Post written by Jordan “n0thing” Gilbert of compLexity Gaming
First day we all arrived around noon in Katowice, after decently long journeys all around. I came from San Diego through Chicago and Germany, so that took about 17 hours. The weather is pretty cold compared to where I’m from, but it’s not snowing, so I can deal with it.
We all were pretty out of it upon arrival, so we made an effort to eat before taking a short nap. Much to our dismay, KFC and McDonalds are the only things in walking distance so we caved in and got some good ole American fast food. After testing our stomachs, we all got comfy in up in our rooms and chilled out for a bit. Normally, prior to a big event like this ($250k!), we will have a bootcamp at or near the location prior to the event. This helps us not only get acclimated to the new time zone, but also get mentally prepared and in the zone for the competing to come. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to fit one in this time due to school and scheduling conflicts, but we are going to make due!
Luckily we still feel pretty structured from the past few months, but it’s definitely not the same as a bootcamp where you spend 10+ hours a day grinding on your team play. Regardless, we are excited to be competing and representing USA, so we look to not disappoint. I think for us the most important thing is to at least make it out of group and give ourselves a chance to gain some momentum. After that, anything can happen. Right now, I’m about to head out and get some food since we’re half way through the day, but I’ll return to this post with some end of the day thoughts…
So, looks like we’re winding down the night. We just got back from a mall where we got some food and smoothies and got to check out some local shops. It’s kind of funny how from culture to culture expressions can change so much. I’ve met a lot of nice people in eastern European cultures, but before talking to them some look like they could be the villain in a movie, haha.
Now, we just got done talking a bit about our first game, which will be the French team Mystik. They are filled with top tier talent, but are a fairly new squad, so it’s up to us to maintain control and not let their sporadic plays catch us off guard. I won’t give away too much info in this post, but we have a decent idea of the maps they want to play so we are doing our best to predict what will come of our map elimination process so we can get a head start on the prep.
For some of you people out there, you may not understand how this works, but as a pro we really have come to like this method rather than the tournament pre-deciding maps. Basically the higher seed can choose to eliminate first map from the pool or eliminate 2nd and choice of the side they play on the map chosen. We will be focused on winning that first game and not really looking past it, because if you win it changes who you play next, and we also don’t know who will win yet out of LGB-eSports and NaVi.
So, that’s it for now. I’ll be writing more after our group play day!
/Gilbz out.