You use Battle Hunger and I help you with my birds.
I'm not joking, it's impossible to counter.
Do you like Singapore? The conditions, the hotel, the food.
It's hard to tell whether I like it here or not as we just arrived and haven't stepped out of the hotel yet,
and besides, it's rainy season here now.
It's raining a bit outside.
We've gone out only a couple of times and haven't really been able to see anything yet.
We've checked the Ferris wheel close to here, and the embankment. Maybe we'll have an opportunity to walk around the city in the next days.
Regarding the cuisine, there is a lot of seafood, which we lack back home, so yeah, I'm enjoying it.
I haven't been to that many tournaments like this one - I like everything.
The food is good, the hotel is nice, so is our schedule - everything is great.
Summing up 2019, how has it been for you? What were the highlights and biggest regrets of the year?
I've grown up, matured and become wiser.
The highlight was qualifying for the International, which had been a long dream of mine.
Unfortunately, we flopped there.
Obviously, the highlight was qualifying for the International and competing there.
As well as the China bootcamp prior and the event itself.
Another one is passing the qualifier for the DreamHack Major, which I believe is a great ending to the year.
And maybe we can top it off with a good showing here in Singapore.
That would boost our team's confidence going into the upcoming Major.
Do you want me to streak?
Of course, Parasite is playing Disruptor.
Can you defeat Naix single-handedly?
Make a heart sign.
I don't know how to do that. Like this?
Don't you know the Koreans do a finger heart like that?
The best part about esports is the free stuff.
Zayac, do you want to fill in for me so I can go and play?
What's your impression of the new player? How's he doing at this tournament and has he fully integrated into the team?
My first impression is really positive.
Illias is exactly the way I pictured him online - calm, restrained and cheerful.
You can tell he is still a bit shy due to his age and lack of experience, but the team is trying to support him.
He and I are sharing a room.
But since it's only been two days, it's hard to tell.
The only thing is that I expected Illias to be shorter.
Given that he's 17 and looking at his picture, I thought he'd be a midget like Vlad, but he's really tall.
He's been doing pretty well so far and I didn't see him being nervous or something in the group stage matches.
So yeah, he's doing great for his first major LAN tournament.
Illias is replicating his online form and doing just as well as at the qualifiers.
He's a great player and an amazing addition to our team.
Good job!
Pasha did wonders with Pango.
I said I'd destroy them.
So far you've had two opposite results: 2-0 against LGD and 0-2 versus Gambit. What's the reason?
It was a bit easier to play LGD as we confidently took the series 2-0,
whereas the Gambit game was pretty challenging, though we did have a chance to win.
Game 1 was way harder than the second one because the main issue was the laning stage.
Yes, we made a comeback at one point but were unable to convert that momentum.
In Game 2, our lanes looked stronger, but... how do I put it... we underperformed and were extremely unlucky in some situations.
Especially in the top lane with Veno and Treant where the opponent denied two of our kills and we gave away the First Blood with Pasha dying to the tower.
That moment had an impact on our game as we were supposed to gain an upper hand in the laning phase.
We started to get our items and making a comeback as the game progressed and had a chance to turn it around, but we didn't capitalize on that.
Gambit were definitely the better team in that series. Props to them.
Objectively, outside of that fight that enabled a comeback, we were in a really bad spot.
I think when we killed them at Roshan, we pretty much won the game.
Yes, we made a comeback at that point.
But then the Satanic out of nowhere, and we all died somehow.
Disruptor was dead even before the fight and did nothing.
How has Zayac's experience as a captain been so far?
He struggled a bit at first - and clearly, it was unavoidable - but we've dealt with it together.
Though he's not the only one calling the shots - Pasha shares this responsibility with Zayac.
Besides, the rest of us have started calling more throughout the game, so I think it's good.
Has the new patch affected pro teams' level of play?
It's hard to tell at this point because we've only played the Major qualifiers so far,
and teams had only 3-4 days to figure the patch out, so it's okay if some of the top tier ones didn't do it better than the others.
We'll be able to make conclusions regarding how much it affected the scene based on the results of the upcoming tournaments:
this one in Singapore and the next Major that'll be held in January and will indicate what teams benefited the most from the new patch.
Speaking of our team, I think it's a good patch for us.
The main thing is to be able to adapt and I think we've figured out the new patch pretty quickly.
How did the new patch affect your laning or nothing changed?
Nothing really changed - mid lane is pretty much the same.
As for the hero pool, I've been working on expanding it and I also like the fact that some of the heroes are now viable again.
Overall, I like this patch as it fits my playstyle.
Have the recent changes affected your work?
The main goal after the roster change was the role reassignment and I think we did a good job here.
I'm still in charge of the drafting aspect along with a lot of other things I've been doing before.
When it comes to drafting and preparing for an opponent, I mostly bounce ideas off Zayac now.
You asked about Phoenix in the early game, of course it makes sense. Did you get the book?
He was 2k short of buying Shiva, I let him farm, then top lane he had 1k left, he farmed everything.
And the caption, "Last pick Puck."
- Last pick Puck? - The idea was cool.
Have you played the new heroes? What do you make of them?
No, I haven't played a single game with either.
I can't really say anything about Snapfire, but it's a good hero in the right hands. As for Void Spirit, he's broken now.
You're facing EG, Liquid, and VG tomorrow. Which team do you fear the most, if there's one, and why?
We played LGD and with the way things are now in Dota, it doesn't matter who you're going up against as long as you play your game.
So I don't care who to play - EG, Vici, Gambit, or any other team.