think that's true right like I think you have a little bit more time but it's not not that it's not that much but like I I still feel like when we play first I feel like I have way more time than when I'm playing second or third okay just because they don't R you as much you know I mean but I think that it's likely that Riot will change that that you're not going to be able to One V one on stage I I think they should personally that you shouldn't be able to One V one like your a certain matchup on stage or something like this right before the game like I feel like it just hurts like like I'm just one V oneing JoJo whenever can in every match up I get Top Lane cuz like it's just why wouldn't I you know it's the best practice I also think it's just hard for LCS because like now when I watch LCS I'm like man this is so nice then I watch EU I'm like can these games transition any faster like that's literally like what I'm thinking um so like and na viewership wasn't doing good you know so it's like any way to make people want to watch I feel like is what is D I would be down with them speeding it up even more bro like I want to just like yeah I don't know if it's was ever like this for you guys but like legit in the early days of LCS scrims had literally no review between games like you would finish a game and you would just insta go next 5 minutes and you're in the next game I absolutely loved it I BL would not love that he literally can't like get get P like if if if something happens in a game he has to like have a 20-minute argument I don't what you say I dude I've been part of I've been part of some long ass reviews too but like at some point I I I wish a team would try it it's like it's hard though right cuz you have to have like everyone agree on a schedule or what we've done it before like actually it happens a lot more international events for example like when we were screaming blg at MSI they were I I swear to God they were not reviewing yeah they weren't but it makes sense cuz we playing as us as blg but like they weren't reviewing like I I felt like they were like playing six in a row or five whatever we were doing and then just reviewing all the games after dude I think that's so I thought that would I have no confirmation I don't know what they're doing but like they we would finish the game they would get in lobby one minute later they typ R they'd be like ready like they were not reviewing at all I think that's the thing in Korea I'm pretty sure LS told me about that a lot of Korean teams doing that where they they review OFA I feel like that would make so much more sense dude if I was on a team I would be pushing for that it's like in that way I feel it it seems like a bad game doesn't feel as bad right it's like you know you're in a scrim some happens you're like I'm about to get chewed out for 30 Minutes interview about this like kind of takes you out of it a bit as a far I think it's just the depends on the mood of like like that your team environment like if your team environment is like uh let's say you have someone who's like or the the whole team environment is like you can get past like ins or like you guys are like laughing about it or like whatever like maybe that's not a good thing because you don't fix your problems but like it's makes losing games a lot easier and you can just move on whereas like if you have like a really like serious team environment or like it's like um every mistake is like the end of the world you know then like it's really hard to play back to back because people are still like you know triggered from the game before so it's not going to be easy for you to just go in next game they're going to want to like talk about it review it be like why are you inting like Focus up you know is is that ever helpful like I mean there's pros and cons there's pros and cons because like there's certain aspects of the game that you want to improve and if you don't do it in the first game the coach wants to talk to you about in the second for the second game and if you just play five games in a row and you're not thinking about the whole day the whole day is wasted I mean someone just chain like making the same mistake not working on something not thinking about something a certain aspect of whatever I think there's PR and cons of both for sure yeah definitely uh moving on a little bit what do you guys think about smolder balanced not balanced I think it's balanced but maybe I just don't understand the Leaning phase but it feels to me like the Champions weak enough in the early game until she gets her items and I don't think the burn is that op like it's strong for sure but I don't think it's like super overtuned or anything like that and I feel like it scales well enough to make up for the fact that its early game isn't super strong mhm so I think it's over pretty well balanced personally yeah okay I also think smaller's pretty balanced uh honestly I just think that balling is like very strong um in general so it's like Champs like varis for example win Lane and scale very well with on hit and smolder is just really weak early um so for smolder to get to like her point of like two a girl have I been miss Jer the whole time maybe she's a maybe it's a guy okay I don't know but either way either way I think we've had this conversation I actually don't know but for smolder to get like the 225 Stacks it really takes a while so like smaller's not strong before then like not really you know and I personally think this Essence dver build isn't that great um have you seen that wild build like shin I also don't know if that build's like good but I I like it a bit more than the D build but I just don't really know because I haven't played that much smolder I just feel like the dver build you're like you normally smike spike on ESS dver you're not really strong or anything like the only thing it helps is for you to get your Stacks faster but maybe that's like important for the champ yeah I mean of course getting Stacks f is important right but I just don't know how much faster you're getting Stacks cuz you have S TR yeah um one thing about that champ is it's all one shots waves yes they need to ruce damage to it's so long range and it's one shot a wave like that makes it you can never make a play on the opposite side of like the map if en bot Lane we can't dive but it's it's like he's ruming the whole yeah it's like R so that aspect I think they should like even the W wave clear is kind of nuts that range is insane you can RW a whole wave and if it's not canon I think every minion does yeah yeah that that is pry maybe the melee are like one HP or something yeah the melee is a low bit how's it been playing with Jojo that's uh oh God he seems he seems like a fun guy uh JoJo is he's a good teammate and he's like really accepted to feedback but he's a big scrim like uh he inant scrims a lot and um I think that's something he needs to work on but uh he he is very good and on days he doesn't like he plays well like some days he's like very good in scrims and he's like trying really hard and some days it's just like what the is happening like you know what I mean um so he's just not consistent in screens but I would say overall he's good and he's really easy to work with because he he's very receptive to feedback um and like he's he's somewhat open-minded by openmed I mean he just copies what CH plays uh that's openminded yeah that's but um he'll try new things and it's nice because uh Vega or someone who really likes like different or unique pics and uh like cooking up he likes cooking stuff and uh JoJo's been like I would say decently open to what V's had to say um not 100% but it's not it's not bad M JoJo Just Just yells and I hate it he just yells during scrims and he he SC and he screams like is this allowed is this allowed every single time the enemy team is like on his screen it's not even like the inting or anything honestly he talks like me when I was like five years younger BL and Jo are very similar though they yell permanently like I put the volume down on L as I'm not as loud as I put them both to 50% on Discord no matter what and if I put them to 100% like normal volume there there's no way I'm I'm thinking my own thoughts if people listen to my comments from like 2018 or 19 I'm just like Perma yelling I'm like screaming everything like now is like a little bit like less screaming than I used to do but it's still like I'm just a loud person yeah so that's not bad yeah it's not a bad thing yeah it it can be a very bad thing it can be a bad thing true true also it's hard to hear fudge cuz fudge is naturally like a really quiet person I talk in a normal tone no he's quiet he he has he has a quiet voice and JoJo has a really really loud voice and then I also have a loud voice so it's like hard for him sometimes I could see that yeah yeah I I agree do you guys want to get into this split a little bit sure sure yeah the the outcome is not what many of us had expected you know most people look at you guys just the super team and I I haven't lost faith like can you just say what today's dat is I don't know what the date is February 16th okay today's February 16th you guys are currently four and five we're we're in our twoe break right now MH and yeah you know results aren't what you guys probably hoped for and you know don't worry I got your back on the co- streams on the dive I'm I'm copium defending you guys than you but let's hear from from your perspective you know what what hasn't gone right what's what problems have you grown into you know just just let me hear your thoughts um so actually at the beginning we were actually doing really poorly in scrims not really poorly but like we were so when we first started playing we were winning and then after like week one we just started like losing like in scrims like after we went two Z like even the week where we went 1-1 um that week we didn't do very well in scrims and we actually hadn't been for like two weeks but recently we've been actually doing really well um comparatively at least to before and um I feel like our team play wasn't very good we were kind of just winning with like individual skill I guess I would say at the beginning and then a lot of a lot of the teams kind of just leveled up and they were playing well together and we were honestly not playing well together and also individually we we just weren't playing that insane either and I felt like we at least compared to the competition got worse over like like week two and three and um I felt like last week even though we went one in one and this week like I felt like we improving a lot as a team and we're starting to win so it feels good but yeah I I don't think we were actually like playing very well I agree with that completely I think like the first two weeks where we won are like went 3-1 right I think those were like our worst scrims uh so like to me I didn't even feel like we to me I felt like the past week for example where we went one like like blabber said I feel like our scrims way better our practice is way better our gaml is actually way better and obviously like there's certain games where you like mistakes happen yeah but overall like over the sample siid of whatever how many scrim games we played uh I felt like we're just way more cohesive and we actually play well better together we aren't really good don't get me wrong but it's way better than the first couple weeks but there was a couple games where draft was dog I'm not going to lie to you well okay they weren't dog but the condition we had to win the game relied on us playing extremely well in my opinion and we are not extremely good to be honest so yeah there were like we could have won a lot of those drafts for sure for sure but we also could have not been in that situation so it was like both you know like I don't really like blaming draft immediately after the game because it's like it's like you can win with anything like when we SC against like T1 Ori we can't win with anything so it's like you can win with any draft given to you as long as the draft is not like like literal grief right yeah um so I feel like you should always look at those games and be like we could have done this better and then afterwards you can be like so uh this draft guys you know was this the best pick yeah I mean I think a lot of the games were're playing like Lucian milio and stuff like this those I think two or three games so the the drafts that stood out to me as being pretty hard to play was like the V mid game uh you know obviously it wasn't vay's fault that the game was lost but there were some situations where I see vins pushing a sid Lane and it's like 30 seconds per wave he's like snails pace uh pushing the Lilia game too I think our draft was oh that that Lilia game was the worst draft it was Nar Lilia versus was like Nar Lilia Lu Milo or some yeah yeah there were two Lucian games there support went like first out of miches and I was just like can't do anything I I still could I played that game like trash honestly like we still could have played it better but yeah even then I mean it's always going to be that we could have played it better we could have won but the reality is is like we're not that much better than our opponents we aren't even better necessarily um and we're playing drafts that require us to get ahead and play without making mistakes and um a lot of the Lucian drafts we were playing Lucian versus a tank top Lane and tank top Lanes right now are pretty good because there's no like tank killers that are that good like Fiora for example Camille used to be quite good into tanks there's not really like those sort of like damaged top laners recently it's starting to become a little bit more like that with new meta but um they were playing into Cante or udio I think it was into fly and TL and we're playing Lucian Milo and like that wasn't necessarily the only the reason we lost the game but it's like we're put we're putting a timer on our heads because the enemy ADC is going to kill our front line we are not going to kill this enemy top laner and he's just going to farm because the Champions are broken and they can't lose Lane and he going to become unkillable and those sort of drops I really didn't feel like we were good enough to play but at the same time like you have to be sort of good enough to play like those drafts to be able to like at least play internationally like you have to play you have to play Drops that require like volatility and stuff like that but I I I just didn't think we were good enough at that time to even play it was also like hard for us to like really understand because like we thought it was good at the time I would say and it's like how can I take a conclusion that like I feel like it's unfair on the the draft itself when your Ballin gets like 2v2 kills four times right and then it's like this draft is bad like how like you know what I mean like for sure you can look at the draft and like it could be better and conceptually but it's like you didn't even really play the draft yeah even know you know 100% and a huge part of it too is like the the fans and whatever they don't see your scrims and most most of the games you play as a pro team are scrims right like you'll play what is it 25ish scrims a week and then you go out two stage games yeah exactly so it's a you know vast minority of the games that actually people see it's also like not that important in my opinion to have like the best best draft but more so like what's been working for you in practice yeah and like Lucian Milo was working for us in practice that week so we were like we should just play it on stage you know um and not much was working for us that we could practice so so like it's like um of course you want to like say you should do the most optimal draft or whatever like people might think it's most optimal draft but like if you're not winning with something that's more aable than like I guess like Comfort or like what you think is good it's like is it better to play that I mean maybe I mean it's just hard you know I mean it's it's always trying to like you know uh how do you separate like the scrim picks from the stage picks and whatnot yeah all all that um I guess my next question would be has it felt like there's a aoid from not having svent on the team because he's been on the team for a long time you know he played 80 carry he played support I know You' said he's got like a a lot of knowledge about the game I assume he was like a shot caller in the game so has it been harder to play without him or do you think um this split's not really related uh I would say the split's not really related okay um I do think like zven is someone like he actually elevates his teammates for sure um and he's also someone who like he calls out like a lot of like bull plays slash like or like just Bullit excuses too like if you're like inting like super hard and you're just trying to make excuses for our inting like he just doesn't let the slide he's like very um he just makes sure like the team's going the right direction I would say but honestly Phil is like kind of like that too a Vulcan um they're kind of both like that uh but I would say like the split is just yeah like we just haven't been playing that good um like even individually not not even like a as a team team but as a team obviously you can we can play better right but individually I think we just haven't been having like that good of a split and um yeah I mean I've never won without zven uh but I've also like played with him pretty much every SPL right yeah yeah for sure um this next one's actually for you blabber there was a quote back in 2020 where you said you don't like being considered a coin flip player because you know that was kind of your reputation um I I don't think it was super deserved but you know it was and then you're saying you know you want to focus on being more consistent and from the outside you know it does seem like your play style has shifted a little bit into being more risk averse like you know prioritizing uh like getting XP advantages on people like farming really efficiently playing Super efficiently uh is that something that you've done actively do you think it's just like the way the game has changed um you have any thoughts on that um I mean I would say like I still take a lot of the same like not the same but like I would say I just take more calculator risk um I will say like those two weeks where like where we were going 03 and I think 111 like I was I felt like I was playing really passive and that was like uncharacteristically passive I would say uh for myself and I just felt like those were just bad weeks um but I think like naturally I just I've been I got better at understanding what's a good like Risk and what's a bad risk and um I would say like before I inted like way more like for just stupid reasons um I maybe I would have found more angles but I I had more like stupid inss like for example flashing for crab uh in 21 had to yeah I had to do that you know um but I think like overall I I'm not like trying to not look for angles or like be aggressive or whatever like people may think it's just like I'm I've always just been doing what I think is best yeah and what I think is best might change over the years you know um but for me like I'm always just like it really just comes down to do I think this is the best thing I can do or is this the best play I can make and regardless of it's bad or not like that's just what I think and um playing more like changes your perspective I would say on the game and uh yeah I don't think like for me anything's changed I just I still have the same mindset just do what I think is best and it's good sometimes that that changes you know I think blab from playing with him I feel like blab is a lot more aware of like how to win the game and what a win condition is in the game and he's not going for like the plays that like he might see an angle but he doesn't go for it because he doesn't feel like he needs to anymore that's to win the game yeah uh whereas before like maybe he'd go for like a Le in Kick when he doesn't need to engage right and E either we would onot the ADC and it would look like a huge Montage play uh like back then or whatever or he would in and lose the team fight because he's trying to kick when he doesn't need to I think nowadays blab is a lot more like he said calculated and he actually understands like why what we need to win the game um which I think is way better personally um and obviously it just makes it look like when we're losing the game it makes it look like he's not doing anything as much as he used to but when we're winning the game it's it just looks like it's a steady free win because there's not as much coin flip yeah you know I meis fair that that aren't required to win the game that's how I feel at least mhm makes sense you know when you watch like geni T1 play that like their games are pretty controlled for the most part they're not just going for like super random allins for no reason I mean I think it's just like it just depends on the character I'm playing too it's like when you're losing like I think it's not a bad thing to like in not not in but like yeah m going Lally team a lesson when you're losing right like like it's not bad to look for the creative angles to get back iname because the game is like at that point lost right like obviously if you're on 2K gold like the game's not in my opinion like like losing that hard you know but like if you're not like 10k gold or like 7K gold it's like you're going to lose this game do none of your gangster actually going to result in a kill like they have Vision everywhere you can't form your cams at that point it's like like your oppon like unless your opponents give you the game like we did for thieves then like you have to do something creative and in those situations I think it's it's still like good to do something and maybe it looks like you in and sometimes you're playing like V and you go zero10 but it's like that's what she does as well you know like otherwise you're just going to lose to do nothing yeah 100% what are some of the difficulties you guys face as Pro players like you know just daily life what have you what are some things that the fans might not expect to be a challenge for a pro player well at least for me I don't really have a lot of time alone uh cuz I'm just with my team all day MH and I feel like it kind of you kind of like not used to like just being alone anymore and like at night I'm just like in my own head and I'm like oh I'm actually I'm actually alone for once you know and it's it's kind of different I feel like as in our in our team environment especially this split we're working on like we have like a thing where we're trying to stay later till like 9:00 p.m. or like like we wake up at 9:00 we work out at 9:00 we usually leave around 9:00 or 9:30 um most of the players and you can individually practice in your own room if you want to but like it feels like you don't I don't really have as much time Al loone and I feel like I low key liked that time alone time after scrims um to like just be in my own head um without distraction and don't really have that that much to be honest with you yeah makes sense you know yeah uh I would just say it's like it's hard to have like relationships outside of like your team uh when you're like 18 19 20 21 like that's when you hang out with like your friends the most I would say uh cuz you're not really working or anything but like you spend all the time all your time playing you know even in your offseason you're playing and then it's like on your off day you feel the need to play like especially now like we're losing right so like I feel the need to to play even more like I'm a bit older now so like um I don't I wouldn't I play as much as I did when I was 18 but I still like play a lot right and um over the years it's like you just spend so much time playing you don't like interact with I guess your friends and stuff outside of the game like that that much yeah yeah I mean a lot of sacrifices for sure yeah what sort of stuff do you guys do for fun outside of League I know there's not a lot of time for it but you got any like things you like to go out and do any other games you like playing how do you unwind well we actually played pickle bow as a team that was fun we did that a couple days ago that was actually really fun that was fun um go on Disco with my friends and post while I play armm that's also pretty fun true love some armm sometimes I talk to my friends on Monday that's our day off um but usually I like Monday recently at least the last like couple Mondays I've been playing 12 games of Solo or 10 10 12 games of solo on my Monday so uh yeah I don't I don't I don't right now I don't do anything for no fun no fun no fun mother my my my off day is like actually pretty simple it's like I sleep way more cuz I'm depressed cuz we just got other weekend so I don't wake up until like I'm awake but like I'm like you know you're awake but you're not actually awake you don't want to get out of bed and then it's like it's like 12 and then you're like okay I need to like stop being subhuman like my season's still going on MH and then you play like for me I play like 10 games of solo Que in a row and then I go on Discord I talk to my friends for a little bit and I go to bed that's the life baby I mean that that those are the tradeoffs that's the price you pay yeah you still play chess uh I do sometimes in Champion Select drop play sometimes no I don't play in champ select but I'll play like in between like review and the next game yeah yeah that's that's fair yes I used to play SL SP during that g we we we have this thing now where like we need to focus in champ select but my teammates not fudge actually but actually not either so the other two do not focus a at all like to be instituting a new instituting no I don't know introducing introducing a new thing where we need to focus very hard in our scrim TRS so we'll be doing that that's good that's crazy we're focusing during practice that that's actually a good idea no like this is like Korea is a little bit better than we should focus and practice that's good all right uh getting toward the end here this one's just a generic question for each of you what does success mean to you um I mean success for me is just seriously honestly like it just depends on how I feel like like it's and and what I want like like if I feel good I don't know I feel successful uh but but um and if I feel good I feel like I feel bad I feel like I failed I don't know uh but also maybe you feel like you failed so you feel bad feel like you succeeded so you feel good yeah I don't know but um for me like it's been my goal for a while now to having like Steps it's like win LCS and then du all internationally those are like two steps but like for me I've always wanted to like have a really good showing internationally for like not just for myself but like also for na like I really hate that like and they was always like on you know and MD on and like I was actually really happy that energy like won you know and got top eight like I feel like that was really good for us yeah um and I really just want like to to prove that like we can compete internationally and um to do that I need to make the International Tournament so my first goal is always to you know win LCS and then um after that I I just want to have like a good performance as a team like internationally and I feel like if I show like a good performance internationally with my team like then I I don't know I feel like we succeeded and if I don't I'm just reaching for that again the next year and until I yeah feel like that that I've achieved that yeah totally makes sense solid goal for me I mean I've played like dog the past international events so my main thing like I feel like in 2021 during MSI maybe not so much worlds but MSI I felt like I played decently well um internationally and then I felt like ever since maybe 2021 world I just been playing really bad at every International Event and I feel like I just want to feel like I played well I feel like I'm at a good level where I'm not just like going into the game loading into the game feeling like I'm going to lose against every top laner that's in like that's Asian internationally you know yeah I mean it's way harder do you think your performance comes down to like is it just there's so much better than you're used to that you feel like you're in totally uncharted waters do you think it's a mental thing you know there pressure a lot of it is mental I think I think I play way worse against players that I think are better than me okay just because it's like you're just playing scared like I'm just making decisions that I wouldn't against the against against fake God I'm making just the same Lane the same situation they're playing better don't get me wrong but like I'm making a way worse decision based off the name plate I'm very certain of it I've noticed it cuz um MSI lost year I was playing in best of five against I think it was gen G uh and it was the lost game and I was playing that was when like uh we lost the first two games and I was playing like absolute dog the entire series you solo back and then the third game I stopped like giving a if I'm going to like int and like I was just like I've alreadying inted I've already been playing like like I might as well just go and like play and make decisions without being scared about anything and then I played my best that game than I did in any of like the other MSI games in my opinion I ENT that whole series um and when I was a rookie I also feel like I played better because I wasn't scared about inting because everyone already expected me to int because I was the rookie yeah so I wasn't scared like oh if I int people are going to Flame me like obviously people are going to Flame me cuz I'm already expected to people aren't even going to Flame me they're going to be like oh he's a rookie yeah so like this the the expectation I feel like and the expectation of myself and like what's going to happen if I play bad kind of thing I feel like it's been making me play a lot worse internationally and that's what I feel like I need to work on the most like mentally um to help me like actually play better against International opponent yeah dude you saying that reminds me I remember I think it was like 2014 when I was at Worlds um this was like the early days of like Len kick flashing so I got like a kick flash at one point and I remember approaching it with that same mindset you had I was like damn like it seems like we're going to lose this like I want to at least make a cool play before we go out and then that was sort of the mindset leading up to it so if somehow you can like get in that mindset of just like not giving a before you start playing you know it's like I don't care what the result is I'm just going to go out there and like put on a show like I'm just going going to show my best kind of deal like maybe that's what we need much easier said than don't of course of course but but I agree with you on that mindset got some fan questions for both of you guys lovely got to sit up for this one first one can fudge bench a black blabber easily definitely not that's not I don't know how much blabber is like fans don't know how much I weigh but I weigh like 100 lb really yeah I could blch a bad I think yeah I think most people fudge side could bench me I would honestly be confident saying 95% of people fudge SES can bench me can you bench a fudge I can't even bench myself okay that's totally okay can you bench a 2021 One Fudge oh man that's good um next question who's the most normal on the team normal like oh I guess it's a little bit open for interpretation but I would take it as like you know if you're going out somewhere talking to non- Gamers who's going to be I would say fudge or Vulcan yeah for sure yeah okay yeah yeah I think Phil I think Vulcan for sure he he actually like has interest too us like he actually reads s which is weird and he like has Faker re did you guys see that list Faker put out of like his oh he put He put out like a book list reading I need start reading he plays he has interest like soccer he really likes playing soccer yeah um plays chess too like like me um but yeah he actually has like a lot of interest outside of League I would say um and he's still super focused like he still plays a lot so yeah he's a very he's a very normal dude what a normal dude uh next one if you had to switch lanes permanently who would be better SL Mains oh I guess like which one of you would be better at a permanent Lane Swap and what would you play I think I played mid lane yeah yeah you kind of done I think fudge would be better at Lane swap because um unless he was forced to Lan SW to Jungle oh yeah that the thing is like I think jungle is too different like he already has Lane experience so it's a lot easier for him to like go from his Lane to like let's say mid lane and just like still know the basic concept of like actual laning like I understand like how Lanes will work and how push but I don't know like the int intricacies of like actually laning as well as like a laner you know D I feel like the early game Lane is the hardest part cuz like I've been on an offr Quest myself and like I I swear if you put me into a game at like level six when I'm not behind I'll do fine but like that early game is so punishing if you don't know what you're doing it's like oops I'm like completely out of the game spell Wast the spell like sometimes I think I'm good at leaning because I'll play solo qu right and my opponent will be like he'll be challenger but he'll be really boosted like he's in challeng but he's really boosted right and like because I'm good at the game if the PO person is bad at like laning then I will be better than in the game you know what I mean because like I'll actually know the mechanics of my character and I only play a call league so I I I know the mechanics of my character pretty well and then also um I just understand the game probably better than the random Sol person so I'll be like wow I'm so good at mid lane but that's just cuz they're so bad at laning and then when I Lane versus like an actual person who knows a lane I feel like I'm just down 40 50 CS I don't know what I'm doing yeah dude there's nothing worse than off rolling and seeing like you're up against an LCS player like a one trick you're just like well this is going to be Rose uh so you you would man a coli then uh I would if I swap Rose I would probably play mid lane yes okay I would also likely play mid lane I mean if I if I swwa rolls I'm not sure if I will though all right the last fan question we have what are your pet peeves about each other we've already heard blabber can be loud anything else any any beef you want to air out pet peeves honestly fudge doesn't do anything that this that annoying I'm just a I'm just I'm just out of everyone's way you know I'm just the top plan I don't know what to say I I don't do anything to yo I got a TP you guys need me ready yeah BL BL yeah I'm very loud sometimes I'm stubborn like it's not even it's not even I don't even give a stubborn it's just like sometimes like blab is just yelling like it's not even in-game it's like in review and like just like when he's talking about we're watching a league game on like the on the screen he just starts yelling and yelling and yelling and I just don't like yelling I don't know what to say it's just a love passionate about the game passionate guy about that play with yeah oh that gragas sucks Gras com dude you going to bring back the Gras your Gras so sick dude I would love to the gra but it's not good right now yeah I tried it actually rest in peace all right well uh I think that that's it for our fan questions you guys have been great guests thank you for joining me amazing host thank you um be sure to go to the Cloud9 store and get a C9 Jersey get my I got a I got a jacket right now you can get this one too I get my get my jersey specifically thank you yep get a fudge Jersey I had to sign a fudge Jersey today for riot Australia Riot Australia yeah nice they wanted a fudge Jersey cuz he's Australian specific kind of makes sense that makes quite a bit of sense I have not seen how the other ones have turned out this one you got to have to move for B let's go move your mic maybe perhaps ready three is it on yeah three two one I hope it works I hope it works too yeah me oh it's looking good right now thanks guys for watching this What's this called a free cast4 okay okay thanks guys for tuning in and watching this Cloud9 forecast I hope you guys uh enjoyed it and make sure to like subscribe and comment down below what you guys want to see next if you have any questions make sure to leave them down below and we will make sure or we'll try to answer them next time try my best H yeah hell yeah hell yeah did it course wo

Channel: Cloud9 League of Legends

Views: 29,831

Keywords: Cloud9, Cloud 9, C9, League of Legends, LCS, League Championship Series, lolesports, Esports, Gaming, c9 lol, cloud 9 league of legends, c9 league of legends, fudge, blaber, jojo, jojopyun, meteos, smolder, lcs, live patch, lcs podcast, the dive, lcs pro, esports pro, league of legends pro

Id: 0XAA450ZhDM

Length: 64min 58sec (3898 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 01 2024